Posted by: JCAZ (jcaz123@aol.com) on Tue Jun 5 11:39:17 2012

> Joe,
> I feel for you and your daughter. My son who is 17 also is doing the
same thing now, barring the lead arm in the middle of the swing.
Getting same results you mentioned, weak ground balls to infield. The
rest of the swing looks good (lower body). Years past he was a great
hitter with some power. This year his hitting has been terrible. Still
makes contact but not good contact.
>
> One thing you mentioned about her hands starting out lower now than
in past years, makes me wonder if it may be part of the cause of her
problem. My son who used to start his swing with his hands level with
or above the shoulder is now lowering them to armpit height before
initiating the swing. I have been trying to get him to keep them up
but no luck in several months of trying.
>
> At the beginning of the year he had other problems we had to work
out and were able to eventually. But soon as we get one thing fixed
another comes up. Can't understand how he could have such a good swing
years prior and this year everything started out screwewd up.
>
> Its hard to watch him go from a .500 or better hitter with a few
home runs every year to batting probably sub .200 with no long balls
at all.
>
> I hope someone can chime in here as to why these kids started
lowering their hands before swing initiation and why the arm barring
during the swing.

Hi all! I have been preaching to my oldest(16) about barring his arm
prior to the initiation of the swing for over a year now. It never
really took until about a month ago. He had been experiencing a lot
of what this discussion is talking about. His lead elbow would remain
low and his hands would run linear out to the ball causing a flat to
downward swing plane. This would cause a lot of grounders and pop
ups.

He had always said he just didn't feel comfortable starting with the
barred arm. So one night I showed him how almost all good hitters bar
that arm early in their swing. Showed him Hamilton and others. So he
believed it, now we just had to get him comfortable.

We put in a very simple, small hand cocking motion to keep his hands
high and to get his swing started. Basically he is just tipping the
bat head towards the pitcher an inch or two to get his swing going.
His back elbow raises just a bit as this happens. Prior to that he is
pre-setting his hands and barred arm prior to a very short toe plant.

He is a believer now. Nobody can throw it by him and he has power to
all fields. His confidence is sky high. He went from an average 300
hitter to hitting 685 over the last month with a 1333 slugging average
with ZERO strikeouts. From the 8th hole to the 3 or 4 hitter. He did
some tee work to get things timed out, but he turned it around very
quickly. It has been a very rewarding thing to watch.

Here is a funny story.....
A former MLB scout had seen my son play at a game and invited him to
come practice with his 18u tournament team. My son is pounding the
ball in BP and this guy is trying to change his swing back to
linear.....are you kidding me??? Have you seen Hamilton? Harper? etc,
etc, etc. Maybe that's why he is a former MLB scout.

There is a lot of resistance to barring the arm out there, but the
results speak for them selves. Just make sure it is done early and
your top hand is flipping back to the catcher as the front shoulder
starts to pull.

Best of luck!