Short fungo drill

I have to admit that watching a coach who cannot hit with a fungo is pretty comical.  It’s something that takes some coordination and quite a bit of practice so I don’t mean to imply that it’s easy and should be mastered by everyone.  

 

If you find yourself among the fungo-challenged then there is hope.  Actually, there’s more than just hope.  There is a drill that can help you as well as help your infielders too!  I’ve heard it called the Short Fungo Drill but I’m sure there is a better name for it out there somewhere.  It’s pretty simple too.

A player or coach stands off to the side of the guy with the fungo and soft-tosses a ball into the hitting area like you would for a normal soft-toss hitting drill.  The guy with the fungo hits the ball to the infielder.  That’s it.

The drill does a couple things:

First, it helps the guy with the fungo if he is not good in his ability to toss the ball to himself when hitting fungos (poor self-tosses are usually what hurts the fungo-challenged the most).  Second, the infielder benefits because he has the ability to practice seeing the ball off the bat in a more realistic manner than if the coach tossed the ball up to himself.

Coach and player benefit at the same time.  What a concept!

Tomorrow’s post:  Double your batting practice productivity