Middle School Pitching Distance...

35' would be nice, not to mention for the hitters.

 

Lots of 8th grade pitchers could pitch just fine from 43. For them its not a big deal either way. For 7th graders its a different thing. Girls naturally get a lot stronger with better control in the year from the 7th to the 8th grade. 7th graders don't need to pitch from 43. Even some of the very well known and very dominate high school pitchers of recent years would not have gained any benefit from pitching from 43 when they were seventh graders.

 

Pitching from 43 is no benefit for any pitcher, unless you mean getting experience.

 

I like what Foothills heat said about girls throwing more junk at a younger age when it was moved to 43 in 14u. I agree its not good for developing arms.
I can't understand the comment that one guy has never seen a 12 or 14u pitcher dominate another team with their arm from 40 before. I've seen it a lot. Especially in school ball its commonplace, when you take a strong 14u who plays 14 or 16u on the weekend, put them up against middle school level hitting from 40 feet, they can dominate. Our conference was exciting this year with several good young pitchers, who were around 50 mph, and dominating weaker hitters. You play school ball with the girls in your district, not recruits. The fun is in trying to get each to be productive at the plate, whether bunting, slapping, or doing whatever you can to move the runners. The "not so fun" stuff is dealing with the dads who believe they could have taken the two weeks before the middle school season started in August, and had all of them drilling line-drives in gaps and laying down perfect sacrifices. If you have an entire travel team at your school, then you will come a lot closer to this, but most schools only have a few girls dedicated enough, or financially stable enough to play year round.

 

My concern is for the transition. In this area the 12U rec teams are pitching from 35'. This makes it tough on the 7th graders in that they are going from 35 to 43. Way to much change in one step. If the 12u organization is 40 then the 43 would be more understandable. I was lucky last year in that I had a couple of 8th graders that could handle it. We play in the spring so we will have to see what this year brings. I do like that more girls are putting the ball in play. I don't want it to be a pitcher dominated game in the sense that she strikes out 2 batters every inning. The more the ball is put in play the more emphasis put on defense. Too many middle school coaches in this area try to just "ride" a pitcher instead of coaching the entire game. Folks in my area don't understand that a pitcher does not have to strike out a lot of batters to be dominate, at least not if she has a decent defense behind her.