Suggestions -- Best Indoor Hitting Drills

[3DD'sDAD]

Pitching Machine vs Tee Work

Here in Southern Ontario we have to move inside in November and continue into April. Using a school gymnasium does not leave a lot of room to set up stations. We are going to be using a 4 station rotation using a golf ball sized whiffle ball pitching machine with a small (1" to 1.5" diameter) bat for hand eye coordination; a Louisville Slugger manual machine (different speeds used) for bunting "soft" balls; a tee station and a soft toss station. It will be tight, but should work. The hope is that the different applications will work on mechanics as well as hand-eye. Most time will be spent on T work and soft toss. I agree that too much pitching machine work can lead to "laziness" as the young hitters don't need to react to different pitches thrown or pitched. It is important to change as much as posssible the speed and/or trajectory of the ball pitched by a machine. The golf wiffle ball machine changes location to some degree as the balls react differently in the air.

IMHO you can't do too much "T" work but the girls don't like it much. So we change things around a little. They love the golf wiffle ball machine and use it as a challenge to each other as they move closer to change the "effective speed" of the ball. Adds some fun and a bit of competition.

 

[fastpitch91]

Target practice

Place a T about 30-40 feet out from 2 pop up nets. Spread the nets 10-15 feet apart. HIt wiffles off the T ( to prevent death by flying softball) . Two sets, first with T set up the middle for the batter and the targets at say short and second ( for a righty) and second set with T set for outside pitch and nets set betwen first and second. Vary the challenge level Got to get five in a row to each net ( or alternate nets 5 in a row perfect). Or have partner call out the location at heel plant. Similar drill for the slappers but alternate hitting down and bouncing and hitting over the net to the "outfield". Drill works hitting the inside/outside pitch and adds a finer level of bat control to really focus the contact point with the ball. The distance provide instant ( and coachless feedback). This drill is pretty much for the players who reasonably have strong fundamental swing mechanics otherwise the distance magnifies bat path errors and balls go all over the place

 

[FJRGerry]

Indoor training is a great time to work in bunting drills. Use safety balls or wiffle balls and work some fielding & running as well.

 

[Hitter]

I agree Mark H . That is why we use The Barry Bonds drill. #3 on go4fpsb list. Those that use a machine and don't move will have problems. I also agree with your first post. You can list a bunch of drills, but you do a drill to solve a problem.

We never use a pitching machine for batting practice for the reasons mentioned. Critical for timing and rhythm is the person feeding the machine! With a ball in their left hand in the throat of the feeder and a ball in the right hand, they make an arm circle with the right hand and at the top of the K position the hitter loads and when they see the ball in the wheel or wheels they go to toe touch. The feeder job is when they are at the top of the K to feed the ball in with the left hand. The hitter as a RH uses a lefty fielding glove and loads and steps and catches the ball with the glove. Start with your top hand in the normal position and foot work remains the same and track the ball to the glove. When using the bat start further back than the catcher sets up and try to hit the low pitch and after each successful pitch you allow them to take one step forward and repeat. We are working low to high slow to fast so no two pitches will be the same. Stop the hitters at about 15 feet from the machine as the ball may either go back through the machine or bounce off the tire. You will have some that can do these. You will notice most hitters will struggle that step stiff legged on the front foot as they will not have an adequate weight shift to flow forward. Most will be effected with 5 feet or less as that is how bad their timing and rhythm actually is. Up and back is one cycle. Then get out and take a break. Then move away from the plate for outside pitches and in further for inside pitches. As we move backwards we are working high to low fast to slow. However we are making the hitter make adjustments to speed and location on every pitch.

For your slappers start off with a right handed glove and make sure they work on footwork and tracking first.

Thanks Howard

 

[SBFAMILY]

Howard just showed us a new drill. If you have a concrete floor it works great. Drop a ball at shoulder height and hit it as it bounces back up off the floor. Each ball will bounce different. My dd loves this drill , because she can do it by herself in the basement.

 

[Hitter]

I like a LOT of FRONT TOSS, a station for CHANGEUPS (VERY FEW coaches spend enough time teaching and letting their batters hit change ups), and BUNTING,,,, Softball is a SMALL BALL game in that 60' MAKES it a small ball game. Some teams can hit the smack out of the ball, but when you are facing great pitching, can you generate a run and in CLOSE games at the end, do you have confidence you can BUNT EVERY TIME if needed?
** Another drill to consider: See if you can get a LOBSTER (Tennis ball shooter) and shoot 70mph tennis balls at them. 1) Vision Training drills (Numbers or colors)
2) Once they are able to hit 70 mph tennis balls, 60mph Softballs look like grapefruits.
**** MAKE your batters learn what their REAL STRIKE ZONE IS. MANY don't know and some have a different perspective from their stance then their strike zone really is. One way to do this, is they stand in WITH their bat in a ready position (NEVER SWING) and tracks the ball from your pitchers warming up to the catcher and lets you know if she thinks its s strike or ball. Correct her and she will learn her strike zone, PLUS she learns how to track a ball batter and if she gets good, SHE PROGRESSES to start to pick up the seams of the ball to start to learn to recognize rise ball spin, screw ball, curve, etc... ALSO helps your pitchers to pitch with someone in the box!

jimginas

I have used the 150 MPH pitching machine and it is an air cannon that puts a slow tumble on the tennis ball and does not have any rifling's in the cannon barrel and at slower speeds you can read the numbers. I have used tennis balls machines and I have never been able to see any numbers because the wheel spins the ball much to quickly as it it is usually between 80 and 90 MPH and spinning (RPM) much to quickly. We teach tracking in doing tee work, front toss, timing drop drills etc in everything we do. Many just look at the ball on the tee and forget about tracking. When working on a tee we mark some thing on the other side of the net so the hitter is forced to track the ball to the tee. When they load they are looking forward and as they stride they give the head a head start by turning their head a little to the right as a RH hitter while the eyes remain forward and then they move their eyes to the ball on the tee. We glue a white rag inside the tee as we want them to practice keeping their head down during contact as they are stronger with their head down than up. The eyes can move faster than than the head and this is why we give the head a head start.

When we do a strobe light drill with the room darkened those that only track trying using only their eyes will hit just over the top of the ball. Those that try to move their head and eyes together are swinging too late and you can see the distance of bat to ball increase visually. By giving the head a head start you will see their nose as a reference point RH hitter towards the second baseman's normal playing position approximately.

Thanks Howard

 

[Hitter]

Another drill we like is the timing drop drill...we do not stand on a ladder or bucket as normal mechanics should be used and I have never seen a ball dropped from above so the tracking mechanics would not be the same. We extend our arm over the plate at arms length and the hitter is looking straight ahead through the net at a mark. We hold the ball in the hand palm down and flex our wrist downward and that is when the hitter starts their load and then we drop the ball and continue upward with our hand. We never raise the ball any higher than eye level. We vary the height of the ball to make them adjust to timing and rhythm.

A variation to this is I will start with the ball looking like it will be dropped inside and I am on my toes and I rock toward the outside back corner of home plate and release the ball. Again they start the load when I flex my wrist downward.

Thanks Howard

 

[PEPPERS]

I won’t say that pitching machines are all bad, but we use them sparingly. I do take my daughter to a facility where they have machines that range from slow pitch to 70 MPH baseball and everything in between. They have a fast-pitch machine that you don’t know where the balls is going, it may rise, curve, drop or screw and my daughter hates it. I think the machine is just worn out and the balls are worn out and the combination makes for the erratic path of the balls. It does how ever give a more realistic hitting experience. Her favorite is the 70 MPH baseball she moves to 35 feet from the release point and crushes the ball, it has helped her with quickness.

The only way to get your timing down is to face live pitching, at the distance you will be hitting from.

Where my daughter takes pitching lessons, they use 2 machines next to each other, they use them for high and low, in and out and change of speed. They are the Jugs Lite-Flite
I’ve also seen this machine used with the Lite-Flite balls and the plastic balls with holes in them and it throws the plastic balls slower simulating a change-up.

My favorite hitting device is the old fashion hitting tee.

 

[HittingGuru]

Start with your top hand in the normal position and foot work remains the same and track the ball to the glove. When using the bat start further back than the catcher sets up and try to hit the low pitch and after each successful pitch you allow them to take one step forward and repeat. We are working low to high slow to fast so no two pitches will be the same. Thanks Howard[/QUOTE]


You are putting an emphasis on the top hand. I am curious as to why? and the what you are trying to effect with the emphasis on the top hand?

 

[SnocatzDad]

Warming up

I like using a tee to force pitch location and at the start of a hitting practice I like pairing up the girls (one tee loader one hitter) and have them hit about 7-10 each at (inside-high, middle-high, outside-high) then switch with partner then adjust tee and do (inside-middle, middle-middle, outside-middle) then repeat for (inside-low, middle-low, outside-low) this is 60-90 swings working 9 different locations. Also ask that they do swing in slow motion and stop just before contact at first on each new location to check themselves for palmup palm down at contact and make sure they still have some arm bend at contact so they can extend through the ball.

I like this warmup because it doesn't require a coach to pitch so coaches can wander the pairs and actually coach and it forces them to make adjustments to hit pitches at different locations.

After that it's usually multiple front toss stations with different size and types of balls. I like hitting golf ball sized wiffles at front toss as it really focuses on bat accuracy, If you line drive a golf ball sized wiffle you are right on plane.