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nabaseball
8 Posts |
 Posted - 05/18/2013 : 08:54:44
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| My 11u son does great when the pitcher throws hard, but if we come up against a lollipop pitcher he's not as successful. I find he mostly pops it up to the left side, he's right handed. Any ideas, advice, or comments? |
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in_the_know
985 Posts |
Posted - 05/18/2013 : 10:16:23
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| Scoot as far forward in the box as you can. Concentrate in driving those pitches right back up the middle. |
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nastycurve
244 Posts |
Posted - 05/19/2013 : 22:18:29
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| take the approach like its a younger child pitching, one your son would dominate... If he looks at it like it was an 8-9 year old pitching, he would probably tear the cover off the ball... Tell him to be patient, let it get there and then line drive it. |
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christheump
351 Posts |
Posted - 05/20/2013 : 08:28:51
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| He is probably swinging out of his shoes......and has thrown swing mechanics out the window |
Edited by - christheump on 05/20/2013 09:00:34 |
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AA17Dad
211 Posts |
Posted - 05/20/2013 : 09:25:26
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| I use to lob balls underhanded, softball style, way up over mines head some times just to make him wait on pitches. |
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zwndad
170 Posts |
Posted - 05/20/2013 : 10:51:26
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| Our teams have used wiffle balls to help our guys learn to stay back and hit the ball middle/away. |
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double play
7 Posts |
Posted - 05/22/2013 : 07:43:41
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| I have seen kids have trouble with this in the older age groups. The problem is they get their weight out on the front foot. This results in a weak grounder or popping the ball up. It's sort of like hitting a slow pitch softball. They need to learn to be patient, get their weight back, wait on the ball and drive it by pivoting on the back foot. AA17Dad has the right idea. Teach him to hit softball style and how to recognize when to adjust to this style. If you do not take care of the problem, it will not go away. The most successful teams are the teams that recognize that they are facing a slow pitcher and they adjust as a team. You will see this slow type of pitching into HS. |
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in_the_know
985 Posts |
Posted - 05/22/2013 : 08:44:56
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double play is exactly correct in his dissection. The problem is getting out front and the slower pitch falling off their swing plane. The key is to keep the weight AND hands back. The problem this can create is getting "fooled" by a fastball. Trying to convey all this to a 10-11u player is too much for most to comprehend. That's why I coach the players to move forward in the box (get to the ball before it falls off) and to focus on driving the ball up the middle (forces player to keep weight and hands back). Much easier for kids that age to visualize and do this than to tell them to keep their hands, back, don't get out on their front foot, etc., etc. A lot of kids have no idea how to translate that info into mechanics.
The last thing you want to do is make too big a deal out of it so that the kid starts second guessing everything and start to over think it. Not too many good things can happen if a kid's thinking during his AB. |
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Trouble with slow pitchers
