update-tb coach tells team dont swing at 1st strike...

[jonriv]

Geek I do agree with you to some extent.... But I have always had a "punch them in the mouth first" approach because there is nothing worse as a pitcher then to have a batter hitting you hard right out the gate. Whether its an out or not if they are making hard contact that means they got my timing. But yes there is a time and place to hold up but for me its not at the start of a game, I tell my girls to "swing the bat with bad intentions"!! Its the easiest way to get a pitcher off their game and when that happens they usually try to overthrow and end up flattening out their pitches .... I guess at the end of the day everybody has there own strategy.....

Curve I generally agree with this philosophy, but I have seen too many times over aggressive hitters not being selective on which strikes to swing at and turn a “punch in the mouth” to three weak ground balls to the shortstop and a very efficient one-two-three inning for the pitcher

[Chin Music]

I could only hope that I get to call pitches against your team at some point...... [/quote]

Love calling pitches against a team where the coach is constantly putting their players in a hole by making them take strikes. Works both ways. Difference of opinions of strategies.

Proven fact hitting early in the count is more successful

[Sam]

Sam- Your 10u coaching strategy to wait for a belt high meat pitch in the middle of the plate make sense....in 10u

That is hilarious. Your philosophy is actually the 10U approach, while mine is actually what is taught to hitters at the older divisions. Very funny. The juxtaposition of the approaches was genius.

[Sam]

I could only hope that I get to call pitches against your team at some point......

Love calling pitches against a team where the coach is constantly putting their players in a hole by making them take strikes. Works both ways. Difference of opinions of strategies.

Proven fact hitting early in the count is more successful

Making them take strikes is much different than having the hitter look for a certain pitch early in the count. The "proven fact" that hitting early in the count is more successful would include the success of actually getting the pitch the hitter is looking for and taking advantage of the situation. It actually may drive the success of hitting early in the count. That's Math.

[Hinky]

Sam- Your 10u coaching strategy to wait for a belt high meat pitch in the middle of the plate make sense....in 10u

That is hilarious. Your philosophy is actually the 10U approach, while mine is actually what is taught to hitters at the older divisions. Very funny. The juxtaposition of the approaches was genius.

Sam- thanks for the laughter and entertainment!!!!

*hey ALL good feedback on the original topic!!
Should batter always let the first strike go or not? seems greater percentage says swing the bat is best way to go! and that includes Sam who will
"cut loose his batters"
to swing if they like it!!!!
Great advice....
Cut loose batters and swing!!!!

[Chin Music]

I could only hope that I get to call pitches against your team at some point......

Love calling pitches against a team where the coach is constantly putting their players in a hole by making them take strikes. Works both ways. Difference of opinions of strategies.

Proven fact hitting early in the count is more successful

Making them take strikes is much different than having the hitter look for a certain pitch early in the count. The "proven fact" that hitting early in the count is more successful would include the success of actually getting the pitch the hitter is looking for and taking advantage of the situation. It actually may drive the success of hitting early in the count. That's Math.[/quote]

I guess where we differ is this Spot u refer to. Good hitters Spot are larger than u perceive.
Pitchers are trying to avoid 2-0 counts.
The success of hitting early in the count is driven by the strikes seen early in the count.

[Sam]

I could only hope that I get to call pitches against your team at some point......

Love calling pitches against a team where the coach is constantly putting their players in a hole by making them take strikes. Works both ways. Difference of opinions of strategies.

Proven fact hitting early in the count is more successful

Making them take strikes is much different than having the hitter look for a certain pitch early in the count. The "proven fact" that hitting early in the count is more successful would include the success of actually getting the pitch the hitter is looking for and taking advantage of the situation. It actually may drive the success of hitting early in the count. That's Math.

I guess where we differ is this Spot u refer to. Good hitters Spot are larger than u perceive.
Pitchers are trying to avoid 2-0 counts.
The success of hitting early in the count is driven by the strikes seen early in the count.[/quote]

I certainly agree with you. My goal is for my hitters to avoid swinging at low, outside corner pitches and off speed pitches early in the count. The 3 pitch, 3 GBs to the infield inning is a killer.

[Chin Music]

Ya hate the weak grounders! Problem is a lot of kids don’t know how to hit an outside pitch. Get inside of that low outside pitch on time and it’s line drive the other way. About 80% of the time spent with hitting we work outside.
Lay off the offspeed early unless ur sitting on it.

[jonriv]

I basically agree with Sam. I have always felt that it is good to be swinging at a first strike, but make sure it is "your" pitch. Basically-as the the count goes your swing should go from long to short and your strike zone from small to big.

With my own daughter I worked with her on this for years. She was a pretty good and very aggressive first strike hitter- a vast majority of her HRs and big hits came on first pitches, but way too often she wound-up grounding out a less than perfect first pitch.. It was always a challenge to focus her aggressiveness without muffling it.

Her college coach had the same approach with her as well and even benched her for a game for swinging at "stupid pitches" The idea was to look for "your" pitch and not any strike

[J. Bouton]

if it is possible to get a scouting report.... if i know a certain pitcher likes to hit a certain spot with their first pitch i will instruct the batter to look there and swing away. on the other side if i know a batter has a tendency to swing at the first pitch i will call something that looks good but probably out of the zone, try to get them to fish....