Posted by: Jack Mankin (mrbatspeed@aol.com) on Mon Nov 10 21:10:27 2003

>>> The question I have is whether you experience or teach any "firming up","squeezing","connecting" the front shoulder as part of/preparation for the "in unison" feel of rotation ? <<<

Hi Tom

Yes, and as you have pointed out, the "firming up","squeezing","connecting" must continue well into the swing. A bat that is gaining a high rate of angular displacement (first, back toward the catcher), produces a much greater load on the arms than a bat sliding linearly knob first. The batter should feel the pressure of the rotating body against lead arm to continue powering a high rate of bat-head acceleration. At least until the back-forearm has lowered toward horizontal.

The problems arise when the batter fires the hands (and bat knob) forward at initiation causing a loss of linkage from the lead-shoulder to the bat. The batter can now rotate the shoulders with little load to overcome. The batter’s rotating body may catch up with the lead-arm, but the back-elbow slides in toward the bellybutton and the bat-head lags far behind the power curve. The shoulders finish rotation with the lead-arm across the chest while the bat is just reaching the lag position.

The body rotating with little-to-no load allows the hips and shoulders to rotate together (the "one-peace rotation"). My faulty writing regarding “unison” had many readers thinking this was what I advocated. I hope most of you that read my posts now understand how I use the term and I will rewrite that article soon with more clarity.

Jack Mankin