Mastering Barrel/Ball Accuracy

   The skill of hand eye coordination is not a God given ability that can't be developed through practice. Optimal swing mechanics does not equal offensive production. It definitely helps make your swing movements efficient but it does not guarantee success. Work on your ability to track an object with your eyes and make flush contact with an object you hold in your hand(s). "It's not the arrow it's the indian." Like I mentioned in the "Aim small miss small" article, as hitters you are trying to be quick and accurate with the middle of your bat to the middle of the baseball. Why? because thats how you hit the ball the farthest/hardest. Distance/exit velocity of the baseball depends on your bat speed/ball type/bat type/ pitcher velocity and weather/field conditions.
   The evolution of technology and indoor hitting facilities has definitely helped create more information for hitters to learn from but it has also created Robots. There are around 800 MLB players on current MLB rosters and over a quarter of them were not born in the United States. There are over 85 players alone from the Dominican Republic. Why? The United States has an advantage over every other country in baseball for the simple fact that the best facilities and coaches almost all reside in the US. This has created a competitive industry of baseball development where thousands of "private instructors" and indoor baseball facility owners make a potentially lucrative living teaching and providing a facility for player development.
   Everyone is in search of the "holy grail" in hitting: the one mechanical adjustment that will turn good players into Major League players. You could spend a month straight reading articles and viewing websites promoting hitting gadgets that lead to better bat speed, shorter swing, perfect swing path and on and on. The simple reality is none of these will turn you into Bryce Harper.
   Harper has simply mastered the craft of hitting a ball on the barrel with a bat. In his E60 story when he was still a 16 year old kid https://youtu.be/gGZ1SUsFnzM Harper talks about playing over 100 games a year as a 12 year old and having his Dad throw him sunflower seeds/ red soup beans because he found out that kids in the Dominican Republic hit bottle caps to practice their barrel accuracy. In the video they say, "Harper hits the ball harder then anyone else" How does that happen? He has better barrel accuracy than anyone else. That happens by swinging more than anyone else. Your swing will evolve if you swing enough.
   Parents pay hitting instructors to give lessons to their children and expect to see results for their money. Because of this reality in the business of baseball, hitting coaches have turned to video and mechanics to fix flaws that give instant positive feedback. Hitting instructors have to do this or the parents are going to go somewhere else to try to pay to have a "hitting guru" give their child the magic hitting potion that will turn them into a stud. The reality is simple: if you want to play in the big leagues you need to master the art of tracking a ball with your eyes and hitting it flush on the barrel of the bat.
   In the book Outliers author Malcolm Gladwell says that it takes roughly ten thousand hours of practice to achieve mastery in a field. So from the time you are old enough to swing a bat you have to practice for a cumulative amount of time= to hitting for 417 straight days with no sleep. It can be done but it takes a huge time commitment that most are unable to endure. It's really that simple. My old assistant the current hitting coach at UMASS Lowell Jerod Edmondson used to tell our hitters, "everyone wants to be rich but most just hope to win the lottery" I say to the players, "decide what you want to do and put the time in to make it a reality"
   Individual players rely on excuses to justify their current career situation. I played 3 years of Independent professional baseball because I did not work hard enough on my swing to excel at that level and my lack of work was exposed at this point in my baseball career. It happens to every hitter at some point in their career, someone eventually tells you you are not good enough to play the game anymore. The hardest thing to do as an athlete is to understand that it's your fault, plain and simple. The excuses are comforting and can be valid if it was injury related but the reality is you didn't put enough hours in to make your dream a reality. If you are still playing you have to understand that you have to deal with that harsh reality when your career finally ends.
   Baseball is the greatest sport in the world because it's the only team sport that doesn't care how physically gifted your are (Pedroia, Altuve) or how wealthy you are (in the Dominican republic the current poverty rate is 41%) You just have to enjoy working on your craft to the extent that you are obsessed and think its fun. In the movie "Alice in Wonderland" The Mad Hatter asks Alice, "Have I gone Mad? " and Alice responds, I'm afraid so. You're entirely bonkers. But I'll tell you a secret. All the best people are." If you want to play in the MLB you have to be obsessed with mastering hand eye coordination and ignore average baseball players that had average careers that try to convince you that you are crazy to believe you can play in the show. Ignore the statistics about your chances and find ways to work on your craft. Invest time in things that will help you hit. Like going to the cage, playing in as many games as possible to get at bats, read books/blogs on hitting, play wiffle ball, stick ball, have someone throw you sunflower seeds, bottle caps, soup beans, play golf, play tennis, play MLB the Show. Invest time. The game eventually rewards the players who consistently invest time in developing their craft. Have perspective, it may seem important now but no one cares what you hit in little league, high school, college and minor league ball, if you get to the big leagues.
   The simple fact is the game remembers the men who get to the Major Leagues and have success there. The game has also shown that you can be a Hall of Famer with a flawed mechanical swing aka Wade Boggs, Ty Cobb etc. The only thing every Hall of Fame hitter has in common is they were the best at hitting a white ball on the middle of the bat consistently throughout their MLB career. "Heroes get remembered, but legends never die, follow your heart kid and you'll never go wrong."--The Sandlot