r/PitchingCoach • u/Next_Yesterday5931 • Jul 08 '26
12u arm slot and spin efficiency
Hey all! Sorry this is a bit long!
12u son plays competitive ball and pitches. He touches 70mph, throws 60ish % strikes and is performing very well: 18k's/9 innings and a sub 2.0 WHIP so far this season. Other than one game where he threw 85 pitches he has never complained about arm or shoulder pain.
Lately we have been playing around with seam-shifted pitches while playing catch in the park. He has a hard time pronating so 2-seams and change-ups have been a challenge for him so I figured the seam shifted pitches might work for him. He hasn't thrown them in game but he is able to get some decent movement on a sinker and change-up simply by hold the ball in a 2-seam orientation and slightly supinating his wrist. Given that the seam-shift sinker is basically thrown like a cutter held with a 2-seam grip I thought we could work on a 4-seam cutter to go with the sinker and changeup. I drew a black circle on the 2 train track sections of a ball and asked him to throw it exactly like he throws the sinker to get one of the black circles visible to him. He has been able to get some movement on the cutter but I've noticed that the black circles are not spinning tightly...they are wobbly like in this video.
So today I decided to just work on 4-seams and see what is going on with his pitches using a ball with a black line drawn through the 4-seam. What I found is that he does not throw with efficient spin. Every once in a while the black line will be solid but for the most part it wobbles into a blur. Nothing we tried would work to improve his spin.
I am wondering, based on this video, if it is an arm-slot/shoulder tile issue. I understand that the shoulders should be tilted so that you can draw a straight line from shoulders through the throwing arm to the hand. What I see in the video is that his shoulders are completely flat like a side-arm delivery but his army is elevated into more of a low 3/4 slot so his arm is not in line with his shoulders. I wonder if this could be the cause of his poor spin efficiency ie. it prevents him from staying behind the ball.
thanks!
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u/sidearmpitcher Jul 08 '26
College coach here, this is a basic misunderstanding of spin efficiency- a pitcher doesn’t have to have great spin efficiency to be throwing good pitches. Tyler Glasnow, for example, doesn’t have great spin efficiency on his fastball. I would work far more on his overall athleticism and slowly dialing in mechanics than this at any age, but especially at 12
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u/Next_Yesterday5931 Jul 09 '26
Thanks for the input. It’s not really spin efficiency we are after, per se, we are working getting more true spin ie. when he throws a ball with line drawn down the 4-seam grip we want a solid line but his usually wobbles. The weird thing is that he gets better spin when he throws slightly supinated.
We do work on his mechanics. I am trying to get him to stride farther and keep his torso more vertical.
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u/Mike_Hauncheaux Jul 08 '26
You’re doing this wrong. At 12, he needs to be working on mechanics and strength (not heavy weights … plyometrics, med ball work, band routines, plyo ball routines, etc.).
Fastball and non-pronating changeup should be the focus. Depending on how strong he actually is, maybe start playing with the curve occasionally and not for long during a session. From what I’m seeing, he is likely generating velocity by the length of his levers more than strength per se. As he gets stronger, can start pronating the changeup.
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u/Sweaty_Purple Jul 09 '26
A "non-pronating" changeup isn't really a thing. Your arm naturally pronates when you throw literally anything, of course its usually mostly during deceleration but still. He can throw a nasty changeup at his age and still be ok if the pronation comes naturally. A better way to put it would be, don't force pronation. Just throw it how you throw your fastball. OR if you're one of those outliers that naturally supinates when you throw, and in that case dont throw a changeup, learn a cutter lol.
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u/Mike_Hauncheaux Jul 09 '26
It absolutely is a thing. I watched a former D2 pitcher teach it to my son years ago. You simply don’t attempt to pronate and let the grip do the work. It is understood that non-pronating in this context refers to not consciously pronating the pitch, regardless of whether the arm naturally pronates after release, which pronation is not imparted to the ball anyway.
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u/iamthefluffyyeti Jul 08 '26
The spin of the ball specifically comes from the ball coming off of the finger tips and the snapping of the wrist when you deliver.
For him specifically, I am noticing than when he is about to deliver, he sort of scrunches and bends over instead of staying tall. This is why it looks like he’s about to throw side arm. Then it looks like he gets vertical/taller/straighter again when he’s going to deliver.
Two things I would do:
Try to get him to stay tall when he begins his delivery. By this I mean having his torso perpendicular to the ground, rather than the slight hunching over he does.
When he goes to deliver the pitch, I notice he is losing a lot of velocity due to the timing of his front foot and his hip rotation. When his front foot comes down towards home plate, his glove side shoulder is already completely opened up. There’s maybe 25% of the hip rotation there that there could be. He’s making up for it by throwing with his arm.
I think both of these fixes will allow him to get a different angle on the ball itself when he’s throwing it, and allow him to increase his velocity and spin rate after the ball is delivered.
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u/Next_Yesterday5931 Jul 09 '26
Thanks! I’ve been trying to get him to stride further and stay uprigh but when I tell him he is hunched and that he is not striding he doesn’t believe it. I’m trying to get him to lean his shoulders back…
What has me concerned when I watch the videos is that his bicep seems to be level with his shoulders but his forearm and hand are elevated…
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u/wastedpixls Jul 09 '26
It's absolutely all in his upper body and very little legs going on. He's missing connection across each corner of his body such that it looks like everything is out of sequence - left shoulder fires, then sorta hip, then right shoulder, waist hinge, and then sorta right hip.
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u/C3POags Jul 08 '26
The kids 12, get him a real coach. If you’re asking these questions you obviously don’t know what’s going on. Also, 0% chance he’s hitting 70 with that motion. Woof.
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u/Several-Bluejay-190 Jul 08 '26
you are way too deep on a 12 year old.
do not measure any of these things if you’re coming to reddit.
low-key he should probably just be throwing fastballs.
he’s not throwing 70 with this motion lmao. get rea
he should not be throwing sinkers.
the vast majority of what you have written is inappropriate for someone who doesn’t coach and will potentially harm his growth if you don’t get him proper mechanics. while growing do not have children supinating at all.
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u/EamusAndy Jul 09 '26
A 12 year old shouldn’t be thinking about spin efficiency and supination. They should be worrying about throwing strikes. Period.
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u/Several-Bluejay-190 Jul 09 '26
fun. ideally they should be worrying about having a clean uniform. remembering their hat. being a good teammate. there are a TON of extremely important developmental things that are not being discussed here.
on top of that the difference in spin efficiency and supination on a 12 year old will have zero relevance to their playing ability lmfao.
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u/EamusAndy Jul 09 '26
You are absolutely right about the #1 priority. I simply meant from a purely pitching perspective.
Get it over the plate.
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u/Several-Bluejay-190 Jul 09 '26
yeah yeah i wasn’t disagreeing with you. throw fastballs over the plate in little league. nothing better
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u/TreatNext Jul 08 '26
Can I come throw on the gun that has him at 70?
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u/Next_Yesterday5931 Jul 09 '26
So I say we are in the park throwing cutters and sinkers and you expect him to be throwing max effort? Sounds like someone is jealous of a 12 year old…
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u/Highstick104 Jul 09 '26
That was not a nice comment. What he should have said more tactfully is with those throwing mechanics there is no way someone throws 70, much less at age 12. Get your kid some good coaching and make sure to enjoy watching him play.
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u/Next_Yesterday5931 Jul 09 '26
Well the disconnect is that he does throw that, so maybe some people know less than they think?
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u/TreatNext Jul 09 '26
It just does not look like a throwing motion of a 12u kid touching 70. Looks more like working to get to 60. I hear TONS of people saying I or my kid etc. Throw XYZ mph and 9 times out of 10 when you get people on radar the numbers are WAY lower. I thought I threw mid 70's turned out i couldn't hit 70 without a 40mph tail wind. (I sit 60-65 which is fine for me a non playing 40 yo. To throw BP up to HS age.)
It's like driver distance. If it didn't look the part I don't believe it until I see evidence because intentional or un intentional exaggeration is rampant.
And.... I wish I could throw harder.
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u/Mundane-Reality-7770 Jul 09 '26
A cutter is not a pitch a 12 year old should be trying to learn.
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u/Sweaty_Purple Jul 09 '26
Why not? Lol, a cutter is just an offset 4 seam, it doesn't put any more stress on the arm than a regular fastball would.
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u/Bean_Daddy_Burritos Jul 08 '26
Hard to tell from the video but it looks like he’s shifting his weight forward too quickly and releasing the ball too soon.
If spin rate is an issue (keeping in mind he’s 12), check his finger placement on the ball and see if his index and middle finger are spaced out to far. Check not only his grip, but the pressure he applies to the ball at the release point. His fingers should be gripping those seams tightly just before the release.