Posted by: Bart () on Fri Oct 18 20:05:52 2002

I have a ten year old that I am working on hitting mechanics with. I'm trying not to overwelm him and make him overthink every swing, but I also want to give him the best advice out there. I am partial to Tom Emanski's methods, but read quite a bit of contradictions in several web sites (Does anyone have an opinion on that one?). I really like this site and think there is some solid baseball knowledge shared. A lot of messages on this board are dedicated to circular rotation of hands and elbow in the slot. Can someone tell me what is meant by circular rotation (Do you mean top hand over?), and elbow in slot(Is that the same as bat splitting the helmet in
> > half when in cocked position?)? Thanks for any help.
> > > >>Hi Mark,The circular hand path means that the hands are connected to shoulder rotation and are brought around in a circular motion,fingers up fingers down.To me elbow in the slot is when the swing begins the rear elbow comes down to the rear rib cage,others may have a different meaning.I well send you 2 videos of rose and Mcgwire,they can be seen in frame by frame by putting the cursor to the left of the bar below the video and dragging across slowly.Rose shows the chp well,mac shows elbow in slot.
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> > Mark, the following is an excerpt of a recent post I made:
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> > "I have a countless number of clips where the following observations are consistent with 90 percent of the major league hitters: (1) from initial toe touch to contact is 6 frames. (2) to narrow it down even more, at toe touch (first frame) the bat angle is generally about 30 degrees. By the end of the second frame, the heel has landed, the bat has began uncocking to the point where it is near-vertical, and the hips have rotated about 30 degrees. This is Epsteins torque position, although he doesn't get into as many specifics as I do.From this torque position, contact is 4 frames away.
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> > At the risk of boring you with even more specifics, by the end of the 4th frame (2 frames away from contact), generally the hands/knob are even with the back knee, with the bat still not being quite parallel with the ground. 1/2 frame later (1 1/2 frames away from contact), the bat is parallel with the ground and this is the "lag position"."
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> > I posted this excerpt because to better understand specific moments in the swing it is important to understand all phases from beginning to end.
> >
> > Elbow-in-the-slot would start about "by the end of the 4th frame (2 frames away from contact), generally the hands/knob are even with the back knee, with the bat still not being quite parallel with the ground". Or, as RQL put it, "elbow in the slot is when the swing begins the rear elbow comes down to the rear rib cage". The "end" of elbow-in-the slot would be at or slightly before contact, depending on how much of an "L" the hitter has at contact. But this is assuming an inside pitch, because the more the pitch is outside, the less of an "L" at contact, and this is because on the outside pitches, starting even slightly before the "lag position" the elbow is "leaving" the slot (because the front arm is extending more and thus resulting in less of an "L" at contact).
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> > The hand path is easy to see. From the tome the bat starts uncocking until contact, just take almost any major league swing, particularly on an inside pitch, lay out all 6 or so frames side by side and it is easily traced. I suspect the clip of Rose that RQL referred to is one posted at setpro by Tim Olson. If it's the same one, Tim added some graphics to highlight the hand path, and it is indeed a great, graphic example of the circular hand path.
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> Bart-
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> Nice post as always.Do you have Paul Nyman's old clip of Nomar hitting the inside pitch compared to the outside pitch.I don't have it anymore.Paul is hoping to repost some archives,so it may resurface some day.Originally Paul posted the side by side to make the point,among others, that toe touch was timed the same regardless of location because the swing got underway for a given pitcher before the location could be determined.Paul synched the clips to contact,but if you re-synch them for toe touch you can see how timing changes later in the swing after pitch recognition.It is hard to make definite conclusions from this clip because the exact pitch speed/movement/location is uncertain.This may exaggerate the difference in this case.
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> The inside pitch mechanics go just as you describe them,however,the outside is somewhat different.Furthermore,it is really hard to pick out exactly when "launch" occurs as opposed to the arms and hands working to cock/uncock the bat before launch while establishing connection,setting swing radius,and dropping the bat into the power plane while posture is being adjusted at the same time.One fair marker of "launch" is when the number on the back of the uniform starts to blur from rotation beginning.
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> As compared to the inside pitch in these old clips synched to toe touch(frame 1),the heel is down in both by frame 3,however,the torso has blurred("launch") before this for the inside pitch,but doesn't blur until after this in the outside pitch(angle of front foot is also slightly different,more open as result of early turning for inside pitch).The torso then turns more slowly for the outside pitch,theoretically because a wider handpath has been set up to get the sweetspot location and timing right for the outside location.This creates what Jack calls a "high load" at "launch" so the torso then turns more slowly than for the inside situation(lead arm stretched more across chest).In this outside case,the toe drags later(hips decelerate later)as well in frame 7 as opposed to frame 5 for inside.The "L" stays in the elbow and contact is made in frame 6 for inside.However,for outside,the "L" comes out of the elbow just prior to contact which is in frame 9.

> In summary,the torso launches later while a longer swing radius is set,then the torso turns slower with bat and even handpath extending more before contact.Have you looked for or seen any of these adjustments?


Tom, I can't quite follow you, and I think part of thereason is due to interpretation of frames. I emailed you jpeg files for first 8 frames of G-parra, with frame 8 being contact for both the is and the os pitches.

For the os pitch, I see toe touch in F1 & F2, heel land in F3 & F4. Also, in F4 bat starts uncocking/moving toward catcher. Contact at F8.

For the is pitch, final heel plant is not until F5, and yet before F5 (final heel plant) the bat is already uncocking/moving toward catcher.
Contact at F8.

My analysis of the clip is the following: (1) The swing for the os pitch took about 1/2 frame longer than for the is pitch, and I think this is consistent with most hitters. (2) I see toe drag on both pitches at about frame 7. (3)The clip is synchronized about the best that it could be. Nevertheless, I think the os pitch clip is ahead of the inside pitch by about 1/4 of a frame. (4) For me, most front views are not good views of the "L" and this clip is no exception. On top of that it is a bit blurry. I THINK I see a more extended "L" on the os pitch but I can't tell for sure. (5) From just this one clip I think it would be risky to try to build a model for hitting is & os
pitches...I think it would take many more similar clips and of many more different hitters.