Posted by: The Hitting Guru (hitman3527@aol.com) on Sat Jan 14 20:16:24 2006

> As a beginning hockey player, I recall being frustrated at the lack of velocity of my wrist shot. I would push my stick as hard as I could with my lower hand (closest to the ice) and could produce only a weak harmless shot that skidded slowly across the ice. A friend shared the "secret" of the wrist shot, explaining that the shooter must push toward the goal with the lower hand while pulling back with equal strength with the upper hand. I quickly developed a powerful wrist shot with this technique, using a principle which I now recognize as "torque".
>
> In addition to hockey, I have been playing baseball/softball for many years, but never saw any parallel between hitting a baseball and shooting a puck. As I studied your detailed swing ananysis, it appears that the same priciple applies....that just before contact, the hitter pushes in the direction of the intended flight of the ball with the top hand while pulling back with the bottom hand. Is there in fact, a similarity between shooting a puck and hitting a ball?


Ted Williams mentioned that swinging a bat was similar to swinging an axe. And at the point of contact the wrist are unbroken. For a slap hitter in slow pitch softball there may be more similarities.