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By Paul Nyman
While preparing a series of articles on Barry Zito’s lost fastball I received the following e-mail: Paul,
Out of curiosity, when will the Zito article be coming out? I've already started telling some people at Baseball Think Factory about the article that will be coming out soon.
As you may know, I wrote a couple of articles on Phil Hughes last year, where I basically predicted lower velocity (based on his new "tall and fall" sh*t) and higher fly ball rates based on his arm slot. Now that you've talked about the Barry Zito problem, I'm starting to see some of the same with Hughes as well. Less horizontal loading and too north/south without the corresponding shoulder tilt.
You want to get people fired up and talking about you? Write a Phil Hughes article...Yankee fans are f**king nuts.
Maybe you could do Phil Hughes and continue (and improve on) some of the things I said in my earlier articles....and of course, I certainly won't be offended if you disagree with me....I might learn something.
I'm telling you Paul..get in on this Phil Hughes stuff---he's the big ticket item.
Carlos
Carlos is Carlos Gomez a.k.a. Chadbradfordwannabe. I'm happy to say that I did have some influence on Carlos in terms of how he blossomed into a very astute pitching and hitting mechanics person.
At the time of Carlos’ email I was deeply immersed in dealing with Zito’s mechanics. Now that the Zito articles are finished and Hughes continues to struggle along with increased speculation as to why he is struggling, I can’t resist.
My investigative approach is to first search the Internet for any and all pertinent information. As expected, there were/are a number of opinions regarding what is happening to Hughes and specifically, his mechanics. Much of what I found is (in my opinion) “mystery meat pitching mechanics”. For example:
Well, here is my theory: Too much is being made of other supposed issues in his mechanics prior to his follow through. I hope I was able to ease some Yankee fans fears that there really is no other changes up to this point in his delivery.
The Phil Hughes delivery of 2006 shows him firming up his front leg, and driving over the top of it. The Phil Hughes delivery of 2008 shows him not quite getting that same drive over a stiff front leg. There is now some more bend in it as he plants and his weight is actually being somewhat resisted by the front leg. This forces his weight and his rear leg to come around his front leg and not so much over it. With his back leg having less work to do, it puts more pressure on his right shoulder to drive the ball downward. See the connection between this and “cutting himself off”?
..the reason for the less aggressive looking follow through with his leg that I pointed out above. The problem is not arm speed, nor is it arm angle or the way his hands are breaking, at least from what I can tell. Through 75% of his delivery, essentially nothing has changed. The leg lift and follow through certainly appear different, though.
Recommendation for Repair With his shoulder pulling downwards towards his left side, it is essentially creating the same situation as pulling off his pitches. And, pulling off, typically causes pitches to leak arm side (In Hughes’ case, in on righty hitters). From watching most of Hughes’ starts, pitches leaking back towards the middle has gotten him in some trouble quite frequently. So, what to do? I’d say the first step would be taking some pressure off of that right shoulder. And, to do that, Hughes would need to once again be aggressive with his legs and get that high rear leg lift. This will certainly make his bend at the waist much more smooth, rather than being pulled down by his shoulder. In my opinion, he simply needs to get his weight transfer flowing smoothly right over and through his front side rather than his weight transfering into that front leg but not over it.
For brevity, I've tried to capture the essence of each person's analysis and recommendations and for completeness and fairness, I urge you to read the full articles.
What I found difficult to understand in the above is how this person correlates and I quote: “With his back leg having less work to do, it puts more pressure on his right shoulder to drive the ball downward.”
It appears that this person views the delivery as being somewhat of a “teeter totter” yet biomechanically, I'm not exactly sure how the front shoulder drives downward on its own. This is similar to what many hitting instructors believe to be true...that the hands somehow are responsible for moving the bat.
In the case of the hands and bat, the hands can only do one thing, hold onto (grasp) the bat.
The only thing that can drive the shoulder down are the actions of the torso, most typically bending at the waist. I also don't understand how this person associates this to loss of velocity. It would seem (to me) that pulling down harder on the front shoulder would result in the opposite, i.e. increased velocity.
Another opinion regarding Hughes’ difficulties: Hughes’ mechanics are the weakest during pitching stages three and four, the time in which he takes the ball out of glove to when the ball leaves his hand. Two issues: First, he’s not getting full arm extension after taking the ball out of his glove – and this creates an inconsistent release point and, therefore, an inconsistent pitcher. Second, he’s leading with his head instead of staying back and throwing “around” his head – something that young, aggressive hitters can be guilty of. The effects of these issues: Reduced velocity on his fastball, because he isn’t able to fully leverage his lower half. His changeup is ending up off the plate to Hughes’ arm-side of home plate. His curve (normally a 70/75 grade pitch on a 20-80 scale) is being left up in the zone.
Because of his mechanics, Hughes’ arm slot is lower than ideal and, thus, his slider is the only breaking pitch that he can command effectively. It’s the same reason you don’t see three quarter or side arm pitchers with good curveballs. It’s also why if you’re looking at Hughes behind home plate his curve ball is breaking at a 10 to 4 angle as opposed to its typical 12 to 6. http://www.dugoutcentral.com/blog/?p=1215.
I fail to see the connection between full extension and consistent release point. Any well rehearsed/practiced movement pattern eventually becomes automatic (Fitts-Posner how movements are acquired).
Release point is one of the biggest fallacies in baseball instruction in that release point is the result of all body movements/actions (i.e. the effect of the whole body system). And yes, it is possible for one particular aspect of the mechanical sequence to upset the release point.
As far as I can tell, Hughes' arm action has not changed since the day he was drafted. Therefore, I doubt his arm action (not extending) is responsible for his “release point problems”. “Reduced velocity on his fastball, because he isn’t able to fully leverage his lower half”.
What the heck does this mean? These all-encompassing statements have no value.
The following observations were made by Carlos Gomez a year ago and not specifically regarding Hughes's current problems but rather general observations of his throwing mechanics.
In terms of how his body moves, I would certainly like him to be more like he was in '06. Better momentum, better center of gravity, better rhythm, later hand break. I would hate to see him slow down in order to get "balanced" or to focus too much on "staying back." I don't think he will keep his velocity throughout his career if he keeps doing what he's doing now. I wouldn't be surprised to find that his four-seam fastball's average velocity is declining slightly already due to those changes.
I'm torn in regards to his arm slot because it seems like he's had better success with the higher slot. I don't have a scientific, physics-based reason for this (Magnus Force maybe?), but in my experience, it seems like pitchers that put better 6-12 backspin on the ball seem to get better carry on the ball. If he's looking for more swings and misses with the bat missing under the ball, then the higher arm slot would seem to be a better fit (if he can keep his velocity). Plus, like Hughes himself says, he gets more of a 12-6 break on his curve.
Although I'm not a big proponent of changing arm slots on pitchers, I do see the value of limiting head movement. I have not seen video of Hughes before '06, so I would imagine that his natural arm slot is closer to what it was in '06. With that and his recent performance considered, I still prefer previous arm slot as well. By not moving his head out of the way to create a higher slot, Hughes is able to keep his center or mass closer to his midsection so he can rotate around a more fixed axis. As he loses velocity, it will also be easier for him to morph into a two-seam/slider guy with a lower slot (which is still pretty high by the way). Then we'll finally get to see that killer slider everyone talks about.
And yet, even with his four-seam fastball, and such an over the top delivery, how did he get a reputation for being a groundball pitcher? Is it mostly his curveball that causes all those ground outs? His fastball in '07 is more conducive with flyouts/strikeouts... I can see the ground balls with his '06 mechanics, and I'm willing to bet that he's been getting more fly balls after the arm slot change.
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/if-it-aint-brokea-video-review-of-phil-hughes-mechanical-changes/
The one exception I'll take to the above has to do with his reference to the relation of arm slot and head not moving out of the way: “By not moving his head out of the way to create a higher slot, Hughes is able to keep his center or mass closer to his midsection so he can rotate around a more fixed axis.”
You can not do this, or should I say, you can do this, but it will lead to less than optimal throwing efficency. I was first introduced to this relationship of arm slot and posture by a doctoral dissertation of AE Atwater published in 1970, and I quote from another publication by Atwater entitled Biomechanics of Overarm Throwing Published in 1980; "Notice that the spatial orientation of the arm at release and all skills (whether near the vertical or the horizontal) are determined primarily by lateral trunk flexion toward or away from the throwing arm rather than by shoulder joint action."
Simply stated, you can't get one without the other, the higher the arm slot the more the head has to move out of the way as defined by moving to the first-base side for a right-hander into the third-base side for a left-hander of what might be considered the centerline path of the center of body mass toward home plate. And from the motor learning world (how the body acquires and develops movement skills), asking (or thinking) that Hughes should make a slot change is the very last thing (desperation move). As in “don't ever draft the player thinking that you're going to change their mechanics”. In part two of this article I will give my opinion as to what has happened (if anything?) to Hughes mechanics... SPAM luncheon meat is a canned precooked meat product made by the Hormel Foods Corporation. The labelled ingredients in the Classic variety of Spam are: chopped pork shoulder meat with ham meat added, salt, water, sugar, and sodium nitrite to help "keep its color". The product has become part of many jokes and urban legends about mysterymeat, which has made it part of pop culture and folklore.(Wikipedia 2008).
Paul Nyman is an analyst and mechanics expert for Baseball Digest Daily. Paul also runs Setpro, a widely recognized baseball training company that focuses on helping players maximize their abilities.
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