3 Comments

  1. Ralph Lilly on August 4, 2014 at 6:12 PM

    Thanks, Phil… I appreciate your thoughts on the spin pitches. I look forward to working with my pitcher on these new ideas. The fact that her pitching coach is on board is just as exciting. Consistency of message to the athlete is critical. I’m going to show your video to her coach and see what she says. Again, thanks a million!
    Ralph



  2. John on April 7, 2015 at 4:28 PM

    Phil,

    Do you find that kids naturally do forearm fire or they don’t? I get kids from the youth league that throw with what I call hello elbow (might have gotten that from you) and have little success on getting them to transform to a longer, whipping arm. I saw a sock drill (ball in a sock) that looks like it would make the pitcher lengthen their arm? What specific drills do you use to teach forearm fire? And do you think you can change the hello elbow pitcher to forearm fire?

    Thanks

    John



    • Phil on April 7, 2015 at 7:59 PM

      John – if you were to examine, in slow motion, the movement of a baseball pitcher’s arm during their delivery, you would see something almost identical to forearm fire. The elbow leads to the back of the throw zone with the forearm and hand lagging behind and whipping through with acceleration and extension toward their target. We have worked with many windmillers who have come to us utilizing the “hello elbow” approach and although they vary in natural ability, I cannot recall any who did not improve significantly as a result of the change. In my opinion, it is no more nor less a “natural” movement than hello elbow. In our experience, it is simply more effective for the many reasons we have discussed on our site. Go to fastpitchpower.com and put “transitioning to forearm fire” in the search bar and it will take you to a post which will demonstrate what we believe to be an excellent drill to start the transition process. Keep us posted on your progress and good luck.