Baseball: Three Essential skills

Baseball: Three key skills

When it comes to the core skills of baseball, there are three that every child should focus on at the beginning: throwing, catching, and hitting. If they join a team or start to play the game more regularly, they will be introduced to skills like pitching, baserunning, and fielding balls in different positions.

Teach Your Kid to Throw a Baseball

Most kids can throw, but can they do it accurately? Teaching your child how to throw a ball properly is a useful skill for them to possess beyond the baseball field.

For this skill, we’ll treat throwing and pitching as two different things. This section is specifically focused on throwing the ball.

⚾️ Step One – Holding the Ball: While holding the baseball properly isn’t the most important part of throwing it (prioritize comfort for your child), learning the correct technique will serve them well if they join a team. We want your child to use the ‘4-seam grip’. Their index and middle fingers should rest across the widest seam of the ball (the “horseshoe” or “C” shape), while the thumb rests underneath for support.

⚾️ Step Two – Making a T: Ask your child to turn sideways to their target. Their glove-side foot should be forward, and their glove-side shoulder should be pointing towards the target. Now ask them to make a T shape with their arms – both arms straight out from their sides. The glove should now be pointing directly at the target, while the hand with the ball is facing away from it.

⚾️ Step Three – Winding Up: We want your child to make an L shape now by bringing the ball up and back near their ear, but keeping their elbow at shoulder height.

⚾️ Step Four – The Throw: Ask your child to first lead with their front hip as they rotate their body, then drive their throwing arm forward. The arm will naturally follow the body’s rotation. They should release the ball when it is out in front of their body.

⚾️ Step Five – Follow-Through: This is important for avoiding injury. When they release the ball from their hand, they should flick their wrist downwards (like they are ‘painting a stripe’ down a wall). Their throwing arm should continue its motion, crossing the body and travelling down towards their opposite knee (or pocket).

Learning to throw accurately takes practice. Fortunately, we have plenty of drills to help you with that!

Catching a Baseball

Have you bought your child a glove yet? Great! In that case, it’s time to teach them how to use it. A baseball glove should be placed on your child’s non-dominant (non-throwing) hand.

⚾️ Step One – Getting Ready: Have your child stand with their feet shoulder-width apart, knees slightly bent. They should raise both hands to chest height. The glove should be wide open, facing the direction from which the ball is coming.

⚾️ Step Two – The Cradle: Children will often stab the glove towards the ball. Encourage them to let the ball come to them. We want them to have soft hands, so ask them to pretend that the ball is an egg and that they cradle it gently as it arrives.

⚾️ Step Three – Snap! The moment the ball hits the glove’s pocket, they should snap the glove closed. They should also close their throwing hand over the ball in the glove to prevent it from popping out.

⚾️ High catch / low catch: As your child starts to get confident, have them practice catching in different positions. As a broad rule, if the ball is coming at them below the waist, their pinkies should be together with fingers pointing down. If the ball is above the waist, they should rotate the glove so that their thumb is pointing towards the ground, the fingers pointing up.

When it comes to hitting and catching, there is one golden rule in baseball: always keep your eye on the ball.

How to Hit a Baseball

Hitting a baseball is the thing that a lot of kids want to do. To help them practice their technique, it is worth investing in a baseball tee. A tee will help them to focus only on their swing, without having to worry about the travel of the ball.

⚾️ Step One – Holding the bat: We want your child to line up their hands close together. Their dominant (throwing) hand is on top, their weaker hand closer to the butt of the bat. And make sure they are relaxed! We don’t want this to turn into a white knuckle ride!

⚾️ Step Two – Get Into Position: Your child should be standing in a position where, when they bring the bat forward, the thickest part of it naturally connects with the ball. Their feet should be slightly wider than shoulder-width apart, and the knees slightly bent. Their hands are held up and back near their back shoulder, with the bat pointing upwards at an angle.

⚾️ Step Three – Load and Swing: We’re going to begin the swinging motion. Have them shift their weight onto their back foot and then start to rotate their hips towards the ball. This is important: the hips guide that first movement, not the hands. The hands and bat will follow the hips. The bat should move in a smooth, level path towards the ball. We don’t want it to chop or go from low to high on the ball. And remember the golden rule: eyes on the ball!

⚾️ Step Four – Hit It! This is the fun bit. Encourage your child to hit it. Hard. Their arms should extend at the point of contact, and they should hit through the ball. We’re aiming for a ball/bat connection in the middle (the thickest) part of the bat.

⚾️ Step Five – Follow Through: We want the bat to continue its natural swing path. As they do, they should pivot their back foot (like “squishing a bug”). This will see the bat swinging around the body, aiming to finish high over the back shoulder.

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