Posted by: tom.guerry (tom.guerry@kp.org) on Thu May 10 22:12:52 2001

Hi jack
>
> Can Dave Hudgen's drills be used with rotational mechanics? Do you think we can do this?

Alfonso-

I'll give you my 2 cents worth.Dave is a very experienced and knowledgeable hitting instructor.He has lots of good drills and cues.He knows what to look for and how to recognize and correct flaws.However,his understanding of mechanics is flawed enough that you can get into trouble trying some of the cues or gettinginto some positions he illustrates.As with Lau,he believes that a rotational swing means you will tend to pull off the ball,so he promotes a number of movements to counteract this tendency and takes pains to describe the swing as BOTH linear and rotational to make it sound superior to the "rotational" swing.

I think it is more accurate to describe the swing as linear then rotational with the controversy people dwell on at this board being whether the initial linear part really adds any thing to batspeed or whether the motion prior to the rotational part of the swing is just related to timing and body positioningor other more complex factors.Jacks analysis has been unable to show that any particular type of linear action prior to rotation is superior in terms of productivity.

Hudgens(and Lau) both describe doing linear and rotational things at the same time which if followed to the letter just inhibit good rotation,power generation and transformation of this power into batspeed.They are overly concerned with "pulling off the ball" and try to correct it by advice as from Dave's "swing" archive (or Lau's criticism of rotational hitters like Williams who can "only pull the ball"):


Stride onto a closed front foot

Keep some weight back

Keep the front side firm by staying square to the plate as long as possible,then push the back side through the front side while pulling the knob to the inside top of the ball.Focus on the feet and not the hips.

The problem with following this advice is that you limit the necessary separation of upper and lower body separation for powering the swing and providing flexibility for adjusting timing.The problem of opening to soon is due to inadequate separation and starting the torso/hands forward too soon.It is much more natural to think of pulling with the front side to initiate hip turn powered by balanced use of both legs.It is better to stride to a balanced position,not keep weight back.

Dave focusses a lot on hitting to the opposite field to stay closed also.The problem here is that you tend to extend the hand path early and push the knob of the bat out early instead of turning the bat to create angular acceleration of the bat(batspeed).In fact he illustrates this on his website with a still picture where the hands have extended away from the body while the bat head is still way behind the hands.This sequence will never generate batspeed.You have to torque the bat out of the arc of the circular handpath BEFORE the hands get away from the axis of rotation or transfer of momentum doesn't happen.This is just a way of keeping the topside closed by extending the handpath to slow torso rotation with the undesirable side effect of killing power.
He also demonstrates keeping the front hip closed while rotating the back hip against it-this is just not a useful/natural motion.No one looks like that when they hit well for power.It is confusing if you don't teach what you see the great players do.At least Dave is against squishin the bug.However,the way he recommends getting up on the back toe is not really a productive cue.

I'm sure Dave has a lot of successful students,but they will never be top producers if actually they follow these particular instructions to the letter.