Posted by: Major Dan (markj89@charter.net) on Fri Sep 20 05:29:18 2002

According to Epstein, being "inside the ball" means "the hands follow the rotating body around its axis".
>
> Would anyone care to express agreement or disagreement? And the more elaboration the better. As a matter of fact, the more opinions expressed the better.

"staying inside the ball" or "hands inside the ball" is one of those 'inside' baseball expressions. Either its new or its something just coming to public attention. TV analysts are starting to use the phrase but only in the last year or two as far as I remember.

On the surface, its a stupid comment. If your hands are outside the ball, the ball would hit you in the forearm. But thats not what is meant.
When pull hitters try to pull outside pitches and ground out to SS (right handed hitters) they 'hook the ball'. That is the opposite of staying inside the ball. However that is the extreme and easy example. But it does point to the key to staying inside the ball.
When the arms extend and the hands release the barrel, the swing is done. If this happens before contact, the hitter loses considerable power. That in fact is what happens when a hitter hooks an outside pitch. The hitter got 'outside the ball'. By this I guess it means that he hit the outside part of the ball - beyond the center back of the ball.
But from that you'd think that in order to stay inside the ball you have to hit the inside of the ball and always hit opposite field.
But that is not true.
It is true that opposite field hitters stay inside the ball. Boggs was a great example, so was Gwynn. It is not a question of the barrel trailing the hands. It is that the hands stay in - don't extend out to contact.
Steve Garvey talked about hitting as 'hitting with short stubby arms'. Jack talks about keeping the back elbow in against the ribs into contact, not pushing the top hand toward the ball. Doing what Jack says, keeps the hands in. When the hands fly out, the swing gets long. If the hands come out early, the hitter didn't stay inside the ball.

However there is much confusion about this. A commentator will praise a hitter for staying inside the ball, then later see a homerun and note that the hitter 'really got extended on that one.'
How do you really get extended AND stay inside the ball?
Seems like those concepts fight each other.

In reality they don't. All good swings start with the hands 'in'. This is the same as the circular hand path. The hands follow the shoulder turn, they don't fly out or cast as the shoulders turn.
On middle-in pitches the hands must stay in longer in the turn, on outside pitches extension happens earlier to lengthen the swing to reach the ball.
In both cases the hands stay in until near contact. Singles hitters like Gwynn and Boggs keep the hands in all the way. Great contact, less power. STARTING extension before contact - not reaching, but releasing the hands into contact is more powerful. When bottom hand torque takes over the pull back from the bottom hand throws the barrel forward. This has to happen into contact, not before contact.
Some hitters like McGuire try to get a lot of extension into contact. He stands off the plate to make all pitches 'outside'. Bonds crowds the plate to create lots of inside pitches and 'stays inside the ball' very well. Much less 'extension' by Bonds.
In both cases however, the hands 'stay inside' for most of the swing, then release into contact, but don't extend and release before contact.

IMO 'staying inside the ball' is a better cue than 'short swing' since you can rotate and stay inside the ball. Short swings are too often taught by pushing the hands staight toward contact. While this is supposed to shorten/quicken the swing, in fact the swing gets longer and the hands extend early resulting in hooked outside pitches, and inside pitches pulled foul. Both those results are from being 'outside the ball'.

I think of 'hands inside the ball' as meaning that the hands stayed with the shoulder rotation into contact.