Basic Hitting Instructions THE STANCE One of the keys to productive hitting is a good base. Most coaches neglect the feet and legs and focus on the upper body. Proper hitting uses the entire body, starting with the feet, moving to the hips, torso, head, arms and hands. Most kids emulate hitters they see on TV, which isn’t always a good thing. There are hitters that swing their arms, have an open stance, or take a long front leg stride. Personal hitting tendencies can be developed as the child gets older. These are basic hitting instructions to give the hitter the opportunity to create the best swing possible. When the hitter approaches the plate, he/she should stand 10” to 12” away from it. Typically, a hitter should stand with his/her feet spread as far as their bat is long, maybe a few inches shorter. So, if they use a 29” bat, they should have their feet spread anywhere from 24” to 27”. THE GRIP The hands should have the “knocking” knuckles aligned, as shown in the picture below. 2 HAND PLACEMENT & BAT ANGLE Hands should be aligned so that the top hand on the bat sits approximately 6 inches from same rear shoulder. Rear elbow should be down at a natural 45-degree angle**. The front elbow should also be down, pretty much even with the back elbow. The bat should sit at a 45-degree angle also, with the knob of the bat pointing at the opposite batter's box. Starting here eliminates unnecessary movement needed to get here during the swing. ** NOTE: ELBOWS SHOULD NOT BE UP!!! When the rear elbow starts up, it must come down in order to hit the ball, creating an uppercut. The swing then tends to get underneath the ball, creating a pop-up or complete miss. When a hitter has an uppercut, the bat is not in the strike zone for very long. Notice hand placement, elbows & bat angle. THE LOAD As the pitcher is getting ready to deliver the pitch, the hitter now has to start the “load”. The load shifts the weight from 50/50 back/front leg (left image below) to 60/40 back/front leg (right image below). The load happens when the hitter slightly leans back with the entire body, hands included. This prepares the batter to hit the ball in time. Do not move the head up or down during the load, the eyes stay focused on the ball. 3 After the load, the front leg takes a short stride or “trigger” step. This is a short forward movement with the front foot, usually about 3 to 6 inches. DO NOT OVERSTRIDE! The foot should glide toward the pitcher, preparing the rest of the body to follow. After the trigger step, the back leg will pivot on the ball of the foot toward the plate. Tell the kids to pretend that they are “squishing a bug” under the ball of their pivot foot. This pivot motion prepares the hips to drive through the ball. The back hip rotates toward the ball so that eventually the rear knee, the waist and the belly button are ALL facing the pitcher. Lead with the knob of the bat, pointing toward the ball, with the barrel up higher than the hands (bat angle), keeping the hands inside of the ball. Avoid early arm extension (sweeping or casting). Keep the head DOWN. Hitter's chin rests on front shoulder, while looking at the pitcher, prior to initiating swing. Head stays there during the swing, down on the ball, with shoulders rotating around head, until chin ultimately ends up on rear shoulder at completion of swing. The final part of the swing concerns the followthrough. Drive the barrel THROUGH the ball with both hands on the bat, extending arms AFTER point of impact. At this point, the belly button should be directly facing the pitcher. 4 HITTING DRILLS ALWAYS USE A TEE DRILL DURING EVERY PRACTICE! THE TEE IS A GREAT WAY TO TEACH HITTING. WE HAVE TO TEACH THAT THE TEE IS “GOOD”. That way when they use it in a game it is not looked at as a negative. Every professional baseball players use a hitting tee for their training. Many times during games coaches think that throwing 10-15 or even more pitches to a child that is struggling is doing them a favor when in fact it is only frustrating them. Get that tee out and let them smack it out into the field and experience some success. Tee Drill – when hitting off of a tee ALWAYS place the tee forward of the players front leg so they get the feeling of hitting the ball out in front of the plate, not when the is over the plate. Check for hand placement, elbows relaxed and grip before the swing. Make sure that they are in a good stance with knees slightly bent before putting the ball on the tee. Keep an eye on how many swings they will take. Rookies should only take about 10-12 swings at a time so they don’t get tired and lose their form. Notice tee placement it’s in front of the plate. Flips – Toss baseballs out in front of your hitters so they can get the feel of a moving ball. You should be out in front of the hitter at an angle where you can toss a ball into the strike zone easily. Make sure the ball does not have a huge arc on it and keep the ball away from their hands (jamming the hitter). The ball should be hit out in front of home plate, not on or behind. Again 10-12 reps and rotate players. Notice angle of the coach and ball placement. 5 Soft toss – Toss pitches to the kids from one knee. Rookies need to see the ball coming from the correct angle for their size. You should always throw from a knee, whether in practice or in a game. Otherwise the pitch comes down at a severe angle almost like a breaking ball making it very difficult to hit. FIELDING In rookie level baseball a major problem with players in the field is that they are not ready for the ball that is hit to them. Standing upright, crossing their arms and/or legs, looking away and daydreaming are often evident in young players. This results not only in misplays but can lead to injury for unsuspecting kids. Make sure you keep your players “awake” at all times. Stance: A good defensive stance is one where the player's feet are slightly wider than their shoulders. The player should always take a step forward as the pitch is being delivered. As they step forward, they should bend at the waist and lower their glove toward the ground, palm open. Once the ball is hit to them, the fielder needs to shuffle, not cross their feet to get in front of the ball. After that, they have to get their rear-end down low and their glove out in front of them, not under them. Field the ball out in front of their body so they can adjust their glove if the ball takes a bad hop or a bobble occurs. Make sure their glove is on the ground! Drill: For rookie players a smaller glove should be used in order for him/her to control it as if it were an extension of his/her hand. Begin by rolling ground balls to the child. Have the child field the grounders (with a soft ball) without a glove and use the "alligator" technique. The alligator technique means that the infielder puts his glove hand on the ground with his throwing hand on top about 6 inches from the glove (like an alligator's mouth). Make sure they are 6 using the fielding position pictured above. This free top hand will offer protection to the child's face in case of a bad hop and will also help secure the ball in the glove once it has been caught. Once the ball is caught, the player should bring the ball and glove hand together into their stomach area to secure it. Then they need to get set to throw. Make sure they get perpendicular to their target with their arms outstretched like a scarecrow. The glove should be pointing at their target and their throwing hand back with the elbow up and hand on top of the ball with the ball pointing backwards. We will get into throwing in the next section. Anticipation: Players should always expect that the ball will be hit to them. Get the players into thinking of situations. Verbally cue individual players with questions. Make them think: "What will you do if the ball is hit to you?" or "Where will you throw the ball if it is hit to you?" Where are the base runners? Constantly repeating this to your players in the field will help to prevent indecision by your players when the ball is hit their way. THROWING While what appears to be a simple act of throwing a round object from point A to point B, learning to throw the baseball correctly at an early age is arguably the most important skill a young ball player must learn. THE GRIP Gripping the baseball correctly is a key ingredient to throwing the ball correctly. As a player matures they must develop the ability of getting the correct grip on the ball before throwing it. Incorrectly gripping the ball will create a ball to not fly straight (tailing off), which will create defensive nightmares for the fielders trying to catch the ball. While it is difficult for the rookie player to get the ball gripped in the proper manner it is important that they are introduced to the concept and continue to practice their throwing using the correct grip. 7 The correct grip is labeled a “four seam” grip. This grip provides the most accuracy and straightest ball flight, which are required for a successful defense. Your rookie player’s hands generally will be too small to use just the two fingers on top so adding in the ring finger is perfectly fine. The key is to ensure that the thumb is underneath the ball and the fingers (whether two or three) are placed on top of the ball. When the ball is thrown using the correct grip the ball will spin backwards in what QC Baseball calls a “12-6 rotation”. As a coach you will want to have your players show you how they grip the ball so that you know that they are doing it correctly. Again, be sure that the thumb is on the bottom of the ball and the fingers are on top of the ball. You also want to be sure that the player is not ramming the ball back into their palm. The player needs to get used to the ball being out more towards their fingertips then back against their palm. Throwing the ball effectively involves the use of the wrist and when a ball is jammed against the palm of the hand it difficult to achieve the right hand and wrist movement. Remember that for the rookie player it is best to introduce this grip to them and use it in throwing drills where they have time to think about the grip so that it can become natural over time as their skill level increases. It is better to teach the skill early and let the player mature into the skill then to have to completely change the way a player grips the ball. THROWING This same philosophy of teaching the correct skill from the beginning and let the player mature into the skill is key to the success of throwing a baseball correctly as well. All to often a coach will see poor throwing mechanics in a rookie player but due to the reasonably short distances that a rookie player 8 will throw the ball, the mechanical errors do not create an issue so they are ignored. Improper throwing skills will create much larger problems as the throwing distances increase. Golfers will find that a flaw in their swing will magnify as they need to move up to higher (longer) clubs and hit the ball further, so too will you find that the longer the baseball has to be thrown the greater the toll will be for the player who has poor throwing mechanics. Proper throwing skills should be taught at the earliest player levels. Rookie players should be taught proper throwing fundamentals from the very first practice and these skills should be monitored and reviewed regularly in practice. It is of little value to teach the proper fundamentals of throwing a baseball and then not watch to be sure that the skill is being practiced throughout your practice time. All too often coaches will teach the proper fundamentals of throwing a baseball and then ignore the fact that during warm-ups, few if any of the skills are being practiced by the players. As coaches, we have to be very careful with the player who has poor throwing mechanics, but due to above average coordination and strength may seem to be very effective with the way they do it. We are inclined to take a “if it isn’t broker don’t fix it” mentality, but ignoring this flaw today will create greater problems down the road when the players piers catch up in coordination and strength. As players move up in age the field dimensions get significantly larger and the demands for proper throwing fundamentals increase significantly. It is important to remember that baseball is a muscle memory game. We have to teach the young player the right way to do a skill and then that skill must be practiced regularly in order for the muscles to learn the right way to do it. Allowing the player to not practice the right skill will further entrench poor skill level through the same muscle memory system. THROWING FUNDAMENTALS The first thing we need to teach the young player about throwing is that they are always throwing the ball to a target. In order to hit the target we have to ensure that the player’s body is aimed at the target. When a baseball player is getting ready to make a throw to their target we should coach them to think about a rope running through both shoulders directly to the target and a second rope running through their feet directly at the target. 9 In this starting position the player’s body will be a 90 degree angle to the target but their head should be turned directly to the target so both eyes can be focused on the target. Sometimes as coaches we get so tide up in the position of the body that we never watch to see what the players head is doing. We can point the player to the target but if the player is not looking at the target it is unlikely they will hit it. Many people can point to the pitcher who does not make eye contact until very late in their windup but this is extremely unusual. Once a player gets the ball in their glove they need to be finding the target with their eyes. While the body is positioned with the feet and shoulders pointing to the target (don’t forget the eyes on the target as well) the throwing hand should be grasping the ball from the glove (remember proper grip especially in drills). The feet at this time will be generally shoulder width apart with the players weight up on the inside portion of the ball of their feet. When the ball is gripped the arms will drop slightly and extend out and up in a crescent pattern from the body. The elbow of the throwing arm will end up at or above shoulder height and the throwing hand will be above the elbow. The fielding arm will raise similarly to the throwing arm while using the glove hand to point to the target the player is about to throw to. At the same time the arm movement begins the front foot will stride forward a comfortable distance (generally a third to half of a body length) towards the target. It is important to watch that the step movement is toward the target. As the front foot is planted with the toe pointed generally towards the target, the upper body will begin the trunk twist while the throwing arm is moving forward to deliver the ball. During this stage the upper body will rotate towards the target so that the players belly button will face the target. Remember to watch during this stage for the throwing arm elbow to still be at or above shoulder height and the throwing hand to be above the elbow with the fingers on top of the ball and the thumb on the bottom of the ball. The ball should be facing away from the player. As the ball is delivered the throwing hand will move towards the hip of the players glove side. As the throwing arm is moving forward to deliver the throw the glove arm has moved from a position of pointing at the target to being naturally pulled back towards the body. You will want to ensure that the glove arm is not just dropping down out of sight but is actually pulled back towards the body. 10 DRILL: ONE KNEE DRILL – Have the players kneel on one knee (the knee on the ground should be the same as their throwing arm ie: right arm thrower – right knee down). Have them take the ball back and stop. Look to make sure the ball is pointed back with their fingers up. Then say “throw” and make sure they follow through over their knee that is up. See photos below: Fingers up with ball pointing back and elbow up. Follow-through with throwing arm over knee. DRILL: Have the players put their throwing elbow in their glove with their hand up ready to throw a ball. The players will be a short distance away from each other. The thrower is to throw the ball only using their elbow and wrist, thus making them use a wrist snap to get the ball to the other player. This throwing motion teaches the kids the to use all moving parts not just their shoulder. 11 CATCHING When teaching rookie players how to catch focus on two major points. One – when the ball is coming at them above their waste, their glove fingers should be pointing up. When a ball is coming at them below their waste they need to have their glove fingers pointing down. Many times kids want to catch every ball with their fingers down. This is very dangerous for them because a ball at head level could bounce off of their glove and hit them in the face. Coaches need to avoid this for the obvious reason of injury but also the player will fear the ball whenever it comes toward them. DRILL: Break the team into small groups and have the players in those groups stand in a line shoulder to shoulder with about 4-5 feet between them. The coach stands 5 feet in front of the players. The kids should put their gloves (fingers up) in front of them, off to the glove side. The coach will then toss a soft ball into their glove. They will move down the line until all of the players have done this 10 times or so, depending on how well they can accomplish this. BASERUNNING Getting Out Of The Box Get in the habit of getting out of the box quickly; this helps the player to beat out the throw from a fielder to first base. A glance at the ball is o.k. to see if it makes it to the outfield, other than that the runner is NOT to stare at the ball. As you take your first couple steps, pick up the ball. Assume there will be a play at first base on any ball hit on the ground or on a line. Once you know where the ball is heading, focus in on where you are going. The runner should not stare at the ball. Run Every Ball Out! Hard! Few players in the Majors run out every ball. As with many things in the big leagues, it may okay to do it when you get there but you shouldn't do it when you're working to get there. All players should run every ball out and run it out hard. It doesn't matter if it's a slow roller to the pitcher or a pop fly – 12 always run through first base. Have the player run naturally through the base without a hop or jump. This slows the runner down. Take A Turn If the ball is going to make it past the infield, get ready to round first base. Do this by moving off the line and into foul territory (use the first base coach as a target) to set yourself up for the turn at first. Try to hit the inside corner of the bag. Some informational youth baseball coaching websites include the following. Be sure to check them out for additional tips, drills and video lessons: http://www.qcbaseball.com/skills/pc_throwing1.aspx http://www.webball.com/cms/page1000.cfm http://www.baseball-tutorials.com/dir/coaching/ http://www.hittinginstruction.com/ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDZoB6lebGg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIvfAkEPAOg YouTube has numerous baseball drills on video that you can use as well. 13