Why do coaches teach pitchers to reach a balance position? Is getting to a balance or gathering position valuable for maximizing pitching mechanics, improving velocity and control while reducing the risk of injury? I believe the answer is no.
My opinion is based on sports science research which has concluded that the balance position for pitchers is a point where the pitcher must slow down his development of forward momentum. A pitcher cannot move his body directly at the plate as explosively as possible if he must first lift his leg to a certain point before he starts his lead leg down and out into his stride.
The Balance Position is One of the Big Reasons Why More Pitchers Cannot Maximize Velocity
The idea of reaching a balance position did not exist many years ago when pitchers used mechanics that were more natural. Even those pitchers who lifted their leg up did not produce a hesitation which the balance position does. If a pitcher wants to maximize his velocity, he must remove any slow movements and hesitation from his delivery. Reaching the balance position encourages slower movements with a hesitation.
In fact, coaches regularly use a drill where the pitcher is encouraged to lift his leg and hold that position for 5 or 10 seconds, as if that is valuable. Do pitchers hold their balance position for 5 or 10 seconds during game pitching? Of course not. So why would you have a pitcher practice something that never occurs?
That drill is called the “balance drill” and, in my opinion, is one reason why pitchers are so robotic and slow and are not able to maximize their velocity.
You cannot teach a dynamic movement such as pitching by doing pitching drills that only serve to teach the pitcher to either move slow or hesitate. If a pitcher is not balanced he will fall down or move to one side or the other. The correction occurs by making the pitcher aware of this fault while videotaping. The awareness of the fault is the key to making the correction, not practicing some drill.
Two videos of Two Hall of Fame Pitchers
Here are two videos of Hall of Fame pitchers Whitey Ford and Don Larsen. Both are Yankees pitchers from the 50’s and 60’s.
Do you see either reaching a balance position? Would reaching a balance position help them improve? No, but it would serve to slow them down and make them much easier to hit because the hitter has more time to react.
Many pitchers from the past did not lift their legs up to reach a balance position. So why is it valuable? I have never heard an explanation that makes any common sense.
I do know one thing – the balance position reduces forward momentum since a pitcher cannot move forward as fast while also lifting his leg. Forward momentum, or the speed at which a pitcher moves from his back leg to his front leg, is the single most important aspect for producing velocity and reducing stress to the arm.
Does Giants’ Tim Lincecum use a balance position? No. Tim Lincecum is a good example of a pitcher who moves very fast into landing. This is one of the main reasons why at 5’10” and 170 lbs, he is able to reach velocities of 95-100 mph plus.
The balance point makes no sense. There is no reason to ever lift the leg in pitching as displayed by Hall of Famer Don Larsen. There are many major league power pitchers who use a slide-step in the stretch, which does not use a leg lift at all. Their velocity and control does not get reduced.
If Yankees Don Larsen (the RH’d pitcher) was aware of how forward momentum could have helped him throw harder, he could have moved faster by getting his body lower by using more bend in his leg so his support leg was able to produce more back leg drive into a longer stride. Or he could have stepped back first which would have helped him produce even more momentum.
If pitchers are encouraged to move slow or hesitate, they will have to use more of their arm to produce velocity, adding more stress.
Why then do coaches teach the balance position? I believe it is because they do not understand that momentum is the key to using the body, instead of the arm, to produce velocity.
If pitchers move slow, they throw slower. If pitchers want to throw fast, they must move faster.
Here are two additional articles I have written about the “balance position”:
- Pitching Mechanics – The Balance Position And Pitching Velocity
- The “Balance Position” In Pitching Kills Velocity
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