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Use Duct Tape For Repairing Ducts
by Dave
Wednesday, October 01, 2008
I remember arriving at the fields one day and seeing our first game pitcher in the parking lot with her father busily doing something in the trunk while she patiently sat in the car waiting for him. He had about the entire contents of the very big trunk of his car on the ground next to him. I wondered what was up so I parked, jumped out of the car and walked towards him to see what was going on. I figured he had a flat or had lost a glove or something in the trunk. I figured maybe I could help. But the girl's father had not lost anything and his tires were fine. He had just discovered a new use for duct (duck) tape! He was wrapping his daughter's worn out cleats with the stuff!!
For those interested in such things, there is no particular good reason to worry about whether you clearly say "duct" tape or "duck" tape. The names have been used interchangeably for about as long as this wonderful, multi-use product has been around. No, you did not mistakenly pronounce it nor hear someone mispronounce it. Both terms are actually considered correct. The tape has been called by both for over 60 years. Don't let Mr. Know-It-All, king of the put-down, convince you that you are a verbal spastic. If you are into such arcane things as the etymology of duct (duck) tape or doubt my accuracy on the point, pay a visit to Wikipedia. But I digress. Back to my friend's invention.
As you can imagine, this guy did not drive to the fields that morning expecting to find a use for the roll of duct tape he usually kept somewhere in his trunk. I imagine the sequence of events went something like this:
Dad (pulling into a parking space): "Come on, hurry up and get your shoes on. I want to get you warmed up.
Kid: "I know."
Dad: "We're playing (so and so) in the first game and you're pitching."
Kid: "I know."
Dad: "I don't know why you don't put your shoes on while we are driving."
Kid: "I know."
Dad: "You would think by now you would realize you have to get ready BEFORE we get to the fields."
Kid: "I know."
Dad: "Hurry up. Get going."
Kid: "I know."
Dad: "Shake a leg."
Kid: "Hey dad."
Dad: (something inaudible)
Kid: "Hey dad. Did I tell you I need new cleats?"
Dad: "No, why?"
Kid: "Cause I do."
Dad: "OK. Tell your mother."
Kid: "I think I did."
Dad: "Come on, let's get going, we need to warm up."
Kid: "I kind of need new cleats today."
Dad: "You what? (expletive)! You aren't telling me you need (expletive) new cleats right now are you? You wouldn't do that, would you? I mean, don't tell me you need new cleats right before a game. That's ridiculous. I don't care if you do need new (expletive) cleats today, you are pitching and playing with what you have now. We don't have time for this. You CAN'T TELL ME ABOUT THING LIKE THIS AT GAMES."
Kid: "I know."
Dad: "Wait a minute, let me see those things."
Dad: "Oh (expletive) (expletive) (expletive)! You have got to be (expletive) kidding me! (expletive) (expletive) (expletive)! Oh wait a minute, I think I have an idea. Give me those things.
This is about where I drove up, perhaps a few minutes before I pulled in. The father fished around in the trunk for a bit. Then he removed the equipment bag, the bucket he uses to catch his daughter, a bucket of balls, the crow bar, a cooler, assorted towels, the tournament t-shirt she just had to have two weeks ago, the little one's bat, a bag filled with whiffle balls, the old sneakers, some fishing tackle, a crab trap, etc., etc. Finally, back deep in the trunk, he found what he was looking for - the duct tape.
The father wrapped her cleats in the tape, held his breath, handed them to his daughter and prayed that his quick fix would be acceptable. It was. And that miracle tape would hold for two games after which he would re-wrap them.
If you have a pitcher for a daughter, there is nothing unusual about the story I just told you. You may have already lived through such an episode. If you don't have a pitcher for a daughter, you may have observed such an event and not realized what was going on. You probably wondered what was happening and didn't equate this event with the kid on the rubber with the weird shoes. You wondered what that stuff was wrapped around the cleats of the pitcher on your team or the one your kid faced. You may have asked yourself or someone nearby, "is that legal?"
Let's face it. Pitchers go through cleats lots more quickly than others. If they don't, they are probably leapers or hoppers. Yes, there are lots of hoppers out there. I have heard and read tons of criticisms about how all these pitching coaches must be teaching the kids to hop because it gives them an advantage. I don't have much time for that today but I sincerely doubt any (many?) pitching coach is intentionally teaching kids to pitch illegally. I suspect that just happens. It does provide an advantage to the pitcher but not necessarilly a competitive one in games, at least that's not the primary advantage of hopping.
The primary advantage of hopping is an economic one. When a pitcher hops, her family is still able to go out to dinner occassionally at Applebee's. &jnbsp; Otherwise, they can't. That's because, if she drags, the family is in hock up to their eyeballs trying to pay for two, perhaps three pairs of decent cleats every season. And in the current credit crisis, with the price of gasoline being what it is, a family just can't afford to buy as many pairs of shoes as it needs without foregoing some sort of "necessity."
Worse still is the fact that many pitchers don't just run through pairs of cleats. They also blow through the multi-hundred dollar pairs of sneakers (they just had to have) when they move indoors to practice! Gym floors and practice mats are just as hard on sneakers as the area in front of the pitcher's plate is on cleats. And you probably practice much more than you pitch in games.
One variation of the above scenario, in the parking lot, is the one where your daughter comes down for breakfast on Friday morning and informs you that she needs new sneakers ... today ... for PE ... or she is going to fail gym class ... and you absolutely have to be out of the house as soon as she leaves for the school bus for an important appointment for some medical specialist which you have tried to make for the past three months ... but she is going to fail gym class and thereby no longer be eligible to play school ball ... and her sneakers look most similar to the snout and mouth of a crocodile ... because after the hole formed at her big toe, she pulled on it and eventually opened a gaping hole which the gym teacher said two weeks ago is no longer acceptable ... and she gave her zeroes every day she showed up like that ... and while your daughter swears she told you about that, you have no recollection and are left simply swearing!
You resolve that your daughter will be going to school late today. She'll accompany you to the medical specialist's office after which you'll be visiting the shoe store and then she can go to school since she doesn't have gym class until last period.
We solved the first of these problems, the one with the cleats. This issue first reared its ugly head long ago. We had credit cards and so were able to procure the needed equipment. But after a while, this became a problem. We sought expert advice via one of the many softball forums which dot the internet and were advised to try this or that brand of shoe, this or that device you attach to any old shoe, this, that, that, this and finally Ringor cleats.
I suppose we probably first balked at the price of this product. They're a bit more expensive than others. But after going through several regular pairs, we finally decided that, if they worked, they represented a more economical approach. You can spend 50 bucks so many times, instead of $100, before you do the actual math. After a while, it is easy to figure that if something costs double its alternative but you go through one of the more expensive ones while 3-6 of the cheaper variety, it makes more sense to spend more. You are actually spending less by spending more.
My daughter really loved her first of two pairs of Ringors. They were lighter and more comfortable than her previous cleats. I believe her feet also were able to "breath" more than with other shoes. They didn't sweat quite as much. Everything aside from durability was a positive. That's nice but the reason we got these was so they would last - so that we would spend less on shoes. That they and we did.
The Ringors last because they have this "Pro-Tec-Toe" built into them. The "Pro-Tec-Toe" is basically a very hard rubber protective shell which runs from about the front of the arch to just beyond the middle of the toe area. This is superior to the devices you attach to other shoes because it doesn't stick out. You wouldn't buy shoes that were a size or two larger than your kid's foot (unless she were in a growth spurt). Why would you want to attach something to the end of shoe if you didn't have to? I guarantee she is going to trip when she runs the bases or plays elsewhere in the field. She may get used to the thing you attach to the shoes but I'm not willing to ruin a pair of cleats to test this out - these attachments do not come off. The "Pro-Tec-Toe" is part of the shoe - it does not stick out. It will not cause you to trip.
Our pitcher daughter's dragging did not wear out the shoe. And generally they were otherwise very durable. We'd probably still be using those shoes today, several years after the purchase, were it not for an unforeseen event, a change of teams. The problem was, on one team, everyone had red cleats to go with their red and white uniforms. It was almost a part of the uniform to have red cleats. Yes, a few of the smart parents bought black but we were, as usual, not among the smart crowd. When we decided to make the jump to another team, we learned too late that their uniform colors were purple and yellow - red cleats were just not going to cut it. So we bit the bullet and sprung for another pair of shoes. But as I said, we are not particularly bright.
As winter turned warmer, my wife decided she had to buy new cleats today. She did a little research and discovered that Under Armour ® had come out with a product of their own which also had a protective shell for pitchers. We decided to give these a try. There was nothing wrong with the pair we purchased. I'm not trying to advocate any particular brand of shoe. And they were cheaper than the Ringors. But, honestly, my daughter just did not find them as comfortable. So my wife returned them and bought the Ringors, this time in black.
So that's cleats. That was the solution to our first problem. But that actually has nothing to do with why I am writing today. The reason I'm writing about this topic has to do with the second problem, the one with the sneakers.
I don't know what sort of training regimen you do but I know we most often throw pitching practice four times a week. Sometimes we do more, sometimes quite a bit more. Sometimes, when rest is more important, we do a bit less. The bottom line is that, in any given year, my daughters are usually throwing about 200 hours or more of pitching practice. Some of this is done out at fields wearing the Ringors. But most is done in a gym or in our basement. This wears out the sneakers pretty quickly.
During some of our pitching practices, you can almost smell burning rubber. If I stop my daughter in the middle of any session and walk over to touch her sneakers, they are very warm, almost hot, to the touch. It is easy to see why they would burn out quickly. And burn they do. I am so shell shocked by the number of pairs of sneakers we wear out in any given year that no number sticks out in my mind. Do we go through 4, 6, 12? I really don't know. But sometimes it seems as if we burn through a pair once a week. Truthfully, maybe once each two months is more accurate. But at the very least, we go through four pairs a year, this for a kid who has about stopped growing. We used to joke that it will be great when she finally stops growing so she can keep the same pair of sneakers for more than a week but that was before she took up pitching. We don't joke about that anymore.
Recently, my wife had a revelation. She was looking online at Ringor cleats for my younger daughter, also a pitcher. She must have clicked on the wrong thing and found what she learned were called "trainers" or "turf shoes." These are suitable for indoor use. And the Pro-Tec-Toes do not mark the ground as the foot is dragged. My wife decied to buy a pair and see how well they last.
I can't tell you that these will last longer than sneakers. We haven't had them long enough to judge that. I can tell you that they are more expensive than cheap sneakers - nothing is more expensive than expensive sneakers. I can also tell you that we are very satisfied with our purchase.
We are happy with the purchase because they are far more comfortable to pitch in. The results were apparent from the first time my daughter used them. We tried them first in the basement and she declared them her favorite without elaborating. Next she used them at a speed / agility clinic. She was able to use these in place of her sneakers for every kind of indoor softball activity. Then we tried them on a gym floor expecting someone to complain because if you look closely at the shoes, they are intended for use on articial turf rather than a wood gymnasium floor. But they did not mark the floor and my daughter said they were as comfortable or more so than sneakers. So we solved our problem with burning through sneakers and that's not all.
More than solving the sneaker burnout problem, we also realized some unanticipated side benefits and that's actually why I sat down to write this morning. You know I quipped about coaches teaching pitchers to hop earlier in this piece and concluded that rather than the coaches being to blame, maybe parents had conspired to do this in order to save money. That's not really why I think so many pitchers hop. I think pitchers learn to hop because you cannot pitch with proper footwork in a gymnasium on a wood floor. Pitching mats are better but they are not perfect.
When I think of my baseball pitching days, one of the things that comes to mind is the difference between pitching in the yard or street and pitching off a mound. The first thought I have is finding the pivot point on the rubber. I used to place my cleats so that the spikes (plastic and then eventually metal) would bite into the rubber - the cleats at the back of the front of your foot push against the rubber. My next consideration was the landing zone where I wanted my cleats to dig in and hold firmly so I could hinge properly and not lose control due to sliding. Softball pitching is obviously different but you still need to have a clean push off and good landing.
The trouble with gym floors is there is no place to push off and they slip a little. I suppose there is good reason for gym floors to be a tiny bit slippery. There has to be a little give and, then, a hold when basketball players are darting back and forth. If there was no give, players would blow out their knees. If there was no subsequent hold, they would slip and fall. Gym floors are made for certain activites. One of these is NOT pitching.
The first time my daughter pitched on a gym floor, she had considerable difficulty. She couldn't throw hard and more importantly, her control was way off. After a few times, she adjusted her motion and did much better. That's troubling. The last thing you want a pitcher to do is practice 200 times in an environment in which she adjusts her motion in order to not fall or just to get better control. If her muscles learn this, and they will, what is she going to do when she is out on the dirt, using a rubber?
When pitchers are young, I suppose any sort of throwing improves them. We certainly don't want our 9 and 10 year olds to develop hops. But little kids seem to adjust better to gym floors, as long as they're flat and have some resistance to them. Older girls with their heavier body weight and much more powerful legs do seem to make more adjustments on gym floors than younger ones. They do seem to devolve into crow hops and leaps. They do seem to adjust their landings to use the natural gym floor slide. The results cannot be good.
Older pitchers need much more than to simply throw. They need to work movement pitches and, more importantly, location. If a pitcher goes several months without pitching from a real mound, adjusting her delivery to get the desired location, when she finally goes onto a real field, she is going to have to adjust back again. She will have wasted a lot of time working on locations for all her pitches. She will probably get the location she desired after much hard work and then she is going to learn that everything she did all winter doesn't just NOT help her location on the real field, but may actually hurt it.
It finally occurred to me that, while I sat there watching our pitchers throw in that gym, there were several hopping. And then I saw my daughter doing it too! Also, she was adjusting her motion to get locations. I was very upset at the propect of her doing this so I began bringing our pitching mat with me to practices. Let me tell you, that was one big hassle.
Our mat is filthy, heavy and difficult to roll up. Once I bring it to a practice, I have to lug it out of the car and back into the basement for our next session. Once I bring it into the basement, I have to lug it back out for the next practice. I didn't enjoy this but developing a hop was worse. There was an interesting side occurence when I brought the mat to practices. The pitchers took one look at that and wanted to use it. So when my daughtet did some hitting or other drills, one of the other pitchers would invariably take over the mat. Then when my daughter returned, they were unwilling to give it up. I had to be the bad guy. That was fun. Get your own darn mat.
Also, as I said, pitching mats are not perfect. They are better than a wood gymnasium floor but while you have a place from which to push off, the landing is different than a dirt one. And, since you don't have cleats on, there is no bite on push off nor hold on landing. The rubber on a pitching mat gives you a place to grab with your feet and to push from but, without the soft clay in front of it, without cleats on, it is not all that similar to a real rubber. When you land on a mat, there is some give. There is also a little slide - more than you would get in game conditions.
The Ringor trainers took care of some of these problems. When using a pitching mat, the cleats on the trainers do allow you to dig in more to the rubber. They also hold on landing better than sneakers. In a gymnasium, they provide enough bite on the wood floor to gain a point of impetus much better than sneakers do. It isn't perfect, just better. On landing, they also hold better. The result is a pitching motion which more closely resembles the real, on the field kind. It isn't the perfect situation but the weather here isn't perfect either. We need to throw. Sometimes that doesn't involve ideal circumstances. The Ringor trainers vastly improve those circumstances.
So that's my revelation for the day. Ringor makes some good products for use on the field and in training situations. These products are durable for pitchers. You will save money on cleats and sneakers. You may also see some side benefits which, for me, are more important. I don't necesarily recommend Ringors over Under Armor but my kid does. You don't have to listen to me and run out and buy trainers. But I'll be watching your location and looking for leapers and hoppers come springtime.Labels: parents, pitching, product reviews
Permanent Link: Use Duct Tape For Repairing Ducts
 
Throw That Changey Thingy, Girl
by Dave
Monday, September 29, 2008
I hope nobody took me too literally this past summer when I discussed "my new favorite pitch, a backdoor curveball." Despite that discussion, I still am throughly convinced that the best pitch in softball is the change-up. I've never seen a good change-up hit particularly well. I've seen plenty of bad ones drilled but those are bad ones in which the pitcher slowed her arm down, otherwise tipped it, or just did not have enough of a speed differential betwen her change and her other pitches. I've never seen a good to very good change-up hit well. Yet, all too often this pitch is ignored in favor of something more complicated, more sexy.
Early on, everyone is after speed. Pitchers learn proper mechanics and then set off practicing so as to get the pitch speed up as high as possible. Then they learn a change-up and during practice sessions, for every 90-95 fastballs, maybe, 5 to 10 changes are worked in. The result is many pitchers can throw the fastball, some even where they want it, but very few have a change-up which is anything more than a junk pitch. They can't throw it for a strike more than perhaps once out of ten times. And batters quickly learn to lay off of it.
The pitcher builds her speed up and if she is good, she begins to feel as if she can throw the ball past a lot of hitters. At 10U maybe she can. At 12U, that's harder to do. By 14U, she begins to realize that anybody can hit a fastball no matter how fast she throws it.
This has not always been the case. Years ago, some pitchers were able to get by just throwing hard. But as time has worn on, smart coaches have figured out how to turn the jugs machine up to 55, 60, 65. A winter spent hitting pitches five miles per hour faster than 95% of what you'll see during tournament season is now pretty common.
The dominant 10U pitcher works up to 50, a few higher. And many of the batters she faces will be overwhelmed by that. They are neither strong enough nor experienced enough to hit a really fast pitch. But by 12, many girls are in their 2nd, 3rd or 4th year of travel ball, have had at least one coach who wasn't afraid of turning up the pitch speed during the winter, and have matured enough to deal with anything reasonably fast. A few monster girls hit 55 or up and overpower lots of girls but in higher level tournaments, teams can deal with even these speeds.
By 14U, most girls have developed the musculature to turn anything fast around. There are certainly some teams which will fold like a cheap suit on anything close to 55-60. But such teams become increasingly rare. You can get by a game or two with a very fast pitcher but eventually, by your third game, you are going to run into a team which has no trouble hitting it. By 16U, it is relatively rare to find any team which cannot hit almost any fastball.
Moving back to the young pitcher. She builds her speed so as to be at the top of her class. Then she learns a change-up but doesn't pay enough attention to it. Then she learns one of the movement pitches and the change goes to the back burner. In any given 100 pitch practice sequence, she might throw 50-60 fastballs, 30-40 movement pitches, and a scant 10 changes. The result is a fastball which is pretty good, can be located and with good speed; a movement pitch which can be put into the strike zone; and a change-up which can only be thrown for a strike twice out of ten game tries. Again, batters learn to take their lumps and lay off the change.
As time moves rapidly forward, the pitcher learns yet another movement pitch and still keeps her change on the back burner. It never really got the attention it deserved before the new love, the movement pitch, came into her life. She gets batters out by mixing the fastball, located well, with her movement pitch and only throws the change in odd moments. But now she has a new movement pitch which takes up another twenty to twenty five percent of her pitching practice. So perhaps she goes fastball-drop-curve-change in a practice mix of 40-25-25-10. She plows through competition with her drop and new curve while using the fastball far less frequently and mixing in the change-up only when she has absolutely no other choice. If, by this time, she can land 30% to 50% of her changes, she'll probably use one mostly when the count is 0-2 or 1-2. Then it goes to the back of the line until the next time she is way ahead in the count.
The result of such a practice is, eventually, the pitcher becomes fairly patterned. She only throws her change on 2 strike counts. Batters start looking for it then. They struggle against her curve and drop but she almost never throws the fastball. Their only chance is to hit the change and they come to realize that they can sit on it 0-2, 1-2. Sometimes they won't get a change, sometimes they will. Then somebody takes one of those changes and drills it which takes the pitcher's confidence in the pitch down another peg. But no matter, she's working on a riseball or screwball now. She doesn't need the change. She doesn't throw it well anyways. And she doesn't want to give up another homerun, not today.
So now, maybe the 14 year old pitcher has 5 or 6 pitches including the seldom used fastball and the not very good change-up. She throws entire games using just her 3 or 4 movement pitches. But as girls get older, they learn to deal with the curve and drop. They look to see whether the pitcher is throwing her screw today. They begin trying to figure out the pitcher and since everything comes in at pretty much the same speed, it isn't that hard. The pitcher struggles at 18U or in her first year or two of varsity ball. She works all her pitches very hard but just cannot seem to get any better. The typical practice mix now is 15% fastballs - just to warm-up, 80% movement pitches, and 5% change-ups thrown in for good measure and because her work habits have always included throwing a few changes.
She has missed the real opportunity to totally confuse batters. Batters don't deal well with a change-up unless they are sitting on it. If a pitcher never throws her change, due to lack of confidence, as a first pitch or at other times when the count isn't 0-2 or 1-2, batters don't look for it and instead focus in on a smaller selection of movement pitches. That makes guessing quite a bit easier. And when the count goes 0-2, they sit on the change. The pitcher should have a big advantage on 0-2 but if she pulls out her change-up frequently then, that advantage is completely lost. The batter expects a change, watches to see if the incoming pitch looks like it is going to be a strike, and then if it is a change-up in the zone, they typically hit it pretty hard. The result is the pitcher loses what little confidence she might have had and laments the fact that she doesn't have a better change.
The question is, how can we avoid this scenario. The answer is, as soon as a pitcher has some degree of control over a reasonably fast, mechanically right fastball, start working the change. And work it the same way you did the fastball. Instead of the mix of 90-10, how about something different? How about something novel? Why not split your pitching practice 50-50? That is, in 100 pitches, warm up the fastball for say 20, then throw 30 to locations, but then work on change-ups for the remaining half of your time. Get to where the fastball is at least 80% as predictable as your fastball. Be able to throw it for a strike almost as frequently as the fastball and then start locating it where you want.
It isn't as if working on the change-up is going to take something away from your fastball. It isn't going to slow you down. And having a good change-up is actually going to make your fastball lots more effective. All those girls who hit really fast pitches during the winter are going to get a little annoyed when you make them look silly, lunging for pitches which haven't crossed the halfway point to home. They are going to try to adjust. And when you throw your next fastball, they are going to struggle to catch up because you cannot both sit on a change and drive the fastball.
Of course, this requires come crafty use of the change in games. The pitcher is going to have to throw some on 0-0, many on 1-0, 0-1, fewer on 0-2, and perhaps some even when she is down in the count 2-0, 2-1, 3-1 even 3-2. I would advise using the change-up only sparingly on 3-0 as it is possible a girl will be back on her heels, taking and then when she sees something she can tear into, she may be ready enough to drive it. But almost every other count is OK time for changes. Just don't get patterned in your usage.
I remember a coach coming up to congratulate me on my pitch calls. The reason he was so impressed was because I called change-ups on non-two strike counts and because I seldom called them on two strike counts. Big deal! It was hardly brain surgery. The whole idea of throwing the chnage on 0-2 comes from the notion that the batter is either going to take it as soon as she recognizes or otherwise won't be able to hit it. So, you throw the change to the tensed up batter and she strikes out. But I don't see the difference between doing that and using the change 0-1, pushing the count to 0-2 and then throwing something fast past her because her timing is now way off.
I also like the first pitch change-up, especially if it can be landed fairly predictably. That doesn't mean 100% or even 70%. If you throw 50% of your first pitch fastballs for strikes, the same criteria applies to changes. And if you;ve been practicing the way I suggest, you should have about the same accuracy with the change as you have with the fastball. Choosing between fastball and change shouldn't be any more complicated than choosing location. You thorw fastball in, then out, you throw change out and then maybe a little further out. You can go inside but you've got to have the thing below the zone, far inside, or both. What you shouldn't do, once you get the change-up to similar accuracy with the fastball is, you shouldn't treat it like something odd or special. It is just one of your (two) pitches. Mix it in.
As the pitcher ages and learn one or more movement pitches, she will hopefully continue to make time for the change. A practice 100 might look like 15-20 fastballs just to loosen up with a few for location purposes, 25-30 changes, 25-30 movement #1, 25-30 movement #2. In short, keep your change as well tuned as your other pitches. And of course, when it comes time for games, mix it in.
I was having a conversation with a catcher who was learning to call pitches. She was working with a pitcher who had 3 pitches that were working very effectively aside from the change. The pitcher also had two pitches which were not p[articularly reliabel yet. I had previously told her I didn't want her to call the fastball more than a couple times per inning, certainly never twice on the same batter. I told her I wanted to see more change-ups called. I think my precise words were, "you have to work in a change like any other pitch." She replied "do you mean once an inning?" I said, "no, once a batter." I told her I didn;t mean she had to work a change into every batter but she should call it like any of the other pitches she routinely called. She didn;t like that but I stayed on her until she would call the change for any batter in almost any count.
This brings up a couple corollaries which I don't really have time to dig deeply into. But let's just say that, yes, you do need to allow catchers to call pitches and you do need to coach them through this.
Too many coaches call all the pitches in softball. In baseball, it is far more common for the catcher to call the game or most of it. We consider this an important skill for a baseball catcher to possess. And when we switch over to our daughter's games, we call everything and turn the catcher into an extension of the backstop.
Also, when a catcher is first calling a game, too often we just let her (or him) go on their merry way. Now you're calling the pitches. Good luck! It doesn't have to be that way. It shouldn't be that way. You let the catcher ease into calling pitches by sharing the responsibility. And, if you don't like a pitch she called, talk to her about why. Teach her to call the game. Many catchers will call for pitches which give them something they are looking for. They look for something they know they can catch on 0-2 so they don't have to fumble around and then make the throw to first. When a runner is on first or second, they look for pitches they can use to throw out the runner. A catcher left to her own devices will often call the first pitch with a runner on base as a high outside fastball. She won't call for a change-up because it makes her job harder. Coaches need to recognize that and make appropriate adjustments.
A overheard a pitching coach asking his charges how many change-ups they threw in games. One girl volunteered "20" our of an approximately 100 pitch outing. The coach asked how many of those were hit hard. The girl said something like one. The coach then asked how many fastballs she thought she had thrown. She said the remaining 80. He asked how many of those were hit hard and the girl replied, I think, about 8. So, he said, "what does that tell you?" The girl loooked back confused so he helped her out. He said, "if 1 out of 20 change-ups were hit, that's 5 percent , and if 8 out of 80 fastball were hit, that's 10 percent. So what you needed to do to have less balls hit is throw more change-ups." I think that about sums it up.
So philosophically speaking, the change-up is my real favorite pitch. I believe I should see more of them used in games. But any old change-up will not do. There are a couple of things to remember about your change-up.
First of all the motion you use when throwing it must be very similar to what you use for other pitches. You must deceive the batter into thinking you are throwing something else. This takes lots of practice, someone with good eyes watching you while you practice, and, preferably, good instruction on how to throw it.
Secondly, a change-up cannot just be slower than other pitches. It has to be a lot slower. The bottom speed differential has to be at least 10 mph. As your speed goes up, the difference should be greater. If a kid is throwing 50, the change needs to be at 40 or below. If she is throwing 55, 42 is a nice number. If she's up to the sixties, a 15 mph differential would be about right.
Third, anything which tips the hitter should be avoided. You can't accomplish the diminished speed by slowing your arm down. The grip and the last ten percent of your motion is how you slow the thing down. Whereas a fastball is snapped, and each of the other pitches you throw similarly involve dramatic wrist motion, the change-up usually has something all its own. There are variants which involve a dramatic snap like the backhand change you may have have seen Taryn Mowatt throw. Some involve no wrist snap at all where the pitcher's arm is stopped by her side and she only pretends to follow-through after she has released the pitch. Others involve wrist motions which copy those of other pitches but, again, are not used to move the ball. For example, one change-up variant mimicks the wrist movement of an overhand curveball but does not use that snap before the ball is released. Still, to the batter, it appears at least subliminally, that a curveball is inbound.
There are many different grips I have seen used to throw changes. I can't go over all of them here. It should be sufficient to say that many of these grips are intended to either remind the pitcher that she is throwing a change - not to snap - or to prevent her from being able to snap the thing. Usually the ball is placed deep in the hand, off the finger tips. Sometimes the finger tips are placed so they can't get any bite on the seams. Sometimes a knuckle or two is employed in the style of a knuckleball although the object is not to get a true knuckleball. Sometimes, the old stand-by, "OK grip" is employed. In any event, the grip and how the pitch is completed are usually the manner in which the pitch is slowed. Any slowing down the arm speed to reduce ball speed is a cheap imitation of a change-up. It is the biggest tip off to the batter and should be avoided at all costs.
I can't emphasize this point enough. Of all the change-ups I have seen at all levels, the most common mistake is to slow the arm down. The batter can see your arm slowing down. And, in doing this, other body reactions tip the batter even further. A pitcher who has performed her usual arm circle for 50%, 60%, 75% of the cycle and then slows down dramatically is going to give all sorts of body posture clues to the hitter. She'll lean forward, stumble, etc. And the batter will know exactly what is coming next.
Fourth, location is at least as important on a change-up as it is for other pitches. You wouldn't throw your curveball so that it breaks over the middle of the plate. You wouldn't throw your drop ball so that it break from the numbers down to the belt. You wouldn't throw a rise so that it comes across the plate at the belly-button. Don't throw your change-up exactly to the wrong spot.
The place you don't want to throw the change is up in the batter's eyes, especially in from center of the plate. Batter's have an easier time seeing a change-up thrown high. They also find it easier to get their hands to one thrown inside. If you are going up, you want to be out. If you are coming in, you want to be down. Most of the time, you are safest throwing it outside but that doesn't mean it can never be right over the middle, though down, or somewhat inside.
If I were practicing a pitcher on her change, I would make sure she could throw it outside and low for a strike before moving to other target areas. Then I would want her to be able to hit it right below the knees (down to the ankles) in the center. Then I would work alternately outside and inside off the plate in each direction by 6 inches.
The ideal change comes at the batter as if it is going to be a strike at the belt or knees. Then it drops out of the zone. A change that is not all that effective, particularly at older ages is one with a hump on it. In other words, I want you to learn not to throw the change so that it rises up to about the top of the batter's head and then sinks down to her mid-thigh. I think this becomes too easy of a target and this is maybe the second most common mistake I've seen. As batters get better at hitting changes - they never get really good - they learn to deal with any sort of hump-backed change first. On the other hand, if the thing looks fat until it gets to within 15 feet of home and then drops to just below the knee, the batter is probably going to swing at it. If she lays off, it is still probably going to be a strike.
So we've talked a bit about how many girls throw hard and few are capable fo throwing slow at will - using the change effectively. We've also recognized that batters work hard to be able to catch up to any speed a human being can throw. Still they struggle to adjust between very fast and very slow. I hope you recognjize the need for a good change-up. I also hope you will agree with me that the pitch needs a lot of repetition in practice - as much as any other pitch. I hope you can work in an appropriate percentage. The thing needs to get exercised in games - frequently. If you want to know how much to use it, the best I can tell you is, probably more than you think you should. All this assumes you have a change which is deceptive, is much slower than your other pitches, and can be located pretty well. If you've got all thease things together, well, you've really got yourself something. You've got yourself maybe the best pitch you'll ever need. You've made yourself loads more effective.Labels: pitching
Permanent Link: Throw That Changey Thingy, Girl
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