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BY JON TUXWORTH SOFTBALL
06 Dec, 2010 01:00 AM
ACT’s Adam Folkard was at ease atop the pitching mound yesterday. It’s where he feels most at home.
But this week he admits he will do it tough when forced to watch his Australian teammates from the bleachers.
Folkard’s team WA Mariners lost 3-0 to Canberra outfit Upstarts in the final of the Fastpitch Men’s Skins tournament at Hawker yesterday.
He will be a mere spectator at the same venue this week, when a Test series against New Zealand and Argentina begins on Wednesday.
Renowned as the world’s best pitcher, Folkard has been banned from the international scene after the International Softball Federation recently outlawed his ”crowhop” pitching style.
Folkard certainly has an ally in fellow Australian pitcher Andrew Kirkpatrick, who pitched for the Upstarts this week. Canberra product Kirkpatrick described the ISF’s ruling as ”quite shit”.
”I’ve been playing in New Zealand and Japan the last two weekends, and they’ve been calling a few guys over there as well,” Kirkpatrick said.
I have played fastpitch for the past 41 years , they [ASA/ISF] have changed the pitching rules so many times I have lost count, then they wonder why fastpitch is strugling,I”m glad I never pitched!
I’m way done with my fastpitch career (age = mid 60s) but I recall that there has been a cry against the “crow hop” since the early 70s. The only way to reel in this problem is to go back to the days when both feet had to be on the rubber when a pitcher “toes up”. I pitched my last 10 years in the sport and that was about the time the federations let a pitcher back step with one foot before the forward hop and release. I loved this but it opened a whole pandora’s box for little tweeks that a pitcher could do when delivering a pitch. It also became a lot harder for the umpires to inforce the pitching rules. It is quite a show to see a world class pitcher throwing a pitch today but just maybe the women have it right in the way they have held to the “old” fundamentals of the pitching rules.
Another pitching rule to confuse everybody!! This does not have a positive to it whats so ever.
Make it easy. Start with your lead foot on the rubber. The stride foot can be any where behind the lead foot.
Mark a chalk line 3 meters in front of the rubber and the pitcher can do anything in between those points.
If the foot makes contact with the 3m mark an illegal pitch is called!! ( popping crease )
Simple for everybody. No grey areas – interpretations or debates.
Let our GAME grow not DIE.
This would promote more people to be pitchers and create different styles and enjoyment for all.
Steve Jackson