Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Tue May 17 15:59:10 2005

>>> Thanks for the forum
I think that a sensible image for having strong hands and arms is that they'd be strong enough to be soft and allow a seamless fluid transfer of energy while having maximum stabilty. Stability is the factor that accounts in part for the disparity between some batters having high bat speeds at contact but less distance resulting. I believe it's prudent to think in terms of accumulation of mass as well as accumualtion of speed. I believe the more dynamic a batter, the more their speed is manifest later in the forward swing. An athletic release is a delayed release, and softer hands are more able to behave themselves as they approach the ball. <<<

Hi Thom

When you state, “I believe it's prudent to think in terms of accumulation of mass as well as accumualtion of speed,” I assume you are referring to how much body mass is transferred to the bat at contact. Some would say that strong hands allow more of the body’s mass to drive through the ball. However, many tests ran by bat companies show that force applied at the handle through contact has no bearing on the ball exit speed. In other words, a 35 ounce bat swung at 75-mph as a free object (like swung with a piece of rope), will hit a ball just as hard as the same bat welded to a 200 pound flywheel.

Forces applied at the handle accelerate the bat to contact, but it is the bat’s mass and speed at contact (mvv) that determines the force impacted to the ball. To understand why forces applied by the hands through contact have no bearing on ball exit speed, go to - http://www.kettering.edu/~drussell/bats-new/grip.html

Thom, would you explain what you mean by, “An athletic release is a delayed release.” Is this referring to when in the swing the batter should apply forces to accelerate the bat-head?

Jack Mankin