Posted by: Jack Mankin (mrbatspeed@aol.com) on Sat Dec 20 21:21:44 2003

>:>>I love your site. I'm a huge believer in rotational hitting. But you need to take a better look at Arod.

He's a Charlie Lau Jr. hitter. He definately extends his hands to contact. Of course his upper body rotates. But watch the hands move to the ball. The path may look circular but what hitter doesn't. Everyone looks circular because of the upper body's rotation. The question is do they go linear before they go circular? Yes they do. Do they travel away from the armpit area before rotation? Yes they do. He is not a poster boy for rotational hitting.

To say differently is uninformed. If you're telling me his swing is the same as Bonds, Sosa, and everyone else we all consider rotational then you're not paying attention.

I don't think it's a bad thing, even though we all believe in rotational hitting, to acknowledge that Arod is not.

Please look at the clips. <<<

Hi Lambert

You stated, “The question is do they go linear before they go circular? Yes they do. Do they travel away from the armpit area before rotation? Yes they do.”

Just to make sure I was not missing something in Arod’s mechanics, I just spent the last few minutes reviewing a good number of his swings again. On every swing viewed from the frontal view, his hands completely disappeared behind his head as he prepared the launch position. He then accelerated the bat-head back with THT. As he initiated rotation, his hands re-appeared arcing outward 12 to 18 inches (depending on pitch location) before they headed toward the camera. An even then, they maintained their arc to contact.

His back-arm is more extended because he uses THT over a longer portion of his swing, but that does not mean his hand-path went linear. – Lamber, It has been proven that CHP, BHT and THT forces will induce angular displacement to a bat. Can you (or Paul) explain how a linear force applied to a bat will induce angular displacement?

P.S. --- I just spent a few more minutes reviewing Palmeiro’s mechanics from the frontal view and found that the points I made regarding Arod applied to him as well.

Jack Mankin