Posted by: rql () on Tue Oct 30 12:54:57 2007

> What Epstein teaches and what two of his critics toward the end of this thread says he teaches are two entirely different things. The one critic blames Epstein for three of his students slamming their front heel into the ground. As I have pointed out Epstein does not teach or have a drill that has hitters slamming their heel into the ground. This critic does not provide any information about the "hitting clinic" that these three youngsters attended. Nor does he say anything about what he knows was taught at this clinic. Can you imagine going to a clinic and coming away with the sole idea that when the heel drops the hips open up. THIS IS NOT A DRILL ITS INFORMATION! Did any of these youngsters pay to go to Epstein's hitting camp or buy his two hitting tapes, the second one of which contains Epstein's torque hitting drills? I doubt it. They may have just listened to a lecture and came away with one idea that they simplified.
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> The first tape is one in which Epstein stresses dropping the heel to open up the hips to create the rotational torque action that the great power hitters have all shared. He shows on the tape 21 great hitters: Ruth, Williams, A-Rod, Griffey, Bonds, etc. having their hips open when the front heel drops. The stop action leaves no doubt. On this tape Epstein covers other hitting topics related to rotational hitting. In short, this tape is purely a lecture. The second one as stated, shows the drills with hands on instruction and correction just using one student, nothing is ever said about the front heel drop.
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> The second critic says that Epstein's emphasis on heel drop does not result in a major league swing. It is, according to him, too slow because of all of the other body actions that have to occur. He also refers to Bandura's information about Epstein recommending in a specific way how to combine the heel drop with back side action. He credits Bandura with calling all of this a drill. Epstein only has several drills and this is not one of them. In fact, it is not even a drill. I suspect that Bandura lifted this information off of Epstein's support forum where there are 27 pages of questions along with Epstein answers.
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> Here is the problem, as far as I am concerned: neither Bandura or the two critics own Epstein's tapes and have ever attended Epstein's hitting camps. When the second critic states that the hitter should try to keep the hips from turning when the front heel lands he is telling me he doesn't understand what Epstein is teaching when the front heel lands and the hips open on those 21 players. It is he that doesn't understand what a major league swing is, and not Epstein.
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> Jude
>>Jude I understand the ML swing and I have not got the tapes but have talked to epstein on the phone before.You apparently did not get my meaning when I spoke of trying to keep the hips closed,anyways The interpretation of when the hips begin to open can be a big point in why the difference of opinion is here.The hips often begin to open as the toe opens to a 45,as when it is said open the toe into toe touch.At toe touch the hips are opening and the heel is turning and or coming down,this is the only point I am making.You will see a much greater opening of the hips after heel plant,but it is important that hip initiation is the 1st movement at GO and the heel plant is a reaction to hip initiation.Epstein as he has said does some things to get the general idea to kids and thru trial and error they learn over time the little adaptions they need to do to become really good hitters.This may very well be one.