Demonstrating The Best Pitching Drills For Youth Pitchers 

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My son is in 9U travel pitching great but walks have been his biggest problem. After hitting two kids in the same game, i found this video. The lawn mower and heal-toe drill have fixed this issue. Pitched 3 innings yesterday, 0 Earned runs, 0 walks, 6Ks. Amazing, thank you!

Thanks for the drills!

You put out great content but I think this may be my favorite. Went over a few of these with my 9 y.o. and wow I think he got some insight into his own body mechanics. The simplicity of the drills is what makes them great but I grew up with basketball so I didn't know many of these. Thanks so much.

Thank you. Helpful. Cleared up several issues with the bad drills.

These pitching drills are amazing. Started working on these with an advanced 11 year old pitcher and the refinement is terrific! Thank you!

Great video. I coach pitching and those last 4 drills should really help me with my players. When I played youth ball, I remember going to camps using some of the bad drills. Thankfully I didn’t use them with my players because I’ve watched many of your videos.

Dan. This was an awesome video. The further demonstration of the rocker is spot on. I love how this is easy and explainable for youth pitchers to understand. And we will replace the towel drill with a water bottle. In Winter we take the baseball away and throw with a football on occasion. Technique and body alignment still apply. I would like to see someone do a complete Winter program for athletes who just finished Fall ball and want to rest their arms but still work on the fundamentals until March with a ramp up timeline. With your network I’m sure this can be packaged into a subscription that most would purchase and follow. Also a weekly Q and A live to answer questions and provide testimony. Really target that 11-18 year old looking to get better. Thank you for your content.

Thanks Coach

I really like the way all your drills employ a high short circle and, I think, eliminate most TJ problems in the future.

Great drills!

Thanks! I've been coaching my son since Tball. Now that he is a freshman in HS, it's time to expand our knowledge.

Thank you for the content and for sharing these drills. I’ll definitely try these outs with my son during the off season while we tweak mechanics. Any suggestions for reinforcing staying behind the ball? I’m going to incorporate a clean fuego ball with your lawnmower drill and see how that feels. Thank you again, I appreciate all your stuff!

Great video Dan! There are as you know a ton of pitching drills out there. And it's hard to know which ones are the best. You've got the knowledge and experience. And I trust your recommendations. I plan to work on these with my sons, and also with my kids in the Spring. Thanks so much!

Thank you very much this video helped me a lot

Good stuff. 👍

it helped me a lot thanks.......

Thank you for those drill demonstrations. The water bottle drill peaked my interest immediately. My friends 10 y.o son's palm on the follow through tends to be facing up, which I believe is called supinated, and not facing down, pronated is the term if memory serves me right. So an hour ago, after just a couple of attempts with the half-filled water battle, he was pronating. Hopefully, that is an OK extension/addition to your water bottle drill. Anyway, decades ago I was told that after every type of pitch, the palm should start facing down so as not to place undue stress on the elbow, and maybe they mentioned the shoulder also.

I never was a big fan of towel drill. I'm going to try this water bottle drill. Thanks for the pointers on behalf of my 15U team Dan.

Dude this was awesome!! Made me laugh on some of the bad drills

At first I wasn’t on board with NOT doing the finishing drill. My young pitchers struggle with not bending at the waste and it’s a good drill to reinforce the proper finishing position and forces them to bend. However the lawnmower/square hips drill are a good substitute. Heel toe is my #3 progression with triple leg lift balance drill being #4. What are thoughts on the Step Back drill? Thanks for the content.

I understand the critiques about the L-drill, but I think a lot of (especially youth) coaches actually use a variation that has the kids starting in more of a T-position, with a much more slight bend in the elbow, baseball starting above the shoulder and facing up and away from the body (but not necessarily towards center field), and the glove out front facing more downward ("equal and opposite") but the glove arm mostly extended. As the baseball comes forward, the glove gets pulled in towards the body and tucked into the armpit while you replace the shoulders. My primary goal in this drill is to break the short-arming habit especially in younger players. As the kids get older, I have them start with the baseball in the glove and work through the full downward break of hands up into that T-position. But for the younger kids I start them there to hammer using their full range of motion. Would either of those still make the list of bad drills?

Love seeing the downtown park backdrops in your videos.

Would you recommend the square hips drill for working on a slider

Rocker drill (the one you did correct) is good but I like having them throw from what I would call position 2 meaning they've already landed from the set. And they are there statically. Especially for young ones I show them that they still need to be weighted back on the mound shoulder level driving osed shoulder to the catchers nose. I never want them to feel over their front toe until a finish at all. Shoulders level and ripping after position two. That's the finish. I actually have them warm up like this pre game and pitching sessions and they know when they haven't hit it. I don't even have to say anything because they now know the feel.

Connection ball drill is very useful for kids with long extended arm actions that put a lot of stress on anterior shoulder and medial elbow. Helped me fix an 11 year old kid. Maybe saved his arm down the road. Ball under armpit is good for what you said (staying connected) and putting the arm in a more mechanically advantageous position to avoid potential arm injuries. Trevor Bauer swears by connection drills.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="533">8:53</a> "hey buddy" 🤣🤣

Appreciate this review and approach of good v bad and your reasons for opinions. I agree about the wrist flip for anyone above youth, but I might ask if you have any thoughts about helping the very young kids with getting behind a ball- I would typically lay them on back and flip balls in air to get used to spinning a baseball as an education tool rather than a mechanical drill per se. Thoughts? Also, I like the good rockers as a diagnostic tool for guys who spin off with front side/glove arm too- I think your comment about a drill has to have a purpose is absolutely spot on. Thanks for the content!!

Coach Dan, first of all that you for all the helpful content. What would you say are the most important considerations for coaches/players to keep in mind for pitchers doing flat ground work vs. being on the mound. It seems like if they execute proper mechanics exactly the same on flat ground then they will throw it higher in the zone, (say 6-10in or the height of a mound?). I hope that question makes sense, thank you.

wrist drills are for beginner players only and it is to fix the kids or adults who are throwing a cut fast ball calling it a a fastball. When I see that I put them on the wrist drills. You are correct that it is a waste of time with experienced players.

Love your stuff Dan-come over to Primetime in Alexandria and come help tighten some boys up

I have a thrower who starts his arm too far out and pulls it forward with his bicep. Water bottle drill helps. Any recomendations?

Yo hablo español tus enseñanzas muy buenas good

Hey Dan I am wondering if throwing a tennis ball could be good in practice or good because it would force you to throw harder and faster because it is less aerodynamic than a baseball. Also I am 13 and love your videos

May be a dumb question here, but is it better to do these from a mound rather than flat ground? Or does it really even matter. My 9yo loves pitching and is getting pretty good at it (threw a 4 inning no hitter two weeks ago and won the game 11-0, sorry just so proud of him I had to include lol). I was a college level distance runner, not a baseball expert, in any way shape or form, so I'm piecing together proper ways to help him outside of practice.

¡Gracias!

Hello, I'm your enthusiastic viewer from Korea and I want to help you to make better Korean subtitles. I want many Korean baseball fans see this and be the best player. And also I'm trying too..

That rocker drill should be done by lifting up the front foot, and stepping to promote having your heel out in front of your knee. In your demo, your knee goes over your front foot.

No big L drill 😮OMG! I learned that drill in college. At all?

👍🔥👊

Biggest thing I need help with is trying not to trip while on the mound haha

I think the towel drill works better for 6-8 yr olds as it is difficult for them to grasp a bottle of water as u ask

I was just thinking. is it throwing baseball, same as throwing football? I think it has same motions.

The rocker drill is done better by lifting the front leg . your rocker drill promotes a bent front knee and And the front knee in front of the heel. IMHO

Korean title suggestion : 다시는 하지말아야할 7가지 bad 투구 연습법 + 모든 연령에 적용되는 6가지 great 투구 연습법

What if you want to be a salt bae meme guy? do you still skip the wrist warmup?

Love all the drills but the bottle drill. The water never moves the right way to get the proper hand movement

If your not throwing down hill to a catcher 60' 6", or whateverr the distance is from the mound to home plate (depending on age) than its worthless and absolutely ridiculous.

This guy doesn’t know how to throw at all