Posted by: Jeff (crjedwards@aol.com) on Mon Nov 22 09:04:30 2004

Consider balls hit on the inside part of the plate.
> > > The batter must keep his hands and arms in closer to the body. Just as the skater spins faster with the arms in the batter also creates higher rotational speed.
> > > Thus "history is made"
> >
> > I dont think that is correct. I could be wrong but if the ball is on the inside part of the plate your swing stays the same you just hit the ball in the front of the plate instead of on the plate for down the middle.
> >
> > mike
> *****************************************************************
> There is a great side by side clip of Hank Aaron htting an inside pitch and a pitch over the middle. The arms are tight to the body
> on the inside pitch. Consider the geometrical alignments necessary to hit an inside pitch on the sweet spot and keep it in fair ground.

YES, YES, YES....thats what you want ALWAYS.....it's the same for balls down the middle and balls away...the difference is where you make contact at. For a ball inside, make contact out in front of the stride foot. For a ball down the middle, make contact just on or slightly in front of the plate, and for a ball away make contact whe the ball is deep in the zone over the back of the plate.....but the hands and TOP hand arm should remain close to the body!!! We call this keeping the TOP HAND ELBOW in the slot....which means keeping the arm bent and the elbow leveraged against the back side hip!!!jeff