Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Wed Mar 8 01:20:18 2006

>>> Jack- great site. I have been studying posts for about a year. Wish there was a search engine attached but flipping through posts have uncovered a lot. I am a firm believer in the rotational swing that you teach. I read last months role of the hips thread. This is what I have been teaching my son. He is eight years old but his ability to assimilate information amazes me. I cannot tell his teammates the same things I talk to him about with the swing. We have been working on the rotation of the hips and been using words like making a “tiny circle” with the hips and pushing the back lead cheek to the rear. I want him to make the smallest tightest turn of the hips- like a screw. I hope this is right. All of which is to instill the shoulders and arms lagging behind.
Question- what is the role of the hands? I still want him to drive the right arm straight like a punch toward the pitcher. Sorry if this is a post is a mess. Baseball season gets me going.<<<

Hi Mike

Welcome to the site. John and Shawn are right on with their advice to you on the role of the hands. I will place below part of an e-mail I just sent on the topic.

Jack Mankin
##

“Thank you for the e-mail. Your girls are lucky to have you as their coach. You are on the right track, but as you can already tell, it may be hard to gain their confidence in rotational mechanics after being instructed so long with linear concepts. I think the most important advice I can offer is to impress upon your team that the best hitters, softball or baseball, swing the bat-head rather than driving the knob.

To understand the difference, you might have them swing a three foot piece of rubber hose at a ball on a tee (I use the PathFinder & Heavy Bag). They soon learn that driving forward with the hands does not produce good results. They will find that keeping the hands back and allowing the rotation of the body to swing the hose gets much better results.

They are use to relying on driving the top-hand past the bottom-hand (torque) to bring the bat-head to contact. Torque applied at the handle does not reach the end with a limber hose. Swinging the hose will teach them how the pendulum effect of a circular hand-path swings the bat-head. Once they have learned to use the CHP with their regular bat, then they can start to learn a more productive way to add torque (push/pull of the forearms) to maximize their bat speed.”

Best regards,

Jack Mankin
##