Tee Work (Softball)
Ages 6 and up · A tee, a bucket of 11-inch balls (or trainers), a bat, and a net, fence, or open yard
The tee is softball's daily swing gym, exactly as it is baseball's, with the sport's own flavor: the bigger ball rewards clean barrel contact visibly (mishits announce themselves), and the fastpitch swing being built (short to the ball, strong through it) gets grooved best where no pitch can interfere. College softball teams hit off tees every day of their lives; the driveway version is the same tool.
The setup detail most families miss: the tee belongs slightly OUT FRONT of the lead foot, where fastpitch contact actually happens, not beside the belt buckle. That one correction changes contact quality the first session, and everything else builds from a settled stance and a full finish.
How to run it
- Set the tee mid-thigh height, a ball-width or two out front of the lead foot.
- Stance: feet a bit wider than shoulders, knees soft, hands at the back shoulder, eyes down at the ball.
- The swing sequence, slow first: small stride, hips fire, hands take the shortest path to the ball, full finish with the belt buckle facing the field.
- Five-swing sets with a full reset between swings (step out, breathe, restage). Deliberate beats rapid, every day.
- After two clean sets, tour the zone: tee inside (contact further out front), away (deeper, driven oppo), up and down. 20-30 quality swings is a session.
What to say
Common faults and fixes
Tee beside the body (deep contact), producing weak push swings.
Move it out front of the lead foot. Check it every session; tees drift, and this single setup error causes half of all backyard tee frustration.
A long, loopy bat path (the swing that gets beaten by fastpitch speed later).
The short-to-it cue plus a check: the bat head should not dip below the hands early. Slow-motion swings grading the path fix it faster than words.
Machine-gun swinging with no resets.
The step-out reset between every swing, by rule. The tee builds patterns; tired hurried swings build the wrong ones.
Make it easier, make it harder
Bigger or softer trainer balls, shorter bat or choke-up, celebration-heavy short sets.
Zone-tour sets with contact points named; called target fields per swing (pull, middle, oppo); a pause-at-load check swing; line-drive-only challenge sets racing the log.
This page teaches the drill. ParentEdge builds it into a plan for your kid.
Built around their game, their goals, and what they’re working on.