Check out our tips below!
Football Tips
- Focus on the Runner’s Belly Button! Runners will always try and fool a tackler with head and foot fakes. The one thing they can’t move convincingly is their mid-section. “Where the button goes, the body goes!”
Baseball Tips
- When in doubt, run it out! Many times younger ballplayers will stand at the plate after hitting a ball and wonder if it is fair or foul. Umpires will never “call” a fair ball but rather will point to fair territory to indicate that a ball is in fact fair. On a foul ball however, umpires will call “Foul!” and spread their arms to show that all play is stopped.
- Tee it up! One of the most effective ways to practice hitting is to use a batting tee and a bag of wiffle balls. Tee it up and start hacking! The sooner you can hit a wiffle ball cleanly off a tee, the sooner you will become a better hitter. When you hit a wiffle ball off a tee correctly, it acts like a knuckleball. You can hear the air going through the ball. When you don’t hit it correctly, you create spin on the ball and it goes all over the place. When the ball spins a lot, make adjustments to correct your swing. It’s not the most exciting thing, but it’s an essential drill to becoming a better hitter.
- Behind the plate decide your fate? No way! Many ballplayers go up to bat with a less than confident attitude and think in a “balls and strikes” manner. They hope that maybe they will draw a walk and/or hope that the plate umpire does not call them out on strikes. What they should do is go up to the dish with an, “I’m going to hit the ball hard!”attitude and not think about what the plate umpire may or may not think is a good pitch. I tell players that they don’t think “balls and strikes” in batting practice so don’t think about them when they go up to hit. If the pitch is something that they think they can drive (within reason of course – it’s hard to drive something that’s over your head), swing at it! If you’re going to be called out, make the base umpire do it. Putting the ball in play forces the defense to make a play and that’s what you always want to do – force the defense to execute correctly. Think about how many times you have seen that not happen!
