luv baseball posted:I advocated that my son not be afraid to take pitches that were tough to get good swings on early in the count.
The approach that worked best for him was to go to the plate with a 2-0 mentality. He would look fastball away since that is what you get about 75% of the time. If the pitcher left it over the plate swing away and take your best cut. But if it is at the edge or off the plate or he runs one in then take.
Bottom line try to eliminate options and focus on getting a specific pitch in a spot you are looking for. It helped that he was a good enough hitter that with 2 strikes he could expand, defend the plate and go the other way and be dangerous.
First ball/fastball is a reasonable approach as long as it is balanced with making sure it is a decent pitch to hit. Swinging at fastballs for the sake of swinging at a fastball is a bad idea IMO.
I agree. You shouldn't swing at a pitch on the "black" 0-0 but if it is a fat one hit it. However there are coaches who generally discourage first pitch or even first strike hitting. Many little league coaches still say wait until the pitcher has thrown a strike.
however I think even in MLB there is now a reverse trend, some top hitters like Donaldson for example swing a lot at the first pitch if it is a good one because that often is the best pitch and MLB pitchers now are trained to throw a fastball down the pipe 0-0 to get ahead.
However there are still some hitters who almost never swing at the first pitch, I read that mauer has swung at only 10 percent of first pitches over his career.