To make a long story short some self professed pitching guru comes up to me and my student and begins pontificating about himself, the style of pitching he believes to be correct his past students and where they are now and all the big name coaches he has worked with in both travel and college.... He explains to us what he has taught to some of the worlds best, keep in mind we are at Columbus Tustin Park not some championship training facility. I asked him to demo what he meant and he showed us without actually pitching the ball I handed him a ball and told him to pitch it to the catcher(dad) so we could see what he meant. He then says he hasn't pitched in nearly 20 years due to a bad shoulder. So I pitched the ball for him using his swing back technique and then I pitched with how I normally pitch (hands together), imagine his surprise that I can pitch!! I then told him why I don't teach the swing back style blah blah blah and then he dropped a dooozy, he says, "well men's style of fastpitch does not work with female pitchers because they are simply not strong enough"!!!!! Holy hell, I would have laid into him but I was on my students time and didn't want to get into it with some blow hard.
Now, I'm sure this has been addressed before but if it hasn't, THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS MENS AND WOMANS STYLE!! Granted men leap (some not all) and we do that to gain ground on the batter it has its advantages and disadvantages. However, proper mechanics are proper mechanics that remains constant in men and woman. It could be argued that some of the best female pitchers in the world pitch like men but in truth they just pitch with proper mechanics they have learned how to use their legs, whip their arms and spin the ball with their fingers to generate velocity and movement a concept that has eluded some pitching instructors out there, including but not limited to, captain blow hard!! To all the parents out there the only two styles of pitching is right and wrong. Do your homework and look up the best male and female pitchers in the world and ask yourself is your instructor teaching your kid what these pitchers are doing??