One of the most common problems I see with hitting is an affliction called “bat drag.” It occurs when the elbow on the back arm gets ahead of the hands during the swing. This puts you into a weak position, with the bat flat and stuck way behind. As the body turns, the bat has to be pulled from that back position all the way to the front. As you might expect, this makes the bat late getting through the zone.

It’s not that difficult to cure. It just takes a little time. Step one is to maintain the “box” that is formed with the shoulders and the elbows. Bat drag usually begins when, on the beginning of the turn, the hands push back and the lead arm straightens out. As the shoulders begin to turn the hands remain back. But the hitter knows she should be moving forward, so the back elbow starts moving forward instead of the hands. At that point it’s going to be tough to get a good, quick, compact swing.

To fix it, set the bat down and grab your shirt by the back shoulder. Practice taking “swings” by striding and turning while hanging on to the shirt. Be very aware of what your back elbow is doing. Once you start getting the hang of it, move to the bat. Go slowly at first, then gradually pick up speed. If you can do it in a mirror, or video yourself doing it, it will help you check to make sure you’re on the right track.

From there, move to the tee, then either to soft toss, the pitching machine, or live pitching. Feel the back elbow come more into the side than past the hands, then extend through.

It may take some work to get it fixed. But it’s worth it. You’ll pick up bat speed, shorten your swing — and most importantly start hitting the heck out of the ball!

One of the most frustrating things for both coaches and parents is watching your player kick butt in the batting cages, ripping balls left and right, only to go into a game and wimp out. You know they can hit. You’ve seen it. But they don’t. Why?

A lot of it comes down to consequences. In the batting cages, there are no consequences. If you miss a ball, you get another one. There’s no runners on base to be brought around, no coaches or parents screaming encouragement and/or advice, no win or loss at stake.

In the game, however, there are all kinds of consequences. And of course, with softball being a game built on failure, those consequences can be dire. You can strike out leaving runners on base. You can pop up, or ground into a double play. The more a player thinks about it, the more fearsome it becomes. And the more fear of consequences there is, the more players start tensing up, swinging to avoid a mistake rather than make a play.

It can be difficult to overcome, but not impossible. The key is to encourage hitters to be aggressive and not worry about outcomes. Instead of trying to avoid mistakes, they need to go into each at bat with the intent to hit the ball hard, consequences be damned. Coaches need to be sure they create an atmosphere where hitters can focus on doing their best without worrying about being yelled at for “failing.” Remember that even a strikeout can be a great at-bat if the hitter has taken the right approach.

Keep hitters focused on swinging the bat, and playing the game one pitch at a time. Soon you’ll see that great batting cage swing out on the field.

It’s an inescapable fact that the earlier in an athletic movement a mistake occurs, the greater the effect on everything else it will have.

That’s what is puzzling about the tendency for fastpitch softball hitters to flatten out their bats at the start of their swings. I see it a lot with girls. The second they begin their swings, their first move with their hands is to lower the bat head until it is parallel with the ground, or nearly so.

That’s a terrible mistake. You need to maintain a roughly 45 degree angle on the bat as you begin to rotate into the ball. Otherwise it’s a pretty random chance that you will be able to get the head of the bat to the ball. Instead, you’ll enter a condition called “bat drag” which is just as bad as it sounds. You’ll be pulling the knob forward, but the bat will not be getting into the hitting zone. If it’s a low pitch it’s unlikely the hitter will be able to get to it.

If a hitter is striking out a lot, or hitting wimpy little ground balls, start by looking to see if she’s flattening her bat before launch. Help her maintain the proper angle and you’ll see a lot more well-hit balls.

This is a companion piece to my previous post. The longer you hang around this game, the more you’ll learn all the “helpful” cliches. One of these is “keep your head in” or the negative version “you’re pulling your head out.” Generally speaking it’s true, but the statement ignores the root cause.

The head pulls out because the body stands straight up and the front shoulder pulls out. But no one ever tells hitters to keep their front shoulders in. If they keep their weight in and let the front shoulder get knocked out by the back shoulder on the swing, the head will stay in where it belongs. And the hitter will be able to see the ball just fine, because the eyes will be closer to the ball, instead of moving away from it.

Had a chance to work with a couple of girls today on their hitting. It was two sisters, one of whom will be playing for me for the first time this summer. She played on my daughter’s HS team last season so I’ve been wanting to work with her anyway. Today serendipity prevailed — she was coming in as I was walking out of Grand Slam after teaching some pitching clinics. I watched her bat a round in the cage, then called her over.

I saw her doing what I see a lot of hitters do — swinging from the heels. She started from a good stance. But after that it was all hands. Her feet were locked in place as though Guido and the boys had cast them in concrete before throwing her in the river. This, in turn, caused a host of other problems. Her first move was also a problem — she’d drop her hands straight down, putting her in a weak position.

Being a natural busybody and serial coach, I called her over and asked if she’d like some help. She said yes, and so we went off to the side to get to work. I had her work on starting her hips rotating before moving her hands, and leading the hips before the upper body. We worked on keeping the hands tied to the back shoulder at the start of the swing, and keeping the bat on an angle instead of dropping it down parallel to the ground. Finally, we worked on trying to keep her weight/balance in toward the plate instead of winding up falling away from it.

It was just one impromptu “lesson” but it seemed to help. She started making more contact, and hitting through the ball better. Of course, now the key will be if she keeps it going. I hope she does, because it will help our offense in the summer as well as helping her individually.

Incidentally, her sister was doing many of the same things so I worked with her while I was there as well. Her sister seemed to get it as well. She’s playing travel ball for the first time this summer too, with our 14U team, so hopefully she’ll stick with it as well.

It’s amazing what you can do with a half hour and a willing student.

Once again I was up at Grand Slam USA for the afternoon. I was there for pitching lessons, but in between I was wandering around aimlessly as I am wont to do.

In one of the cages was a girl working on bunting. She assume a good position, and looked ready to lay it down. But each time as the pitch came in, she dropped the barrel of her bat below the handle and stabbed at the ball. Almost without exception the pitch went foul, or at least as foul as a bunt can go in a batting cage. Often they also went up, creating a little pop-up.

Keeping the barrel of the bat above the hands is essential to getting the bunt to go toward the ground. It definitely makes it easier to hit the top of the ball, which is what you need to do to get the bunt down. Dropping the barrel tends to make you hit the bottom of the ball.

Here again I make the case for bunting with the hands together. The girl was using split hands, which as I’ve said before tends to make it easier for hitters to drop the barrel. I’ve observed that phenomenon time and time again.

Ironically, she did use hands together for one technique. She would show bunt, then pull back to swing away, hands still up the handle. This makes no sense to me either. If you’re going to show bunt you need to show it the same way you actually bunt. Otherwise you’re not fooling anyone. It was odd — show the bunt, then full pull back with the hands up the bat, then swing away. Seems to me like all you’re going to do from there is ground out and not very well. People sure teach some strange things.

I tried to get this topic going before but so far no one has posted. Seriously, if you have an opinion on anything by all means leave a comment! I may not agree but that’s ok. We’re all in this together, and we all get smarter when we’re forced to think through our positions on various topics. All I ask is that you be civil.

Anyway, I was up at Grand Slam the other day watching a couple of kids bunt in the batting cages and was reminded of one of the big reasons I prefer hands-together over hands-apart bunting. (The two are actually girls who play for me, but who have fallen under the evil influence of their HS coaches on this topic. )

When you bunt split hands, there seems to be a strong tendency to drop the head of the bat, especially when going after a low pitch. It’s sort of like holding the proverbial 10-foot pole. If you try to do the same thing with a hands-together grip you have to work much harder to drop the bat head because of the way it feels around the wrists. I’m not saying it can’t be done because I’ve seen it. But when your hands are farther apart it’s much easier to let that bat head drop down.