Posted by: John () on Sun Dec 28 20:40:50 2008

Hi,
Mr. Mankin I have a lot of respect for your ideas on hitting and for your stance against the cues that many coaches teach today. Now, I disagree in some of your conceptions regarding swing mechanics and hope you and others analyze this approach attentively.

Load phase of the swing-
Rotate the chest back slightly. (The focus should be on the chest. It will cause your arms and your feet to rotate back as well)

Launch-
Rotate your chest forward toward the ball and fix your arms on a level position with the plane of the incoming pitch without any forward movement of the arms. (Remember the chest should rotate forward not laterally, and the level of rotation will depend on the location. The rotation of the chest will cause a rotation of the legs or hips as well. At the end of the rotation the bat should be perpendicular to the plane of the incoming pitch.)

Attack-
Once you have fully rotated the back arm should extend toward the ball by concentrating on the tricep extension. (This is the extension many coaches refer to but don’t now how to explain and the one Mr. Mankin disbelief. The direction varies depending on the location of the pitch.)

It is important to understand how muscles interact because a swing is quite a complex approach.

Agonist Muscles (prime mover): these muscles generate the bulk of the force in the direction of the desired movement.

Synergist Muscles: these muscles assist the prime movers, providing less force but adding control. (Legs are synergist in the swing phase)

Stabilizer Muscles: a muscle that contracts with no significant movement to maintain a posture or fixate a joint.

During the load the chest is the agonist meaning you consciously control it, the legs are synergist meaning that they just response to the movement of the chest, and the arms act as stabilizer muscles. During the launch the chest stays as the agonist, the legs as synergist and the arms as stabilizer but you should fix your arms it plane with the ball. During the attack the back arm tricep is the agonist and the legs or hip will act as synergist.

This is mechanic is based from experience, success with this approach, analysis of major leaguers swing, studies about muscles interaction, some very interesting Bruce Lee techniques, and Mr. Mankin concepts. I believe many successful hitters would actually benefit if they understood how to attain the most out of their swing.

Very good slow motions swings can be found on chrisoleary website (just Google it) and Pujols swings are my favorites.