Pitching and Pitchers Discussion 10U Pitcher Speed

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A 10u at 60? Wow! Speed is good, but don't fall in love with it. A good hitting team will rock a pure flamethrower. We have seen some exceptional 10u pitchers, but 60mph is a little bit ridiculous. If she throws 60 at 10u what is she going to throw at 14u? Unless she is a 6' tall exception to the rule, I can't think there is any validity to this story.

 

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timac,

Your post is right on, like you too many times I have seen players like this, who can dominate with a fastball at 10/12/14, and then others start to catch up, usually the girls that have been working HARD on the fundamentals, it sounds like some of the players mentioned are getting good advice and coaching, hopefully the pitchers parents will keep everything in perspective.

Many times also we have seen these type of girls with a parent that decides they need to coach her, and it then becomes a case of, "insert name and her traveling all-stars" .

Good luck to these girls and I hope to read about them on future threads, maybe they will break 75.

 

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I hate to deflate any of my Ohio neighbors that may have spent $600 on an expensive device but I'm afraid you've been had by the manufacturers. Let me compare to something I am very familar with, high end audio and video equipment. People spend $500 on a DVD player thinking they are getting a much better image than on a $100 DVD machine. Guess what? The difference is almost immeasurable to the human eye. Same things with guns. I'm not saying there aren't slight diffference but you can take any of 10 PROPERLY functioning devices and clock a pitcher and they will be close. You don't need to set up a freaking laboratory to get a 98% accurate reading. I will even go so far to tell you that the $79 radar glove has been shown to be accurate to with 1 MPH of the best gun

 

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Yeah, but when my DD breaks 60 the guns seems to malfunction and only show low 40's.... ;D

 

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Yeah, but when my DD breaks 60 the guns seems to malfunction and only show low 40's.... ? ;D

You probably forgot to flip the "D.A.D." switch. Check your owner's manual. You'll get the readings you expect.

 

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Thanks Ringer! That did the trick....she just threw an 80 mph fastball.

 

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LSHIPMP!!!!!!!! ;D That's funny!

 

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I'll get back to the original question, I've watched and clocked a lot of 10u pitchers, here's my take: on most 10u teams an average pitcher will throw between 42 and 45, the so called "flamethrowers" will throw around 47 to 48. Thats not to say that I have not seen an occasional 10u pitcher throw around 50, but there are few around here. I clocked some very good 14u pitchers last year and on "average" they were throwing around 50 to 52.

 

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I guess the bottom line at any level, be it 10U,12U,14U etc.----if the batter isn't hitting it, it's fast enough. Let the college coaches worry about the radar readings (with their properly calibrated guns) in about 6 or 7 years.

 

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I'll get back to the original question, I've watched and clocked a lot of 10u pitchers, here's my take: on most 10u teams an average pitcher will throw between 42 and 45, the so called "flamethrowers" will throw around 47 to 48. Thats not to say that I have not seen an occasional 10u pitcher throw around 50, but there are few around here. I clocked some very good 14u pitchers last year and on "average" they were throwing around 50 to 52.

I agree , but the 2 I mentioned did throw at 50-51 , maybe 52 last year . Would like for someone with the Lasers to verify my guess on their 10u pitcher last year, she looked real close to our 10u pitcher last year. I do agree , those 2 were far and above the hardest throwers I saw all year at 10u. MD

 

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You are correct MD she (The Laser girl ) could throw consitantly above 50 all game.

 

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i have a 12yr old who throws high 40's consistently, low 50's occasionally, but can hit spots so speed isnt everything. It is nice though

 

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Last year both of my 10u pitchers were clocked at 54mph. A lot of you know Mr D as a pitching coach and it was from him. Did they pitch 54mph in a game..........sometimes a pitch here are there. I noticed they slowed down in a real game situation. They still threw high 40's, and they both dominated alot of games.

 

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Finch --Thats bringing it bigtime. To have a girl throwing that hard on a 10u team is great , to have ?two is super. I'm curious, ?I saw what I thought was two hardest throwers in the state last year at 10u , but don't get the pleasure of watching many teams from up north , which team did they play for ? ? The two I mentioned were from the lasers 10u and Scioto Co Wild Thangs 10u pitcher. The lasers girl stayed at or above 50 most of the time and so did the WT girl. ? ? FYI The lasers went 62-0 into natl's. The WT's went 42-6.

 

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Down here in southern Ohio I reported that our kid from last year was throwing at/ or above 50 at 10u and had several people ridicule me like I was telling something that was totally insane. I even think one the guys giving me a hard time is a local pitching coach. They think if they have not seen it , it must not be true. I challenged him to bring his gun to tommorrows scrimmage , We''ll see. MD

 

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My dd is 11 almost 12, she has been playing travel ball since 8u. Last fall coming out of 10U, she pitched 45-48mph. Now she is playing 12u and was clocked last weekend (by two different guns) pitching consistantly at 50-51, she did hit 52 one time on a breaking ball. Would you consider this average for her age group? (she is a big girl)
I agree that speed is not as important in 12u as it is in 10u. My dd is currently throwing fastball, breaking ball, change up, knuckle change, offspeed, offspeed screw, triple pitch, screw, curve and drop ball all pretty effectively, that is why she has two different change ups, and three different offspeed pitches, because if one particular one is not working she can switch to the other one.
What should be her next pitch to learn?

 

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sales, she could follow in the ol' mans footsteps MD

 

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Ace6 it is great that your dd is working on movement pitches they will become very important. Speed is nice but hitters will time a pitcher eventually no matter how hard they throw, this is particullary true in hs where the same teams may play several times in a short season. Location is nice but look at the width of the plate, hitting the inside or the outside is not that different. Take the entire strike zone as defined in the rule book and then consider if your lucky you will have an umpire that will give you half of that making location less effective. Keep her working on the movement.

 

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10 different pitches at 11yrs old ? Are you for real ? I don't doubt the speed a bit, that sounds about right for a good , upper level 11yr old. But 10 diff' pitches and you are asking about an 11th ?? I'm open to an education , is this possable to throw 10 distinctively different pitches at 11yr's old? MD

 

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Effective pitchers have three distinct qualities:
1) Different speed pitches
2) Movement
3) Accuracy

What do good hitters have? Good timing and good vision. How do pitchers counteract good hitting? With cange of speed to mess up timing, and movement which messes with vision.

Consider things college coaches look for:

60mph speed combined with ACCURACY. (One is not effective without the other)
Movement WITH ACCURACY. (Up, down, left and right. Rise, drop, curve, screw)
Change of speed. (Fastball, off-speed, change-up)

Bottom line - If you are a high school junior with these abilities and decent academics, you have 11 Ohio DI softball programs waiting to give you a free education.

Fact: Few Ohio pitchers fit into this mold, although there have been a few good ones.

Is your 10u pitcher on track to develop these qualities?