Posted by: Coach C () on Mon Nov 24 12:54:05 2003

>>> Way down below in a post there was a discussion about not hitting the ball at full batspeed. i believe this to be true, however i don't think that most hitter back off 20%.
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> > > Tom mentioned the caos theory in evolution of the human being and its application to hitting. i think what he meant was the following. if you're hitting the bag and you're using your game swing and it's clocked at 90mph, that's your comfort range. if the coach tells you to concentrate on the rotation of your hips and rotate as hard as you possible can, pulling with the lead hip and you clock in at 93mph your mechanics can't have deteriorated or else it would be impossible to increase your speed. what has deteriorated is your concentration on timing/ball. now the coach tells you to maintane that hip rotation and now really concentrate on pulling that THT... now you've clocked in at 95mph. shoddy mechanics, no that would be impossible again, right? if the hitter was extending his hands in his max THT that would have slowed the bathead. if he had lunged linear that would have wobbled his axis of rotation and again slower batspeed. once again what has happened is his focus is on mechanics and not on timing/ball.
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> > > Now the coach wants you to do one more thing... keep that 100% rotation and THT now he wants you to really blast the BHT... bingo 95mph without a care in the world about hitting the ball. coach says that was fast but he knows that you can swing faster than that. give me a balls to the wall swing and don't think about anything but swinging the bat as fast as you can(INTENTION) WOW!! 98mph
> > > what was the hitter concentrating on? i'd say nothing... it was caos. it was 100% maxed out swing. could he do that in a game? yea. could he hit the ball? probably not. so why even do it?
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> > > By pushing your body/mind into caos it either dies or reorganizes into a higher level of evolution. swing at 100% often in practice then back down and keeping it smooth, loose and ever
> > > accelerating... by backing down from caos to say 93mph you are now capable of focusing on the timing aspect of hitting. and little by little you can get your game swing closer to caos... keep in mind that if your bat speed is going up your mechanics have to be falling into place, it's the law and the laws of physics usually can't be broken. make any sense... regards, rich
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> > Your theory breaks down where you say the increase of batspeed from 90-93 mph or 93-95 mph can not mean a deterioration of mechanics. It most certainly can and very likely does.
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> > Your statement that it is a law that "if your batspeed is going up your mechanics have to be falling into place" is not true. Good for what? Swinging fast? Swinging fast is not the goal. Hitting the ball hard and consistently is the goal.
> >
> > If you were golfing or hitting off a tee I might agree with you. And I'm not saying batspeed isn't important. You do need to swing as fast as you can but only as fast as you can and still hit the ball. A ball that may be coming 95 mph or 75mph or anything in between. Reacting to these different pitches requires a different swing than your max batspeed swing. Therefore, IMHO, your mechanics are not necessarily falling into place as you see the batpseed meter rise. Your batspeed rising is only a good thing if it is doing so with good mechanics. It's rising, in and of itself, is not an indicator of good mechanics.
> >
> > Dave Kingman had tremendous batspeed. Hit many long home runs. But he is not a poster boy for hitting. Barry Bonds has great batspeed but swings under control. He does not swing at max batspeed. He does swing at max quickness. Therefore, is a poster boy, in fact, IMHO, the greatest of all time. <<<
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> Hi Coach C and Teacherman
>
> I would say that a batter’s swing that makes efficient use of good transfer mechanics (CHP, THTand BHT) would generate greater bat speed with much less effort than a maxed-out swing exhibiting less efficient linear mechanics.
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> Jack Mankin
>

Jack I agree!!! "efficient use of tranfer mechanics", is the key phrase. I know you and I agree on this issue. When a big leaguer states, "hey I never go max effort", it is highlighting a key mental concept. I wonder how many linear hitters would actually become more rotational if they decreased their effort level. In other words they gave the swing more time, instead of trying to win a race to the ball. There is no race...hitting is more about slowing everything down, so that we feel like we're dancing with the pitcher. That's when tranfer mechanics turn into power (IMO). Once the tranfer mechanics are learned, then understanding where the power is, is easily understood.

The difference between me now and back in the day, is that I tone it down and it slows everything down.....including the ball. When I'm feeling good I expand my effort level, but it's always monitored by way of the results in quality contact and ball flight.

Thanks Jack.

Coach C