Batting Strategy

I found this in a baseball coaching book. The concepts are pretty simple and I think they can help the boys get better "at bats." The idea is that the quality of the pitch is the most important determinant of the quality of the potential hit. In other words, it is better to wait for a pitch down the middle and take the chance that all other pitches are balls, except when there are two strikes, then the boys should expand the strike zone and then swing for contact or even bunt to put the ball in play IF THE PITCH IS HITTABLE.

From first base it is easy to see that the majority of the swings and misses are on balls at the shoulders or higher. These pitches are unhittable as the boys lack the bat speed to get their hands and then the bat head to the height of the pitch. By the time they do, the pitch is past them.

The article below leads me to believe our "take the first strike" approach is solid, as the pitchers in this league are just learning control, and that we want our batters picking a spot where they want the ball pitched and waiting for that pitch as soon as they have a one strike on them, and swinging for contact when they have 2 strikes (while still maintaining discipline not to swing at unhittable balls)..

(This is an excerpt from Youth Baseball Coaching by John T. Reed)

Ted Williams’ strike zone diagram

 "The most memorable thing in Williams' Science of Hitting is his diagram of the strike zone. He puts a whole bunch of baseballs in it. Each has the batting average that Williams figures he would hit off pitches in that location. The diagram reveals Williams' sweet spot as well as his weakness. (I use the work "weakness" in a relative sense when speaking of Williams' hitting.)

That's too fine a breakdown for youth baseball. I just broke the strike zone down into nine zones: left, middle, and right across the top and high, middle, and low down the side. I also added the out-of-the-strike areas and labeled them with letters and numbers. Here's a catcher's-eye-view diagram.

The red squares are balls. The yellow and green are strikes. But I only want my batters to swing at the green until they have two strikes on them. Then they swing at the yellow and the green. The green area is a "hitter's pitch" or line-drive pitch. Pitcher's call a pitch in the green location a "mistake pitch" or being "wild in the strike zone." The yellow areas are "pitcher's pitches."

 (note from James: a little later in the season, as the boys progress, we may relax the "take the first strike" rule and move to the swing at a pitch in your zone, on the 1st or 2nd strike -- but we wait until the opposing pitchers show us that they can get the ball over the plate.)