Posted by: nativetrout (nativetrout@earthlink.net) on Mon Mar 20 17:45:57 2006

I have read this too with some puzzlement. Frankly, what Hudgens describes as being rotational is not (and what he calles linear is not) as far as my understanding goes (As Epstein puts it "Do we really teach what we see?"). Gary Sheffield's swing is a case in point. I always see photos of him at ball contact with his back foot on his toes (or even off the ground) and his front foot firmly preventing the forces generated by his rotation from, in effect, launching him towards the pitcher's mound. He is, however, ROTATING. The rotation occurs at an angle away from the mound and around a stationary axis through his head and torso. His swing plane is upward, hands above bathead, shoulders dipped. This is rotation, pure and simple, no? Hudgens seems to inply that rotation occurs on the back foot, ala Reggie Jackson -- a sort of corkscrew. Moreover, I can't help but see Sheff's bat 'waggle' as a manifestation of the torque forces created by THT and BHT (and wonder how he makes use of it in the swing itself). I have been studying photos of MLB hitters everywhere I can find them and they all look the same (unless they are fooled by a pitch): their hips are open WELL ahead of the bat --leading the hands, their hands are above the bat barrel, they are 'back, the front foot often much more open than hitting instructors would have, the hand path appears circular, their top hand elbows are tucked close to their sides and at an angle. This is so different from the 'chop' swing-down-at the ball in a linear path to create backspin school of thought. In fact, the MLB players in these photos look nothing like what is taught in LL and High School hitting clinics where I live. What is frustrating is the propensity of Coaches to ignore a child's innate talents and try to impose (flawed) theories that have come to be considered truths. It sure would be nice to see a unified theory of hitting mechanics taught at the youth league level based on the mechanics used by professional baseball players. Perhaps the proponents of rotational hitting (Jack, Epstein, etc) can approach Little League International and begin to get these theories in the hands of LL coaches.