Softball Excellence

Do your players hit great until they face a pitcher with a good change up - and then they really struggle? If so then check out a great drill for teaching your players to hit that awesome changeup!

Fastpitch Softball Hitting Hit Change Up changeup drill drills

The best drill I know of for teaching players to either successfully hit the changeup or else to recognize it early and lay off of it is called the bounce drill. Plus the setup is pretty simple.

When you're doing front toss (or even side toss - although front toss is always better as it replicates an actual pitch-path), instead of every ball being tossed in the air to the hitter mix it up and bounce one every so often. The hitter must do two things on the bounced toss:

Say "CHANGE-BACK" as soon as they recognize a bounce (CHANGE meaning they see it's a change up, and BACK as a reminder to stay back on a change and not let their body drift over the front foot).
Then only swing if it's a strike.

Make it competitive and give +2 points for every player on every bounce toss during front toss work (+1 is for saying CHANGE-BACK soon enough, +1 for only swinging & hitting strikes). If you give each player 20 front tosses and at least 5 are bounced it gives the players a possibility of 10 points on bounced-front toss the player with the highest point total wins!

Check out our website for more great hitting drills!

Can't Hit the Change Up?

By: Cindy Bristow

Do your players hit great until they face a pitcher with a good change up - and then they really struggle? If so then check out a great drill for teaching your players to hit that awesome changeup!