Posted by: 5skill () on Wed May 17 09:14:59 2000

> > i was intrigued by your question because my 18-year-old son throws right and bats left...i don't see him as having any advantages in applying torque...in fact, he has the opposite problem of many hitters....he hits everything to left/left-center, but he can not pull the ball to right field, at least for line drives...when he hits to left which is most of the time he hits line drives...when he hits to the right side, it is usually a groundball....i am sure that this problem is related to his bottom arm being the dominent arm and it's causing his arm to pull in tooooooooo close to the body...a real severe "inside-out" swing that countless coaches and instructors have been unable to identify a solution for...example...one instructor said he needs to "stay inside the ball", "take the knob and hands straight to the ball" and proceeded to prescribe the "fence drill"!!!! his problem is having the hands toooo "inside the ball" and this instructor prescribed the "fence drill"!!!!
> > Knight1285@aol.com

One thought to ponder....Is the arm too close to the body or is the body too close to the arm? There is a big difference in results even if the description sounds the same. Your son sounds like a classic weight shift hitter with the inside-out swing & line shots to the opposite field. May be nothing to change if it works for him. Just the same if he uses the same approach on inside pitches, it is not suprising that he is not happy with the results. I'm guessing that the problem with inside pitches is not with the hands. More than likely he does not turn aggressively enough with his hips and shoulders to allow the hands room to get through properly on an inside pitch.

Tough question - does he make the effort to rework his inside pitch stroke with countless drills & swings off the tee. Or does he leave well-enough alone and not risk messing up his effectiveness on middle to outside pitches.

One final thought. Be leary of coaches or instructors who think that throwing the hands or bat knob at the ball is good advise. The theory is partially valid, but many young hitters take the advise too literally and end up lunging to the ball and making contact too close to the handle. Better advise for almost any style of hitting is to get the hands through the hitting zone while going after the ball with the fat part of the bat.