Latest / From the Coach's Mouth / Episode 46: Bill Hillhouse

Transcript

Episode 46: Bill Hillhouse · From the Coach's Mouth

0:00
I really worry about the kids because eventually they're going
0:02
to run into an umpire who does know the difference and is going
0:05
to call those pitchers illegal. And will that kid be able to
0:09
adjust? Will that kid be able to make an
0:10
in game adjustment to to pitch quote UN quote legally as
0:16
opposed to the crow hopping that they're doing?
0:19
Whether you live northeast, West or South, the best fast pitch
0:26
info comes from the coach's mouth.
0:40
Welcome to the From the Coach's Mouth podcast with your host Jay
0:46
Bolden and Ken Krause. All right, hello, welcome back
1:05
to the From the Coaches Mouth podcast.
1:07
Jay, I have to say, you're looking good over there, buddy.
1:10
He's rocking the new headphones. Yes, it's actually, it's great
1:17
to hear myself and I didn't know I sounded this good, Ken, so I
1:20
have to really thank you so much because now I can really hear
1:22
what I sound like. So I think I'm going to start
1:25
recording, maybe put out an album or something.
1:27
I'm not sure. But I really appreciate the the
1:29
new. Headphones.
1:30
They're they're amazing so. Yeah, Yeah, I knew you would.
1:35
I've been good. I mean, I knew you would like
1:37
those. It's it's really helpful when
1:39
you can just hear yourself coming through and imagine now
1:42
you're going to want to take over the the announcements, the
1:45
opens, the closes and all that. And now that you know you sound
1:48
that good. No, actually, but I will tell
1:50
you I do like wearing these at home too, especially when my
1:53
kids are loud. So this, these are, they're
1:54
paying off really well. Two youth, 22 forms of use for
1:57
these things. This is great.
1:59
That's good. Yeah.
2:01
Otherwise, you know, this is mid January here in the Chicago and
2:06
Northwest Indiana area and we're just trying to stay warm.
2:09
Are you are you doing lessons this weekend?
2:12
Yeah, I'll get out there a little bit.
2:13
I'll tell you what can I think, you know, when this when we get
2:16
going here, like we're going to be, I think days away from the
2:19
the kickoff of of softball and you know, we're going to see it
2:23
on TVA lot. I just I can't wait.
2:24
I got a lot of kids this year that they're in their senior
2:26
year, senior season in college. It's exciting.
2:29
So yeah, I'll do some lessons this weekend, but I I just can't
2:33
wait to start watching stuff and for our team at Saint Xavier,
2:36
start playing. I'm I'm just ready to go.
2:37
I love the practices, but man, I really want to just the
2:41
competition is what it's all about.
2:42
So yeah, excited. How about you?
2:45
Yeah, yeah, I'll be doing lessons this weekend.
2:48
It's going to be cold, but luckily the facilities I'm in,
2:51
I'll be, you know, they're usually pretty warm.
2:53
You know, worst case, I'll have to wear a hoodie instead of just
2:56
the T-shirt. But yeah, looking forward to it
2:58
and getting back in there. With high school tryouts coming
3:02
up, I got a lot of kids that are really starting to get focused
3:04
and getting themselves ready. Yeah, as we get ready for the
3:08
season, Ken, did you happen to see the pitch calling Zoom?
3:12
I did with Rick Paulie. Yeah, I did.
3:14
I thought it was great. You know, you guys shared a lot
3:18
of knowledge there. It was awesome.
3:20
You know, anytime someone like that, like a legend like Rick
3:22
Paul in the pitching community asks you to do something, you
3:25
just you jump in with both feet. But you know, enough of enough
3:29
of me rambling, you rambling. We have another legend in my
3:32
opinion in the pitching community, fast pitch pitching
3:35
community that's that's here today.
3:36
Do you want to let people know about who are awesome guesses
3:39
today? Yes, I certainly do.
3:42
All right. Today's guest has accomplished
3:44
more in one softball lifetime than most people would
3:46
accomplish in three. As a player, he was a star
3:49
pitcher in international men's softball, playing all over the
3:53
world, including eight seasons competing in New Zealand.
3:56
He was not only a two time member of the USA Men's National
3:59
Team, but was the youngest pitcher ever to play for that
4:02
team when he joined it in 1993. Among his accomplishments are
4:07
being named the Pan American Games MVP, winning the Men's
4:11
Major National Championship three times, earning a gold
4:14
medal at the US Olympic Festival, and being inducted
4:18
into the USA Softball Pennsylvania Hall of Fame in
4:21
2022. His coaching career is equally
4:24
stellar. After stints as a pitching
4:26
coach, consultant for Division One Drexel University and the
4:30
University of Georgia, in 2013 he joined the staff at
4:34
Providence College in Rhode Island.
4:36
A strong advocate of men's fast pitch, he also served the sport
4:40
as a commissioner for the International Softball Congress
4:43
from 1997 to 2013. He is probably best known though
4:48
as a private coach. He broke onto the scene as a
4:51
controversial figure, speaking out against what was commonly
4:54
being taught in the women's game while railing against the
4:57
so-called pitching coach mafia, local coaches who were more
5:01
interested in defending their turf than seeing reality.
5:05
He offered private lessons and held pitching clinics all over
5:08
the US, developing many top level students.
5:11
Perhaps his best known student right now is Tegan Kavan, who
5:14
led the Texas Longhorns to the 2025 Women's College World
5:18
Series Championship while playing for our guests, close
5:21
friend and former teammate Mike White.
5:24
In addition to his personal instruction, he also created a
5:27
series of popular videos to help coaches and parents learn the
5:31
fundamentals of pitching as well as more advanced techniques.
5:35
In July of 2025, he was diagnosed with stage 4
5:38
pancreatic cancer and given a diagnosis of a short time to
5:42
live. But he's still with us and
5:44
fighting like he always has. Of course, we could only be
5:48
talking about one man. Ladies and gentlemen, please
5:51
give a warm from the Coach's Mouth podcast.
5:53
Welcome to the creator and driving force of the House of
5:56
Pitching, the incredible Bill Hill House.
6:01
Hello guys. Hello, Bill.
6:03
That's quite an introduction to getting there.
6:06
We went from, from, from some really good stuff all the way
6:08
down right, right down to the, the cancer there.
6:12
The the intro fell off at the end.
6:14
Ken. Well, we, we figured, you know,
6:19
we want to talk to you about a whole bunch of different things.
6:21
So, you know, we include it all. In fact, I want to ask how you
6:26
feeling these days? You know, I never understood
6:30
what people go through with when they say I have good days and I
6:33
have bad days with, with stuff like this.
6:35
And, and this has been a real eye opener for that.
6:38
It, it truly is. There's good days and there's
6:40
bad days and there's, there's no rhyme or reason to to why I feel
6:45
bad or why I feel good on any particular day.
6:47
I haven't noticed any kind of a pattern with foods or anything
6:51
like that so far this morning I feel OK.
6:53
So, you know, last night was a bit rough, but but this morning
6:57
I feel better. So it's just kind of comes and.
6:59
Goes well, I'm good I'm glad you're feeling better,
7:02
especially because we're going to be taking up an hour of your
7:05
time this morning so. Well, that's good do.
7:08
You think your experience as a high level athlete has helped
7:10
you to kind of deal with what's going on right now?
7:14
I I don't kind of one pitch at a time approach.
7:18
I, I don't really think so because I don't think anything
7:20
prepares you for being told you have a terminal illness and you
7:24
know, you basically they, you basically have nine months to
7:27
live and that's an opponent that pancreatic cancer is an opponent
7:31
that nobody's beaten. There's no cure.
7:33
There's no, it's inoperable there.
7:36
I, I've, I've gone against a lot of stacked lineups in my
7:39
pitching career pitching against them.
7:40
But, but this is the toughest 1. So, you know, I'm pretty
7:44
realistic about it. I understand what my chances are
7:47
and and you know what kind of time I have left and I'm just
7:51
trying to make the most of that as much as I can.
7:54
So Bill, I was going to ask, you know, knowing that that
7:57
prognosis, have you, are you trying to, to fill some bucket
8:00
list things or are you just like staying kind of in the norm?
8:04
Like what's, you know, what's kind of like the thing that
8:06
that's going on? I know a lot of people say they
8:07
want to get out there and do the things they haven't done.
8:10
Or are you just more of like, hey, we're going to, I'm going
8:11
to stay the norm and, and, and work through this?
8:15
Well, quite honestly, Jay, there, there really hasn't been
8:17
any bucket list things. I, I, I'm, I'm kind of, it's, I
8:20
kind of treat life kind of like Christmas.
8:23
You know, I'm a hard guy to shop for, for Christmas because when
8:25
I want something, I go get it. And if there's ever been
8:28
something I wanted to do or a place I wanted to go, I went.
8:31
So I don't really have a lot of bucket list items, except I
8:34
tried to spend as much time with my son as I possibly can, which,
8:38
which isn't easy considering he lives in Europe.
8:41
And that's, that's a whole other subject.
8:44
But you know, I'm, I'm, I'm doing what I can.
8:47
I mean, I'm certainly not sitting at home, you know, poor
8:51
me glum, you know, doing nothing.
8:54
I, I actually started to try to do some lessons again on, on
8:58
weekends just to kind of get out of the house and, and kind of
9:02
exercise that part of my brain again.
9:03
That's, that was not easy to do. I, I took a good, probably 5
9:07
months off or I wasn't doing any lessons And, and boy, the
9:11
atrophy of my brain and pitching lessons was, was pretty severe
9:15
and, and, and you know, get getting back into it just on a
9:18
very, you know, I can't do 10-12 hour days like I used to, but
9:22
you know, just doing 5 lessons a day, maybe, you know, maybe 6 or
9:27
for three hours, 6 lessons, 30 minutes each.
9:30
It's it, it really is done wonders to help me kind of and I
9:34
just stay active and and give me something to look forward to
9:37
each week. Yeah.
9:38
I mean, I know what you mean about that with the atrophy and
9:41
all that. You know, I take a week off and
9:43
I come back and I have to kind of reorient myself and try to
9:46
get back into the rhythm of it. Yeah, it's it's amazing how
9:50
quickly it seems to disappear. Yep, but fortunately usually
9:54
bounces back. For people that don't know your
9:57
full story, how, how did you get started in softball?
10:00
I mean, we know kind of your your accomplishments and the
10:03
high level stuff, but where, where did it all begin for a
10:06
Bill Hill House? Erie, PA.
10:09
That's where I was born and raised.
10:10
My my father played fast pitch softball.
10:14
He was not a pitcher. He played first base in right
10:16
field. He batted 9th only because there
10:19
wasn't a tenth spot was not not a very good player.
10:23
My brother and I were the bad boys for his team.
10:26
And you know, that was back in the day when men's fast pitch
10:30
softball was everywhere. In fact, in Erie, PA, there was
10:35
so much men's fast pitch softball that they actually had
10:38
a morning league for guys who work second, third shift and
10:42
couldn't play in the in the rec league at night on Tuesday,
10:44
Thursday. So guys that worked overnights,
10:48
they could they get off work and they'd go play their softball
10:50
game at 10 AM. And there was leagues that did
10:54
that. And nowadays there's it's just,
10:59
it's the exact opposite. Everything you see today in the
11:02
women's game was opposite of what the men's game had.
11:05
I mean, it was the men's game had it was everywhere.
11:08
And the women's game was basically non existent.
11:12
And, and the roles really reverse themselves here and now
11:16
the the women's game is all over and the men's game is hard to be
11:21
found. So that's kind of where I got
11:23
started was was in Erie, PA, and I just imitated the pitchers on
11:27
my dad's team and I never quit. I.
11:29
Mean, is that how you learned to pitch overall or did you have
11:32
somebody that was working with you or teaching you?
11:35
I I imitated the pitchers and I asked a ton of questions.
11:39
I was, I was one of these annoying, annoying park rats
11:43
that was just constantly asking questions of the guys and, and I
11:47
started to notice a lot of similarities.
11:49
You know, the, these guys, they, they, they do a lot of the same
11:54
things similarly, but with, you know, Doug Gillis, I, well, I'm
12:00
sure we'll talk about him in a little bit, but Doug Gillis has
12:03
a, has a, had a program where he called it absolutes and styles.
12:07
And the absolutes are the things that every elite pitcher in the
12:11
world does, male, female, they all do the same things
12:15
mechanically, but they have a different style in which they
12:19
did them. And I started to notice that
12:21
even as a young pitcher, I noticed that there was a
12:24
difference between the styles that people were using, but they
12:28
were still getting themselves into the same positions
12:30
mechanically in their pitch. So I noticed that early on.
12:35
And it it really, you know, I guess I was just pretty
12:39
observant. What are some of those, the
12:41
absolutes that you saw well? Things like making sure that
12:45
you're not pitching around your hips, basically anything that's
12:49
hello elbow is out. You know, it's funny.
12:54
It's funny how that in in the in the East Coast and and up into
13:00
Wisconsin too, There's a game called modified pitch softball.
13:04
I don't know if you guys have ever heard of modified pitch,
13:07
but there's but there's two kinds of modified.
13:09
There's nine man modified and there's ten man modified.
13:13
Nine man modified is basically slingshot where the guys are
13:18
allowed to just rear back and throw it as hard as they can.
13:20
Slingshot and you can throw rise drop, you can, you can throw
13:23
anything you want. Slingshot, but ten man modified
13:27
is the exact opposite. You're not allowed to bend your
13:29
elbow. You can't whip your arm.
13:31
You have to go around your hips when you pitch and you got to
13:34
step straightforward. You can't turn your body.
13:37
So it, it's always, it always makes me laugh that that the
13:41
people who advocate for hello elbow pitching mechanics, they
13:44
don't realize that that's actually mechanics that are.
13:48
Those are the rules. For nine man or excuse me for 10
13:51
man modified pitch, which is designed to restrict the
13:55
pitcher. So, so it's, it's, it's crazy
13:58
that, that, that that's still being taught as though that is
14:02
the way to pitch from some people.
14:04
Because like I said, you know, if you play 10 man modified, the
14:07
exact same things that a hello elbow coach is teaching someone
14:11
are the things that a 10 man modified pitcher has to do.
14:14
And they're very restrictive, locking the elbow, locking the
14:19
wrist. Do you feel that the modified
14:21
kind of took away from the normal that the real the real
14:24
men's fast pitch? Do you think you kind of just
14:27
drew it like spread it out too much?
14:29
For a while it did for a while it it definitely did it, it
14:33
diversified and, and, and took a lot of great players and, and
14:38
you know, they guys that wanted to not necessarily it basically
14:42
it's a game that you don't want to play fast pitch, but I also
14:44
don't want to say I'm playing slow pitch.
14:46
So it's kind of that happy medium that a guy that people
14:49
like try to talk themselves into saying, Oh, I'm not playing slow
14:53
pitch, but then they're they don't want the challenge of
14:56
playing fast pitch either. So it did.
14:59
But I think even even today, modified pitches is really the
15:03
all all sports are really losing numbers and participation, you
15:07
know, and rec league stuff. I mean, you drive by any park it
15:10
in the summertime, you don't see kids outside playing and, you
15:13
know, using fields and things like that.
15:15
So you know, it's it's it definitely took away from it,
15:18
but did it. It's not the the only thing that
15:20
killed men's fast pitch, that's for sure.
15:22
What else do you think contributed to it?
15:25
Well, I think there's a lot of things that contributed to it.
15:28
And you know, even when I was a kid and I'm 53 years old, but
15:31
when I was a kid, there was one game a week of baseball on TV.
15:35
It was the the game of the week on NBC or whatever on Saturday
15:40
afternoons and now you don't have to leave your house to be
15:43
entertained. You can watch the Yankees seven
15:45
nights a week if you want. You don't have to leave home.
15:48
So people aren't going out to the ball fields anymore.
15:50
People aren't participating by going out and bringing their
15:53
kids and and people getting to see it that that really is taken
15:58
away from a lot of things too. Is is just people just aren't
16:00
going out for their entertainment anymore.
16:02
They don't have to. Well then, what about at the
16:04
upper levels? I mean, you've been pretty
16:05
outspoken about men's fast pitch getting the short end of the
16:09
stick from USA Softball. Is that is that still a problem?
16:14
Unbelievable. The the in in further for the
16:17
first time and forever the USA has they have a really good
16:22
chance to win it both at at the 18 U level and the 23 and under
16:27
level. And the men's team is is ranked
16:30
two for the first time a long time.
16:31
So USA men's softball has never been in a better spot for the
16:35
males. But they, they just, they won't
16:39
put the money into it or they say they don't have it and but
16:43
you know, they have the money to send the 15 year old girls to
16:45
wherever they want to go, you know, for a Pan Am tournament.
16:48
But the USA boys team didn't even get to go to the Pan Am
16:52
championship because USA Softball couldn't fund it.
16:55
Yeah, that's that's bad. I want to go back to a little
16:58
bit with your pitching. Who are some of the influences
17:01
or the the people that you know really helped you to get to that
17:05
next level? When I was young, I, I and
17:09
growing up in Erie, PA, we, we had the, the men's league was
17:14
good. It wasn't great, but it was
17:15
good. And, and I didn't know any
17:17
better. I didn't know that that what I
17:20
was seeing was basically a Class B level, maybe Class A, a low
17:25
level Class A. So you have 4, you have 4
17:28
levels, you have the major, the A, the B, the C.
17:32
And I thought what I was seeing was some of the best pictures in
17:35
the country in, in Erie, PA watching these guys pitch
17:38
because they, I was a kid and they were throwing hard and I
17:41
was amazed at what I was seeing. And then I would get to go see a
17:45
tournament and I would see someone who's better than the
17:47
guys in Erie and I'd go, wow, that guy's even better.
17:50
And then I could see another picture and go, wow, that guy's
17:52
even better. And so I started to realize that
17:55
there was levels above what I was seeing at home.
17:59
And so every time I ventured out to a different place, I would
18:02
come home with a, with a new idol.
18:05
And that's when I started to discover, you know, New Zealand
18:09
softball and, and the growth, or I shouldn't say the growth, but
18:12
the, the popularity of softball in New Zealand and, and how they
18:17
bring in pitchers, teams would be bringing in pitchers from New
18:20
Zealand over here. And they, you know, they, they
18:23
that became kind of The thing is, is all the top teams were
18:26
bringing these guys over from New Zealand and then later
18:29
Australia and different parts of the world.
18:31
And so, yeah, I mean, Mike White in particular was one that I
18:35
looked up to. Getting to play with him was,
18:39
was just a dream come true. And, you know, I, I really and
18:43
genuinely got to play with all of my heroes that I was that I
18:46
looked up to as a kid. Not many people can say that.
18:51
Yeah, yeah, that's for sure. And then you mentioned Doug
18:54
Gillis as well. Yeah, Doug, a big influence on
18:57
you. Doug was a big influence in
18:59
getting me started into coaching.
19:01
He and I aren't that far apart and age, but he's, he's got a
19:05
few years on me. But you know, he, he was one of
19:08
the originals that, that I knew that got that started to do his
19:12
coaching and doing lessons. And I remember asking him about
19:16
it and telling him that I was, yeah, maybe I should get into
19:18
that. And he encouraged me to do it.
19:20
Eventually I I decided to do it about 2526 years ago.
19:24
I started giving lessons and, and Doug was always somebody
19:27
that I could call if I had a question or, you know, how do I
19:29
teach this or how do you approach that?
19:32
And, and you know, he, he never, ever, ever refused me any help.
19:37
So he was a big influence on my coaching, that's for sure.
19:41
So what were some of the early lessons or mistakes that from
19:44
your experience that kind of influenced your coaching later
19:47
on as well? Well.
19:51
Trying to make sure that I understood that I wanted people
19:54
to understand the difference between the absolutes and the
19:57
styles, to use Doug's phrases. Because where I think coaches go
20:01
wrong is they teach their style as though it's an absolute.
20:06
Like I wind up this way. So you have to wind up this way.
20:09
I hold the rise ball this way. You have to hold the rise ball
20:11
this way. And you know that that is a big,
20:15
big component of something that that.
20:18
It, it took me a while to, to come to grips with making sure
20:23
that, that people understood that, you know, listen, you can
20:25
keep pitching. The one of the things that's an
20:27
advantage for me is, is, is obviously the background I have
20:30
where I, I can demonstrate the pitching anything I'm telling
20:33
them, you want to see backspin on a rise ball, I'll demonstrate
20:36
it for you. And then and then the girls
20:39
would say, Oh my gosh, that's amazing.
20:40
Look at that. Oh, that's amazing.
20:42
I said, oh, you like that? Well, doing it the way you're
20:44
doing it, you're not going to be able to do what I just did.
20:48
And I say that unapologetically because it's not my rule.
20:51
I didn't invent how to pitch in any way, shape or form.
20:54
I didn't create this. I don't own a patent on
20:56
anything. I, I didn't reinvent the wheel.
21:00
But you cannot get backspin per SE.
21:03
Let's just use a rise ball. You cannot get backspin if
21:05
you're using hello elbow mechanics.
21:07
It can't be done right. So you have to make a decision
21:10
somewhere. Do I want to pitch with these
21:13
these hello elbow antiquated mechanics, or do I want to do
21:19
what the best pitchers in the world are actually doing?
21:21
Yeah. And I think that when you, when
21:24
you're talking about that, I mean there's just certain bio
21:25
mechanics they have to go into it.
21:27
You can't throw a rise ball and get backspin if your hand is
21:30
facing forward. If you're pushing the ball
21:32
through through release it just. It's impossible.
21:36
Right, and, and, and saying that makes you come across as
21:39
arrogant. And they say, oh, though
21:41
there's, there's all these different ways to the top.
21:44
And, and these are the people that, that think that, that,
21:48
that they can get there, they can get to that top of the
21:50
mountain because even using hello elbow mechanics, but you
21:55
know, some of the best pitchers, you know, a, a good example is
21:58
Jenny Finch. Jenny Finch grew up as a hello
22:01
elbow style pitcher, but you watch Jenny Finch pitch and she
22:04
does not pitch with hello elbow mechanics.
22:06
She does in her clinics and her demonstrations and stuff like
22:09
that when she's going super slow motion, but you watch her pitch,
22:13
she doesn't pitch like that. And I, to my knowledge, I don't
22:17
know anybody that's ever called her out on it and said, wait a
22:19
minute, that's not what you're doing.
22:21
And and so unfortunately, I've never been invited to one of her
22:25
camps because I would probably call her out.
22:31
So unlike you Bill, I do since we're on the rise ball, Bill, I
22:35
want, I want to talk to you a little bit.
22:37
I use a cue that I believe I actually took and stole from you
22:41
and that is talking about the back shoulder, right?
22:44
Where that back shoulder has to be on that rise ball.
22:47
Can you elaborate a little bit for some of the the pitching
22:50
dads and moms about where that back shoulder should be on a
22:53
rise ball and how the hand can get under better?
22:56
Well, yeah, I mean, the thing about the rise ball is, is that
23:01
that's the one pitch that's unforgiving.
23:03
You can cheat but mechanically and have a drop ball, you can
23:07
cheat mechanically and have a change up.
23:09
You can even cheat to a degree and have a curveball.
23:11
But there's no such thing as cheating to get backspin on a
23:13
rise ball. It can't be done.
23:15
And so the, the one thing that I always make sure that I'm really
23:20
reinforcing is that that pitcher hides the back shoulder from the
23:24
target that allows the arm to make to make sure it goes
23:27
through the hips and not around the hips.
23:30
And that that's not a small difference.
23:32
That's a major difference in, in mechanics is making sure that
23:36
the hand goes through the hips, not around the hips.
23:39
And so there's little cues that I'll use to make sure that that
23:43
happens. And one of them is making sure
23:45
that they hide the back shoulder.
23:47
One of the other ones is trying to make sure that the back of my
23:49
forearm is brushing against my stomach to ensure that my hand
23:53
is under the ball. Tip of my thumb stays pointed to
23:56
third base as long as possible. And this, you know, some of this
24:00
stuff, Jay, is where, where a problem lies is the way some of
24:04
the girls are warming up. The way you warm up has a, has a
24:07
direct correlation to the way that you pitch.
24:09
And when you see like the wrist snaps, when pitchers are taught
24:12
to do wrist snaps, they're teaching themselves to use the
24:15
wrist. And the wrist is not your friend
24:17
on the rise ball. The wrist is what creates the
24:19
bullet spin when you're turning your wrist.
24:21
That's why I really dislike the the phrase turning a doorknob on
24:24
the rise because that that that implies that you're turning the
24:28
wrist and when you turn the wrist that automatically is
24:30
going to make the ball go into bullets bin.
24:32
I think I've heard you say hundreds of times, Bill and I, I
24:36
use it all the times with the girls that the wrist is the rise
24:38
ball killer. Yeah, it is because and, and it,
24:42
and it goes back to the warmups when, when you see girls warming
24:46
up, that's what they do is they do the wrist snaps.
24:48
And, and I, and I don't know if you've ever seen it before, but
24:51
I always one thing that I that I tell when I do a speaking
24:55
engagement to, to coaches, you know, I, I always ask how many
25:01
usually the males in the audience, how many here grew up
25:03
playing baseball and, and usually a heavy percentage raise
25:06
their hands, say I grew up playing baseball.
25:09
And I'd say, but, but have you ever in your life seen a
25:11
baseball pitcher warm up with his arm straight up over his
25:14
head and just using his wrist and snapping his wrist like
25:17
nobody's ever seen that before? Because that's not how you
25:20
throw. And an underhand, that's not how
25:23
you throw. You don't want your elbow locked
25:25
so that you're on. The only thing that can move is
25:27
your wrist. Because the the wrist when, when
25:29
that happens, that's what's going to when you're, when
25:32
you're locked out your elbow, you locked out your wrist.
25:34
Your, your wrist is going to well, I shouldn't say locked out
25:37
your wrist because your wrist is going to move if you locked out
25:39
your elbow. So, but that's what kills it is
25:42
is these wrist snap drills that comes back to bite them in the
25:45
butt. How's your understanding of
25:48
mechanics changed over the years or, or has it, I mean, have you
25:52
kind of adjusted as you've gone along as you work with more kids
25:55
and, and seen more different, I guess body types and, and
26:00
movement patterns and all that? I, I don't think, I, I don't
26:04
think I've changed too much. If I have, it's been so long
26:08
that I've been doing it, that it's happened so gradually that
26:10
I haven't noticed. I think I'm just a little more
26:13
aware of some limitations that some girls have.
26:17
You know, it's, it's it, I'm sure you guys have this too,
26:19
where some of the most dedicated passionate pitchers are the ones
26:24
that have the least amount of talent.
26:26
And the ones that just can roll out of bed and throw 65 miles an
26:29
hour are the ones that just go, hey, you know, yeah, you know,
26:33
it just drives you insane that because that's 65 mile an hour
26:36
picture. Just imagine how good you'd be
26:38
if you actually put 100% into it, you know?
26:43
But I, I, I don't know that I've made any, any changes
26:49
necessarily to what I teach. I, I, I genuinely dislike the
26:53
term IR that whole IR debate and internal rotation.
26:57
It's it, it drives me insane because people think that that
27:00
is like a style of pitching as opposed to what it actually is.
27:04
And just describing what your body's doing, even Hello elbow
27:07
is, is really just describing what you're you're kind of
27:10
doing. But I don't think I've, I've
27:14
changed too much. I've, I've pretty much stayed
27:16
the course all the way through and I think just more people
27:19
have kind of caught up with what pitchers are actually doing.
27:23
I'll tell you guys a funny story.
27:24
I spoke at a coach's clinic in Seattle a number of years ago
27:28
and the the headline speaker was Sue Enquist, former UCLA head
27:33
coach, winner of all the national championships,
27:35
everything like that. And there was 300 people in the
27:38
crowd. And, and she said her first
27:41
thing she said when she got up on, on the dais was how many
27:45
here have my hitting videos from 9:50 years ago on my VHS tapes
27:49
and everybody wanting to be a good student raise their hand.
27:51
I, I have all your stuff, Sue, I have all your stuff.
27:54
And she said, throw them away. And I, I thought, boy, from a
27:57
marketing standpoint, that's outstanding, man.
28:00
She's going to be resell everything.
28:02
But, but she said, you know, everything that a lot of things
28:06
that we thought we were doing, we weren't actually doing, like
28:10
squish the bug. That's not what the hitters are
28:12
actually doing. And, and pitching, you could
28:15
relate that to pitching as well. I think the Hello Elbow started
28:18
off from a good place. It started off where people
28:22
thought that that's what they were actually doing.
28:24
But now we have software programs and we have high speed
28:28
cameras and we have all these tools and rap sodos and gadgets
28:31
and, and, and we're finding out what the body is actually doing,
28:35
not what we think it's doing. And, and that's made a
28:38
difference. Yeah, some people.
28:40
Some people saw the light and others or just going to die on
28:43
this hill. Yeah, that's the thing that I
28:45
get a student in sometimes and she'll say my high school coach
28:49
or my travel coach told me that I should do this or I should do
28:52
that. Then, you know, it goes totally
28:54
against what good mechanics are. And I say tell your coach to
28:56
throw out the VHS tapes and maybe at least buy a DVD.
29:01
Yeah, yeah. It, it's, it's madding, isn't
29:05
it? When, when somebody is coming to
29:07
you for for, for this, for this, this coaching and then the high
29:12
school coach who has no business teaching pitching tries to get
29:16
you to because they saw a video, you know, somewhere.
29:19
In in. Sometimes there's no business
29:20
teaching geometry, but that's another step.
29:26
I also want to talk to you. Have you used the pitch logic
29:28
ball at all? Have you?
29:29
Do you have that out at all or no?
29:31
Some, one of my students got one and started using it and it's,
29:36
it's just amazing to me how that ball does what, what they say it
29:40
does. You know, the dad's got his, his
29:42
phone and he's, after every pitch can tell you the, the spin
29:45
raid and everything. It's, it's, it's just amazing
29:49
how every day there's something new that comes out that it's a
29:51
new gadget and it's, it seems like it's a pretty good tool.
29:56
I, I, I think it's probably good just for the sake of measuring,
30:00
just to see if you're picking up your spins and stuff.
30:03
The, the problem with some of that stuff, though, is it
30:04
doesn't help correct the spins. It just shut tells you where
30:07
you're wrong or, or what what's happening with it.
30:10
So I, I don't really use all that stuff myself.
30:13
I'm not a big gadget guy. There's very few gadgets that I
30:16
recommend and endorse, but that one seems kind of interesting to
30:20
me. It seems like it's kind of a, a
30:23
modified version of rap Soto in a way.
30:26
Is that what we're talking about?
30:27
The the the ball that you throw and you just get the the results
30:30
on your iPhone and. Yeah, you know.
30:33
Yeah. So yeah, that's something, I
30:35
mean, I've been using it and actually I think it's helped a
30:39
lot with the kids. It's not something I think you
30:41
can use by yourself. A lot of times, you know, that's
30:44
the kid can't do it. But for me, what I found is when
30:48
we're using it, getting that feedback and seeing it that way,
30:51
it has helped the kids to understand better how they need
30:55
to change or what they need to do to make an adjustment.
30:58
So I, yeah, I, you know, I think, you know, for me, it's
31:02
had some value that way. I think it just helps the kids
31:05
with some understanding. Yeah, and, and I think I, you
31:09
know, anything that that helps the kids is, is a good thing.
31:12
And there's, you know, kids are, are a lot more tech savvy than
31:16
than probably the three of us are.
31:18
So they, they understand the gadgets and the, and the tools
31:21
and all that stuff. I, like I said, I, I catch for
31:25
every one of my students when I'm doing lessons.
31:27
So I'm, I'm seeing it all first hand and that's based that,
31:31
that's basically how I will construct the lesson or whatever
31:36
it is that we're working on at that point is from catching
31:39
thing, the rotation on the ball from the rotation.
31:42
I can tell immediately what they're doing right, what
31:44
they're doing wrong, what what they have to alter and how.
31:48
And that's pretty much the first thing I do with a brand new
31:51
student to begin with is make sure they understand why does
31:54
the ball go where it goes? If they don't understand why the
31:57
ball is going to the left or to the right, they're not going to
31:59
know how to fix it. And you can yell all day long,
32:01
Susie throw strikes, throw strikes.
32:03
But if she doesn't understand why she's not throwing strikes,
32:06
would you know, how is she going to be able to make corrections?
32:09
I think, I think my, my catching, I, I'm just not a big
32:14
gadget guy and, and maybe maybe that's to my detriment a little
32:18
bit, maybe I should be a little bit better, but at this point in
32:20
my life, I'm, I'm probably not going to change.
32:23
Yeah, yeah, You know, I mean, it's like I'm, I'm so old now.
32:26
I told people I don't even buy green bananas so.
32:32
What I used to do all night now takes me all night to do it.
32:39
Hey Jay, on a scale of 1 to 10, how important do you think brush
32:43
contact is for pitchers? It's pretty high up there Ken,
32:47
probably a 10 since it's hard to get maximum speed and or
32:50
accuracy without it. Yeah I agree, but have you ever
32:53
had a student who struggled to get good light brush contact?
32:57
Sure, all the time, in fact. Especially when they've been
33:01
taught hello elbow and are trying to throw around their
33:04
hips or they're sliding their hips out of the way doing that
33:07
crazy ninja move. So what do you do when you run
33:10
into this situation? Keep railing on them until they
33:12
get it right. I used to do that a lot, but
33:15
then I learned about a product called Pitch Squeak Ken.
33:18
Pitch squeak. What's that?
33:20
It's a cool little armband with a squeaker inside of it.
33:24
Like a dog toy. Yeah, kinda.
33:27
So how does it work? Well, you slip the armband onto
33:30
the pitcher's forearm and you set it so the squeaker is where
33:33
the brush contact should happen. Then when the pitcher goes into
33:37
release, she tries to get it to squeak like this.
33:41
If she makes it happen, she got brush.
33:44
If there's no sound, she knows immediately and can make a
33:47
correction. Wow cool, so she gets immediate
33:51
audible as well as tactile feedback.
33:54
Oh, there you go again, showing off with those big and technical
33:57
words again. But yeah, she can feel it and
34:00
hear it. Does it really work?
34:02
You bet it does. I use it with my students all
34:05
the time and it helps them learn how to get brush contact pretty
34:09
quickly if they practice with it sounds.
34:12
Neat. Where can I get one?
34:13
Oh, it's easy, Ken. Just e-mail
34:16
support@pitchsqueak.com and Jason, the inventor of it and a
34:21
Poly Girl certified pitching coach himself, will ask you how
34:25
many you want and send them right out.
34:27
I'll do that today. Thanks, Jay.
34:29
What's that address again? Oh you bet, Ken.
34:32
It's support at pitch. Squeak dot com one more time for
34:37
those of you who are listening, support@pitchsqueak.com and
34:42
don't forget to mention in the e-mail that you heard about it
34:45
right here on From the Coach's Mouth podcast and you'll receive
34:49
10% off. So what makes a drill actually
34:56
valuable versus just social media filler?
35:00
Oh boy, if it incorporates the actual pitching motion, I mean,
35:06
the, you know, like, again, going back to the wrist flips
35:10
drills, I mean, the, that's, that's going to come back to
35:13
bite them in the butt. And so I, I want to make sure
35:17
that whatever drill they're using is something that, that,
35:22
that is going to be beneficial when they actually pitch.
35:24
Now that, that sounds like, of course, that's simple logic, but
35:28
when you see how many drills are out there that don't make any
35:31
sense at all, it's a statement that still has to be made.
35:35
I don't understand a lot of drills.
35:37
I see. I do not understand pitching
35:40
from my knees and like I'm Eddie Fainer King in his core,
35:44
pitching from my knees through my legs and all that stuff.
35:46
And I, there's, there's, there's a lot more bad drills than there
35:52
are good drills. And I, I think you said it right
35:56
that that a lot of them are just fillers for their lessons.
35:58
Yeah, or even just trying to get social media clicks.
36:01
Jay and I talk about that all the time that, you know, social
36:05
media, you got to be constantly putting stuff out there.
36:09
And I think sometimes they, you know, people just sit there and
36:11
they try to come up with something so they have something
36:13
to post that day, but it isn't necessarily valuable.
36:17
Yeah, that's that's kind of the that's the rub, isn't it?
36:21
Is trying to trying to, to to make your post have have some
36:26
meaning behind it and and logic behind it and and actually
36:31
helpful to to to a pitcher and and you know, not everybody's
36:36
itching at the same place. So what what a fix for one thing
36:41
may for one person may not be the fix for the for the next
36:45
person in line in the in the clinic.
36:47
So what it's like, for example, saying hide your back shoulder
36:52
on the rise ball. Well, Sally might understand
36:54
what I mean, but Jane next to her doesn't understand that.
36:57
So then I'm going to have to come up with another way to
36:59
explain it to Jane. And I I try to keep all that
37:03
stuff as simple as I possibly can.
37:05
That's why I don't really spend a lot of time with drills
37:08
because I think drills come back to bite people in the butt,
37:10
especially when they start doing them wrong.
37:13
And, and, and not the not the least of which is some of these
37:16
drills for the whole IR thing when you got people forcing the
37:21
IR, which is what is I see a lot of times I see people forcing
37:25
like just rolling their hand over as they're releasing their,
37:29
they're, they're teaching themselves some another bad
37:31
habit. I mean, you're just trading one
37:33
bad habit for another. And it, but oh, I'm doing IR,
37:37
I'm doing IR. Well, that's great.
37:39
But you're you're just trading one.
37:41
I mean, I think that's one of the most misunderstood parts of
37:44
pitching, you know, in the whole IR idea is I see so many kids
37:49
that come in that say, yeah, she was taught, you know, the
37:51
parents said she was taught IR. But I can see that she's just
37:54
pushing the ball out and then rolling her wrist over after the
37:57
ball is gone. It's like this is not, this is
38:00
not to make it happen. This isn't let it happen.
38:02
Yeah, it's it's very similar to what people who throw a turnover
38:06
drop. You people who who do the
38:09
turnover drop or the rollover drop the ball, if you watch them
38:13
put it in slow motion, 99.9% of the time the ball is out of
38:18
their hand. By the time they roll their
38:19
wrist over and they do that goofy turnover where they
38:22
finished down with their hand. What is the point of it?
38:26
What is the point of doing that added motion at the end of
38:29
rolling the wrist over when the ball's already been released?
38:32
What What made the ball drop is not the turnover motion.
38:35
It's that you did everything else probably pretty well.
38:38
You probably rolled it off your fingertips good.
38:41
You probably had a shorter step so that you didn't over stride
38:44
and and hang the ball high, but it didn't have anything to do
38:47
with that turnover part. And you know, that's drives me
38:51
nuts when people say they throw a turnover drop and you watch
38:54
them and they're not actually throwing a turnover drop.
38:57
So you know, the hardest thing about the drop ball is the
38:59
simplicity of it. So Bill, I want to ask you, what
39:05
do you think about this current trend of people teaching the
39:08
leaps? You think it's good or bad for
39:10
pitchers and for the game? I think something had to be done
39:14
because the hot bats and the hot ball, I mean you're when you're
39:19
infield has to wear face masks because of how hot the bats and
39:23
the balls are. Something had to change for the
39:26
pitcher because it's everything has been geared towards the
39:30
hitter in recent years, I think. I think strike zones have shrunk
39:35
or so. Maybe I'm a little biased on
39:36
that, but. Not according to all the parents
39:39
I talked to after a tournament over the weekend.
39:42
Yeah, yeah, it's been on which side one it, it was the next
39:46
phase in the evolution of pitching Jay.
39:48
It it was, it was bound to happen.
39:51
I think. I think though that people are
39:54
taking it to the extreme though and, and just just, there's,
39:59
there's too many people that do not understand the difference
40:01
between a leap and a crow hop. And the majority of what I see
40:04
being taught is blatant crow hopping.
40:07
And I don't understand how they're not being called
40:11
illegal. I think that that the, the
40:14
governing bodies, if you will, the, the, the rule makers, they
40:18
did this just for the sake of, of taking this off the umpires
40:23
back. And so the umpires just say, I
40:25
think it's a leap and that's all there is to it.
40:28
It's a leap. It's not a crow up, it's a leap.
40:30
And so gives gives the umpire some deniability is to, they
40:33
don't have to look anymore because now leaping is legal and
40:36
they don't really have to pay attention to whether it's a crow
40:39
hop or a leap because it all comes down to discretion.
40:42
It's the umpire's discretion whether or not it's a leap or a
40:44
crow hop. And so I think that's why it
40:47
started to really catch on is, is that umpires just they, they
40:52
were, they don't want to get accosted in the, in the parking
40:55
lot after games because, you know, Sally's dad costed them
41:00
for calling illegal pitches and now they don't have to.
41:03
But mechanically speaking, if it's done safely, I don't think
41:07
it's going to be a problem. But there are some issues that
41:11
happen when pitchers grow up And, and it, you know, a lot of
41:14
pitchers that have low back pain.
41:17
It's, it's from the, the pounding that taking from, from
41:22
crow hopping and landing on that back foot.
41:24
But it's it's pretty common thing to get some low back pain.
41:28
So there's there's trade-offs to it, that's for sure.
41:31
Yeah, but you know, if you win the the the Winter Breeze
41:36
tournament indoors, isn't that worth sacrificing a kids back
41:40
for it? Sure, sure.
41:42
Of course it is. Yeah.
41:44
It, it's, I, I, I don't know where it's going to go at this
41:48
point because I think they've painted themselves in a corner
41:51
with not this not having clear cut definitions between a crow
41:55
hop and a leap that they're just letting umpires have the
41:58
discretion. And I guess it's always going to
42:00
be that way to a degree. But I mean, what I'm seeing,
42:04
particularly from, from a couple social media pitching coach
42:10
pitching coaches is they're just blatant crow hops.
42:13
And, and I, I, I really worry about the kids because
42:16
eventually they're going to run into an umpire who does know the
42:19
difference and is going to call those pitchers illegal.
42:22
And will that kid be able to adjust?
42:24
Will that kid be able to make an in game adjustment to, to pitch
42:29
quote UN quote legally as opposed to, you know, the crow
42:33
hopping that they're doing? And I can tell you from first
42:36
hand experience, it is not easy to, to flip flop from one to the
42:40
other. I had to learn how to do it both
42:42
ways, both legally and with crow hopping.
42:45
It's, it's not easy to flip flop.
42:48
Timing gets disrupted, everything gets disrupted.
42:51
So I, I, I think it, I think it was an, I think it was
42:55
inevitable that this is what was going to happen.
42:57
Because it was about the only thing that we can really do for,
43:00
for pitchers is to, to open it up a little bit for them.
43:04
Because these girls have, you have 90 LB slappers who can hit
43:07
a ball 300 feet now because of the bats and the ball.
43:10
So they had to do something to open it up for the pitchers a
43:13
little bit. When we look at that and you
43:16
know, you talk about having to make those adjustments and all
43:20
those kinds of things, that reminds me of just general
43:23
adversity. Since you have experience with
43:26
pitching and being in the game, how do you how do you work with
43:30
your girls to handle adversity and challenges and failures and,
43:35
and all those kinds of things? I am one of the biggest
43:39
proponents of sports psychology out there.
43:42
I have a guy here in town that I work a lot with that when I have
43:46
pitchers the, the kind that are serious and the kind that are
43:52
going to put the time in with it and are going to make a
43:55
difference with it. I, I send them to sports
43:58
psychologists and they're like I said, I have a guy here who is
44:01
a, he's actually a, a softball coach as well.
44:05
And his part time gig is sports psych.
44:07
His full time gig is, is he's like truly one of the guys on
44:11
Criminal Minds and he goes around to the prisons and
44:13
interview serial killers and stuff during the daytime and
44:16
then, yeah, and then, and then he his, his passion, his
44:20
softball and, and sports psychology.
44:24
And so, you know, the, the, the good and bad, there's 100,000
44:29
pitching coaches out there, good and bad.
44:31
There's 100,000 hitting couches out there, but there's very few
44:35
that really work on the brain and, and how to how to teach
44:39
yourself how to think and how to stay cool in the moment.
44:43
And you know, that's something that the US Olympic team spends
44:47
a lot of time with too. Having spent time with the
44:49
Olympic team, they, they bring in the sports psychologist.
44:52
He does individual meetings with them and group meetings with
44:55
them and, and we had it with the men's team too.
44:58
We had access to the Olympic sports psychologists and I, I
45:02
really wish I would have gotten more opportunity with it because
45:05
it's, it's invaluable, invaluable.
45:08
And I, I tell parents that operate clubs or particularly
45:15
parents, but, but even if it's just a club director, find out
45:19
if any local colleges in your area offer sports psych.
45:23
And if they do contact that professor, see if the students
45:28
in that class will come out and do field training with, with
45:31
the, with the softball teams and, and that and put apply what
45:35
they're learning to, to, to a softball team.
45:39
That's great. Yeah.
45:41
And and that's it's, it's something that if they did
45:46
again, it's, it's just, it's hard to put hard to quantify how
45:51
valuable that is. Yeah, it's, although it sounds
45:53
like that guy that's working with the prisoners during the
45:56
day, maybe instead of working with the kids, you ought to be
45:58
working with some of the softball parents.
46:01
Yeah, check it out as well. That's, that's that's a whole
46:05
other subject too, isn't it? Softball.
46:08
Softball pitching parents. Yeah.
46:11
I don't know. Are they as crazy with hitting
46:13
as they are with pitching? Yeah, Yeah, I think so.
46:17
The only thing I do hitting is is just throw live batting.
46:20
I don't I don't do any. I don't do anything outside of
46:25
pitching, like I don't do any kind of hitting lesson or
46:28
anything like that. I throw live batting to them.
46:31
And then when they get to a certain point, then I'll start
46:35
working with them on how to pick pitchers and what to look for
46:39
from the box and how to see, you know, what the pitchers going to
46:42
throw ahead of time. And it's things like that, that,
46:45
that really if, if they're just taught how to, how to look for
46:50
things just just like catchers calling games, it's just
46:53
ridiculous to me that we're getting dugout, they're getting
46:57
signals from dugouts in Division One college softball because
47:01
they don't, they're trained like robots when they're kids are not
47:04
taught how to call games, they're not taught what to look
47:07
for. They're not taught how to react.
47:08
They're not taught. And, and it's, it's, it's just,
47:12
it's frustrating because it, if, if you have somebody that can
47:15
teach that sort of stuff, it cuts out that element of needing
47:18
to get all the signals from the dugouts.
47:20
And, and, but it's, it's, it's also just about getting their
47:24
softball IQ up by watching, paying attention.
47:28
You're going to get jail fired up here.
47:30
Oh. You're not.
47:32
You are. Well, I was just going to say,
47:34
Bill, when when, when you were playing back in the day, I mean,
47:38
the coach wasn't really a coach. You just kind of had to figure
47:41
it out ourselves, right? Like, I mean, you just learned
47:43
and then you didn't make that mistake again.
47:45
But you learned by doing it, not by someone telling you.
47:48
Right. Yeah, there's it's it's, you
47:50
know, we're in in my world, it was more about, you know, the
47:54
coach made-up line UPS that it wasn't, you know, coaching per
47:58
SE and on, you know, there wasn't calls coming in from the
48:02
dugout for pitch selection and things like that.
48:05
That that doesn't exist in men's softball.
48:07
Probably more out of ego than anything, but.
48:10
Yeah. So you mean they didn't, you
48:11
know, on the 1st and 3rd they didn't, you know, call a time
48:13
out and go talk to everybody and tell them what to do?
48:16
Yeah, that if you haven't figured it out already, then
48:20
yeah, guaranteed time out, isn't it First and third?
48:23
Yeah, almost guaranteed to be a time out.
48:25
All right, so we've been talking about parents.
48:28
And you have that experience now with your son.
48:33
He's a championship level swimmer, a sport that you really
48:36
don't know anything about or at least didn't grow up doing.
48:40
What's it like being on the parent side?
48:43
Well, it's. It's, it's, it's a little, a
48:48
little unfair because he does all his stuff.
48:51
He lives in Europe so he, I don't get to see him swim all
48:54
that often. But when, when they do stream
48:57
some of his events, I'll, I'll get up at 3:00 AM to, to watch
49:00
his event. It's nerve racking.
49:03
I can see why, why parents? I, I think, I think if I was a
49:07
softball parent, I would be one of those that, that takes my
49:10
lawn chair out to center field and sit because I would, I would
49:15
be too boisterous or at least my body language would denote how
49:21
I'm feeling at that moment and with, with the pitch selection
49:25
or whatever. And so, yeah, I would probably
49:29
just excuse myself out to center field and, and let the coach do
49:34
his coaching and, or her. It is, it is hard.
49:37
It is hard because you, you want to be there to, you want to help
49:40
him. I want to help him with
49:41
everything I can. But I'm also aware of my
49:44
limitations. I'm not a swimmer.
49:46
I can't teach them anything swimming.
49:48
The only thing I can do is drive them to the pool, You know?
49:51
And I and I wish that more people knew their limitations
49:55
when it comes to pitching. Makes you wonder why sometimes.
49:58
Why? Why are you paying for these
49:59
lessons when you know better than me?
50:02
Yeah. So I I've done.
50:03
A thing before where, you know, I'll have a parent that's trying
50:07
to give advice or or even worse to me is repeating what I just
50:12
said, you know, you know. So I'll tell them, you know,
50:16
hey, you know, if you want, I'll go sit down the bucket and catch
50:19
and you can do the lesson. But I'm going to charge you the
50:21
same amount no matter which one you have me do.
50:24
Yeah. Yeah.
50:25
You know. A mistake that parents make is,
50:28
is they say something to the kid every pitch, every single pitch,
50:33
good or bad, they got something to say.
50:35
And, and you see it like the girl will throw a pitch and
50:38
she'll immediately look to dad for, for feedback.
50:41
And it that, that's, that's no good.
50:45
You can't, you can't have that because what's going to happen
50:48
if dad isn't there that day? And the feedback isn't always
50:52
going to be there for That's why I'm, I'm a big proponent of
50:54
teaching them what they're doing right, what they're doing wrong
50:57
on their own, so they can tell themselves what they did right
51:01
and wrong and how to fix it. But yeah, it's that that's,
51:05
that's where I come from with it is, is I'm making sure that the
51:08
kids know what they done themselves so that they can make
51:12
their own self corrections. Yeah, I think that's important
51:15
to you. It's.
51:16
Become your own pitching coach. Learn what you're doing wrong.
51:21
That's why I like to what we call the Socratic method.
51:24
I try not to tell them what to do.
51:26
I try to ask them what they did and see if they can figure it
51:30
out. So that and I even will tell
51:33
them why am I asking you this question?
51:35
And they usually know. So when I'm out there pitching,
51:38
I can figure it out. You know, if something's going
51:40
wrong, I can do it. I said yeah, because you
51:42
certainly don't want your coach or your parents or anybody else
51:45
yelling advice to you. At that point.
51:47
You just need to be in the zone and focused on what you're
51:50
doing. Well, one of two things happens
51:52
when a parent or. Even a coach, it doesn't have to
51:55
be a parent could be a pitching coach who says something after
51:57
every single pitch. One of two things is going to
52:00
happen. That kid is either going to
52:01
become dependent on that feedback and after every pitch
52:06
stare. What did I do good?
52:07
What did I do wrong? Or they're going to learn to
52:09
tune you out because you're saying something every single
52:12
pitch. And either way, it's not a good
52:14
situation. So hope I hear ambulances.
52:19
That's that's not. Coming for you, is it?
52:21
No, Sir, I don't hear. Anything OK?
52:24
Did you really hear an ambulance?
52:25
Yeah. I can hear an ambulance in the.
52:27
Background somewhere. Maybe that's by me, might be by
52:31
one of you guys. I'm I'm.
52:33
We're Yeah. OK, No ambulances here.
52:35
All righty good. Just want to make sure.
52:38
Yeah. That's, that's The thing is, is.
52:40
There's that balance between, you know, the, the coaching, the
52:45
the coaching and the over coaching because there is a such
52:48
thing as over coaching. First thing I do with a new
52:51
student is make sure they understand why does the ball go
52:54
where it goes? If they don't understand that,
52:56
they're not going to know how to make corrections themselves.
52:59
What? What is one of the first things
53:01
that you look at? When you get a new student in,
53:03
how do you when you're evaluating them?
53:05
What are you looking for? Can tell a lot just by watching
53:08
her throw overhand. The first time she throws the
53:11
ball overhand, it can tell. It tells me a lot.
53:14
If there's good form or bad form in the overhand throw is going
53:17
to tell me a lot about what can I can expect in the underhand
53:20
now is it? It's not a foolproof method.
53:22
There are people who aren't very good at throwing overhand, but
53:25
can throw underhand pretty well, and vice versa.
53:28
But you know, remember Jolly Selden over at UCLA?
53:33
Yes. You know, that is one of the
53:37
hardest things to do in pitching is to throw overhand after
53:41
you've been throwing underhand like that.
53:43
And I tell all of my students that in between innings, when
53:48
you get your 3 warm up pitches and I throw it down, they throw
53:51
it around. I will stand there and I will
53:54
throw overhand with my third baseman until the batter is on
53:58
their way into the box and they're ready to go and the
54:00
umpire says play ball. I will just sit there and throw
54:03
overhand. Just making sure that I keep
54:05
those muscles in shape and ready to go so that if I do get a
54:09
comebacker, it's not going to be an errant throw.
54:12
Hopefully, because it it is really hard to be to throw a
54:16
ball overhand, especially if there's a fast runner and you
54:20
got a house, you got a hustle. But just take take two or three.
54:24
Throws throw it over. To third base and just keep keep
54:27
that that overhand motion working for you because you
54:30
never know when you're going to need it.
54:32
So Bill, where do you see? The future of softball.
54:37
Pitching had. In future of softball pitching.
54:41
Well, I think it's only going to keep getting better there.
54:45
There's a lot of a lot of male coaches, a lot of male fast
54:51
pitch coaches are getting in fast pitch players are getting
54:53
into the, the college game and, and their daughters are playing.
54:58
And and it's not to say that that men are the end all be all
55:02
to to this, but it's, it's adding another dynamic to the
55:06
game, another style of play, if you will, to the game.
55:10
And so it's, it's, it's only going to help increase the level
55:14
and make, make pitchers better having having more opportunities
55:19
and and having more voices to hear from.
55:22
I think the future of it looks pretty good.
55:25
You look at we were just talking about that ball that has all the
55:27
gadgets attached to it and everything, you know, look at
55:30
all these things that are coming out now that are designed to
55:32
help pitchers. It's it's starting to starting
55:35
to kind of there's a lot of good lot of tools out there now.
55:40
So I just because I'm old fashioned dinosaur, I'm not
55:43
using them doesn't mean that there isn't any value to them.
55:46
But you know, it's it's I think it's it's only going to keep
55:52
getting better. Look at the look at the pictures
55:55
that are out there today, Geordie ball and and Nigerie
55:59
candidate and you know, Tegan Kavan and you know, they're
56:04
they, they all they're they're, they're the top of their class.
56:09
You know, they're the top of the top of the game.
56:11
And if you look at them, they all have pretty similar motions
56:14
and so similar mechanics anyway. So you know, I I think it's only
56:21
going to increase. I think the more of the the
56:25
hello elbow coaches. They're they're for the most
56:28
part, I I see them dropping off. I don't think there's as many as
56:32
there used to be. But like I said before, there's
56:34
some that are going to just die on that hill.
56:37
Yeah, absolutely. From your perspective, are there
56:41
things that maybe don't show up on a stat sheet that college
56:44
coaches value? So I I guess some of the
56:47
intangibles that kids might bring body language.
56:53
Body language is is a huge one. There's a famous story, and I
56:56
don't know how true it is, but a famous story that Patrick Murphy
57:01
recruited Montana Thouts. He made her her offer of of
57:06
Obviously he was going to offer her anyway.
57:08
But one of the things that happened was Thouts pitched in a
57:12
game and she got rocked apparently, or didn't pitch very
57:14
well and she didn't go in the dugout and cry or sulk.
57:18
She was the the biggest cheerleader for the pitcher who
57:20
came in and supported her. And that right there showed
57:25
Murphy that this kid gets it. And, you know, some days, some
57:31
days you got it and some days you don't.
57:33
But she didn't pout and sulk the way that a lot of kids will
57:37
today. Didn't have to put up with any
57:40
crap. You know, I didn't worry about
57:43
the the outcome. She just knew that she still is
57:46
a good pitcher. And, and it was.
57:49
But that was how Murphy made his offer to her.
57:52
Apparently was after that game that she did, she didn't do very
57:55
well. And it was because of the way
57:56
she handled defeat. So it's kind of a cool story,
58:00
even if it's not true. Yeah, definitely is.
58:04
If you could give one message to young pitchers.
58:06
Chasing big dreams. What would it be?
58:09
1 message. Ask questions or you can make it
58:14
two or three will say ask. Questions but like the way I.
58:17
Did ask how, how you know, go to talk to don't be shy and and
58:26
afraid to ask for help from, you know, if you see somebody that
58:31
well, I don't think of how I want to say it.
58:34
I just I just ask people all the time.
58:36
How did you how are you? How did you do that?
58:39
Why did you do it this way? That's how I was learning how to
58:42
pitch was asking all these questions.
58:44
And I think sometimes girls are a little shy to do that because
58:48
they have a pitching coach. They don't want to step on toes
58:50
of the pitching coach, but if I'm seeing the best in the world
58:55
doing something that my my pitching coach is not teaching
58:57
me, I need to know why that is. And, and so why why are you
59:04
teaching me to pitch hello elbow when that's not what that girl's
59:07
doing over there who's pitching for Texas?
59:09
So I would ask questions as much as I can.
59:13
That's the biggest thing is find the common denominators in the
59:17
answers because they they're all going to say, I, I hide my
59:20
shoulder, I whip my elbow, I get my legs into it, you know,
59:24
whatever the appropriate thing is that, that whatever the
59:27
question is, ask questions. You know, I think one other
59:31
thing that's kind of cool. About you is that you've been
59:34
pretty vocal about? Not really promoting that you
59:38
were the pitching coach for this kid or that kid.
59:41
I didn't know you were Tegan's pitching coach until you happen
59:45
to mention it to me. You know, in another context.
59:48
Why are you that way? What's the what's the reason
59:50
why, you know, so many people want to go out there and make it
59:53
seem like they were the reason that this kid or that kid was
59:56
successful. Why do you kind of step back
59:58
from that for that exact reason? Because I'm not the.
1:00:02
Reason that Tegan could then every kid I work with gets the
1:00:05
same exact information. It's what they do with it that's
1:00:10
different. Now some some kids just have
1:00:14
more natural ability than others.
1:00:15
There's no question about that. But I, I just don't take credit
1:00:19
where where it's not due. And, and, and these girls put
1:00:23
the time and the work in. And I don't think it's my place
1:00:26
to say, Oh, yeah. Well, I was, I was her coach.
1:00:30
And I just try not to take credit for their hard work is
1:00:33
really what it comes down to. Yeah, I, I, yeah, it's, it's
1:00:40
like I said. They all get the same.
1:00:41
Training, it's what they do with it.
1:00:43
That's the difference. Yeah, I love hearing you say
1:00:45
that because that's the same. Thing that I'll say you know
1:00:47
when somebody's talking about a a kid I have those having some
1:00:50
successes like you know I I judge my abilities on the kids
1:00:55
that are having the most trouble not the least trouble exactly
1:00:59
exactly that I. You get, I get more, I get more
1:01:03
out of seeing somebody with the lesser ability do well then you
1:01:07
know, I do with somebody I know is going to be good, somebody I
1:01:11
know is going to make it. And those are the ones that
1:01:14
bring you back after week after week.
1:01:16
Is that those those ones that you know, man, they just
1:01:20
appreciate what you taught them and and they're going to work at
1:01:22
it and you know, it doesn't matter that they're not the best
1:01:25
pitcher in the country. They're just going to keep
1:01:27
working hard. Those are the ones that it's
1:01:30
it's enjoyable and you got to have the right parent mixture
1:01:33
too, right? You got to have the right parent
1:01:35
mixture where you know, the kid. I've we've all had students
1:01:39
where the dad is just a nut job. Let's to be honest, there's,
1:01:44
there's a nut job and and I had I had a student once that, that,
1:01:49
that dad can't take it. If if she can't, she keep her
1:01:54
backspin wasn't there that day. He can't take it.
1:01:56
He'll go out and sit in the car because he gets so mad and
1:01:59
frustrated with his daughter because she can't, she's having
1:02:02
an off day. And it's, it's these are the
1:02:05
people that you see on Oprah, you know, the, the, the doctor
1:02:09
Phil. So, yeah, I, I'm, I'm a big
1:02:14
bullet. I, I just don't, I don't take
1:02:17
the credit for, for somebody because of, I don't take the
1:02:20
credit for, for anybody's success.
1:02:23
And the same is true for the speed factor too.
1:02:25
I, I've, I've never held up a picture with somebody with their
1:02:29
speed gun and stuff like that. And I, and I understand why kids
1:02:32
do it. It's a great motivation tool for
1:02:34
them and and they're proud of their achievement.
1:02:36
And I I get it. And if, if they do it on their
1:02:39
own, that's great. But it's just not something I
1:02:41
promote myself. Yeah.
1:02:43
And I will admit I do do that. And I, I do it because I want to
1:02:47
reward the kid, you know, she, she worked and she did well.
1:02:50
And I'll usually tell a little story about it, you know, and
1:02:53
usually try doing some little funny things that happened.
1:02:56
Like I had, I had a girl, the last one I wrote up was
1:02:59
yesterday, Tuesday night. I had this girl, Gwen, and she
1:03:03
told me at the beginning of the lesson that her dad told her.
1:03:06
She got back up to her previous high.
1:03:08
He'd give her $100 and then if she got a new high, he'd give
1:03:14
her another $100. She hit both goals.
1:03:17
And I, you know, when she came back after we took the picture,
1:03:20
I said, So what are you going to do with that $200?
1:03:23
And she just looks at me and she goes, that was just a scam.
1:03:26
They're not going to pay me. I think I I see most of the
1:03:32
girls. Can that, that you're talking
1:03:35
about on your social media that hold up their radar gun and
1:03:38
stuff. And those girls are just beaming
1:03:40
with pride, right? Beaming with pride.
1:03:43
And, and that, that alone would be worth it to, to, to hold that
1:03:47
memory for them, you know, so I, I don't blame anybody for doing
1:03:51
it. It's just not something I do
1:03:52
myself, right? Yeah, no.
1:03:54
And again, I I don't. Hold it up as an example of my
1:03:57
great teaching. I hold it up as an example of
1:03:59
this kid worked hard. She set a goal and you know, she
1:04:03
did better. Yeah.
1:04:06
Yeah. That's the.
1:04:06
Thing is, is you know, you, it's all about the context that
1:04:10
you're not trying to pick take the credit or you know, you
1:04:15
know, blow, take the wind out of their sail.
1:04:18
Awesome. Well, Bill, we've had you for
1:04:19
more than an hour now. So we're gonna let you wrap it
1:04:22
up here too, but before you know, we can't Ken and I can't
1:04:25
thank you enough. You're a legend in this game.
1:04:27
You've taught and helped me tremendously.
1:04:29
I know you've helped other pitching coaches and we can't
1:04:32
thank you enough for that. And what you've given to this
1:04:35
game. Before we let you go, though, is
1:04:37
there a way, is there a way for our listeners to help you with
1:04:41
your medical expenses or other needs that would that's.
1:04:44
Oh, that. Would be so helpful.
1:04:46
As I said at the at the outset of talking to you guys, you
1:04:49
know, I used to do 10-12 hour days on Saturdays, Sundays and
1:04:52
then I had weeknight lessons and now I'm down to doing 6 lessons
1:04:57
a week. So my my, my, my, my expenses
1:05:01
have not changed, but my income has certainly changed.
1:05:05
So my girlfriend set up a GoFundMe account.
1:05:08
If you go to gofundme.com and then type in Hill House cancer
1:05:12
or just Google Hill House cancer GoFundMe, you'll find it.
1:05:16
Anything helps. Anything helps.
1:05:19
It's tell you what, it costs more to die in this country than
1:05:22
it does to live. So yeah, isn't that a shame?
1:05:26
Expenses and everything else that goes with it.
1:05:28
But that would be extremely helpful.
1:05:30
I still get emails from people a lot that ask for pitching help.
1:05:35
And I always want to say to them, well, how about you help
1:05:37
me? Yeah, but.
1:05:41
Yeah, that would. That would that I appreciate you
1:05:43
bringing that up gofundme.com is is some people have just Venmo
1:05:49
directly. My Venmo is William Dash Hill
1:05:51
House Dash 13369 is the last four of my phone number.
1:05:56
Sometimes people need that to send a Venmo to somebody they've
1:05:59
never been mode before. Yeah, it's it would be very
1:06:03
helpful. Take anything I can get.
1:06:05
And it sounds I never thought a day would come where I would be
1:06:08
doing that, but here I am. I never thought the day would
1:06:12
come where I told I have a terminal illness either.
1:06:14
So yeah. And then is is house.
1:06:17
Ofpitching.com. I mean, are you still selling
1:06:20
DVDs? And well, DVD markets pretty
1:06:24
much gone now. There's nobody, I mean, if
1:06:26
anybody wanted DVDs, that would just pretty much give them to
1:06:29
them. OK?
1:06:30
My, my website, I, I, I got hit with a malware attack about
1:06:35
almost 10 years ago now and I never put it back up because I
1:06:39
was coaching in college at that point.
1:06:42
And so when you're coaching in college, it restricts what you
1:06:44
can do with private lessons. And so I just never put it back
1:06:49
up and got my website going again.
1:06:52
And fortunately I have enough name recognition.
1:06:57
I guess the Hill House is a goofy enough name that people
1:06:59
recognize the name and and I was able to get lessons here in
1:07:03
Nebraska pretty quickly, so it worked itself out.
1:07:08
All right. Great.
1:07:09
Well, Bill, thank. You so much for joining us
1:07:12
today. You know we know you got a lot
1:07:13
of stuff going on. So we really appreciate all the
1:07:15
time and and everything you've done for the sport.
1:07:19
So we wish you well, hope that thank you guys, hope that this
1:07:24
was my pleasure, like I said. Earlier, you know about
1:07:27
stretching those softball muscles in the head.
1:07:29
This this helped with that. You guys asked me some questions
1:07:32
I got to really think about, so I appreciate that.
1:07:35
Oh, great. Thanks, Bill.
1:07:38
All righty. Well, that's.
1:07:38
It for us this week thanks to. All of you for listening and the
1:07:41
kind words you've been sharing with us.
1:07:44
If you like what you're hearing, Please remember to give us a
1:07:46
like, leave a comment and share this podcast on your social
1:07:50
media channels. Make sure you never miss an
1:07:52
episode by following us on your favorite podcast platform.
1:07:56
If you're so inclined, you can also leave a great review on
1:07:59
Apple Podcasts to help more people find us.