Midwestanal pains

[redhotcoach]

Is anyone else in the country battling old school bug squishing coaches? I have played baseball all my life, started coaching softball, came hear to discuss fastpitch and studied how to teach girls to hit. I have dvds from epstein, enquist, your Rotational 101 chris, and a few more.

The high school coaches here have a lot of influence. They hold coaches and parent clinics, which is great. They preach "candrea, candrea, candrea" in these clinics, but I swear they must have learned Candrea techniques from the 1980s. I emailed the biggest influence, after her Candrea name dropping hitting clinic and with respect told her to watch an Arizona game, that what she is preaching is not what Candrea is teaching. One part of the response to me was "I will take a high average ground ball hitter over a power hitter anyday." I that I should study Charlie Lau's teachings.

I coach a travel team and a rec team both 10u. I work a lot with girls on hitting and no one has said anything, but I know the parents with older girls give the cold shoulder because I am not teaching what the high school authorities are. I paid for 4 session hitting clinic with a local ex mlb player. First session warm up everyone smiling because my 9 yr old girl is hitting line drives harder than 12 yr old boys in the clinic. The rest of the personal instruction to my daughter was on her squishing the bug, shifting weight to the front, taking the knob to the ball, and how "homeruns are hit in softball by hitting down on the ball to create more backspin." I got my money back for the rest of the clinic.

Now, as the rest of my family tribe is growing up and have sports every weekend, I am wanting to step out of travel team coaching, but I know the first coach that dd has after me is going to have her squishing bugs. We NEED some more left coast hitting clinics and instruction making it to the midwest! Or I need to move!

 

[Amy in AZ.]

I couldn't figure out what kind of pains you were having. Midwest anal? I am from the midwest and can be pretty anal, but I digress.

I don't think that you can force people to change. I sure didn't want to. But times change and softball does, too.

Around here, I battle people that want the knocker knuckles lined up and the back elbow high. I just don't say much about it. If you don't enforce squishing the bug, most hitters aren't going to do it, anyway.

If your DD is really smashing the ball, the others may come around.

 

[redhotcoach]

Knocker knuckles! I finished mowing yesterday and daughters were in backyard with oldest pitching lite flites to younger sister. She stops and tells younger sister to line up her knocking knuckles....I said "I know you have heard that, but that is not important in the way I teach you, and if you look for yourself, yours are not lined up when you swing."
I am just thinking to work hard with dd to keep her really smashing it (she hit one out in each of the first two tournies a month ago, hits alot to the fence in soft toss, but for some reason is now not keeping weight back and is dipping at low pitches in game.) and hoping future coaches don't mess with my girls so I don't have to be "That Dad."

 

[FiveFrameSwing]

There was a time that Candrea was teaching "squish the bug" ... and it wasn't all that long ago. Some of the older material I have from Mike, prior to his hook-up with RVP, is filled with non-ideal information. It is quite possible that someone may be teaching what they believe Candrea is teaching, and teaching "squish the bug" ... along with a host of other non-ideal issues. Mike, like many of us, has continued to learn and evolve. I guess the best I can say is that if you love this game, then do your best to remain current ... because the competitive nature is forcing a continued exploration and testing of concepts, and people like Mike, that have a passion to succeed at the highest level of this game, remain hungry for the absolute best information.

 

[Mike]

"A pitcture is worth a thousand words"

print out pictures of elite hitters at contact and ask these coaches why there is no bug squishing.

I have had parents telling there kids to get fully extended at contact, and take there hands to the ball, swing level. I just show them pictures then explain what high speed video and video analasis has done for sports. My favorite is take your hands to the ball, I say man thats got to hurt.

 

[SoftSocDad]

If something works, why is that a bad thing? Help me out here.

 

[Dragoncoach]

knuckles grip

In a fairly recent video Candrea said either lining up doorknockers or spliting the difference was the proper grip. Is it ok to split difference? or line up oppossing knuckles(door knocker of top hand to top knuckles of bottom hand), this feels right.

 

[Amy in AZ.]

I asked Candrea during his coaches camp last January. Don Slaught (Right View Pro) was there and they said "Door knockers on the top hand are above the bottom knuckles of the lower hand."

That is all I know about it.

My hands then rotate on the bat at extension, anyway. But, I didn't want to ask too many questions.

 

[Chris O'Leary]

Is anyone else in the country battling old school bug squishing coaches? I have played baseball all my life, started coaching softball, came hear to discuss fastpitch and studied how to teach girls to hit. I have dvds from epstein, enquist, your Rotational 101 chris, and a few more.

On the baseball side, the biggest problems are level swing and extension.

On the softball side, the biggest problem is keeping both the feet on the ground so you can push off of it. I'm not sure when or why.

 

[Ken Krause]

Unfortunately, there's not a whole lot you can do about it, at least in the big picture. If people don't want to learn, you can't force them to.

I would suggest (if you haven't already) that you show your daughter why you're teaching her what you're teaching. Let her see that it's the right thing to do (at least as far as we know today) no matter what she's hearing elsewhere. I've found that when it's all said and done, even the less informed coaches put the girls on the field who can deliver performance, at least most of the time.

I remember hearing a story about Sue Enquist at a coach's clinic a few years ago. As she described how she teaches hitting now, a coach raised his hand and said, "I have one of your old tapes, and this isn't what you said on there. Why are you changing it?" Her response was simple: "I know more now than I did then." It would be nice if everyone had the dedication to keep up with the game and seek out the best information they could find. But they don't. As I've said before, the enemy when it comes to hitting isn't the coaches/instructors who have a slightly different approach to the swing. It's the ones who cling to the old ways and prevent kids from achieving to the best of their abilities.