Pitching - The basics
If you love to compete, then pitching may be for you. While you love to compete you must also be the type of person that can easily put aside failure and concentrate on the task at hand. It's rare for a pitcher to have many 1-2-3 innings. You're going to give up hits, walks, and deal with fielders making errors. If you can't get over these plays and focus completely on the next pitch, you're going to struggle and not reach your baseball pitching potential.
Pitching, just like hitting, will bring advice from almost everyone, especially if you're struggling. Handling the "advice" will often take as much mental toughness as pitching in a game. Most pitching problems are caused by poor mechanics. The mechanics of the baseball pitching motion can be difficult for a coach to dissect at full speed. Often advice will be given relating to one particular aspect of the motion. Much like a golf swing, if the fundamental mechanics of the pitching motion are flawed, changing one aspect of the motion will not fix the problem. As a pitcher it's your job to realize when your motion doesn't feel right. Lack of control can certainly be one of the most important signs that something is wrong. Pitching isn't something that you can do once in awhile and be successful. It's something you have to practice and continue to work at. Being able to work on your pitching motion while throwing less than full speed will be an important ingredient in determining your progress in developing sound pitching mechanics.
While the physical part of pitching is important, the mental part of pitching is of equal importance. Simply put, you must be mentally tough to be a good pitcher. This is something that you will develop over time and you must be able to analyze your performance each time out to improve in this area. Your ability to respond to adversity and focus on the hitter will often define how you perform in a game. If you get upset and lose focus once you give up a hit or an error is made behind you, then big innings by the opposing team will probably follow. The successful pitcher is the one who realizes that he must continue to focus on each hitter regardless of what has happened up to that point. He will learn from each at bat, but not dwell on the result.