Drop and Drive

i drop and drive and it seems like 4 out of 5 college coaches dont like the fact that i do it. disadvantage, its easy to miss up in the zone if your arm is lagging at all.

quote:

Originally posted by LIONS10:
i drop and drive and it seems like 4 out of 5 college coaches dont like the fact that i do it. disadvantage, its easy to miss up in the zone if your arm is lagging at all.

Don't be fooled by "myths" of drop-drive deliveries. Having a late arm at solid foot plant is a problem most of the time with any delivery.

The major problem with being low to the ground in a drop-drive scenario is rotating the pelvis around the leading hip...the lower you go, the more difficult/physically demanding it is.

Two excellent observations, cap.

bpw, there are also smaller guys like Pedro who don't use drop & drive.

I wouldn't recommend dropping and driving. What I would recommend is to focus on being as explosive as possible. Push the rubber to 2nd base.

Pitching is an explosive movement. If you look at any pitcher, their back leg is going to have some flex to it as they start to move towards home plate. It'd be hard to be explosive on a leg that didn't have any flex to it. Your stride length would be like 12 inches. (Not exactly, but you see my point?).

Try it, go somewhere with some room, and try moving to the side as quick as possible without bending your back leg at all. It's not as good as if you were to bend it right? The thing is, should people be taught how far they should bend their back leg? I don't think so. It should be a natural reaction to moving as quick as possible. Push off the back rubber as explosively as possible (push the rubber towards 2nd base) while leading with your front hip. Your body will dictate how much your knee should flex. That will see your velocity increase.

Push off the rubber ??

My kid like Seaver is a drop and drive, righty, right knee actually gets dirty from the mound. Just had a college pitcher try to convince him to change to over the top off the stiff front leg. College pitcher's reasoning is the ball is released from a higher point giving more movement and less of a flat trajectory to the plate, and potentially more velocity due to the torque off the stiff leg. At 17 I doubt he will change but it's important, especially in the winter to experiment with different things and listen to all well intentioned advice. The college pitcher also showed him a new curve ball grip, more at the ends of the fingers and it was nasty during the first experiments. One of the good things with drop and drive is that it appears those who use it in the majors have fewer injuries from some of the info I have read over the years, Seaver for instance had a remarkably injury free career.

I should have added my kids at 17 has thrown 150- 200 innings very year for the last 5 and has never had any arm injuries at all, not even a twinge unlike nearly all his teammates who throw more conventionally over the top. He has thrown as many as ten innings at a time for which I credit the lack of injury to arm care programs, knowing his own body and being willing to say when he is done, no curveballs till he was 16 and his style, the drop and drive which by the way came naturally to him from an early age.

Don't think a conclusion can be drawn about injuries with either style based on a few data points. Arm problems are far more likely to be due to mechanical flaws not related to tall & fall or drop & dive.

all you have to do is make sure your arm is up. if its not you will miss your spot high everytime.

quote:

Originally posted by XFactor:............. Push the rubber to 2nd base.

At what point do you suggest starting to push the rubber to second base?

At what point do you believe I might be talking about?

quote:

Originally posted by XFactor:
At what point do you believe I might be talking about?

If I could read your mind, I wouldn't have wasted my time asking. If you don't know or don't want to answer a direct question, just say so.

I'd do it as the first movement ala this right here, you can see as the leg moves up, he's already driving towards the plate.

Or if you're doing MP, it'd be as soon as your body gets sideways.

I hope the visual helped.

Could never recommend leaping like that.

While some things could be improved on, the speed of movement generated to get that kind of stride length, definitely showing up in the 87 MPH pitch.

That is some bad looking delivery right there. Like to se him defend a ball hit back up the middle.

That is the most ridiculous delivery I have ever seen. He should try fast ball.
I have never seen anyone jump a few feet before throwing the ball.