Many pitchers struggle moving efficiently down the mound with their lower half. Especially younger pitchers, who have a tendency to collapse the back leg when initiating forward movement. As pitchers, we want to drive our energy towards home in the most efficient way. I hope this video analysis break down will help answers all questions.
One of our 13u’s had an issue with collapsing his back leg as he came out of leg lift.
In the video on the left, we see his right knee coming down (which means he is becoming more quad dominant) over his toes(collapsing his back leg/hips) and his hips going down instead of staying tall and gaining ground towards the catcher. By Collapsing his back leg he will be more prone to throwing across his body because his hips will not be able to open up properly. This puts more strain on the elbow/shoulder and the athlete will become more injury prone. Because of this collapsing, he also doesn’t stay connected to the rubber and turns into a “toe pusher” off the mound.
In the video on the right, we see a great adjustment where he rides his back leg and is gaining ground. We notice that his hips push back (keeping them taller as he activates the glutes and hamstrings) while his knee goes straight to home. Another benefit of using our glutes/hamstrings is that they help create faster hip rotation, which in turn helps pitchers be more explosive down the mound. This also creates a healthier/more efficient arm action down the mound. A cue for pitchers we like to use is "drive off the back heel." This will help our pitchers stay connected with the rubber longer to drive off the mound and activate our glutes/hamstrings more efficiently. For a bonus, this adjustment gained him 2.8 mph.
Charles Davis
TCats Pitching Instructor