- Jun 8, 2016
- 16,118
- 113
So DD is taking hitting lessons and she does great in lessons. She can swing fast and her bat speed is way above average for her age. She can hit in the cages, she can hit off a pitching machine.
When she faces actual pitchers, she forgets how to hit.
She loses everything she's been taught, swings too slowly and is always hitting to the right side of the field.
She's facing faster pitchers now - she recently moved from 12U to 14U this season.
In hitting her instructor will throw inside/outside pitches to get her to be able to hit those.
In her first TB tournament she only struck out once and that was a called strike - she tends to let the outside pitches go. She's good at making contact.
She just isn't swinging fast enough when she makes contact.
We are going to ask her hitting instructor for some more tips but any ideas on stuff she can try?
I'm not sure if it's just mental during games that she is thinking about too much and forgets everything.
It's really frustrating to watch her ground out to second all the time :/
Is she really swinging "too slowly" or is she not getting started early enough? She needs to be getting into her "gather" as the pitcher gets to the top of her windmill. Start slow and early. If she starts too late
everything will be rushed and her mechanics will break down.
If she isn't getting enough reps in practice against live pitching perhaps she can gently tell the coach(es) she would like to get some more practice via live pitching.