1. Flailing with the Fastball
Do you ever keep throwing your best fastball, but the hitter either hits it or keeps fouling it off? To remedy this, you can add a change up to your pitching repertoire. The change up is an excellent complement to the fastball because it looks like a fastball leaving the pitchers hand, but has more movement and travels to the plate at a slower rate to fool the batter that is sitting on the fastball.
2. Circle Change
One type of change up, and one of the most popular, is the circle change up. The circle change up gets its name from the position of the fingers when the pitcher grasps the baseball. When you grip the baseball, place the index finger and the thumb with the tips of each almost touching. This forms the circle in the circle change up. Be sure to grip the baseball on its seams to get proper finger traction on the pitch. The arm action is just the same as a fastball. A proper circle change up will look like a fastball, but have more sinking action on the pitch.
3. Three-Finger Change
If the circle change up does not work, or you just want to add another type of change up to your arsenal, you can learn to throw the three-finger change up. The three-finger is a lot like the circle change with the only major difference being the placement of the thumb and pinky finger. Instead of having the thumb almost touching the index, you want move the thumb and pinky finger underneath the baseball to throw the three-finger change up. If your hands are large enough, touch the pinky finger and thumb when you throw the three-finger change for better control on the pitch.
4. Mechanics of Change Up
No matter which type of change up you choose to throw, it's important to follow a few mechanical rules to throw the pitch correctly. First, a pitcher needs to keep the wrist straight and follow through on the pitch. If the pitcher does not rotate the shoulder and hips through the pitch, it will have a tendency to lose movement and stay flat. Moreover, every pitcher knows that a flat pitch with no movement is a very bad thing because a flat pitch is much easier for a hitter to locate and hit since it has no movement.
5. Magic Fingers
Apply pressure with your fingers on the change up to make it fall as the pitch nears the plate. The more pressure you apply with your fingers, the more pronounced the downward movement of the pitch will be. Because each person has different hand sizes and strength, you will have to experiment until you find just the right amount of pressure to make the pitch move correctly.
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