Have you ever heard of the Babe Ruth towel drill? I know I never have, and I am not sure if I think it is actually good for hitters either. I recently read about the Babe Ruth towel drill on eFastball.com, and while the drill seems like it could be effective, the site say the drill is only meant for certain types of swings. The most interesting part about the drill is about how it exists today. … [Read more...]
School comes before baseball
We could go very in depth and talk about the next two pieces of information that I am about to present to you all day. However, I merely wanted to show these statistics to the parents of our young readers, for the next time their children say their more interested in baseball than school. The probability of playing college baseball, for a high school senior, is extremely slim. And, even if your … [Read more...]
‘Let it get deep’: Hitting the Outside Pitch
Hitting to the opposite field is one of the most important qualities a young hitter can have, but few hitters know how to effectively handle outside pitches. Most hitters never learn to hit the other way, and, as a result, their careers are short lived. When I pitched in high school, my approach as a pitcher was to hammer the outside corner. At the high school level, surprisingly only fifteen … [Read more...]
Common hitting mistakes
In order to improve at anything in life, we must look to improve our flaws. When it comes to hitting, we have the advantage of being able to look towards others when we want to improve our errors. Because, if this is the first time we have encountered a particular problem, the odds are that someone else has identified and corrected our mistakes. Matt Schilling is the Director of On-Field … [Read more...]
Two dills you may have heard of, and one I haven’t heard of
Livestrong.com has a surprising amount of credible articles about baseball training and exercises. For our high school hitter focus, this week, we will look at an article published by Steve Silverman entitled How To Train Your Eye Better To Hit the Baseball. Despite the glaring grammatical errors present in his title, the article contains three tips to help improve performance in the batters box; … [Read more...]
Linear vs. Rotational hitting
As promised from yesterday we will discuss the difference between a linear and a rotational hitter. The purpose of this distinction is to come to a conclusion about what type of a hitter your daughter/son is, and what drills best fit their type of swing. When you have a rotational hitter and try to do a drill that is meant for a linear hitter, you are trying to fit a square peg in a round whole. … [Read more...]
Lessons for linear hitters
I found a hitting exercise that I though would be helpful for all of our readers, regardless of their age. Then I remembered that we have not discussed the difference between a linear hitter and a rotational hitter. And, while we will not discuss the difference between a linear and a rotational hitter today, we will discuss this divergence in school of thought tomorrow, our blog for today—January … [Read more...]
Baseball hitting myths
Today I want to defunct two common practices that coaches try to instill in hitters, as far as technique is concerned. They are connected in the way that they take place in the lower half of the body, and in the way that one generates the other. Let’s look at the load and the action of the back foot during the swing. Most coaches suggest a short and concise stride on the front foot. This swing is … [Read more...]
Weight training in baseball-What is appropriate?
For this weeks blog on advanced hitting our focus will be on an article written by Dana Cavalea, a strength and conditioning coach in the New York Yankees organization, entitled Machine Training vs. Free Weight Training.. Train to Move! Weight training in baseball is a controversial topic and most often comes up as your young baseball player moves into high school. Cavalea’s stance is that there … [Read more...]
Baseball Hitting Tips: The Mental Approach to An At Bat
Here's a great tip from one of MLBs best hitters in the past 30 years. Don Mattingly shares some great advice in not trying to do too much with a pitch, waiting for something to hit and approaching every at bat the same way, regardless of the game situation or pressure involved. Yes, easier said that done...but good advice nonetheless. Enjoy... … [Read more...]