pitching to catchers glove as a target

 my son ..... told me he does not use the catcher as a target more or less does it by feel. Question is this good or normal ?

This is a great question.

To clarify, however--which statement below is true about your son?

1. My son doesn't try to put the ball where the catcher wants it.  IOW, my son pitches towards the location that he feels is best.

2. My son tries to put the ball where the catcher wants it, but he doesn't concentrate hard on the target while doing it.

I would say closer to 1, he may be anticipating the break or movement or possibly using the batter as a locator of where the pitch should end up which would explain why he throws better in games than in bullpens throwing to just the catcher.

Assuming his arm speed and mechanics are the same on all his pitches, he should use as his target (aiming point) whatever is needed to get the ball where he wants it. For example, if he wants the ball to bounce behind the plate, pick a sighting point (maybe somewhere on the catcher - mask perhaps) while warming up and see where the ball is landing; adjust accordingly. IMO, this allows his brain to make the microscopic changes necessary to get his pitch where it's desired - without filling his head with conscious thoughts (like release point, etc.).

S never throws to or sights at the catchers glove; he throws through the catcher and sights (may be somewhere on the catcher, on the batter [especially on breaking pitches], or on the ump), adjusting where needed (some days a pitch may be sighted in one location, other days a slightly different location - his sights will vary depending on the mound, the weather, his arm that day [e.g., breaking pitches may break a bit more or less on any particular day]). (As a aside, one drill he likes is to throw from the mound to a catcher squatting at 90 feet; good drill to teach throwing through the catcher.)

Sighting this way is similar to what a marksman does when shooting at long ranges - the marksman must account for all sorts of things like wind, weather, gravity, etc. and the same shot on different days will necessitate different aiming points.

goosegg excellent view this sounds like a  very scientific approach and i like it. I don't think this is talked about much with youth players and could be a big help to pitcher once they start to command their stuff. what did that old time player says baseball is 90% half mental

1. My son doesn't try to put the ball where the catcher wants it.  IOW, my son pitches towards the location that he feels is best.

While not disagreeing with the basics of the discussion the one thing I see missing is the importance of the communication required for success between a pitcher and a catcher.  At younger ages this may not be as critical because athletic ability of the catcher can react and respond to a ball being thrown to an area not expected.  

As pitchers develop whether they use the catchers glove as a target, throw to, or through the catcher or have some other aiming point are all unique to the individual pitcher.  If you look at today's high level catchers many use a flash and relax approach where the mitt is in the area of the anticipated pitch for only a moment and then the wrist is relaxed, some use variation on this approach but rarely do catchers hold a fast and steady target for a pitcher to lock in on unless a particular pitcher requires it.  

What is very important is that the pitcher and catcher know exactly what the pitch is and the location the pitcher is trying to throw to. Crossing up a catcher is a huge no-no.  Good catchers don't care what you are doing as long as they know what you are trying to do.  

Last year we had a pitcher who thought is was a good idea to let the catcher set up for a breaking ball outside so the batter would see that movements out of the corner of their eye and then came up and in with a fastball.  Because the umpire also expected the pitch away he was drilled on the shoulder as the catchers mitt was a hair to slow to reach the pitch.  For the rest of the game the strike zone shrunk until only the white of the plate remained.  Even after pulling the offending pitcher our next pitcher had a tiny zone to work with.  

I am not complaining about the umpire at all, Our pitcher demonstrated he did not understand the importance of communication and until the sting of that pitch wore off the Umpire was going to make sure he enforced that truth.

Pitching is individual and what you focus on or where you focus is unimportant.  Louis Tiant used to look everywhere but at the plate, Fernando Valenzuela used to look inside his head somehow...Understanding what you are trying to accomplish with the pitch and the pitch sequence and that both pitcher and catcher are on the same page is very important. 

according to my son, he  does pitch the ball to the called location he just doesn't use the catchers glove as a target if he calls for up and in that were is goes etc, not sure how he does this but says he blanks out everything does not hear anything and just looks at that zone and the brain tells the arm what to do. maybe concentrating on a very specific spot is too much focus and throwing to a general quadrant (up-away), (up -in) (down away) down-In) is good enough frees his mind to relax and not be so fine that it takes a toll on his nerves

Agree with everything being said. Threads like this open your eyes to what is actually going through a players head. Way back when, I always used the batter and the plate as a reference and not the catchers glove because these things are generally static and allowed for more consistancy. if you use the catcher where you sight a pitch is constantly different if the ste up in/ out etc. It would also depend on how good my stuff was that day; that could change from starting a curve at the middle of the plate on a good stuff day to starting on 3/4 outside part of the plate on not so good stuff day and so on. As far as using the hitter as a reference- knees, waist and obove the waist worked for me. Everyone's mind works different.

I know what I'll be talking about tonight with my catcher son, very interested in his perspective.

Originally Posted by MDBallDad:

What is very important is that the pitcher and catcher know exactly what the pitch is and the location the pitcher is trying to throw to. Crossing up a catcher is a huge no-no.  Good catchers don't care what you are doing as long as they know what you are trying to do.  

The thing that’s important to keep in mind with that is, there really are very few catchers at the HS level who don’t need all the help they can get from the pitcher.

Something I wondered about was who’s calling the pitches on the OP’s son’s team? It wouldn’t take most coaches who call pitches too long to figger out their pitcher’s not on board with his plan, good, bad, or indifferent. My boy’s HS coach would have fits when his pitchers couldn’t hit specific spots, as though any pitcher could do that. I have no doubt in my mind that if he ever got the idea a pitcher was ignoring what he was calling, the boy wouldn’t pitch again in the foreseeable future.

Although I think you are generally correct about the skills for HS catchers, the catchers at our HS call the games.  The coaches intent was that they learn to understand the game within the game, learn the philosophy and concepts of successful pitching and within the coaches framework (their game strategy) apply instantaneous feedback on what stuff the pitcher had and how he was throwing on a given day to create an appropriate tactical solution.  Accordingly he has his best athletes up the middle at short, second, center and behind the plate with a premium on baseball knowledge at the catchers position.

It seems to work well but requires everyone to be on the same page and understand what they are trying to accomplish with each batter in the line-up.

if you have a lot of movement on your fastball even,   you have to figure out where to start the pitch to get it to end up where the catcher wants it.     breaking balls are going to start in a variety of places depending on if you want it for a called strike,  swinging strike etc depending on the