Posted by: Ralph Jenkins (crashjenkins2000@yahoo.com) on Tue May 31 16:07:14 2005

I agree with Greg. I've had a lot of success working with kids who are gripped by fear and lack confidence at the plate. In most cases when I had a 10, 11 or 12 year old who was too scared to swing I would have them square around to bunt while the pitcher was in the wind-up. Whether they actually made it to safe first or not was usually irrelevant. Defenses at this level are such that 50% of the time if you put the ball in play you can get on base. The mere fact that my players weren't humiliated looking at strike 3 but put the ball in play gave their confidence a huge lift.
Most of the time after that their swings got stronger and faster and their averages rose as a result. It was exciting to see the confidence grow in their eyes.