I've never met Ann Hawkins but I've heard she's very professional. As far as pitching, having been pitched to at least 500 times, I find it exhausting for the agent and a perfect waste of time for for a writer who is trying to impress an agent with his or her writing. As was said above, you have no way to judge a person's ability to write. It is, however, a great tool to judge a writer's ability to market, as was also mentioned. Most agents don't like pitch sessions--but editors and producers do, so that, in itself should say something. One thing I do disagree with is the statement that marketing is the publisher's responsibility. Yes, if the writer is high enough on the publisher's list, then using a publicist to assist the author might help, however, book signings, newspaper ads, reviews, etc, marketing tool that most publishers have used for years, have been proven ineffective for most writers. So what works? Personality, the ability to pitch the product (books are products), intelligence and, yes even physical beauty are all assets that help when marketing a product. Thus the pitch. Writing, I'm afraid, has become secondary to the process and to make my point, I give you the hundreds of badly written books that have made best-seller's lists in recent years.