Ages: 8 - 18

Zone Nation’s Hitting Development Program

Zone Nation’s Hitting Development Program is  heavily reliant on data analytics to assess and develop players. It includes an extensive upfront assessment covering various hitting metrics, and the athlete’s strength and mobility profile. This information allows us to prepare a customized hitting program and individualized strength training specific to each player’s needs.

The following is a brief summary of the initial evaluation:

Movement and Physical Assessment

Video Analysis

Strength and Power Assessment

Swing Path Metrics

Batted Ball Results

From hitting mechanics to physical strength and mobility, we work backwards from the results of our initial assessment looking to put the player into the most optimal position to succeed at the plate. In general, many of these are intertwined, so let’s review each in some detail:

Movement and Physical Assessment – Athletes move in all three planes of motion so their program and assessment should reflect that. The assessment is an extensive anatomical evaluation of the athlete's overall physicality and mobility.  Physical limitations and imbalances, from a strength and mobility standpoint, can have profound effects on a athlete's ability to perform at his max potential.  The assessment covers a variety of topics, including:

Anthropometrics

Mobility and Stability

Strength and Power Testing

In addition, utilizing VBT (velocity-based training) sensors, we construct an initial Force-Velocity profile for each athlete. This tells us if an athlete is using the optimum weight in order to produce the greatest peak force, so programming can be adjusted accordingly. This crucial information helps put together important pieces of the puzzle on the strength-side that allow us to better individualize the strength training portion of the program.

Swing Path Metrics Analysis – From the moment it’s released by the pitcher to the moment it makes contact with the bat, a 90-95 mph pitch takes approximately 400 ms to reach the batter. That’s less than half a second. If you zero in on the actual point of contact, it’s a fraction of that. We are talking about 7 ms, that’s 7 thousandths of a second!

So, if anyone is telling you they know everything about your swing by just looking at it, they are missing the point. The whole thing happens way too fast for the human eye.   There is a great deal that we can learn from a player’s swing path metrics.

The following are examples of several that we analyze in evaluating the swing:

Attack Angle and Swing Plane:

Attack Angle Range is the angle of the bat’s path, at impact, relative to horizontal.  Although every athlete has an average AA, the standard deviation is often so wide that we also look at a athlete's AA range to get a better idea of their overall swing path.

On Plane Efficiency measures the percentage of the athlete's swing where the bat is on the swing plane. Vertical bat angle at contact establishes the plane for that swing. Plane is a great indicator for making more consistent contact on the barrel of the bat.

Speed, Power and Acceleration:

Power generated during the swing is found from the effective mass of the bat, the Bat Speed at impact, and the average acceleration during the downswing.  Higher Power is achieved when an athlete is able to swing a heavier bat and accelerate it to higher speeds.

Rotational Acceleration measures how quickly the athlete's bat accelerates into the swing plane. Rotation is a good indicator of how the athlete builds bat speed by sequencing properly. The higher rotational acceleration, the more power and time there is to make a decision at the plate.

Average Bat Speed is the speed of the sweet spot of the bat at impact, measured six inches from the tip.

Batted Ball Data Analysis – Analyzing batted ball data speaks volumes about an athlete's strengths and deficiencies at the plate. The following is a summary of metrics we evaluate from batted ball results using our HitTrax system:

Average Launch Angle

Peak Exit Velocity

Average Exit Velocity

Average Distance

Point of Contact

Program Summary – The program incorporates the results of the assessments into one cohesive hitting and strength training program, both inside and outside the nets to address deficiencies in an athlete's performance. The following is a summary of the various components:

Strength training:

Our strength program for players is 100% designed around the athlete. It is highly specialized and customized for each athlete's strengths and imbalances. The reality is that every athlete is different and each needs a different approach to developing their strength and power.

Swing path correctives:

Swing path correctives are designed to help improve the athlete's ability to stay on plane with the incoming pitch for as long as possible. The program is highly reliant on the results from batted baseballs, but the premise is to reinforce a positive attack angle range at the point of contact.

Hitting protocol:

The hitting protocol is progressive and it’s customized to the individual needs of each athlete. At any given time, it might include hitting live, flips, or off a tee with regular, overweight and underweight bats. The purpose of the hitting protocol of the program is to bring all aspects of the training together at one time.

Email zonenationsportstraining@gmail.com for more information and to be placed on our email list for future notifications!