Baseball Hitting Aids For Any Back Yard

By Agnes Dickson


Hitting tools can help hone a young batter's inherent talent and make the best of it soonest. Keen vision and quick reflexes certainly don't hurt when it comes to teeing the ball, but a balanced and disciplined swing is essential. The only way to cultivate that fine a swing is through many repetitions, and a great many repetitions is difficult to maintain if the youngster is forever gathering baseballs from the outfield. Baseball hitting aids are a good resource for gaining repetitions.

As a piece of sports equipment to improve one's swing, it doesn't get much simpler than the batting tee. It works on the same simple principle as the ordinary golf tee but the ball is held high, and is adjustable, usually between two and a half feet and almost four feet high. This puts the ball into the sweet spot for most young hitters, so they get that repetition.

To keep the ball close after hitting it hard, one can supplement the tee with a portable screen that nets the ball once struck. Some of these nets have targets stitched inside them so the batter can practice placing the ball. Like the tees themselves, the screens are perfect for baseball or softball as well, and can be weighted and designed not blow away or tip over when it is windy.

The entire problem of catching the batted ball before it flies off is altogether avoided by using a swing tee. With such a tee the ball is fixed to an arm that swings around an axis, that arm being parallel to the practice field itself. When the ball is struck it quickly is whipped about its stalk, then snaps back relatively slowly.

Any sort of batting tee is good enough for honing one's form through repetition, but none can simulate the action of being pitched to by a real pitcher. Unfortunately, needing to have a pitcher to practice with almost always means having to cut down on the repetitions one needs, not just with form, but to practice seeing the ball into the strike zone and timing that first move to ball. Here, a pitching machine is a crucial piece of equipment.

Many people naturally think of a pitching machine as a rather expensive proposition, the sort of device only baseball teams and batting ranges can afford. It might come as a surprise to find that there are plenty of home pitching machines out there, especially for the younger players who need them most. Some of them cost little more than a bat or a glove, and in fact are some of the least expensive aids one can find.

There are backyard protection nets, like rooms with netting for walls, built to hold in balls blasted off either a pitcher or a pitching machine, whichever is available. On the pricier end are the packages a training equipment, frequently associate with a big league star. In these packages, which combine equipment, there usually is more distinction between softball and baseball.

There is a lot more equipment once reserved for the practice field that is now available for home use. All of it is conveniently scaled down for smaller athletes, but sturdy to withstand those shots that are sure to come as their skills sharpen. This equipment is quite possibly sharpening the skills of future batting champions every day.




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