Youth Baseball Training - Pitching Drills for Little Leaguers

Youth Baseball Training - Pitching Drills for Little Leaguers
By guest author: Jake Wyatt

In youth baseball training, the coach shouldn't wait until problems develop to use pitching drills. Pitching baseballs should be practiced all the time to promote good pitching habits and fundamentals. Here are some pitching drills that can be used by Little League coaches.

Before beginning pitching drills, you must know pitching mechanics. The type of pitching drills and number of throws depends on the age and strength of the player. Every coach should teach the mechanics first. This will be boring for the players but the coach must require proper mechanics of all his pitchers to prevent injuries.

Here are some great pitching drills for young players:

1. Balance Drill. This involves the pitcher "playing ball" from the mound, to get the feel of compensating for the slope of the mound. Have a "catcher" set up in front of the plate, giving a good target to the pitcher. Since the distance is shorter, the pitcher can work on his mechanics while not using his arm as much. This drill helps reinforce the wind up and throw, with balance, while throwing strikes.

2. Stay-closed Drill. This is another drill that helps reinforce good mechanics. Again, the catcher will position himself six or so feet in front of home plate. After warming up, have the pitcher stand sideways on the mound with his feet spread the approximate width of his stride. Next, have the pitcher shift his weight to his back foot to throw the ball to the catcher. You want the pitcher to develop good tempo by smoothly transferring his weight from back to front. The goal of this drill is to make sure the pitcher's head stays on line with the target and to have his head down as he finishes the pitch (have him take his hat off and pick it up at the end of the drill to reinforce this). The goal is to throw efficiently, not hard, in this drill.

3. On-your-knee Drill. This drill reinforces the hip and trunk rotation needed for a mechanically correct delivery. Have a right-handed pitcher place his right knee on the ground, with his left shoulder closed and pointing toward the catcher. Have the catcher set up in front of the plate to make the drill easier. Have the pitcher "rock back" and throw the ball. Make sure the pitcher keeps his head in line and finishes the delivery properly. This drill is good for developing curve balls and changeups.

Making pitching drills part of your regular practices will improve your team's pitching consistency and help prevent injuries as well!

In order to be the best possible baseball player, training should happen year-round and be a joint effort between the coach, the player and the parents. Get more free tips to improve baseball performance, reviews of e-products related to baseball, and links to training resources at http://youth-baseball-training.com.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jake_Wyatt

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One Drill That Guarantees the Correct Baseball Swing

One Drill That Guarantees the Correct Baseball Swing
By Jack Perconte

There are very few coaches of young baseball players who can look at a baseball swing and know it is a good fundamental swing. Even many high school coaches are not experienced enough to do this. There are some fine technical ingredients that are hard to notice by an untrained eye. The good news is that anyone can help a player with their swing with one drill.

One common saying that I tell hitters is, "It takes perfect fundamentals to hit an outside pitch solidly to the opposite field." For example, a right handed batter would be able to solidly hit a pitch on the outer half of the plate into right field. Hitters' hands and bat barrel position, as well as their timing must be perfect to continually drive this ball the other way. Many hitters hit pitches to the opposite field because of swinging late or because of incorrect fundamentals. However, in order to consistently hit a pitch "the other way" on a ball that is on the outside half of the plate, it takes a perfect fundamental swing. This is very important because the odds of hitting the outer half pitch solidly when it is pulled are not good. Pulling a ball is hitting a ball to the same side of the field as the side a hitter stands in the batter's box. Believe it or not, a ball that is fouled off to the opposite side of the field or straight back is often a better sign of a good fundamental swing than when this pitch is put in play to the pull side of the field. A foul ball is a positive on a tough pitch.

Coaches can get an indication of a good fundamental swing by noticing which direction players hit balls depending on the location of pitches. Players should work on the correct baseball swing by working on driving outside pitches to the opposite field with the following drill.

Drill

Very simply, set a batting tee on the outer half of home plate making sure the batter stands in their normal position at the plate, as in a game. Have hitters work on hitting line drives the opposite way until they can do it repeatedly and until it becomes very natural. A continuation of this drill would be to do the same thing with balls flipped by a coach to this part of the plate and following that with batting practice on outer half pitches.

As mentioned, it takes great fundamentals to consistently do this on this pitch. Hitters will find that as they become more consistent with this pitch, their swing will be correct on all pitch locations.

This drill is also another way of analyzing a player's swing to see if it is a good fundamental swing, especially for people who don't have a trained hitting instructors "eye." Players, who cannot consistently drive this pitch to the opposite field (8 or 9 out of 10 times), need improved baseball swing fundamentals. Additionally, because of the use of aluminum bats and their fear of hitting batters, pitchers throw more pitches "away" from hitters so becoming better at hitting outside pitches can only help hitters' batting averages.

Former major league baseball player, Jack Perconte gives baseball hitting tips and batting practice advice for ballplayers of all ages. His baseball hitting lessons advice can be found at http://www.baseballhittinglessons.com/baseball
Jack is the author of two books, The Making of a Hitter and Raising an Athlete - his parenting blog can be found at http://positiveparentinginsports.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jack_Perconte

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