"Get on top."
This is one of the most common cues heard from coaches. The problem with this one is the majority of pitchers don't have an over-the-top arm-slot and asking them to "get on top" of the baseball only causes problems.
Take Nolan Ryan, for instance. His release point was from a 3/4 slot and releasing the baseball from the side of his hand allowed him to stay upright with his head over his center-of-gravity (around the belly button). Asking him to get "on top" would have encouraged him to leave his natural arm-slot and sacrifice his posture.
Anytime a pitcher leaves his natural arm-path and arm-slot he runs a higher risk of injury and, less importantly, will lose velocity and natural movement. Biomechanists tell us that each individual has a biomechanical signature that includes the natural path of the arm, and allowing a pitcher to pitch without altering it is the safest way to go.
_
Somewhere along the line a popular rumor started in baseball that warned of the dangers of throwing sidearm. I can remember hearing people tell me as a kid that throwing sidearm is "dangerous" and had to do the (unfortunately still popular) "showing the baseball to 2nd base" drill over and over again.
_
The thing is, that arm path, and slot, is artificial for most baseball players and an artificial arm path, and slot, is counterproductive and can often lead to injury.
_
A look at a few other healthy pitchers reveals the same thing. Here we see three slightly different arm-slots, but none of them are over-the-top and none of them release the baseball "on top" of it. (Another potentially interesting observation is that all four examples are releasing fastballs).
When a pitcher hears a coach instructing him to "get on top" it often ends up looking like the following image of Francisco Liriano. His dramatic change of posture, head leaning glove side, occurs because he is trying to get his hand on top of the baseball. While pitching like this can still be effective, it can often - and did - lead to injury. Liriano spent the '07 season recovering from Tommy John surgery.
danny@arizonapitching.com
www.arizonapitching.com
