Creating Room for Error in Your Swing: The Key to Hitting Success

When it comes to hitting in baseball, the idea of creating room for error might sound counterintuitive. After all, who wants errors in their swing? However, considering that pitchers are constantly trying to disrupt your timing with various pitches, aiming for perfection can be impractical. Instead, focusing on creating room for error can enhance your consistency and success at the plate. In this blog, we will explore how hand separation and barrel extension can help you achieve this.

The Pitcher's Objective

Pitchers aim to throw off your timing using a mix of fastballs, sinkers, changeups, and other pitches. Their goal is to make it difficult for you to make perfect contact. Given the variety of pitches and speeds you face, it’s unrealistic to expect perfect timing on every swing.

The Importance of Room for Error

Creating room for error means allowing for slight imperfections in your swing while still achieving...

The Key to Baseball Success: Simple Instruction and Massive Repetition

One of the age-old questions in baseball is whether a player's success hinges more on the competency of their coach or the number of repetitions they perform. While many believe it’s a combination of both, there are unique insights to be gleaned from comparing different training environments. For example, Latino players often receive less formal coaching but benefit from massive repetitions, whereas American players might receive extensive coaching but limited repetitions due to high costs. The real secret lies in how these elements are blended together to create successful players. This blog explores the importance of simple instruction and massive repetition in baseball training.

Simple Instruction: The Foundation of Skill Development

Effective coaching is about providing clear, simple instructions that players can easily understand and implement. Overcomplicating techniques can lead to confusion and...

Dreaming About Being The Best? Here's How You Set Goals To Get There.

Dreaming about being the best is easy–but setting goals to get there? That’s hard. Taking the necessary steps to accomplish those goals is even harder. But it doesn’t have to be.

We’re all guilty of it—especially baseball players—finding ourselves dreaming of the day we drive in the winning run, get the ring, and get awarded the MVP trophy. I bet you have even imagined (or maybe actually practiced) your post-game on-field media interview.  We get this far-off gaze in our eyes and dream of accomplishing these Big Hairy Audacious Goals (or BHAGS) that leadership guru Jim Collins taught, almost as if they are already a reality. 

That far-out gaze you get and that sense of hope for the future aren’t goals. They’re dreams. I know that truth probably stings a little. But if you are confusing dreams with goals, you lie to yourself, and you will no doubt...

Want To Become A .300 Hitter? Learn Your Swing Feelings

Anyone can swing a bat. But learning how to swing doesn’t make you a .300 hitter. I can still hear those very first instructions from my tee ball coach. Point your shoulder to the mound, feet apart, and put the bat up by your inside ear. Eye on the ball. 

Swing!

Those first few swings were both exhilarating and intimidating. But over time, every young player begins to understand the feeling of swinging the bat. But as you mature, that feeling needs to be replaced with the feeling of hitting. Because swinging the bat and hitting a baseball are not the same thing. 

What would you say if I asked you what your swing felt like? What does a smooth, early building trigger feel like? How about your thoughts on the feeling of a long-full-robust extension after contact? Many of you have never stopped for even a fraction of a second to consider how your swing feels. 

That’s...

How To Avoid The Dangerous Trap That Belief and Hard Work Guarantee Success

“If you work hard and believe in yourself, you can accomplish anything.”

You’ve perhaps seen this on a bumper sticker, read it in a book, or heard a video proclaiming this grand truth. If you’re a parent, you’ve likely repeated this to your kids on more than one occasion. And if you’re an athlete, you’ve tried to convince yourself of this every time you’re staring at a lofty goal you want to achieve. 

Except that it’s not true. Make no mistake. We desperately want it to be true. We want it to be that simple. We want confidence that the playing field is level, that my kid has just as much chance as any other, and that we can simply overcome every obstacle if we just believe. 

It makes excellent movies, bumper stickers, books, and even great T-shirts. But it’s not reality. 

Of course, hard work and believing in...