Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

**metallidevils** · 04-30-2021, 10:45 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by Rmiok222

I think what he’s trying to say is it’s not “aiming” it’s more of “looking for a certain pitch and executing”

If I’m in a 2-0, 2-1, 3-0, 3-1 count and have a pull hitter at the plate I’m holding my left analog stick towards my hitter before the pitcher is even in his windup and not letting go. While I’m doing that I look for a pitch middle in.

If it’s not where I want I let the pitch go, even if it’s a strike I let it go if it’s not exactly where I want.

That’s just one situation though. There’s tons of situations. You just have to pick what tactic you’re going to use. If I’m in a 0-0 count I’m usually using no influence. 0-2 I try to “slap” the ball if I’m NOT hitting with a major pull guy (Franmil Reyes) because it’s easier to make contact since the barrel of that bat stays in the zone a bit longer opposed when you try and pull the ball you’ll have a higher chance of swing and miss.

You should check out TheWarmWinds directional hitting guide too. He has good stuff in there.

Directional Hitting Guide
https://forums.operationsports.com/f...d.php?t=907904

Sent from my iPhone using Operation Sports

Hm, let me speculate. If you have a pitch right down the middle and you LS toward the batter, do you have a larger 'pull' window (i.e. you still pull even if you dont swing early)?

**Rmiok222** · 05-01-2021, 03:19 AM

Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by metallidevils

Hm, let me speculate. If you have a pitch right down the middle and you LS toward the batter, do you have a larger 'pull' window (i.e. you still pull even if you dont swing early)?

Yea you’d have a larger pull window. On the flip side if you’re pulling and it’s on the outside it doesn’t go too well. That’s my experience atleast. I’m honestly not the best person for these kind of questions. Hopefully TheWarmWind sees this. He’s the directional hitting guy to ask.

Actually, if you check out his directional hitting guide on here I’m sure it’ll give you a ton on answers you’re looking for

Directional Hitting Guide
https://forums.operationsports.com/f...d.php?t=907904

Sent from my iPhone using Operation Sports

**cvantu** · 05-01-2021, 01:08 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by SamC24167

i use zone and i can rake normally on allstar and legend but not hof when im in my franchise but when i am online playing against other people i become way to impatient because i feel like he other player wont throw strikes like the computer would and with zone its hard to keep track of the ball sometimes with the PCI... would it be better to use Directional when im online against other players and just try and hit the pitch where it is instead of using zone??

Try setting the PCI to fade out the outer and center. I find it makes tracking far easier.

**JayhawkerStL** · 05-02-2021, 02:52 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by metallidevils

I've read the whole thread and still don't understand how it's not aiming. Under what circumstance would you not choose the direction that corresponds to when the ball crosses the plate?

On a hit and run, or to beat the shift.

**metallidevils** · 05-02-2021, 07:55 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by JayhawkerStL

On a hit and run, or to beat the shift.

I can understand influencing up or down. Left or right is what I am struggling with. If you want to beat the shift wouldn't you just swing late? What would it mean to aim directional away from the batter, but still swing early? Especially on a pitch inside?

**liftheavy9** · 02-19-2025, 05:39 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Always go back and forth with directional and zone. Love directional as it’s more realistic and you can use real baseball hitting tactics. They definitely have made directional harder on legend difficulty no doubt. This thread was a great read…a bit old but SCEA chimes in as well. Remember directional had always been the default hitting option before online took off. Now you see strike zone cam and zone hitting. Reminds me of duck hunt and has little baseball strategy. Ambush hitting sounds nice for zone users but it’s been in the game for years naturally…especially with the directional interface.

**kinsmen7** · 02-19-2025, 06:49 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by metallidevils

I can understand influencing up or down. Left or right is what I am struggling with. If you want to beat the shift wouldn't you just swing late? What would it mean to aim directional away from the batter, but still swing early? Especially on a pitch inside?

Early in the count, I tend to look for my pitch, which would something middle-inside...which I would be looking to pull.

When you're behind in the count, pitchers will tend to try and get you to chase outside, which I look to hit the other way/foul off (Push).

What I've found from my own experience, and the regression in my hand-eye coordination as I get older/play less, is that I'm far more successful just going left and right, as opposed to trying to go up/down on left/right.

As you mentioned, timing factors in a lot with directional hitting.

I do play with quick counts on though, so I tend to strikeout a lot, but I still do see a solid amount of success, and a solid variety of hits doing this.

**NYJin2011tm** · 02-19-2025, 08:54 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

I always hated the artificial option that earlier Shows had to influence where you hit it. I either turned it off or never used it. If I wanted to hit to LF with RHB I would just swing early, if I wanted to hit a flyball I would look for a pitch up in the zone, etc. I just prefer to do it naturally.

**Ghost Of The Year** · 02-19-2025, 09:29 PM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by NYJin2011tm

I always hated the artificial option that earlier Shows had to influence where you hit it. I either turned it off or never used it. If I wanted to hit to LF with RHB I would just swing early, if I wanted to hit a flyball I would look for a pitch up in the zone, etc. I just prefer to do it naturally.

At the time, I didn't understand why they separated timing/directional into two different styles of hitting but once I found out the why, I eventually found pure timing to be a better fit for me as well.

**Ghost Of The Year** · 02-20-2025, 01:34 AM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by Brian SCEA

Directional or Zone is personal preference. As far as the main hitting engine goes, both interfaces are identical (Directional simulates your PCI placement for you and passes it to the engine). In Zone hitting you pick the timing and PCI location. In Directional you pick the timing and influence PCI location (or if you don't influence, it picks for you). For this reason it is better not to influence than to influence randomly and get it half right and half wrong (in that situation you are better off paying attention to location and taking pitches).

I would compare it to manual vs automatic shifting for driving. If you are below average in stick shifting, you are better off using automatic where it handles it for you. Your disadvantage is 'forgiven' though you gain nothing extra for it. If you are above average in stick shifting, you are better off using stick to 'earn' that advantage. This is why professional drivers have to use stick to compete at the highest levels because even a small edge adds up, but you can drive perfectly well either way. In fact automatic accelerates faster than manual and doesn't lose energy to shifts, losing out only because manual is smarter and more efficient in other ways.

For this reason, some players succeed more with Directional, others succeed more with Zone. As you approach Legend difficulty, it becomes more important to use Zone because you have 2 ways to outperform rather than 1 1/2. There is no inherent disadvantage to Directional but you miss out on 1/2 a way to shine. So Zone is not significantly more successful in general. For beginners, Directional is often more successful. To be precise, it depends on if you are above or below average in skill at PCI placement (compared to your 2 other skills - timing and take pitch).

Originally posted by Brian SCEA

A few years back we changed timing feedback so that Good is wider, so it includes some concept of both 'good early' and 'good late' (this depends on pitch location - on an away pitch being slightly late is fine). Unfortunately there isn't a good way to show both meanings of timing: a) your timing was good for that pitch location, b) the exact early/late/direction of your timing more precisely. We've experimented but simple beats out the other versions we tried.

Essentially, the direction of the hit off the bat will tell you the more precise early/late timing you had, after factoring in location. The swing analysis timing field tells you something more that isn't as obvious.

Originally posted by Brian SCEA

I'm not the best hitting coach, but this is from my answer to a similar question:

The more important goal starting out is to focus on taking bad pitches and getting the right timing. When you have that down, then focus on pitch quadrant and influence. I.e. the learning progression being: a) not swinging on a ball, b) using good timing when you do swing, c) reacting to pitch location (with timing + influence).<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w

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When you try to learn all three things at a time, I don't think you'll do well. If you want to learn to juggle 4 balls first learn how to juggle 2 then 3. But maybe someone else knows better.

All I can speak of is to how things are implemented and designed. For example, bad influences hurt and good influences help - so influencing randomly isn't going to be better than focusing on timing alone. Whereas consistent good influence input is better than no input. The interfaces are designed to also reward individual multiple skills a through c, so that you can progress in skill and hitting has a wide differentiation between skill levels. And moreover, each player has a way to showcase his individual strengths even when he has the overall disadvantage.

To give one example of the result of that design, I think last time we gathered the data a Legend player compared to an Allstar player is something like hitting .355 versus .250 with all other things being equal. Rookie would be .145 (comparable to a pitcher hitting). Or put another way, Legend vs Allstar is like .250 versus .145 - an MLB team hitting against a team full of pitchers hitting. Of course, any one of those pitchers can hit a home run and any one of those top players could strike out - we're talking only over the long run.

The moral is - what you do matters, and skill matters (in the long run).

Originally posted by Brian SCEA

I looked through it and it's hard to say, I could make the case either way.

For example:
"No influence increases the impact of hot/cold zones for your hitter"

There is no mechanic that specifically does this. However, since you have 1 1/2 inputs (timing + '1/2' PCI) instead of 2 (timing + PCI), in a sense this makes timing worth more (it is now worth 2/3 of your success rather than 1/2). In the same way, you could argue that paying attention to hot and cold zones matters more. However, I would guess that there are more important things that come first. There is some general truth to the idea that 'less input means the inputs remaining matter more' but it is not dramatic.

It is definitely true that high pitches are more for power, versus low pitches, since flyballs care about power (HR versus an out) more than groundballs (single vs an out). But the relationship is not that you gain more power, just that power is more important for that strategy. So you could state 'going for flyballs / high pitches' is more viable with high power hitters than low power hitters. In an extreme example, pitchers are known for flying out all the time and don't necessarily want to go for flyballs or high pitches (but they should also swing well at whatever they can regardless). Important is that you do not gain significant power just for swinging at a high pitch or influencing up.

The same goes on for the rest of the guide. I didn't see anything that wasn't based on some truth, and it might be great for coaching someone at hitting. All I can speak of is how hitting works from input to output. And it is always very hard to use one to interpret the other.

Feel free to use or quote anything I've said. I'm only providing information and I'll even be putting some summary of this into the next strategy guide. I like to think that knowledge should always be free and doesn't belong to anyone.

Remember when we used to receive gem posts like these?
Those were the days.

**MiracleMet718** · 02-22-2025, 05:36 AM

Re: Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

Originally posted by Ghost Of The Year

Remember when we used to receive gem posts like these?
Those were the days.

There is a reason we don’t get them anymore. Just need to scroll through 2-3 threads and it makes sense why they don’t post around here.

Directional Hitting in MLB The Show 20

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