illegal pitches?

[Dabears17]

Aren't they already?

How old is your DD? 11 or 12? Does MS play at the same time as HS? If she is on the MS JV team, umpires are likely happy someone can throw it over the plate and not too concerned about leaping, and probably not the most experienced umpires. No excuse IMO.

Though pitching in our 8u rec division is so weak after two years of Covid umpires are instructed to let pitchers pitch from 25" instead of 30" and if they start regularly throwing strikes move them back.

At All-Star evaluations last Saturday the typical pitcher in 10u and 12u were pitching 4 to 5 mph slower than the typical pitcher did 3 to 4 years ago.

Older pitchers work hard on their leg drive, and with most (all?) sanctions allowing them to start with the non-pivot foot a step behind the pitching plate, they are going to be getting the release point closer to the batter with a legal toe drag.

What "style" of pitching does your DD use? Around here the preferred is referred to as "Internal Rotation", "Arm Whip", or "Forearm Whip", where the ball is pulled around the circle, doing a whip at the hip, vs. pushing the ball around the circle.



My DD is neutral to up in the box to decide whether to hit the ball before it breaks. She rarely soft slaps, but sets up to be a triple threat of bunt, power line-drive, or hard/power slap. She can catch up to fast pitching, the slower pitchers mess her up.

 

[radness]

Yeah, you're like the voice of reason around here. Always asking a question before making a judgement.

I guess I would say...what if that hitter had reached the absolute limit of their ability to time and react and swing with a minimum of speed and power to make contact? There is no farther to back up in the box. The cleats are free of dirt and the laces are tight. There is a stalemate between the fastball thrown legally, and the hitter's skill.

Then the pitcher breaks the rule and lands a foot closer to the plate. But the hitter has nothing left. The pitcher has created a new obstacle. Obviously I'm painting a very specific scenario here, but that foot matters. It's an advantage the pitcher can take even from pitch to pitch in order to alter timing. It could be used very effectively because only the pitcher knows it's happening. There is a set of rules for pitchers and a finite number of ways to work within them. The batter can only prepare for what is within the rules, and the pitcher chooses one of those finite ways to deliver the ball. But when a new variable or option is introduced, the batter is now at a new disadvantage and has no strategy because that new variable isn't within the rules. It could be used as infrequently as one pitch per at-bat, or even less. But the fact remains that the rule exists and has now been broken.

I would totally bring that up in a hotly contested game. Even if the speed wasn't affected. It's a major change in the pitcher's motion that could do any number of things to affect their desired outcome. Coaches do things like switching pitchers mid-inning to disrupt timing, then having the first pitcher reenter, etc. There are plenty of rules being manipulated or enforced to change the outcome. I certainly wouldn't let my kids continue to get smoked at their current skill level if there was something WAY within the rules I could do about it.

I've said a couple times though...we were fine with the JV girl moving like that because the game literally meant nothing. But that kid's parents are paying for lessons twice a week. Mine goes once a week and that REALLY adds up fast. If she develops that pattern for years and years then gets called on it in high school or travel ball, it could be a real problem to correct. Maybe not, but I want all these kids to be successful. I want her worst day to be vs us in the future, but otherwise I wish her well. I would hope someone would do the same for mine. What completely blew me away though, is both umpires and her coach not knowing it was illegal. We could have let it go. Her coach is a braggart and I'm not fond of her. It could have benefitted us next year to just let her float across the circle in a varsity game, but I'm not interested in seeing the kids suffer at the expense of the adults. I know how hard my own kid has worked just to throw a straight 42mph fastball at this point and I'm sure the jumping girl has done the same...and at a cost $5k per year no less.

lord, I type too much.

Additional points to distance,
We can acknowledge that as players develop age brackets the pitching moves back farther it is not incrementally by inches, it is by 3 ft.

Years ago pitching was from 40 ft,
Even in top age brackets & college 40'.
Some pitchers did leap and Crow Hop, not all.

So even if a pitcher nowadays from 43' did land 12-inches closer
they would still be 24 inches farther away.

In my mind
Even at only 2 feet farther is more than enough to help batters in today's game with much lighter bats and a Super Rocket ball...

Not making excuses for anything just pointing out perspective on distance.

Besides that there are pitchers who never leap and still land erasing the pitching circle line. So gaining distance is not an issue of Leaping it is a explosive Drive mechanism. And or body length.

Timing is still something that every batter needs to learn to develop.
Because every pitcher is different.

 

[Dabears17]

When did they switch from the white ball to the optic yellow ball? Early 2000's? Did you play with the white ball and was it harder to pick up out of the hand to hit?

Additional points to distance,
We can acknowledge that as players develop age brackets the pitching moves back farther it is not incrementally by inches, it is by 3 ft.

Years ago pitching was from 40 ft,
Even in top age brackets & college 40'.
Some pitchers did leap and Crow Hop, not all.

So even if a pitcher nowadays from 43' did land 12-inches closer
they would still be 24 inches farther away.

In my mind
Even at only 2 feet farther is more than enough to help batters in today's game with much lighter bats and a Super Rocket ball...

Not making excuses for anything just pointing out perspective on distance.

Besides that there are pitchers who never leap and still land erasing the pitching circle line. So gaining distance is not an issue of Leaping it is a explosive Drive mechanism. And or body length.

Timing is still something that every batter needs to learn to develop.
Because every pitcher is different.

 

[radness]

When did they switch from the white ball to the optic yellow ball? Early 2000's? Did you play with the white ball and was it harder to pick up out of the hand to hit?

Cannot remember when they started the yellow ball. But I remember testing it doing self toss up by myself.
With white ball from home plate could not hit over a 200 fence
but the yellow ball I can self toss and hit it over.
That was Eye Awakening to what was about to happen to fastpitch.
Plus lighter bats easier.

The white ball is what I knew all my life and it was just normal to look at.

The yellow ball was a little weird at first,

What I really noticed most was texture in my hand. White ball more texture.
Which do think there's a possibility the Old white balls seemed to move more then I think the yellow balls do.
Which believe texture may have created greater wind resistance and such toward effect of spin and air flow.
While I cannot prove that other than recollection of difference at the time the two softballs switched over. And seeing a difference in movement of the pitchers switching over, do know pitchers had to learn the new yellow ball.

 

[Dabears17]

Did bases for a 12u rec game today. Happy to report I saw 4 pitchers, none were leaping (except within the rules when there was a hole in front of the plate starting in the 4th inning). All of the adult umpires are former board members. They were dragging the whole side of their foot. After the game took aside the parent coaches of the two who will be the main All-Stars pitchers and showed them how they should be dragging the toe to pick up some speed.

 

[GunnerShotgun]

My DD is neutral to up in the box to decide whether to hit the ball before it breaks.

What does that mean? Do you really think a ball comes in straight and then breaks in some direction (breaking the laws of physics)?

 

[Dabears17]

What does that mean? Do you really think a ball comes in straight and then breaks in some direction (breaking the laws of physics)?

Generic term I've heard used since the pitching distance was moved from 40" to 43" feet to describe how it allowed the US pitchers who relied on movement pitches more time for their pitches to do what they do. I used "break" as a single word to avoid having to explain:

a) before the forward spin on a dropball causes gravity to affect the ball more than the brain estimates the trajectory of the ball when the brain determines which bat path to use to hit the ball.
b) before a riseball's backspin has time for gravity to start having the ball dropping slower than the brain estimates the trajectory of the ball, causing the swing to use the wrong bat path to hit the ball.
c) I've never learned how to throw a curve ball, but it is a pitch that the natural path of the ball is to cross the front corner of the plate, so a batter neutral to back in the box cannot make good contact on the ball when it reaches even to where their bat path is as a pitch off the plate. Someone up in the box can hit it where it crosses the corner of the plate, or foul it off if there are 2 strikes. I don't like calling curve balls because it does not have as much up or down movement to trick the brain if the batter is up in the box.
d) Similar description of how the movement of a change up tricks the brain.

That the batter sees the ball from the pitchers hand until it hits the bat is a myth. According to the article linked below from Sports Illustrated, the baseball batter doesn't see the ball the last 8" to 15" feet. The batter makes an educated guess on the path of the ball from what they see and projects the path of the ball to hit it. That is why Jennie Finch and Paige Parker can strike out baseball players. Their brain doesn't have the database to estimate the path of the ball. Give them a day or two of hitting practice against softball pitchers they will hit, but may mess up their baseball swings some. That is why a submariner pitcher is effective at least once through the order in MLB. I've seen 11 year old girl softball pitchers scare over-confident 11 year boy baseball players in the batter's box. It is why girls switching from baseball to softball have an adjustment period before they are good hitters. Why most batters have an adjustment period when they move from the 11' ball to the 12' ball. They need to add more/different information to the database.

YOU CAN'T KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE BALL

A Hundred years or so ago an early baseball coach waggled an admonishing finger at a chin-whiskered rookie and said, "The first rule in hitting a baseball is:

vault.si.com

Pitcher on DD's team last year ruined her curve ball near the end of the summer because she had been doing strength and conditioning work during the summer and was throwing the ball harder, causing the curveball to miss the front corner of the plate by ~2 inches.

I am an engineer, been on this board for over 11 years, started coaching in 2005, umpiring around 2010. I've stayed at the same hotel as Rick Pauly, Bill @Hillhouse, Brandon Carr, Mike Mulhleisen, Doug Romrell, @Ken Krause, Chris Delorit, Dave Edwards, Jamie Carr, James Clark, and Rich Balswick-- plus I bought the t-shirt to prove it! Do you think I'm making things up? .

Pitching is the art of deception and disrupting timing. Ideally a pitch looks the same from hand separation, going through the same window in space, until roughly halfway between the pitcher and home, before the spin on the ball caused by the release out of the pitchers hand takes over to move the ball the way that spin does. A good hitter recognizes spins out of the hand, tells the pitcher has, makes educated guesses on what pitch the pitcher will pitch in that situation, and tries to recognize pitch call patterns of the other team.





Case in point, in the game I umpired this evening the good hitters could hit the pitcher throwing 47ish without a lot of spin. The pitcher throwing 43ish with more spin on the ball won the game. It's why as an umpire a fair amount of the time I know if a pitch will be a strike with a high rate of success when it is 10 to 15 feet from the pitcher's hand.

 

[radness]

Generic term I've heard used since the pitching distance was moved from 40" to 43" feet to describe how it allowed the US pitchers who relied on movement pitches more time for their pitches to do what they do. I used "break" as a single word to avoid having to explain:

a) before the forward spin on a dropball causes gravity to affect the ball more than the brain estimates the trajectory of the ball when the brain determines which bat path to use to hit the ball.
b) before a riseball's backspin has time for gravity to start having the ball dropping slower than the brain estimates the trajectory of the ball, causing the swing to use the wrong bat path to hit the ball.
c) I've never learned how to throw a curve ball, but it is a pitch that the natural path of the ball is to cross the front corner of the plate, so a batter neutral to back in the box cannot make good contact on the ball when it reaches even to where their bat path is as a pitch off the plate. Someone up in the box can hit it where it crosses the corner of the plate, or foul it off if there are 2 strikes. I don't like calling curve balls because it does not have as much up or down movement to trick the brain if the batter is up in the box.
d) Similar description of how the movement of a change up tricks the brain.

That the batter sees the ball from the pitchers hand until it hits the bat is a myth. According to the article linked below from Sports Illustrated, the baseball batter doesn't see the ball the last 8" to 15" feet. The batter makes an educated guess on the path of the ball from what they see and projects the path of the ball to hit it. That is why Jennie Finch and Paige Parker can strike out baseball players. Their brain doesn't have the database to estimate the path of the ball. Give them a day or two of hitting practice against softball pitchers they will hit, but may mess up their baseball swings some. That is why a submariner pitcher is effective at least once through the order in MLB. I've seen 11 year old girl softball pitchers scare over-confident 11 year boy baseball players in the batter's box. It is why girls switching from baseball to softball have an adjustment period before they are good hitters. Why most batters have an adjustment period when they move from the 11' ball to the 12' ball. They need to add more/different information to the database.

YOU CAN'T KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE BALL

A Hundred years or so ago an early baseball coach waggled an admonishing finger at a chin-whiskered rookie and said, "The first rule in hitting a baseball is:

vault.si.com

Pitcher on DD's team last year ruined her curve ball near the end of the summer because she had been doing strength and conditioning work during the summer and was throwing the ball harder, causing the curveball to miss the front corner of the plate by ~2 inches.

I am an engineer, been on this board for over 11 years, started coaching in 2005, umpiring around 2010. I've stayed at the same hotel as Rick Pauly, Bill @Hillhouse, Brandon Carr, Mike Mulhleisen, Doug Romrell, @Ken Krause, Chris Delorit, Dave Edwards, Jamie Carr, James Clark, and Rich Balswick-- plus I bought the t-shirt to prove it! Do you think I'm making things up? .

Pitching is the art of deception and disrupting timing. Ideally a pitch looks the same from hand separation, going through the same window in space, until roughly halfway between the pitcher and home, before the spin on the ball caused by the release out of the pitchers hand takes over to move the ball the way that spin does. A good hitter recognizes spins out of the hand, tells the pitcher has, makes educated guesses on what pitch the pitcher will pitch in that situation, and tries to recognize pitch call patterns of the other team.



View attachment 25544

Case in point, in the game I umpired this evening the good hitters could hit the pitcher throwing 47ish without a lot of spin. The pitcher throwing 43ish with more spin on the ball won the game. It's why as an umpire a fair amount of the time I know if a pitch will be a strike with a high rate of success when it is 10 to 15 feet from the pitcher's hand.

Favorite sentence in that GREAT READ

'Pitching is the art of deception and disrupting timing.'

Really like this sentence also

'A good hitter recognizes spins out of the hand.'

*** everybody should go watch pitching lessons can learn important visual cue's!!!

 

[PJR202]

Additional points to distance,
We can acknowledge that as players develop age brackets the pitching moves back farther it is not incrementally by inches, it is by 3 ft.

Years ago pitching was from 40 ft,
Even in top age brackets & college 40'.
Some pitchers did leap and Crow Hop, not all.

So even if a pitcher nowadays from 43' did land 12-inches closer
they would still be 24 inches farther away.

In my mind
Even at only 2 feet farther is more than enough to help batters in today's game with much lighter bats and a Super Rocket ball...

Not making excuses for anything just pointing out perspective on distance.

Besides that there are pitchers who never leap and still land erasing the pitching circle line. So gaining distance is not an issue of Leaping it is a explosive Drive mechanism. And or body length.

Timing is still something that every batter needs to learn to develop.
Because every pitcher is different.

I agree with all this. Kids at MS+ level have been pitching at 43 for years though. This is really why I'm speaking strictly of the change in distance from one pitch to the next with all other things being equal/unchanged. Anyone can feel free to disagree and/or say these things can be adjusted in other ways, but it's still a broken rule that changes the pitch as any other broken pitch rule would in its own way.

I mean...I GET why some would disagree for various reasons, but I would still definitely request the umpires adhere to the rule in a serious game. Not JV...which we didn't. We aren't complete d'bags. Maybe only somewhat d'bags. But not 100%.

 

[PJR202]

How old is your DD? 11 or 12? Does MS play at the same time as HS? If she is on the MS JV team, umpires are likely happy someone can throw it over the plate and not too concerned about leaping, and probably not the most experienced umpires. No excuse IMO.

Though pitching in our 8u rec division is so weak after two years of Covid umpires are instructed to let pitchers pitch from 25" instead of 30" and if they start regularly throwing strikes move them back.

At All-Star evaluations last Saturday the typical pitcher in 10u and 12u were pitching 4 to 5 mph slower than the typical pitcher did 3 to 4 years ago.

Older pitchers work hard on their leg drive, and with most (all?) sanctions allowing them to start with the non-pivot foot a step behind the pitching plate, they are going to be getting the release point closer to the batter with a legal toe drag.

What "style" of pitching does your DD use? Around here the preferred is referred to as "Internal Rotation", "Arm Whip", or "Forearm Whip", where the ball is pulled around the circle, doing a whip at the hip, vs. pushing the ball around the circle.



My DD is neutral to up in the box to decide whether to hit the ball before it breaks. She rarely soft slaps, but sets up to be a triple threat of bunt, power line-drive, or hard/power slap. She can catch up to fast pitching, the slower pitchers mess her up.

She's 14, just finishing up 8th grade. Started softball in 6th grade and has been taking pitching lessons weekly for 16 months. She had never pitched in a MS game until this season, though. Her speed and accuracy are improving all the time, but at the moment she's low 40's and most games throws 60-67% strikes. She usually only walks a couple kids a game and hits a batter or two (we call her sniper). She does pretty well overall for being so new to it and for making such slow progress for the first 11 months or so. Things started to fall into place about December and she's really coming along quickly now. The speed used to frustrate me, but it's never outpaced the accuracy, which I see FAR too often in kids on other teams. Her speed actually gives a lot of kids problems for an inning or two when she comes in after the normal starter. I call her the human change-up.

I don't know exactly what you would call her style. She'll be starting a leap/drag after this season ends. Right now it's a lunge forward while the pivot foot stays in its original position until the right hip comes around. It's the style her instructor (former men's team USA) teaches the kids that start brand new until they start to leap/drag. Seems to really help them learn how to keep from falling over to the right. That's such a bad habit I see in other kids and it's difficult to break. She struggled with it a long. long time. There's hardly any change when it becomes time to leap/drag. It's just a matter of learning that portion of it and memorizing it physically. The hip is already doing what it's supposed to do.

The release is a push slightly in front of the hip. The circle is a push until palm faces backward by about the 11:00 postion (going clockwise) where it becomes a pull, then push release so there's no significant elbow rotation during the release. I've not really seen the exact style on youtube other than part of it that some refer to as rotational pitching. I'm no expert and may be describing it poorly but I pay a lot of attention at the lessons so I've got probably 70 hours of observation. I like to say he's her instructor and I'm her coach. He corrects and adjusts the mechanics, and teaches new stuff, and I spend several hours trying to make it habit. It's fun though.