8u swing

[acooper1983]

no one's suggesting pop-ups. but hard ground balls are outs more often than hard fly balls at pretty much every level in every bat-ball sport.

The points about the arc of the pitch are valid, but she's going to see a lot of that type of pitch. That she's instinctually adjusting to it is GREAT. If that was a 35' pitch she hit it what, 70? 80? That's over the infielders head probably.

You can work on the swing, and not dropping hands and good load and all that without worry too much about the pitch. After all, you can control the swing, you can't control what you're getting from the pitcher. You didn't mention what type of league, but in town rec/lower competition leagues you can see pitches like that for 4 more years. Might as well crush them.

we play for a org that has some very good upper age group teams this is their feeder program, we have some traveling teams that play in the league as well as some local area rec teams. dd plays for the actual feeder team that could lead to travel ball at a high level depending on skills. their elite team had 8 girls go to college last year 4 of them D1, or so im told

the shed is about 26yards from where she is standing iirc. the back yard us uphill so it throws perspective off a bit. she routinely hits it into the flower bed by the back fence

 

[Soccerdadcoach]

no one's suggesting pop-ups. but hard ground balls are outs more often than hard fly balls at pretty much every level in every bat-ball sport.

The points about the arc of the pitch are valid, but she's going to see a lot of that type of pitch. That she's instinctually adjusting to it is GREAT. If that was a 35' pitch she hit it what, 70? 80? That's over the infielders head probably.

You can work on the swing, and not dropping hands and good load and all that without worry too much about the pitch. After all, you can control the swing, you can't control what you're getting from the pitcher. You didn't mention what type of league, but in town rec/lower competition leagues you can see pitches like that for 4 more years. Might as well crush them.

I see answers like this on Reddit sometimes, but suggesting that 7-8-9 year old girls (or boys, for that matter) can effectively deal with a hard bouncing ball that hasn’t slowed down yet… that’s not good advice for these age groups. It’s actually harder for them than a line drive. Hard grounders are awesome at these ages, and you shouldn’t try to avoid them by swinging up. Kiddos should be aiming to hit the ball flat and hard, and shouldn’t really care if the hit goes a little low or a little high. But loopy fly ball (from an upward swing like video 2) will be an out to the infield more times than it lands in the outfield. OP is asking for advice to train her swing memory bc her live-pitching swing was vastly different than off the tee. Once her body “memorizes” how to hit flat and faster pitches with correct swing path, it will be much easier to properly hit that loopy coach-pitch pitcher. At these early formative ages if she is training to swing up (bc of loopy pitching) then (a) she won’t be as effective and (b) she’ll have a much harder time fixing her swing later.

 

[CoachCeetar]

I see answers like this on Reddit sometimes, but suggesting that 7-8-9 year old girls (or boys, for that matter) can effectively deal with a hard bouncing ball that hasn’t slowed down yet… that’s not good advice for these age groups. It’s actually harder for them than a line drive. Hard grounders are awesome at these ages, and you shouldn’t try to avoid them by swinging up. Kiddos should be aiming to hit the ball flat and hard, and shouldn’t really care if the hit goes a little low or a little high. But loopy fly ball (from an upward swing like video 2) will be an out to the infield more times than it lands in the outfield. OP is asking for advice to train her swing memory bc her live-pitching swing was vastly different than off the tee. Once her body “memorizes” how to hit flat and faster pitches with correct swing path, it will be much easier to properly hit that loopy coach-pitch pitcher. At these early formative ages if she is training to swing up (bc of loopy pitching) then (a) she won’t be as effective and (b) she’ll have a much harder time fixing her swing later.

difference between loopy fly and like a slightly up 10 degree launch angle. all grounders slow down, the ground slows them down. that's what the ground does. Maybe the kid doesn't field it cleanly, but takes an 8u kid plenty of time to get to first. If that 'hard' ground ball is up the middle or to the right, plenty of time to pick it up after it hits off your glove. There's a lot of space out there. Hit the ball hard and unless it's RIGHT at someone, it's going to be a hit. Hell, a good half of 8u kids can't even catch half the balls thrown to them playing catch.

I'm not suggesting she swing to hit a loopy pitch, i'm saying she should swing correctly to start with, focusing on the swing itself and not worry about what the pitch looks like. And that's not hitting the ball to the ground.

The one drawback would be that sometimes fly balls are tricky for your teammates on the bases.

 

[Soccerdadcoach]

difference between loopy fly and like a slightly up 10 degree launch angle. all grounders slow down, the ground slows them down. that's what the ground does. Maybe the kid doesn't field it cleanly, but takes an 8u kid plenty of time to get to first. If that 'hard' ground ball is up the middle or to the right, plenty of time to pick it up after it hits off your glove. There's a lot of space out there. Hit the ball hard and unless it's RIGHT at someone, it's going to be a hit. Hell, a good half of 8u kids can't even catch half the balls thrown to them playing catch.

I'm not suggesting she swing to hit a loopy pitch, i'm saying she should swing correctly to start with, focusing on the swing itself and not worry about what the pitch looks like. And that's not hitting the ball to the ground.

The one drawback would be that sometimes fly balls are tricky for your teammates on the bases.

No one is saying hit it into the ground… hit it hard and flat. Hard grounders don’t slow down until they are in the outfield. If it slows down in the infield, that’s a soft hit and generally ineffective. Hard and flat is still a good hit if kiddo misses it a little high (hard grounder) or a little low (line drive), which happens often at 8u.

The main point is that parents have become afraid of a hard hit ball that hits the ground in the infield first. Then the Reddit community then starts talking about launch angle at 8u when kids can’t even fully control their bats yet.

 

[CoachCeetar]

No one is saying hit it into the ground… hit it hard and flat. Hard grounders don’t slow down until they are in the outfield. If it slows down in the infield, that’s a soft hit and generally ineffective. Hard and flat is still a good hit if kiddo misses it a little high (hard grounder) or a little low (line drive), which happens often at 8u.

The main point is that parents have become afraid of a hard hit ball that hits the ground in the infield first. Then the Reddit community then starts talking about launch angle at 8u when kids can’t even fully control their bats yet.

hard and _up_. 10-15 degree launch angle. If you hit it 'flat' it's a grounder, because gravity. They're 7,8, 9. Even the strongest ones aren't hitting it hard enough to get to the outfield. a 50 mph exit velocity, flat, at 3 feet above the ground will hit the ground at 30 feet. Doesn't even clear the pitcher. It'd go 93 feet with a 15 degree launch angle.

the point is the same. Work on a good swing and it doesn't matter how the pitcher is throwing.

 

[Soccerdadcoach]

Let’s just politely agree to disagree. In 7u we had 5 of 11 girls could clear the infield regularly. Of those, one young lady hit it far enough to be an actual outfield gap hitter (helped by slow 7u outfielders of course). The other four were infield flyball dangers if they popped it up, or they could be .800 hitters by hitting flat. DD in this video hits a lot like those four.

 

[softballphreak]

As mentioned by a previous poster, start with the bat in a neck slot position. This will help her stay connected and prevent the barrel drop. The neck slot position will benefit her for a long, long time.