Posted by: Jack Mankin (mrbatspeed@aol.com) on Sun Apr 4 10:30:43 2004

>>> I have read the arguments pro and con about the above. Some say the ball stays on the bat 1/2000 second and hitting through makes no sense.
What happens if the player misjudges the exact contact point which most surely do? Is it possible to reach max acceleration to the exact contact point? Not likely..The mental cue of hitting through the ball might make no sense as judged by pure physics but accelerating through a wider zone does make sense in real life. Telling the players to "replace the shoulders" seems to get this done for me. Any comments? <<<

Hi Donny

I agree with you that few (very few) hitters reach maximum bat speed by contact. This is especially true when hitting the ball straightaway (bat perpendicular). The swing mechanics used by the vast majority of batters do not reach max until the bat has rotated 50+ degrees past this point. That is why most of their longest hit balls are pulled foul and they have very little power to the opposite field.

Donny, I have nothing against “driving thru the ball” at contact -- as long as we understand that “thru” is only ¾ of an inch. That is how far the bat moves with the ball before the ball is gone. I think you would agree that reserving energy to accelerate the bat after that point is wasted energy. Would not that energy have been better used to accelerate the bat-head earlier in the swing?

The reason a few hitters (the great hitters) are able to generate maximum bat speed by contact is because, at initiation, their swing mechanics start accelerating the bat-head around the swing plane instead of driving the knob at the ball leaving the bat-head trailing behind. --- While analyzing hundreds of video swing reviews of young hitters, I find that most rotate their shoulders just fine. The problem is, their transfer mechanics do not efficiently convert that shoulder rotation into bat-head rotation. --- Obviously, timing is a critical element to good hitting. That is why we require countless hours of batting practice.

Jack Mankin