default
Member
Tom writes in to ask, "How about doing one for the bucket dads? Everyone talks about the kids!"
You know, Tom, I would do something for the bucket dads and moms but I don't want to wallow in self-pity. So I am going to try to stick to anecdotes you and others have sent me, as well as some interesting stories I have heard or seen. I will, of course, talk about some of my personal experiences because those are the ones I know best.
Tom complains of pain he got while returning the ball to his two daughters when they practice pitched to him. As he notes, "there are no points for throwing it back on the fly." I'll add that there are no points for looking like a pro when you throw the ball back either!
I have not only caught a lot of pitching sessions, I have watched others do almost as many. One of the more comical things I have noted is the father or mother who squats like a real catcher and then tries to whip the ball back to the pitcher, again, like a real catcher. I know the mentality. I did this a few times and gave it up for personal safety reasons and to avoid pain.
Even funnier than the would be major league catcher is a fellow I know who wanted to work his daughter's ability to protect herself from line drives by whipping the ball back at her as hard as he possibly could each and every time. His throws probably maxed out at 50-60 mph. Nobody hits a ball back to the pitcher that softly beyond 10U. It doesn't do any good to whip the ball back at her if that's the best you can do. It just gets your blood up and makes her dislike you. It also will eventually burn out your arm.
Let me provide some advice to all parent catchers and this same advice was mentioned to me by Tom. Flipping the ball back on one hop is not a shameful act. It will save your arm. If your daughter is really, really going to grow up to be a pitcher, you are probably going to have to catch 2 - 4 times per week for 100 pitches and returns at the very least. A good average might be 3 times per week for 150 pitches and even that is a bit understated. That is 450 return throws per week, 44 weeks per year, over the span of perhaps an 8 year career, yields 158,400 throw backs. If you, like Tom and I, have 2 daughters, figure it out. You are going to hurt your arm!
I have a pretty bad right, throwing arm. I broke my elbow playing football when I was 15 and still have shards of bone on the inside of the elbow. I know the shards are there because my doctor warned about this at the time of the injury and, quite a while ago, I hurt it and it locked into place. When I had X-rays done, the doctor noted that he could see the shards and it was the swelling around them that had caused the lock-up. Years later, when my kids first got involved in softball, I threw a little too hard with another father before practice one day. My arm was sore for weeks after that.
Once you get the knack of throwing it back on one hop, it may actually save you time because you won't suffer all those bad throws as you try to emulate Pudge-Rod. Tom suggests that bouncing the ball back will make them better fielders. I'm not sure if it is true or not. But it certainly does not hurt their fielding ... or your arm.
The knees are probably your most abused joints. If you ski, snow or water board, that's more so. If you value your ability to walk around, up the stairs, into an elevator, I suggest trying something besides the standard catcher crouch. I am fully aware that there is a little known Medicare benefit for which you might qualify. I am slightly jealous of all those people on the TV who got their Power Chair and didn't have to pay a penny out of pocket for it. But if you are in your 40s, you will look silly making your way to the restaurant/bar/supermarket in an electrical chair. The alternative is a knee replacement but those replacements need to be replaced after a decade or so. You can count on having to replace your bad knee(s) as many as 5 more times during your life if you need your first one at 40 or so. Save your knees, get something to sit on during pitching practice!
Tom suggests a high bucket. He recommends this because 1) he has sufficient room to toss the ball back underhand and 2) he is able to get out of the way of a wayward pitch very quickly without stressing his knees too much. I prefer a lower bucket. I use one of the shortest buckets around, one I used on my boat before I got rid of the boat in favor of softball lessons. I like the shorter bucket because I can set a lower target and I want my kids to throw a lot of low pitches in order to induce grounders. But I may rethink my approach very soon as I am missing out on the benefits Tom noted.
I do not suggest spending money to get the item I have seen in stores and online. That is a stool which stands on one leg and is sold specifically for bucket dads and moms. I got one for Father's Day. It is not very convenient and I have fallen off it several times. The thing about a bucket is you can use it as a bucket in which to carry gloves and balls. It is sturdy. One cheap little plastic bucket will probably survive your kids' pitching careers and you will be able to will it to them when they become parents.
At this point I have to tell you a story or two story about buckets. I learned about them my first year of travel. The warehouse superstore was selling seeds in a bucket for a very cheap price and we decided to buy one for the team. I had hoped to recoup the bucket after the seeds were gone because it looked like it might make a good seat. But when the seeds were depleted, the team's manager, a father of a pitcher, grabbed the bucket and made it his own faster than I could possibly have grabbed it back. A month or two went by and someone took the top of that bucket and attached a proper seat cushion to it for the coach. He still has my bucket today! I think he is rather proud of it.
Another bucket brigade dad I know often catches his daughter when she pitches. He does so in pitching lessons and practice sessions, at team practices and before games. I noticed that he sits sideways on the bucket in order to protect his potential to produce children in the future. After years of watching this, I commented to my wife about it and was surprised by her reaction. She told me that when she first saw him sit sideways like that, she lost all respect for the man! She said he should sit like a real man!! So if you are at all concerned about the way people perceive you as you sit on your bucket, sit straight and protect yourself through other means.
Yet another bucket dad I know has a daughter who is a good pitcher but not always that successful when pitching against the best kids. We were conducting a tryout for catchers one day and she was pitching to them. I asked her if she had a dropball because I wanted to see the catchers block. She said she did and proceeded to throw several very good ones. I was genuinely impressed, not with the catchers but with this girl's dropball. So I asked the father about why he never had her throw the drop in games. He looked at me with a puzzled expression and said,
"Well, she really doesn't have a drop. I mean we don't work on it at all. I can't stand catching the thing. So she never works on it. I didn't think it was very good because I haven't seen her throw one in many months."
I informed him that she does indeed have a good drop. I also told him that she practices it when she throws with her younger sister, a catcher. I strongly suggested that he begin calling the pitch as one of her main ones in games. Do you know, that pitch has become her mainstay and she is a much more effective pitcher now than she was before she started throwing the drop a lot.
Yet, I understand why a father would not want his daughter to spend a lot of practice time working on the drop, at least not while he was catching it. The drop is the bane of many bucket dads' existence. I remember talking to one father who had a daughter with a good drop. He was catching her in the yard one summer evening when one pitch pointed out a tree root he had not completely removed from their throwing area. He was struck in the knee by a drop that bounded off the tree root. For months afterwards, he walked around with a softball sized bump on one leg. This guy used to wear shorts in weather above 25 degrees. But during July and August of that summer, he wore long pants due to his embarrassment.
Speaking of embarrassment, another father of a talented drop ball pitcher I know took one off his shins. He had to go in for X-rays after a few weeks of hobbling. The pain was excruciating. But this guy had some trouble with the doctor because he refused to tell the man flat out that the injury was caused by catching his daughter's pitching! The doctor wanted to know how it happened. He said "never mind." The doctor persisted relentlessly. I think the doctor finally accepted some explanation about a foul ball at a high school baseball game.
The moral of that story is shin guards are advisable. I actually don't wear them because I can't stand them. I caught until I was 18 but I never really loved wearing guards. And as an adult, I really can't handle the feeling, especially when I wear shorts. That's not a very good excuse and I have chipped bones on my shins too, though nothing that hindered my ability to walk. I guess I am pig headed and one day my daughter's dropball will convince me to wear the shin guards I have.
Tom has some advice if you also refuse to wear baseball/softball shin guards. He uses ****** style leg guards. I may have to look into this because it makes a lot of sense. But I may have trouble finding anything that fits properly. If you don't have football shaped calves, you might want to look into ****** shin guards to protect you while catching.
I have one final dropball story for you. I was at the field one day and noticed a bunch of guys from our organization standing around a pick-up truck chatting. As I walked towards them, they were laughing and making all kinds of odd faces. As I got close, one yelled out to me, "hey Dave, have you ever taken one in the ... you know?" I replied, "yes, many times, it ain't pretty, it's always the darn dropball." As I uttered the beginning of the word "dro" they all broke out into hysterical laughter. They were all pitchers' dads. They knew exactly what I meant. They all had the same experience.
I understand what Tom is saying about the higher bucket. If you are catching a dropballer, it is best to get the heck out of the way once that ball hits the ground. It has a lot of spin on it. You really do not know where it is going to go. The faster you can get out of the way, the better.
Still, I cling to my low bucket. And one of my kids is a dropballer. I have worked a way to protect myself and that is: I stay closer to the plate and when the ball hits the ground, usually it is right around the plate. I go forward rather than trying to block it like a catcher. I attempt to short hop it right near where it hits the ground so it doesn't have the opportunity to jump. It doesn't matter to me if I catch it or merely knock it away. Just so long as it doesn't jump me. So far, that technique has worked.
The worst I have ever been struck is actually on a change-up. My kid's change is pretty good. It moves and dives. When it hits the ground, it is difficult to know which direction it will bounce in. She once threw one that hit the plate, bounced up, and caught me in the chin. I saw stars. I got a nice little knot on my face that stayed there for several months. I think perhaps the bone was chipped but I never sought medical treatment because I was a little too embarrassed. I didn't need to hear another human being suggest I wear a mask. So I won't go into proseltyzing you about wearing a mask. I'll just say that there is a good reason to put one on, and leave it at that.
So to recap, a bucket is better than squatting. I prefer a low one but Tom likes a high one and he can offer some sound logic for choosing that size. Protective equipment is probably a good idea though I admit to wearing none. You must be hyper vigilant to protect yourself. And those of us too proud to admit it hurts when we get hit should probably rethink our manhood.
Speaking of manhood, I don't want to shortchange the many women who catch their daughters' sessions. I know several who, for one reason or another, do the job. They may be better athletes than their husbands are. They may just be the only one available when their daughters take their lessons. I think I know of more fathers than mothers but there are penty of each and all have their own war stories.
As a matter of fact, I know that one of the guys who laughed at my comment above no longer catches his daughter's lessons. Instead, he has his wife do that. The reason is he has become very good friends with the pitching coach. When the coach sees him, he likes to talk endlessly. The guy not only feels as if his daughter is shortchanged due to the coach's excessive conversation, but also he is concerned because he too often gets distracted from the job at hand. His daughter has hit 60 on the gun. But she is a little wild, especially when throwing movement pitches.  l; He often finds himself nearly getting hit because he is too engaged in conversation. So now his wife catches the daughter at lessons. And she's the one sporting the injuries most of the time.
I really urge you in the strongest terms possible to not allow yourself to be distracted when catching. Even a 50 mph pitch can do some damage when it hits you in the head. Talking with others is possibly the most insidious form of being distracted. I just heard on the radio that the result of laws prohibiting cell phone usage behind the wheel actually have accomplished one of their objectives - to lower the rate of usage while driving. Unfortunately, the laws did not accomplish the main objective. Accident rates did not go down. While hands-free devices are used to a much higher degree than before, it turns out that they do not prevent accidents. It is the talking that yields the distraction, not the use of hands. If you try to hold a deep conversation while catching your daughter, you're gonna pay a price.
I have on many occasions found that I am not quite as wide awake as I should be when catching. Sometimes my concentration drifts. Sometimes my relatively weak eyesight takes me out of focus. That is not good.
I strongly suggest that before you get behind the plate, you make certain you are wide awake. I now very often drink a full cup of coffee before catching. I sometimes take a shower beforehand. I will try almost anything to ensure that I am as awake as possible. It is no fun to recognize that you almost got hit by that pitch.
Speaking of those times when you feel like you almost just got hit, it is difficult for those whose daughters don't yet throw hard or those who have never been part of the bucket brigade to understand our plight. The best way I can describe this is via analogy.
Do you know that feeling which immediately follows a near miss auto accident? Your adrenaline pumps at full throttle. You feel sweat start to well up in all the usual places despite having been relatively cold before the incident. Your heart pounds. You feel throbbing at your temples. That's an almost car accident. Almost being hit by a pitch is not as bad. I would say that on every pitch my daughter throws, I feel about 5 percent of the car feeling. And when I almost get hit, I suspect I reach to about 10 or 15 percent of that extreme. During the winter, we catch down in my basement which is very large. The basement is also rather cool, perhaps 45 - 50 degrees. But after we are done, I am always sweating. And when I almost get hit, I sweat profusely.
Women have more sense than men. They are more willing to don the full gear. Men are often either too lazy or too stupid unless or until their daughters become demonic hard throwers. I know of a Division one pitcher whose father always puts on the equipment. He does this because his daughter has been clocked around 67 and for one other reason. When the kid throws to him, which she still does on occasion, he abuses her psychologically. When he does this, she usually throws harder. And she, I believe, aims to hurt him. He throws the ball back at her hard a lot - he doesn't follow my one bounce advice and when he does throw it hard at her, I believe he aims to hurt her. Their sessions are rather violent. He dons the gear as a matter of survival. She should consider pitching with catcher's gear on too. Then again, she throws harder than he does.
One other item about gear, as a person who has suffered several concussions, not as a result of catching, I urge you to use the old style of catchers mask which is generally more protective of your brains. I know the newer, hockey style masks are more in vogue and look better. But the helmet part is intended to deal with foul balls. I personally do not think you need to use a helmet. And the hockey style mask provides less cushion when the mask is struck. That is my opinion formed after doing some research. You can do your own thinking and research.
The plight of the bucket dad or mom is not a well respected one. Those of you who regularly catch your daughters know of what I speak. We in the bucket brigade suffer all manner of injuries and humiliation. A little common sense can go a long way towards reducing the number of our injuries. And learning from others is at the heart of the human condition. So take Tom's advice and mine. Don't let your pride get in the way of protecting yourself. Also, when your daughter can throw a projectile hard enough to kill you, it is best not to anger her too much.
Information From: www.girls-softball.com
More...
You know, Tom, I would do something for the bucket dads and moms but I don't want to wallow in self-pity. So I am going to try to stick to anecdotes you and others have sent me, as well as some interesting stories I have heard or seen. I will, of course, talk about some of my personal experiences because those are the ones I know best.
Tom complains of pain he got while returning the ball to his two daughters when they practice pitched to him. As he notes, "there are no points for throwing it back on the fly." I'll add that there are no points for looking like a pro when you throw the ball back either!
I have not only caught a lot of pitching sessions, I have watched others do almost as many. One of the more comical things I have noted is the father or mother who squats like a real catcher and then tries to whip the ball back to the pitcher, again, like a real catcher. I know the mentality. I did this a few times and gave it up for personal safety reasons and to avoid pain.
Even funnier than the would be major league catcher is a fellow I know who wanted to work his daughter's ability to protect herself from line drives by whipping the ball back at her as hard as he possibly could each and every time. His throws probably maxed out at 50-60 mph. Nobody hits a ball back to the pitcher that softly beyond 10U. It doesn't do any good to whip the ball back at her if that's the best you can do. It just gets your blood up and makes her dislike you. It also will eventually burn out your arm.
Let me provide some advice to all parent catchers and this same advice was mentioned to me by Tom. Flipping the ball back on one hop is not a shameful act. It will save your arm. If your daughter is really, really going to grow up to be a pitcher, you are probably going to have to catch 2 - 4 times per week for 100 pitches and returns at the very least. A good average might be 3 times per week for 150 pitches and even that is a bit understated. That is 450 return throws per week, 44 weeks per year, over the span of perhaps an 8 year career, yields 158,400 throw backs. If you, like Tom and I, have 2 daughters, figure it out. You are going to hurt your arm!
I have a pretty bad right, throwing arm. I broke my elbow playing football when I was 15 and still have shards of bone on the inside of the elbow. I know the shards are there because my doctor warned about this at the time of the injury and, quite a while ago, I hurt it and it locked into place. When I had X-rays done, the doctor noted that he could see the shards and it was the swelling around them that had caused the lock-up. Years later, when my kids first got involved in softball, I threw a little too hard with another father before practice one day. My arm was sore for weeks after that.
Once you get the knack of throwing it back on one hop, it may actually save you time because you won't suffer all those bad throws as you try to emulate Pudge-Rod. Tom suggests that bouncing the ball back will make them better fielders. I'm not sure if it is true or not. But it certainly does not hurt their fielding ... or your arm.
The knees are probably your most abused joints. If you ski, snow or water board, that's more so. If you value your ability to walk around, up the stairs, into an elevator, I suggest trying something besides the standard catcher crouch. I am fully aware that there is a little known Medicare benefit for which you might qualify. I am slightly jealous of all those people on the TV who got their Power Chair and didn't have to pay a penny out of pocket for it. But if you are in your 40s, you will look silly making your way to the restaurant/bar/supermarket in an electrical chair. The alternative is a knee replacement but those replacements need to be replaced after a decade or so. You can count on having to replace your bad knee(s) as many as 5 more times during your life if you need your first one at 40 or so. Save your knees, get something to sit on during pitching practice!
Tom suggests a high bucket. He recommends this because 1) he has sufficient room to toss the ball back underhand and 2) he is able to get out of the way of a wayward pitch very quickly without stressing his knees too much. I prefer a lower bucket. I use one of the shortest buckets around, one I used on my boat before I got rid of the boat in favor of softball lessons. I like the shorter bucket because I can set a lower target and I want my kids to throw a lot of low pitches in order to induce grounders. But I may rethink my approach very soon as I am missing out on the benefits Tom noted.
I do not suggest spending money to get the item I have seen in stores and online. That is a stool which stands on one leg and is sold specifically for bucket dads and moms. I got one for Father's Day. It is not very convenient and I have fallen off it several times. The thing about a bucket is you can use it as a bucket in which to carry gloves and balls. It is sturdy. One cheap little plastic bucket will probably survive your kids' pitching careers and you will be able to will it to them when they become parents.
At this point I have to tell you a story or two story about buckets. I learned about them my first year of travel. The warehouse superstore was selling seeds in a bucket for a very cheap price and we decided to buy one for the team. I had hoped to recoup the bucket after the seeds were gone because it looked like it might make a good seat. But when the seeds were depleted, the team's manager, a father of a pitcher, grabbed the bucket and made it his own faster than I could possibly have grabbed it back. A month or two went by and someone took the top of that bucket and attached a proper seat cushion to it for the coach. He still has my bucket today! I think he is rather proud of it.
Another bucket brigade dad I know often catches his daughter when she pitches. He does so in pitching lessons and practice sessions, at team practices and before games. I noticed that he sits sideways on the bucket in order to protect his potential to produce children in the future. After years of watching this, I commented to my wife about it and was surprised by her reaction. She told me that when she first saw him sit sideways like that, she lost all respect for the man! She said he should sit like a real man!! So if you are at all concerned about the way people perceive you as you sit on your bucket, sit straight and protect yourself through other means.
Yet another bucket dad I know has a daughter who is a good pitcher but not always that successful when pitching against the best kids. We were conducting a tryout for catchers one day and she was pitching to them. I asked her if she had a dropball because I wanted to see the catchers block. She said she did and proceeded to throw several very good ones. I was genuinely impressed, not with the catchers but with this girl's dropball. So I asked the father about why he never had her throw the drop in games. He looked at me with a puzzled expression and said,
"Well, she really doesn't have a drop. I mean we don't work on it at all. I can't stand catching the thing. So she never works on it. I didn't think it was very good because I haven't seen her throw one in many months."
I informed him that she does indeed have a good drop. I also told him that she practices it when she throws with her younger sister, a catcher. I strongly suggested that he begin calling the pitch as one of her main ones in games. Do you know, that pitch has become her mainstay and she is a much more effective pitcher now than she was before she started throwing the drop a lot.
Yet, I understand why a father would not want his daughter to spend a lot of practice time working on the drop, at least not while he was catching it. The drop is the bane of many bucket dads' existence. I remember talking to one father who had a daughter with a good drop. He was catching her in the yard one summer evening when one pitch pointed out a tree root he had not completely removed from their throwing area. He was struck in the knee by a drop that bounded off the tree root. For months afterwards, he walked around with a softball sized bump on one leg. This guy used to wear shorts in weather above 25 degrees. But during July and August of that summer, he wore long pants due to his embarrassment.
Speaking of embarrassment, another father of a talented drop ball pitcher I know took one off his shins. He had to go in for X-rays after a few weeks of hobbling. The pain was excruciating. But this guy had some trouble with the doctor because he refused to tell the man flat out that the injury was caused by catching his daughter's pitching! The doctor wanted to know how it happened. He said "never mind." The doctor persisted relentlessly. I think the doctor finally accepted some explanation about a foul ball at a high school baseball game.
The moral of that story is shin guards are advisable. I actually don't wear them because I can't stand them. I caught until I was 18 but I never really loved wearing guards. And as an adult, I really can't handle the feeling, especially when I wear shorts. That's not a very good excuse and I have chipped bones on my shins too, though nothing that hindered my ability to walk. I guess I am pig headed and one day my daughter's dropball will convince me to wear the shin guards I have.
Tom has some advice if you also refuse to wear baseball/softball shin guards. He uses ****** style leg guards. I may have to look into this because it makes a lot of sense. But I may have trouble finding anything that fits properly. If you don't have football shaped calves, you might want to look into ****** shin guards to protect you while catching.
I have one final dropball story for you. I was at the field one day and noticed a bunch of guys from our organization standing around a pick-up truck chatting. As I walked towards them, they were laughing and making all kinds of odd faces. As I got close, one yelled out to me, "hey Dave, have you ever taken one in the ... you know?" I replied, "yes, many times, it ain't pretty, it's always the darn dropball." As I uttered the beginning of the word "dro" they all broke out into hysterical laughter. They were all pitchers' dads. They knew exactly what I meant. They all had the same experience.
I understand what Tom is saying about the higher bucket. If you are catching a dropballer, it is best to get the heck out of the way once that ball hits the ground. It has a lot of spin on it. You really do not know where it is going to go. The faster you can get out of the way, the better.
Still, I cling to my low bucket. And one of my kids is a dropballer. I have worked a way to protect myself and that is: I stay closer to the plate and when the ball hits the ground, usually it is right around the plate. I go forward rather than trying to block it like a catcher. I attempt to short hop it right near where it hits the ground so it doesn't have the opportunity to jump. It doesn't matter to me if I catch it or merely knock it away. Just so long as it doesn't jump me. So far, that technique has worked.
The worst I have ever been struck is actually on a change-up. My kid's change is pretty good. It moves and dives. When it hits the ground, it is difficult to know which direction it will bounce in. She once threw one that hit the plate, bounced up, and caught me in the chin. I saw stars. I got a nice little knot on my face that stayed there for several months. I think perhaps the bone was chipped but I never sought medical treatment because I was a little too embarrassed. I didn't need to hear another human being suggest I wear a mask. So I won't go into proseltyzing you about wearing a mask. I'll just say that there is a good reason to put one on, and leave it at that.
So to recap, a bucket is better than squatting. I prefer a low one but Tom likes a high one and he can offer some sound logic for choosing that size. Protective equipment is probably a good idea though I admit to wearing none. You must be hyper vigilant to protect yourself. And those of us too proud to admit it hurts when we get hit should probably rethink our manhood.
Speaking of manhood, I don't want to shortchange the many women who catch their daughters' sessions. I know several who, for one reason or another, do the job. They may be better athletes than their husbands are. They may just be the only one available when their daughters take their lessons. I think I know of more fathers than mothers but there are penty of each and all have their own war stories.
As a matter of fact, I know that one of the guys who laughed at my comment above no longer catches his daughter's lessons. Instead, he has his wife do that. The reason is he has become very good friends with the pitching coach. When the coach sees him, he likes to talk endlessly. The guy not only feels as if his daughter is shortchanged due to the coach's excessive conversation, but also he is concerned because he too often gets distracted from the job at hand. His daughter has hit 60 on the gun. But she is a little wild, especially when throwing movement pitches.  l; He often finds himself nearly getting hit because he is too engaged in conversation. So now his wife catches the daughter at lessons. And she's the one sporting the injuries most of the time.
I really urge you in the strongest terms possible to not allow yourself to be distracted when catching. Even a 50 mph pitch can do some damage when it hits you in the head. Talking with others is possibly the most insidious form of being distracted. I just heard on the radio that the result of laws prohibiting cell phone usage behind the wheel actually have accomplished one of their objectives - to lower the rate of usage while driving. Unfortunately, the laws did not accomplish the main objective. Accident rates did not go down. While hands-free devices are used to a much higher degree than before, it turns out that they do not prevent accidents. It is the talking that yields the distraction, not the use of hands. If you try to hold a deep conversation while catching your daughter, you're gonna pay a price.
I have on many occasions found that I am not quite as wide awake as I should be when catching. Sometimes my concentration drifts. Sometimes my relatively weak eyesight takes me out of focus. That is not good.
I strongly suggest that before you get behind the plate, you make certain you are wide awake. I now very often drink a full cup of coffee before catching. I sometimes take a shower beforehand. I will try almost anything to ensure that I am as awake as possible. It is no fun to recognize that you almost got hit by that pitch.
Speaking of those times when you feel like you almost just got hit, it is difficult for those whose daughters don't yet throw hard or those who have never been part of the bucket brigade to understand our plight. The best way I can describe this is via analogy.
Do you know that feeling which immediately follows a near miss auto accident? Your adrenaline pumps at full throttle. You feel sweat start to well up in all the usual places despite having been relatively cold before the incident. Your heart pounds. You feel throbbing at your temples. That's an almost car accident. Almost being hit by a pitch is not as bad. I would say that on every pitch my daughter throws, I feel about 5 percent of the car feeling. And when I almost get hit, I suspect I reach to about 10 or 15 percent of that extreme. During the winter, we catch down in my basement which is very large. The basement is also rather cool, perhaps 45 - 50 degrees. But after we are done, I am always sweating. And when I almost get hit, I sweat profusely.
Women have more sense than men. They are more willing to don the full gear. Men are often either too lazy or too stupid unless or until their daughters become demonic hard throwers. I know of a Division one pitcher whose father always puts on the equipment. He does this because his daughter has been clocked around 67 and for one other reason. When the kid throws to him, which she still does on occasion, he abuses her psychologically. When he does this, she usually throws harder. And she, I believe, aims to hurt him. He throws the ball back at her hard a lot - he doesn't follow my one bounce advice and when he does throw it hard at her, I believe he aims to hurt her. Their sessions are rather violent. He dons the gear as a matter of survival. She should consider pitching with catcher's gear on too. Then again, she throws harder than he does.
One other item about gear, as a person who has suffered several concussions, not as a result of catching, I urge you to use the old style of catchers mask which is generally more protective of your brains. I know the newer, hockey style masks are more in vogue and look better. But the helmet part is intended to deal with foul balls. I personally do not think you need to use a helmet. And the hockey style mask provides less cushion when the mask is struck. That is my opinion formed after doing some research. You can do your own thinking and research.
The plight of the bucket dad or mom is not a well respected one. Those of you who regularly catch your daughters know of what I speak. We in the bucket brigade suffer all manner of injuries and humiliation. A little common sense can go a long way towards reducing the number of our injuries. And learning from others is at the heart of the human condition. So take Tom's advice and mine. Don't let your pride get in the way of protecting yourself. Also, when your daughter can throw a projectile hard enough to kill you, it is best not to anger her too much.
Information From: www.girls-softball.com
More...
