What is the secret to hitting? I'm trying to tell my son that it is hand speed

I remember my dad telling me to aim for the back of the head when punching, or in other words to follow the punch through.
(I'm not sure now why my dad was giving his 10 year old daughter lessons in fighting though....?)

The key is in your legs and hips. Fast hands will allow the head of your bat to get through the zone, but the legs supply most of the power. Keep the head down and follow through.

depends what art your basing this on like for a hard art lift the elbow and drive down while focusing past your target and dont hold your breath whilst doing this

Depending on the age of your son. Hitting a baseball is the hardest thing to do and you will fail at it 70% of the time you go to the plate. So don't be to hard on him. The best thing to teach him is foot work because it all starts there. Step pivot swing. This has to work with the other upper part of the body. Hands have to stay back at the start of the swing and through the swing the knob of the bat must be pulled towards the pitcher staying in close to the body so that the bat head is the last thing through the swing and the hands turn over past the plate. It helps to get hitting lessons but the do cost a good bit by a good instructor.

G'day Coachbobby,

Thank you for your question.

The secret is timing and bat speed.

I have attached some tips for hitting.

Regards

Paul Molitor batting tips
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQNv7NF7Mpw
Baseball hitting tips
http://www.baseballcorner.com/battingtips.asp
Baseball Hitting tips and drills
http://www.qcbaseball.com/skills/hitting1.aspx
Be a better hitter
http://www.beabetterhitter.com/

I don't think speed or power has all that much to do with great hitting. It's really more about physics and timing. I used to be a pretty great hitter in little league. The trick is, "watch the ball hit the bat". If you can do that, and manage to hit the ball right on the sweet spot of the bat, it will be a great hit every time.

[edit]
I thought of a couple other tips, although based on the other answers here, you may not need them:

- Always "step into" the swing. If you're a lefty like me, lead with your right leg.
- Swing level, like chopping a tree

im not the best hitter,but my coach always told us to keep your eye on the ball follow through snap your wrists and hit it then run for your life. hope that helped. :)

There are many componets to hitting. Hand speed is one. Balance is a critical componet also. The swing starts at the base (feet). So you have to start with a balanced base. Manny Rameriz (LAD) has great balance and weight shift.
Hitting is also a great deal of mental work. Getting youself into hitting counts (2-0, 2-1, 3-0, 3-1) makes hitting alot easier.
Lastly, you have to hit alot!!! It is hard to do so the more practice the better.
You could talk forever about this topic....not one real answer.

Keep your eye on the ball.

Don't get technical just yet. I assume you son is still young, he just needs to have fun at this point. As he ages the things he'll need to learn are timing & balance. Hand/bat speed are great but hard to learn/improve usually you either have it or you don't. There are many great hitters without quick hands but all hiters have excellent timing and balance. Give this site a try: http://krushhittingcompany.com

really the secret is to slow the ball down mentally so you can see it coming and are able to hit it accurately.

There is no secret to hitting. It's the skill and experience that depicts the nature of a person's strength and abilities to withstand the enemy.

Hand speed is indeed important, but eye contact, drive power, hip action, and wrist action are quite important as well. You have to make sure that you're son isn't leaking with his hips, keeping his weight between his feet, and keeping his head down. These are all important things before contact. Then comes your hand speed. You want your hands to come straight from the shoulders and "punch through the imagenary board" and finish with hands high and a backside "L". Those are the simplified keys to successful hitting. If you're ever around the North Louisiana area, I would be more than happy to assist you with your son's education of the great game of baseball.

I think it's the eyes. Ted Williams's # 1 rule was to get a good pitch to hit. I'll go with him.

aside from the movement of the wrist it includes the movement of wrist, arms and shoulders ad that also include

The key to quick hands is quick hips you have to get the hips out of the way to take the bat the shortest path too the ball. If you dont, the hands have two travel around the body. remember you want to go from point A to point B with your bat no wasted movement. If you have quick hands you can make up for alot of mistakes and still hit the ball pretty solid. Dont forget to see the ball first. Take a soft stide so your weightstays back and your head doesnt move too much.

watching the ball first, then bat/hand speed. two fingers from the rib at the end of the bat so it does not hit your wrist. Time the pitcher while on deck.

Consistancy,

Hitting a spherical object with a cylindrical one requires excellent eye/hand coordination.

We humans we grow too fast to achieve excellent coordination until around about 17/18 when we start to reach our full size and really slow down on the growth since up until that time we are not only growing taller, our arms and legs are growing longer our spacial definition continues to change.

Any pre-adult human who can do this successfully repeatedly has better that average spatial senses.

That is usually a product of genetics, not of intelligence, not of manhood, not of anything within a person's control. Hand Eye coordination is a genetic trait - a talent like having an hear for music, an eye for proportion (for art).

It has been theorized that if we grew any faster than we did we would be unable to navigate through the world - simple tasks like walking, feeding our self might be drastically stymied, the brain unable to cope with the 'sudden' rapid changes in our "space" would not learn fast enough to keep up with the growth of the body.

That is more of a problem of complexity of our brains - We have the pre-frontal cortex that is highly developed and being more developed requires a good deal of the energy that we consume. We also have abilities to reason, to perceive of time (past, present, future context of experience) and we are able to consider alternatives to the future. A good many of these abilities are called upon while attempting to hit a spherical object with a cylindrical object.

To compound the problem we humans are in a sustained state of 'falling' while standing, running, walking, jogging. Many thousands of tiny muscle adjustments take place just to keep us standing in one place. The human body 'sways' back and forth, side to side in very tiny movements - rarely seen by the human eye, but measurable.

Assuming your son as near 20/20 acuity in both eyes and assuming his sense of space is not too addled, then the problem boils down to one of timed reaction to visual stimuli. Meaning he needs to be able to 'time' internally the duration (time) that it takes for the ball to travel the distance from the pitcher to the 'sweet spot' over the plate. He also has to be able to calculate where that ball will be in the FUTURE from the moment he starts the swing - and then he has to calculate spatially where to have the bat to meet the ball at precisely the right angle, right time, etc.

If he were a computer there would be programs like Baseball 1.45 and Hitting 3.0 and Home Run Calculations Vista - but we are not, we are human beings and the way we 'reprogram' ourselves is through rote and through practice and a good deal of error.

We can break down baseball batting into subsets of abilities - one being mere 'hitting' of an object - either as a still object on a post (there are such ball holding posts available for softball), or through throwing the ball up and waiting until it reaches 'the right area' and swinging. This will develop the spatial sense a little bit - meaning your son will have a better concept between where he ends and the bat begins and where the ball is in that space around him.

Timing and judging the validity of a pitch comes through being put through the "game" having a pitcher who will throw various combination of ball throws - from 'spot on' certain hit to outside, inside, too low, too high kind of pitches. This requires a pitcher who can control his/her pitch, who knows how to throw a ball to achieve these goals BEFORE throwing the ball.

Earlier on the warning would be given "I'm throwing outside" or "I'm throwing inside". Your son would be coached as to how to act/react to certain pitches. He would stand there and observe the approach of the ball (Keep the eye on the ball) to get a 'feel' for the spatial placement of the ball. As skill improved the pitcher would throw 'without warning' the kind of pitch, allowing him to make judgment calls and even to make errors in judgment. Hits and misses should be rewarded equally in the praise department, each miss also provides a good deal of useful data when it comes to learning the complexities of batting.

Timing of the ball depends on the speed of the ball and the speed of his arms to swing the bat.

Force is a product of mass and velocity - meaning if he has greater than average mass in arms and upper body (all that is thrown in behind the swing) then he will require less velocity to send the ball flying on a hit. If he has less than average mass, then he would need to achieve greater velocity. This can lead to a wide area of time between pitch thrown, his reaction or the start of the swing to the connection between ball and bat. If he is attempting a bunt then the swing is delayed longer. We humans can have a gut 'feel' for these physics through our own personal experience - we may be unable to express them as physics problems, and we definitely can not relate the feel of time and energy and force to one another expecting the other to be able to achieve exactly what we achieve.

Ultimately there is no one secret to hitting. Each individual has a combination of 'secrets' that work for that individual only.

Usually the common thread in all good and excellent batters is that they have practiced, practiced, practiced.