Soft toss teaches hand-eye coordination with a moving ball. The underhand toss is slow enough that kids can react, and it’s close enough to your position that you see every swing.
Equipment needed: 20-25 baseballs, a bucket, a net behind the hitter or open field with a fence, one bat.
Setup: You stand 30 feet from home plate with the bucket of balls. The hitter stands at home. A net or fence is behind them to catch balls.
How to run it:
- Call out the location before each toss: “Inside corner,” “Outside corner,” “Up and in,” “Low and away.”
- Toss the ball underhand at 10-15 mph so it arrives at chest height, waist height, or wherever you called it.
- They swing. Repeat.
- Do 20 tosses. Most kids will make contact on 12-16 of them.
What to look for: Adjustments. If you toss inside, they should shift weight forward. If you toss low, they should drop the hands. Kids who are rigid will swing the same way on every pitch.
Variation: For younger kids (8-9), toss from 25 feet at chest height only and call no location. Let them just see the ball and swing.
If they’re struggling: Slow the toss to 8 mph and stay in the middle of the zone for a full set of 10 before you start moving locations.
If they’ve got it: Call the location after the toss leaves your hand instead of before. Now they have to read and adjust mid-flight, which mimics real pitching.