Pitching Mechanics / Illegal Pitches / Teaching Children Properly From Day 1

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Yes lorafter you should take a chill pill or, like a HS junior told a hyper opposing coach in one of my games the other night "take a breath and eat a donut once in a while."

Some of the responses have bordered on rude but you set the original tone that smacked of anger and stress over what you've seen in games. What you are missing, as has already been said, is you're not the first to come on here trying get "ammunition" to shoot at other parents or players, so we're all a little putoff. And you are also missing the point that many of us coached for many, many years and we had daughters play up through college ball. I still teach pitchers ranging in age from 8 to HS varsity. We've been through the softball wars and we've seen every imaginable style of parent and coaching personality and some are just not pretty. We also have a lot better idea than you may have of what are reasonable expectations for players at different ages. For example- you stated you got to HS pitching wrongly and had to correct. My expectation of HS age is to be pretty sound mechanically and legally with only minor issues to address (yeah I know, not always the case). Should your experience of improper coaching be a reason to try to clamp down so hard on a 7 or 8 year old kid? Lot of difference in ability, maturity and training time between 8 and about 15. As I said earlier, most 6, 7, and 8 year olds struggle to throw something across the plate. For those ages it's reasonable to let them develop a love of the game, enjoy the thrill of pitching, and let them evolve more legally at their pace as they can be worked through it. Why pressure them so young?

My thoughts anyway. So eat a donut and keep reading the board. You may learn something even though you to try to imply you have it all in your hip pocket.