This is a side-by-side video analysis comparing a 10 year old’s pitching mechanics to MLB pitcher Zach Greinke so we can help the 10 year old improve his velocity,his pitching mechanics while reducing the risk of an arm injury.
If a 10 or 11 year old loves pitching, then this is the perfect age to have their pitching mechanics evaluated so that they don’t create bad habits going into the future.
When working with youth pitchers or more importantly when advising them to make changes it is very important that we do not take away their natural throwing ability. Instead we want to help improve the efficiency of how they use their body so that the body produces pitching velocity…not just the arm. The arm should be used mainly to control the ball.
Parents should be encouraged to learn how to videotape and find the common faults that not only reduce pitching velocity but add stress to the arm and increase the risk of arm injuries.
I often get calls from fathers of youth pitchers wanting to know what they should do to help their sons improve their pitching. The first thing I tell them to do is learn the basics of good pitching mechanics. This will not only help them to become their son’s instructor but will allow them to evaluate a pitching instructor in the event they decide to hire one.
Another consideration with kids at this age is to encourage them to begin a full-body strength and conditioning program with emphasis on building in stabilization strength along with speed of movement under control…since pitching is a full body and a very explosive action.
The explosive nature of pitching must be practiced at an early age. Those who wait until high school may find it is too late as the body learns motor skills and speed between the ages of 9 and 13.
So parents should make it part of practice bullpens to work on improving explosiveness and speed of movement down the mound.
During these practice bullpen session when parents or coaches are helping youth pitchers to improve mechanics, they should get very familiar with videotaping whether using a camcorder, a phone or a tablet. The reason being is that studies have proven that accurate feedback from pitching is required in order to help pitchers improve. Using only oral feedback is far less effective and will not increase learning the way feedback from video will.
Below is a video analysis between a 10 year old pitcher and Los Angeles Dodgers right-handed starting pitcher Zack Greinke.
This is designed to be instructive for parents of youth pitchers who would like to know what they should focus on when trying to help their son’s improving their pitching mechanics, their pitching velocity while reducing the risk of arm injuries since nearly 50% of youth and high school pitchers pitch with pain every year.
The boy on the left is a boy by the name of Blake. He’s one of our members. He is 10 years old, and Blake throws about 60-62 miles an hour. His pitching velocity is well above average for youth pitcher.
One of the things that we talk about continuously is how important it is for improving pitching mechanics and velocity is to work on fixing the beginning… because what happens at the end of the delivery is a result of how the pitcher starts.
So most of the time, whether it’s youth or high school pitchers, we end up fixing the beginning…showing pitchers how to initially start to make their move toward the plate from a good, stable position.
Once they’re able to do that, then that changes everything that happens at landing.
So during this analysis I’m going to talk about what I would recommend Blake’s dad does to improve his pitching mechanics in order to make him even more effective than he is right now.
Any pitcher at 10 year old who is throwing 60 mph or above must be doing many things right. So I will not try to change Blake’s natural pitching style but rather the timing of how he uses his body to produce and transfer forces so more of those forces end up on the ball.
In this position, both Greinke and Blake synced up at hand break. It appears that they are both in a pretty good position to start shifting their weight toward the plate.
It’s Important To Position All The Weight Over The Back Leg
One thing you want to try to keep in mind when you’re working out of the set position is, we want to make sure that all the weight is positioned over the back leg.
In order to maximize pitching velocity, momentum and force production, it is important to position the pitcher’s body as far away from the plate as possible.Then once the pitcher shifts his weight, he will be able to maximize his forward momentum and thus create more energy to transfer to his trunk at landing. This will help his trunk whip his arm through faster.
In the case of Greinke, you can see that if he had his head turned and facing the plate, that his nose would be positioned over his bellybutton or center of gravity.
Blake, our 10 year old youth pitcher is in a similar position, but he’s a little bit further forward than Greinke, so what I’d recommend is make sure that he feels all the weight sitting over his back leg. I notice he’s got his foot positioned up on the rubber. I’d would recommend putting that foot down next to the rubber, so he can use that rubber to develop push and leg drive.
How To Recognize Collapsing Of The Back Leg
Let’s see what happens when they both take the ball out of the glove. Notice what happens after they break their hands. You can see where Blake has started to sink down a little bit. You’re able to see that a little bit better from the back angle, but you can see where he’s sinking down first.
Zach Greinke on the other hand stays in a good, stable position as he starts to move forward. If we continue forward, we can see that Greinke works on extending his back leg.
Because Blake collapses his back leg, he’s got to go into early hip rotation, so he’s going to start to rotate and turn his lower body too early. Notice his front foot turning toward the plate while Greinke continues to move sideways…with no turning until landing.
For maximizing pitching velocity, you want to make sure that the back leg is stable, doesn’t collapse. Collapsing meaning that the knee continues to move down after hand break. Collapsing has nothing to do with the amount of back leg bend.
Pitching Down The Mound Is Essentially A Lunge Movement
Pitchers actually do a lunge type movement down the mound, just like Zach Greinke in this video. You can see the difference in the back leg positioning. This is the kind of positioning you want to see right here with the back leg, where that back hip gets ahead of the back knee. The knee gets ahead of the foot, and we can see we don’t quite have that same thing here with Blake. That’s kind of a telltale sign that his back leg is collapsing and he is into early hip rotation.
Initially we want the pitcher to begin to move his front hip toward the plate, so we’re going to put a line right here, in front of Blake’s face…and the same thing with Greinke.
If I put a line right here at the front of Blake’s front hip, same thing with Greinke, what we want pitchers to do is to begin to lean the front hip toward the plate before we take the ball out of the glove… while maintaining stability with the back leg, so the back leg doesn’t collapse down.
Again, if I put that line right here with Blake, same thing with Greinke, it’s not going to be exact, but you’ll get an idea. As the hands start to move down, we want the pitcher to start to lean his front hip toward the plate. Let’s see what happens with both pitchers.
There’s the ball out of the glove, and you can see how far Greinke has moved his front hip. We can see that Blake basically is just sitting down. He hasn’t really gone anywhere. He’s actually kind of shifted back a little bit with his head. Greinke has moved this far right here and he’s moved his head that far, so you want the head to go along right with the belly button.
To Maximize Pitching Velocity Weight Shift Is One Of The Important Keys
Weight shift is the key, because we want to get the body moving toward the plate before we take the ball out of the glove. We want to build momentum with the body…the arm is along for the ride.
Now we can see that, basically, Blake and Greinke are in similar timing positions, as you can see, even though they’re positions are not exact. But notice with, Greinke, when his throwing arm is down and back, he’s already got the glove arm up to shoulder height.
You can see with Blake, he’s still got the glove arm down, so I would encourage him to get the glove arm up to shoulder height sooner. You can see when Greinke starts to get it up…when the arm is still down.
We want the glove arm up because we’re going to use that glove arm to help rotate our trunk. The faster the trunk rotates the faster the arm whips through and thus the more arm speed we create.
We can see with Blake that his throwing elbow is above the line of the shoulder. This can be stressful on the shoulder and increase the risk of arm injury.
He’s probably leaning his trunk forward a little bit and he’s getting his arm up too early. The reason he’s getting his arm up too early is because he didn’t shift his weight properly in the beginning … didn’t get momentum built up soon enough, because he wasn’t getting that front hip out there.
Moving Down The Mound Faster Means Improves Velocity
In this position Blake is coming in to landing, and yet Greinke’s already released the ball. That means that Greinke is moving faster down the mound.
You can tell the difference in what happens with speed of movement and momentum – when you shift your weight properly, you’re going to move faster down the mound, and the faster you move down the mound, with good mechanics, the faster you’re going to throw.
So with Blake we want to work on fixing his starting position. We can see here with Greinke that, at the top of his leg lift, he’s got his nose over the belly button.At the top of the leg lift with Blake, he’s a little far forward. We want to get him shifted back a little bit. Then stabilize the back leg and start to lean the hip.
The other thing I would encourage him to do is to keep the front leg bent during his stride. He’s got his front leg completely straight. You want to keep that front leg bent, because it’s a more efficient movement. We can move down the mound faster with that bent leg than a straight leg. That is just more efficient mechanics.
In this position Blake is just touching down with his front foot. That’s a pretty good position. This is touchdown for Greinke. You can see they’re in kind of a similar position, but you can see that Greinke’s glove arm is pulled down a little bit and Blake still has his glove arm up.
Now if I go one more click, this would be considered the landing position. You can see with Greinke, his glove arm elbow is sitting right about here, and Blake still has the glove arm up, so he’s not going to be able to get his trunk going as fast as Greinke. Something else you should notice and be aware of is the positioning of the elbow just before he goes into elbow extension and ball release. Can you see that his throwing elbow leads his trunk. That is more stressful on the elbow and could lead to elbow injury.
Blake is not in a bad position. You can see however that he doesn’t have quite the hip rotation that Greinke has. Notice that Greinke has the laces of his back foot turned down. Blake’s not quite there yet. Again, that’s a function of speed and movement, as well as anything.
Right here Blake’s front heel touches the mound surface. We call that the touchdown position. Then notice that the foot gets flat. What we really want to notice here is that front knee continue to drift forward? Yes it does, right until this position.
We don’t consider landing until that front leg braces up and the knee does not continue to drift forward. With Greinke…notice his front leg is braced up at landing. You’ll watch and see when I click him forward, notice that his knee does not continue to drift forward.
Some tips for Blake would be to begin to bring his glove arm down sooner so that he’s not going to go ahead and rotate that trunk too early. Right now he’s going to go into early trunk rotation. You can see right here that his front shoulder has already pulling off a little bit toward first base.
Next thing that’s going to happen is going to be trunk rotation, right there. Blake can really improve his trunk rotation speed by bringing the glove arm down sooner, being in a better position at landing, and obviously this goes back to the beginning.
In this position Greinke reaches maximum external rotation where the arm lays back to parallel.
Here Is A Telltale Sign Of Elbow Stress
After the pitcher’s arm lays back into what is referred to as maximum external rotation, the elbow extends into ball release. Notice that Blake has to lead longer with his elbow. Can you see Blake’s elbow’s out in front of his trunk before his elbow extends to ball release?
This is stressful on the elbow…and the reason that this occurs in Blake’s pitching mechanics is because he’s a little bit too far forward when he lands. You can see right there that his nose is not over his belly button.
His trunk is just too far forward. Because he’s too far forward, he’s not going to be able to use his trunk as well to get it speeded up, and you can see the position of his glove arm, as well.
Those two things are going to slow down his trunk, and that’s what gets his elbow in front of his trunk. This is something you want to look for in your youth pitchers. We see it in high school pitchers as well. It’s always an indication that the trunk is not doing what it’s supposed to do.
On the other hand, in the case of Greinke, notice that his elbow is behind the line of his trunk which means he’s letting his trunk whip the arm through. That’s what you want. You want the trunk to whip it through. Then he goes into elbow extension and ball release right there, where Blake is just one click behind. Something you want to look for.
Blake also can’t get to complete extension with his arm because he’s leading with the elbow. However, he does have a good finish.
But, all in all, any 10 year old who’s throwing 60 miles an hour, you’ve got to be very careful with what you mess with. Don’t mess with changing too much at once.
We’re talking about one or two things we’re going to mess with here. I’m going to work with him on being in a better position when he starts. I want him to start working on shifting his weight (moving toward the plate before hand-beak) and stabilizing his back leg.
As I said, the beginning takes care of the end. The other thing I’d work with him on, probably when playing catch, would be getting that glove arm up to shoulder height a little sooner, so he can use that glove arm to help rotate his trunk.
He keep the glove arm up too long and then starts bringing it down to late. Watch Greinke as he comes into touchdown. Notice the position of his glove arm. See how it’s coming down right now? If we go one more click, notice Greinke brings the glove arm down, and Blake’s still got it up here. Again, fix the beginning. Work on weight shift. Make sure the pitcher’s in a good starting position. That takes care of everything out in front.
The Back Angle Is Important When Assessing A Pitcher’s Mechanics
Let’s take a quick look at him … Blake from the back angle. Okay, guys, here are the … Greinke and Blake from the back angle, and I’ve got them synced up.
You can see where the ball’s coming out of the glove right about the same time for both pitchers. If we go back to the beginning, top of the leg, you will notice that Greinke has some bend in the back leg.
Blake, in a similar position to Greinke, should have a little bit of bend in the back leg at the top of the leg lift. His leg however is locked out. It should have a little bit of bend because you want to be in a good athletic position. Good posture. You want that good upright posture.
Let’s see what happens as he breaks his hands. Again, what are we going to have happen? As the hands start to come down, we’re shifting our weight toward the plate and we’re moving the front hip toward the target.
As Blake is moving toward the plate, we can see that he’s collapsing his back leg. You can see where he’s collapsing his back leg now.
Again, as the hands start coming down, we want to move the front hip toward the target and break the hands at the belt.
You’re going to see a lot of kids at this age that are going to break the hands too high… so you want to make sure the hand break is at the belt. Then the pitcher must stabilize the back leg. Instead you can see that Blake has sunk down just a little bit. But not too bad.
Something else I would work on is keeping the lead leg in a bent position during the stride rather than extending it out away from the body which produces a slowing action.
So I’d keep that leg bent, just like with Greinke. Again, this makes for a faster movement down the mound and is more efficient.
From the back position you can also see that Blake is not able to get his throwing arm fully extended because of being too far forward and not using his glove arm to help rotate his trunk.
I think for just 10 Blake is looking very, very good despite some needed adjustments. He’s also got a pretty good finish.
Fix Just One Mechanical Fault At A Time
Blake’s got a lot more in him and I can see he’s an athlete, so he’s probably going to continue to do well. All his dad has to do is work on those two or three things but just one thing at a time. Let me repeat…one thing at a time.
Don’t try to rush it. Take your time. You’ve got plenty of time between now and next spring to get this all fixed, and all of a sudden now you got a 10 year old who’s throwing 60, 62. Then with improvements all of a sudden he’s throwing upper 60s. Upper 60s is a heck of a lot better to pitch at, just like upper 80s is better to pitch at than low 80s.
I think Blake is doing a great job. I think his dad’s doing a great job. Just a couple of things to work on, and boy they can be having a great time next spring.
That’s another Video Analysis from pitching.com. Again, subscribe to my YouTube channel and come over to the Web site, got a lot more videos and articles over there.
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