Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Tue Sep 28 14:02:18 2004

>>> If you stand in the back of a pickup truck going 30 miles an hour and throw a ball at 80 wouldn't it then be going 110 (I'm not sure about that) but isn't that what you are saying about bat displacement. If you initiate bat motion before or at the same time as shoulder turn you are going to have a higher speed then just waiting until you are part way through shoulder turn. <<<

Hi Bruce

Your analogy with the pickup is correct. However, bat speed acquired before initiation probably has a greater impact on contact velocity than most people realize. Bonds and Sosa may only attain 3 or 4 mph bat-head velocity during pre-launch torque. But this does not mean their contact velocity is only increased by 3 or 4 mph. This is because bat-head acceleration is exponential rather than linear in nature.

To explain this, let’s use the acceleration of a dragster for example. The acceleration of a dragster is also exponential rather than linear in nature. The dragster may only accelerate from a dead stop to 10 or 12 mph in the first second. Whereas, it may accelerate from 110 to 200 mph in the last second when coming to the finish line. Therefore, allowing the dragster a rolling start of 10 mph would not increase its speed at the finish line by only 10 mph. --- The same principle holds true with the baseball swing.

Jack Mankin