Pitching Effectiveness -Effective Velocity
We Want to Change the Conversation.
The game of baseball is amazing simply because of the balance of power between great pitching and hitting. The number of potential outcomes in each situation and level of pressure sends an athlete on a journey through meditation, mind control techniques, visualization, and manifestation. You have to be resilient to play this game and what's going on upstairs matters significantly.
The truth is, the odds are against you and just when you think you've got it all figured out, your biggest enemy returns. Self doubt is vicious and can't exist. Only, you are destined to fail and have to understand that. That's the painful truth and pitchers have it worse than anyone. It's important to prepare yourself to fail less frequently!
Every conversation about a pitcher is always short. How hard does he throw? At every level of the game a player's worth is based on ball velocity because it is easier to assess and simpler to understand and track than other pitching parameters. Hard throwing is not synonymous with effective pitching. Great hitters can hit hard fastballs far.
An aggressive velocity training regiment can be helpful at times. However, we can't turn athletes into Aroldis Chapman no matter the approach and it shouldn't be the goal.
Imagine if coaches refocused an athlete's energy into a thoughtful pitching strategy? Strategy makes your fastball look faster!
If it seems like we don't value velocity, that isn't the case. We absolutely are an advocate of effective velocity.
Effective velocity is how fast the pitch appears when compared to the pitch that was thrown before it. Pitchers want to fool hitters, not let them time the heater and hit moon rockets. Transforming velocity into effectiveness depends on changes in how far the hitter has to move his bat to make contact. Pitchers force those disruptions by changing locations and the needed reaction time of the hitter.
A ball thrown inside travels less distance than a ball thrown outside. The location of the ball adds or subtracts distance to stride length and impacts the perceived velocity to a hitter.
We can't make you Chapman but...
An 85-mph fastball straight down the middle looks 85 mph. The same pitch on the inner half of the plate will appear 91-92 mph to the hitter’s eyes. The same pitch away will appear to be 79-80 mph.
Read this twice. An 85-mph fastball down and away and it’s going to look like 80 mph. If you throw a 73-74 mph breaking ball inside, it appears to be 80 mph. You approached pitching with good intent and changed both pitches and location. BUT the pitches appear exactly the same speed to your enemy. You don’t want that, trust me.
It's time we take some of the equilibrium out of the game. Pitching is a purpose, but hitters are guessing. Pitch with a purpose.
Athletes throw harder than ever but the reality is effective offspeed pitches and good location get people out. Ground ball, ground ball, fly ball, repeat.
We encourage you to learn to pitch as opposed to throw hard and would love to help you become effective on the mound. If you are only talking velocity in your preparation, it's likely the result from your hard work will be a lot of balls getting hit harder.
