Posted by: Jim (Jim@TheBatJack.com) on Mon May 2 21:52:01 2011

Pulling the knob toward the ball is one of the worst teaching cues out there. The barrel is the part of the bat that needs to get to the ball, not the knob. Players that pull the knob tend to be late and under too much with the barrel.

Throw the barrel through the ball. I assume that there are opinions in here that are strong when it comes to swinging up or down. The facts are that all hitters regardless of their swing path swing both up and down every time.

If the barrel didn't go down somewhere, the barrel would stay the same height through the swing as it was in the hitter's stance.

When the barrel travels downward, it eventually planes out then comes back up.

One thing to remember, trying to "match" the plane of the ball will always bring you to being below where you want to be. Especially on good fastballs that have some fuzz on them. The bat will come down on it's own somewhere, so the hitter should try to have it plane out and through the ball on the front side of the center of their body vs. behind the center of their body.

Check out this conversation between Pujols and McGwire about staying "inside" the ball vs. "driving" the ball.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1XFrOjpVhM&feature=related