Thoughts on slapping

Reminds me of a funny story from last June during a travel tournament being played at the Byrnes HS fields:

Silver was on 1B and took off for second on the first pitch to the next batter. Easily beat the throw sliding into second. The opposing coach standing behind the 3B coach yells "She left early! She left early!" Then after a pause. "At least that's what they always say when she plays for me." (He's her HS coach at Hillcrest).

I agree, Silver is one of the fastest kids in the area and knows how to place a ball. Also a great CF.

 

Good

Sounds like this kid is a difference maker, I love that speed! Amber Kiser, a former Blue and Furman star was that scary on bases, the best base runner I ever coached.

 

The game continues to evolve. When slapping was a new thing, the athletes who could perfect it brought advantage to their teams. There was a big rush by lots of teams to push the short game. Now, it seems to have settled in and become only part of a well balanced offensive strategy.

A few years ago lots of strategy centered heavily around slapping and the short game and the pressure it puts on the defense. The mindset of many coaches was to put the ball in play in the infield, then take advantage of catching and throwing errors made by the other team's inability to defend against it. Today, that's a fatal mistake when playing a good team. Good teams no longer make those errors.

Today, slapping is only successful with legitimate slappers. To be legit, requires SPEED. Over 3.0 to first base won't get it. 2.9 along with good technique is a starting point. Today's slapper should also be able to hit (swinging) with reasonable power because sometimes the situation calls for it. With practice, slappers can become tremendous assets to their teams because they generally are good opposite field hitters and most develop an ability to read the defense from the batters box.

More times than not, championship teams are the ones that successfully combine the long and short game, fully utilizing their player's abilities.

 

that is exactly correct

and that is why I think, to the poin of the original post, was that to many coaches are turnning kids around left, for the wrong reasons IE; just cause they think they are fast. I hope it didnt come across as you dont need slappers, they are a tremendous asset. but its a difficult trail, and takes a lot of moxy to learn as the learning curve is a great sacrifice by both the team and the player. but your spot on in my opinion.

 

Downtick,,,only and i mean only if you are super fast and capable of placing the ball is this a weapon anymore,usually an automatic out if you know how to defend it,,,i have seen some that were fast enough no matter what you do they are on,,,give me hard line drives anyday..

 

lol

I suppose I may be bias on the subject but I have 2 all-american trophies sitting on my shelf thanks to slapping. Now dont get me wrong you have to always learn new tricks to keep defenses honest. By the time I graduated I learned to hit away from the left side.... not a tool I used often but it always got the cheating infield out of my face. But lets be honest SPEED KILLS. I think the reason right now that you dont see them as much is true speedsters are really hard to find. Its one thing you can not teach.

 

and you have a dang good reason to be bias, lol. nice. and that is my point. and yeah, they are out there, but my belief is we try to turn to many players into this, when the truth is, they area average fast. still fast, no doubt, but not this kind of fast. ok, i beat this one enough with my 2 cents and 2 more. sorry.

this was a good discussion.

 

Yes I was quite fast BUT that wasnt the reason I was moved the the left side. I have really bad eyes and they wanted my dominate (right) eye to be on the pitcher. It allowed me to see the ball better. Yes my speed helped but I made better contact using my dominate eye.

Plus heres some food for thought, and I will prolly get killed for this, say in a year a pitcher throws 1000 pitches (this is totally low balling). How many of those pitches are thrown with a lefty in the box? Not that many. Its rare for pitchers to throw in on us.... so just by us being there we have taken away pitches. And if the pitcher did throw a curve to us they have to throw it fatter than they would to a righty otherwise they would hit us. I'm sure Right handed hitters would like to know stepping in the box that there is an 80% chance that the pitchers is gonna throw on the outside corner. And I would be willing to bet that their avgs would go up too.

I dont think everyone should be made into a slapper. Ive worked with and played with kids who run an honest 2.7 but couldnt put their pride aside and accept their new role. But if you have a kid who is too small to ever produce homerun power, is willing to work hard to learn something new and can get to 1st under 3.0 its worth giving it a shot. Id be willing to be that your team avg and runs scored will go up.

But then again I am bias.

 

Good Post

Nice post, I love speed because it never is in a slump and if you hone your skills as a slapper like you obviously have done, you can be a huge weapon. Give me speed and I will score against most any defense, provided that speed understands their role and embrace it.

 

a funny stat our old stat guy told me was that every game that I got on in the first inning we won 97.89% of the time. I told him that he had too much time on his hands but it proves SPEED KILLS.