Posted by: rql () on Thu Dec 25 16:43:38 2003

Thanks again for the excellent clips,Nick,and Happy
> Holidays !
>
> Nomar goes in and out of the stride style,but not much
> stride for the past few seasons.Was this a stride just for
> the derby or was this long enough ago that he was still
> doing some stride ?
>
> He has a great swing to study.He is one where you can
> really see the back foot turn backward as he finishes
> cocking the hips.Lugo does this to and jump starts the
> hips by pointing the back foot toward the pitcher.
>
> I tend to like this belly-up,hook the handath as much as
> possible swing because I believe it is the quickest
> swing.As I mentioned before,I think the key to the
> transfer mechanics is that the center of rotation of the
> bat keeps getting closer to the center of mass of the bat
> ("swing radius stays circular or hooking").This seems to
> prevent deceleration and encourages a quick swing
> which reduces timing error.There must be some
> physics type way of doing the inertia/momentum/kinetic
> calculations,but it still intuitively seems to me that these
> players who belly up and hook the handpath like
> Nomar and Bonds are getting both quickness and great
> max batspeed.I don't think they are prisoners of a zero
> sum/either/or game.i think they get better power and
> better average.I think Arod is rotational in the same
> sense(swing radius circular or diminishing/no
> disconnection from launch to contact),but more off the
> plate and therefore not as quick and with a wider range
> of adjustment required to cover the zone.
>
> The lead arm/bottom hand is determining the swing
> radius via tight connection to the front scap which
> "unshrugs" as necessary to hook the handpath.The
> back arm will go along for the ride on the late approach/
> through contact/into follow-through,.Ideally at
> contact,the bat should turn about an axis between the
> hands if it has hooked maximally.Longer swings will
> have the center of rotation still off the knob of the bat as
> much as 6 inches or a foot or more.
>
> The more you hook the handpath,the more you apply
> BHT,and the more the torso totally transfers its
> momentum to turn(not slide/drag)the bat.For
> outside,you depend on more THT to get the bathead
> out fast,so inspite of a high load/limited torso turn
> situation,you still get excellent batspeed.The combo of
> THT/BHT/circular handpath is the minimal/simplest way
> of adjusting to cover the zone.THT is necessary in
> every case to adequately load for the swing.BHT is
> necessary in every case to prevent deceleration before
> contact.
>
> The theory is nice,but I think more important are the
> sequence and synchronization of joint motions during
> the cocking of the hips(hitch the hands) and cocking of
> the hands(scap load/center bat/hide hands) followed by
> THT( slotting of elbow/rotate the bathead-rotate the
> front foot)) and uncocking of hips to drive launch(drop
> and tilt).
>
> Then to "teach it" you can break things down and
> backward chain with no-stride,then add stride.Jack
> demonstrates most of this nicely on Final Arc II.
>
> One handed top hand swings for rotational component/
> circular handpath.
>
> Add bottom hand to apply BHT.
>
> Rotae the foot/rotate the bathead to apply THT,etc.
>
> You can customize the backward chaining progression
> depending on the needs/style of the individual.
>
> Tom,what do you mean by that term you use belly up to the ball.
>