Dick Mills answer to Me!

General Pitching Topics
#1

If you want to throw fast you must move fast…thus increase your momentum into a stride that it at least your height if not more.

And improve your overall mechanics. There is no other way to improve velocity.

Dick Mills

(this is my question)
dullavin12@yahoo.com wrote:
Hi, I have a quick question to ask if you don’t mind. A little about me. I am 18 6’2" about 230 LBs Pretty big lean kid. I am a pitcher of course and will be attending a D1 college in a few months. So I am prepping to become the best I can be. As of now my fastball has been everywhere. I could hit 90 if i throw my hardest but constant in the 85-87 mph zone. One thing i would like to ask is when pitching how loose should the arm really be? When I throw loose my velocity usually is at 83 84 but when I stiffen my arm I throw about 88 89. I have never iced my arm in my life nor do i ever if not rarely have pain. What would you suggest I do to increase my velocity? I know and have read about longer strides and getting all the momentum sideways towards the plate

#2

he’s right Speed of movement into a long stride is very important. Also since you are big if you can go fast also then you can really throw hard since:

For an object moving in a line, the momentum is the mass of the object multiplied by its velocity (linear momentum); thus, a slowly moving, very massive body and a rapidly moving, light body can have the same momentum.

Saying this you would be getting the speed from to parts your mass and how fast you will be able to move it. So raw talent focus on getting the mass of your body to move off the rubber fast when lifting the leg up this will help increase stride then mive more momentum. You seem to stay balanced which you don’t want to do. Look at randy johnson and mariano river.

#3

I don’t completely agree with this. I mean yeah it might work out but I have seen guys with overall slow mechanics throwing pretty hard. basically they use their mechanics…leg power…arm strength all together and the pull from legs up makes the arm speed. I dont think you have to move faster to achieve this. just have a strong body and and use your entire body as a sling shit. Make it so that your body creates…like…tension…like when you pull back a sling shit the sling gets tighter and tigher and then when you let go bam…explosive power

#4

To get alot of energy you need a long stride, So when saying that the people that that don’t get it going and use more rotational power will have a shorter stride and throw with more arm. When you use momentum into a long stride you get more energy to put in the ball. And you have to go fast because if you don’t then you will end up throwing with the arm.

People that are big tend to have short strides and muscle up on the ball when they should focus on momentum and moving the body fast so the body can throw the ball not the arm look at nolan ryan and tim lincecum along with roy oswalt.

The reason for the injury’s is because we throw with to much arm most of the time and have short strides and don’t use momentum and speed to get the arm to speed up.

#5

That was his entire response?

#6

Yessir

#7

WOW :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock:

#8

I don’t think Mills is going to give away info for free.

#9

mills keeps everything simple and also he has seen good things from keeping it easy. Like some of the kids he coaches it’s easy for them to improve velocity because it’s easy steps and easy to learn.

#10

[quote]If you want to throw fast you must move fast…thus increase your momentum into a stride that it at least your height if not more.

And improve your overall mechanics. There is no other way to improve velocity. [/quote]

hey, i never knew it was that simple. i’ll just forget my whole training program, tweak my mechanics a little, and spend the rest of the summer getting stoned!

dick mills has pretty much been discredited as a legit pitching authority. hardly any other coaches agree with him anyway. basically, in more words, his whole thesis is that you’re either born with it or you’re not.

i called dick mills about a year ago to ask about some of the stuff in his books. i casually asked him what he thought about weighted balls and he actually told me “the fact that you asked that question just proves how ignorant you are.”

dick mills kind of like RIstar: he’s got his own theory and no amount of quantitative evidence that proves the contrary will ever change his mind.

#11

You don’t know dick mills that good. I’ve talked to him alot and he keep’s everything simple and can prove everything to you. You just have to challenge him on the subject and he does have evidence done by a hired outside sports medicine doctor that proves everything he say’s so to say that he doesn’t know what he is doing is ignorent.

Dick Is well known and back up what he say’s and has allway’s been able to do it. Dick hasn’t been called dumb by rick peterson or anyof them If they didn’t think he was smart they wouldn’t talk to him as much as they do.

So adapt your thinking of mills and think outside the box. Alot of the things he say’s about momentum are true. And the workout part is true to because he has talked to people like MIKE CLARK Vice President of national sports medicine and has once LA Angles tranior. So to talk the way you do about him is not smart when he backs everything he say’s up with evidence.

Come to the chat room. at the top of the page in yellow.

#12

[quote=“Samo_292”]hey, i never knew it was that simple. i’ll just forget my whole training program, tweak my mechanics a little, and spend the rest of the summer getting stoned![/quote]How can you be so sure this is what will happen? You speak as if that’s all Mills recommends. “Tweak your mechanics a little”. That’s quite a statement and really reduces what he actually is doing to a “cute” little statement.

[quote=“Samo_292”]dick mills has pretty much been discredited as a legit pitching authority.[/quote]By whom? What backup do they have for that or is it just the enormous, competing egos (including Mills’, which is large) who don’t like his style (which I don’t either)?

[quote=“Samo_292”]…his whole thesis is that you’re either born with it or you’re not.[/quote] :shock: Excuse me! I’ve read his stuff more many years and I’ve not heard him say that. If he did, it was a long time ago and, as most will jump on him for, he has changed his thoughts several times over the years.

[quote=“Samo_292”]dick mills kind of like RIstar: he’s got his own theory and no amount of quantitative evidence that proves the contrary will ever change his mind.[/quote]OK, where’s all of this “quantitative evidence” that proves the contrary? What I see is Brent Rushall stating that all of that evidence on weighted balls has serious flaws in methodology that renders them invalid. I also see others who state that there are no flaws in the methods and therefore they actually are valid. Who’s right here? I, certainly, am not qualified to judge which camp is right. I just see 2 groups sniping at each other.

If we’re going to blast one of the gurus, let’s make sure it’s for what they’re really saying, not what we “think” they’re saying. Some of the things in your last post are in the “think” category.

Blast away but make sure it’s on reality.

#13

actually RIstar i know dick mills TOO well. my dad ordered his tapes and CONSTANTLY played them in the car during my early high school years. his books were also the first pitching books that i read.

believe me, i’m very well read on pitching theory. i gave dick mills a VERY fair chance and realized that there’s a lot better stuff out there.

and you can say that dick mills has evidence to prove his theories all you want, and yeah, i’m sure he does. but then you’ve got other coaches who have evidence that proves the contrary. so who do you believe?

and yeah- of course, mechanics are big and there are certainly benefits to better mechanics. but to say that fixing your mechanics is all you can do to improve velocity is ridiculous when there are SO many examples of the contrary.

read tom house’s fastball fitness, or tuff cuff. or check out woolforth or yaeger. they all disagree with house.

i’m thinking outside the box buddy. that’s why i’ve read all the books i can about this stuff and chose which ones i think are best. my mindset has changed a lot over the years. you never listen to anyone but the people who say exactly what you want to hear.

#14

Yes and I’m doing a workout that can improve velocity you could say but any person with not a stable base will gain then the rest of the training they will not be able to only through mechanics. SO focus on mechanics and workout but if you are stable U can’t get anymore velcoity after you are in baseball shape to pitch meaning you can stabilize the body through the delivery.

#15

Is it just that this forum have been talking about Mills all the time like this or is it that I stepped in here just in a wrong time?

Anyway, I’m on Nyman’s pitching (aka rotational ‘throwing’) program and I never measured my velocity after getting my new mechanics, but it should be an improvement from 74~78mph range (clocked it 2 months before I got the Nyman’s program(). Well, Nyman seem to be ripping Mills up a lot fo times, mainly because of Mills’ conccept of ‘body delivering the arm’ and lack of explanation of rotation after lanidng.

#16

[quote=“vertigo”]Is it just that this forum have been talking about Mills all the time like this or is it that I stepped in here just in a wrong time?
[/quote]

Heh. When I first got here, they used to argue about Marshall all the time. That’s why I moved over to the S&C forum and just hung out there.
:smiley:

#17

[quote=“kc86”]
Heh. When I first got here, they used to argue about Marshall all the time. That’s why I moved over to the S&C forum and just hung out there.
:D[/quote]

Haha yeah, I haven’t seen O’leary post in ages, he was a big guy on various Marshall concepts, although he didn’t believe it to be gospel.

#18

Mills and Marshall are favourite targets for 2 reasons, minimum.

#1 They are extremely arrogant and their statements about others are quite insulting

#2 They are recommending something other than the traditional line of mechanics or training ideas.

Are they right? Are they wrong? Who knows? Every single one of these “gurus” say the same thing about the others. “They don’t know how the body throws a ball.”

The tiring thing I find in this and other forums is not when someone criticizes Mills’ or Marshall’s or House’s teachings. It’s when they attribute something to them that isn’t true and use that to describe how lame the particular guru is. That’s happening a lot. Actually, most of the time. That’s what I find particularly troublesome on this board. Roger sees it all the time with House. He knows House and the NPA better than all of us and he sees what people use to try to discredit House. It’s not always true or even current. Same with Mills. This is what I will consistently address.

Like I said in an earlier post. Blast away, guys. Just make sure it’s accurate information.

#19

I find more often than not people blast House based on his old, outdated teachings. Way more people are familiar with his old ideas than his current ideas. I’d imagine it’s the same with the other experts. Where’s the value in bashing old ideas? You’re right, DM, it is tiring.