- Jun 21, 2010
- 134
- 0
Comments appreciated on this. Fastballs slowed down to show technique.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96Pwg4bf56Y
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96Pwg4bf56Y
14 yo pitcher - video
- Thread starter ElmoBlatch
- Start date
Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch
Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.
FiveFrameSwing
Banned
Overall she looks pretty good. She turns her drive foot/leg outward as she starts her motion, that will limit her ability to push off and drive out at the hitter.
- Jul 26, 2010
- 3,553
- 0
She has good flex and whip in the arm, but she is bowling a bit with palm down on the backswing, then tilting towards third a bit to get some IR. If she focused on pulling the ball down and leading with the elbow the whole way, she would have even more whip. Are you sure this is a fastball? There is no follow through to speak of, and she appears to be trying to guide the ball to the catcher. The poor arm motion may be a product of the bigger issues with footwork.
That said, there are some significant problems at the beginning with her footwork that causes a cascade of issues:
- Her presentation is not square. Her right foot is already at a 45 degree angle from the catcher, which causes her whole body to stand at an angle. This is where the big problems begin. She should stand square to the catcher, both feet facing the catcher, with her intent to move every part of her body straight towards the catcher.
- She rotates her foot, and her entire right leg towards third base before she even pitches. This forces a great deal of energy towards third base that she has to compensate for later (wasting even more energy). She needs to concentrate on exploding straight towards the catcher. Her right foot and right toes face the catcher and she begins in a sprinter start. The ball hand, glove hand, and stride leg all need to explode towards the catcher in her initial step. Practice sprinter starts and exploding with all limbs to the catcher to work on this.
- As a result of a good portion of her energy going towards third, her glove hand has no choice but to fly out towards first base to compensate. Fix the first two issues and this will largely correct itself
- Her glove hand has to fly out to compensate for her crooked start, but this is not enough, so her buttocks must also fly out towards first, which cause her entire stride to be well to the 1B side of the power line. Her body is essentially going every way but the way it needs to go. Fix issues 1 and 2, and then put a powerline down so she can relearn where she needs to stride, and this should correct itself.
- Her weight needs to be back more, she's bending at the waist, but because her entire body is off kilter from the issues above, I would not address this until the other issues are resolved, this may resolve on its own
- Her stride leg seems a bit soft when it lands, but that's hard to tell with the sweatpants. It seems she's absorbing a good deal of power in the land rather then transferring it to arm momentum. Again, however, you cannot work on this until the other issues are addressed.
It seems to me that this pitcher probably had an issue with getting open at one point, and was pitching around her hip. Instead of being taught the correct ways to address this, she adjusted her motion from the beginning to "move" her body out of the way of the pitch, and this caused the cascade of issues mentioned above.
Puberty is a critical time for pitchers, and is the most important time that they need a quality pitching coach who not only understands how to pitch correctly but understands how the female body is changing and the correct mechanics to teach during these changes. It looks like she either tried really hard to fix this on her own or had a PC who had no idea what she was going through.
-W
That said, there are some significant problems at the beginning with her footwork that causes a cascade of issues:
- Her presentation is not square. Her right foot is already at a 45 degree angle from the catcher, which causes her whole body to stand at an angle. This is where the big problems begin. She should stand square to the catcher, both feet facing the catcher, with her intent to move every part of her body straight towards the catcher.
- She rotates her foot, and her entire right leg towards third base before she even pitches. This forces a great deal of energy towards third base that she has to compensate for later (wasting even more energy). She needs to concentrate on exploding straight towards the catcher. Her right foot and right toes face the catcher and she begins in a sprinter start. The ball hand, glove hand, and stride leg all need to explode towards the catcher in her initial step. Practice sprinter starts and exploding with all limbs to the catcher to work on this.
- As a result of a good portion of her energy going towards third, her glove hand has no choice but to fly out towards first base to compensate. Fix the first two issues and this will largely correct itself
- Her glove hand has to fly out to compensate for her crooked start, but this is not enough, so her buttocks must also fly out towards first, which cause her entire stride to be well to the 1B side of the power line. Her body is essentially going every way but the way it needs to go. Fix issues 1 and 2, and then put a powerline down so she can relearn where she needs to stride, and this should correct itself.
- Her weight needs to be back more, she's bending at the waist, but because her entire body is off kilter from the issues above, I would not address this until the other issues are resolved, this may resolve on its own
- Her stride leg seems a bit soft when it lands, but that's hard to tell with the sweatpants. It seems she's absorbing a good deal of power in the land rather then transferring it to arm momentum. Again, however, you cannot work on this until the other issues are addressed.
It seems to me that this pitcher probably had an issue with getting open at one point, and was pitching around her hip. Instead of being taught the correct ways to address this, she adjusted her motion from the beginning to "move" her body out of the way of the pitch, and this caused the cascade of issues mentioned above.
Puberty is a critical time for pitchers, and is the most important time that they need a quality pitching coach who not only understands how to pitch correctly but understands how the female body is changing and the correct mechanics to teach during these changes. It looks like she either tried really hard to fix this on her own or had a PC who had no idea what she was going through.
-W
- Jun 21, 2010
- 134
- 0
Thanks for the feedback. There are some great observations here.
When she has lessons, she uses an indoor mat with a power line. This has been something she has been focusing on. This was a side session with no mat available so it seems like she went back to some bad habits with no line to guide her. That being said, the camera angle is not from straight on so the distance from the power line looks a little worse than it really is. I'm not saying this isn't an issue though.
We will work on having a more efficient motion, moving towards the target at all times.
When she has lessons, she uses an indoor mat with a power line. This has been something she has been focusing on. This was a side session with no mat available so it seems like she went back to some bad habits with no line to guide her. That being said, the camera angle is not from straight on so the distance from the power line looks a little worse than it really is. I'm not saying this isn't an issue though.
We will work on having a more efficient motion, moving towards the target at all times.
- Jun 21, 2010
- 134
- 0
Here's another video from that session. It shows the fastball and changeup side by side. She's been working on having the same motion for all pitches.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMSOPkVg0s4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMSOPkVg0s4
Last edited:
