If you searched for a HitTrax cage near you, there is a good chance the closest one is inside a Dick’s Sporting Goods. HitTrax says the system is now in more than 200 of their stores, including every new House of Sport location. What almost nobody explains is that Dick’s runs two different things in that cage, they cost very different amounts, and picking the wrong one is how people end up disappointed.
Two services, one cage
The first is a bat fitting. A store employee runs you through bats, tracks exit speed and launch angle on each one, and hands you a personalized Bat Fitting Report at the end. This is the service the cage was really built for — you are there to find out which bat works for you.
The second is a cage rental: $15 for 15 minutes, $25 for 30 minutes, or $40 for an hour, with up to eight players in some locations. Dick’s states plainly that a cage rental does not include the Bat Fitting Report. You are buying the room and the screen, not the help.
That distinction matters. Book the cage expecting bat advice and you get the room without the help. If the bat is the reason you are going, ask for a fitting by name.
What the cage is actually like
Setups vary by store, so check yours before you drive out. In the configuration HitTrax describes, the bay includes a pitching machine, a projection screen, and real-time metrics on every swing, plus arcade-style games like Target Practice. Reviewers who have hit in the retail bays report something simpler: foam balls off a tee, not leather balls off a machine.
Foam matters more than it sounds. Exit velocity off a foam ball is not exit velocity off a baseball, so treat the raw numbers as a way to compare bats against each other in the same session, not as a measurement of you. For picking between two bats, that comparison is genuinely useful and hard to get anywhere else. For knowing how hard you actually hit a baseball, it is not the tool.
Where it fits, and where it does not
A HitTrax bay at Dick’s is very good at one job: helping you spend $300 on the right bat instead of the wrong one. Swinging three bats back to back with numbers on a screen beats guessing in an aisle. Before a birthday or the start of a season, it is worth the trip — ask what a fitting costs at your store, since it is a different service from renting cage time.
It is not built for training volume. You are in a retail store on a 15-minute clock, hitting foam, with a store employee waiting. Nobody is fixing your swing path there, and you are not getting the 150 quality reps that actually change a hitter.
The part worth doing the math on
An hour in the Dick’s cage is $40. Across the 217 bookable backyard cages published on CageList right now, the median rate is also $40 an hour — for a private cage, real baseballs, a pitching machine, and nobody watching the clock. Same money, very different hour.
So the honest split is this: go to Dick’s to choose a bat, and book a real cage to use it. They are not competitors. They are two steps in the same week.
Before you go
- Call the store. Setups and availability differ, and not every Dick’s with a cage runs it the same way.
- Say which service you want. Ask for a bat fitting by name if you want the report.
- Check whether yours takes reservations. Select stores offer online scheduling; others are walk-in. Walk-ins are often fine, but a weekend afternoon is not the time to find out.
- Bring your own bat if you want to compare it against what is on the wall.
We list 285 HitTrax locations across 274 cities in 44 states — browse them on our HitTrax directory. When you are ready for the reps, find a private cage you can book by the hour.
Common questions
How much does the HitTrax cage at Dick’s cost?
Cage rental is $15 for 15 minutes, $25 for 30 minutes, and $40 for an hour. A bat fitting appointment is a separate service and is not the same as renting the cage.
Do I need a reservation?
Some stores offer online scheduling and some are walk-in only. Call ahead, especially on weekends.
Do you hit real baseballs?
Reports from the retail bays describe foam balls, usually off a tee. Some configurations include a pitching machine. Confirm with your store.
Is it good for practice?
It is built for testing bats, not for training volume. For real reps, book a cage with a machine and real baseballs.
Where are the HitTrax cages near me?
We track 285 of them across 274 cities in 44 states on our HitTrax directory, searchable by city. Nearly all of them sit inside a Dick’s Sporting Goods, so treat the directory as a map of bat-testing bays rather than of places to train.
