September 28, 2023

Softball Hitting Tips

There are a million different softball hitting tips, but for this article, we’ll stick to some of the ones that are more fundamental to the game

It is a fact, if you can’t hit and score some runs, you won’t win any games, but how do coaches get hitters carry over success from practice to real games?  Every coach has had this problem from time to time and wonders how to get his promising players to perform well during games.

Here Are Some Basic Tips That Can Bring Out The Best In Young Softball Players.

1.  Failure To Perform During A Game Like They Do In Practice – Sometimes batters do really well in practice and off the machine, but fall apart during a real game.  What goes wrong?  Often, the solution to this problem is very simple and can be eliminated by having the batter get out of the box after every practice swing.

What happens is the batter stands at the plate and swings at a set without running except maybe on the last hit and then the coach is surprised when she fails to get out of the box in a real game.  The hitter needs to get out of the box after every swing.  Keep them running.

2.  Not Enough Practice Time Or Tees For Each Player To Take Enough Cuts At The Ball –  Typically there is one practice tee and just not enough time during each practice for each player to properly develop good softball hitting techniques.  Again, the solution for this very common problem is to implement visualization into your fastpitch softball hitting drills.

How can visualization help my hitters?  These softball hitting drills using visualization are scientifically proven to improve fastpitch softball hitting mechanics almost as quickly as the same number of live practice swings.

The procedure get the players to assume their stance with their bat and then visualize the pitcher pitching the ball.  Each player should go through their typical routine of beginning outside the batters box, stepping into the box and getting set for the pitch.

Have them see the ball pitched to the normal  but different spots like inside low or high, outside low and high and so forth.  Have them take 5 solid swings using proper form at each visualized each spot.

Visualizing like this should drastically improve their fastpitch softball hitting mechanics in short order.

3.  Not Enough Live Practice Hits –  One very effective way to remedy this problem for your players is to set up two stations and utilize the soft toss.  Unlike, live pitching where the hitter has to judge whether to hit the ball or not, the soft toss should enable to swing at the ball every time, and to give them even more of a workout, you could also set up two stations, just don’t throw two balls at the same time.

4.  Rushing Through 100 Swing Practices – The truth is, we only have so much time to practice, but it is essential to set up your practices, at least part of the time, to resemble real game-like situations.  Good fastpitch softball hitting instruction means slowing things down part of the time.  For example, in a game situation, the hitter gets a pitch, has about a ten second break, gets another pitch and so on.  The point is they won’t be taking five swings right in a row with no break.

The idea is to let your hitters have quality swings during some of your batting practices; let them take a good swing, get out of their stance, get back in stance and hit again.  You will find that doing this will develop good fastpitch softball hitting techniques faster than having them get in their stance and hitting with no break.

5.  Failure To Have Correct Hitting Form –  Many times the learning curve can be shortened by watching good quality fastpitch softball hitting videos.  Your hitters will all have different ways to learn, some of them can take verbal instruction and go with it, but others will be more visual learners.  These visual learners can go from struggling hitters to confident batters just by watching the right video that shows them the hitting technique of champion hitters.

Following these simple softball hitting tips will give you a leg up on many of your competitors.  Give them a try and see what you think.

 

 

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