Hey, what's up guys?
Have you ever been to one of those hitting clinics where they talk for hours about the
same stuff and it's boring as hell?
Well, not today!
I'm going to put on a clinic right here, right now, and I'm going to tell you everything
that you need to know about hitting in 5 minutes or less.
Ready?
Start the clock!
Here we go!
Alright, I've got my little sheet here.
First, pre-at bat routine.
What you want to do when you're in the hole is when you go to grab your bat and get your
helmet on and put your gloves on I want you to take a deep breath all the way in, stand
up on your toes, get your chin up tall, and have a good presence because this is going
to put you into a good state and get you ready for your at bat.
Now when you go on deck what I want you to do is take a few swings to time up the pitcher
that's pitching out there but then after that I want you to visualize your best pitch that
you've ever hit.
Ok?
Just take a second you can keep your eyes open to do it.
Visualize that pitch, see the pitcher who was pitching it and remember it, see what
happened.
Maybe it was a double in the gap or a home run and imagine that hit.
You might even find yourself smiling, ok?
So do that while you're on deck.
Now, when you get into the batter's box you're going to get into that batter's box take another
deep breath, nice and tall, chin up before you get in and while you're digging in.
You'll see a lot of Major League players doing this, ok?
When you get in there now all I want you to think about is see the ball hit the ball.
Now, we're going to talk a little bit about mechanics of hitting as well.
First is going to be your set up.
A good set up is going to be a good wide stance like you're playing basketball, if you're
playing basketball, playing defense on basketball, that's where you want to be.
Now, one thing you also want to do is knock your knees in just a little bit because in
baseball we want to create linear energy this way, ok, side to side.
So you want to have those knees knocked in just a little bit.
You want that butt down and you want your chest over your toes which is creating a body
angle.
So if this is straight up, this would be a good body angle, ok?
Next your load and your stride.
When you load and stride you want to make sure that it's all one movement, you want
to keep everything going, you don't want to get your front foot down and then try to swing.
You want it all to be one fluid movement.
A good load should be closed, you should show your butt and the bottom of your foot and
even a little bit of your back to the pitcher, as well as this bat should be moving.
It's ok if you drop your hands.
That's a big misconception.
So get that loaded up and have good timing with it.
Now, as far as what you do with your stride foot, you want to open this thing up a little
bit, ok?
45 degrees or maybe a little bit more as you land so that you can start to open up your
bottom half.
I want you to think about hitting as three parts, your lower half, your mid section,
and your upper body.
When your front foot lands, your hands should still be back and this is going to create
tension in here, like a torque, like a, all this energy, elastic energy is going to be
stored in the mid section because this is open and this is closed back here so everything
is going to be stretched like right in the middle like a rubber band, ok, and that's
what's going to give you a lot of energy.
Now the most important part of this is how you release that energy, ok?
And we go back to the body angle on this one because when you set a body angle, which is
right here, you're creating an axis with your spine to swing around, ok?
So swing plane is huge in hitting.
The biggest thing you want to work on is working on a good swing plane through the ball.
To do this you've got to have a good body angle.
So if you take that load and that stride and land open with a good body angle now you're
creating this axis to swing around and you're creating a good swing plane which is going
to put you in the zone early and out of the zone late.
So that means if you're off a little bit with your timing you can still get a good hit,
ok?
Alright, let's talk real quick about the 7 checkpoints at contact.
I did a video about this, you can check that one later but real quick let's go over them.
Number one is, at contact, so if you pause yourself at contact on video here, you want
to check that your head, or your eyes, are on the ball, number one.
Number two, your back foot is going to be up like this.
Some guys are off the ground but it wants to be straight up.
After that you're going to catch yourself but at contact you're right there.
Number three, your head is going to be over your back knee.
Number four, your front leg is going to be straight coming up that body.
So you want to hit against a strong straight front leg.
Number five, your left forearm wants to be in line with that bat at contact, the barrel
of the bat should be a straight line.
Number six, your right arm should be in a power L.
This is not contact point.
That's contact point, ok?
And number seven is, your hands want to be above your barrel.
You don't want to be even or below, ok?
So those are the 7 checkpoints at contact and you can check yourself if you get yourself
on video from the side.
Now, let's talk about the follow through.
When you finish that swing you want to thing getting through that ball wherever you're
trying to hit it.
If it's an outside pitch, take it that way and extend those arms through it that way.
If it's a middle pitch, here, extend the arms through it.
If it's an inside pitch, inside and finish through, but get through that ball.
A good finish too, good extension is when your finish that swing all the way here.
You should finish so far that this hand has to come off in order for you to finish all
the way.
That's a good follow through when you're hitting.
Run hard!
Alright?
Run hard.
I see so many guys not running hard after they hit the ball.
You should be running like you're racing against someone, ok?
That's how fast, no matter what, no matter what happens.
If it's a ground ball to the second baseman you should be running as fast as you can to
first base, no matter what.
Now, let's talk a little philosophy.
You want to be patiently aggressive in here which means you don't want to swing at bad
stuff but you want to be ready to swing at good stuff.
I did a video called yes yes no hitter, go check that one out.
Hitting is controlled violence.
You want to let all that energy explode and go through that ball but you've got to be
under control while you're doing it.
So you want to create as much energy as you can to hit that ball but under control.
Controlled violence.
Let's talk about working the count.
You want to get yourself into a fastball count because fastball is the best pitch to hit
right?
So if you're working the count, if you're being patiently aggressive and you get into
a good count, a 2-0, a 2-1, a 3-1 count, let's look for one pitch one spot.
If you're looking for a good fastball and that pitcher is trying to throw a fastball,
which at the high school level and below, you're going to get 90 percent of the guys
throwing fastball to the outside part of the plate there.
So look fastball middle away and be ready to hit the ball, ok?
Be ready to attack that ball.
Consistency is key when it comes to hitting.
If you're practicing a difference stance every single time, you're not going to be consistent
and you're going to have different results when you're hitting the ball so try to be
as consistent as possible with your swing and finding a good swing plane.
Don't worry about the things you cannot change, ok?
Don't worry about umpire's calls, don't worry about line outs, if you smoke a line out to
the center fielder, that's a great hit, don't worry about line ups either, if you're not
in the line up you can't control that.
Don't worry about any other excuse for not getting the job done, ok?
No excuses.
Instead what I want you to focus on is things that you can control like hustling, mind set,
energy, dedication, commitment, competitiveness, will, desire,and heart!
That's hitting.
Just get the job done.
No excuses!
Putting on a clinic.
Did I get it?
5 minutes?
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