Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Wed Oct 27 16:57:34 2004

>>> I wonder why Epstein did this in his early tapes? Maybe a drill designed to get the hips FAR ahead of the hands to teach a new rotational feel. When your belly button is through before you release the bat( as a drill)it can squeeze thru with the fence in closer proximity. Linear or rotational application would have to consider what the lower body is doing and how exaggerated the steps were IMO.

We strive to get the bat to "flail" with big muscle leverage. I really don't like to be near the fence. <<<

Hi Donny

Mike does show his students performing the fence drill in his video. I think Mike suggests the bellybutton be even closer to the fence than a bat length. I have often wondered if he ever studied a frame-by-frame breakdown of those swings in his video. Being that close to the fence forced a linear hand-path well into the swing. Regardless of how much body rotation the large muscles developed, it was not transferred into a “flailing” action of the bat until the hands were arcing well over toward the shortstop late in the swing. The bat was dragging through the entire contact zone.

Obviously, a batter could move far enough away from the fence to perform a rotational swing. Even then, personally, I do not find the drill helpful. I impress upon my students that in order to generate an optimum CHP, the first direction the hands are accelerated is perpendicular (top of the circle) to the path the incoming ball. Having a fence in front of them does not encourage that mental image.

Jack Mankin