pitchers. Up until this year, she (or Thomas) have pretty much tried to find the next great speed thrower. If you look at our pitchers, they do not move the ball that much (Tyler senior year exception - also note her All ACC year) but rather rely on fastballs and maybe one other good pitch (see riseball or change). That will definitely change with Keely - she can move the ball around. Keep in mind both pitchers are from a 3A high school - big step to division 1 so they may struggle early although both are very good to great travel pitchers.

The game has changed a lot since TInch played. Back then, you could throw heat and overpower a team. That is really hard to do now as the batters are exponentially better than almost 10 years ago. Unless you can hit 68 to 70, the batters will now just sit on a pitch and put it out.

That's why most of the bigger programs have gone to multiple pitchers who can throw many pitches. I attended a SEC coaches camp a few years ago. Auburn was a real different breed in using 5 pitchers and they all understood they could be pulled at any time. The goal was to keep the batters guessing as each pitcher threw different junk.

Tinch has seemed to favor speed and then thought she could teach movement. My experience on the showcase level as a pitching coach (and with a daughter who pitches) has been that girls who throw hard and rely on one or two pitches, don't make the change quickly to throwing junk while a junk pitcher who can control the strike zone is much harder to hit even though she may only throw 60 to 63 mph. Again, I would put Keely in that bucket - her spin is great and her ball jumps. I have heard she recently changed pitching coaches to gain speed. Don't know if that is true but hopefully she can get one or two mph and still keep her movement.

If Tyler is an indication, Tinch seems to be changing to the new way of pitching and that is a good thing even though we are behind the curve. If we continue to recruit pitchers like the two we just got, and Tinch starts relying more on drop balls, drop curves etc. where you are not only changing speeds but changing planes, I think she will be a much better coach and we will be lucky to keep her.

These are just my observations. I am not a college coach nor will ever be. I admire Tinch a lot as she is the one coach who is in the spotlight all the time as pitching still can control the game. The pressure she is under to produce is very high and it must be very frustrating for her at times. I think as she gets more experience at the coaching level, she is going to be great and, if she chooses, will probably take the next step to assistant or head coach at another university. She definitely knows the game and the strategy and she is showing she can change with the times.