As hitters advance, one of the common issues that we see is that they have a very handsy, downward path to the ball swing that kind of cuts off the ball. This is especially common across minor league hitters that had success at the high school level.
When they got to the pro level, having a slightly downward swing is not good for hitting off speed pitches or to hit balls that are moving. And so the way that we work on that is with the Angle Toss Drill. This drill helps hitters get on a plane earlier and to be able to hit the ball with a better bat path.
The way that you set up angle toss is we want to have our hitters in their normal stance, and we're going to try to focus on having this pitch come in at a 45 degree angle to the back of the plate. From a right handed hitter standpoint, you want to stand on the first base batter's box and deliver the front toss from there.
So the pitch is going to be tossed at the back point of the plate. Your focus is to pitch the ball along this angle as deep as they can and the hitter is going to hit the ball. The hitters focus is going to be to hit the ball as deep as possible and try to hit the ball back to right center field. If it's a left handed batter, you'll do the same thing coming from the third base side, going to the back part of the plate and the hitters are trying to hit the ball to left center field.
