Medicine Ball Exercises |

Mailbag #3 – rotational strength and bat speed training

August 12th, 2009

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I am trying to use my larger muscles more when I swing and I thought perhaps you had some type of specific drill with a medicine ball or some weight that would help develop my rotational strength.

Check out this post I made on Resistance Training for Batspeed. The article in there covers a lot of basics about general, special and specific training for bat speed. Each of the protocols referenced there were used successfully with high school and college athletes.

World Wood Bat Championships in Jupiter, and some links

October 30th, 2008

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I spent last weekend taking in Perfect Game’s WWBA event right here in Jupiter. From everything I heard, this is/was the premier high school tournament in the country that brings the best players from all over to one spot. That’s pretty easy to believe if you’ve been to one of these things and you see the hundreds of scouts and college coaches. The Roger Dean Stadium complex in Jupiter is home to the St. Louis Cardinals and Florida Marlins, with 6 minor league fields on each side, and when the event is in full swing there is action on all of the fields. You can check out profiles on some of the players here.

I’ve also been playing some catch up as far as reading up on different internet resources and a number of different books that I’ve ordered. Here are a couple of nice links that you should find useful:

SB Coaches College is a site created by three well known coaches in the S&C industry and it has tons of articles and other information. For example, here is a quick piece on a college softball dynamic warm-up program.

The S&C staff at the College of Holy Cross has assembled a video library of exercises that they use in their program. Here are a couple that I like/use – 1-leg straight-leg deadlift (hip dominant hamstring) and cable lift rotation (although I’d make a point for the spine angle to stay vertical or slightly back as in the swing)…