Lower half pitching mechanics

Keep your back heel on the ground as long as you can.

shhhh... don't tell anyone.

Your knee collapses when your weight goes to the ball of your foot. Often this can lead to a weight shift towards the pitching arm side. (towards third for a righty) If you will set up with the weight on your posting leg centered in your foot, or even slightly heelward, you will be able to drive in a straighter line to the plate. You should feel the drive come from inside the socket of your posting hip, not your posting knee. This will reduce your possible tendency to drift arm side. If your are trying to drive from your posting knee, you will bend to back knee so you can push with it. I don't think this works as well.

I can't really comment on your arm path without seeing any video. Your command will improve if your drive direction becomes straighter to the plate and you are better able to maintain your posture.

Good luck,

Ted

I actually have video of a recent flatground I threw, and the flaws I was talking about before are very obvious when you watch the video. When I throw, I feel almost as if my body just wont cooperate with my mind. And what I mean by that is my mind knows what my body should should be doing, however, my body seems to get lazy and wont cooperate and causes me to have poor mechanics. If anybody has any advice about what I can do get back on track, that would be very much appreciated. Thank You! http://www.hudl.com/technique/...w/BoXu7CQM?e=3013365 

First, I am impressed with setting up, recording and posting the video on your own for feedback.  Shows an investment to improve.  I am not an expert on analyzing mechanics so I will leave that alone.  I can attest to the benefits of investing in a solid strength training program that addresses whole body compound movements, lower body power lifts and core strengthening as a means to be healthy and also to improve throwing action.  Curious, how old are you and how long you have been pitching for?  

Is your body really being lazy, or is that part of your body not strong enough to do what you want it to do?  I know nothing about pitching, but it's a thought.

First of all you are left handed. Smart decision.

I like the arm action and I recommend you do not do anything to address it directly. It is good to very good as it is. It is long and loose. Keep it. Hand break timing is about right. I do not think you need to change it.  If on you next filming session, you can get the camera directly behind you, it would help to see your direction a little better. I would also like to see you work off the mound. I wouldn't make timing assessments based off of the flat ground. You may be a little late with your arm but I do not think that is the control issue, unless you are trying to mentally adjust it as you pitch. That will not work. Just let it happen.

Do you have arm pain? I mean ever. If so, where? That would change my outlook some.

On your wind up you take a step armside and (i think) continue a slight drift in that direction as you go to the plate. This has you throwing slightly around your body and makes the exact release point more critical.

Start in the stretch for now. Use a very slight inward flex on the posting leg during setup to bury your weight in the inside arch of your posting foot. On your lift, take your knee towards you nose or your left eye (just do it the same each time). Feel some coil or tension build inside the posting hip socket? As your knee is approaching the highest point feel the outer (back) of your posting hip drive your front hip towards the mitt. It doesn't need to be max effort just a firmly directed drive toward the plate. You don't bend your knee for this drive. It comes from the tension created in your hip from the lift. You might imagine you are pushing the rubber straight towards second from the inside of your posting leg. Have the side of your landing foot glide sideways to the mitt as as long as possible. It will turn to the mitt before you land. This should get you better directed. When you move to the windup seek to get the same feeling of slight coil inside the back hip. It doesn't have to be much. We are merely trying to set your direction straight to the mitt and not allow you to drift armside. I do not feel you collapse the posting knee more or earlier than many high level pitchers.

Have you had a growth spurt lately. It can take a while for your body and brain to sync up as you are growing. What year are you?

At the end of your video you look a little disgusted. You shouldn't. You have a pretty good base to build on and you will progress a lot faster if you will allow yourself to believe this is a problem you are going to solve and can keep the "I suck!" thoughts out of your head.

Good luck and stay strong,

Ted

Could he break his hands a little earlier?  Maybe a later break causes rushing, more/quicker collapse of the leg as he tries to get his body to catch up.  It's something that is easy to try.  That'll be $75.

(...as is sit on a bucket and spit into a cup...)

I am a 2016, and I have been pitching regularly since my freshman year.

Can you film some of you throwing from the mound with the camera more behind you some and from first base side some? Where is your velo?

Here's your back heel coming up way too soon.

And your upper body doesn't coil inward at all as you move out.  Your lower has some, but not much.

Sultan, are you sure this isn't a misprint? The problem here is that the heel has barely begun to lift. At foot strike, the back heel should not only be off the ground, but the back ankle should already have turned over:

I'll be honest with you. You need a complete overhaul. There are multiple problems with your mechanics that need to be changed. However, go step by step. First, fix your lower body problem. Look at the photos above that I posted of Lincecum. These are somewhat exaggerated examples of where your upper body (and arm) need to be at the moment your front foot strikes the ground. Your hips should be as open as possible. Your back leg action impedes your hips and, as a result, the hips and upper body come around as one unit giving you absolutely no lower body involvement - you're all arm. While I haven't used the velocity belt, everything I understand about it tells me that it could help you a lot with this problem. Fix the lower body before even thinking about you upper body mechanics.

I know I reccomend Drivelines stuff a lot to people, but I believe in it so I'll do it again. Walking windups have shown to improve lower body mechanics a lot for guys I know. You dont really need the plyocare balls, you can do it a few times every time you play catch with the real baseball.

Exactly. The heel has begun to lift, and the kid just dropped his back arm.  Lincecum and other pitchers are just a fraction away from foot strike, when their back heel comes up.

If you look at faster pitchers, their hips may not be open at all.  So, I don't think this is true.

I have mentioned to you before, i think, that the rear knee turnover is the key - not the hip(s).  It's the same story in hitting.

Yes. His arm is late. By this point he should be finished with external rotation and he's just beginning it. Maybe we're basically saying the same thing, but you're not going to find a clip of a high level pitcher whose heel is still touching the ground at footstrike.

I also would have to challenge you to show me a high velocity pitcher whose hips aren't significantly opened by the time the stride foot has completely contacted the ground.

As to the hips vs. knee; here I think it may be a question of semantics. As I see it, turning the hips results in the back knee turning over. The hip drags the knee over. I'm not sure if you're saying the opposite or not; that turning the knee pushes the hips open. I see that as the same argument as "squishing the bug" because you would be teaching a symptom that can be accomplished without the correct mechanics. I think opening the hips and creating separation prior to upper body rotation is crucial to velocity and you can turn the knee over without opening the hips, but you can't pull the hips open without dragging the knee closed. I see the knee position as a checkpoint for correct hip mechanics rather than the engine for proper kinetic sequencing.

Counselor, please check the transcripts, but I don't remember saying that.

True. I think you're looking at the back heel in chorus with arm action and I'm looking at it in concert with stride action, so we may simply be looking at this from different angles. Actually, I'm also not sure it's even worth evaluating too much on lower body action considering he's pitching from flat ground.

Once you realize that the hips are not opened in hitting or pitching, then you can understand how the hips are not turning the knee.

Now I'm really lost. You don't think his hips are open?

OK, let's start over.  I was reading 'closed' and I see you were saying 'open'.

I was trying to do this and do some other things at the same time.

Give me a couple of minutes to re-read this and try to be more coherent.

Sorry. Yes, you think they're open or yes, you think they are not open?

OK. Yeah, I'll agree on that. I look at fully open as the goal, with the notion that actually getting there is rare, if even possible. We may simply have a disagreement as to what "significant" means.

OK, let's clarify 'open' and 'closed'.

To me, 'open' is facing 3B, and 'closed' is facing the batter.  (Although that's the opposite in hitting. Maybe I'm wrong here.  I don't really post much on pitching.  ) It seems that you're saying the opposite.  Let's clear that up first.

Right. I think the common terminology as that the hips start in the closed position facing 3rd base for a right-handed pitcher and then open toward the batter. If I've got that backwards than I've had a lot of embarrassing arguments over the years with people who probably actually agree with me.

Think Sultan and Root are saying virtually the same thing, however I too will caution, you can manipulate the knee whereas if you are rotating your "back" hip just prior to FFS then you will have to roll over the knee....which in my mind if done correctly makes the back knee action a result of hip activation, and a "non-teach".

I looked at the flat ground clip, and agree that he has very little / or no lower half, and upper / lower half moves in one piece.  If you fix the lower half, your upper half will likely self correct. 

I'd recommend Heavy Med ball throws with a velocity belt, and the Driveline walking wind-ups will help.  Sometimes long toss, especially distance will create the "run & gun" throws which get you the distance from the "momentum" created by the crow hop, and then does not always transfer without it.  I'd forgo the long toss for now, and work on getting the lower half activated.  Currently your hips are opening because you swing your front leg open (passive), and you need to get where your front foot remains closed, and opens as a result of your back hip rotating into foot strike.

OK, well let's use your version.

I do not think that most faster pitchers get into the 'open' position.  Most only get about halfway, much like the two Lincecum pics above.

This is the same thing that happens in hitting.

I'll agree with that statement. The only difference is that I think of almost any counterclockwise movement from the closed position as open, even if not fully there. In other words, if you're not closed, you're open. In fact, Lincecum is about the max "open" that anyone gets to. Hitting the same, but even far less so.

Lord knows I'm no expert, but here's what I think...

You can try to turn your knee, but that makes things worse/slower.

You can use your back hip to turn the knee, but that's too slow.  And the hip doesn't fully turn in time anyway.

In pitching and hitting, you extend (or triple extend, or whatever others call it) your back leg, which turns the knee, which turns the heel, and the rotating back leg turns the hip.

OK. We're really not far off at all. I see the 3x action as a lot more kinetically connected in sequence than some others and I do agree with you that this is what is happening, even if I might put the sequencing slightly different. I just feel that it at least feels more like throwing the hip and pulling the knee rather than the other way around. However, now we're getting into details so small and so insignificant in how we teach it that it's nitpicking at this point.

See, I don't think they are small.  I think the difference is huge - 3-5 mph - if you bend your knee too soon, or keep it bent too long.

And the 3X only matters for the back leg, the front does not need to be extended.

Again, I am no pitching expert, I am just trying to learn this stuff.

OP, sorry to get off on a tangent here.

I believe that too often people try to attribute the extension you talk about to particular movements when it's more of a combination. I focus more on the segmental separation that I believe is the engine behind quick upper body rotation and velocity. So, for me, I don't care as much how you get there - just that you do. Now, I fully realize that others - you and Eric Cressey for example - find the "how" more important than I do. Although, to an extent I do buy some of what Cressey believes concerning overuse of the upper torso to achieve the effect being possibly counterproductive.

It looks like you mean the same thing but are using different definitions of closed and open which might be some of the reason for the confusion. 

When I watch that video I see no separation between lower and upper body.  His left arm is bringing his back hip through - they come to the plate together.  What I think I hear you saying is that his hips should be rotated towards the plate (vs open or closed) when he begins his upper body delivery.

When I see that video it reminds me a lot of my 2016 RHP last summer and BFS's description is spot on.  He had two coaches at the time which we reduced down to one after the summer.  The focus was on eliminating the "swing" of the front foot and separating the lower half and upper half.  He did not suffer control issues but lacked velocity.  By addressing the front leg swing and working on separation (what they called it instead of closed vs open) he was able to pick up 6mph on his fastball between last summer and the spring HS season (he also got much stronger).  He still has a tendency to fall back on old habits though so it's a work in progress. 

Be careful what you're reading here.  Some of these things being put forward for you has more to do with improving velocity than command.  And what I got in your starting post is your interest in improving your command. . .right?

Therefore, I'd say you're on the right track when making an effort to have your front foot land towards home plate and keeping both feet in line with HP as much as possible.  Since your video is only flat ground work AND you didn't really set up like you would pitching to a batter, it's hard to know if you really look the same when pitching off a mound.  But, given what I see, in addition to keeping your feet in line with HP, a bit longer stride would help and maybe reaching out a little more with your throwing hand as you release the ball (Lincecum's dad used to lay a dollar bill out in front of his landing foot for him to reach out to pick up, which was a key exercise for him and his command).  I don't see any issue with your back knee unless you really feel a weakness there and in that case conditioning your legs to make them stronger, which is all I feel you might need for that).

In your case, I see potential for more velocity by getting some rotation in hips and shoulders.  Rather than me trying to explain that in detail, just look closely at few MLB pitcher videos and notice what they have in common along this line.  Then try to emulate it.  If you've got some core strength and flexibility, I feel you'll find quite a bit more velocity.

Wish you the very best and hope it all comes together in this important upcoming season.

PS:  here's a video of Timmy . . .   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrdHEOJvLf8