Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Thu Jan 11 22:02:22 2001

>>> if you hit the ball with your lead arm at contact and you do evrything in the swing right will you have just as much power as if you had a straight arm at contact? kac <<<

Hi kac

There are two main reasons the lead elbow is bent (or flexed) at contact. One is when the batter is jammed with the pitch and bends the lead arm to bring the meat of the bat in tighter. The second is when the backside is over dominant in relationship to the front side. The lead elbow must flex to take up the slack. In either case, the lead shoulder cannot apply as strong a pull on the knob end of the bat at contact when the elbow is flexed. I have seen home runs hit with a bent lead elbow, but the real long shots were all with straight front arms at contact.

Jack Mankin