Unraveling Pitching Frustrations

[Greg Tudor]

DD gets frustrated sometimes in the circle when things just go wrong in the field. She is a pitcher that depends on her defense and isn't going to strike a bunch out, but will usually get a lot of easy grounder and little pop ups. For the most part she is able to just move on and keep working, if not work harder to make up for her defense.

Funny story that taught my DD a lesson and humbled her. One game, her defense was leaking like a sieve while she was pitching. In the post game meeting, she expressed her frustration with her team about her giving her best and needing the same from them. You know what's coming. Next game, she's at 3rd and ole's 2 or 3 balls. Her team let her know about it after the game. No one was mad, just reminding each other that it goes both ways.

Same as my DD


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[Greg Tudor]

Talking about what pitchers encounter at any level.

To schwabach's comment
'think most players understand the pitcher has special challenges, but dont feel the need to practice like'

Exactly the point !

If you have a pitcher who is expected to work on control.
And does so by applying individual work.
*The defense should also!

IMO
that comment is a gap that shouldnt exist!

I know my daughter goes to a pitching/hitting coach same amazing coach for both and she has drills she does almost every single day but outside of practices and games other than the pitcher and catcher do the other positions players do drills or stuff at home ?? and she is on a “C “ level team but eventually wants to play at a much higher level so I was just wondering


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[Greg Tudor]

This is a great topic! My DD pitches and I've always taught her to have a bad memory in the circle when it comes to pitches/plays in a game. She works hard and expects a lot of herself and what she is learning on her own is not every girl is going to work as hard, play as hard, or care as much as she does and on the flip side there's going to be girls she meets that work, play, and care more then her. All I tell her she can do is, help the ones that need it and learn from the ones that she can.

I tell mine just play her game cause she can only control her play not everyone else’s


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[cnardone]

If LF came charging “in” and the ball went over her head than that is clearly an error and misread ball. If she was charging in full blast and didn’t reach the ball that dropped in front of her then no error.


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"clearly an error" is a hard stance to take. My dd was recently in LF. a blast hit directly at her. She took two steps in and then turned and ran to the fence to pick up the ball. Terrible read, terrible first step. But even if she did everything correctly, there was NO WAY she was catching that ball. none. You can't give that an error. BTW - my DD is a pitcher as well.

 

[Greg Tudor]

As far as pitchers dealing with defensive errors I tell my students to look at a base on balls as an error by the pitcher. Then I ask them how many errors they typically make in a game.

Never thought of that way I’ll talk to mine and ask her the same thing


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[Greg Tudor]

That's interesting. Is it an error on the pitcher when the umpire is missing calls? When an umpire's zone changes?

RAD, I remember acting negatively when I was young and dumb and someone made an error. I quickly learned not to do that because I didn't want anything said when I'd give up a homerun.

I do find it frustrating that most infielders/outfielders don't put as much time into their craft as pitchers/catchers or their hitting. Now, I realize someone will come on here and tell me how wrong I am that THEIR KID takes 200 ground balls per day, 200 fly balls per day, etc. etc. But overall, what I'm saying is true. You typically don't see a parent working with their kid at a park on their fielding, the way you do a pitcher or someone hitting. So, please everyone save me the replies about how YOUR kid out works everyone. I get it, it's not everyone. I am speaking about the majority.

I agree 100% with you and I think that most parents that reply negatively to ur post are the ones that claim to work with their kids but don’t are they same ones that think their kid is the next best thing that walked in the diamond but their skills say different I’m a realist I don’t candy coat anything for my daughter I just try and be truthful cause they play like they practice and it really shows to the ones that really see it


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[Greg Tudor]

Funny. Actually, not a day of lessons goes by that parents and pitchers don't tell me about how bad the fielding is on their team. While I realize a lot of parents will call a 200mph line drive off someone's forehead an error, but when I watch games being streamed on YouTube or whatever, I see it for myself. Bad errors, not covering bases, overthrows, etc.

And since someone else is likely to chime in with a shot across the bow, I do realize errors happen. I've made my own share of them. But that doesn't take away from my overall point. I know I didn't practice fielding as often as I should've either. But if you think fielders put in as much with fielding as they do with hitting, or as much work as a pitcher does with weekly lessons, then I will stand corrected.

A small few maybe but the majority no where near as much !!


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[madone09]

"clearly an error" is a hard stance to take. My dd was recently in LF. a blast hit directly at her. She took two steps in and then turned and ran to the fence to pick up the ball. Terrible read, terrible first step. But even if she did everything correctly, there was NO WAY she was catching that ball. none. You can't give that an error. BTW - my DD is a pitcher as well.

Right true! Errors end up being the scorekeepers opinion and not clear cut. I should have worded that differently. I got a picture in my mind of what that play might have looked like. I usually imagine a 15-30 ft radius (depending on age and level) around the fielder for fly balls. They should be able to catch anything in that circle. Line drives caught are a bonus not expected for me anyways. Unless hit right to them and in the glove then dropped, for outfield. Infield line drives missed never an error.


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[radness]

I’m following this cause my daughter is a 12u pitcher and she only pitches in the mid to up 40’s but her spin and rotation is pretty awesome so the majority of the hits are all ground balls so it really bothers her that even though she is pitching a awesome game it’s the defense that’s not doing their job and let’s not forget the dropped 3rd strikes and the girl is safe at first so far she doesn’t blame the other players but it is really taking a toll on her mentally


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The simple words
'Keep Trying'
become profound when a player and/or an entire team
Never Gives Up!

At life this maybe the greatest accomplishment!

Utilize being positive
@Hillhouse touched on this with a post about healthy mentality.
Athletes work a lot on the physical.
The MENTALITY part imo is very much more individualized.
Some let things go easily, others dont.
Recognizing personality type may prove essential to understanding how we each can learn to deal with difficulties.

Look forward to others sharing their journeys! Live Life Learn

 

[Danica]

My 10 year old pitches but is also a utility player. I played Division 1 college ball. I was mainly a catcher but also a utility player. I have always told my kids that being a pitcher or a catcher requires more time put in. You are involved in every single play in the game! You have to work hard and understand what is required of you. That means more time put in off the field doing drills, etc. Of course other positions require hard work too but I would say that catching and pitching generally require more time put in. That doesn't mean that other positions are easy and players should feel like they don't need to be out working hard on their own, outside of normal practices, to become better athletes.

About frustrations with team errors...we've recently dealt with this. My daughter tries to keep her focus on her role. She is there to pitch and her teammates are there to play defense behind her. If there are errors then all she can do is try to keep doing her job and lift her teammates up. If she loses her cool then she can't do her job.
If the same girls are the ones always making errors then I think the COACHES are the ones that need to address it. The girls need to stick together and have each other's backs. There should be good communication between pitchers and their coaches. If a pitcher is frustrated then they should be able to talk to the coach and have the coach rally the team to do better. And yes, there are always those teams where you just have to say we probably aren't going to win many games but I can always work on my skills and get better as an individual.

I think hiding your frustrations while your in the pitching circle is a huge thing for young girls to learn. Softball is such a mental sport! Getting down on your teammates only does harm. Usually when a girl that makes an error she's going to replay that in her head over and over. Telling a teammate to shake it off and get the next one shows unity. I see games unravel all the time! One error leading to another and another. Girls giving each other looks of frustration and shaking their heads. That never helps.

We've even considered doing some team building activities to help with morale. When a team has chemistry, they play better. When they care about each other as individuals, they play better together and encourage each other more. It's about accountability too! Feeling like you don't want to let your teammates down gives you more motivation to work hard on your own = less errors overall.