Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Tue Feb 26 11:15:58 2008

>>> I call it "The Throw Back Drill"

1.Have him get into a balanced, athletic position with his legs.
2.While in this position, have him point the bat out toward the
pitchers mound with just his lead arm. (kind of like Jim Thome but
make sure his arm and bat are in a line, not hinged at the handle)
3. The coach can toss this from either the side or the front if an
"L" screen is handy. It is important that the coach gives the hitter
a rythm in his delivery of the toss instead of just tossing the ball
without giving him any time to start his rythm.
4.Just as the coach starts to wind up to toss the ball, the hitter
should simultaneously shift his weight back and throw the
bat down and back to swing it up into his launch position.
5.The hitter should fluently swing the bat to the ball from this
position. This is an important part to doing the drill correctly. It
must be a continuous, fluent action without any stopping or pausing
at the point of his launch position. He should have a rythmic tempo
bringing the bat and his weight back then right into the swing on
the ball.
6.He should finish his swing in a natural and balanced position with
his weight right between his feet.

The tossed ball should enter the hitting zone in rythm with the swing. The timing of the tossed ball should not rush the hitter or even give him a feeling of being rushed. It should give him a feel and sensation of developing a fluent rythm with his legs and hands working together to produce a strong swing through the ball. <<<

Hi Jimmy

Good drill and sound advice on the necessity to perform it correctly. I use basically the same procedure in the “self toss” drill. The batter cocks the bat toward the pitcher with his back-hand while tossing the ball up with the lead-hand. The bat is accelerated back to, and through, the launch position as you described. This is the pre-launch movement I defined as PLT.

When performed correctly, these drills can help produce the fluid rhythmic mechanics we see in high level swings. However, as you pointed out, they can also produce very negative results when performed incorrectly. For the drills to produce the desired results, it is imperative that the rearward acceleration of the bat is sweep cleanly behind the batter’s head into the swing plane.

If the bat is accelerated to straight back rather than sweep behind the head, the bat’s trajectory will be cutting down through the swing plane rather than into it. This leads to serious wrist binds and waves in the swing plane. Wrist binds and waves in the plane greatly impairs the batter’s ability to make consistent solid contact.

As the video clips in the post below show, wrist binds and waves in the swing plane are what contributed to the slumps in A-Rod’s batting performance.

A-Rod & The Swing Plane

Jack Mankin