What age group? Do you mean live pitching from a coach or player? We always hit off of coach pitching at every level. I agree that live pitching is beneficial.
10/11
We do coach and kid pitch. They’re too comfortable with coach pitch and I personally don’t think it translates to kid pitch in games so I do have kids pitch. Also helps the pitchers. Win win
It's just what kids do, as soon as it's game time and there's another kid on the mound, they just go back to what they were doing before. Takes a lot of time, try to get him to work on his adjustments in team practice when there's a kid on the mound.
Specificity is king in all skill development research.
You need to get as game like reps as possible teeing off on dad in the backyard is going to have diminishing returns.
It is a huge issue in baseball because it is one of the hardest sports to get game like reps.
Don’t get me wrong I have my qualms about travel ball but it does do a very good job of skill development because kids who play face a ton of live pitching.
Specificity is why we put my kid in a pretty easy fall ball league. Lots of low pressure real game reps fixed his lunging problem that was only happening in games.
You can't practice games. The best practice for getting used to games is to have more games. I usually try to have 1 or 2 scrimmages before our game schedule to get kids used to actual games.
He’s 9, just keep spending time with him practicing and enjoying the time together as well as teaching him to love the game, try his best, and that failure is just a part of the game as it is in life. The baseball skill will come with experience but nothing can replace the memories you’ll create with him through this beautiful game!
He's one of those kids where he stops to fall out of love with it when there's not instant gratification (so, a normal kid). I love playing with him, just trying to translate that fun to on the field.
The thing is in BP kids swing because they know it’s going to be a good pitch. They get ready early and let it fly. Come game time many get into pick a good pitch and hit it. What they do is try to see the ball, decide if it’s a strike then get their swing going and they are too late or have a defensive swing.
Every pitch they need to be swinging till they decide they don’t want to.
Yeah we have a very vocal parent crowd that keeps screaming "EYE ON THE BALL" or "NO PRESSURE" and I don't think helps at all. When he's just pretending he's Ohtani he's very loose.
Some people have labeled it "ball anxiety" they feel pressure to not strike out, so their hand leak down hips leak forward, trying to just not miss the ball. It's more mental than physical. One option is
to encourage him to either strike out or smash the ball. This helped my doughter stop "half swining." Talk about the idea of trying to take the practice swing I to a game, even of they think it won't work. They need to build trust in the practice swing. We talk a lot about the process being more important than the result. You took a bad swing and hit the ball. That's a fail. Good swing and struck out. That's a win. May need to sacrifice short-term gratification for long-term success.
My son said the same thing. Thing is, after several games he got over it and became more confident. I think this is likely what most kids experience. They do great when getting reps with dad but when game time comes they fold like a chair. Just takes a little bit of time before kids gain the confidence to crush it at the plate
He probably trusts you not to hit him, but not other kids. So he's waiting until he's sure he pitch is not going toward him before thinking about swinging.
Give him the chin music in the backyard lol...kidding but what I do is warn him him that some pitches are coming inside, throw it lighter when using tennis balls and hit him in the legs or something just to get the point across that pitchers at this age are never going to give you the perfect pitch to hit. Seems to work....he's not nearly afraid of the ball as some kids are
Very much this. Every pitch from dad is perfect speed, thigh high and down the middle.
8-year-old Timmy put the first pitch an inch over your son’s head, spiked the second one a foot in front of the plate, and now he’s got no clue where the third one is going.
Do NOT pressure him on hits or runs. Focus on the process, from seeing what the pitcher is doing before he’s up, to following a ritual when he’s in the hole and then on deck, to focusing on form, vision, and decision-making at the plate. Congratulate him when he follows the process.
Results take care of themselves when players learn to truly immerse themselves in the process. But when they focus on the results (especially what might/will happen, or what did happen), they lose sight of the present. Along with that, they lose confidence, and the results suffer.
It cannot be overstated how mental baseball is. Have patience with him and treat it as an athlete’s ultimate lesson in mindfulness.
Ask him these questions.
1. When you're at the plate do you hear the crowd or can you focus ok?
2. Are you looking for whether a pitch is a ball or a strike before you swing?
3. When the pitch is thrown, when are you deciding its ok to swing?
What you are trying to determine is whether its nerves or approach. If it's nerves then you can address that by just letting him know you love him no matter the outcome (which I'm sure you do) and that you just love seeing him play and have fun and none of it really matters.
If it's approach you can tell him to have a yes-yes-no approach. If he says that he's waiting to see if it's a strike before swinging then it's too late. He should assume the pitcher is going to throw a great ball for him to hit and only stop if it ends up being a bad pitch. Decide that you want to swing until you don't. Don't have the approach of "no swing no swing - oh no it's a strike, now I swing". Approach should be - yes I'm swinging, yes, its a good pitch, and then no it's not. A hittable pitch and a strike are two different things. There are pitches that are strikes that are not hittable and pitches that are balls but are hittable. We look for hittable not strikes.
I don't care if you swing at a pitch that would've been a ball as long as you swing hard.
He’s a kid. It’s pretty normal.
He knows when you pitch, it’s for him to hit.
Now he’s got another kid pitching and he’s probably in the box thinking “Is it a ball, a strike, in the dirt, faster than I’m used to, too slow, at me, at my head?”
Kids do it. Adults do it. Everyone does it.
The most important part of hitting isn’t mechanics, it’s reading pitches that are being thrown for the sole purpose of getting you out, and deciding to swing or not. It’s easy to swing hard in practice when you know it’s gonna be a strike, or if you miss or pop out it doesn’t matter.
I find the best way to fix this is to add competitive intent to practice for it to translate into games. My favorite method is play whiffleball but with a game bat. Yeah, the ball is going to get mangled, but the balls are cheap. You really have to track a whiffle ball to hit it, even more so to square it up and hit it hard. I find this translates to games extremely well.
Very common with kids. They get nervous and go up to the plate thinking it’s going to be a ball and are indecisive about whether to swing. Live AB’s against other kids is the best way to get past it.
There is a kid on my kid’s team that is like this. If you soft toss or front toss him he probably has the best most aggressive swing on the team. He absolutely crushes it. In a game or taking full speed practice he he’s the slowest, latest, most tentative swing ever.
Ask him who his favorite big leaguer is .
Show him his mlb hitters home runs compilation and point out the focus has on the pitcher and the ball .
Point out how the batter is focused on crushing the ball and focuses like when ur about to crush a piñata.
Then point out how he swings with intent and force and focus . Hes not looking at crowd or his dad , or the girls (they laugh ) but only at the ball .
I tell my 9yo son these things and remind him before he bats I say "hey kid let's see Ohtani up there !"
Or
Ask him his favorite animal. (Lion for example )
And point out a lion is strong and pushes fear aside and owns the ground he's own and doesn't back out and intent on the kill .
And
Teach him how to turn away from a bad pitch and how to get hit . And tell him if he gets hit by pitch he gets Panda Express or some other reward , if he owns the ground and turns from pitch and doesn't bail out like other kids . And remind him he's the man .
The best thing is seeing pitches from kids in a game-like practice. But thats a tall order to see enough good pitches to get in enoigh work with the whole team.
One thing that seemed to help my daughter and nephews the most when they moved to kid pitch was getting on a pitching machine. The machine at our gym is not super consistent, so it forces them to read the ball because it isn't in the same spot every time. Also, my daughter got hit three times in 6 games so she kind of had that band aid ripped off early and got over that fear. That seemed to be a big deal as well with all of them. When they see that it may hurt but it isn't the worst thing in the world. Especially when you get on base.
What helped me is "gamifying" practice. Make it measurable.
For example, even just doing tee work... make it a game that all your hits to up the middle, right field etc. I used to do this and track results in Google sheets and it helped my mindset when playing games....
Baseball will teach you a lot of life lessons and the #1 thing in my book is patience. It'll come, things will click. Don't stress too much about the games, I don't even talk to my kid for 24 hours after the game has completed. The want is there and that's all that matters. I've been coaching for 10 years and it really doesn't start clicking for them until 11-12.
Hitting is a hard thing to do, you as the pitcher has to simulate a kid pitcher when they are throwing strikes. You pitching is also putting you as the coach in a horrible position to correct batting flaws. You might have to get another kid in the mix and they can end by pitching to eachother, this also helps you coach.
Timidness is also a sign of not practicing enough. 1000 reps to develop a skill and 10000 reps to correct a flaw. A little league age kid can probably do 200 swings a day, and 1000 swings a week.
There are also quality reps vs less than quality reps, how many can a 9 yr old actually obtain? Tee work obviously is the best way to mechanically improve your technique, but also gadgets and pitching machines to isolate an issue and keep the batting practice (200 swings a day,1000 swings a week) fresh.
Don't practice every day for one. Two, games create nerves, that's simply something he will have to get over. He needs to develop confidence at the plate and that comes through games. Talk less about it as well. Post game regardless of play keep a cool demeanor and later on ask him what he thinks he did wrong at his at bats and let him think about what happened. Once he tells you, that will be your focus for the next time you two practice hitting.
Another mentioned it but do not underestimate timing and its impact.
If your kid has a decent swing and mechanics, timing is critical.
Put differently, when you work with him at home… soft toss, etc. they get a ton of reps at that drill versus live, but they also REALLY get the timing down.
You say you like routines: work with him on his process to the plate including on deck, pitching changes etc. How is he approaching timing?
Live reps are going to help as he grows, but give him the tools to start developing his approach to timing.
And dear lord don’t yell anything mechanical when he is at the plate. Ha
My son does the same. He trusts you to throw him something to hit. He doesn’t trust the other kid.
We switched a lot of practices to player vs player. Grounders they gotta get the runner Hitters gotta hit off live pitching
What age group? Do you mean live pitching from a coach or player? We always hit off of coach pitching at every level. I agree that live pitching is beneficial.
10/11 We do coach and kid pitch. They’re too comfortable with coach pitch and I personally don’t think it translates to kid pitch in games so I do have kids pitch. Also helps the pitchers. Win win
It's just what kids do, as soon as it's game time and there's another kid on the mound, they just go back to what they were doing before. Takes a lot of time, try to get him to work on his adjustments in team practice when there's a kid on the mound.
Specificity is king in all skill development research. You need to get as game like reps as possible teeing off on dad in the backyard is going to have diminishing returns. It is a huge issue in baseball because it is one of the hardest sports to get game like reps. Don’t get me wrong I have my qualms about travel ball but it does do a very good job of skill development because kids who play face a ton of live pitching.
Specificity is why we put my kid in a pretty easy fall ball league. Lots of low pressure real game reps fixed his lunging problem that was only happening in games.
You can't practice games. The best practice for getting used to games is to have more games. I usually try to have 1 or 2 scrimmages before our game schedule to get kids used to actual games.
He’s 9, just keep spending time with him practicing and enjoying the time together as well as teaching him to love the game, try his best, and that failure is just a part of the game as it is in life. The baseball skill will come with experience but nothing can replace the memories you’ll create with him through this beautiful game!
He's one of those kids where he stops to fall out of love with it when there's not instant gratification (so, a normal kid). I love playing with him, just trying to translate that fun to on the field.
The thing is in BP kids swing because they know it’s going to be a good pitch. They get ready early and let it fly. Come game time many get into pick a good pitch and hit it. What they do is try to see the ball, decide if it’s a strike then get their swing going and they are too late or have a defensive swing. Every pitch they need to be swinging till they decide they don’t want to.
Agree. the thinking on every pitch has to be: Yes, Yes, No - or Yes, Yes, YES
My son does this too, I think when your playing with him he is just having fun. But they put pressure on themselves in game time
Yeah we have a very vocal parent crowd that keeps screaming "EYE ON THE BALL" or "NO PRESSURE" and I don't think helps at all. When he's just pretending he's Ohtani he's very loose.
Those parents needs to shut up.
Some people have labeled it "ball anxiety" they feel pressure to not strike out, so their hand leak down hips leak forward, trying to just not miss the ball. It's more mental than physical. One option is to encourage him to either strike out or smash the ball. This helped my doughter stop "half swining." Talk about the idea of trying to take the practice swing I to a game, even of they think it won't work. They need to build trust in the practice swing. We talk a lot about the process being more important than the result. You took a bad swing and hit the ball. That's a fail. Good swing and struck out. That's a win. May need to sacrifice short-term gratification for long-term success.
I know my son has said he gets nervous in front of alot of people at games.
My son said the same thing. Thing is, after several games he got over it and became more confident. I think this is likely what most kids experience. They do great when getting reps with dad but when game time comes they fold like a chair. Just takes a little bit of time before kids gain the confidence to crush it at the plate
He probably trusts you not to hit him, but not other kids. So he's waiting until he's sure he pitch is not going toward him before thinking about swinging.
Give him the chin music in the backyard lol...kidding but what I do is warn him him that some pitches are coming inside, throw it lighter when using tennis balls and hit him in the legs or something just to get the point across that pitchers at this age are never going to give you the perfect pitch to hit. Seems to work....he's not nearly afraid of the ball as some kids are
Sometimes seeing too much of dad pitching makes it hard to adjust to new pitchers with different arm angles, wildness, speeds, etc.
Kids don't trust kids not to hit them ime
Very much this. Every pitch from dad is perfect speed, thigh high and down the middle. 8-year-old Timmy put the first pitch an inch over your son’s head, spiked the second one a foot in front of the plate, and now he’s got no clue where the third one is going.
You fuckin know Timmy too??
I was a Timmy, never knew I set so many precedents.
fuckin' timmy!
You haven’t seen this guy pitch.
That is why I hit my son with pitches (That’s a joke)
Timing is everything.
Just means he’s stuck in his own head at game time. Best remedy for that is real reps, and a focus on the process not the results
Do NOT pressure him on hits or runs. Focus on the process, from seeing what the pitcher is doing before he’s up, to following a ritual when he’s in the hole and then on deck, to focusing on form, vision, and decision-making at the plate. Congratulate him when he follows the process. Results take care of themselves when players learn to truly immerse themselves in the process. But when they focus on the results (especially what might/will happen, or what did happen), they lose sight of the present. Along with that, they lose confidence, and the results suffer. It cannot be overstated how mental baseball is. Have patience with him and treat it as an athlete’s ultimate lesson in mindfulness.
I'm very much trying to be process oriented. We practice a four count, the four being the swing. If it's not there, hold back.
Ask him these questions. 1. When you're at the plate do you hear the crowd or can you focus ok? 2. Are you looking for whether a pitch is a ball or a strike before you swing? 3. When the pitch is thrown, when are you deciding its ok to swing? What you are trying to determine is whether its nerves or approach. If it's nerves then you can address that by just letting him know you love him no matter the outcome (which I'm sure you do) and that you just love seeing him play and have fun and none of it really matters. If it's approach you can tell him to have a yes-yes-no approach. If he says that he's waiting to see if it's a strike before swinging then it's too late. He should assume the pitcher is going to throw a great ball for him to hit and only stop if it ends up being a bad pitch. Decide that you want to swing until you don't. Don't have the approach of "no swing no swing - oh no it's a strike, now I swing". Approach should be - yes I'm swinging, yes, its a good pitch, and then no it's not. A hittable pitch and a strike are two different things. There are pitches that are strikes that are not hittable and pitches that are balls but are hittable. We look for hittable not strikes. I don't care if you swing at a pitch that would've been a ball as long as you swing hard.
He’s a kid. It’s pretty normal. He knows when you pitch, it’s for him to hit. Now he’s got another kid pitching and he’s probably in the box thinking “Is it a ball, a strike, in the dirt, faster than I’m used to, too slow, at me, at my head?”
Kids do it. Adults do it. Everyone does it. The most important part of hitting isn’t mechanics, it’s reading pitches that are being thrown for the sole purpose of getting you out, and deciding to swing or not. It’s easy to swing hard in practice when you know it’s gonna be a strike, or if you miss or pop out it doesn’t matter. I find the best way to fix this is to add competitive intent to practice for it to translate into games. My favorite method is play whiffleball but with a game bat. Yeah, the ball is going to get mangled, but the balls are cheap. You really have to track a whiffle ball to hit it, even more so to square it up and hit it hard. I find this translates to games extremely well.
This is what I do but with a smush ball that has more weight than a whiffleball. My 8 year old has learned that dad can be all over the place too.
Very common with kids. They get nervous and go up to the plate thinking it’s going to be a ball and are indecisive about whether to swing. Live AB’s against other kids is the best way to get past it.
There is a kid on my kid’s team that is like this. If you soft toss or front toss him he probably has the best most aggressive swing on the team. He absolutely crushes it. In a game or taking full speed practice he he’s the slowest, latest, most tentative swing ever.
Ask him who his favorite big leaguer is . Show him his mlb hitters home runs compilation and point out the focus has on the pitcher and the ball . Point out how the batter is focused on crushing the ball and focuses like when ur about to crush a piñata. Then point out how he swings with intent and force and focus . Hes not looking at crowd or his dad , or the girls (they laugh ) but only at the ball . I tell my 9yo son these things and remind him before he bats I say "hey kid let's see Ohtani up there !" Or Ask him his favorite animal. (Lion for example ) And point out a lion is strong and pushes fear aside and owns the ground he's own and doesn't back out and intent on the kill . And Teach him how to turn away from a bad pitch and how to get hit . And tell him if he gets hit by pitch he gets Panda Express or some other reward , if he owns the ground and turns from pitch and doesn't bail out like other kids . And remind him he's the man .
The best thing is seeing pitches from kids in a game-like practice. But thats a tall order to see enough good pitches to get in enoigh work with the whole team. One thing that seemed to help my daughter and nephews the most when they moved to kid pitch was getting on a pitching machine. The machine at our gym is not super consistent, so it forces them to read the ball because it isn't in the same spot every time. Also, my daughter got hit three times in 6 games so she kind of had that band aid ripped off early and got over that fear. That seemed to be a big deal as well with all of them. When they see that it may hurt but it isn't the worst thing in the world. Especially when you get on base.
What helped me is "gamifying" practice. Make it measurable. For example, even just doing tee work... make it a game that all your hits to up the middle, right field etc. I used to do this and track results in Google sheets and it helped my mindset when playing games....
Baseball will teach you a lot of life lessons and the #1 thing in my book is patience. It'll come, things will click. Don't stress too much about the games, I don't even talk to my kid for 24 hours after the game has completed. The want is there and that's all that matters. I've been coaching for 10 years and it really doesn't start clicking for them until 11-12.
Hitting is a hard thing to do, you as the pitcher has to simulate a kid pitcher when they are throwing strikes. You pitching is also putting you as the coach in a horrible position to correct batting flaws. You might have to get another kid in the mix and they can end by pitching to eachother, this also helps you coach. Timidness is also a sign of not practicing enough. 1000 reps to develop a skill and 10000 reps to correct a flaw. A little league age kid can probably do 200 swings a day, and 1000 swings a week. There are also quality reps vs less than quality reps, how many can a 9 yr old actually obtain? Tee work obviously is the best way to mechanically improve your technique, but also gadgets and pitching machines to isolate an issue and keep the batting practice (200 swings a day,1000 swings a week) fresh.
Don't practice every day for one. Two, games create nerves, that's simply something he will have to get over. He needs to develop confidence at the plate and that comes through games. Talk less about it as well. Post game regardless of play keep a cool demeanor and later on ask him what he thinks he did wrong at his at bats and let him think about what happened. Once he tells you, that will be your focus for the next time you two practice hitting.
Another mentioned it but do not underestimate timing and its impact. If your kid has a decent swing and mechanics, timing is critical. Put differently, when you work with him at home… soft toss, etc. they get a ton of reps at that drill versus live, but they also REALLY get the timing down. You say you like routines: work with him on his process to the plate including on deck, pitching changes etc. How is he approaching timing? Live reps are going to help as he grows, but give him the tools to start developing his approach to timing. And dear lord don’t yell anything mechanical when he is at the plate. Ha