Fall 2019 Hitter Development Process

In this post, we will describe the process we took this past fall to put together our hitter development plans.

This fall was the first time in two seasons in which we had fall team practice prior to individuals. By letting our players compete in intrasquads prior to making any mechanical adjustments, they had the opportunity to prove themselves in a game, which is really the only thing that matters. That time period also allowed us to collect a large amount of baseline Blast Motion and Rapsodo data to base their development plans off of for individuals.

We began the fall with just one Blast Motion sensor for the entire team and it was our first time using it. In another post, we will outline how to use one sensor in a team setting and how it can actually be more beneficial to have just one sensor.

Toward the end of the fall season in mid-October, we made an Excel sheet like the one below for every player.

For the most part, we avoid looking at the Plane, Connection and Rotation Scores because they are just the product of the other metrics. The same goes for Power and Time to Contact. Once we had each hitters’ numbers, we determined whether each metric was a strength or opportunity to develop (weakness). We based their development “Focal Point” a little differently by asking the question, “How did the hitter perform in competition? Is this hitter capable of improving his biggest weakness? Or does it make more sense to exploit his greatest strengths?” After we were able to determine this, we wanted to make sure that not only our coaching staff knew why it was important, but the players understood the reasoning behind their specific plan, as well, and we addressed this in the “Why?” section of their plans.

Below is a table for specific drills that were implemented based on their individual focal point.

The hitters were placed into their individual groups based on what their focus was as much as possible (class times sometimes got in the way). The idea behind this was that not only would it be convenient because they would be doing the same drills, but they would also hear the same things over and over again. After our coaches implemented the specific drills for each focal point, we continuously monitored their progress rather than having a specified “assessment day” every week or two. Since we only had one sensor, we wanted to make sure we were maximizing the number of swings each player had with it.

At the end of the fall, each player was shown a series of charts like below, tailored to what their development focus was in addition to other valuable metrics. This allowed both our coaching staff and players the opportunity to evaluate the progression.

How We Intend To Improve Our Process

Admittedly, looking back at some of the focal points, we could have done a better job focusing on the most translatable metrics. Having never used Blast Motion before, we had no firsthand experience of how easy or difficult it would be to improve a specific metric, or how important that metric is to in-game performance. In another post, we will go over specific improvements on a player-to-player basis. Now that we understand certain areas that can be improved upon more easily, we can implement the drills that worked this fall into other hitters' plans in the future. We will also be looking into why some players improved in certain areas more than others, even though they were doing nearly identical drills. Unfortunately, COVID-19 prevented us from seeing how the numbers translated because as stated in the beginning, that is really the only thing that matters.