About a year and a half ago, I did a couple posts sharing my two cents on the latest proposed pitchers’ helmet.  (See Here and Here.)  I received some great feedback, even if some of the responses pointed out my flaw in using great fielding Pitchers (Greg Maddux, Mike Mussina, and Mike Hampton) to point out just how hard it is for pitchers to protect themselves from hard hit come-backers.

Since then the helmet idea has faded away, but pitchers are still getting drilled.

Most recently, Brandon McCarthy (A’s), Jason Hammel (Orioles), and Mickey Storey (Astros), have been hit in the head, pitching elbow, and face respectively, with McCarthy needing to be hospitalized with a skull fracture, and also needing to undergo a two-hour surgery to relieve the pressure in his skull.

I made sure I was prepared this time with pictures of all three of these pitchers in the position they found themselves when the hitters made contact with the baseball.

I think it’s pretty clear that not one of these pitchers are in any position whatsoever to either catch or protect themselves from a line drive hit right back at them.  Mickey Storey is in a “better” position than McCarthy or Hammel, but obviously his position wasn’t good enough, or he wouldn’t be included in this post.

Unfortunately it doesn’t take too many hours at the ballpark, or sitting in front of the TV to see just about every pitcher wind up in very similar positions as these three.

So why do pitchers find themselves in this position so often…completely at risk to have something very bad happen?

1. Tucking the glove like you are carrying a football.  I’ve heard quite a few pitching instructors use this analogy to remind pitchers the importance of using the glove side of the body to assist in rotating through the pitch.  When pitchers do this, they either use their glove elbow or glove hand to pull the glove backwards.  The result: exactly what you see in the three pictures above.  The Solution: quickly folding your glove forearm tightly against your glove upper arm.  (Sometimes I tell pitchers to try throwing their glove over their glove shoulder.)  This way the glove is very close to your face, giving you a fighting chance at protecting your face and head.
2. Striding too far.  I know that explosively striding as far as you can off the pitching rubber is the latest and greatest to come from the minds of the pitching gurus out there, but this is a problem.  Not only does striding too far lead to lower back and glove knee problems, striding longer makes it that much tougher for pitchers to get their pitching foot off the rubber and planted firmly on the ground.  When both feet are firmly planted on the ground, pitchers can move/react much quicker than balancing on one foot while the other foot hangs on the air as it’s being dragged over and around the pitcher’s body.  The Solution: Striding shorter is the obvious answer, but only if a pitcher makes a point of driving his pitching knee forward, so at release the pitching knee is close if not lined up with the glove knee.
3. Bending you back to follow through.  This is a result of striding too far, but I know you’ve heard pitching coaches tell their pitchers to bend their back in order to “finish the pitch.”  I know more than a few coaches that bark out “Bend your back!” any time one of their pitchers fall behind in the count.  Not only is bending your back bad for professional movers (their mantra: bend with your knees and not your back!) it’s bad for pitchers who are told to bend over 100 times a game.  This is just one of those things that’s been around so long it’s considered the right thing to do.  It’s not.  The Solution: stand tall and rotate.
4. Getting into an infielder’s fielding position.  I know this one will rub a lot of people the wrong way but hear me out on this one.  The other night I watched Chipper Jones fail to come up with a one-hop ground ball to his glove side.  He was playing on the cut of the infield grass, about eighty feet away from the hitter.  He was in a “perfect” fielding position, yet he didn’t have enough time to react to the baseball.  (Sure you can say he’s old now, but as a life-long Braves fan I can recall this happening to him in his “prime.”)  How… I repeat HOW do you expect a pitcher to get into that very same fielding position BEFORE the baseball is hit AND react to the ball from 54 feet away?  Unless his name is Neo and he’s in The Matrix, he’s got little-to-no shot at 1. getting into this position in time – without compromising the pitch he’s trying to throw, and 2. react/avoid a ball hit back at him!  The Solution: Stand sideways like hitters do.  (Don’t roll your eyes until you’ve tried this position.)  With both feet on the ground from this position, you can react faster than facing “the problem” head on.
5. Not commanding the inside part of the plate… and beyond.  Mistakes happen.  Pitchers make mistake in the form of missing their target and/or leaving pitches out over the plate.  There’s no absolute cure for that.  BUT!  When hitters have a fear of being hit with a pitch, they aren’t that gung ho to jump out over the plate to drive a “mistake pitch” left over the plate.  The Solution: Pitchers need to command the inside “area” (because I’m not just talking about strikes) in order to curtail hitters getting too comfortable, taking aggressive swing in all counts, and diving out at mistakes left over the plate.

I’m tired of seeing pitchers getting drilled with come-backers.  The “old-school” way has been proven ineffective.  Give these tips a shot to better to either protect yourself or one of your pitchers.

Coach Bones