Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Tue Dec 3 00:18:08 2002

>>> At foot plant? Do you mean toe touch or heel drop?

Mark H. <<<

Hi Mark

Please excuse the delay in my reply, I have been very busy the past couple days. --- By “foot plant,” I was referring to the foot landing on the ball of the lead-foot. At this point, many batters have their lead-foot, knee and hips in a fairly closed position. The lead-heel then starts to rotate back toward the catcher as it lowers. As the heel rotates back, the lead-knee starts to rotate around toward the pitcher, which initiates hip rotation around a stationary axis.

A number of students retain the tendency to stride to a closed flat-foot plant and drive the back-side forward. This type of foot-plant can restrict rotation. But, after 2 or 3 sessions of stressing the need for lead-shoulder pull at contact, they begin to land on the ball of the foot and use the rotation of the heel and extension of the lead-side to generate most of the rotation.

Jack Mankin