In today’s video blog post, we are continuing to talk about the baseball hitting secrets to correct the common problem of the Hip Slide.   If you missed Part 1 of this series, you can view it here:   The Hip Slide Part 1

Baseball Hitting   and The Hip Slide: Part 2

Continuing our discussion, here is another great baseball hitting drill you can use to correct the Hip Slide.

Bat Exercise

  • Grab a bat, and ask the player to put their hands right at their hip and lock the bat in on their hip.
  • Throw the ball right at the bat, and as long as they don’t hip slide, the ball will hit the bat. If they are striding and taking that natural quick motion, the ball will hit the bat itself.

This exercise will reinforce in the athlete “Am I hip sliding?   Am I taking my hip and making that dance movement, or am I locked in and making sure that I’m rotating around it?”

What you want to see the player do is this: go forward, don’t move…. go forward, don’t move…..

 

Why is the Hip Slide bad? Why can’t it happen?

What happens when we hip slide, when we throw that hip forward, is this – the head is going to follow the largest weight distribution that we just moved. Which means your eyes are moving, which means you are creating a situation where the ball appears to be coming at you faster than it is really being propelled at you, creating an optical illusion.

But the biggest problem is that when you hip slide and your head comes forward, and you create a “Lock Up” situation.   All of your weight is on the front foot and your not able to rotate the back axis through the ball. Instead you are coming around the ball because your head is following your weight distribution to your front side.   You are never going to be able to clear your hips and swing around your core. You’re going to swing through and out at the ball, which is going to cause you to come over the ball.

 

So as we isolate the hip slide, make sure the athlete identifies that throwing the hips at the ball is not a good thing. Teach them to work off the back side, not the front side.

 

For more great baseball hitting drills like this one, be sure to check out my Baseball Drills and Practice Plans series, complete with video demonstrations!   And don’t forget to Become a Fan on Facebook, where I will share more baseball hitting tips and techniques!