My son's recent swings

[mr. potato head]

He's only 5-6 and 120lbs soaking wet. But he hit for power and average, capable of driving the ball over 300ft. Almost never struck out.

I didn't video tape much during this past freshman season.

So here are a couple triples with woodbat before the HS season started

.294, 2 SO and not afraid to take one for the team?

[tradosaurus]

Lancers,

Here are some "Don'ts" and "Do's" I would suggest:

1) Don't mess with your son's swing.
2) Don't bring him to a paid hitting instructor because the "instructor" will find some "flaw" in your son's swing to justify getting paid.
3) Don't take the advice from baseball forums too seriously. Posting up a video of your son's swing will always illicit a comment on what to fix.

1) Do encourage your son in ball games through the failures that inevitably happen.
2) Do sit back and enjoy the hitting clinic from your son.
3) Do read "The Science of Hitting" by Ted Williams as well as "Lau's Laws on Hitting" to understand when to fiddle with your son's swing and when not to.

Personally I think it's great to be able to switch hit from an early age but I would encourage your son to eventually swing only from the side that he is strongest.

Some of the greatest hitters in the game never switch hit because if you can "see the ball, hit the ball" why not swing from the strongest side?

[lancers]

.294, 2 SO and not afraid to take one for the team?

Uh oh, wondering who is potato

He started the season with a 0 for 14 slump for the first 7 or 8 games after hitting lights out during winter ball. Even got benched briefly by the coach.

This was when a little patience pay off. I just kept on telling him don't worry the result, if you hit a screamer right at the short stop so be it. It will fall for you sooner or later.

Then he went on a tear, going 15 for his next 35 AB or so to climb over the 300. The final game was against a bad team on a small field with only 300ft down the line. I told him if he can have a 3 for 3 or 4 for 4 he would be hitting over .350 for the season. It will be also great if he can get a HR.

Big mistake:o He was pressing and reaching and ended up 0 for 2.

[tradosaurus]

Uh oh, wondering who is potato

He started the season with a 0 for 14 slump for the first 7 or 8 games after hitting lights out during winter ball. Even got benched briefly by the coach.

This was when a little patience pay off. I just kept on telling him don't worry the result, if you hit a screamer right at the short stop so be it. It will fall for you sooner or later.

Then he went on a tear, going 15 for his next 35 AB or so to climb over the 300. The final game was against a bad team on a small field with only 300ft down the line. I told him if he can have a 3 for 3 or 4 for 4 he would be hitting over .350 for the season. It will be also great if he can get a HR.

Big mistake:o He was pressing and reaching and ended up 0 for 2.

The biggest challenge for me is to relax and enjoy the games even if my son has a hitting slump or doesn't do well on the mound.

A few parents on our team constant chide their kids if they fail. The kids either tune their parents out or try too hard and fail even harder.

[Encinitas]

Uh oh, wondering who is potato

As was mentioned in another thread there isn't too much you can't find these days. Mr. Potato Head is a good ghost name for someone that is familiar to us. There isn't enough ghosting or spoofing on these sites. Twitter much more entertaining in that regard (such as one of my favs the Fake Bill Walton).

What a nice HS team site. Covers all three. Amazing how few people I know from that town considering we lived so close and right in it that last year.

[mr. potato head]

As was mentioned in another thread there isn't too much you can't find these days. Mr. Potato Head is a good ghost name for someone that is familiar to us. There isn't enough ghosting or spoofing on these sites. Twitter much more entertaining in that regard (such as one of my favs the Fake Bill Walton).

What a nice HS team site. Covers all three. Amazing how few people I know from that town considering we lived so close and right in it that last year.

If you only knew, lol. Btw, close the drapes or put some clothes on!

[CircleChange11]

2) Don't bring him to a paid hitting instructor because the "instructor" will find some "flaw" in your son's swing to justify getting paid.

Likewise, don;t take your car in for a tune-up or go to the doctor for a physical or check-up. <-- Sarcasm.

What is that advice supposed to mean?

Y'know why there's always something to point out with hitting/batting mechanics? Because very few batters/pitchers have really really good mechanics.

Now, what you don;t want to do is be constantly changing the mechanics based on whatever flavor of the month philosophy a forum may have or change your opinion based on the forcefullness of a poster's comments, or things of that nature.

But dads/coaches/batters are always messing with their swings, because they can always be improved. Now, having said that you don;t want to start a fire just because you thought you saw some smoke. If the kid is hitting well and doing well, then you don;t want to keep saying stuff about mechanics. Once it's gametime, the swing is on autopilot. Program the swing in practice, let it do what it does during the game.

In the box the kid should be thinking about the pitch and situation, not mechanics. I see far too many dads bark out 5 reminders or bits of advise before each bat, and always throwing in things like "see the ball" at the end. Much of it is so obvious as to not be all that helpful, but most of it is likely to be confusing ... but dad just can't help himself.

[mr. potato head]

Likewise, don;t take your car in for a tune-up or go to the doctor for a physical or check-up. <-- Sarcasm.

What is that advice supposed to mean?

Y'know why there's always something to point out with hitting/batting mechanics? Because very few batters/pitchers have really really good mechanics.

Now, what you don;t want to do is be constantly changing the mechanics based on whatever flavor of the month philosophy a forum may have or change your opinion based on the forcefullness of a poster's comments, or things of that nature.

But dads/coaches/batters are always messing with their swings, because they can always be improved. Now, having said that you don;t want to start a fire just because you thought you saw some smoke. If the kid is hitting well and doing well, then you don;t want to keep saying stuff about mechanics. Once it's gametime, the swing is on autopilot. Program the swing in practice, let it do what it does during the game.

In the box the kid should be thinking about the pitch and situation, not mechanics. I see far too many dads bark out 5 reminders or bits of advise before each bat, and always throwing in things like "see the ball" at the end. Much of it is so obvious as to not be all that helpful, but most of it is likely to be confusing ... but dad just can't help himself.

While I agree with much of what you post, I have to pose a question about this comment. I agree that Dad's hollering to players about elbows up, eye on the ball, shoulder in etc is not productive, but I have no problem with a hitter thinking about mechanics. I would much rather have them thinking about the mechanics vs the results. Results will happen if mechanics are in place. Now, situational hitting and pitch selection are good things, but I would have to question not thinking about mechanics. Nothing wrong with it if used productively. Your thoughts?

[CircleChange11]

but I would have to question not thinking about mechanics. Nothing wrong with it if used productively. Your thoughts?

In the batter's box there is primarily reacting not thinking ... which is why it is so critical that the good mechanics become habit in practice.

I'm not saying that the batter shouldn't say "Okay remember to get your pullbacks in so that everything works well" every so often. I'm also not suggesting that batters should be blank of thought either. They should be focused on what pitch they want to hit, and then get it. What I AM saying is that the batter likely cannot stay relaxed, focused on the pitch AND thinking about 5 things dad/coach is hollering.

I think the primary thing a batter should be thinking about is remaining relaxed and calm. Relaxed is fast, tense is slow.

[mudvnine]

Nice user-name C-bad

Yeah, no kidding.....

Been back to In-N-Out "lancers"?

Righty doesn't look too bad (better in the SC clip).....has he laid off his LH swing for awhile? I've seen it better.

Short on time right now....we'll talk later.

[tradosaurus]

Likewise, don;t take your car in for a tune-up or go to the doctor for a physical or check-up. <-- Sarcasm.

What is that advice supposed to mean?

Y'know why there's always something to point out with hitting/batting mechanics? Because very few batters/pitchers have really really good mechanics.

Now, what you don;t want to do is be constantly changing the mechanics based on whatever flavor of the month philosophy a forum may have or change your opinion based on the forcefullness of a poster's comments, or things of that nature.

But dads/coaches/batters are always messing with their swings, because they can always be improved. Now, having said that you don;t want to start a fire just because you thought you saw some smoke. If the kid is hitting well and doing well, then you don;t want to keep saying stuff about mechanics. Once it's gametime, the swing is on autopilot. Program the swing in practice, let it do what it does during the game.

In the box the kid should be thinking about the pitch and situation, not mechanics. I see far too many dads bark out 5 reminders or bits of advise before each bat, and always throwing in things like "see the ball" at the end. Much of it is so obvious as to not be all that helpful, but most of it is likely to be confusing ... but dad just can't help himself.

Actually it's true that mechanics and doctors are really very similar to paid batting instructors. They don't know, for the most part, how to troubleshoot the root cause.

[CircleChange11]

Actually it's true that mechanics and doctors are really very similar to paid batting instructors. They don't know, for the most part, how to troubleshoot the root cause.

Not so sure about car mechanics and doctors. My Father in Law runs a dealership service department, and the technology seems to indicate the problem.

As for doctors ... I don;t think the patients usually like to hear the root cause, because it often means eliminating something they enjoy (like their eating habits, etc).

I'm not going to disagree that a hitting instructor will very often find something "wrong" with the swing. But isn;t that because there are very few swings that are "perfect", rather than "he's got to find something wrong, otherwise you don;t need him."? I say that because people don;t generally go to a hitting instructor if there kid is hitting really well. Likewise, I don;t take my car in if it's performing very well and I don;t go to the doctor if I feel great.

As a side, I have a pre-med degree and was on my way to med school until I decided to go a different direction, but we used to joke that anytime the answer was looking for "symptoms" you could always put diarrhea and fever and get 2 parts correct. Docotrs are very often looking to identify the problem with minimal amounts of data and not using tests that insurance companies won't pay for ... so very often the answer is "viral infection", which seems to me to be code for "it's something, but we're not sure what." *grin*

I think hitting instructors are a lot like car mechanics in the regard that not many of us know enough about either to know when the answer is valid and when we're being taken for a ride (pun intended).

This is where it was important to me to learn as much about hitting mechanics as I could. I can either learn enough to help my son, or be reliant on hitting instructors for the rest of his playing days ... and in my area the hitting instructors are very limited.

[omg]

While I agree with much of what you post, I have to pose a question about this comment. I agree that Dad's hollering to players about elbows up, eye on the ball, shoulder in etc is not productive, but I have no problem with a hitter thinking about mechanics. I would much rather have them thinking about the mechanics vs the results. Results will happen if mechanics are in place. Now, situational hitting and pitch selection are good things, but I would have to question not thinking about mechanics. Nothing wrong with it if used productively. Your thoughts?

Hitters are more likely to succeed if they think about results as opposed to mechanics. For example, the swing thought "hard line drive up the middle" is much more beneficial than "rotate my hips...". As Circle says, hitting is a reaction. The catch phrases, or cues, are vital because of the split second nature of it all.

Kids literally forget that the goal is to hit a line drive because they have much swimming in their head fed to them to their coaches. Sometimes the goal is just to put the bat on the ball somehow, someway if the pitching is challenging. Hitting is, in large part, the ability to hit good pitching.

Regardless of a coach's level of playing experience, I think it is a good idea for a coach to get up in the cage against some fast pitching and try to hit. Or at least stand close to the batter's box when a good pitcher is throwing-see the curves, changes, etc. It tends to be a real eye-opener and puts some reality into the process.

If you are trying to get kids to hit successfully in games here are some considerations for swing thoughts: a simple phrase with the word "ball" in it. A simple phrase that has an aggressive word in it. A simple phrase which, possibly, has some direction in it like "at the pitcher" or "between first and second". A simple phrase which has one simple mechanic in it like "swing through" or "front shoulder in". Not saying a phrase would have all of these but they should probably have some.

Again, mechanics have their place, no doubt, but the misconception, in my view, is that many go about teaching hitting with the assumption that constantly harping on, fine-tuning, and breaking down mechanics is the Holy Grail of hitting improvement. It's not. Also, there are relatively few key mechanics, in my view.

Finally, most good hitters will figure out these mechanics for themselves if we encourage them to do so and, most important, if they practice properly and consistently. If we don't, they are at the mercy of a well-intentioned coach. If it is a mechanics ultra guru then that just gives that hitter one more obstacle to overcome.

Results will happen if mechanics are in place? If only that were true. It might be true for some other slower moving aspects of baseball. For hitting, the batter has to be able to be somewhat successful at hitting line drives against good pitching, the split second reaction that Circle mentioned.

[new2thesport]

He's only 5-6 and 120lbs soaking wet. But he hit for power and average, capable of driving the ball over 300ft. Almost never struck out.

I didn't video tape much during this past freshman season.

So here are a couple triples with woodbat before the HS season started

Look at how big he is now!!! And.....he is still pounding the balls!!!!!
Which is always nice to see!!! I remember when he was 70lbs and pounding the balls then!!

[Encinitas]

lancer.gif

OK "Lancer" this fine young man has no corner.

Watch very closely what the lead arm does. This subtle form of chicken wing is due to the fact that I think he is timing the back leg turn to the decision to swing. Which by then is too late. If you watch this in slow-motion you'll see around frames 10-11-12 or something that it quickly becomes an arm-swing. Can he pro-nate without chicken-wing?

Really I am not sure I'd focus on the fact that there is a chicken-wing, what you have here is a push. The chicken-wing is something he has to do here because his Stretch-n-fire was not fired because it didn't get stretched. I find the best way to attack this is find a way to get that back leg to "win" sooner, but there are many ways to skin the cat. The thing is let's say the leg wins early like Kent before he's even ready to swing. The continuous pull-back there with Kent allows all the slack to tighten up as he is coming around the corner. Can you feel Kent's scap? As his hands start to pivot they stay closely to the shoulder.

I'd say that he really wants to go get the ball here so the arms take over early -- push.