Posted by: Chris Yeager, PHD, CSCS (yeagercw@hotmail.com) on Tue Feb 1 21:44:34 2005

Jack,

This has gotten out of “hand” (pun intended). I loathe bickering, but this nonsense needs to stop.

NEVER in any of my videos, during any of my lectures or in any interview have I advocated or suggested that the hands should stop during the BASEBALL SWING.

In your posts quoting the Baseball Prospectus article, any and all mention of the stopping of the hands refers to the WHIP, not the baseball swing.

3 OF YOUR POSTS, QUOTING ME ON MY INTERVIEW WITH BASEBALL PROSPECTUS:
1. Yeager>“If one were to attempt to crack a WHIP by rotating in a circle without stopping the hand, and therefore not transferring energy, the goal of cracking the WHIP would not be attained. However, if we stop the whip and then allow the WHIP to sequentially stop down the line, then we'll get the desired result.”

2. Yeager>“if we stop the WHIP and then allow the WHIP to sequentially stop down the line, then we'll get the desired result”

3. Yeager>“If one were to attempt to crack a WHIP by rotating in a circle without stopping the hand, and therefore not transferring energy, the goal of cracking the WHIP would not be attained.”

I REPEAT: In your posts quoting the Baseball Prospectus article, any and all mention of the stopping of the hands refers to the WHIP, not the baseball swing.


The whip is an analogy that I used to describe the conservation of momentum in the baseball swing. The goal is to help the layperson understand how momentum is transferred within a defined system.

I think that it is obvious (or thought so) that the human body does not have the exact same properties as a bullwhip.

Frankly, after communicating with thousands over the past 10 years, you are the first (that I am aware of) to make the leap that my teachings suggest stopping the hands during the swing.

Both the whip and the human body DO pass momentum through deceleration followed by acceleration of segments.

In short, (which is often dangerous with someone playing semantics) both are segmented from largest to smallest. Lost momentum (deceleration) of a larger base segment (s), results in acceleration of the smaller extremities.

The 5 PRIMARY SEGMENTS of the human body that are involved in the baseball swing are:
1.Legs- 2.Hips- 3.Shoulders- 4.Arms- 5.Hands/Bat

*******From a video I produced over 5 years ago:
“ The hands/bat constitute the final segment and ACT AS ONE PIECE during the swing.”

The hands/bat act as the tip of the whip (Figuratively speaking Jack. I am not suggesting that the bat transforms into a whip).

In addition, because I note that one must “stop” the hand in order to crack a WHIP does not imply that the shoulders must “stop” to transfer momentum. In short, I speak in terms of allowing maximal, (not complete) rotation before involving the following body segments. As MASS x velocity is lost in the system by one segment, mass x VELOCITY is gained by the following lighter segment in the system. (Mv = mV)

FROM “DEFINITION OF TERMS” ON SHAWN’S HITTING SITE:
Conservation of Momentum = MASS * velocity (before) = mass * VELOCITY (after)
(Mv = mV)
In a defined system, the total momentum of the system must remain constant. Therefore a loss of mass in the system will result in an increase in velocity. This explains why lost momentum from the lower half results in high velocities for the upper half and why the hips rotate first in order to pass momentum from a massive body part to less massive body parts. The difference in Mass must be made up with an increase in velocity. Mv = mV

Chris Yeager, PHD, CSCS
yeagercw@hotmail.com