Pitching Lessons

[SoftballJunkie2]

My DD (16) has been taking pitching lessons for 4 years now. We have been satisfied with her progress. She has 5 pitches. her speed is ok for the effort she puts into pitching. We are happy with our pitching coach. BUT every softball person that we talk to tries to convince us to change coaches. Everyone seems to know someone who is very good and my DD should go to them. Is this common everywhere?

[jofus]

Not where we live, but I wouldn't use that for a good reference

I feel lucky to have a decent pitching coach 3 miles from my house, especially in WV

[FPDD_cabbie]

Maybe you should ask these other softball people WHY you should switch pitching coaches.

My DD (12U) she has been with the same Pitching Coach for over 4 years. I have taken her to another pitching coach for a few lessons to get a second opinion of her mechanics. Sometimes a fresh view can help.

[dustyshoes]

It's funny how these things progress when your DD is a pitcher. A year ago I was my DD's pitching coach and I learned what little I knew from her Rec league pitching clinics. During the fall season other parents would compliment DD on her pitching and ask me if she had a pitching coach to which I'd always say, "yeah, me."

As I soon learned, other pitchers were getting private lessons and, realizing my own limits, I began to look for one. The coach the other rec league parents were using was a pitching coach at a local D1, non-powerhouse university and charged about $45/hr. She didn't have any available time to take on my daughter so I searched and found out that everyone else charged about the same but significantly more than I expected so I chose a guy with the best fastpitch credentials. He didn't moonlight w/baseball players, got a lot of girls D-1 scholarships and coached a 16u team for the areas only national-caliber travel organization.

From what I've seen so far from the pitchers who worked with the other coach, I'm glad I spent a little more and went elsewhere. They've all improved but I just think DD has improved more and he helped her in fielding and hitting in addition to pitching (I know, I could be rationalizing my bigger expense).

If your using a resonably priced coach it could be that the people you talk to think she has the potential or could benefit from higher level coaching. Or they could also be trying to drum up some business for their coaches if they are part of a large travel organization that runs camps and clinics. As the above poster said, ask them why and maybe consider interviewing other coaches if you think it would help your DD.