1
Vernon Wells demonstrating bat/shoulder staying perpendicular to spine angle for maximum momentum transfer
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2
Ortiz - showing parallel shoulder and bat planes.
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3
Troy Glauss hitting outside, outside low, and inside low pitches. Notice the adjustment made by tilting on lower pitches.
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4
Glauss swing plane for inside-low, low, middle pitches. Adjustment is largely via tilt over the plane and then just turning. Notice how close to parallel shoulders and bat are.
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5
Adam Dunn - level shoulders, swinging down, and remaining balanced?
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6
Edmonds hi/low, Sheffield, Manny at contact. Notice on Edmonds how the adjustment for pitch height is shoulder tilt. Also, notice how close to parallel shoulders and bat are on all.
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7
More swing plane, shoulder alignment.
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8
Proper posture. Bat angle perpendicular to spine. Amanda Freed, Lovie Jung.
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9
Step #1 - Intent to hit the ball hard
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10
Vladimar Guerrero - pre-load of the shoulders.
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11
Soriano properly loading the middle
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12
Pelvic loading - Michelle Smith pre-loading the middle before starting the swing in a different fashion
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13
Very typical youth swing with improper swing plane adjustment and other posture issues. Adjusting the swing plane via some tilt (good), some squatting (bad), and a lot of arms (bad).
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14
Ortiz remains "connected", also known as "maintaining the box"
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15
Manny attached to a simulated weight stack. Staying connected and driving the knob with the body - not the arms.
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16
Example of arm disconnection too early into extension rather than maintaining "the box". (See Rose clip on for a very good example of maintaining the box.) Other issues here include lack of front knee firmness and insufficient pelvic load.
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17
By the way, here's the same youth hitter shown in #16 after a lot of hard work to improve his swing. Now that's some terrific improvement!
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18
Disconnection - "hands to the ball" style. Unfortunately many coaches still teach this.
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19
A common problem with the Epstein "fence drill" which is commonly used to prevent casting. Notice the front elbow disconnection just before & at contact - one problem helped, another created.
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20
Example of significant hip slide and bat drag problems. Hip slide is defined as hips continuing translation (sliding forward) after rotation has begun (approx frames 13-17). Bat drag occurs in frames 9-14 - see the rear arm's elbow getting ahead of the rear arm hand.
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21
Bat drag - youth hitter compared with Guerrero. Bat drag causing the fulcrum of the swing to be at the rear elbow and results in a long (i.e., slow) swing. Bat dragging kids will often show a lot of power - when they make contact.
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22
Bat drag (see blurred rear elbow getting ahead of rear hand)
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23
Bat drag - top hand elbow getting ahead of top hand.
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24
Bat drag - commonly leads to a powerful but very long youth swing.
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25
Hi-speed overhead view (with bat drag?)
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26
Paul Nyman's "medicus" training bat. Disconnection and swing plane issues are exacerbated with this bat.
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27
Hinge bat ($200) - from MetalWood Bats.
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28
My hinge bat ($5.50).
My rope bat ($2.80). Made from 3-ft of 1-1/2" manilla rope (found at a specialty hardware store).
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29
Hinge bat closeup: old 34" bat with 4" removed, connected by heavy duty two eyebolts and single adjustable chain link (which take up the removed 4").
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30
Jeter head & eye movement during the swing. The 4 small colored lines drawn on each photo indicate Jeter's eye level at the 4 points of this swing:
1. early stance (top blue line taken from top left photo eye level),
2. beginning stride (green line taken from top right photo eye level),
3. heel plant (red line taken from lower left photo eye level),
4. contact (bottom blue line taken from bottom left photo eye level)
Notice that Jeter's head & eyes move (very typically of elite hitters) - including during the swing (i.e., between heel plant and contact). Jeter does seem to watch the ball to the bat until contact - something that many other elite hitters don't do. Summarizing, cues from coaches to keep the head perfectly still and watch the bat hit the ball generally aren't backed up by video evidence.
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31
Another comparison of the Mike Epstein fence drill to a real swing.
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