the way my coaches teach to hit?

[jamesh23]

Is this linear or rotational or a mix? they say you must have your knuckles lined up, a loose grip or in other words dont squeeze the handle hard, your hands should be 5-6 inches away from your chest, and your hands shouldnt go behind your back shoulder. The say the back elbow should be kept down and close to the body. Is this right? I want the most power possible with contact available too.

[Erik]

Is this linear or rotational or a mix? they say you must have your knuckles lined up, a loose grip or in other words dont squeeze the handle hard, your hands should be 5-6 inches away from your chest, and your hands shouldnt go behind your back shoulder. The say the back elbow should be kept down and close to the body. Is this right? I want the most power possible with contact available too.

Jamesh,

What do you see when looking at good swings? Do you see the things that you have desribed?


EL,

[jamesh23]

Jamesh,

What do you see when looking at good swings? Do you see the things that you have desribed?


EL,

well yea except keeping the elbow down, ? im not sure thats why I was asking lol

[jbooth]

Is this linear or rotational or a mix? they say you must have your knuckles lined up, a loose grip or in other words dont squeeze the handle hard, your hands should be 5-6 inches away from your chest, and your hands shouldnt go behind your back shoulder. The say the back elbow should be kept down and close to the body. Is this right? I want the most power possible with contact available too.

Nothing that you mentioned has anything to do with rotational or linear. They're describing a grip and a load/launch position.

BTW, maybe 5 out of 100 MLB hitters line up their knocking knuckles. Most either have the top knuckles lined up with where a ring would be on your bottom hand, or have a "box" grip.

The elbow can be down, but it is better to have it up because it can be used better as a timing device for keeping the hands back while you get the hips going.

Here's the two most popular grips in MLB.

The one on the right would have the top knuckles shifted in the direction of the arrow, to line up with the black line.



The grip choice is up to the individual. It should be what is most comfortable for you. Hank Aaron used one different from all 3 of the most common ones.

[jamesh23]

they do teach the load/ toe tap, swing thing, thats the sequence he has us do, and our back elbow has to stay close to our body.

[jbooth]

they do teach the load/ toe tap, swing thing, thats the sequence he has us do, and our back elbow has to stay close to our body.

Well, the back elbow should stay close to your body as you swing, but it doesn't have to be close to the body in your stance or load, but that is personal preference.

Pujols has his elbow up in his stance, but he drops it down and keeps it close to his body as he swings;



Jeff Kent has his elbow pretty far down in his stance, and keeps it near his body as he swings. Just a different setup, but the same fundamental in the swing;

[jamesh23]

the one with jeff kent is pretty much what he wants.

[Jake Patterson]

Is this linear or rotational or a mix? they say you must have your knuckles lined up, a loose grip or in other words dont squeeze the handle hard, your hands should be 5-6 inches away from your chest, and your hands shouldnt go behind your back shoulder. The say the back elbow should be kept down and close to the body. Is this right? I want the most power possible with contact available too.

James go to Clips, Pics and Sites and look at what the very best do.

Here's Ortiz's knuckles...
Ortiz knuckles.bmp

[TG Coach]

Is this linear or rotational or a mix? they say you must have your knuckles lined up, a loose grip or in other words dont squeeze the handle hard, your hands should be 5-6 inches away from your chest, and your hands shouldnt go behind your back shoulder. The say the back elbow should be kept down and close to the body. Is this right? I want the most power possible with contact available too.

A batting stance and grip is nothing more than personal preference. It's when the hitter is in the "ready" position it matters. You can look at two hitters with extremely different stances. But when they hit "ready" they look very much alike.

Neither of my kids stand anything alike. Their stance isn't anything like mine was or close to how I first taught them. They found their own personal comfort zone. But at "ready" they look identical.

[Ursa Major]

The back elbow position is sort of an odd thing for a coach to focus on as a mandatory step. I look to it more as a possible means of adjusting the swing to take care of another flaw -- particularly bat drag (i.e., the back elbow preceding the hands into the hitting zone), which sometimes can be addressed by lifting the back elbow. But to make everyone drop the elbow is a little akin to the coach saying, "I always wore red shoelaces and was successful, so you should all wear red shoelaces too."

It's one of the things about having (I like to think) a decent understanding of the physics underlying rotational hitting -- you can avoid fussing with some of these little nuances that don't really affect the outcome of the swing.

[Go Cardinals]

The back elbow position is sort of an odd thing for a coach to focus on as a mandatory step. I look to it more as a possible means of adjusting the swing to take care of another flaw -- particularly bat drag (i.e., the back elbow preceding the hands into the hitting zone), which sometimes can be addressed by lifting the back elbow. But to make everyone drop the elbow is a little akin to the coach saying, "I always wore red shoelaces and was successful, so you should all wear red shoelaces too."

It's one of the things about having (I like to think) a decent understanding of the physics underlying rotational hitting -- you can avoid fussing with some of these little nuances that don't really affect the outcome of the swing.

Pretty much what I think...

[Drill]

Coach wants a quicker swing and maybe its his way to make sure of not arm baring.

I would go half way and say you are working on your elbow position. Just make sure you don't start sliding forward


drill

[callyjr]

A batting stance and grip is nothing more than personal preference. It's when the hitter is in the "ready" position it matters. You can look at two hitters with extremely different stances. But when they hit "ready" they look very much alike.

Neither of my kids stand anything alike. Their stance isn't anything like mine was or close to how I first taught them. They found their own personal comfort zone. But at "ready" they look identical.

the grip makes a big difference. try and rotate your knuckles in your stand and see how it effects your back arm/elbow. In order to keep the elbow slotted correctly you cannot line up the knuckles IMO.

Cally

[korp]

Well the hand grip and pre swing bat position doesn't really translate directly into any type of swing but more so what you do during the swing .... for example where you hands go, do your hips fire and pull the upper body along. The back elbow doesn't really matter if its up or not but you have to get in the proper position when swinging. I prefer to keep it down but as far as I know there is nothing that this will affect so personal preference (again as long as you get to the proper position).

As far as the hands not going past the back shoulder .... if you go too far back you will arm bar (straight arm) and I think this is what they are trying to teach you which is good. I guess it would depend on arm length exactly how far back you can go. You do not have to go as far back as your arm can reach though and doing so would be bad for your swing .... remember a lot of power has to do with rotational speed and if you go too far back I believe this would cut down on your bat speed.

[TG Coach]

the grip makes a big difference. try and rotate your knuckles in your stand and see how it effects your back arm/elbow. In order to keep the elbow slotted correctly you cannot line up the knuckles IMO.

Cally

The grip doesn't make a difference within the boundaries of acceptible grips.