Our travel team had their first games of the year this weekend and whatever the HS coach is doing for Michael seems to be working great. I gave him the start in game 1 and he pitched 3 beautiful innings (we limited all pitchers to 3 innings or 60 pitches). He had seven K's and allowed 1 hit. On the offensive side, he was on base all 7 times (doubleheader), he went 5 for 5 (with 2 walks). He had 3 doubles and scored 4 runs. I firmly believe it is all the hills they make him run as a pitcher. He is getting a lot of new-found strength in his legs and it is apparently really paying dividends. I'm going to start all of my pitchers on the hills, instead of running poles.

How dare you say something positive about a HS coach!

Sounds like a good idea. One of the drills my son's pitching instructor uses is pickups where you just roll balls to the kids from side to side and they have to stay down the entire time while getting them and rolling them back. He used to do it over and over with Schilling when he was young.

When they run the hills does the coach let them walk back down? Going downhill can be hard on the knees.

He knows those well too. Their everyday after practice workout is 10 poles, 50 hills, 50 pickups, and 50 crunches. Running is also a big part of their practices. As an eighth-grader playing freshman ball, he was assigned to practice with the varsity squad and he runs bases over and over. He is also getting the benefit of the varsity pitching coach's help. It has been great for him. He does sometimes get bored with not getting much fielding or hitting time, but he gets plenty of that with me on his travel team.

I have ouestin for a 14yr old who threw for 58 plus ininngs, 4 complete games and was evaluated by his high school in 2002, along with a pro mlb coach evaluation in 2003. At his freshmen tryout the player only got to throw 10 pitches to another player not a cather. This was over two days. Is this the norm out there someone help me please.

lefty89,

No, I would say this is not the norm. At my sons school, they had over 80 kids tryout and the majority of them tried out for pitcher too. All of them threw to catchers and threw at least 25 pitches, even the ones that it was immediately apparent they were not future HS pitchers. There were 2 days of tryouts before the first cuts were made and tryouts were not completely over for about 10 days, with a series of 4 cuts. All of this and they only kept 8 players. The pitchers pitched to catchers everyday of the tryouts.

AgentDad.....Is it normal and legal according to Kentucky high school rules for a kid to play travel baseball while he is playing on a high school team? That would not be allowed in Michigan.

It's legal in New Jersey, there are lots of leagues set up around here doing that.

It is legal for 8th graders. They are not affected by any of the HS eligibility rules. Next year, as a freshman, he will have to start after the HS season is over. There are cases of freshman playing during the season here, but with their coaches approval. My son's coach said the 8th grade players could continue with their AAU teams - he wants them to play as much as possible. He does not allow anyone above that to play anywhere until after the season.

Agent Dad,

This school was AA state champ last year. Also, the last two leftys were brought up as sophs, one 03 and one in 04. So you would think his chances would have been good. They kept two other leftys that don't pitch. The kid that was cut is 5'9 1/2, 160lbs and was evaluated by video tape MLB pitching coach with good results in Dec 2003.I just find it intresting how he could have been properly evaluated by these baseball minds. Why you cut any on developing freshmen pitcher, not to mention a lefty.

My son's school was state runnerups in 4A last season. They cut a lot of kids that could start JV/Varsity on other teams in our area. In fact, I have 8 kids from my AAU team (14U) that made HS teams this year. Two of them made varsity squads at their school due to the programs being weaker. My son still gets upset a little when they talk about playing varsity ball. I try to keep his spirits high by explaining to him that he is getting better instruction where he is and it will him play at the next level. My son is a lefty pitcher too (5'10" and 155 lbs.). Pretty amazing how close they are in size and both lefty pitchers. My son tops out around 77-78 mph, how hard does yours throw?

He throws upper to mid 70's also. The big stud in his age group was in the low 80's. So i would say 70's for freshman is more than enough, this backed-up by good cruve and occasional knuckleball.He will also play on two teams starting in May so he should get more than enough pitches this summer. Good talking to you and good luck.

quote:

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Originally posted by AgentDad:
He knows those well too. Their everyday after practice workout is 10 poles, 50 hills, 50 pickups, and 50 crunches. Running is also a big part of their practices. As an eighth-grader playing freshman ball, he was assigned to practice with the varsity squad and he runs bases over and over. He is also getting the benefit of the varsity pitching coach's help. It has been great for him. He does sometimes get bored with not getting much fielding or hitting time, but he gets plenty of that with me on his travel team.

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How big are these hills?

It's not real tall hills, but very steep. The hill is about 12-15' tall, but is the grade is about 1:00 on a clock face - don't know what that is in degrees (maybe 75-80).