I recently read an article written by Mike Candrea - one the top coaches in the history of our sport.  I thought you would all enjoy it. 

Building Consistency in Your Performance

Consistency is a habit formed by repeated acts. Consistent behavior will get you consistent performance. We have heard many times over that softball is a game of monotonous repetition of fundamental skills. Coaches and players alike always enjoy learning new drills that add variety and freshness to our teaching methods. It is important that we understand how drills affect our ability to perform the necessary skills of the game with consistency and how our behavior affects our ability to perform those skills in game situations.

Why is repetition so important? My first area of building consistency in simple terms is: repetition creates muscle memory. This muscle memory will give us the best chance to execute necessary movements with consistency and more importantly without thinking. As an avid golfer, I know how difficult it is to repeat my swing and the ball is not even moving. Imagine the challenge we have in our game to build consistency with all the variables we have to deal with. Whether you are building a pitcher or hitter in our game, the ability to repeat the same movement is the difference between good and great! As coaches, we must make sure our athletes understand the movement they are executing and that proper technique is always applied in practice situations. Quality repetitions vs. quantity repetitions!

This brings me to the second area of building consistency in performance - Consistent behavior! The game we play is a very difficult game and we tend to make it more difficult by the behavior we choose when we lose track of the process. How many times do you see a player always fighting themselves because of the inability to deal with the failure this great game brings at times. They are constantly on a roller coaster and can never achieve consistency in their performance. As coaches, parents or players, we cannot underestimate the power of choice. We have a choice as to how we respond to a situation and it is our job to teach young people that failure is a part of the process. Just ask Tiger Woods, Thomas Edison or Michael Jordan the number of failures they learned from before reaching greatness in their careers. I have used an acronym with our players to give them a plan to build consistency. The acronym is P.A.R. This stands for Preparation, Action and Response. In our game, we have control over certain things and these are three areas that cannot be underestimated. If we can bring a consistent behavior to our preparation, actions and response to our actions, we will finally understand how the great players have brought consistency to their games. This is not only a great approach to building success on the field, but also a great formula for success in life.


"After watching Greg Maddux for [many] years, I've to come to appreciate his consistency in performances, the consistency in his work between games, the consistency in his thought processes, the consistency in the excellence of his innings, his games. It is amazing to watch. It just never varies."
Bobby Cox
Manager - Atlanta Braves

Is the softball swing different from the baseball swing? 

In a word – NO

And if anyone tells you they are or should be – then I challenge you to ask them “why”.  And make them back up their argument with facts and information.  Not just make claims.

For many years, the softball world yelled and shouted that the swings were different and needed to be mechanically different.  It was just the accepted view for a long time.  In fact, many coaches and instructors will still try to push this on their players and teams.  

But the science of the game has changes a lot of things in last 5-10 years.  The truth is, with the exception of slapping, the best baseball and softball swings are the basically the same.  And if you won’t take my word for it, how about legendary coaches like Mike Candrea and Sue Enquist – who have both gone on record as saying what has been taught in the past, has been proven wrong, and they both now believe the high-level softball swing is the same as the high-level baseball swing.

There have always been 2 primary arguments used for why the swings should be different.
     1. Softball Players require a shorter/quicker swing due to reaction time differences.
     2.  The plane of a softball pitch – specifically the rise ball – is different than a baseball pitch. 
     3.  Girls are not as strong or athletic as boys/men.   

Let’s take a look at these arguments one at a time.

Reaction Time – without getting in to too much detail or math, the reaction time of a for 60 mph softball pitch from 43 ft is equivalent to the reaction time of about an 83-84 mph baseball pitch.  And a 65 mph softball pitch is equivalent to about a 90 mph baseball pitch.  So the reaction times are actually very similar between the two.  Plus, a softball is actually moving more slowly through the “hitting zone”, and thus stays in the hitting zone longer… so there is actually more time to make contact. 

Plane of the Pitch – again, without getting in to a lot of the details, it has been proven that the all pitches, including the rise ball, is actually dropping as it crosses the plate and passes through the hitting zone.  The effects of gravity are just too much for a pitcher to physically overcome.  A "good" riseball will actually "drop less" than a normal pitch - actually giving it appearance to the hitter of "rising".  But that doesn't change the fact that the ball is still dropping vertically as it crosses the plate, and thus doesn't change the swing mechanics to best handle this pitch.    So does that make mean the rise ball isn’t a good pitch?  Absolutely not. It’s a deadly pitch when thrown correctly.  Maybe the toughest pitch out of all of them to hit.  All I’m saying is the trajectory of the ball as it crosses through the hitting zone of the hitter is still downward and does absolutely nothing to support the argument of needing a different swing to efficiently hit this pitch.  In fact, the plane of a rise ball in softball and the plan of a high fastball in baseball are very close when they are crossing the plate. 

Also, keep in mind that girls will see VERY few good, true rise balls.  The vast majority of girls who claim they throw a rise ball do not have the proper spin or hard enough spin to really be a rise ball.  Most of the rise balls the girls will see are just high fastballs with improper spin. 

Size & Strength – lastly, let’s look at the size and strength argument.  To me, this is the easiest one to address.  Why would we ever consider teaching our girls anything but the best, most efficient swing possible?  Do we teach girls run differently than boys?  Do we teach girls to shoot a basketball differently?  Do we teach girls to throw differently?  Etc.  No!  So why would we teach them to swing differently just because they are girls.  It just makes no sense to me.  Let’s teach the best, most efficient swing possible.  Period.

So to go back to the original topic – Should the softball and baseball swings be the same?  The answer is yes.  And if anyone tells you differently, make them explain why.  And if the arguments are different than we wrote about here, come back and let us know.  We’ll address those arguments too.

Nebraska Fury Fastpitch

Mental Approach To Hitting – Aggressive Hitting

Nebraska Fury Fastpitch, as an organization, strives to have one consistent hitting identity throughout all of our teams and players - to be known as very aggressive hitting teams.  

When watching teams play, I quite often hear such things as “be patient”, “don’t try to kill it”, “just make contact”, “take some pitches”, “just put in play”, “walk is a good as a hit”, etc.  I could go on and on.  And while those giving this advice are usually well meaning and some of this advice may even be technically true, the actual "words/phrases" can also have unintended effects on a hitter. 

At Nebraska Fury, we want our hitters to be ready to hit each and every pitch.  And even going one step further, we want our hitters to “expect and prepare” to hit every pitch.  We want AGGRESSIVE hitters.  We don’t want hitters who are reactive or passive or, even worse yet, looking for a walk.  We want our girls to be up there, looking for a good pitch, expecting a good pitch and hoping for a good pitch so they can aggressively drive the ball. 

Ted Williams, one of the best hitters of all time, said the most important part of hitting is finding a good pitch to hit.  Even very good hitters have trouble covering the whole strike zone and even a harder time covering pitches outside the strikes zone.  The hard part is you don't know "when" you will get that pitch.  Against good pitching, you typically don’t get many “good pitches” to hit.  It may come as the very first pitch of the at-bat and it may be the fifth pitch of the at-bat.  Heck, there may be at-bats that it never comes.  But… the hitters HAS to have an aggressive mind set and be fully prepared and ready to take advantage of that “good” pitch whenever it does comes.  They should have that same aggressive approach every pitch.  Why do I hear parents and coaches complaining about swinging at the first pitch?  What is that was the only good pitch that hitter will see in the at-bat that was really one they do something with?  Do we really want them being "patient" and taking that pitch?  Sure, there are certain times that a situation dictates a different approach... but in general, we want them prepared to hit any pitch at any time!!

Hitting (softball or baseball) is one of the most difficult things to do in sports.  Very possibly the hardest.  The pitcher already has the advantage.  So why do we want to make it even harder by putting our hitters in an even more difficult, passive approach and giving the pitcher even more of an advantage.  Pitchers want hitters to be passive. So why are we giving our hitters cues and advice that can make them that way.  It just makes no sense. 

This only touches the surfaces on this subject and what we teach our hitters and some of mental instruction we give them at Nebraska Fury.  Is your coach/organization talking/teaching your hitters about Level 1, 2 and 3 pitchers and the different approaches to them?  Are they talking about “yesing” the ball?  Are they talking about pitch anticipation?  Are they talking about pitch recognition?  About controlling middle of the plate?  About visual mechanics?  Etc. It's all part of the player development we believe so strongly in at Nebraska Fury.

Nebraska Fury is about player development first.  Developing players to be successful in the long term at a high level.  Yes, team success is also a goal and is important to us.  But we believe that is something that comes as a direct result of focusing on player and team development.  If this sounds like something you are interested in, we encourage you to take a closer look at our organization. 

 

Nebraska Fury Fastpitch is based in Omaha, NE but we welcome committed softball players from a larger surrouding area. 

Our organizational goals are all built around one key factor - player development.  We believe in a strong work ethic, good coaching, respect for the game and a team first approach.

We currently have 4 teams (11U, 12U, 16U and 18 Gold).  3 of our teams were Nebraska State Champions last year and all competed very well at national tournaments.  Our Gold team is a newly formed team.  

We encourage and welcome everyone to take some time to learn more about our organization.  We take pride in not only doing things differently, but also doing things better than other organizations in our area.  We are always interested in exploring the opportunity to add new players and new teams that fit our organizational model and are committed to themselves, to their team and to the game of fastpitch. 

We do not limit our organization to only elite level teams.  We are looking for committed, dedicated players and teams at all levels. 

Please contact us with any questions or interest.

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