Travel Ball or HS pitching

I think it depends on 1) who you face and 2) the level of hitter in question.

1) Who you face - Not all pitchers at PG are top tier pitchers.  I've seen many who I am convinced couldn't make a HS varsity team.  I have also seen a team or two with rotations better than most colleges.  What is "easier" to hit?

2) The level of hitter - Is the hitter disciplined to not chase pitches from a slop pitcher?  Does he have elite level batspeed?  Is he capable of handling quality secondary stuff?  All of these play into your answer.

Seems most travel teams I see have deeper pitching staffs. So in a typical week of HS you may get the #1, #2, #3 or #4...whereas with the travel teams a lot of the pitchers are 1's and 2's only. 

Not sure if this is everyone's thought...but here's what I've seen.  HS pitching, at least in our area is average at best.  We may have seen 2 kids hit 85 the entire HS season.  My son's travel team (17U) played very good competition this summer.  I would say that in the 30-34 games we played, we only faced a couple kids under 80.....the majority 80-85....a good percentage 85-88 and several who were up to 90 and above. It's not so much that you see the top guys in travel....it's that you don't usually see the HS freshman who struggles to hit 65 with his FB.  Also, as was mentioned above, the strike percentage in the summer is significantly higher than what he sees in HS...meaning you've got a lot more hittable balls over the course of a game. 

In my experience, travel teams at the 16U and above level have much better pitching, especially on teams that compete at a national level.  A high school team is lucky to have one of these elite pitchers on their team.  It is common on a higher level travel team to have every starting pitcher committed to a D1 level college. They all have above average or higher velocities for their age, and usually have 2 or 3 solid secondary pitches.  Although travel team pitchers throw more strikes, they also do a much better job of hitting locations. There are less walks and hits. In addition, the position players are much better at fielding ( less errors).  The hardest part about facing high school pitching is that a batter could face a guy throwing high 80's or low 90's and then have to face a guy throwing in the 70's. 

I guess it would be easier to approach, but not necessarily easier to hit.

Of course it depends on the travel team you are facing.  I've seen some of those with pretty unimpressive pitching.  The oversaturation of youth travel ball is expanding rapidly upward.

In my opinion, if you see 90% of a travel roster is made up of kids from the same school, it's going to be a weak team on the travel circuit. There are very, very few high schools that have enough talent to field a team that can compete with teams made up of other school's 1's and 2's. 

Originally Posted by Buckeye 2015:

…Also, as was mentioned above, the strike percentage in the summer is significantly higher than what he sees in HS...meaning you've got a lot more hittable balls over the course of a game. 

Do you have any REAL numbers? It’s not that I disagree, but I am curious about how the numbers I have compare to what you’re seeing. For the last 8 years, our HSV pitching staff has had a strike percentage of 62.6%, and all the pitchers in all the 230+ games have been at 60.9%. That’s not as good as the MLB strike percentage, but then again its less than 5% below it. That means in 100 pitches, 5 more will be strikes. That’s not something I think means a great deal since there’s no way to know when those strikes will come.

So when you say the strike percentage in the summer is significantly higher than what he sees in HS, I’m trying to get a sense of what that really means. I know what logic, belief, and myth say, but I’m trying to find out what the reality is. From what I can tell, there’s definitely a higher spread from best pctage to worst as the skills get lower, but I’m not so sure that those outlier pitchers on the low side are geeing many opportunities to pitch.

Typically, a good travel team (at that age) is a collection of the better HS players in a given area, so the quality of pitching should certainly be better on average than that of a HS team from the same area.  Therefore, the average travel pitcher should be more capable of getting hitters out than the average HS pitcher.  There are certainly exceptions. 

Does anyone else get tired of this bleep'n kiljoy interrupting so many good threads with "show me the numbers?" Maybe he has nothing to do all day but manipulate the numbers. But most other posters have lives and things to do. So they provide information based on their vast knowledge and experience.

Overall, It's not even close... 

I can't tell you how many committed D-1's we faced this summer in PG events... It seemed like almost EVERY game we were facing one or more...

Our HS is 8-A here in FL, and our district has had 3 different schools in the 8-A state championship game the last 3 years in a row... So we see our fair share of D-1 pitchers, but it's nothing like PG events...

I don't have any numbers to back up my thoughts about pitching in the summer being better...I just know what I've seen.  Keep in mind that my son's HS schedule is no where close to some of the top teams in Ohio....and certainly not up to the schedules of teams in the South.  We are a fairly small school...and most of the schools we play are our size or even smaller. 

I guess I would look at opposing pitchers the same way I look at my son when he pitches...with regard to HS vs Summer.  In HS, he feels like he has to strike out or overpower the hitters because he's afraid his defense won't be able to help him out.  He relies more on curveballs hoping to get swinging strikes...as opposed to just throwing strikes and letting the hitter put it in play and his defense work.  Obviously this attitude has got to result in fewer strikes as he is much more of a "thrower" in these situations...than he is a "pitcher".   In the summer he has a completely different approach on the mound...he's willing to throw strikes, let kids swing and let his defense help him out...and he doesn't necessarily try to strike out everyone...meaning less curveballs in the dirt, wild pitches or passed balls.  I'm thinking that that may be a big part of why summer pitching is (or at least seems to be) better than HS with regard to strike %....maybe it's real, maybe not....I guess I really have no way to say for sure

There is a difference between command and control. Good pitchers throw more good strikes. It's not easier to hit those.

Buckeye,

I read all through your post, generally understanding and agreeing. Then I got to the last sentence and thought how great it was that someone could admit they understood the difference between PERCEPTION and FACT. JH pretty much hit it on the nose. And when you think about it, even a really lousy pitcher is gonna throw somewhere around 55-60% strikes. The trick is not to have a lot of those strikes being base hits.

Other than that, you can think of tournaments as being similar to an all-star game. Of course the players who are performing the best are gonna be there, so you can expect to see a much better execution of skills than in a regular season game. That doesn’t mean the performances will be better, because after all the players on both offense and defense are better. But the execution sure should be noticeably better.

Just a hint here. You should really do everything you can to get him to overcome the regular season “I’ve got to strike everyone out” mindset, because even if his team stinks defensively, it’s what he’s got to learn to deal with. Good luck!

Nailed it

Don't look at it as HS or travel has better pitching because that is going to create ready made excuses for failure.  Look at it as "Can I hit this guy throwing today?"

Whether he's throwing 90 or 60 you still have to hit him.  Nothing I can't stand more is when a guy gets out from someone throwing slow and they come back to the dugout saying how much better they hit off better pitchers.  Well last time I checked that guy on the bump is competing and he's competing to get you out.  That means you need to step your game up to compete against him.  Be disciplined as redbird5 describes above to get your job done.  

If you go into it thinking HS pitching is inferior then what's your mindset when they get you out?  You going to gripe and complain about how bad that guy is and let it leak over into the field and next at bats?  Or are you going to suck it up and focus on doing your job and being a hitter regardless of how good or bad he is?

Exactly.  Just because PG pitchers may throw more strikes (I have no idea whether they do or not) does not mean they are going to be easier to hit.  The better pitchers will be throwing harder, they will be hitting more corners, their offspeed stuff will be much better - all these things will make it harder to hit them.  It's not just throwing strikes that make it easier to hit.

Agree with those saying the elite travel teams are likely going to be more proficient at getting hitters out...even with the better hitters, good pitching normally prevails.  The biggest difference I have seen aside from consistent higher velocity (which when facing good hitting will only get you so far), is the quality of the secondary pitch.  At the HS level you may see decent velocity, but most of the times, it is not complimented by a really good secondary pitch.

At the better National events this year, the best pitchers had very good off speed, with good command of it, and most importantly they throw the secondary pitch with the same consistent FB release window (FB arm slot / FB arm speed)....that is what makes it difficult for any hitter.  You don't see the same number of guys that can do that at the HS level, as you do on the elite travel teams.