11 Year Old Video

[Dragoncoach]

It appears shes lunging (causing her body to drop), lacking tilt (stance could be more atheletic), dropping hands and rolling wrist to soon. I like to use the cue stay down on the ball.

 

[DB1]

Quick Update

Been pretty cold and wet here lately. Not much time to get outside, but she had an indoor hitting practice the other night and we've been doing some dry swings inside. We haven't talked about upper body, and have tried to introduce more coil as has been discussed earlier. Here is a video of what we've talked about so far. Will get out this weekend to see how things look with live pitching. Thoughts?



Thanks

 

[FiveFrameSwing]

My wife saw me reviewing your swing and commented ... "another person swinging a bat in the house". I personally translate that as a compliment to your willingness to work IMO.

Okay ... here's the swing.

I suspect most will comment on the 'bat drag' and 'barrel dumping'. Probably an area to take care of.

First a question to you.

Your daughter's rear elbow is displaced far away from her body, as opposed to being in and tight.

Please explain why your daughter is doing this. Does she have a 'goal' or 'thought' of trying to have a vertically stacked rear forearm?

 

[DB1]

Were going to go outside yesterday, but it never made it over 40°. Decided a little work inside would be better. We have never talked about a stacked vertical rear arm. In these swings here, I didn't say anything about the upper body. Things we have talked about, not dropping her hands to swing, trying to keep form casting by keeping her hands closer to her shoulder. We really haven't addressed much more than that. The drag and dumping are definitely a concern but not real sure how to go about tackling those issues.

Thanks again.

 

[FiveFrameSwing]

Good answer DB1. I can see how what you described 'could' possibly lead to the result we see, depending on the particular interpretation.

When you say 'not dropping her hands to swing', what exactly is her interpretation of that? 'When' during the swing is she trying to avoid 'not dropping her hands'? Does she have a mental image of not lowering the hands all the way to 'contact'?

 

[FiveFrameSwing]

I placed markers along your daughter's bottom hand to help you see her hand path.

 

[FiveFrameSwing]

Compare that to these hand paths .....

 

[DB1]

I'm sure she is not trying to drop her hands through the swing. We talked about keeping her hands up at the start of the swing and have also talked about keeping the hands tight to try and avoid casting. My guess is she's trying to keep her hands by her shoulder through the swing. I definitely see the difference, but am not sure where to go from here.

 

[softballphreak]

This appears to be another swing that would benefit from the "check swing" drill.

Have her turn her hips as she is in the video but have her keep her hands at launch position.

Replace her bat with something much lighter; something to simulate a bat. A tee ball bat or anything light.

Have her deliberately keep her elbow behind her hands, aligned with the hip mostly.

Once she is doing that, give her back the bat.

Post a video of that.

It appears in the current video that her swing is having to come around her front too much. Because her hands are getting too much ahead of the hips too early. The elbow drag may be a habit of swinging a heavy bat previously--or maybe even now. How much does the bat weigh?

 

[Wellphyt]

Were going to go outside yesterday, but it never made it over 40°. Decided a little work inside would be better. We have never talked about a stacked vertical rear arm. In these swings here, I didn't say anything about the upper body. Things we have talked about, not dropping her hands to swing, trying to keep form casting by keeping her hands closer to her shoulder. We really haven't addressed much more than that. The drag and dumping are definitely a concern but not real sure how to go about tackling those issues.

Thanks again.

Regarding the lower body, you have to start somewhere, and it looks to me like in her latest swings she has the basic idea of coil-uncoil. I see that as progress. Be sure to reinforce why it's important to coil. I tell the players that the weight shift is done with the hips and not the stride. The coil is how you get your weight back, and the uncoil is how you shift your weight into the pitch. If you don't first coil, then there is nothing to shift forward. Players that don't coil, end up striding onto their front foot and turning their hips, resulting in a very weak weight shift.

Also, when she uncoils, make sure her back foot maintains pressure against the ground in a clockwise direction until the hips reverse. This will ensure that her rear leg remains firm, giving the hips something to reverse off of.

As for the upper body, the Q's you're using can be confusing. Notice how the Q "don't drop your hands" creates a pin-wheel type swing and bat drag. Rather than telling her to not drop her hands, teach her how to get her hands flat correctly. The correct hand flattening action automatically prevents the hands from dropping. Right now she is launching her swing with her hands a little too high for my taste. I would prefer the swing be launched with the top hand at armpit height. Part of the problem is that she is starting the bat by applying torque to the handle parallel to the pitch. She needs to start the bat by applying torque perpendicular to the pitch. The correct back arm action is similar to skipping a rock or turning a double play.

Overall, I think the coiling action she demonstrates in the latest clip is a step in the right direction.