Baseball Training Aids: The Ultimate Guide

Baseball Training Aids - SPC Sports

Finding the best baseball training aids for your solo practice session can be overwhelming.

You know that improving your skill means practicing on your own time, but where do you start? How can you train the weaker parts of your game, by yourself, without breaking the bank?

If you’re trying to figure out your options for building a better practice session, then you’re in luck.

We’ve collected everything you need to find the right training aid for you and keep you from spending your season in the dugout. (You’re welcome)

1. Baseball Training Aids for Better Batting

Let’s hit it off with some baseball training aids that’ll help you swing for the fences.

(At) Bat Attachments for Improved Strength and Accuracy

You don’t have to invest in expensive baseball equipment to increase your skill. With these batting aids and attachments, you can hit a home run for you and your wallet.

Baseball Training Aids - Easton Speed Bat WeightBat Weights

Great training aid for hitters, batting weights, weighted sleeves, and weighted donuts add swing resistance during games or warm-ups.

Batting weights like the Easton Speed Bat Weight, Champro, and Pow’r Wrap bat weights are designed to strengthen your swing and improve hand speed.

That way, when it’s time for the weights to come off, you can really let the ball fly.

SWINGRAILSwingrail - bat attachment

Whether it’s baseball season or you’re training in the off-season, if you’re looking to improve the mechanics of your swing then you have to try the SWINGRAIL. This elastic band straps to your bat with one end and to your arm with the other.

When swung correctly, the elastic band slides smoothly off of the rail. Otherwise, the velcro connection is pulled apart during the swing. That way you know you’re “casting” your hands away from your body.

This kind of immediate external feedback helps hitters develop a long slow swing that stays inside of the ball.

LineDrivePro Swing Trainer - baseball training aidsLine Drive Pro

Improving your speed and power is important, but no team needs a loose cannon.

Accuracy attachments like the Line Drive Pro Swing Trainer teach hitters proper swing mechanics by providing immediate feedback on both good and poor swings.

To do this the Line Drive Pro fits to your bat, holding a tennis ball. When the hitter swings, the ball gets thrown from the bat toward a target.

To have any control over the ball’s direction, hitters must have proper hand and bat path in their swing. This develops muscle memory through repetition by keeping their hands and bat through the zone longer.

2. Improve Your Hitting and Data Analysis Skills with a Swing Analyzer

Sometimes, we need to look at swings from another perspective.

Baseball Training Aids - Blast BaseballSwing Analyzers

With swing analyzers such as the Blast Baseball 360, Diamond Swing Tracker, Garmin Impact Baseball Sensor, and Zepp 3D Baseball Swing Analyzer, players can get a detailed breakdown of their swing, and find where they need to improve.

Speed analyzers offer a wide range of data (bat speed, hand speed, and video footage). That way you can document your practice, and pinpoint where you can use more training.

The level of detail is really personal preference. If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the data, then the maximum number of measurements aren’t what you need right now. However, if you can understand how they relate to your game, there’s a lot you can gain here.

At the very least your inner baseball nerd can prove your growth with math.

3. Hone your Skills with Specialty Baseball Bats

You can attach things to your bat all day, but sometimes the best baseball training aid is a specialty bat.

Baseball Training Aids - Specialty BatsWeighted Bats

Weighted bats such as the Axe Bat Speed Trainers and SKLZ Power and Quick Sticks are designed to improve your swing power, hand quickness, and hand-eye coordination.

Like weighted ball training for pitching, weighted bat training is becoming increasingly more common at many highly respected training facilities, high schools and colleges, and even with the pros.

Not only does weighted bat training increase bat speed and exit velocity, but it can also help hitters square the ball up more often.

You can browse our stock of Axe Bats here 

Momentus - Speed HitterUtility Training Bats

Albeit they boast an odd design, specialty training bats like the Momentus Speed Hitter and Insider Bat, improve your form by requiring an ideal swing every time.

They literally won’t operate otherwise, so you have no choice but to improve.

Specialty Bat - Insider Bat

As some of the most positively received baseball training aids on the web, these easy to use, “pick up and swing” bats offer immediate feedback and keep players from casting out.

 One-handed Training Bats

One-handed BatOne-handed training bats really let you focus on strengthening and developing your mechanics … one arm at a time (of course).

Ranging from 20 to 25 inches, the shorter length and lighter weight of a one-handed bat shortens your swing path, helps you keep your hands inside the ball when striking, reinforcing proper technique.

4. Improve the View from Homeplate – Batting Goggles and Wedges

Let’s take a look at some baseball training aids that aren’t bat-related.

Swivel Vision Training Goggles

Hitting Goggles

If you find yourself struggling to track the ball before the swing, the Swivel Vision Training Goggles force your chin to stay on the ball and reduce your field of vision, (similar to blinders on a horse).

Wearing the goggles teaches you to focus both eyes and use the optimal field of vision to track a ball from the pitcher to the bat. (you can’t look anywhere else anyway).

Bonus Tip: pitchers and fielders will benefit from this aid as well.

PowerUp WedgeHitting Wedges

The PowerUp Wedge is a rubber wedge that goes on a hitter’s back foot and is secured by a one-size fit all velcro strap.

Wearing the wedge when hitting teaches you to transfer more energy from your backside towards and through the ball, firing your hips and landing strong with your front.

The PowerUp Wedge is, easy to transport, simple to use, and practical for both throwing and fielding training. Any hitter looking to learn the proper use of their lower body should invest in this versatile training aid.

2. Fielding & Catching Aids for Commanding the Outfield

Baseball is more than just hitting, so be sure to develop outfield skills with these fielding and catching aids.

1. Ordinance for the Outfielder – Specialty Baseballs

Rawlings ReactballReaction Balls

Not all baseball fields are created equal, and sometimes you’re going to get a bad bounce.

However, with the Rawlings Reactball, SKLZ Reaction Ball and Champro Reaction Ball, you can make a bad bounce a little better.

SKLZ - Reaction BallThese six-sided rubber balls are designed to improve your hand-eye coordination, reaction time, and agility.

By imitating a baseball nightmare of unnatural and unpredictable bounces, you’re forced you to stay on your toes and focused at all times.

Shop by brand and view our collection of Rawlings products here.

2. Seize the Game with Specialty Baseball Gloves

You can’t blame every misplay on the sun, or the wind, or the lunar equinox.

Fortunately, these specialty gloves will help improve your hand-eye coordination and help you whiff a little less often.

Rawlings 2 Hands Foam Training GloveFoam Training Gloves

Suitable for players of all ages, the Rawling 2 Hands Foam Training Glove is designed to teach the proper technique for fielding ground balls.

A flat foam pad with finger slots on the back, the minimalist design promotes the use of two hands. This keeps your body low and in front when fielding a ground ball while improving the speed and smoothness of a ball transfer from your glove to your throwing hand.

However, you won’t be able to “stab” at the ball like you can with a traditional fielder’s glove, and it’s not recommended for line drives or fly balls.

Inexpensive, light-weight, and wearable on both hands, foam trainers are a veteran baseball training aid.

Bonus Tip: Foam Training Gloves are great tools for practicing fielding in both Slow-pitch and Fast-pitch softball.

Flat GlovesChampro Baseball Training Glove

While more expensive than their foam cousins, flat gloves like the Champro Baseball Training Glove, are a smart investment for an experienced fielder.

The tough leather of a flat glove grants greater versatility, protection, and life-span, justifying the additional cost.

Advanced players use flat gloves to field live ground balls off a bat or to play catch, without damaging their hand.

Unlike the foam version, leather flat gloves are hand specific. So, make sure you choose your flat glove for the correct hand.

Libke Pro Wrist Correction - Fielding AidLibke Pro Wrist Correction

A bent wrist and a groundball are not an ideal combination and are one of the biggest challenges for young infielders.

Infielders often field ground balls with their wrist at an angle, limiting the amount of glove pocket and web facing the ball.

Even if a ground ball is caught, a curled wrist during the ball’s glove-to-hand transition is just asking for a fumble. An embarrassing mishap in a high-intensity game.

Beyond your average fielding accessory, the Libke Pro restricts the wrist keeping it straight. This forces you to keep your body low, field the ball out front, and keep your wrist from curling.

3. Pitching Aids: Everything You Need to Send Hitters Back to The Dugout.

The best view from the pitcher’s mound is a batter trudging back to the bench. These pitching aids will help you put that scene on repeat.

1. Specialty Baseballs for the Perfect Pitch

Sometimes the best teacher is the ball itself.

Champro Pitcher Training BallMarked Pitching Balls

If you’re new to the pitcher’s mound or advanced pitches, then get yourself a pitching training ball.

SKLZ Pitch Trainer BallBalls such as the Champro Pitcher Training Baseballs, Crenstone Baseball Pitching Trainer Kit, and the SKILZ Pitch Trainer Ball are all viable options for getting yourself acquainted with the art.

By using color-coded dots on the baseball to show a proper grip and a helpful instructional booklet, these training balls teach you to throw a variety of tactical pitches.

Champro Weighted Training BaseballWeighted Training Balls

Generally running from 4 to 15 ounces, weighted baseballs are becoming increasingly popular at both the amateur and professional levels and for good reason.

Underweight baseballs train faster arm speed, while heavier balls improve arm strength and pitch velocity. This helps develop all around stronger wrists and forearms.

The debate is still out on the effectiveness of weighted training balls. Regardless, these are best used by more practiced pitchers with well-developed mechanics, as younger pitchers are more prone to injury.

There are a number of companies that offer weighted baseballs including Champro Weighted Training Baseball, Total Control Ball, Powernet, and PRIMED, among others.

Bonus Tip: Weighted baseballs are also another great training aid for hitters, teaching you to swing through the baseball and encourages good hip rotation.

2. Improve your Pitch with Home (Plate) Decor

You’ve seen a lot of baseball training aids that focus the source of a pitch, but what about its destination?

Bownet Strikezone NetBownet Strike Zone

Items like the Bownet Strike Zone and eProMound’s Strike String Kit,  defines the strike zone, helping the pitcher’s accuracy over the plate.

These pitching aids provide immediate feedback.

If you pitch within the orange zone outlining the strike zone, there’s a good chance that’d be a strike in a real game. If you don’t, well…  you get the idea.

Schutt Strike Zone PlateStrike Zone Plate

Much like the Bownet Strike Zone, the Schutt Strike Zone Plate is a training aid designed to help pitchers improve their accuracy and focus by defining the strike zone with a color-coded plate.

Lightweight and easy to transport and storage. It’s suitable for players of all ages.

Bonus Tip: The Strike Zone Plate is also a useful tool for catchers and umpires, and great training aid for both baseball and softball.

Pro Mounds - Designated HitterDesignated Hitter

If you’re practicing alone but would still like the illusion of company, the Designated Hitter™ Pro is your ideal pitcher’s training tool.

This advanced tool displays all of the hitter’s key visuals, creating a more realistic training environment, without the need for a live batter

The Designated Hitter™ Pro gives pitchers an authentic image of the strike zone, helping develop more consistent, and accurate pitches.

3. Alternative Pitching Gear

Not all pitching gear involves a glove or a ball. Here are some alternative baseball training aids you can use to improve your presence on the pitcher’s mound.

Oates Specialties - Shoulder TubeShoulder Tube

The Oates Specialties Shoulder Tube is a great tool for baseball players to warm up, cool down, and strengthen their throwing shoulder.

By rhythmically moving the Shoulder Tube, the counterweighted ends will move. This stretches and shortens the affected muscle groups, increasing flexibility and blood flow to the shoulder complex.

You can target specific muscle groups by altering the position and direction of the Shoulder Tube during the exercise. An essential tool for the health and durability of all throwing athletes.

Bushnell Velocity Speed GunBushnell Velocity Speed Gun - Baseball Batting Aids

How fast is your fastball?

Don’t know? You should. It’s one of the first things scouts will look at.

With a large LCD display, ability to measure throws within plus-or-minus 1 mile per hour, and a range of 10 to 110 miles per hour from up to 90 feet away from the pitch, look no further than the Bushnell Velocity Speed Gun.

4. Baseball Training Aids for Strength and Agility.

Baseball training aids for batting, fielding, and pitching, are extremely useful for focusing on certain aspects of your game.

However, you don’t want to neglect your overall strength and agility.

1. Build Power with Strength Aids

By including these tools into your workout you’ll be swinging for the fences in no time.

Strength Aids - Resistance BandsResistance Bands

Resistance bands are a baseball player’s best friend.

Your throwing arm and batting swing can greatly benefit from adding resistance bands to your workout. By focusing on specific muscle groups, and they can be used to strengthen your body overall.

Resistance bands also go way beyond training, as they’re crucial for prehab/rehab that keeps you healthy and playing.

Baseball Strength Aid - Mini BandsMini Bands

Mini bands are another piece of inexpensive equipment that you can add to many of your baseball training workouts.

These elastic bands are primarily used for strengthening and stabilizing your upper and lower body through hip and glute activation, lateral movement exercises, shoulder stabilization, and much more!

These are crucial to improving “all the little things” and seeing big advances in your game!

Medicine BallMedicine Ball

Medicine balls are ideal for improving your strength, core, stability, and rotational power.

A combination of both heavy and lightweight med ball routines is ideal for improving the strength, speed, and rotational power of your game.

TRX Suspension TrainingTRX Suspension Training

Our last strength aid is the extremely versatile, TRX suspension training bands.

These bands use your body weight for workouts, so it travels well and takes up virtually no space at all. Use them for total body workouts, core, plyometrics, and balance/stabilization exercises, either at home or in the weight room.

2. Increase Speed and Quickness with Agility Aids

All that strength won’t matter if you can’t get to the ball or around the bases.

Sports Cones

One of the easiest investments for improving your game is to buy a set of spots cones.

You can practice angles for ground balls, fly balls, and create agility formations to improve your footwork efficiency.

Agility & Speed LadderAgility Ladder and Mini Hurdles

Baseball is full of explosive movements wherever you are on the field.

A training program that incorporates explosive speed and agility is crucial to practicing these movements at an elite level without getting injured.

Agility & Speed - Mini Hurdles Adding an agility ladder or mini hurdles to your workout is a great physical and neurological warm up.

They get the heart rate up, teach coordination and rhythm, and train foot speed and quickness.

You really can’t go wrong with either of these.

3. Recovery Aids for Injuries and Injury Prevention

All the specialized baseball equipment in the world doesn’t matter if you end up getting injured.

Recovery Training - Foam RollerFoam Roller

Every elite athlete should have a foam roller, especially if they want to stay an elite athlete. (Coach won’t play you if you’re injured, it’s the truth).

Foam rollers are ideal for loosening and stretching muscles, and crucial for avoiding injury, maximizing performance, and soreness recovery.

By putting pressure on trigger points in the muscle, tension is released. This makes foam rollers excellent for self-myofascial release or self-massage, and core workouts.

We cannot stress this enough; a foam roller is key keeping you off the injured player’s list.

5. Heavy Duty Baseball Training Equipment

We’ve covered a lot of quick and simple training aids that help improve your game. But, if you’re interested in more extravagant baseball training aids, try these.

1. Tee Systems and Swing Trainers

There are all sorts of tee systems and swing trainers of varying complexities and investments.

Hands Inside Trainer - H.I.T.H.I.T. Trainer

The Hands Inside Trainer, or H.I.T. for short, is a tee attachment that teaches hitters to keep their hands inside the zone by stopping them from casting out. There’s no other option but to hit correctly because if you do cast out, you make contact with the H.I.T.

Louisville Slugger Ultra-Instructoswing TeeLouisville Slugger Ultra-Instructoswing Tee

If you’d rather not use a tee attachment and would rather invest in an entire tee, then consider the big brother to the H.I.T., the Louisville Slugger Ultra-Instructoswing tee.

You can shop our entire range of Luisville Slugger baseball gear and equipment here.

Backspin TeeThe Backspin Tee

The Backspin Tee trains hitters to hit the middle and bottom of the baseball to create both the proper launch angle and backspin, to carry the ball farther.  It trains the hitter to stay on path with the baseball resulting in more consistent squarely hit baseballs.

SwingAway MVP Trainer

If you felt that the standard tee wasn’t pushing the boundaries of ball suspension technology, then look no farther than the SwingAway MVP Trainer.SwingAway MVP Trainer - Baseball Batting Aids

The batter hits the ball attached to bungees. The ball strikes the net and shows the hitter where the ball would have traveled on a field.

SKLZ Hurricane Category 4 Swing TrainerSKLZ - Hurricane Category 4 Swing Trainer.

Another all-in-one system is the SKLZ Hurricane Category 4 Swing Trainer.

Imitating pitches from a variety of angles, the hurricane 4 improves your hitting strength, speed, and hand-eye coordination.

You can leave your practice net and bucket of baseballs or ball caddy at home with this swing trainer. Just make sure you brought your bat.

2. Pitching MachinesBaseball Training Aids - Pitching Machine

Not interested in hitting from a tee? Looking for a way to hit game-like balls on your own?Then a pitching machine may be a sound investment.

Available in a wide range of specificities, pitching machines imitate a variety of throws, from different heights, speeds, and angles.

Pitching machines are usually on the pricier end. However, their versatility and durability mean you can use them throughout your career. Therefore, make sure that you are serious enough to justify long-term investment.

3. Heavy Duty Ball and Swing analyzer

For when you want The Matrix levels of baseball analytics on everything from your home run to your fastball.

RapsodoBaseball Training Aids - Rapsodo

While probably impractical for individuals in both price and utility, the Rapsodo is top of the line when it comes to measuring and tracking ball flight.

The Rapsodo is great for the batter or pitcher looking to get as much data as possible out of their hitting aid.

Your Baseball Training Aids

No doubt you’ve heard of or tried at least one of the baseball training aids on this list.

What are the items you’ve had the most success with?

Feel that there’s gear missing that should be included in the guide?

Either way, let us know by leaving a comment below now.