Bat Speed -- Baseball Hitting Forum

Posted by: Scott B (a.k.a. SWB) (batspeed@integritycorp.com) on Thu May 9 03:22:30 2002

There are lots of good suggestions posted already. I'll make two obvious ones:

1) Video tape 30 swings off a tee, and 30 swings in live hitting. Are his mechanics correct, and is he doing the same thing with live pitching as on the tee, or is he reverting to "linear" form.

2) 500 to 1000 swings off the Tee per week.

My kids are making the same transition as your player is. They both had problems lunging at the ball, and "uppercutting". They tried to start their hips first, and then their arms (opposite timing form linear hitting), but in live hitting, they ended up sliding the hands as soon as the hip started opening.

With linear hitting, a kid who pulls consistently is frequently "opening his hips too soon". You can't generate bat speed with the hands moving and hips moving at the same time, period. If you're going to use linear mechanics, you need to open the hips quickly (i.e. "explode") right before contact, but AFTER the hands move to the impact zone (i.e. throwing the knob of the bat at the ball). Open the hips too late, and you're swing 100% upper body. Too early, and the bat will swing across the body towards 3b, and again, you lose power because the hands can't accelerate fast enough when the hips are open (i.e. leading shoulder required to pull the bat to the impact zone).

With rotational mechanics, in what I've seen thus far, a dead-pull hitter has pretty much the same problem. He's pulling the bat into the impact zone early, before forward momentum of his body has stopped. I like the way that Mike Epstein states that the front heel must touch down before the hands come forward. I don't know if that guideline works for every hitter, but at least it's an objective guideline the hitter can watch for on video tape.

Casting can also result in a pull swing, as the hands move too far away from the body.

And as I mentioned already, the first thing my kids did when converting to rotational mechanics was swing too far up on the ball (in relation to the path of the ball, i.e. an uppercut) and lung. Again, keeping the hands back while the hips rotate, and until the heel of the lead foot touches down, has happened.

Good luck.. Scott

Maybe this link can help: http://www.mikeepsteinhitting.com/ (see menu tab "touble shooting")

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Re: Cause: Maybe hands moving early, momentum not halted at swing start, or casting SS Coach [ Thu May 9 19:13:01 2002 ]

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> There are lots of good suggestions posted already.  I'll make two obvious ones:  
> 
> 1) Video tape 30 swings off a tee, and 30 swings in live hitting.  Are his mechanics correct, and is he doing the same thing with live pitching as on the tee, or is he reverting to "linear" form.  
> 
> 2) 500 to 1000 swings off the Tee per week.  
> 
> My kids are making the same transition as your player is.  They both had problems lunging at the ball, and "uppercutting".  They tried to start their hips first, and then their arms (opposite timing form linear hitting), but in live hitting, they ended up sliding the hands as soon as the hip started opening.
> 
> With linear hitting, a kid who pulls consistently is frequently "opening his hips too soon".  You can't generate bat speed with the hands moving and hips moving at the same time, period.  If you're going to use linear mechanics, you need to open the hips quickly (i.e. "explode") right before contact, but AFTER the hands move to the impact zone (i.e. throwing the knob of the bat at the ball).  Open the hips too late, and you're swing 100% upper body.  Too early, and the bat will swing across the body towards 3b, and again, you lose power because the hands can't accelerate fast enough when the hips are open (i.e. leading shoulder required to pull the bat to the impact zone).
> 
> With rotational mechanics, in what I've seen thus far, a dead-pull hitter has pretty much the same problem.  He's pulling the bat into the impact zone early,  before forward momentum of his body has stopped.  I like the way that Mike Epstein states that the front heel must touch down before the hands come forward.  I don't know if that guideline works for every hitter, but at least it's an objective guideline the hitter can watch for on video tape.
> 
> Casting can also result in a pull swing, as the hands move too far away from the body.
> 
> And as I mentioned already, the first thing my kids did when converting to rotational mechanics was swing too far up on the ball (in relation to the path of the ball, i.e. an uppercut) and lung.  Again, keeping the hands back while the hips rotate, and until the heel of the lead foot touches down, has happened.
> 
> Good luck.. Scott
> 
> Maybe this link can help:  http://www.mikeepsteinhitting.com/ (see menu tab "touble shooting")

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