
Hey, hitters who want to learn how to get out of a slump in baseball, let me know if this sounds familiar.
The game feels too fast.
You’re not seeing the ball well.
Your swing feels off.
Your strikeouts are up, and when you DO make contact, it's a weak pop fly, or a weak ground BALL pull side because you were trying to pull a pitch you had no business pulling.
You’re thinking too much.
Now, you’re 0-10, and you can’t even buy a hit.
What happened?
Either your approach was wrong, or worse. You HAD no approach.
Here are some solutions.
This is How to get out of a baseball slump.
Winning The At-Bat
So much of hitting is about focusing on what you can control.
You can’t control the umpire and his bad calls. You can’t control what your coach thinks of you, where you hit in the lineup, how much playing time you’re getting, and what happens to the ball after you make contact.
Here’s the challenge every ball player will have to face.
How to be confident and stay confident even when you’re not getting hits.
In a game loaded with failure, this is the 100-headed dragon you’ll have to slay.
So how do we focus on what we can control while hitting a baseball?
We have to shift our perception of what we consider success.
As hitters, we have to focus on Winning The At-Bat.
Most importantly, we have become masters at:
- Doing damage on mistake pitches up in the zone - chest-high fastballs and hanging breaking balls.
- Swinging with intent to do serious damage. Not just swinging to make contact but swinging to drive them so hard that it hurts the pitcher’s feelings.
- Keeping the finger on the swing trigger - starting on time to be on time, and never getting cheated but the Fastball
- Thinking up the middle - a line drive swing that peppers the ball up the middle is and stays consistent
- Being tough with two strikes and competing your tail off.
In other words, swinging at good pitches, being on time with those pitches, and being a fierce competitor.
That’s it!
You don’t need perfect mechanics though mechanics are important, and you don’t need to be an All-American.
Just a goal to Win The At-Bat.
Reframes
Sometimes we get stuck in Slumps because of our perception of failure.
When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.
Baseball is a game of failure, but it’s also a game of opportunity.
Failure is a feedback mechanism. When you fail, you’ve only truly failed if you choose not to learn something from the shortcoming.
Instead of transferring blame, you take 100% ownership.
This is the power of using Reframes.
Each time Derek Jeter failed to get on base, he would see it as one at-bat closer to a plater appearance where he did get on base.
It was a process.
Timing
Sometimes we get stuck in Slumps when we’re waiting for the pitch instead of anticipating the pitch.
Great hitters DO NOT GET CHEATED by the Fastball.
Especially when we have count leverage, 1-0, 2-0, 3-1, if we’ve been watching the pitcher and we know they’re throwing Fastball in these counts, we have to be geared up and prepared to swing with controlled-aggression.
We also have to have the ability to stay back on the off-speed and breaking ball.
How do we do this?
We use the big part of the field with a gap-to-gap mentality.
In other words, hard line-drives up the middle.
If we’re dead-pull, we’re hosed on anything soft, down and away.
We have to think up-the-middle with our swing, attacking the inner half of the ball.
From here, we can pull anything soft that’s up in the zone, without having to leave our posture and lung at pitches we’re out in front of.
Drive the ball up the middle.
Try and hit a line drive off the pitcher’s neck.
Thats competing.
This leads me to my final principle.
Fierce Competitor
Hitting isn’t a looks-contest. The only thing that matters is your ability to make consistent, solid contact with the ball. It doesn’t have to be perfect or look pretty. To get the job done, you have to compete.
You need the belief that you have what it takes to beat the pitcher. Any pitcher.
How To Get Out of a Slump in Baseball Outro
Baseball is a game and it’s meant to be played.
Winning the at-bat, using reframes, perfecting your timing, and becoming a fierce competitor, all of these skills don’t come overnight.
It may even take a lifetime to master them.
This is why becoming a better ball player is a lifestyle.
A long-term process.
If it’s a priority, you’ll find a way to get it done.
If it’s not, you’ll find an excuse.
The question is, “how good do you really want to be?
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