Blur w/ night baseball photos...HELP!

[Tammy Snyder]

Have a terrific lens...Tamron 70-200mm f2.8 and brand new camera. Went out to photo my sons baseball game. The early evening photos were great...there was still light. But, when darkness came and the overhead lights came on and the game picked up interest...I either sacrificed light or shutter speed.
I can't seem to get the blur out of the fast pitch or from the batters swing.
Any helpful ideas would be great.

I tried researching and following others' ideas but to no avail.

[OsmosisStudios]

Up your ISO. If you cant do that, then you're out of luck.

[dcclark]

Did the photos you took look properly exposed? I ask because your camera (in Matrix / Evaluative metering mode) might be overexposing a bit, if it sees a lot of darkness plus a little bit of brightness on the field. You MIGHT be able to get a slightly better result if you change to center-weighted metering -- the result MIGHT be a good-looking subject (your son / some other player), with the surrounding area being a bit darker.

Otherwise, yeah, higher ISO. You've got the right lens, but the situation might just be too dark otherwise.

[Tammy Snyder]

Thanks everyone. The lighting was great and I upped the ISO to the point of bad noise but it still didn't work. I tried a tripod too of course and that didn't help either. I figure I'm doing something wrong. I can get the ball stopped better being behind the batter more but a swing of the bat brings blur...although it doesn't look bad...I've just read that sports photos should be completely frozen.
I'd like to pin this down but if not, guess I'll just be doing daytime.
P.S.
The histogram shows my exposure is dead on but still the blur. Hmmm.

[OsmosisStudios]

You just need more shutterspeed. If you cant get any higher ISO, then your only other option is a more light.

For what it's worth, getting the bat totally frozen is gonna be next to impossible. They move surprisingly quickly. If you do a quick image search, ALL of the images of a batter with the bat frozen are taken during the day.

[Tammy Snyder]

Thank you. You're right.