Ron Wolforth's Baseball Ranch

In some ways, Texas Baseball Ranch is "Retro," a return to the concepts of the 1940’s and 1950’s, a return to the up tempo, dynamic, athletic, free, nonchoreographed, and individually unique movements of Hall of Fame pitchers such as Bob Feller, Sandy Koufax, Whitey Ford, Dizzy Dean, and Fergie Jenkins.

In other ways, Texas Baseball Ranch is "Cutting Edge," a brand-new comprehensive approach to training never before utilized anywhere in the world. We have combined the insights of experts such as Paul Nyman, Jim Dixon, Alan Jaeger, Vern Gambetta, Perry Husband, Matt Feury, Mark Verstegan, and Phil Donley to produce a unique, one-of-a-kind system, which makes Texas Baseball Ranch the most progressive and forward thinking baseball training facility in the world today.

What Sets Texas Baseball Ranch apart?

What do Ptolemy and Copernicus have to do with baseball and the Texas Baseball Ranch?

Since 1880, Baseball has been a mixture of art and science, mostly art.  Baseball is steeped in tradition and ritual.  Most coaches naturally re-teach and regurgitate what they were taught.  Some of those traditions, rituals, myths, and sacred cows are very good and make Baseball special.  Some, however, have inhibited Baseball’s natural evolution. The late 1970’s to 2000 were particularly harmful to the development of arms and baseball pitching athletes.

For example, before 1971, the "Disabled List," as we know it today, didn't even exist. Complete games were common place. Injuries, as well as access to orthopedic surgeons and physical therapists, were rare.

Pitch counts were not recorded prior to 1971. Prior to 1975, pitchers were not cloned nor their movements choreographed. They were not forced to comply with some theoretical model or "ideal." Their deliveries were not "cookie cut" nor their bodies "posed" into certain specific positions. After 1975, cloning and choreographing the pitching delivery became more and more prevalent.  Today, it is standard operating procedure.

Instead, prior to 1975, pitching athletes threw with freedom and energy and learned by trial and error. Thousands of trials…hundreds of errors. Lots of natural learning.

Prior to 1971, pitchers REGULARLY threw long toss without limits on time or distance. They simply listened to their arm for guidance, not pseudo scientists, self-proclaimed experts, or people simply trying to sound like the smartest guy in the room/dugout.

They were not limited by the typical 5 minutes at 90 feet, 5 minutes at 120 feet, and 5 minutes at 150 feet. They were not told to only throw as far as they could do so "perfectly." Again, they threw with freedom and individuality; they routinely pushed the envelope, and they simply listened to their arm for direction.

Prior to 1975, pitchers played "burn out," threw batting practice between starts, and simply threw the baseball a lot more than they ever pitched a baseball in game time competition. Consequently, their arms were more durable.

Flash Forward to 2006-

Coach Wolforth and Coach Strom believe the current trend is so bad because, around 1970, we got off track and got stuck on the wrong paradigm. We became focused on forcing our pitchers to follow our particular version of "the ‘ideal’ mechanical model," when logic and history would tell us one has never existed. That incorrect paradigm served to make our athletes far MORE mechanical and far LESS free, natural, and athletic.
 
In 1999, Coach Wolforth wrote the first of four Books on pitching, Improving Your Pitching Mechanics I.Q.; 16 Positional Relationships That Affect Performance.  Obviously, at that time, Coach Wolforth was also caught up with body part positioning in space and time.  He was also primarily regurgitating what he had been taught.

In 2003, that changed.  Coach Wolforth invited Paul Nyman of SetPro to speak at the Ultimate Pitching Coaches Boot Camp in Houston. Because of Mr. Nyman’s concepts that challenged the status quo, Coach Wolforth and Coach Strom changed their teaching emphasis and changed their course forever. They have never looked back and the rest, as they say, is history.

• In 2004, Coach Wolforth designed the current #1 pitching system in the country,  The Athletic Pitcher Program™.
• In 2006, Coach has upgraded, enhanced, and improved that system and the new program is now referred to as The Combat Pitcher Program™.
• The Texas Baseball Ranch will use that new methodology at ALL THREE campuses: Pitching Central, Hitting Central, and Web-gem Central.  The results of utilizing this new methodology, based upon a new paradigm for pitchers, have been dramatic. In the past five years, Coach Wolforth has had 27 of his athletes drafted and 48 athletes play past High School. The average pitcher has gained 7.4 mph in six months in the program.  Many have exceeded over 12 mph over the course of a year.

  Coach Wolforth has become possibly the most recognizable face and leader of a national trend of progressive thinkers who have challenged the old standard conventional thinking AND ALSO REALIZING AMAZING RESULTS.
  

Several Division I college coaches have recently referred to Coach Wolforth as the Father of Objective Baseball Training for Pitchers, or in other words, the leader of the movement that has, as its goal, to “Systematically Objectify Baseball Training.” In essence, its goal is to minimize the power and scope of subjective analysis and personal preference and actually qualify and quantify performance, practice, and preparation to cut through all the opinions and get to what’s really important.

The Texas Baseball Ranch is, in one way, a return to the ideas of the 1940’s and 1950’s and, in another way, a brand-new evolution of thought and innovation never before seen to baseball.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:

RON WOLFORTH'S BASEBALL RANCH INC
5451 Honea Egypt Road
Montgomery TX 77316-2365
(936) 588-6762