What is more affective at getting people out in High Arc softball pitching Back Spin or Forward Spin?

Answer 1

If you look at it as similar to english on a billiard ball, then backspin should result in more ground balls, while a forespin should tend towards more fly balls.

But in slow pitch, it's hard to get enough spin to get much movement on the ball. Back when I was younger, I was working on a bit of a curveball in slow pitch -- doesn't get much movement, but enough to fool some batters.

Answer 2

I don't feel those have any impact towards getting a hitter out at all. Regardless of the spin, the hitter still has to hit the ball on the same plane to get it out of the infield for a base hit.

I would focus on location, especially hitting the outside corner. A lot of hitters only know to pull the ball, which when they try and pull an outside pitch, many times they'll just pop it up.

Answer 3

WIth high arc pitching, spin isn't much of a factor since you have one commonly used method of release - underhanded. If you could put topspin on the ball you might make it drop a bit faster, but that's a tough trick to pull off to a reasonable effect with underhanded release.

Because the ball is already coming downwards, the up-down jetstream effect of spin is pretty much worthless.