Posted by: RQL () on Mon Nov 5 12:26:53 2001

I have often said hitting is more than mechanics but with 2 top pitchers going at it tonight I thought it would be interesting to hear how others would approach both pitchers tonight.My thought is both are similar in what they throw Schilling may throw more breaking balls.The key is that both are over powering and their low pitch usually sinks to the ground and the high fb you never catch up to.Their weakness however is often when they throw the fb for a strike it is belt high and in the middle of the plate.My plan would be to back off the plate look up the middle and away.Don't try to pull a power pitcher early.Get it belt high and middle away take advantage of hitting it a little further back,don't get jammed inside don't go up for a pitch and take your chances with the low pitch being a splitter and leave it alone.With all this said I very much understand how hard it is to lay off certain pitches but this would be my game plan.
>
> The Hitman,
> As a good hitter I would go after the first pitch looking for a fastball middle in, with 1 strike i would probly look middle away fastball, and if i was behind 0-2 or 1-2, then i would look for the splitter just like soriano

>>If you go after the 1st pitch and its not middle in as you say then you have went after a pitch that was'nt where you were looking.I think you have to have a game plan look for a pitch 1st in a location then go after it.I believe a good pitcher will try to get ahead of you but not pitch to your power on purpose when the hitter is ahead in the count.As the pitcher gets ahead then he may run the ball in on you as you get more defensive.If your looking splitter which was seldom a strike even on Sorianos homer your chances are like most of the yanks did struck out or weakly hit.I wrote the above thread before the game then Brenly came out and said that they needed to lay off the high heat and lay off the low splitter.Onlt the ball in the middle of the zone can you committ to early and be pretty sure it will stay in the zone.