A New Generation, A Better Way to Pitch

A couple of weeks ago I worked with one of the nation’s top high school pitchers. She has already signed to pitch for one of the nation’s premier D1 softball programs. After watching her on the mound a few minutes, I learned she has extremely high goals, so I suggested a couple of major, and I mean major, changes. Expecting a lot of resistance, it was so refreshing to see her get excited, saying she felt these things would allow her to reach her true potential. She was very relieved that someone could finally explain why she was stuck and how she could take it to the next level.
That says a lot about how she became one of the nation’s best. She was not satisfied with the status quo. Over the course of a weekend, we unleashed a total beast, with speed and movement that made it almost impossible for her catcher to handle at times…a catcher who has been with her since rec ball.
During the same event, we worked with a high school sophomore who thought her career was over. She had no hopes of college softball, but I explained that she could be one of the great ones, and that the things holding her back were things she had been taught. I watched the kid blossom and, over the next three days, she was pushing the kid we mentioned above.
In less than 2 years well over 75 of my kids have been accepted to pitch in D1 colleges. The vast majority of these D1’s were kids who were taught in traditional fashion. Most were either injured or had hit a plateau and came looking for help. It took an average of just 10 months from the time we started with them until they received their scholarships. Most were complete turnarounds. What did they have in common? They brought three things to us:
1-An open mind.
2-A huge work ethic.
3-Enthusiasm to develop body awareness for the first time.
As we introduce very unconventional concepts, parents are often resistant for a moment. They don’t want to feel they have been wasting their money in the past or that they have taken their daughters in the wrong direction. We try to get their minds off those concerns so they can relax and see the results for themselves. In just a few minutes they are fully on board and the reluctance is replaced by enthusiasm and hope. For the first time their daughter knows exactly how the hips should feel when they pitch, how the shoulders should feel, and what causes the ball to come exploding out of the hand in a way that defies logic.
For the first time these parents begin to question the antiquated approach that starts with wrist snaps and K or T drills…drills that have been the Holy Grail to so many, yet so few can even explain the rationale or, worse yet, have no concept of the negative consequences they have on a kid’s form. They just do it because it has always been done. If these people were in charge of hitting we would still be swinging wooden bats. All of this goes a long way toward explaining why College World Series scores used to be 1-0, but now they are often 10-9. Hitters have gotten better while pitchers are going the other way. It also explains why, last year, over 45-percent of all D1 college pitchers suffered a significant lost-time injury.
So many people are stuck in the past because changing would mean would actually have to learn something new, to think in new ways, and many are simply threatened by things they don’t understand.
They leave in their wake a lot of kids, frustrated with tired old approaches to things as simple as glove swim, dragging the back foot heavily, leaning, turning the foot, injuries, and way too much tension in a movement that should be almost artistic. All of these things should be fixed in the first 10 minutes, but few people have a clue and try to fix symptoms instead of seeing the real problem and addressing it. Yes, problems that simple should be fixed in ten minutes or something is very wrong.
But, a new group of Instructors is emerging and we are proud to be surrounded by them. They are changing pitching and the results are showing across the country.
This is my open invitation to people like that, especially former college pitchers and players, to join us as we continue this search for ever-better ways to help these kids succeed. Our record at this point is unchallenged, and we want more people who can push us to continually get better. Contact me at TincherPitching@aol.com