Posted by: dougdinger () on Sat Feb 21 20:08:24 2004

BHL, I have to disagree about the cues you mentioned that Jack uses. Cues are different for all hitters.......you might use a cue with a hitter that is very familiar with you that gets a quality result, and I might use a cue that is different from yours that gets the same result with my player.
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> As far as where the front foot lands and how many degrees is right.......it is different for many fine hitters. George Brett landed closed and many times stayed there. Barry Bonds lands at about 45 degrees sometimes and sometimes he does not. It depends many times on the pitch and the location of the pitch on how closed or opend the front foot lands. I have many hours of film on some of the very best hitters over the years, and can find some swings that change very much in most of them. Front foot rolling over and then not rolling over etc.
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> We can study a clip of a great hitter, but it is IMO better to study about 20 different clips of 20 different hitters and you will then find only a few absolutes.
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> Doug


True. Everyone is different. I think it would be insane to copy someone elses swing, since we all have different size and strength. I have a Jimmy Rollins build and it would be really crazy if tried to imitate a Pujols or a Bonds swing. In fact, I don't even have a Rollins swing, I have my own and it works for me. With different swings and techniques it makes sense to have different cues.
There's an old cue that goes "swing thru the ball", and I believe in an old post Jack disagrees with the cue saying that it will cause linear movement at or around contact and will result in pushing at the ball. After I read that I found myself swinging with no follow-thru, no full hip and shoulder rotation and my hit balls would have sidespin instead of backspin and the ball wouldn't travel far, they would tail and drop. I've been wondering why I only have a couple doubles in the last 5 years, just singles, and one lucky homerun. So I'll be using the cue starting this season. I think Jack would agree more with the cue "apply torque through the ball", but that sounds too scientific to me, I prefer the old cue. There's a reason why the cue is so popular, cause it works.