The following is a special guest post from former MLB pitcher, professional pitching instructor and author of The Complete Guide To Pitching, Tom House.
Hitting is the most difficult thing to do in sports. We all know this. And most coaches don’t understand this, which is why they give advice that impedes their player’s ability to succeed.
The fact is you can’t coach hitting, but you can create an environment for hitters to succeed. I’ll share with you 10 rules for talking to a hitter as well as some hitting tips that will help hitters succeed!
The most important thing to remember when talking to a hitter is that baseball is a crazy game. Anything can happen. Just because a guy is 0-for-4 with 4 strikeouts doesn’t mean he’s not going to come up in the 9th and hit a walk-off homerun.
Never say things like, “Hey, you’re 0-for-4 today, you suck,” or “Hey, you’re 0-for-4 today, you’re really struggling.” The most obvious thing in the world is that the hitter knows he’s 0-for-4 and that he’s struggling. There isn’t anyone on this planet who hates the thought of striking out more than the hitter himself. And if your comment manages to break through all of the other thoughts racing through his head at the moment, all your comment will do is add more pressure and make him even more nervous than he already was.
The best way to talk to a hitter is just ask him what pitch he wants in what location; or tell him one of your favorite sayings, like “See ball, hit ball.”
Rule
Talking to hitters is a skill few people possess. In the same way that being a great hitter requires years of training, knowing how and when to talk to a hitter requires practice and patience.
I was lucky enough to have one of the best hitting coaches in the country, but I still had to learn how to receive his advice. I learned through trial and error what worked for me and what didn’t. While my hitting coach was talking about approach and mechanics, I was thinking about something completely different. It took years for me to figure out how to communicate effectively with my coach, but once I did, my game took off.
The following are ten points you can use as guidelines for communicating with your hitters:
I have sat in the dugout as a player and watched my coach give a speech to someone on the team. That is, I have heard coaches say “good job” to other players. What I haven’t heard much of is coaches giving advice or talking to someone during a game.
That’s not to say that coaches don’t do it; they just don’t do it as often as they should. I think this is because most coaches are afraid to talk to hitters during games. They are afraid that if they talk too much, they will ruin the hitter’s confidence or throw him off balance by saying something stupid. The problem with talking to hitters is that so many coaches don’t know how to do it effectively.
But I’m going to teach you how to talk to hitters during games so that you can help your team win more games.
Before we get started, let me make one thing clear: this article is not about how to motivate players. This article is about how to give your hitters advice in a way that will help them improve and become better hitters over time.
This article will teach you:
1) The most effective way to talk to a hitter during a game
2) Why you shouldn’t be afraid of talking to hitters during
1. Avoid chattering.
2. Don’t lie to a hitter.
3. Don’t talk about his hitting.
4. Don’t criticize his hitting technique, or lack of same.
5. Don’t repeat what the coach has already said to him, or what he already knows.
6. Don’t ask questions; they relate to
I pitched to a few hitters in high school and even in college, but my first experience of pitching to a real pro came in the summer of 2004. I was at the University of Kentucky, taking part in the Cape Cod League, and a guy on our team had a brother playing for the Atlanta Braves. We were playing Holy Cross one afternoon when we heard their bullpen catcher had gotten hurt and they wanted someone to fill in.
So after the game I drove down to Ft. Devens to catch bullpens for the Lowell Spinners. The manager, Gary Allenson (who is now managing in AAA), asked if I could throw BP to their hitters. It was an amazing experience catching for guys like Dustin Pedroia, Hanley Ramirez, Ryan Kalish, Jason Place and George Kottaras.
One of my first batting practice sessions was with David Murphy and Al Cowlings. Before I started throwing the two of them were just sitting there chatting about how they were going to hit me all over the yard. I was excited at first that they were talking trash, but then I realized that they weren’t doing it because they were competitive or confident; they were just doing it because it was batting practice and that’s what hitters do.
So
CuteAct is a contributor at CuteAct. We are committed to providing well-researched, accurate, and valuable content to our readers.