Pitching Speed

[Amy in AZ.]

Be aware of the pitching coaches that lie to the girls and parents, too. I see them pitch in a game and I am wondering "What in the world?"

 

[Jojo]

Forgive me if I've told this story before. A few years ago someone I knew was telling me about a pitcher on another travel team. He was saying he'd heard from some of the parents of girls on her team that she was throwing 60+ mph.

That's interesting, I said. I'm her pitching coach, and I have her around 55 mph on my Jugs gun. Amazing how the legends grow.

Funny!
I just had an 8yr old go try out for a 10U team, they were telling me all the wonderful things the coach said about my student, how she had the best mechanics of any 8yr old he had ever seen, she could also benefit from the teams pitching coaches because their 10u's throw in the mid 50's.

I knew the coach was full of bunk, not because he said all his 10u's threw in mid 50's but because he said my 8yr old had great mechanics!

 

[jazz10NE]

I would like to know if there is a way to determine a girls pitching speed without a radar gun?

I watched a pitching coach set up a station yesterday.

Girl is at 40ft to plate
He strung a rope across the front of the plate about 4ft off the ground
about 8-10ft behind the plate on the wall tarp were 2 horizontal lines.
One about 6 inches up from the ground
One about 18 inches up from the ground

The pitcher had to keep the ball under the rope
If she hit the wall near the bottom stripe he said it's about 40mph
If she hit the wall at the top line it was about 48 mph.

I don't know the exact measurements or how exact this process would be but with some trial and error/experience I do see how it could give you an option.

 

[FPMark]

I watched a pitching coach set up a station yesterday.

Girl is at 40ft to plate
He strung a rope across the front of the plate about 4ft off the ground
about 8-10ft behind the plate on the wall tarp were 2 horizontal lines.
One about 6 inches up from the ground
One about 18 inches up from the ground

The pitcher had to keep the ball under the rope
If she hit the wall near the bottom stripe he said it's about 40mph
If she hit the wall at the top line it was about 48 mph.

I don't know the exact measurements or how exact this process would be but with some trial and error/experience I do see how it could give you an option.

If it bounces before it gets to the rope... would that be zero?

 

[joemcq51]

So I tried to gauge my DD's speed with the calculator method last night. Definitely a lot of user error. After I figured the best way to stop watch her was to actually catch the pitch with one hand and hold stop watch in other, I got more consistent readings. Here is some of the math we used and the results.
We pitched from 43' with my glove being held right at the point of the plate. I then measured her stride and made a mark at her approx release point. That was 4'. So for the experiment we used 39' as the distance traveled. She consistently was between .55 and .59 in the times. After calculating the resluts I get speeds between 45 and 48 mph. Pretty consistent to what she actually was clocked on a gun. It was neat to discuss with her the difference in speeds and how just getting 1/10 of a sec quicker to the plate effected the speed results. I was also able to explain that imagine adding 12 inches of stride with no more velocity and how that would effect the results. To me, this worked so much better than just pointing a radar and reading a number. I will definitely use the drill again.

 

[Mrek]

So I tried to gauge my DD's speed with the calculator method last night. Definitely a lot of user error. After I figured the best way to stop watch her was to actually catch the pitch with one hand and hold stop watch in other, I got more consistent readings. Here is some of the math we used and the results.
We pitched from 43' with my glove being held right at the point of the plate. I then measured her stride and made a mark at her approx release point. That was 4'. So for the experiment we used 39' as the distance traveled. She consistently was between .55 and .59 in the times. After calculating the resluts I get speeds between 45 and 48 mph. Pretty consistent to what she actually was clocked on a gun. It was neat to discuss with her the difference in speeds and how just getting 1/10 of a sec quicker to the plate effected the speed results. I was also able to explain that imagine adding 12 inches of stride with no more velocity and how that would effect the results. To me, this worked so much better than just pointing a radar and reading a number. I will definitely use the drill again.

Just an FYI since I've done this with video...

Any timing method calculates an average speed as opposed to a radar gun which measures the max speed. Although I can't find a study for a softball, it's fairly well documented that MLB pitches slow down by about 8-10% due to air resistance between release and the hitting zone. Given that softballs travel through about 1/3 less air (60 vs 43 feet), are about 25-50% slower, but have about 2.2 times the surface area of a baseball, I would say the 8-10% holds for softball pitching as well. (Video roughly confirms this, a 15 frame pitch reaches the midway point in a little under 7 frames and the rest of the way in a little over 8 frames). This means you should increase the calculated speed by about 4-5% to approximate a max speed.

So bump her up 2MPH or so.