Baseball Pitch Recognition & Vision Test Questions

Here's the thing, if your pitch recognition isn't on point, your abilities won't surface. A solid way to test your pitch recognition abilities is by answering these baseball pitch recognition & vision test questions

We spend dollars and hours in the cage to refine the swing. We give sweat and blood in the weight room to build bat-speed, but what do we do to make sure we're seeing the ball as well as we can?

If you have abilities, but your abilities are showing up during the game, consider these questions related to your baseball vision and pitch recognition.

Are you picking up spin-speed?

A big part of hitting is recognizing spin, speed, and location. Here's why.

When your eyes are working for you at the plate, the difference in spin-speed and the color of the pitch will vary.

Breaking balls with fewer rotations will have a lighter shade since the seams will have fewer rotations.

Faster spin-speed will cause a fastball to look darker since the red seams will have more rotations.

If you're not identifying spin-spin, your ability to judge pitch-types and location will take a hit.

You can learn everything there is to know about spin, speed, and location here.

Does the ball look too fast?

All good hitters have a solid plan to slow the game down.

If the ball looks to fast, one common reason is the size and speed of your lead-stride foot.

Often times, when we lunge or have too big of a stride, the head movement increases causing our eyes to move along with it.

The more our eyes move, the harder it will be to pick up the pitch out of the pitcher's hand and make an adjustment to pitch-type.

If you want to make a 90 mph fastball look like a 95 mph fastball, speed your feet up. If you want to make 90 look like 85, slow your feet down and keep your head still.

Are you competing with confidence?

What happens when you have nothing to look forward to before getting out of bed? You have to force yourself to get up. When you have something to look forward to, you hop out of bed.

Hitting is similar.

When you're hitting with confidence, you're locked-in and ready to get moving. Your eyes are primed to recognize the release point and your hands and hips are ready to fire.

When we don't have confidence, our reactions are slower. Period.

If you're not walking up to the plate with confidence, your pitch recognition will take a hit.

Is your finger on the Swing Trigger™?

Tell me is this sounds familiar? You step in the box, the pitcher delivers and you freeze-up on the strike. You just can't seem to pull the trigger.

Here's why.

While at the plate, are you thinking that you're going to swing "if" it's a strike or are you assuming that the next pitch is going to be a strike?

Big difference.

If you're not anticipating the next pitch as the best pitch you're going to get all day, you will be too late.

With every pitch, we have to assume that it's going to be "our" pitch.

If we're not sure we're gonna swing, our eyes will be too passive to pick up the pitch effectively.

The mental talk is always - "Yes, yes, yes, GO!" on a strike and "Yes, yes, yes, NO!" on a ball.

Keep the finger on the swing trigger™.

Do you understand "Count Leverage"?

Count leverage is any hitter's count we're your chances of getting a good pitch to hit, increases. 1-0, 2-0, 3-1, are hitter's counts when you're more likey to get a fastball for a strike.

As a hitter, your job is to be ready to jump on the fastball with a controlled, aggressive swing.

If the game dictates the type of swing you take, the type of swing you take should dictate what type of pitch you should be anticipating.

When we don't have a plan for what pitch to anticipate, and you're just at the plate, swinging at anything close, you're giving the pitcher all the momentum.

Since we're not anticipating the pitch, the game speeds up.

Can you recall past pitch sequences?

In baseball, sometimes the pitcher doesn't repeat himself but he rhymes.

In other words, if you got fooled on a breaking ball on the second pitch that you saw, you'll probably get the same pitch at some point in your next at-bat.

If you're not collecting data on the pitch types in previous at-bats, you're leaving valuable data that could help you collect more Quality At-Bats.

Being able to recall your past pitch sequences gives you better instincts and pitch recognition skills.

Do you have a plan & approach?

If you think you can walk up to the plate w/o an approach especially at the HS Varsity level or Collegiate level, be prepared to get a real job, real soon.

It doesn't matter how great your mechanics are, or how high your confidence levels are, the approach supports the mechanics and the confidence.

Once you have the right approach, hitting becomes much easier because now, your only job is to see the ball as well as you can.

No approach leads to poor pitch recognition abilities.

Are you swinging to not miss?

When you're in the batter's box, and you're swinging to just make contact or to "NOT" strikeout, you're hosed.

There's a big difference between swinging at the ball and swinging to drive the ball with 100% authority.

If we're tentative at the plate, the ball hits the bat.

When we're geared up to hit the ball hard, the bat hits the ball.

Same movement, completely different outcome.

Controlled aggression with the intention to do damage, primes your eyes to perform.

Are you hitting with tension and pressure?

When we're playing with tension and pressure, our reaction time sufferers.

When we're loose and relaxed, our muscles become quick twitch.

The same process happens with the muscles around the eyes.

Tight facial muscles give you eye-strain.

Relaxed facial muscles gives you that soft-gaze you need when transitioning from the pitch to his release point.

Achieve loose muscles with focused breathing.

This is how you slow the game down.