Questioning how fast to be small D1 pitcher

Cabbage, that was very well stated and very patiently explained. 

Most college teams at D1 level can't string together 21 weekend innings worth of competent pitching. By competent I mean 'won't randomly blow themselves and team up at any given moment or outing'.  Example why do games have so many absolute blowout 5, 8 run innings? Why are scores often 12-10 or worse? This is supposed to be high level ball, not mistake filled walk fests.

Most D2 college teams can't string together 14 innings of competent pitching.

Most D3 teams can't string together more than 9 innings a weekend at best.

And at all the levels the extra velo that is there goes down drastically after 30 pitches? Why? Is the C4 wearing off that quickly? Do you need a triple dose?

And why is it that every time runners get on base, or the crap is about to or has begun to hit the fan, that college coaches look like they are going on the mound trip to somehow instill some mound presence into an obviously rattled pitcher that has never had any mound presence? At any prior level high school thru USSSA included.

Why is this? Do they like 4:15 hour, 250 pitch games? Why does every at bat seemingly start out 2-0 only to eventually end up 3-2?  Does it ever occur to them that their 'product' would look far less silly if they had recruited mound presence and outs over pure radar gun velo?

Why indeed? Is it lazy recruiting? Is it lazy coaching? Is it peer pressure that you got to have the radar gun breakers to appear legit? Is it back door deals? There has to be a good reason for such obvious shooting oneself in the foot repeatedly.

Hot take but I will go as far as to say for every single fastball thrown across D1 baseball it's probably a 60/40 split above/below 90mph. This is by individual pitch, not pitcher. 

In other words if 300 pitches are thrown in any given D1 game, I would put my money on there being about 120 below 90. Now when Florida plays Vanderbilt where likely won't be a fastball below 92, but there are plenty of games that may not see a fastball above 88 as well. Even the guys who touch 90/91, they will largely be 88/89. 87 is more common than 95. 

I posted this a few years back

Son (2020 RHP) topped out in the low 80's last summer as a rising sr. He had some of his best games on the mound in front of D1 coaches, teammate is a highly recruited catcher, did not get one sniff from a D1 program. He had serious interest from several D2 programs because of his "projectability", he's 6'4" 210. He ended up committing to a D3, Academics were the number one factor in his decision.

Close friends son (2019 RHP) was a highly recruited pitcher nationally. In his last game on the mound as a senior he topped out at 96-97 and sat 92-93. He pitched his first game as a freshman two weeks ago against an SEC team. He went 1 1/3 innings and topped out at 90-91 and sat 88.

Whether its right or wrong........velo is king when it comes to recruiting.

My 2022 RHP topped 88 (had video and rapsodo data) and generally up to around 87 this offseason.. He's had interest from some D1s including some P5s. He went to one of the school's camps in Jan (not something we would have normally done). His arm strength was fine, but didn't throw too many strikes.

Feedback to his summer coach was basically  "great arm strength, but we need to see him throw some strikes in games this summer". Was/is pretty clear they didn't like his command. 

Maybe if he's throwing 90 at the camp with same command it's a different story.

I think it's both.  The main point is that if you throw all strikes at 85, it doesn't matter.  The Velo is the thing they want to see before they look further.  I actually watched a RC/PC who had come to watch my son summer after sophomore year.  They had told our coach they wanted to see him throw 75 pitches so they could see what he looked like several innings in.  I think he had 11Ks in 5 innings, but the RC was actually saying...come on...hit 90  to himself (he had started off around 88-89).   When he hit 90, they contacted him that night to offer.  It's like a box they have to check.

Hell, I’m watching this board and eating popcorn.

BaseballHS wrote, “when he hit 90 they contacted him that night to offer. It’s like a box they have to check.”

This is 100% correct and are the parameters that D1 RCs are given to work with in most programs. Doesn’t make it right but it’s the way it is and it’s only getting worse. I coach a lot of HS kids that throw 85-89 mph FBs. All they can think about is reaching 90 while we are trying to get focus off of velo and teach them how to pitch. Drives us crazy. Velo is king and always will be - as frustrating as that is. 

While thinking about this topic, I wonder if it boils down to a over generalized way of thinking. This goes for all levels of baseball and even pro. Seems that the overall thought process is pure velo can't be taught. Kind of like height in basketball, you either have it or you don't. Command takes a back seat to what stands out. I ask you to think about what seems to look better when a pitcher has a bad day (after all everyone has one) - Mid 80's getting teed off on, or a Mid 90's walk-athon? On the surface, nobody put the ball in play during the walk-athon, so the nature of thought is "What if he only threw strikes?". Ultimately the reason 90+ comes into play is that this kid has something the other kid will likely never have. Recruiters/scouts view this as a theoretical "ace up your sleeve". They believe that once their coaches can get a hold of this kid, he can be taught command and secondary stuff. Played quite a bit of baseball and after all, it's dam near impossible to respect 90+ then adjust to Slider/CB speed differential. You can't be sitting soft and adjust to fast, your brain don't work that way.Then if you can control a quality CU - good luck - might need to start banging on some trash cans to have a chance  This is why coaches say when the guy isn't throwing hard sit CU. It works because you don't have to fear getting blown away.

Had a D3 coach at a very successful program, tell my son's travel team that they have a RHP that is 6'6" and tops out at 95, he saw very limited mop-up bump time because he couldn't find the plate....... kid got a tryout with a MLB organization.

I was fortunate to be able to watch a BigTen team weekend series. They payed my son's small D1 to come down and play them.

They had one kid who touched 97 once and another who touched 93-94.
Maybe two dozen or so pitches above 90. Majority 84-89.
Our guys all throw 85-89 maybe touch 90 with a tailwind.
Plenty of 78-80 breaking balls and change ups from both sides.

Aside from those standout pitchers, the obvious difference between the two teams was the size of the players.
BigTen was all well over 6 feet and 200#+. The majority of our guys are not.

We took the series 3 games out of 4. Their one win required ten innings and 15 runs to beat us.
Team chemistry and heart go a long way.

If a guy can touch 84-85 a few times during his session he'll get looks from small D1s.
He'll also need command, control and good grades, obviously.

adbono posted:

BaseballHS wrote, “when he hit 90 they contacted him that night to offer. It’s like a box they have to check.”

This is 100% correct and are the parameters that D1 RCs are given to work with in most programs. Doesn’t make it right but it’s the way it is and it’s only getting worse. I coach a lot of HS kids that throw 85-89 mph FBs. All they can think about is reaching 90 while we are trying to get focus off of velo and teach them how to pitch. Drives us crazy. Velo is king and always will be - as frustrating as that is. 

This is the absolute truth. Once my son starting throwing 90 the floodgates of contacts opened up. First with Jucos then Mid-Majors. 

In his first meaningful indoor BP of the year (last week), my 2024 LHP topped out at 76.  He has a goal to reach 80 and be "healthy" when he pitches for his summer team at a PG Super25 qualifying tournament in June.  I have used PG player profile data form the top 50 LHP's in the 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 classes to help set my boy's pitching velo benchmarks for the next 4 summers. This benchmark will lead him to 90 [give or take] during the summer after his jr. HS year --- if he keeps working hard and avoids a major injury setback.

The 90 mph FB is a real benchmark and should not be disputed when discussing the D1 P5 sub-group.  I will post (attach) a screenshot of my chart later tonight when I get on my home PC.  There is plenty of variation in the data, however, the trend line (regression analysis) correctly points a high potential young teen baller in the right direction (the data can be transformed into a very useful player development compass).  

The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma.   I am going to enjoy the journey, carefully (if not subtly) influence decisions that will impact his arm care,  ... and be supportive, if/when he decides (in a couple yrs) that he likes basketball better than baseball.  Folks are already telling us he will become a  PO; no question ... basketball players get to play two-way.

"The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma.The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma."

Have to get over the age thing, my kids will both be 17 when starting college. Control what you can control.

nycdad posted:

"The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma.The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma."

 

Have to get over the age thing, my kids will both be 17 when starting college. Control what you can control.

Had a funny conversation with my kid last night after a basketball game. He was beat down after the close loss and stated "I can't wait until next year (8th grade) so I don't have to work so hard for the rebounds". Kid he was trying to box out all game was dam near my size so I kind of felt bad for him, lol. The point is he is a 2025 with a March birthday. So facing older kids is not new to him. I agree with NYDAD: it is a destructive mind-set we had to drop a while ago, but I will be honest with you and say it is very hard to do at times. I guess it comes back to having no control over it. I tell my kid if he wants to keep pursuing sports as his dream, one of the biggest pitfalls is to compare yourself to someone else. Another's success will not limit yours unless you mentally let it happen. 

You would think that a smart RC would make the "interest trigger" 89mph rather than 90, just to steal a march on his competitors. I mean, what's the difference, really?

57special posted:

You would think that a smart RC would make the "interest trigger" 89mph rather than 90, just to steal a march on his competitors. I mean, what's the difference, really?

1 MPH :-)

My son finished up at a mid-major last year.  He was 90 his senior year in HS and hit 93 in college.   Of the 20+ pitchers that were there during his 4 years, I don't think more than 5 regularly hit 90.  Most were 85-86.  Heck, we had a lefty who did pretty well and he was never over 80 once.  

Here is the chart I reference in my earlier post from today.

Yes, I know, life is never a straight-line … it is much more like a game of chutes & ladders.  With that said, my little graph will still be very useful in charting my son's annual LHP FB velo measurables against the very best in the country.  Just need to get to 80 mph on his 14th b-day, then add 3 mph each yr for the next four years without injury and without losing his intrinsic motivation to do the hard work - sounds so simple … not.

Back to the data for a final summary … my chart has 183 player data points; when I gathered the data in Dec, 142 (78%) of these players had public college commitments on their player profile.   The list of colleges with 2 or more of these Top 50 LHP commits (over the span of four HS grad yr classes) includes: Virginia (11), Vanderbilt (9), Florida State (6), Georgia (6), Louisiana State (6), Texas Tech (5), Florida (5), Mississippi State (4), Tennessee. Auburn, Boston College, Stanford, South Carolina, Florida Gulf Coast, TCU, Kentucky, Arkansas, North Carolina, Virginia Tech, Stetson, UCLA, Washington, Clemson, Duke, North Carolina State, East Carolina, Ohio State, Alabama, Oklahoma State, Baylor, Louisville, Maryland, Wake Forest, Miami, Michigan, Mississippi.  

Help your son build a compass with the open source data … and you too can fight off the urge to pay for a 14u showcase event ;-).

Sitting through a few weekends of B10 play over the last couple of years the pitches in the 90's were the exception. Granted didn't make it to a lot of weekends but the ones I did velo was mostly upper 80's, sometimes low 90's. 

IMO it's not the FB so much as the quality of the offspeed at the college level.

nycdad posted:

"The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma.The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma."

 

Have to get over the age thing, my kids will both be 17 when starting college. Control what you can control.

I'd argue that doesn't matter in baseball like it does in football/basketball as it isn't a contact sport. What matters is what you've seen, IMO. The kid played USSSA super-NIT majors tournaments at 12-13. As such he saw some way mature kids throwing very well. Stepping onto the varsity field as a freshman was no big deal.

nycdad posted:

"The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma.The challenge for my son ... he will still only be 17 yrs old when he graduates from high school while most of the nation's best in any given class will be 19 yrs old when they receive their HS diploma."

 

Have to get over the age thing, my kids will both be 17 when starting college. Control what you can control.

There are gap year options...but your last line is important. I tell my kid don't use your age as an excuse to not work harder. The stress and burnout is real. I used to bust his chops on playing the xbox, now I try everything to have him find time to hang with his friends, play the games and lastly enjoy playing  HS ball with his friends/team mates.