Young Girls Swing advice needed

[Adopted4Girls]

New member here. I thank you in advance for letting me ask some questions and seek some answers. To give a little background, I am a teacher/coach. I am as analytical as it gets, which is why I love the swing. I am 35 from Omaha, NE. I have coached baseball for ten years, mostly little league ages 6-14. I love baseball, but my wife and I adopted four girls this past November. They are seven, six, five, and four years old. They like to play ball. This was their second summer with us.

Now I have learned through observation of this site and personal interaction that coaching softball is not the same as coaching baseball. I still love baseball, but my passion for helping those girls has made me fall in love with softball.

The differences between the games, the swings, the throwing motions, the rules,........is FAR MORE than I ever expected it to be. Am I the only one who went through this realization?

All four girls are on different teams and I coach all of those teams. I have learned a lot, but still need help. Now I know girls are not as aggressive as boys in general, and I have learned that just teaching girls to swing hard is not easy.

I have the six and five year olds right now and I am having trouble with each of them. Need help with some things.

Five year old: She releases her wrists way too early. She holds the bat well, has a good stance, but when she swings, she releases her wrists FAR TOO EARLY. I got her the "chuckit" and she likes that. She likes to practice that. I am trying to teach her to hold and not release too early, but am having trouble.

Six year old: She holds her front elbow high. Too high. I tried to correct it with telling her to raise her back elbow, but soon realized that doesn't work in softball. I am trying to teach her the "upside down V" and not getting her elbows too high, but she can't seem to get out of it.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for letting me be a part of this site!

 

[Amy in AZ.]

Welcome and thank you for taking care of these little girls.

I think that I would just let the little girls be little and enjoy t-ball and making friends. Teaching the overhand throw is something that we talk and dissect a lot on the board. I think that is what I would work on with the 7 yo and I would let the other little ones join in as they want to. If the girls are having trouble gripping the softballs, use your baseballs for awhile. I teach boys to throw exactly like I teach girls. Show them a 4 seam grip and go from there.

You may be trying to teach the girls something that they have never even seen before. So, that is difficult. I am trying to do that with a 12 yo, right now.

I like the Chuck It drill. Have you seen my video of my 2 yo granddaughter trying it? Anyway, I found a short one for her. You might want to try that.

So, throw, run, hit off of a tee and try not to coach too much. Above all, have fun and eat lots of ice cream.

 

[Perfect Circle]

Welcome to DFP... Congratz on gettin the Girls :{)) I would work on bunting first, then slapping. Get them to hit the ball just to the grass, with out, swinging for a strike. At that age, they are never going to see any good pitches for a while.

 

[chinamigarden]

the good news is, the softball swing isn't different from a baseball swing, so teach away.

 

[redhotcoach]

Hey welcome. I have a lot of friends in Omaha...some pretty darn good teams from there.

There is no perfect road to successful coaching, but I will say that I disagree with you about softball and baseball being different. It is the same game, especially the things you mentioned that are different. The swing is the same, the throw is the same, the rules are pretty close. Her in the midwest (and possibly you being a teacher) the are still quite a few coaches that try to teach the softball swing vs the baseball swing. Twenty years ago I would understand that, but today we have slow motion video that shows the best sball hitters swing the same as the best bball hitters.
Agressiveness, I have found there are quite a few agressive girls too, they are the ones that are still playing at 12-14 years old.

Learning to swing, yes I would agree that a majority of girls have a tougher time learning the swing, but not all of them. I have a few that I can just show them a vid of Manny or Cano and they can copy it fairly well. Wait until you try teaching sliding.....yes you have to teach girls to slide. Most boys have it down soon after walking. Girls have to be taught.

My opinion, girls your dds age. If they swing without spinning all the way around (my 7yr old son still tries it once in a while, I blame Mario and Luigi), if there hands are close together, and if they run to 1st after hitting, you are doing pretty good. Have fun, have some laughs. Good luck.

 

[redhotcoach]

Oh and Amy made a good point. I went to a clinic with Northwestern University a few years ago. Kate there said "softballs are too big to teach a girl to throw, use baseballs."

 

[Greenmonsters]

Like Amy said, teach overhand throw with a ball that's not too big. The weight/momentum transfer and lower half leading and upper half following will set the stage for the swing (and don't be misled, the high-level BB swing should be the model for the elite SB swing). For eliminating the early release, she'd probably get a kick out of practicing throwing the bat up the middle - just make sure you have a lot of space for mis-timed releases. With 4 younguns, they may very well have different learning styles and one size doesn't fit all so you may have to use different approaches for each of them, whether its for learning to read, count, tie their shoes, or SB. As a teacher, you probably already know that though. Bottom line is if its not fun, they'll lose interest in anything, so make it fun and they won't even know that they're learning. God bless you and your wife. Enjoy the ride

 

[redhotcoach]

Our favorite Nebraskan, Cooter Ray

 

[Adopted4Girls]

Thanks for the help. So you guys coach the elbow up? In research I have done, that is one thing I have seen to NOT be emphasized with girls.

I didn't mean to say the baseball/softball swings were complete opposites. Sorry. I just see a few differences that I had to overcome.

Thanks for the ball advice. The girls play with 11-inch balls, but I have them practice throwing with 10-inch balls. They like the yellow balls

By the way, one thing I haven't been able to figure out.........What does "DD" stand for?

Thanks again

 

[Perfect Circle]

Like Amy said, teach overhand throw with a ball that's not too big. The weight/momentum transfer and lower half leading and upper half following will set the stage for the swing (and don't be misled, the high-level BB swing should be the model for the elite SB swing). For eliminating the early release, she'd probably get a kick out of practicing throwing the bat up the middle - just make sure you have a lot of space for mis-timed releases. With 4 younguns, they may very well have different learning styles and one size doesn't fit all so you may have to use different approaches for each of them, whether its for learning to read, count, tie their shoes, or SB. As a teacher, you probably already know that though. Bottom line is if its not fun, they'll lose interest in anything, so make it fun and they won't even know that they're learning. God bless you and your wife. Enjoy the ride

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Pitching.avi - YouTube

Batting.avi - YouTube