Customer Reviews

SKLZ Zip-N-Hit Pro Baseball Trainer

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

My son hit .515 as an 8 year old last year. This year, he moved up a division and has struggled at around .250, even though he has a fairly nice swing. Using this device for two weeks, he suddenly can't hit anything. I pitched him hardballs today and he swung over the top of every one of the first 60! The problem with this device is that the ball doesn't drop like a pitched ball, so it actually trains them to swing higher than normal. I'll be putting this away for the season and trying to recover my son's swing and confidence. Don't get me wrong, the kids love it. The entire team lines up before every game and begs you to throw fastballs with it. It's great for use around the house - just tie it to a tree and you can take swings that you couldn't otherwise. Beware if you intend to use this for much more than casual practice and don't let it replace live pitching. Fun-factor is a 5, but as far as a training device, I have to question its value.

Durability seems to be an issue. The cord breaks or unravels much too quickly. The sleeve inside the ball becomes grooved and slows the ball's travel on the cord. A sleeve made of a harder, slicker material would improve both ball speed and reduce cord wear. Possible materials are hardened aluminum, stainless steel (polished), teflon-based plastic or polycarbonate.

I got great results coaching 2 teams last season in 2006 using the Zip N Hit as a training aid in addition to live Batting Practice. We would work it into our routine for pre-game drills and starting practice drills. With every player maybe getting another 20-25 swings at a moving ball at each practice and pre-game session, over a season it adds up to 200-300 extra swings that you can't get from live BP (which takes too long, you must retrieve balls). Both of my teams last year batted as a team over 0.400 in both Bronco and Pony. I had several players bat over 0.500 and 0.600, too. It also helped them develop a level swing which improves the Batting average, and become better situational hitters. Other opposing teams also began copying us. Perfect for pre-game warmups where you aren't allowed live BP, i.e. regular games, tournament games. Our league is now buying one kit for every team in our league as basic equipment. The players can even help drill themselves.

The team my 9-year-old boy is on uses these in practice and will even take some swings on them during the games. His coach also uses them with his 13 year olds team. Not saying the zip and hit is the reason why, but my boy's team has only lost 1 game in over 3 years of baseball, including fall ball. So it's not a bad team, and they use it quite extensively.

At home we have the Hit-Away baseball mounted to a pole and it works great. But, I can't really take it with us. So, we picked up the zip and hit. Now, when the wife goes in the grocery store, we park far enough out for me and the boy to attach it to the back of the vehicle and take some swings in the parking lot. When we go to a Red's game or a Florence Freedom game, it's a big hit in the parking lot there as well. I coach 3 soccer teams year round and the boy and me can squeeze some hitting in between games.

So just for the portability alone, this thing gets 5 stars in my book.

Also, about the review stating his kid now swings over the ball because it doesn't drop like real pitches would. You can make it drop using several different techniques that are described in the directions that come with it. After you get his confidence back up, you might be able to give it another try.

My 8 year old son needed something to level out his swing, and no amount of verbal coaching from myself, mom, grandparents, coaches, other parents, or teammates was doing the trick. He has an awesome Ken Griffy style of swing, and beautiful follow through, but he consistently aims for the sun every swing, that swing works great when I'm tossing the ball to him in the back yard, however his team uses a pitching machine, so the ball comes in faster and straighter than what I pitch, so he always swings under the ball. So I bought the "zip-n-hit pro" set up took a whole two minutes and before I knew it my son was hitting level, he's now hitting the ball alot more consistently than before, not sure whats going on with the negative reviews, but all I can say is this trainer worked for my son, almost instantly.

I bought this for my son when he was 9 years old. We attach it to the baseketball hoop and go to town! It REALLY helps warm up the swing and hand/eye coordination. The cord can fray pretty easily, we replaced ours after about a year. Comes with a second cord though.

I can't pitch to save my life so this was a huge help to me. And I didn't have to run after the ball when it was hit.

This also helped my son from dropping his back shoulder too much. If he swings below the string he knows he's dropped his shoulder.

The only thing I don't like... You really have to hold the string TIGHT so that your knuckles don't get smacked with the ball. That's a little bit of a problem for my little ones to use it together.

My 6 year old is learning to bat and I bought this thinking it would help. Instead of him improving his swing, he's more likely to not swing through due to the bat getting caught up in the rope. I gave this a 4 star rating not because of my son's inability to bat right, but rather because in the 2 times we've used this (50 minutes total) the plastic clip that holds the line inside the handle no longer stays clipped in. This doesn't seriously affect it's usefulness, but sometimes it goes riding down the line with the ball. My biggest complaint with it is the type of plastic that the handles are made of. If you are sensitive/allergic to some plastics this may be a problem for you also. After 10 minutes of holding the handles my hands are itchy and red.

Zip n hit is a great product! Every summer my ten year old sons hitting gets messed up. He is a good baseball hitter but summer camp underhand softball,nintendo wii and tennis racket baseball really have adverse affects on his "eye" It takes a lot of work to correct his hitting. I saw a coach using a zip n hit pro with his son and it got my attention so I purchased one.I own alot of baseball training equipment and in no time this simple device got my sons hitting back!! You can concentrate on consistent location and speed.The zip n hit is fun and you can do some silly things with it to make practice more interesting. Kids have a blast.My only complaint is the the strings do not last very long but you can purchase extras.

Reviewed in terms of my 7yo son, an above avg little leaguer. This hitting trainer definitely has a cool factor when you first get it set up and try it out. It actually works well as far as sending the ball down the line toward your hitter, which gives good training for timing and hand/eye coordination. Where it lacks is in the actual hitting experience. Several times my son has hit more of the rope than the ball and as a result his swing follow-thru is impeded so much that the bat has hit him in the side of the head. That quickly led to a lower gratification in the hitting experience for my son. You could chalk this up to sometimes his swing is an upswing due to dropping his right shoulder and so he comes up and hooks the rope with the bat. Perhaps hard to describe but I don't think it's too uncommon.

This is a great way for me and my daughter to practice her batting together. I can't throw straight to save my life. This helps her a lot and it shows in her games. Love it!