A chance encounter has led to an incredibly positive experience for our middle-schooler. We met Dennis Kinney in 2013 and now drive 45 miles to take our son to pitching instruction with Dennis. It is worth every mile! Coach Dennis has a genuine interest in the long-term development and well-being of young athletes. His focus on the individual ability and potential of the player has done wonders for our son’s confidence and development.

My son has worked with Dennis many times. I was impressed on the first visit when Dennis took time to do an assessment of my son’s arm and shoulder health before he threw the first pitch. Knowing my son’s health, rather than top velocity or breaking balls, is a priority to Dennis made me more comfortable. At each session, Dennis focuses on correct body mechanics, but he also teaches the mental aspects of being a successful pitcher such as pitch selection, location, and mental cues. His positive attitude and knowledge of the game of baseball are what I want my son to experience from his coaches.

Coach Dennis is a great coach and instructor. He has been helping me work on power and speed, but in a way that keeps me safe from injury so I can keep playing. I am keeping my arm healthy and have better stretching habits thanks to Coach Dennis.

While watching my son’s first session with Coach Kinney, my husband called me and asked how the session was going. I said “I’m seeing things I’ve never seen before. This guy really knows what he’s doing! Why did we wait so long to get his advice?”

I’ve been involved with various levels of baseball for many years and Dennis Kinney is one of the finest pitching minds I have encountered. The thing that sets Dennis apart is the fact that he has played the game at the highest level – yet he is on the cutting-edge of the latest information on mechanics, strength training and pitching philosophy. He gets results and has a wonderful way of interacting with young people. Dennis doesn’t just teach pitching – he teaches kids to throw properly. His insightful, science-based approach is a breath of fresh air and I’d recommend him unconditionally.

After a significant growth plate injury, several months of rehab and a year later we sought out a pitching coach that could get our son back on the mound. At our first meeting, Coach Dennis recognized the flaws in Shane’s mechanics that contributed to his injury. Coach Dennis then began teaching him the importance of stretching, warm up exercises and the value of proper mechanics, balance, control, power, acceleration and finish. Coach Dennis is different than the rest of the pitching instructors we’ve experienced. Instead of sitting on a bucket and making observations, Coach Dennis utilizes many different drills to improve technique, skills and video to achieve results. He incorporates research based information to make the various movements within a pitching motion make sense and work together. Coach Dennis strives to help young pitchers achieve mechanical efficiency without injury. We will continue to work with Coach Dennis so that Shane is successful on his baseball journey injury free, and cannot thank him enough in helping Shane return to the pitching mound, not only with improved form and increased velocity, but with a better understanding of the art of pitching. Thank you very much Coach Dennis Kinney!

Over the past few years our son has had the good fortune to work with Dennis on his pitching technique. Dennis comes highly recommended and has greatly contributed to our son’s success. His guidance is making a difference for sure.  It’s obvious he must be listening and adopts what he has been telling him.  His mechanics are different and he is getting sneaky fast. He likes his style of teaching and would not think of missing a session. Dennis is unsurpassed in his ability to recognize potential and work in those areas that are most beneficial to the pitcher. A great pitching coach!

I appreciate the opportunity to have worked with Dennis Kinney on my pitching skills development. He brings his experience, knowledge of the game, and knowledge of pitching and arm care to everything he does.

We just found that he made the team!!!! Thought you would appreciate to know that he was one of the faster pitchers and pitched all strikes…..thanks to you!!

Dennis has a great approach to player development: personalized and dedicated. He has done his homework with the best programs around the country. I highly recommend him for anyone interested in reaching their fullest potential.

Coach Kinney always focused on long term success over short term speed. It was his approach to total arm health and proper mechanics that allowed my son to be successful on the mound after what could have been a career ending break.

When I started working with Coach Kinney, I threw a decent fastball and a pretty good changeup. After working with him over the summer, about once a week, he has transformed my pitching performance. He significantly increased the velocity and helped me locate my fastball, improved my changeup, and taught me a good, developing curveball. Coach Kinney improved my mechanics and helped me better understand the game of baseball.

After getting lessons from other pitching coaches in the area for a number of years my son wasn’t improving. We reached out to Coach Kinney. During his initial evaluation and instructional session, we saw a noticeable improvement. Coach identified some key flaws and weaknesses that the others failed discover. His teaching techniques work.

Coach Kinney is teaching my son to be his own best pitching coach. After working with Coach he now is aware of his strengths and weaknesses and knows what he needs to do to get better. Even his hitting is improving!

Coach Kinney has a gift… he doesn’t teach one motion to every player, he is able to find each player’s natural motion and natural release point and then he makes it better. He is also able to pinpoint a problem and then effectively communicate the solution in a way the player can understand and apply in order to improve. The player leaves every lesson feeling like he’s a better player than when he started!

I highly recommend Dennis Kinney.  Over the years, I’ve met a number of pitching coaches along the Grand Strand, each bringing their own philosophy to improving pitching performance.  Dennis’ approach, however, is why I have recommended and sent upcoming and in the zone, varsity players his way (besides the obvious, being a former MLB pitcher).  In a game today where the terms ‘power’ and ‘velo’ are all too often used (and arm injuries are ever more prevalent), it is encouraging to see and hear Dennis talk about longevity and teach the basics: conditioning, flexibility, mechanics, movement and, what I call, ‘pitcher IQ’.  Unlike some who only become good bullpen pitchers, Dennis’ pitchers are game ready, too.  And, that’s the true measurement.

Coach Kinney is as committed to the process of pitching as any coach in our region. He combines both his research and study of the sport as well as the knowledge of spending years as a professional pitcher. Most importantly, Coach Kinney is able to clearly communicate this knowledge to young players who are serious about learning the game of baseball.

Coach Kinney is a skilled coach with Major League experience. Myrtle Beach is fortunate to have someone with his expertise willing to help our young athletes to excel on the mound.

The previous pitching coach we were seeing was basically sitting on his bucket and playing catch. No learning was taking place. Coach Kinney is actually instructing and explaining the “how’s and why’s”! What a refreshing difference!

Thanks again for working with Walter last spring. Mike and I both believe that the training you gave him was instrumental in the vast improvements he made over the summer that led to his signing with Michigan State University.

Coach Kinney has a way to take complex concepts and break those down so that my 10 year old son has a clear understanding and can incorporate those into his pitching; a big improvement from other pitching coaches.

Our son, Praise, is a 15 year old pitcher/infielder who has had the good fortune of working with some very good instructors over the past 5 years. He has now reached the level where someone with MLB experience and the ability to communicate and demonstrate advanced researched –based information to rising prospects come into play. Dennis has fulfilled that need and is exceeding our expectations by a wide margin! Praise is now throwing faster, with better control AND without discomfort! That’s important! While no one knows the future, with Dennis passing on his knowledge to Praise we know he’s in good hands. It’s exciting for us to watch as his future unfolds. We encourage any family that is looking for that “extra” teaching advantage to contact Dennis, let him do an evaluation and then construct a personalized program that will help position your son at the top.

My son was chosen as a pitcher to play in this year’s All Star Game. So what you may say, but let me tell where he started in baseball.

This was his second spring of baseball and at 13 was moving into a 13-15 year old league. He had spent years playing soccer but found that he loved baseball, especially pitching. Unfortunately toward the end of the first spring he injured his arm. He was diagnosed with “Little Leaguers Elbow”. He spent 4 months in rehab and when he finished he still felt pressure in his elbow when he threw.

Enter Dennis Kinney. We found Dennis through a local baseball academy. What initially drew us to him was that he was an ex-major leaguer, a college pitching coach, and left handed, the same as my son.

Coach Kinney introduced himself and watched my son throw. In the first twenty minutes of the first lesson he changed my son’s mechanics and he has thrown without discomfort ever since. Each lesson the coach had with him built on the previous one. He had an easy manner that my son responded to and when a lesson was over he would ask “when do we see Coach Kinney again.” After his series of lessons my son threw the most innings for our team, had the most strikeouts, the most pickoffs, and fielded his position well. When we told Coach Kinney that my son was chosen for the All Star Team and thanked him for his help his reply was “I didn’t do anything, Andrew did all the work.” Yes he is right my son spent a lot of time on the practice field but without Coach Kinney’s guidance I believe my son could never have come so far, so quickly. I cannot thank him enough.

As a parent, I decided to reach out to a professional pitching coach to protect my sons arm. Carter started going to Coach Dennis when he was 8 years old and continues to at age 10. With Coach Dennis’ assistance, Carter has developed the proper arm mechanics and form. With Coach’s help, Carter has become a 10 year old who is throwing strikes and helping his team win ball games. It’s a wonderful environment to learn and love the game of baseball.

As he got closer to playing high school ball, my son approached me regarding his desire to try to play college ball in the future.  Realizing that he was ready to make a serious commitment, I reached out to a close friend I consider a good baseball man and he referred us to Dennis Kinney.  At our initial meeting with Dennis, I knew that we found the right coach.  Dennis connected really well with my son and it became clear that he has a unique ability to convey advanced concepts to young players on their current level.  Not something that’s always easy for parents to do!   Dennis stays on top of current throwing and pitching training that modern research and studies have revealed to us; but he also mixes in a nice balance of “old school” finer points that are hard to come by and clearly beneficial.  Another aspect of working with Dennis that I appreciate is his focus on my son’s “mechanical” health both now, while still physically growing/developing, and down the road potentially beyond high school.  In a short time my son was able to be quicker to the plate without sacrificing velocity or control and with a more streamlined delivery.  Pretty impressive given the limited time he’s worked with Dennis! It’s also obvious that Dennis cares a good deal about the kids he coaches.  He’s a very good pitching coach and an equally good person.

We can’t say enough positive things about Dennis Kinney.  Our 11 year old son, Rylee, has worked with him for a couple years now and has shown tremendous improvement.  Coach Kinney has not only taught him proper throwing mechanics but he has also raised Rylee’s confidence level.  Coach Kinney is someone our son looks up to as a mentor and he has given Rylee the tools needed to become a more effective pitcher.  The knowledge that Coach Kinney has of the game makes him a tremendous asset to this area’s young players.