Posted by: Bruce Miller (brumil2@hotmail.com) on Sun Jan 26 07:19:19 2003

I’m new to the forum and before I put out my question, in reading through the past answers, I’ve seen what I call the hard headed baseball types trying to tell the Fathers of daughters that there is no difference between fastpitch softball and baseball (I must confess I was one of those hard headed baseball types before I came involved in fastpitch, remember there are bad coaches in both sports). First of all the argument between linear and rotational was settled long ago in fastpitch. Because of the shorter distances (and testosterone) girls had to go to the rotational swing to have any chance in making contact,(with almost equal emphasis on women sports the development of pitchers in fastpitch is phenomenal). I have coached both baseball and softball for thirty years and fastpitch softball is a lot harder. A boy who is a gifted athlete can go a lot farther in baseball (even the majors) with poor mechanics. A girl with poor mechanics can’t make a good U-16 traveling team. Power hitters are easy to find but the little gal who can hardly hit the ball out of the infield but can consistently slap bunt from the left side will make the team every time. So for all those out there who think softball coaches are just trying to “protect their turf” you are doing an injustice to the Fathers who are trying to get their daughters prepared for top fastpitch softball.
Having said all that, there is still a lot of disagreement on what role the hands play in the rotational swing. (Another topic that can be brought up at a later time is the difference between the grip that softball coaches teach and baseball)
Theoretically if you take an ax instead of a bat and want the most power hitting that tree your top hand will be palm down and you don’t even (or can’t) roll your wrists. In swinging the bat obviously you have follow through which requires wrist turnover. Many coaches say if the palm is down you will pop up a lot. So give me some thoughts on hand position at time of contact and power vs. consistent contact. It might boil down to individual style.
Thanks
ps. Just looked at that compariable clip of softball and baseball- I think a whole book could be written on that- what a great clip!