Hitting down on the ball

My advice would be to tell him to go back to what he was doing.Doubt he will get benched for getting base hits.

Welcome jpk3!

Don’t you just love baseball coaches? I think there is confusion on the whole “hitting down” on the ball concept and many coaches confuse this with being aggressive with the front side and getting out through the ball. MLB batters have a flat to slightly up plane and are on plane for a long long time.

If you can post some video some of the batting experts around here can give you some advice….Afterwards an argument on some trivial aspect of this swing will break out your son can be honored with a thread with 200 posts and 10,000 reads…

In practice hit down on the ball and creat backspin to make the coach happy. In game, hit like normal, .. line drives.

Have your son tell the coach he's wrong....It's time, someone needs to set a precedent with this coach.....

Good idea BlueDog, your right....but.... How long do you think he will be on the team when the 16YO kid tells his coach he is full of it.

Actually he could suggest he look at some MLB swings in slow motion and ask him to point out how the batter is hitting down on the ball.

Thanks for the info. I agree BFO telling the coach he is wrong will only make the proble worse. So the best way to hit is to have more of a flat swing with a little upper cut to it to drive the ball Is that right? Really want to get me son back on the right track. I can't believe how messed up he got by trying to do this style. Does hitting this way actually work for anyone? What is the best way to get out of it? Tee work, soft toss, or just a lot of cuts in the cage?

If you can not hit and you can run then hit down on the ball and run like hel. Otherwise run like hel from this approach. It is a hitting theory that many HS coaches teach. It is an approach to put as many balls in play on the ground as possible in order to give your team a better chance to win "in theory."

Fly balls take one play to record an out. Catch the ball
Strike outs take no play to record an out.
Ground balls require it to be hit where it can be fielded.
If hit where they can be fielded someone must field it.
They must make a good throw.
Someone must catch it.
Before you reach the bag.

Hence teaching your team to hit down on the ball is an attempt to put balls in play. This idea that you hit down on the ball to create backspin in order to create carry is pure nonsense.

Get on the plane and drive the ball. See the ball deep get the bat in the zone and keep it in the zone and extend.

It is a tough situation when a kids coach is trying to teach them something that will hurt their ability to develop as a hitter. Very tough situation. The best way to deal with this is to produce with your swing and hope he leaves you alone because you are producing with what you are doing. Chopping down on the baseball is the most ignorant hitting approach and it is taught at many High Schools. Good luck

There is a 2011 high school player who is extremely talented. He can do everything very well except he has a swing that swings down on the ball. Until he changes this it is impossible to project him as a hitter.

If and when a coach gets a hold of this kid and teaches him how to hit, we might find out that he is a first round type. Until then who knows, what he's doing now doesn't work at a higher level.

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Originally posted by PGStaff:
There is a 2011 high school player who is extremely talented. He can do everything very well except he has a swing that swings down on the ball. Until he changes this it is impossible to project him as a hitter.

If and when a coach gets a hold of this kid and teaches him how to hit, we might find out that he is a first round type. Until then who knows, what he's doing now doesn't work at a higher level.

And the longer you wait the harder it is to change. It might be time to buy the coach The Science of Hitting. Good luck.

Thanks coach May. That sums it up nicely. As I said earlier that is exactly what my son has been doing. Putting the ball in play on the ground, with very few hits and a ton of ground outs. How can anybody teach this when it is so anti productive? We worked last night off the tee for a good hour just to try to get him to stop chopping down. We made some progress. Tough to change after thousands of swings the wrong way. When he turns how should this hands be? I'm trying to get him to have them go a little more of a rounded ark to the ball, trying to hit it square. From what Ive read here that seems to be what is most suggested. Any other suggestions,tips or drills will be greatly appreciated. Thanks for the help.

They teach it because it is productive. Its team productive at the high school level. You dont recruit in hs. It is so much easier to teach everyone the same thing than to teach each hitter as an individual. So they clone them. They teach them to all chop wood. Its productive at the high school level because it limits fly balls. Fly balls are easy outs. It produces tons of fielding opportunities. And at the hs level some will get through. Some will get booted and some will be thrown away. So they teach it because they believe it gives them the best chance to win with the talent they have.

What it does is allows the poor hitter to put the ball in play on a more frequent basis. It also destroys the hitter with potential to be a very good hitter. Since more hitters fall into the first category - there you go. Its kind of like the youth coach that says "Hold the ball and run it back it." Yes that will allow you to win more games because you wont throw it away and allow runs to score. But it kills the kids ability to actually learn how to throw and catch in a game situation.

I am not trying to bash hs coaches. All of them do not teach this. But many do. I have seen it first hand. And I have heard this philosophy preached at clinics in the past. And it made me sick to my stomach. And the previous poster is 100% correct. The longer you wait the harder it is to change. And is some cases it can never be totally reversed once truly engrained in the hitter.

Are we on the right track with having more of an arked swing to the ball and hitting it square? Ive seen some posts that talk about the benifits of using the inside batter tool. Will that help with this type of problem? Anything to speed up the correction process.

I think there are some really good guys here that can help you out. I am not very good at all with explaining what I teach on a keyboard. I believe in getting in the slot and getting on plane with the baseball. A short stroke that allows you to see it deep and then long in the zone with extension through the baseball.

What I do believe is the hitter has to have the intention to mash. He has to have the desire to drive the baseball.

I am sure some guys will come by here and give you some good advice and they are pretty good at explaining in detail some things that can help. I have to be there , see the swing and then put my hands on it. Good luck

quote:

Originally posted by Coach_May:
If you can not hit and you can run then hit down on the ball and run like hel. Otherwise run like hel from this approach. It is a hitting theory that many HS coaches teach. It is an approach to put as many balls in play on the ground as possible It is an approach to put as many balls in play on the ground as possible in order to give your team a better chance to win "in theory."

Fly balls take one play to record an out. Catch the ball
Strike outs take no play to record an out.
Ground balls require it to be hit where it can be fielded.
If hit where they can be fielded someone must field it.
They must make a good throw.
Someone must catch it.
Before you reach the bag.

Hence teaching your team to hit down on the ball is an attempt to put balls in play. This idea that you hit down on the ball to create backspin in order to create carry is pure nonsense.

Get on the plane and drive the ball. See the ball deep get the bat in the zone and keep it in the zone and extend.

It is a tough situation when a kids coach is trying to teach them something that will hurt their ability to develop as a hitter. Very tough situation. The best way to deal with this is to produce with your swing and hope he leaves you alone because you are producing with what you are doing. Chopping down on the baseball is the most ignorant hitting approach and it is taught at many High Schools. Good luck

You are right and I suspect when the new bats come into play in 2012,these same coaches are going to be doing alot of research on how to get the ball in the air for line drives.

quote:

Originally posted by jpk3:
Are we on the right track with having more of an arked swing to the ball and hitting it square? Ive seen some posts that talk about the benifits of using the inside batter tool. Will that help with this type of problem? Anything to speed up the correction process.

Without having any other drills or techniques that you have training and understanding with yourself,I believe the insider bat is an excellent training aid and would be beneficial for your son.

I am just a dad myself but I did go through hitting class with my son and learned some of the Epstein approach to hitting so I can continue his teachings on my own.

My son had a very good BA in his league this year and led the 11-12 year old league in homeruns as an 11 year old(5 homeruns) with few strikeouts and his all star coach still tried to change what he did at the plate.

The first tournament out,my son did what he had been doing all season and batted over .600 and 2 homeruns(1 was an opposite field shot off a curveball) to help his team win a state title and his coach was still arrogant enough to keep trying to change what he was doing.By the last game at national regionals,my son had lost most of his power and was a groundball contact hitter so I feel your pain.

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Originally posted by tfox:

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Originally posted by jpk3:
Are we on the right track with having more of an arked swing to the ball and hitting it square? Ive seen some posts that talk about the benifits of using the inside batter tool. Will that help with this type of problem? Anything to speed up the correction process.

Without having any other drills or techniques that you have training and understanding with yourself,I believe the insider bat is an excellent training aid and would be beneficial for your son.

I am just a dad myself but I did go through hitting class with my son and learned some of the Epstein approach to hitting so I can continue his teachings on my own.

My son had a very good BA in his league this year and led the 11-12 year old league in homeruns as an 11 year old(5 homeruns) with few strikeouts and his all star coach still tried to change what he did at the plate.

quote:

The first tournament out,my son did what he had been doing all season and batted over .600 and 2 homeruns(1 was an opposite field shot off a curveball) to help his team win a state title and his coach was still arrogant enough to keep trying to change what he was doing.By the last game at national regionals,my son had lost most of his power and was a groundball contact hitter so I feel your pain.

Have you been able to get back to your orignal swing? Never heard of the Epstein approach. Sounds like it is very effective. Thanks for the info on the inside batter.

That was his last ball games but he did get the opportunity the last couple of weeks as a 7th grader to workout with the high school team and I noticed he was right back to HIS old form in the cages.He has very specific drills that he is able to do,even by himself at this point that helps with his mechanics.

Do a google search for Mike Epstein rotational hitting.

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Chopping down on the baseball is the most ignorant hitting approach and it is taught at many High Schools.

Once again Coach May has hit the ball sqarely with the sweet spot on the plane of the pitch.

quote:

Originally posted by tfox:
That was his last ball games but he did get the opportunity the last couple of weeks as a 7th grader to workout with the high school team and I noticed he was right back to HIS old form in the cages.He has very specific drills that he is able to do,even by himself at this point that helps with his mechanics.

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[/QUOTE]Tfox, I looked it up. Did your son go through the class? How much did it help with his swing and power? You mentioned drills that he can do on this own. Did he get them from the course? As with most sights they give you a little info. then hope you jump in. Just want to make sure it is a quality thing and not just another gimmick. There are plenty of those out there.

Sorry about the quote lines. I can't seem to figure out how it works.

You really need to find someone he can work with individually. www.webball.com has some drills and books you can look into also. It is a good resource.

quote:

Originally posted by BOF:
You really need to find someone he can work with individually. www.webball.com has some drills and books you can look into also. It is a good resource.

I agree that an individual coach is the way to go.My son had an instructor that we went to together and it helped with his power to all fields.He was already a good hitter and had already hit a few homeruns so this philosophy didn't make a hitter where there was not 1.It did make for a more compact and versital hitter.


The bat on the shoulder and torque drills are done before every game.When he goes to practice with his team and they have them do stuff off the T,he can go back to these drills without my supervision.

[jpk3 wrote]I looked it up. Did your son go through the class? How much did it help with his swing and power? You mentioned drills that he can do on this own. Did he get them from the course? As with most sights they give you a little info. then hope you jump in. Just want to make sure it is a quality thing and not just another gimmick. There are plenty of those out there.[/quote]

JPK - we are fortunate to live not far from Mike Epstein and my son goes to his house for lessons (cage in the basement). Actually, Jake Epstein works with my son, although Mike will stop by and offer insights from time to time. Their approach is so common sense based - match the swing plane to the incoming pitch. The slow-mo analysis of students and proven MLB swings provides excellent comparisons and teaching points. Yes, there is a hard-sell aspect to the website; they are in it as a business. Nonetheless, they do a GREAT job and the results are very much worth it. In particular, the teaching methods that Mike has developed are clear and easy to comprehend and lead to easy drills that can be done at home or before BP. Disclaimer - I have no relationship with Epstein Hitting other than being a very satisfied client.

The right swing depends on the player and how the player projects. Most players are best suited to a line drive swing with a slight bias toward the ground ball when they don't make full contact. Kids with power are more effective biasing the line drive swing a bit more toward getting the ball in the air. Kids with enough power to hit a significant number of home runs should bias the swing toward more of an uppercut. Hitters with little or no power and lots of speed should be trying to hit line drives that hit the ground before getting to the infielders. Even Williams said there are some hitters who should swing down on the ball.

In my own, admittedly unqualified opinion, every hitter should be trying to hit line drives and the angle should vary a bit depending on how much power they have or project to have. It is really a trial and error thing and it can change as a player matures and faces different types of pitching.

My suggestion is to have your son think of hitting lower line drives to satisfy the coach and hopefully not mess up his swing. BTW, one hits the bottom part of the ball resulting in backspin more often by swinging slightly up than by swinging slightly down.

Tfox,
BTW, my guess is that the HS coaches pushing the grounders will do so even more with the new bats because fewer HS players will have home run power especially given that the current crop has grown up using rocket launchers.

Thanks eyeontheball. Nice to know that their program works and you are a satisfied customer. Unfortunately we can't get lessons with Jake. We are on the east coast. I did find a few certified coaches who teach thier methods through their wed site. Im in the process of contacting them. Hope they are as good as Mike and Jake. As you said their approach really makes sense. I know one thing, hitting down on the ball doesn't work. At least not for my son. Thanks again for your input.

quote:

Originally posted by CADad:
The right swing depends on the player and how the player projects. Most players are best suited to a line drive swing with a slight bias toward the ground ball when they don't make full contact. Kids with power are more effective biasing the line drive swing a bit more toward getting the ball in the air. Kids with enough power to hit a significant number of home runs should bias the swing toward more of an uppercut. Hitters with little or no power and lots of speed should be trying to hit line drives that hit the ground before getting to the infielders. Even Williams said there are some hitters who should swing down on the ball.

In my own, admittedly unqualified opinion, every hitter should be trying to hit line drives and the angle should vary a bit depending on how much power they have or project to have. It is really a trial and error thing and it can change as a player matures and faces different types of pitching.

My suggestion is to have your son think of hitting lower line drives to satisfy the coach and hopefully not mess up his swing. BTW, one hits the bottom part of the ball resulting in backspin more often by swinging slightly up than by swinging slightly down.

Tfox, BTW, my guess is that the HS coaches pushing the grounders will do so even more with the new bats because fewer HS players will have home run power especially given that the current crop has grown up using rocket launchers.

You may be right but even our high school coach,who also is a proponent of Epstein teachings seems to think the new bats will hurt smaller schools because they tend to be the ones that are swing down schools and have fewer power hitters.Those ground balls imo will just be much easier to field now than they once were and as with any swing,line drives are where it is at,regardless of homeruns.

Only time will tell

jpk3,

FWIW- My son is 11, and has been off/on,and not very disciplined about working on the Epstein stuff that we learned from the DVD "Do We teach What We See?". (mostly just the torque drill) Even considering this, it has helped to some degree. If he put more into it I know he'd get a lot more out of it, and I can say that everything that I've seen from Epstein just makes sense.

Also, one time I had a question and left a voice mail with the number from the website. Jake called me back in a day or 2 and was very helpful and a first class gentleman.

I guess I am a little confused. I do teach my hitters to hit down through the baseball. Like Coach_May said, I also teach my kids to be short to the zone and long through it. My experience has been that players who started hitting down through the ball conistently started hitting for more power. They really just started hitting the ball harder in general. We also emphasis staying on top of the ball. A good friend of mine played five year in the Detroit Tigers Organization and he taught me a lot of what I teach as far as hitting goes. Is there a chance that the term hitting down through the ball is often understood by some to hit it down? I teach it more like a chop as opposed to driving a nail with a hammer. I am really looking for insight on this. Thanks.

The swing begins down. If you think in terms of what the barrel of the bat does (begins well above the strike zone)then the barrel of the bat obviously must come down. The hands ,too, go slightly down at the beginning of the swing. This is irrefutable.

The plane of the swing levels out-maybe slightly up- as the bat approaches the ball. And then the followthrough may be level or up depending on the location of the pitch.

As long as a hitter can distinguish that the swing begins down, but does not continue down to the ground, then "down" is definitely a worthwhile concept.

IMO the idea of staying on top of the ball all started when someone caught on to the fact that most fastballs are missed below the ball. That was before there were so many sinker ball pitchers.

Problem is that at the same time most pitches missed on breaking balls are missed above the ball.

So if a hitter were to actually stay above the ball he would become just another victim of the many who didn't make it because they couldn't hit the curve ball.

The theory of chopping down lacks successful examples. I think some believe it creates more back spin.

Obviously the barrell has to drop initially, but only so the hitter can get it close to on plane with the pitch. The term for this is "squaring up" the ball. The best bat/ball contact is pretty much a head on collision! This is why we see so many high finishes. Also there is no margin for error when chopping down.

Most every pitch is on a downward angle to the plate, I'm amazed that so many people think the way to hit is chopping down at a ball that is going downward. We have told hitters facing a good fastball to stay on top. At the same time we have told hitters facing a good breaking ball to stay below the ball. This is just a mental thing rather than anything physical. But never make contact while chopping down.

"Hitting down" is a bad myth told by most coaches. There's nothing down about it.

The plane of the bat (heading up) matches the plane of the pitch (heading down).

The ball must be struck in the center or just below center in order to go up. If you hit the top of the ball, it must go down.

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IMO the idea of staying on top of the ball all started when someone caught on to the fact that most fastballs are missed below the ball. That was before there were so many sinker ball pitchers.

PG; I agree but going a step further it is relative to the era when the high fastball was used more. Good hitters like fastballs and good power hitters love high fastballs. The cue "stay on top" in that instance, is just a reminder to not dip/drop down (with knee and hips) as your first move to the ball or it will be by you whereas to elevate a lower pitch hitters drop to get to the plane of the baseball if they want to elevate the ball in that particular situation.

So match happens from the initial set-up, where the hands and barrel are above the baseball "strike" pitch, to the movements required to match the bat barrel to the arrival point of the center of the baseball in the strike zone. Although the barrel must "move down" to get the ball you wouldn't want someone teaching to "swing down."

I like how I once heard Barry Bonds describe hitting; "it's like catching a baseball with your glove except that you are catching it with the sweetspot of the bat."

Some people have gotten the right idea here. It is about terminology. It's not that the coach is really trying to get guys to hit "down on the ball". It is the fact that he is trying (I think) to get guys to be "short to the ball". I don't know that anybody is attempting to get a player to hit ground balls all of the time. If so, I disagree with the philosophy. However, it is proven and shown in video, pics, etc on the web that good hitters work in a "downhill" swing plane to get "to" the ball but the barrell must stay in the zone at a level plane. "Short to the ball, long through it" or "down to the ball, level extension through it" usually gets the point across with the swing plane that successful hitters generally have. In order to backspin the baseball (which by the way, obviously makes it travel further) a player must consistently work down hill to the baseball, contact top palm up, bottom palm down, and keep extension through the ball on that level plane. So much of hitting instruction comes down to terminology and handling each hitter in his own way. An absolute level or slight uphill swing plane as some have said would mean that a hitter would have to "guess" as to where the pitch enters the hitting zone. Do you want your hitter starting with his hands at his back hip? Doesn't make sense. So.... you have to work downhill to be short to the ball, then the plane changes through contact and extension. I see it in my own head, but it's hard to put in absolute words. A loopy or uphill swing doesn't work to stay on the ball and make it carry.

I just posted this link to an article I wrote that uses a lot of slow motion clips to explain why swinging down on the ball is junk. It seems like most of us agree with this concept, but this may provide you some more ammo to fully understand how the bat should come through the zone.

Swing Down on the ball article

This pretty much says it all - Ted Williams 1971. No MLB hitter swings down on the ball.



This swing has nothing to do with "through the ball" or any of that nonsense. The swing plane is determined the moment the hands start moving from the shoulder. Too soon, it's "level/down".

There are a ton of good tips in that book you reference on Williams. Some good visuals too!