Posted by: Major Dan (markj89@charter.net) on Mon Feb 11 10:03:23 2002

Hey Jack, Rql, Major Dan, and everyone else
> > I have been clobbering balls of late, hitting homers to right and left center, but I have been having trouble with hitting the inside pitch. I always seem to get tons of top spin and the ball always hooks foul, my high school coach tells me to stay inside and throw hands at the pitcher, but I understand those terms aren't right. I was wondering if there are any drills to do or any advice you have that will enable me to hit inside pitches for homeruns.
> > Thanks
> I remember the story of RQL figuring out how to keep these babies fair after countless hours of work-pull back with the bottom hand.This is what Jack named bottomhand torque.Only when you hook the handpath in front of the body with a decreasing radius as the location gets further inside can you keep the bathead from releasing too soon (resulting in the dead pull foul).Try bottomhandtorque with tee work and the heavy bag.Sometimes you need to shade the head back a little as rotation proceeds,and you may have to also think of where your arms point after contact when they come to extension.RQL?

Tom -
good references. RQL has written extensively here about his adventures with the inside pitch.
There is also a clip of Mike Piazza in the Setpro public forum. Piazza turned on an inside pitch and crushed a HR down the line, no hook at all, in a playoff or World Series game.[I think 2000 WS]
If anyone knows the URL it is a good clip and generated interesting discussion as well.