Derek Jeter Hurricane Hitting Machine by SKLZ

Welcome to the Hurricane Hitting Machine Blog for Baseball Coaches, Players and Parents. Our daily posts can help you get the most out of your baseball drills and team practices. Our free baseball articles, baseball coaching tips, and baseball drills can help your baseball player or baseball team improve. Our archive has hundreds of articles related to baseball training and baseball practice.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

The Derek Jeter Hurricane Hitting Machine - One of Baseball's Most Popular Training Products

Hurricane Machine - One of Baseball's Most Popular Training Products
"Endorsed by Derek Jeter"

The Derek Jeter Hurricane Baseball Hitting Machine is guaranteed to improve hitting skills. The engineering and technology that went into the design of this machine make it superior in quality, performance and productivity to other practice machines.

The Hurricane Baseball Hitting Machine is "second to none" when it comes to boosting batting averages,increasing bat speed and power, eliminating strikeouts, and enhancing personal and team performances. Yes, it's revolutionizing home and team workouts.It is becoming a known fact that the hitter that works out regularly, on this machine, will have an advantage over a hitter that does not.

The Hurricane Baseball Hitting Machine allows more versatility, repetition, and correct fundamental practice than any other machine ever invented. The Hurricane Baseball Hitting Machine produces hitting success!

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Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Hurricane Machine Drills - Top Hand and Power Hand Drills

Drill: “Top-Hand”

“One-handed drill builds strength and skill.”
Objective: The “Top-Hand” drill builds and develops arm strength in the wrist, forearms and biceps. The drill is used to improve hand-eye coordination of the top hand.

Procedure: The batter will hit the ball using only the batters top hand. The batter may “step into the ball” and use the lower body, hips and legs to help generate more power with these one-handed swings.

Recommended Number of Swings: Beginners should begin with 10 swings. Each week the batter should add 10 more swings until the batter can take 60 swings with a bat of normal weight. Advanced hitters may wish to use a weighted bat and increase the number of swings taken.

Coaching Point: The bat will always go where the top-hand takes it with the power generated by the bottom-hand. Players perform the “Top-Hand” drill with the top hand in its normal position on the bat grip. There should be an effort made to take a short, compact, and deliberate swing that perfectly hits the “bulb” of the ball. This drill can be performed with a still or moving ball. The batter may wish to kneel and perform this drill on one knee to make the arms muscle work above the shoulder thus building more strength.

Drill: “Bottom-Hand”

“One-handed drill improves bat speed and power.”
Objective: To build and develop wrist, forearm, and muscle strength in the batters “bottom or pull hand.” The bottom hand generates most of the swings power and bat speed.

Procedure: The batter will hit the ball using the batters bottom hand on the bat grip. The batter may “step into the ball” and use the lower body, hips and legs to generate a more powerful swing.

Recommended Number of Swings: Beginners should begin with 10 swings. Each week the batter should add 10 more swings until the batter can take 60 swings with a bat of normal weight. Advanced hitters may with to use a weighted bat and increase the number of swings taken.

Coaching Point: The batter should perform this drill with “pull or bottom hand” in its normal position on the bats grip. There should be an effort made to take a short, compact, and deliberate swing that perfectly hit the “bulb” of the ball.

This drill can be performed with a still or moving ball. It is recommended that this drill be performed with the ball set at its highest level possible to make the ball utilize the muscles of the arm rather than using gravity to move the bat.

The ball must be chest high to the batter to maximize the benefits received.
Very tall batters may have to kneel on a knee to perform the drill.

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Friday, October 3, 2008

Baseball Instruction - What to Change If You Hit Lots of Groundballs

By Nate Barnett

Because there are so many intricate moving parts within the baseball swing, it's tough to keep everything moving well, all of the time. Add the fact that the pitcher is trying to mess up everything you've learned in all your hours of baseball instruction and you've got some serious challenges.
One of the most common questions I get as a hitting instructor is solving the problem of grounding out repetitively to the pull side (left side of the field as a righty, right side of the field as a lefty). There are multiple causes of this problem, but chances are that it's one of the below issues I'll cover.

1. The most common hitting mistake that leads to frequent ground outs is too much weight transferring forward onto the front leg. Good hitting stems from energy that is stored onto the back leg. Therefore, when preparing for the job of hitting a baseball, the hitter must shift some weight onto his back leg before the baseball swing begins. If the hitter doesn't shift the weight to his back leg, or doesn't keep the weight there as he swings, he will begin to transfer weight to his front foot and become off balance. This balance problem (too much weight on the front foot) will cause a lot of baseballs that are hit in a downward angle.

2. A second cause of hitting ground balls to the pull side is the opening of the front hip too soon. As mentioned above, the back side of a hitter's body creates power and energy. The front side of the body (front foot, knee, and hip) are then responsible for controlling some of that energy and channeling it into the correct direction, back to the pitcher. If the front hip begins to rotate at the same moment the back knee and hip begin to turn, energy will be moving away from the contact zone. Because of this, many times the bat will enter the hitting zone and come into contact with the ball as it's moving away from the plate causing a ground ball or top spin line drive (bad spin) to the pull side.

3. One last cause is an improper hand path into the hitting zone. Some of the problem can stem from poor front hip control, but sometimes it's just the hands that are the issue. In general, and without being too technical on this part of the baseball swing, the hands should stay near the body as they enter the hitting zone. Hands that stray away from the body will cause a bat that is sweeping through the zone. A bat that sweeps will not be moving towards the pitch on contact with the ball. Instead, the bat will be moving away and to the pull side. This is improper extension and will be the cause of multiple issues ranging from a slow bat to getting jammed on a lot of inside pitches.

Finally, my suggestion would be do a search on the internet for some pictures or videos of major league hitters and look for the parts of the swing mentioned in this article. It's only with a visual that you will begin to learn and understand the intricate details of a good baseball swing. Once you learn some of the techniques, implementing some exercises into your youth baseball drills will make all the difference in correcting this problem.

Nate Barnett is owner of BMI Baseball http://bmibaseball.com and is based out of Washington State. His expertise is in the area of hitting, pitching, and mental training. Coach Barnett's passion is working with youth in helping expand their vision for their baseball future. After finishing a professional career in the Seattle Mariners Organization, Nate pursued his coaching and motivational training career. His instructional blog is located at http://bmibaseball.com/blog
His new FREE ebook, Toxic Baseball: Are you polluting your game? can be found on the main BMI Baseball website.
Hitting Mechanics 101, an ebook on complete hitting mechanics will be released in June, 2008. Features include numerous illustrations, video clips, and a special offer to discuss your hitting questions over live on the phone strategy sessions.
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