pitching inside

BB,

Not really answering the question - but I would guess that 90% of the guys Maddux hit - he meant to hit.

I wasn't around during the time when Koufax pitched, but from what my dad and his friends say, "no one was better."

Maybe it's also the fact that Koufax was a power pitcher that caused him to have more WP and BB. The HBP obviously sums up his quote, even Maddux, one of the softest throwers in the game, throws inside. Koufax could have just perfected it, or maybe the batters really were that intimidated and moved off the plate. Who knows?

ha, ya, maybe it's kind of like what J H is saying, if Maddux throws one at you, you take it and get a free base. If Koufax throws one at you...you get the hell out of the way and live for at least 1 more pitch.

Can't say about the earlier part of his career. But he did go inside the last several years.

Very interesting stat, bbs.

Drysdale & other teammates have stated that Koufax almost never intentionally plunked anyone. That might explain some of it, but probably not all.

Koufax was plagued by wildness early in his career, but he gained pinpoint control after a few years and that's when he became the dominant pitcher most remember. Take those stats and break them down year by year, and you'll see that at one point he clearly turned a corner.

Koufax likely didn't hit many because he was a lefty, meaning the angle of his pitch was such that it came in from a right-handed batter's away side. And while his fastball was excellent, his curve and slider were what made him devastating -- not the kinds of pitches you'd expect to hit a lefty with. And the downward action is also not associated with hitting guys, righty or lefty.

Maddux hits guys with some regularity for a couple of reasons. For one, he needs to move guys off the plate in order to capture the outside corner. Sometimes this is intentional -- not necessarily intentionally hitting a guy, but intentionally moving him off the plate and being willing to risk hitting him if that should happen.

For another, he relies tremendously on side-to-side movement of his fastball. It's not unusual to see him start the ball over the plate and run it in to the right-handed batter. If the batter is diving out over the plate he'll get plunked. To lefties, he likes to throw the ball right at them and have it tail back over the inside corner. Once in a while it doesn't tail. So sometimes he's intentionally brushing them back, other times it's just a pitch he needs to establish but it gets away. Even the best are not perfect every pitch.

Koufax had dominating stuff, especially for his era, and didn't need much help to put fear into people. Maddux is less dominating, so he has to remind folks that he can still hurt them if they don't respect him.

A final point: You didn't see the batters diving over the plate in Koufax's era like they do today. Most of them weren't even wearing helmets. Today, you've got Barry Bonds wearing armor on his lead arm and hanging all over the strike zone. You'd better believe that in the Koufax and Drysdale era, Bonds would have learned to hit with a different style -- if he valued his life.

quote:

Originally posted by Midlo Dad:
Koufax was plagued by wildness early in his career, but he gained pinpoint control after a few years...

After he took a few MPH off of his FB.

I saw an interview with Koufax and he said early in his career he was having trouble with his control. the advice he was given, and took, was to throw his fastball with about 85% effort, sort of like a second serve in tennis... he said after that it was night and day.. he had his control and dominated.
I do think you'd have a hard time convincing the hitters he dominated that he was throwing less than 100% .... but it was a very interesting interview.
It's snowing like a son of a gun out right now...
I wonder if that big lottery winner of the other day would like to build a dome here at my school

quote:

Originally posted by trojan-skipper:
I saw an interview with Koufax and he said early in his career he was having trouble with his control. the advice he was given, and took, was to throw his fastball with about 85% effort, sort of like a second serve in tennis... he said after that it was night and day.. he had his control and dominated.
I do think you'd have a hard time convincing the hitters he dominated that he was throwing less than 100% .... but it was a very interesting interview.

I gotta be careful here because I don’t want to start a war, so please hear me out before ya’ll get too angry.

I’d heard that too, and had the opportunity to talk about it with a very very close personal friend of Koufax’s , who was also the Dodgers pitching coach for 12 years.

He said that although Koufax had retires before he took over the PC duties and couldn’t say for sure, what was said was probably slightly misunderstood, and he got me to understand this way.

Assuming that Koufax had his greatest success throwing his FB at 95mph, which is by all estimates on the low side, that would mean his “A” or 100% FB would have to be at least 112mph, and that’s flat out impossible. But, as he further explained, too often people think that the 85% effort translated straight across to an 85% reduction in velocity, but that wasn’t at all what was meant.

He went on to say that even in the late 30’s when he’d started his pro career, it was very common for coaches to tell pitchers to not to try too hard. What they were talking about was, when someone gets all amped up to give something “everything he’s got”, usually the result is, all the muscles get all tightened up, thus becoming less flexible, and that’s a bad thing. What ends up happening is, rather than throwing harder, many times they actually don’t throw as hard as they can.

So chances are, what was meant is, he just relaxed and didn’t try to throw the ball through the side of a battleship, and by doing that, he stayed “loose”, and was able to control the ball much better. Sure, he might have dropped from maybe 100 to 96 or 97, but that’s only a 3-4% loss which was more than made up for by what probably was a 15-20% improvement in command.

OK, now you can get mad at me!

bbscout,

This seems like a good place to ask you about how you see a P’s ability to control a ball. I have to be honest and say I don’t think P’s are nearly as accurate as what most people think they are, and hearing someone say, “that P is really hitting his spots”, really pushes one of my hot buttons.

I’ve always used the C’s mitt as the primary means of judging accuracy of a pitch. I figger that if a P can get any part of the ball to touch any part of the glove if it wasn’t moved, that’s pretty darned good. And, if the P can do that with the pitch he has his best command with, anywhere from 60% up, he’s a spot on accurate son of a gun!

I know everyone will have their own idea about a P’s true accuracy, but what would you say is yours?

quote:

Originally posted by Scorekeeper:

I’ve always used the C’s mitt as the primary means of judging accuracy of a pitch. I figger that if a P can get any part of the ball to touch any part of the glove if it wasn’t moved, that’s pretty darned good. And, if the P can do that with the pitch he has his best command with, anywhere from 60% up, he’s a spot on accurate son of a gun!

Scorekeeper - Doesn't this presume the catchers glove is necessarily the pitcher's target on that pitch?? Maybe my son has been doing it all wrong, but on days he has his best control he's zinging it inside, dropping it on the plate and cutting the outside edge. He often "aims" for a catcher's knee or shoulder,... or the top of his head. I can tell if he's on because he'll keep hitting those spots over and over. If he's off, he's more likely to land only at the glove (and blast a couple into the dirt or backstop).

Scorekeep:
I hear ya. I'm just saying what he said in the interview. Of course it wasn't 85% of the velocity or he'd have thrown nothing but changeups... I do try using that cue with some of my pitchers... but I must admit; i've never had one turn into Sandy Koufax on me.

quote:

Originally posted by Scorekeeper:

quote:

Originally posted by trojan-skipper:
I saw an interview with Koufax and he said early in his career he was having trouble with his control. the advice he was given, and took, was to throw his fastball with about 85% effort, sort of like a second serve in tennis... he said after that it was night and day.. he had his control and dominated.
I do think you'd have a hard time convincing the hitters he dominated that he was throwing less than 100% .... but it was a very interesting interview.

I gotta be careful here because I don’t want to start a war, so please hear me out before ya’ll get too angry.

I’d heard that too, and had the opportunity to talk about it with a very very close personal friend of Koufax’s , who was also the Dodgers pitching coach for 12 years.

He said that although Koufax had retires before he took over the PC duties and couldn’t say for sure, what was said was probably slightly misunderstood, and he got me to understand this way.

Assuming that Koufax had his greatest success throwing his FB at 95mph, which is by all estimates on the low side, that would mean his “A” or 100% FB would have to be at least 112mph, and that’s flat out impossible. But, as he further explained, too often people think that the 85% effort translated straight across to an 85% reduction in velocity, but that wasn’t at all what was meant.

He went on to say that even in the late 30’s when he’d started his pro career, it was very common for coaches to tell pitchers to not to try too hard. What they were talking about was, when someone gets all amped up to give something “everything he’s got”, usually the result is, all the muscles get all tightened up, thus becoming less flexible, and that’s a bad thing. What ends up happening is, rather than throwing harder, many times they actually don’t throw as hard as they can.

So chances are, what was meant is, he just relaxed and didn’t try to throw the ball through the side of a battleship, and by doing that, he stayed “loose”, and was able to control the ball much better. Sure, he might have dropped from maybe 100 to 96 or 97, but that’s only a 3-4% loss which was more than made up for by what probably was a 15-20% improvement in command.

OK, now you can get mad at me!

Red Adams was right on.

The advice to dial it back a notch is usually attributed to catcher John Roseboro, a legend for his handling of pitchers. But I agree, relaxing and letting it flow smoothly does not mean losing velocity. Often the velocity is the same or even better. I don't know that any actual drop off in velocity for Koufax was ever documented. And because he had to retire young (due to a circulatory problem in his pitching hand), he never reached the later years when his velocity would have tapered off due to the simple effects of aging.

quote:

Originally posted by Scorekeeper:
bbscout,

This seems like a good place to ask you about how you see a P’s ability to control a ball. I have to be honest and say I don’t think P’s are nearly as accurate as what most people think they are, and hearing someone say, “that P is really hitting his spots”, really pushes one of my hot buttons.

I’ve always used the C’s mitt as the primary means of judging accuracy of a pitch. I figger that if a P can get any part of the ball to touch any part of the glove if it wasn’t moved, that’s pretty darned good. And, if the P can do that with the pitch he has his best command with, anywhere from 60% up, he’s a spot on accurate son of a gun!

I know everyone will have their own idea about a P’s true accuracy, but what would you say is yours?

As 2008 Beebe noted,many pitchers (myself included) use targets other than the glove. Rather than arguing with my catcher, I would use his feet, knees, shoulders, mask and even home plate as targets when pitching, because many times young catchers just put the glove over the middle of the plate, or they ask for a pitch in an area that you don't want to throw it. As far as grading accuracy, I use two grades, one for control and one for command. Control is the ability to throw the ball over the plate for a strike. Command is the ability to hit a specific spot with the ball.

The gold standard for command is Greg Maddux. In his prime, he might go 4-5 innings and never miss a spot and at times would go 9 innings and miss his spot maybe 4-5 times. There are no HS kids who can do this......in fact, there are only a few big leaguers who can do this. There are many pitchers who can throw the ball over the plate consistantly though.

There are many reasons for using different targets, but writing about it would take too many pages.

quote:

Originally posted by 2008 Beebe:
Scorekeeper - Doesn't this presume the catchers glove is necessarily the pitcher's target on that pitch?? Maybe my son has been doing it all wrong, but on days he has his best control he's zinging it inside, dropping it on the plate and cutting the outside edge. He often "aims" for a catcher's knee or shoulder,... or the top of his head. I can tell if he's on because he'll keep hitting those spots over and over. If he's off, he's more likely to land only at the glove (and blast a couple into the dirt or backstop).

Yes it does make that presumption. And you’re correct that not every pitch is aimed for the center of the mitt. But that’s why I use the entire glove, plus another 5” outside of it in every direction. Now your talking about a circle over 20” in diameter! From 60’ away, a 22” circle will pretty much blot out the C’s upper trunk.

Now I don’t know about today’s C’s, but I had P’s aiming at everything from shoulders to knee guards too, but certainly not on every pitch. ;-) In general, a P is taught to pick up the glove as a target, and I think in general, they’re trying to hit it.

It really all a big guess and I understand that. Until someone figgers out how to actually read the brain patterns of a P and be able to translate it into an actual target, no one can really ever know for sure.

quote:

Originally posted by Scorekeeper:
Until someone figgers out how to actually read the brain patterns of a P and be able to translate it into an actual target, no one can really ever know for sure.

And he ain't telling!

quote:

Originally posted by bbscout:
As 2008 Beebe noted,many pitchers (myself included) use targets other than the glove. Rather than arguing with my catcher, I would use his feet, knees, shoulders, mask and even home plate as targets when pitching, because many times young catchers just put the glove over the middle of the plate, or they ask for a pitch in an area that you don't want to throw it. As far as grading accuracy, I use two grades, one for control and one for command. Control is the ability to throw the ball over the plate for a strike. Command is the ability to hit a specific spot with the ball.

The gold standard for command is Greeg Maddux. In his prime, he might go 4-5 innings and never miss a spot and at times would go 9 innings and miss his spot maybe 4-5 times. There are no HS kids who can do this......in fact, there are only a few big leaguers who can do this. There are many pitchers who can throw the ball over the plate consistantly though.

There are many reasons for using different targets, but writing about it would take too many pages.

Nice explanation for the difference between command and control. Most people use the words interchangeably, but shouldn’t. I try to be careful about it, but often use them incorrectly too.

I guess part of what irritates me is that there’s no way anyone other than the P can possibly know precisely what he’s aiming at, but people insist they do. When I see a C set up low and away, then see the P get a called strike on a pitch in and at the top of the strike zone, I’m sorry, I have to believe he missed where he was trying to throw it by at least 3’. And to hear an announcer or some dad declare how that P is hittin’ spots just churns my lunch.

So do you not care if you’re watching a P and often see his C reachin’ all over the place?

I’m still lookin’ for that magic number I can look at and get a good idea about what’s goin’ on out there. FI, I have always tracked strike percentages, and I gotta say that there sure seems to be a definite relationship of “success” to strike percentage.

I’ve never checked it closely, but I’m guessing a strike percentage of at least 58% is necessary, and in general, the higher the strike percentage, the more “success” the P has. Of course a lot of that is that the more accurate P’s walk fewer batters, and in HS, at least by the numbers I have, 1 in 3 batters that get hit or walk score, and overall, about 50% of all runners that reach score.

quote:

Originally posted by bbscout:
As 2008 Beebe noted,many pitchers (myself included) use targets other than the glove. Rather than arguing with my catcher, I would use his feet, knees, shoulders, mask and even home plate as targets when pitching, because many times young catchers just put the glove over the middle of the plate, or they ask for a pitch in an area that you don't want to throw it.

I got bit by this last year with my 11U rec league team; by trying to oversimplify things.

I trained my pitchers to throw to the glove, but when they learned to do this they started having problems. What I soon realized was that my pitchers were doing what I told them to do but my catcher was giving them a target right in the middle of the strike zone.

I ended up having to change catchers because the one kid absolutely could not understand why I wanted him to set up the target low (or low and away).

He would set up high and I would say "Low Target" and he would drop his glove and then the next pitch he would set up high and I would say "Low Target" and he would drop his glove and then the next pitch he would set up high...

quote:

Originally posted by Scorekeeper:

quote:

Originally posted by bbscout:
As 2008 Beebe noted,many pitchers (myself included) use targets other than the glove. Rather than arguing with my catcher, I would use his feet, knees, shoulders, mask and even home plate as targets when pitching, because many times young catchers just put the glove over the middle of the plate, or they ask for a pitch in an area that you don't want to throw it. As far as grading accuracy, I use two grades, one for control and one for command. Control is the ability to throw the ball over the plate for a strike. Command is the ability to hit a specific spot with the ball.

The gold standard for command is Greeg Maddux. In his prime, he might go 4-5 innings and never miss a spot and at times would go 9 innings and miss his spot maybe 4-5 times. There are no HS kids who can do this......in fact, there are only a few big leaguers who can do this. There are many pitchers who can throw the ball over the plate consistantly though.

There are many reasons for using different targets, but writing about it would take too many pages.

Nice explanation for the difference between command and control. Most people use the words interchangeably, but shouldn’t. I try to be careful about it, but often use them incorrectly too.

I guess part of what irritates me is that there’s no way anyone other than the P can possibly know precisely what he’s aiming at, but people insist they do. When I see a C set up low and away, then see the P get a called strike on a pitch in and at the top of the strike zone, I’m sorry, I have to believe he missed where he was trying to throw it by at least 3’. And to hear an announcer or some dad declare how that P is hittin’ spots just churns my lunch.

So do you not care if you’re watching a P and often see his C reachin’ all over the place?

I’m still lookin’ for that magic number I can look at and get a good idea about what’s goin’ on out there. FI, I have always tracked strike percentages, and I gotta say that there sure seems to be a definite relationship of “success” to strike percentage.

I’ve never checked it closely, but I’m guessing a strike percentage of at least 58% is necessary, and in general, the higher the strike percentage, the more “success” the P has. Of course a lot of that is that the more accurate P’s walk fewer batters, and in HS, at least by the numbers I have, 1 in 3 batters that get hit or walk score, and overall, about 50% of all runners that reach score.

Score keeper, Catchers will give a sign and then give location. If I did not like the sign or the location, I would shake him off. If we agreed on outside corner, I would then use his foot, knee, glove, shoulder or whatever for my target. I don't go to games and watch a catcher set up outside and then watch the pitcher throw the ball inside and then think he has good control. Only a pea brain would think that

The idea is this.....if the catcher sets up outside corner with his glove belt high, there is very little chance I will be using the glove as a target.

quote:

Originally posted by bbscout:
Score keeper, Catchers will give a sign and then give location. If I did not like the sign or the location, I would shake him off. If we agreed on outside corner, I would then use his foot, knee, glove, shoulder or whatever for my target. I don't go to games and watch a catcher set up outside and then watch the pitcher throw the ball inside and then think he has good control. Only a pea brain would think that

The idea is this.....if the catcher sets up outside corner with his glove belt high, there is very little chance I will be using the glove as a target.

I can see I better do some more explainin’ before I get into hot water again.

When I said, “So do you not care if you’re watching a P and often see his C reachin’ all over the place?”, I didn’t mean it quite as literally as you took it. Poorly stated. My bad.

Although I admit most HS coaches allow their P’s to shake off a sign, the P’s on my son’s HS team weren’t, under penalty of possibly being yanked, right on the spot. After he’d earned his spot as the #1, he was allowed to shake, but if the batter happened to get a hit, it was punishment runs. So he just gave up and threw what was called, even though I told him the coach couldn’t tell the differences in most pitches from the dugout, which he couldn’t.

IMHO, it was a terrible handicap for the boys! I don’t know about anyone else, but I know my son always threw better when he had confidence in what he was gonna throw, especially in a tight situation, and most pitchers have told me the same.

It was a lose lose situation. I remember so many times watching one of our P’s running punishments after a game because he gave up a game winning hit on a pitch he really wanted no part of.

Scorekeeper, I reaize that most amateur coaches call the pitches, but that does not having anything to do with where the pitcher is sighting in on. The coach can call an inside fastball, but the pitcher can use the shoulder or knee as a target. I got to the point where I used things other than the glove to zero in on darn near all the time. There are other reasons why I did that, but that would be too long of a story.

bbscout,

My bad again. When I read that you could shake, I kinda go off track. Sorry. ;-)

I do understand what you’re talking about though, and I‘m sure most P’s with more between their ears than fresh air, eventually learn that they have to do that.

But nonetheless, although I won’t argue it, I still don’t believe P’s can actually hit spots with more regularity than what I said before.

Let's talk about the MLB for a minute. Is it not safe to assume that the MLB catcher is putting the glove in the vicinity of where the pitch is going? Surely MLB pitchers don't set up with the glove in the middle for an inside or outside pitch.

I seem to see them almost always setting up outside or inside.

And a significant percentage of the time, they move the glove quite a ways inside or out to catch the ball.

I would have to go with SK, the ability of pitchers to "hit their spots" is - on the whole - overrated by most (not all) folks.

quote:

Originally posted by Texan:
Let's talk about the MLB for a minute. Is it not safe to assume that the MLB catcher is putting the glove in the vicinity of where the pitch is going? Surely MLB pitchers don't set up with the glove in the middle for an inside or outside pitch.

In most cases, a MLB catcher will set up in the neighborhood of where he wants the ball.

However, if he thinks the batter is a peeker -- someone who looks at where the catcher is set up in order to get a sense of what's coming -- the catcher may set up in an incorrect spot or right down the middle.

quote:

Originally posted by thepainguy:
In most cases, a MLB catcher will set up in the neighborhood of where he wants the ball.

However, if he thinks the batter is a peeker -- someone who looks at where the catcher is set up in order to get a sense of what's coming -- the catcher may set up in an incorrect spot or right down the middle.

Let me be perfectly clear so there’s no misunderstanding here. I am not saying P’s at any level stink! All I ‘m saying is, there is a tremendous amount of baseball dogma implying its no big deal for a guy anywhere from 46 to 60 feet away from a target, convulsing his body in a very complicated series of moves, not just once, but over and over again over a period of what might be hours, and I don’t believe what the dogma implies is accurate.

That being said, there just aren’t so many “peekers” that the number of times C’s have to leap around like a court jester, are explained.

But aside from even that, the conversation was about HS P’s, or at least I thought so. Anyone who wants to try to compare any HS player to any ML player isn’t doing either of them justice. Also, Although I know this is a HS board, there are people here who deal with the 12U crowd, and they are probably the worst offenders of all because that’s where the mindset starts.

I just wish there was a verifiable way to check it.

The reason I brought up MLB, is because if the MLB pitchers can't hit their spots 90% of the time, there is no way that a HS pitcher can.

quote:

Originally posted by Texan:
The reason I brought up MLB, is because if the MLB pitchers can't hit their spots 90% of the time, there is no way that a HS pitcher can.

And even less likely 9YO Li’l Joey with an arc on his throws that looks like the arch in St Louis is gonna be able to do it either.