Posted by: John (Badged27@aol.com) on Fri Oct 10 06:11:36 2003

Very interesting analogy you seem very versed in the 2 theories. One thing to consider the rotational theory is one of a power hitter in which you have several inherent problems. #1 you will need to start your swing earlier then the Linear swing and as you stated the hands and wrist go along for the ride which is like saying the tail is wagging the dog. In other words once the rotaional swing has started bat head control is diminished as once the bat head is casted out a change in ball plane makes it difficult to hit if the change occurs within the last 30' as the bat head has already committed to a particular swing path. This is a good little league swing as you pointed out as most LL pitchers have little movement. As you move onto regulation fields and competitive play unless a batter specializes in fastballs and has the power to hit consistant home runs or gappers your looking at a lot of POP ups or weak ground balls if the committed bat does match the ball plane exactly. So pitches with movement are out for the most part.

As a matter of fact in the past I have and still coach many competitive travel, high school and Legion teams and have been showing the players that when we have more than 5 pop-ups in a game we have lost as you can't have approx. 1/4 of you outs in pop ups. I also showed them that it appears that the same batters are doing the pop ups and all have a Rotational swing and that all the batters with the higher and more consistent batting averages are Linear Hitters. Before you change anyone make sure you test the waters to make sure it's correct. There are numerous training aids to teach proper swing path and technique and none are for rotational swings. WHY? There are 2 tapes out there " Keys to consistent Hitting" by Mark Kingston and " Line drive Hitting drills" which both teach Linear style why because it works and 2 because most hits are hard grounders and line drives if you read the hitting books then you would know that 80% of the hits are line drives and hard grounders, which a linear swing will produce where as Rotational depends on power and gaps which is never with the odds. However you do have some natural power hitters where the rotational swinger will prevail but they are the exception not the rule. Before changing 13 yr old players who are just seeing good pitching with movement examine all the facts. I have been to all the seminars for baseball coaches in Cherry Hill, NJ. and have found 1 out of over 30 instructors advocate the rotational swing and mainly because that's what his own training tapes were pushing. Most coaches and so forth see what they want to see as in the analysis of Barry Bonds swing Rotational swings say he hits rotationally but Tony Gwynns analysis shows it to be Linear. Problem is most see the bat angle at contact not the 9-10 sec before that.

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/gallery/bonds/flash.htm
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