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| SOFTBALL LINKS |
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Go With Gold
by Dave
Saturday, June 24, 2006
If you've never been to see an 18U ASA Gold level tournament, I highly recommend it. I went to see my first recently and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. From dawn until dusk, and a little beyond that, we saw days of great softball played by some of the hottest college recruits in the country. Well known teams from California, Texas, Virginia, Georgia and other states competed in as many as 5 games a day per team. Most played 3 games a day but you didn't have to wait long to catch your favorite team. The experience was extremely informative on so many levels I scarcely know where to begin.
PitchingI suppose the majority of the many college recruiters who were in attendance were there to look at pitchers. I say this because most were camped out behind backstops looking at movement and location. The pitchers were very good but so were the hitters (I'll get to that in a moment). I did not see very many rise ball pitchers and when the pitchers I saw did go to the rise, it was frequently on favorable accounts and the pitches were thrown up and out of the zone. The majority of what I saw were drops, screwballs, drop curves, an occassional fastball, and the most effective pitch of all was almost always the changeup.
You could ascertain the type of pitch by watching the game very carefully and observing shortstops as they signaled the outfielders on each pitch. Before long one could anticipate what was being thrown and then judge the location and whether the desired spot was hit or not. It is very instructive to know what a pitcher is throwing, examine the location and note how really good hitters who don't have your knowledge react to what is thrown.
I imagine it is very difficult to learn to throw the rise within the strike zone while still having the desired action. The best pitchers can accomplish this but I did not see many even at gold 18U who could. But the most effective pitchers had great changes, threw them fairly often, and almost always fooled even these well schooled batters. If you did not have the advantage of seeing the sign from shortstop to outfielder, you would about fall off your seat following the flight of the ball.
There were a fair number of walks issued in the games we saw. But I don;t think this was due to pitchers inability to find the plate except in one or two cases in which the pitchers seemed to succumb to the heat or became frustrated when plate umps called it close. Most of the pitchers worked the areas just outside of the strike zone on both corners, up and down. These pitchers seemed to be able to locate well and were missing by inches because they wanted to keep the ball away from apparently dangerous hitters. Every time a pitcher got to fat with a pitch, it was drilled for a hit or extra bases. There were a number of strike outs but most of these were swinging at borderline pitches with action or at changeups swung at off the front foot as batters got fooled.
HittingThe hitters I saw were invariably disciplined, rarely swinging at anything outside the zone and rarely taking a strike three. I saw a lot of western style, rotational swings. There were not a lot of release hitters and only a few didn't make use of the western style. There was far more hitting than one would expect to see at, say, the college world series, but that's to be expected at this level. In college the quality of pitching is far superior mostly because there are fewer pitchers needed. When you play three to five games a day for three or four days straight, you need more than two or three pitchers. I'm sure at least some of the pitchers on these teams do not aspire to pitch in college. But even given the lower level of pitching, these hitters were remarkable.
There was less bunting than I expected which can be explained by the speed and ability of fielders. The bunts I saw laid down were good but they were only effective as sacrifices because the fielders invariably got the out at first. I saw no true slap-hitting to speak of which I found extraordinary. If you want to get yourself a scholarship someplace and you have above average sprint-running speed, I strongly urge you to learn to slap. I would imagine that a good slap hitter would have turned a lot of heads here among the recruiting crowd.
FieldingI would have to say that most of the fielders on these teams were schooled in the Kobata method. The most well played position, at least from what I saw, was shortstop. I've seen several good professional softball shortstops in person and many good college ones on TV. I'd have to say that the girls I saw appear to be on tracks to be as good as the ones I have seen.
The next best played position was probably catcher although that would also qualify as the worst played position as well. No steals went unchallenged by close plays and I saw many throw outs at second on even the fastest runners. But as good as many of the catchers I saw were, there were several who were quite poor. It very well may be that these girls are not used to the several pitchers they had to catch since most likely the summertime is the only time they catch them and possibly there were several newcomers in the group I saw. It is often said that you should encourage your daughter to catch since there aren't enough good catchers to go around. I'm not sure that's true but more importantly it is a very difficult position made more difficult when you aren't intimately familiar with your stable of pitchers.
The remainder of positions were about equal. There were some very good firstbasemen, second and third. Outfield play was mediocre in a lot of cases yet spectacular in others. Maybe one or two of the outfielders I saw had plus arms. Most either didn't have the opportunity to show off heir arms or had average ones.
BaserunningBaserunning was not as aggressive as college level ball. Like I said earlier, there was a bit of bunting runners over but not much slap hitting. Stealing was fairly frequent but as there were many good catchers and the teams didn't know each other all that well, it was mostly a cat and mouse game.
The thing that stuck out to me about the baserunning was the method of sliding. I grew up playing baseball and did the more or less standard slide right into the bag with the idea of looking for the ball to come loose. So the objective was to slide down and spring back up. To do that, you pretty much have to slide right into the bag. The sliding I saw at ASA 18U Gold, was doen to the side of the bag and the runners then grabbed the bag with their hands. I can understand this method from the point of view of getting around the fielder trying to make a tag from in front of the base but I had never seen it en masse before. Every single slide I saw was done in this manner. I have seen college world series participants do this on tight plays at the plate but never at second or third bases. I haven't read anything about this technique or the motive for using it but it occurred to me while watching these games that had the three girls on our youth team used it they wouldn't be out for the season right now. You must be less likely to break an ankle, jam a knee or collide with a fielder if you slide to the side of the bag. There is of course the issue of safety for the hands but many runners forget their hands when sliding in the old manner causing them to injure wrists or slice open fingers. While you may be able to injure your hands trying to grab a base as you slide by, I suppose knowing that you need your hands to grab the base makes it somewhat less likely that you'll forget them and drag them on the ground.
ConclusionYou can learn a lot about this game by watching some of the best players go about their business. Sometimes I'm sure I get the wrong idea about techniques since I don't have a road map to use to see what it is they are doing, how, or why. But still, it is extremely educational to see this level of play. That's true for me, a generic bucket dad, but it's also true for girls who yearn to one day play the sport at its highest levels. If you can get to a Gold tournament, I very much suggest you do. You can find these things on the internet by searching for "Gold" level teams and then checking their calendars. Enjoy!
Permanent Link: Go With Gold
 
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