Learn How Poor Power Will Reduce Pitching Velocity

Pitching Velocity Analysis

Pitching Velocity Analysis Transcript

Hello this is Brent Pourciau at topvelocity.net and I’m doing a pitching analysis here of Brian and I’m gonna pair him up with Trevor Bauer. Now, let’s take Brian into his leg lift and let’s take Trevor Bauer into his leg lift. There’s gonna be a big difference here between the two, just because Brian doesn’t have a lot of power in his pitching delivery so you’re not gonna see a lot of explosive movement – he just moves at a slow pace and doesn’t really produce a lot of stride power, a lot of torque, there’ll be a big contrast, that old saying of a picture says a thousand words.

Power Pitching Analysis

I could probably just put Trevor and Brian into each component of the 3x pitching mechanics and just those images would tell the whole story. We’ll point it out as we go, make it as simple as we can, see how cut and dry we can make this. We can see in this lift leg position, the start position, Trevor has got more weight on the inside of his drive leg, he’s closed off a little bit more, that front foot is showing, has really closing off his hips with his lift leg and his shoulders as well, looking over his glove side shoulder. Brian is more balanced up, this is to me is a big problem, I’m not the only guy saying this but that old school balance position doesn’t really work with momentum, speed or movement because if you’re working to get into this position, you’re not really moving and we only have the length of our stride to generate as much power or speed as we can so we can convert that to the ball. If we stall or delay during that lift leg into our stride then we are basically shortening our time to generate power. We can see that as Trevor is lifting his leg he is already starting to build momentum that’s why his weight is inside his drive leg. Coming up into this balance position and pausing and delaying is really gonna make it harder for you to build power and momentum through your stride phase.

Let’s move into the load position. We can see as Trevor moves into the load potion, he really leads with that butt hard. That’s the key, kicking that butt hard as your lift leg is moving down the hill and you’re starting to build speed. That’s’ gonna also, hopefully, if you let your knee follow, that’s gonna line up your force vector. Let’s take Brian into that position, we just don’t see that forward progress so look when his lift leg comes down it doesn’t break his hip, he hasn’t really gone anywhere. You could have just put your foot down and started here, you don’t see a lot off movement. You could take advantage of that leg lift by getting your hips going a little bit earlier like Trevor does and getting that force vector in line. Now, because that force vector is not in line, you are not in position to explode in that lateral movement or that linear drive. Your force vectors vertical so if you were to extend and drive you would go up and that’s no use to a pitcher. You’re gonna have to continue to hold everything until your weight, or hips, gets farther out, and now your force vector’s in line. You’re where Trevor Bauer is and you’re already about to put down and you’re already starting to throw the ball. You’re in a position where you don’t have a lot off flexion in your drive leg which is gonna lead to triple extension, you don’t have a lot of flexion or momentum, you’re stride won’t get much bigger than this. Exactly, you put down. Now, look at Trevor here, his drive leg or lift leg is still in line with is front hip, we can see all this movement in his body indicating by the blurring of the film and here is that force vector already in line at this position. We know that Trevor Bauer is gonna get a lot of extension and more explosive power that is really gonna put him into a full stride onto his front foot. Look where he gets out to at the same time he’s opening up he’s also triple extending so he hits that full stride. We can see that triple extension just at, or before, front foot strike which puts him at that full stride. That’s because he did a great job of getting going initially, as early as possible. Getting his hips leading with his lift leg closed off and getting that force vector in line as soon as possible with some flexion in that drive leg so that he can then throw all that into triple extension before front foot strike. That’s a lot there, but like I said, a picture says a thousand words. Look where Trevor Bauer is at front foot strike and look where you are Brian, you’re nowhere close to where you need to be. We can tell from your short stride and from the fact that you’re still dug in on the rubber, your hips are still closed, that you built no power, speed or momentum. You didn’t even build a full stride and because of that, none of that converted before front foot strike and the core torque – shoulder to hip separation.

Bauer’s hips are open, the belt buckle’s to the target, his shoulder’s still closed. We can see your belt buckle’s still to the camera and your shoulders are still closed so you have built no torque, have not converted torque from the power of your stride. Your stride is gonna be of little use to you, you’re in this position now stuck with just your arm but you’re still gonna probably try to get your legs into it, you’re still gonna drive your hip through with your arm but you’ll notice how you have negative separation. When your hip here gets to the camera which means your belt buckle’s at the target and your hips are open your elbow is out in front of your face which means you have negative shoulder separation. This is the moment when your hips get open, your back leg is through. We can see here that Trevor has used that triple extension to get his hips open early, we can see with that triple extension, that his hips are through, belt buckle to the target, but look where his shoulder is. That’s optimal hip to shoulder separation, where he’s in the positive, you’re in the negative because you did not use the power of your stride through triple extension to convert all that into torque or hip tot shoulder separation from foot strike.

So, as far as I’m concerned, you’re done. Pitching really is everything to this point. I look at it like a sprinter, sprinters first few steps are critical to his overall time, if he can correct those first few steps, its more efficient and effective than correcting the last few steps. Same thing for pitchers, if we spend our time correcting the end of the delivery, that’s gonna have very little on the overall result of velocity and precision. Everything to front foot strike here is triple extension, if we can achieve this then I know you’re gonna find yourself in the high velocity category. It doesn’t mean that your jobs done at this point, you still have a lot of other things to work on, but I bring that in later on with my pictures.

Once they master triple extension before front foot strike, optimal shoulder to hip separation before front foot strike, then we can work on the rest. So really Brian this is where you have to get, I’m not even gonna waste my time on the end result, you need a program like the 3X pitching velocity program that’s gonna train you how to move like an explosive pitcher like Trevor Bauer and get you into a position like this front foot strike. Just looking at this position, if you just actually in your room or on the field or wherever you are, if you put your feet out this far, a nice full stride, and close your shoulders like that, look down the glove side, you probably couldn’t hold the position, very difficult to implement  as far as motor coordination or muscle memory, but it’s also something that is very physical, it takes a very strong and powerful athlete to be able to hold and hit these positions through a ballistic movement. This is why the 3X pitching velocity program is critical because it’s going to ultimately teach you about these mechanics and train you through the throwing program and the strength conditioning program, how to actually implement them through strength development and motor co-ordination. Hope this helps, if you have more questions then contact me and I appreciate you sending the video.