Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Thu Jul 20 23:06:16 2006

>>> Hey Jack - I have tried everything - How can I get my daughter to sit back on the pitch and let the ball get into the power zone in lieu of jumping on it so quick and either pulling the ball extremely left or hitting weak balls to the left side.

she has good swing mechanics and her hand eye coordination is fine, she makes consistent contact on any speed pitch 50-65 mph but it is mostly at full arm extension and there is nothing behind the hit. I just cant get her to time out the pitch and wait for it.

Any suggestions??????? PLEASE???????

signed, Frustrated <<<

Hi Frustrated

As Scott points out below, having good timing and rhythm is highly important in becoming a great hitter. But regardless of how much time a batter spends at the plate developing his/her timing, they will never reach their full potential practicing with inefficient swing mechanics. Without seeing your daughter’s swing, I can not say for certain what her main problem is. In most cases, I have found that the problems you describe is found in batters who rely to heavily on the back-side to swing the bat.

I will place below a few excerpts from posts I wrote on this problem (and some possible solutions).

Jack Mankin
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Re: Late swing

Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Fri Jun 17 11:14:45 2005

>>> My Daughter is 8 and playing fast pitch softball, the coaches are pitching to them. She is a hard hitter, but lately she was been hitting a lot of foul balls to the 1st base side, she is right handed. I think she is swinging late, should I tell her to start her swing when pitch is released from pitcher. Is there any drills to do. I played softball so I do practice with her a lot. <<<

Hi Jody

Welcome to the site. – When a batter is continually hitting foul balls to the right side it means the bat-head is trailing too far behind the hands at contact. This is due more to their swing mechanics than timing. The mechanics taught by most girls’ softball coaches has the batter quickly extending the hands toward the ball. This linear theory relies on a whipping action that is supposed to occur as the hands near full extension.

However, a whipping action of the bat-head (pendulum or flailing effect) only occurs when the hands are accelerated in a circular path (like swinging a ball on a string). With a straight hand-path, the bat-head just trails behind the hands and the batter must then try to bring the bat-head around by driving their top-hand past their bottom-hand (torque). This type of mechanics requires strong arms to attain even moderate bat-head acceleration, and that is why batters using these mechanics have limited power (especially to the opposite field) even with very light bats.

Jody, I would suggest your daughter would better attain her potential practicing rotational transfer principles. Rotational mechanics use the larger muscles in her legs and torso to fling the hands into a circular path. She would then be swinging the bat-head around instead of trying to muscle it with her arms.

Jack Mankin
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Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Sat Sep 10 14:23:12 2005

>>> what can you do to correct a hitter from pulling the ball. She pulls the ball 9 out of 10 hits/contacts with the bat. Help. <<<

Hi Jerry

Welcome to the site. – To pull a ball just means the bat-head is out in front of the hands at contact. If the batters is pulling the ball foul to often, we normally think of it as a timing issue and advise the batter to let the ball get in deeper before initiating the swing.

However, this advice does not always work because many times it is not solely a timing problem. Much of the problem is often rooted in the batter’s swing mechanics generating bat speed to late in the swing.

I have seen the problem you describe in the swing of many young hitters. Most of their best-hit balls are pulled foul and keep a wary third base coach watching him instead of the runners. One of the Dads of a recent Swing Review I analyzed, stated that if the foul-line was just swung around another 30 degrees, his son would have hit over 600 and led the league in home runs. – His son was right-handed.

Although the surgery may play a role in your son’s case, linear mechanics is most often the problem of generating bat speed too late in the swing. Linear mechanics leaves the bat-head dragging behind the hands too far into the swing. The bat-head is well past the normal contact point before it really takes off. This leaves the batter with little power to the opposite field and most of their best-hit balls are pulled foul.

Since we can’t swing the foul lines around 30 degrees, the batter must develop mechanics that accelerate the bat-head 30 degrees farther back in the swing. To accomplish this, I have found that working with a heavy bag to be most helpful. I have the batter move forward in the box so that at “foot plant,” the lead-knee is even with the bag. From this position, the bat will be about perpendicular (hitting straightaway) to the flight of the ball as contact with the bag is made.

I explain to the batter that the bat is in contact with the ball for only 1/2000 seconds and the bat only moves forward during contact about ¾ inch. Therefore, it is pointless to continue applying force to the bat after contact. It is just wasted energy that should have been used to accelerate the bat-head farther back in their swing. By contact, the batter should have expended all his or her energy, and allow momentum of the bat to pull the arms through the follow-through – if the bag was not there.

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Cynthia, it is beyond the scope of this one post to cover all the mechanical principles necessary to attain maximum acceleration of the bat-head from the launch position. We have been discussing them here for six years and there are many articles on the Swing Mechanics page that describes them. However, I will outline a few points for your son to keep in mind as he practices.

The bat-head travels about 180 degrees from the launch position around to contact – about 90 degrees to the lag position and then another 90 degrees on to contact (perpendicular). When the batter extends the hands during initiation, he accelerates the knob but the bat-head just slides over to the lag position and trails behind the hands. There is no way a batter can attain good bat speed with a static bat at the lag position.

In order for a batter to attain maximum bat speed earlier in the swing, his mechanics must accelerate the bat-head around the entire swing plane (180 degrees). This means that from his launch position, he must first accelerate the bat-head rearward to (and through) the lag position and then around to contact. It may be helpful to understand what I am talking about by studying a rear view of this Bonds clip - http://www.youthbaseballcoaching.com/mpg/Bonds01.mpeg . Note how his mechanics first accelerates the bat-head rearward to and through the lag position before he directs his energy toward the ball.

Jack Mankin