Caveman vs. Tech: Hitting Drills That Build Real Skill

By BK, Athletic Hitting Development
Complete Hitters Are Built… It’s Earned!

Give me an axe, a sledgehammer and a tire over a room full of expensive technology — every single day.

Technology is fantastic. I use it. Video, data, swing analysis, pitch machines and training tools can all make coaching clearer and practice more efficient.

But if I had to choose between that room and a Caveman Hitting Lab — an axe, a sledgehammer, a tire, a railroad tie, a hammer, nails, bats and baseballs — I would take the caveman tools.

Not because technology is bad. Because the right simple tools do more than tell a hitter what is wrong. They often make the hitter do the movement correctly.

That matters.

1. The axe does not care what your data says

Take an axe and make a short, controlled cut into a piece of wood. To do it well, you cannot roll your hands early. You cannot drag the handle. You cannot cast the head of the axe away from you. You cannot be loose, long or out of control.

The tool will expose those mistakes immediately.

To make a clean, powerful cut, the body has to organize itself:

• Start athletic and balanced.
• Keep the move short and controlled.
• Deliver the tool with intention instead of throwing it from the hands.
• Let the hands work together — one palm working up, one palm working down.
• Keep the action through the target instead of rolling around it.

That is not a baseball swing. But it teaches athletic positions and hand action that transfer directly into one.

In hitting, we want to drive through the baseball — think about cutting the ball in half — not rolling over the top of it. The axe gives the athlete a feel for staying connected, staying organized and applying force with a short, accurate movement.

2. Caveman hitting drills force a positive movement

This is the point: the best baseball and softball hitting drills create a useful problem for the athlete to solve.

If you swing an axe poorly, the result is obvious. If you hit a tire with a sledgehammer while off balance, casting or pulling your hands apart, the tool gives you feedback right away. If you hammer a nail, each hand has a job and the movement must be controlled.

Those tools build two things hitters need:

1. Strength — the ability to create and control force.
2. Skill — the ability to put force in the right place, at the right time, with the right movement.

Too often we separate those. We lift for strength, then we try to learn skill somewhere else. But a well-chosen caveman tool can train both at once. It can build a stronger athlete while teaching body control, hand control, rhythm, direction and intent.

That is a powerful return on a simple tool — and why these are more than novelty hitting drills. They are strength-and-skill work with a direct purpose.

3. Technology can diagnose. Simple tools can teach.

A great technology system may show that one hitter is less efficient than another. It may measure bat speed, attack angle, rotational speed, contact quality or time to contact. That information can be valuable.

But information is not automatically development.

The next question has to be: What will make this hitter better?

Sometimes the answer is video or data. Sometimes it is a coach seeing something the athlete cannot feel. And sometimes the best answer is to hand the athlete a simple tool that demands the correct movement.

The athlete who learns to move an axe with balance, control, direction and force may develop a more useful movement pattern than the athlete staring at a screen trying to chase a number.

The number can tell you something. The right drill can change something.

Use technology to help you see. Use training to help the athlete do.

4. You do not need to sell a kidney to build a hitter

Baseball and softball families are told every day that they need more: another subscription, another sensor, another machine, another number, another expensive lab.

There is nothing wrong with investing in development. But do not confuse expensive with effective.

An outstanding hitter still needs the same things he or she has always needed:

• An athletic body.
• Strength and explosiveness.
• Balance and body control.
• Mechanically Advantaged Angles (MAA) — the positions that let the body deliver force efficiently. AHD hitters own them.
• A short, efficient path to the ball.
• Strong hands that work together.
• The ability to see, recognize, time, decide and attack.
• Repetition with purpose.

You can develop a great deal of that with a bat, a ball, a tee, a partner, a tire, a hammer, an axe and a coach who understands what the work is supposed to teach.

That is not anti-technology. It is pro-development.

5. Build the athlete. Then use the information.

At Athletic Hitting Development, we want hitters to use every good tool available. We also want them to understand that the foundation is not hidden inside a machine.

It is built through athletic movement — and through all four pillars trained together: the swing, athletic development, the Hitting Processor and the mental approach.

Give me the Caveman Hitting Lab. Give me a hitter willing to work. Give me the simple tools that reward balance, strength, direction and control.

Then, if technology helps us see the next priority more clearly, great. We will use it.

But we will never let the search for more technology replace the work of building a complete hitter.

Don’t collect drills. Build a complete hitter.

Parents: before you buy another gadget, run the free SwingChecker™ to find your hitter’s #1 priority, then read Strength Training for Young Hitters: What’s Right at Every Age. Coaches: the next step below shows how to bring this work to your whole roster.

Complete Hitters Are Built… It’s Earned!

AHD • BACKSPIN2/2

THELESSON.

• Tech helps you see.
• Training makes you do.
• Build the athlete.
• Earn the swing.

Complete Hitters Are Built…Earned.

AHDBackSpinAthletic Hitting Development

Quick answers

This article is part of the AHD guide Baseball Hitting Drills by Age. Start there for the full picture and every related article.