Good mechanics, makes contact, goes nowhere...

[vdubya]

You guys bring up good points. Her grip is the Carrier/Bustos and she uses turbo slot gloves--always holds the bat in the fingers, not palms. I appreciate the guesses without video. Will try to get some but honestly I think all would agree that her swing looks more or less like MLB and has no resemblence to '10u Sally Recleague.' Hitting coaches never try and 'fix' her. If I had video I'm sure there are some tweeks, but I'm pretty certain that the mechanics are in order generally.

I agree with Druer's 'goalie' analogy and with my team I talk about swinging for offense rather than swinging for defense(K-prevention). I also drill them that the time to decide to hit a pitch is not when it's coming toward the plate, but when it is in the pitchers glove. 'Only decide 'not' to swing, never decide 'to swing' at a ball that has been thrown. I'm still seeing some late decisions..."oh crap it's a strike I better swing" with some of my players. Too late.

With this kid this might be part of the problem. All of this falls under the 'lack of intent to hit the ball hard' category IMO and I think I'd rule out mechanics and focus on intent.

Where to go with it beyond what I preach to them above? The kid is not walking--we preached 'don't get walked' and 'hit the first strike' in 10u to stress the importance of hitting with this team. So while she doesn't K she also rarely walks. I just need her to advance from putting it in play to 'never leave it in the infield.' I have literally told her to swing for the fence and she seems to understand the message, but still...easy out.

Next million dollar question:

How do I get her to DO it (when it comes to intent) against live pitching? The smile and nod with no results is getting old.

Thanks for letting me borrow your wisdom!
'dubya

 

[obbay]

How do I get her to DO it

start by getting her hitting off a tee and see how far she can hit compared to everyone else. make it a contest amongst your team.

 

[starsnuffer]

What obbay said. Have her hit off a T, that'll let you know if it's a mechanics issue or not. Just because she has a pretty swing does not mean she is mechanically sound. There are a lot of things the body can do to appear to be moving correctly, when in reality the force that is supposed to be generated never happens. Use the "squish the bug" analogy. Kids that do this "appear" to be doing something right, when in reality no work is being accomplished.

The other thing you can do is have her swing later. Try to get her to hit it to right field. If she's "sneaking up" on the ball slowing down her swing, this will help getting her to wait before initiating her swing. Once she starts doing this she may actually hit harder, and then you can adjust her timing until she's hitting CF again.

-W

 

[vdubya]

Ok, I agree a tee can be useful but it has limitations. This kid hits off of a tee among other things most of the year with an instructor. One thing she doesn't get is live pitching year round. The instructor pitches some, but never at distance and he never brings a live pitcher either.

Analogy: If I want to be good at driving a motorcycle in a congested urban area, how often do I need to practice by driving a car in a big empty parking lot? Yes, it is still driving, but it is a different vehicle (pitched ball vs ball on tee) in a different context as well.

This girl has hit a ton off of a tee compared to some of her teammates. I won't recommend she stop, but it hasn't translated yet. I'll tell her to hit buckets for distance in an open field as suggested and see if that helps.
Thanks,
VW

 

[Mr T]

Fascinating thread. If a player has great mechanics then they are by definition harnessing their power to a good extent, no? Maybe some would disagree with that statement.

So what makes this so interesting is she is somehow masking some missing ingredient. Lots of good suggestions here.

Mine would be that videotape is critical in this case. Measure her bat speed compared to some of the other players for starters. How many frames does it take?

At this point if she is hitting the ball a lot with a "good" swing we're at F = MA. If the bat speed is there then this just doesn't make any sense unless she has the weakest grip on the bat ever.

 

[vdubya]

I'll see if I can get some video within a few days if the rain lets up. Should be able to get some game swings this weekend. Maybe there will be a disparity between tee/soft toss and game swing that brings the issue to light.

 

[starsnuffer]

We didn't ask her to do more T work. We just asked for you to put a T at home plate at the field, and have her hit about 10 balls off of it. See how far the balls go.

This will tell you if she has enough power in her swing to hit the ball deep regularly. If she hits all the balls deep from the T at home plate, then great, her swing is mechanically sound and you know to focus on why her game swing is different. If the balls all go shallow, then you know it's an issue with generating power.

Do that and report back and we'll have more info to go on. Video will be great too, as always.

-W

 

[softballphreak]

But if she doesn't hit it far while hitting from the tee at home plate have her keep trying to hit it hard while she's there. Have her make various adjustments while attempting to hit it far.

I had a kid just recently who kept topping the ball and hitting long tee has really helped her. She's hitting to the fence now from the tee. I'm pretty sure this will transfer to her game swing.

 

[playball13]

I have seen a couple of good sized strong girls who couldn't hit the ball hard. They had bad bat drag and were just swinging with their arms. They also had the problem of very little wrist action it was almost like a full swing push bunt if that makes sense. Video helped these girls alot.

 

[obbay]

Re: hitting off a tee
hitting into a screen or in a tunnel is like driving in a parking lot
Hitting out onto an open field is like driving in the street.

hitting live pitching vs Tee;
Tee is like Drivers Ed
Live pitching is like driving without your parents in the car.

the problem with that last analogy is that you don't need to take Drivers Ed more than once where batters at all levels can benefit from Tee work. Like Continuing Ed. CEUs for hitting.