I did not use my wrist on the curve my dad taught me, and I never threw a screwball. I’ll read it in a bit to see how far above my head it is.
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Well, maybe if “everyone” does not include me.
Golfers are obsessed with these terms.
Hence the best use of them ever in Tin Cup when Costner’s character gets the shanks.
Roy : I’m pronating.
Romeo : When you’re not supinating.
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Holy shit, that is technical. Glad I had my dad catching me in the back yard.
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So many reasons to be thankful for that.
I tell everybody my dad was the best pitching coach I had, and I am including my time at UT. He taught me an easy on the elbow curve ball I taught to all my teams’ pitchers, and he never was too tired to catch me. I threw millions of pitches to him, and he insisted on and developed the control which allowed me to pitch in college. I tried to emulate my dad with Mark, and I probably threw Mark 10M BP pitches at various venues. Mark’s completely voluntary extra work on hitting from 10 years old on took him from not good to very good, and he had the benefit of a BP pitcher who threw consistent strikes. I owe my dad a lot, and I view Mark’s outstanding improvement as my dad’s doing through me.
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On a related note:
I have seen exactly zero pickup baseball games in my neighborhood.
I have seen kids doing batting practice with their dads (batting helmet, equipment bags, bucket of balls, sometimes video camera).
The batting cages closest to us is a full on training center. There are pictures of their clients in their various college uniforms and a few minor leaguers. They do pitching, fielding, and batting instruction.
The availability of informed instruction must be at an all time high.
I’m not sure the experience of being a kid playing baseball is at a high though. It’s an industry.
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We were at the JUCO World Series for a few days this week, and we were chatting with a guy who’s the father of a 13-year old playing baseball in Grand Junction. Apparently Little League is dying out there, and kids as young as 9 are playing travel ball, going over to Salt Lake City or over the mountains to Denver for tournaments. My brother and friends and I used to go down to the park (which is still there, thankfully) and play by ourselves, and also play Little League. The idea of asking parents to drive us 4 or 5 hours to play baseball would have been completely preposterous.
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I played Little League, and my parents encouraged and supporter me when I did. But the idea of travel ball would have had them laughing out loud for days. I can here it now;
Me: “dad, there’s a tournament this weekend in Tallahassee.”
Dad: “yeah, and there’s a cow pasture out between the orange grove and the river. You can play all weekend there.”
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Kids as young as 7 have “select” travel teams in Oak Hill and likely elsewhere in Austin. A law partner’s son played on one. I told him more than once: “Travis, there ain’t no such thing as a select 7-year old.”
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A friend of mine was talking to a HS coach.
The coach told him that to make the HS varsity his kid would have to play select.
The kid was in the 3rd grade at the time of that conversation.
Pronation- turn arm by turning thumbs in
Supination- turn arm by turning thumbs out
There are pronator and supinator muscles in the forearm, which execute the rotating motions
That is total bullshit too. On my ‘97 team which reached the State Tournament, two were select travel team players, and the rest played in neighborhood leagues. The two (Belisle was one) had the most talent and had the best stats for sure, but guess what? They did not do any better in pressure situations than the neighborhood league kids did.
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Interesting observation. Beth and I moved to Georgetown from McKinney after retirement to be closer to family including our two grandsons of which the oldest is now 7 and getting into sports. I have the pleasure of playing hardball catch with him now-and-then. I’m happy to say he’s pretty good. I feel responsible to keep in interested in baseball since his dad is a basketball guy.
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I don’t know what percentage of MLB draftees these days came up through that crazy travel/select ball path, but I suspect the numbers would depress me.
My very good friend from childhood, played LL together with our dads as the coaches, has a kid who is in a Westlake/Oak Hill/etc area Select league. It is surprisingly serious as far as the coaching and training goes, the games are actually a little more laid back.
The “gotta play Select to have a chance in HS” is a real thing now, so I’ve been told, at least in the West Austin area. His kid fell in love with the facilities, and told his dad “I want to practice here”. They do play something baseball related in the yard/park pretty constantly, the kid is just nuts about the game.
I feel sad that a bunch of these kids will never appreciate the joys and endless possibilities that came with a postgame snocone ticket
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Total, complete bullshit spread by the guys who are making big money running select teams. They sell the parents on this crap, and the parents want to stick their chests out and say “My kid is playing select.” I absolutely hate it, and it is not true.
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“have to” is an exaggeration, sorry, but that’s not coming from the select trainer-types, it’s coming from HS-level coaches within the past year. The kids who play select ball (which is an ever-increasing percentage of them) will by and large get better coaching than the one’s who don’t. “Training trains up talent” I heard from a parent in the stands (barf).
Not everyone has your dad and later you as a coach. Our dads were good enough for me (my buddy moved for a bit to Colorado before 6th grade) to, after LL, start as a 7th grader in MS and as a Freshman in HS at a private school where the talent pool was more like a deep puddle.
And I’m not arguing with you about this at all, I think it kinda sucks. Kids need to be kids. I’m thinking about snocones and nachos now, and playing spread eagle with a raquet/tennis ball against the cinderblock wall of the utility shed at Memorial Ashford LL, waiting for my brother’s game to finish and mine to start. Select kids don’t get that.
I’ve heard many idiots say things like "Babe Ruth wouldn’t hit .100 today. "
The counter is of course if Babe grew up with all the coaching, training and game experience like today’s kids he would thrive. The cream from each generation rises. Hopefully.
Then again, how many American orphans get that chance?
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He’s dead but plenty of pitchers would still find a way to walk him.
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