Posted by: Jack Mankin (mrbatspeed@aol.com) on Tue Nov 18 14:23:04 2003

>>> Jack, it appears to me that the front shoulder moves early and outward toward third base. Sometimes the move is so violent that the head follows.I would have to say that the body fades away from the plate in various degrees depending on the batter <<<

Hi Ron

There is a definite problem when the batter’s axis fades away from the plate during the swing. There is also a problem when the batter "un-shrugs” the lead-shoulder or opens the shoulders (creeping open) before initiation. But, rotating the shoulders (around a fixed axis) is what all great hitters use to accelerate the hands. In other words, when viewing a swing from the pitchers mound, you will note that the shoulders start to rotate before the hands start to accelerate.

So Ron, I would work on getting the batter to rotate around a fixed axis and keeping the lead-shoulder “shrugged” during initiation. --- Below are a couple of post from the archives regarding the lead-shoulder.

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I do not like the term “barred lead-arm.” I have no problem with a batter who has the lead-arm fairly straight across the chest. But the term “Barred” conjures up images of tense ridged muscles, which I oppose. Whether the batter has the lead-arm straight or flexed, the important point to remember is that the arm should not flex any further during initiation. The more the lead-arm flexes during rotation, the more linear the resulting hand-path.

The lead-arm need not flex to draw the hands in tighter unless the batter is jammed with the pitch. You can test this for yourself. – Keep the arm fairly straight across the chest and rotate your shoulders to the 105 degree contact position for an inside pitch. Note that your lead-hand barely clears your right side. Not a bad position for hitting most pitches from the middle-in. – The same would hold true for a batter with a more flexed lead-arm. He would just need to move his stance in a couple inches or lean out more over the plate.

As far as your choices are concerned, I would say “Pull arms across chest, perpendicular to the pitch” is true if we clarify what mechanic is pulling the lead-arm arm across the chest during rotation. --- Each shoulder has 90+ degrees of movement independent of the spine or other shoulder. As the batter extends the hands back toward the back-shoulder to set up the launch position, the lead-shoulder rotates inward about 60 to 70 degrees from its straight away position. I have referred to this inward rotation as the “Shrugging of the lead-shoulder.”

As the rotational batter prepares to launch the swing, he can almost rub his chin on the shoulder. (In fact, Matt Williams does just that as he waits for the pitch.) It is very important that the “shrug” remain in the shoulder during initiation. If the batter fires the hands forward, the shrug will come out of the shoulder and the lead-arm will be forced away from the chest too soon resulting in a loss of linkage and disconnect to body rotation.

You will note as rql pointed out in his Post , it is the rotation of the shoulders (and the timely un-shrugging of the lead-shoulder – pulling back of the lead-arm) that powers the hand-path, creates the “hook” in the hand-path and generates Bottom-Hand-Torque. However, as I pointed out above, this can only take place if the hands remain back and allow shoulder rotation to accelerate the hands at initiation.

Yes, Coach C, the lead-arm will be pulled across the chest during rotation by the timely “un-shrugging” of the lead-shoulder. With this mechanic, the lead-arm will remain fairly straight through contact.

NOTE: For the baseball/softball swing, I think the shrugging of the lead-shoulder is the correct example of “scap loading.” It is loading the muscles in preparation to do the work.

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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