Posted by: Alan () on Mon Jan 13 09:44:59 2003

I think you need to get your daughter in a competitive softball league as soon as possible. Pitching a softball uses completely different mechanics than tpitching a baseball.
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> Because the arm comes from a completely different position than baseball, pitchers are able to make the ball move in many more angles than a baseball pitcher. For instance, softball pitchers are able to pitch rise balls. A girl that uses a typical baseball swing will never be able to hit that pitch. Since her natural motion is to "lift" the ball with her swing, she will always be swinging underneath the pitch. The end result is that if she hits the pitch at all, she will pop it up. We actually teach our girls to use an rotate the back shoulder "over the top" rather than dropping it down. This is completely opposite of a conventional baseball swing. However, if the pitching is different, the hitting must adjust.

I don't disagree that hitting a rise ball would take some different mechanics, but do you really want your kids trying to hit that pitch. My daughters have been playing travel for the last 5 years and I could probably count on my fingers the number of times I've seen a pitcher with a quality rise ball throw it for a strike. I have seen numerous ocassions girls swing at pitches out of the strike zone, which from what I have seen is the real purpose of the pitch. I think the best thing you could teach kids is to identify the rise pitch and lay off of it.