So you decided to get a hitting instructor

[Dabears17]

Is that what power slapping means? Seems like an oxymoron to use the word "power" to say "just over infielder's heads".

Personally, I'm a fan of power bunting.

Probably misnaming..... more accurately it was dropping it in between the infielders and outfielders. My DD isn't fast enough to do regular slapping.

Looks like the last hit in this MegRem video on the "Power Slap":





She also got a fair number of ROE's because she's pretty good at hitting it hard right at people and they misplay it.

 

[cnardone]

I once read an interview with Joe Montana. His sons were high school quarterbacks. The had a coach and would not listen to him. Yes, one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever play could not get his children to listen to him. What chance do I have of getting my DD to listen to me?

 

[RADcatcher]

I once read an interview with Joe Montana. His sons were high school quarterbacks. The had a coach and would not listen to him. Yes, one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever play could not get his children to listen to him. What chance do I have of getting my DD to listen to me?

That's quite an example!

 

[uncdrew]

Probably misnaming..... more accurately it was dropping it in between the infielders and outfielders. My DD isn't fast enough to do regular slapping.

Looks like the last hit in this MegRem video on the "Power Slap":





She also got a fair number of ROE's because she's pretty good at hitting it hard right at people and they misplay it.

I've heard multiple people use the term. It was your post that made me realize I'm not sure what it means. You are probably using it correctly.

 

[stox]

My daughter turns 7 in September and started hitting lessons when she turned 6 last year. My reasoning was because I really wanted her to avoid developing bad swing habits.

I don't see any downside to starting professional instruction (besides cost) if they are coachable.

Some of the swing mechanics in our rec leagues 8u all star team are pretty bad and I worry some of the girls moving up to 10u next year will struggle against real pitching.

Sent from my SM-S906U using Tapatalk

 

[Westwind]

Parents are much more capable than they realize.

I never played. I’m older than most parents that had kids my age. What I did have was room in an agricultural shed for a cage and the ability to work overtime that translated into a small amount of disposable income so I could afford used machines and balls and screens and hitting stuff.

I started with my older dd doing EVERYTHING wrong. I got better by going to hang out with a buddy that ran a travelball team. I copied him. I did what he did. I bought the now ancient RVP program. Then I found DFP.

While all this was going on, the kids hit a little with instructors. They were really young. I learned from the instructors but there were things they did I was very skeptical of. I was right too. I knew I could do it better.

I was hitting coach for four kids. Two of my own and my buddies two kids. Those four kids are pretty much the best four hitters our high school had and they set all the hs records. They all started four years (except the cancelled spring of 2020). I also dabbled with lessons and team coaching but the four kids I worked with from 10u to hs were my main “projects”. All four played or play in college.

OK…. So to Rad’s question…. Yes, I eventually took my younger kid to a well known professional coach. She was a freshman or sophomore in college. What is funny is by then, she was pretty convinced that I knew what I was talking about. BUT, I knew she needed something more than I knew how to provide. He made a very good hitter better and I learned a lot watching and listening him. He made her better.

Some days I am tempted to get back into giving lessons or team coaching. Then I come to my senses. No way I’m doing it again unless my kids want me to help with any grand kids teams.

If nothing else, parents who want to help their kids need to learn how “practice” their kids. They need to understand the difference between instruction and practice. You don’t need to know how to instruct. Pay someone to do that if you don’t feel like you can handle it. Instead, learn how to simulate live pitching, don’t make it too hard. Learn to make it challenging sometimes but mostly help them practice hitting. That goes a really long way.

But just like the first line of my post, some parents can instruct. They are more capable than they realize.

Take the approach of “catching them doing something right”. When something good happens, make sure they know you noticed. Shut up about 90% of the things that don't go right. Encourage them to do what you want. It will take time but it will get better.

Writing this, I realize I did it backwards of what most people do, lol

 

[RADcatcher]

Some days I am tempted to get back into giving lessons or team coaching. Then I come to my senses.

No way I’m doing it again unless my kids want me to help with any grand kids teams.

What stops you from teaching/coaching outside of family?

 

[Orange Socks]

I noticed an interesting dynamic recently. Now that DD is no longer playing softball, I started working with her with her golf swing. For some reason I am more patient with her than I was when we worked on her softball swing. We used to butt heads when she was in HS. Because I don't have to feed her balls I am not scrutinizing every swing. At the chipping green I have been letting her swing on her own without saying anything for 15 minutes. I think golf is more feel than softball. She needs to learn what it feels like when something goes right and then repeat. Yes, same thing in softball.

She was visiting her BF over the past couple of days and they went to the driving range. BF was trying to give her instruction on her swing. This is the guy who doesn't even have a putter in his bag! She just smiled and nodded her head. She knows the drill. LOL.

 

[HunterMO]

We started taking DD to a hitting instructor between her second year of 12u. I don't have any background in baseball/softball, short of playing in random dirt/gravel fields as a kid. I grew up playing hockey.

As DD has gotten older, it became less the weekly/bi-weekly visits to once every couple of months. This was a cadence we already did with her pitching. Her pitching instructor would see her about once a month to do an evaluation, talk through where she's having difficulties/successes, and work on the next steps. Ultimately sending her home with homework. Whether she worked on it or not, that was on her.

The hitting instruction helped DD immensely. I've learned a ton as well. DFP has also helped me. We've also learned who to follow online for help. At this point DD sees a hitting instructor once a month to every two months. Part is schedule alignment, the other is that she knows what she needs to be working on....so I'm not going to pay someone to have her practice once a week. I know enough now to help her and provide feedback. She listens "enough" that the work at home/in a cage is beneficial. Then when we go in to see the instructor the next time, he provides a fresh eval and walks her through what is good and what needs continued work (with how to work on it). Rinse and repeat.

I'm also a big proponent of letting kids figure it out themselves. But they need to understand the why and what tools are available to "figure it out". I'll make sure the information is available to her, but at the end of the day she has to work through it. Because once she's in the box, it's all on her.

 

[Cannonball]

I was always my dd's hitting coach and she didn't have any options. In fact, I eventually turned into her pitching coach as well. She grew up watching me coach HS baseball so dad as the hitting coach was all she knew.

She is now giving lessons. This is her first week of lessons for this summer. She has given lessons for four or five years. She has the ability to make hitters comfortable with her coaching style and she definitely knows her stuff. I think she does a couple of things that parents appreciate. She takes videos of the hitters when they start. Like me, she does the first lesson for free and then talks to both the hitter and parents to see if what she does is what they want. She goes to her hitter's summer TB games. IMO, that is really important. She keeps a journal on every hitter. For example, she has had some of her hitters go to college and they have called with some problems with their swing. She can access that journal and it helps her figure out what a player was thinking back then and what they were doing wrong. She keeps a video library of the hitters as they progress through lessons. Finally, she doesn't charge an arm and a leg.

I warned her that for this summer, she needs to gear back some. They are going to be building a house. She agreed and I think she is limiting her numbers to 15 or 16. She literally could have 30 hitters. I always kept my number at 22.