Fastpitch is pitching, catching, .300 hitters,
and the rest. Hitting is timing. Pitching is messing up that timing.
These old sayings are as true now as in the past or the future. The
arguments about styles concerns me less than the substance of
pitching. Location, speed changes, movement, without being read
prior to delivery will always be hallmarks of the tough pitcher to
hit. Mechanics that minimize risks of injury in a very ballistic
performance should be continued to be studied and taught. Teaching
the mental aspects of focus and intensity, on and off the field,
will forever be qualities of good instruction and coaching.
Location, location, location wins in fastpitch
and real estate. The real estate a pitcher should be interested in
is the four corners and the borders of the strike zone. Artrageous
artist Don Ash created one of my favorite t-shirt designs for our
camps. It has A's printed on the corners, B's along the borders, and
a big C framing a meatball with a fork in it covering the entire
middle of the strike zone. There are no D's or F's in the picture.
If you cannot throw strikes, you cannot be a pitcher. How many youth
coaches set the pitching machine up to throw right down the middle
for hitting practice? And then, they walk over to their young
pitcher and tell them, "Just throw heat over the plate". Is that not
teaching the pitcher to practice throwing what the hitters are
practicing to hit?
Try this drill against your own team in a
scrimmage. Place the ball on a tee on the four corners of the strike
zone. Put the batters in their normal stance. Play a game this way
and see the effect of good location.
Along a similar line of thinking, I am amazed how
many times I hear "Throw it by them". Most of our pitching machines
here at The StrikeZone run all winter at 65 m.p.h. A youth throwing
10 to 15 m.p.h slower than our normal practice is not going to throw
it by hitters conditioned to the same easily timed fastball. Speed
does count, sure. Reaction time is a reality. Doesn't the
inexperienced coach who fiddles and fidgets trying to feed the
pitching machine drive your own hitters nuts? When the ball doesn't
drop routinely and smoothly through, it messes up your hitters
timing. Old Fiddle & Fidget is a real pitcher. For every pitch you
throw, you should have at least two speeds of the same delivery and
spin. It is nice to have more speeds with greater variances. The
purpose is not to get hit hard. My 57-year old senior shortstop
handles three-hop grounders well. It is the rock-skipping bullets we
all have trouble with. Change of speeds is the paint a pitcher can
use to become an artist.
Movement of the ball is created by two well known
factors, spin and the angle of attack into a given resistance.
Whatever grip on a given pitch that causes the greatest spin is the
one you should use. The glaring difference between the world-class
pitchers I've caught or warmed up over the years was not the
orientation of the spin, but the angle of attack and the tremendous
acceleration of the hip and wrist just prior to release. All the
great ones have that explosion just before release and a little
wiggle from the throwing hip. It wasn't so much hip rotation that it
became a waddle and the shoulder took the abuse. (Please read Dr.
Sherry Werner's Olympic Analysis). No hip action, or throwing across
the body, will flatten out the best drop or rise. Check out a
baseball curve, a golf stroke or a tennis serve without hip action.
Velocity surely helps movement. But anyone who has caught the
Clearwater Bombers Herb Dudley's changeups knows it is a well-timed
explosion of hip and wrist.
Not being read is an easy correction to make.
During your practices, videotape from the coaches boxes and behind
the plate. If you can see your grips or differences in your
delivery, so can the opponents' coaches and hitters. Change how you
cover the ball with your glove. The ball is in the important hand,
teach the one to hide the ball until you start forward or the
throwing arm is moving fast enough you can't see your fingers from
the plate. Do this the same on each and every delivery. Work hard to
deliver the ball with the same motion on all your pitches. Teach
your catcher to cover and disguise signals. Don't let your catcher
move to the location too soon, or better yet, not at all. My
favorite pitcher is one who drops the throwing hand below the glove,
pauses the white ball in front of black pants, then continues the
arm swing. That is my favorite pitcher to HIT. His glove would fly
out of the way to give me an early picture of the ball directly in
front of his release point with every grip exposed! I don’t know a
single good hitter who was fooled by a windup. I know lots of great
hitters who study reading pitchers to eliminate the guesswork.
Finally, do you have the right stuff to be a
pitcher? Does failure motivate you to seek excellence on the next
pitch or in the next practice? Does success fuel your competitive
fire? Can you keep a healthy balance in your life off the field so
as not to affect your game? Good grades? Honest, wholesome
relationships with teammates, coaches, friends, family and yourself?
Can you focus intently on your goal for this pitch, this game, this
year, this life?
Regardless of how far your talent and
determination takes you, when you play fastpitch, I'm rooting for
you. Be a good sport and good luck.
Dr. Ron Osborn is the pitching instructor at the
StrikeZone Hitting Center.
