Posted by: George M (moosewing@charter.net) on Tue Jul 24 21:10:37 2007

> I was looking for something my 10 yo could take BP with in the back yard and found two pitching machines that throw miniture whiffle balls. Each (The Personal Pitcher and The Crusher) look pretty identical and made with a lot of plastic and small motors. Anyone have any experiences with either machine? They look like a great idea but I am concerned the machines may not last very long.

I would recommend the Grand Slam Pitching machine. I had the personal pitcher and it broke after about a month. The Grand Slam used a shop vac blower to propel wiffle golf balls. You control the speed by the amount of air and by distance. The only two drawbacks are just fastballs and a bit noisy. My son and now daughter use it in our basement (unfinished). Go to www.swiftstik.com and click on products.