My DD pitching - Internal Rotation Question.

[Alan Snedeker]

I've been on the forum a few months now after discovering the Internal Rotation thread. I have pretty much exclusively taught my DD to pitch. She will be 10 on Sunday, and started pitching 12 months ago. She is one of three pitchers on a 10U travel team that I also coach.

We have been working on the Internal Rotation part since the start of the year. She has gained almost 5mph in this short time. Here is the video I took last night:

MVI_0061.MOV - YouTube

I notice on all the slow motion clips I see of examples of Internal Rotation the upper arm and elbow come all the way up against the side of the body and almost stops as the lower arm rotates. It is almost like the side of the body is used as leverage to rotate the lower arm before continuing on with the follow through.

I tell my DD to let her arm come all the way to her body but she says it will hurt if I hit myself, LOL. Is the upper arm not coming to the stop as the lower arm rotates a lack of strength, timing, technique, not getting to her side? It just doesn't seem quite right. Can Board Member comment on this or anybody else please. Any other critique welcome please.

Thanks,
Alan

 

[lhowser]

I love it. Looks great to me. Would like to see it from the front as well. Looks like her arm is in pretty good position. Keep pitching a bit before trying to much of a mechanical change. bet she is pretty accurate for a 10u too based on what I see here.

 

[knightsb]

I agree with Ihowser, looks pretty good. She looks very smooth. You are off to a good start. I'd put a stripe of electrical tape on the ball and work with her on the proper spin, that is one thing I would have done with my DD at an earlier age.

 

[sluggers]

Looks good to me. IMHO, work on her location and speed, and then start teaching her breaking pitches next fall. A small point--she should come to a point better with her glove hand at 3. She is kind of lazy about the point at 3--not a big deal really. I like her effort as well.

I've got to ask: She is really fluid. It seems we've seen a bunch of kids with a real crazy, herky-jerky start. How did you avoid it? Or do you blindfold her when someone else is pitching?

 

[knightsb]

Looks good to me. IMHO, work on her location and speed, and then start teaching her breaking pitches next fall.

I agree. My point about the electrical tape is my DD got in a habit of bullet spin at an early age, and has struggled to try and get the tape to stand straight up on a 4 seam peel or FB.

 

[Alan Snedeker]

Looks good to me. IMHO, work on her location and speed, and then start teaching her breaking pitches next fall. A small point--she should come to a point better with her glove hand at 3. She is kind of lazy about the point at 3--not a big deal really. I like her effort as well.

I've got to ask: She is really fluid. It seems we've seen a bunch of kids with a real crazy, herky-jerky start. How did you avoid it? Or do you blindfold her when someone else is pitching?

We have really worked on her leap the last 2 weeks. Before she was pushing really hard but only going straight out. We have been really working on getting elevated and having a lighter drag foot. Maybe that is part of it. I always stress to her it is not how fast you start but how fast you finish and to have a smooth acceleration until the lasts part. It may also be that she plays golf too, although not as much as softball right now. In golf the swing has to be fluid.

 

[Alan Snedeker]

I love it. Looks great to me. Would like to see it from the front as well. Looks like her arm is in pretty good position. Keep pitching a bit before trying to much of a mechanical change. bet she is pretty accurate for a 10u too based on what I see here.

I will try to get some video from the front tonight. She had really struggled with North and South accuracy. Missed a lot high. I think this my have been attributed to not getting elevated on her leap, landing with a bent knee and pushing up. We have worked on that the last 2 weeks. We are playing this weekend so we will see how it goes.

 

[Alan Snedeker]

I agree. My point about the electrical tape is my DD got in a habit of bullet spin at an early age, and has struggled to try and get the tape to stand straight up on a 4 seam peel or FB.

Yes. We always pitch with striped balls. We started with Nancy Evens DVD and she teaches a bullet spin. We struggled with it for the first few months. The day I switched her to a peel she instantly threw much more consistent and gained some mpg.

 

[GOINGDEEP]

I will try to get some video from the front tonight. She had really struggled with North and South accuracy. Missed a lot high. I think this my have been attributed to not getting elevated on her leap, landing with a bent knee and pushing up. We have worked on that the last 2 weeks. We are playing this weekend so we will see how it goes.

The north/south could be as simple as releasing too early or too late. A lot of young pitchers have that trouble, specially if they throw hard ( going for speed they release late in the mill ), it just takes time and reps for the release to come natural. I think she looks good.

 

[SoCalSoftballdad]

Alan - very smooth and relaxed. Looks good. Areas to work on:

1) I like that she has the glove and ball hand going back to the same side on the backswing. I think she can do a better job of waiting longer to separate the pitching hand from the glove until after she passes her waist on the stride and drive forward with the hands/glove. Hope that makes sense? The longer she waits the less time the batter picks up the grip and ball. It also keeps her left shoulder, and both arms down the powerline longer, right towards the catcher for more speed and accuracy. Notice how she currenlty closes the left shoulder on the backswing, opens it up almost square to home plate at separation and then opens it up again on the stride? Not ideal.

2) When she does the "figure 4" finish with her pivot foot / pivot leg, some of her momentum leaks to left instead of down the powerline. I would encourage her to finish directly behind the stride leg.

3) If you are pitching indoors, make sure you give her a pitching plate to work off of (tape one to the floor is you have too) so she can work on getting a good leg drive and explode off the plate.

I really like the way her upper body stays behind her belly button after release. Many young pitchers have a tendency to be over their toes after release and off-balance, she doesn't. Her arm whip (IR) looks very good. Nice work by both of you.