A Productive Rant About Release Point

She’s whispered it to herself a million times, "Please just throw a strike!"

Unfortunately, for this player, she doesn’t know about the better ways to improve other than pleading with herself.

Command is actually improved by learning to release the ball at the same point of the arm circle, which is next to the back leg, but only if the back leg is working properly. It’s when the ball is at a 90 degree angle from the ground, give or take a little depending upon which pitch she’s throwing and what body angle she needs to be at. What does it mean for the back leg to be working properly? How do you get a player to learn different pitches? Does a 10 year old know about body angles??? This seems complicated.

Cheri Kempf, in one of my favorite books, “The Softball Pitching Edge” explains the difficulty of becoming consistent like this,

“If you were to set up a game at a carnival in which you gave participants a small ball and asked them to make a backward circle with their arms as fast as they could, let the ball go, and hit a 17-inch-wide, 3-foot-high target a distance of 35 to 43 feet, you probably wouldn’t give away a whole bunch of teddy bears!.”

One of the least effective ways to help a pitcher develop better accuracy is to instruct them to "release sooner" or "release later." Her arm is moving too fast to make such small movements intentionally, especially for a young person who has little body awareness. Secondly, athletes respond better to “external cues” which are conveyed by relating their body to something outside of themselves, like a target in the distance, or the ground, or the sky. Say, “Throw your right hip to the catcher.” An “internal cue,“ on the other hand, is less effective. Directions such as, “turn your leg to the right” or “close your hips” (I know, I accidentally say those), fall on deaf ears.

To repeat the same release point she needs a repeatable motion. The simpler a motion, the more repeatable it is. We build these in lessons She also needs to develop a “feel” for the release, which she builds in practice.

Hera are the 2 ways to “feel” the release:

1) Pitch at full effort because it’s the easiest motion to repeat. If a pitcher throws at a different effort level every time, it changes the feel.
2) Always focus on a target. The target is the “external” cue.

Habitually focusing on a target enables the pitcher to get instant feedback on how her hand feels compared to the result it's producing. Repeat the motion (not the words "throw a strike!") a million times and voila, she’ll have command! You’ll notice if the only target you ever give your pitcher is your glove down the middle, she’ll get bored and stop looking at it. You need to make her targets exciting and different. You need to make targets interesting to look at so she can pitch with intention. Here are a few ways to provide vibrant visuals.

Remember, developing mechanics and accuracy are two totally different skills. If you pitcher is working on changing her fundamentals then she would specifically NOT focus on a target for those pitches. She would instead pitch into a close net, about 10 - 20 feet in front of her. Her intention during mechanics practice is a focus on her body movements. When a pitcher is looking at a target she has too much difficulty thinking about not only release point but also resistance/arm circle/drive, etc. Put intense focus on the ONE thing, perform it correctly, then switch to another. Good luck!