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Life Lessons


Life Lesson #61: Recognizing the Off-Speed Pitch

Don't Get Beat by the Curveball!!

Hitting the off-speed pitch is a common challenge for hitters 10-14, and I believe it’s important to know that the swing remains the same as when hitting a fastball. In a nutshell, there’s a simple and disciplined pause in the swing when hitting an off-speed pitch. As a coach, its important both to understand this fundamental key and also how to teach this without confusing the hitter. THIS is the true definition of what all those coaches mean when utter the phrase: “Stay back on the curveball.”

Understanding the Swing
At Lifeletics, we use a number system to identify the main points of the swing:

0. Stance: The athlete’s starting point. The stance should be balanced, comfortable and relaxed.
1. Load: Hands move back slightly as the front leg steps lightly 4-6 inches. The majority of the weight is held back on the squish-the-bug leg (60% back / 40% front).
2. Contact: Knob of the bat moves towards the baseball as the hands stay “inside.” Hips rotate and back foot turns to provide trunk rotational power. Hands are flat at contact, top-hand palm-up… bottom hand palm facing down.
3. Finish: Balanced and strong, the body has completed the swing with the hands high, head down, front leg firm and back leg completely rotated.

What’s important to understand is the rhythm and timing of these movements. A “normal” swing’s rhythm does not stop from 1-2-3 and is timed to pace of the fastball. This means that once the body moves from the stance into the load… there is nothing more than a split second pause before the swing starts moving towards contact and eventually into finish. In English: Once you begin the swing you don’t stop (to hit the fastball!).

Hitting the Fastball
This is true for all ages, even for the youngest hitters, when hitting the fastball. Young hitters can even wait until the ball is in the air to start their load. They can do this because of the length of time it takes for the ball to reach home plate (timed to the pace of the fastball). You can relate this to a slow pitch softball game, where the ball goes waaaaay up before it comes down. In this case, a hitter would have the time to wait and watch before starting his load and swing. On a side note, this hitter would also be able to step in the direction of the pitch – something that coaches often say at the youngest levels of baseball. This is NOT something you can do beyond the age of about 8 years old – unless the pitcher is really throwing slowly.

As the kids start throwing harder, there is a related decrease in time available to see the pitch. Because the fastball is now getting to the hitter much quickly, the swing must get started sooner. And the swing itself is timed off of the fastball to ensure that the hitter does not get beat by the fastest pitch. By about age 10, hitters are instructed to take their stride and load their hands before the pitcher releases the ball. This gets the hitter into the “launch” position with time to see the pitch and aggressively take a swing. The fundamentals remain the same: set the body in a comfortable stance… stride and load the hands… take an aggressive swing… and finish strong and balanced. This is done without any sort of pause or break in rhythm in anticipation of catching up to and making contact with the fastball.

Hitting the Off-Speed Pitch
The key to hitting the off-speed pitch is simple in theory, and terrifically difficult in practice! To properly hit an off-speed pitch (curveball, change-up, knuckleball, etc), the athlete must simply take a pause at the load position before continuing the swing.

Let me repeat that again: To hit the curveball, the athlete needs to take a tiny pause between the load and the actual swing.

In theory… the athlete has taken his stance, locked his eyes on the pitcher and started the load as the pitcher nears his release point. Just before release, the hitter’s load is completed so that the hands have moved back and the front leg has touched down lightly. If the pitch is indeed a fastball, there is no break in rhythm and the swing begins from the loaded launch position in an attempt to make solid contact. If the pitch is an off-speed pitch, however, there’s a slight pause at the load position, before the actual swing continues at the adjusted, off-speed, pace.

Now, back to why this is so difficult… and why this makes the battle between pitcher and hitter so amazing. The statement above, describing the pause needed to hit an off-speed pitch, assumes that the hitter has recognized that the pitch released is NOT a fastball. And doing this is incredibly difficult!
  • Pitch Recognition: Great hitters have great vision. They are, somehow, able to pick up small tips that identify which pitch is released. They see the fingers at release, the type of spin on the baseball, and/or the arc of the pitch released that tell them “yes” it’s a fastball, or “no” it’s an off-speed pitch. And they pick up these keys, and make these adjustments, in a split-second… literally.
  • Keeping the Hands Back: Many great hitters are able to keep their hands back in the hitting position, even if their weight starts to shift forward. Although they may be fooled somewhat and the body has started to move forward (as if hitting a fastball), the hitter’s hands stay back and allow for solid contact regardless.
  • Pitcher vs. Hitter Battle: Understanding the difficulties of hitting an off-speed pitch… the pitcher’s goal is to mimic the flight path of a fastball as much as possible. This is why a change-up is often referred to as the most difficult pitch to hit in baseball. A great change up comes out of the pitchers hand on the exact same path as a fastball. And if it’s thrown with the same arm speed as the fastball, how the heck is a hitter supposed to recognize it?!?!
  • Curveball vs. Change-Up: The difference then with the curveball is that the ball flight will be different that the fastball. Because it can be recognized more easily, this means that the curveball’s effectiveness is much more dependent on movement, rather than deception (as with a change-up). With this understood, it explains why a harder curveball that breaks sharply can be more effective that a huge breaking ball that breaks 5 feet! That curveball with a huge break will go straight up out of the hand, an immediate trigger for a hitter that the pitch is definitely not a fastball.
The fundamentals described here have been simplified significantly. It takes almost freakish coordination and athleticism to do this – and then it takes terrific ability to make solid contact with whatever pitch is thrown. Toss in a high degree of failure, major league defenses, and the best arms in the world… it’s amazing that hitters are able to do what they do.


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