Long time listener, first time caller

[mightylakers]

I have been following this board for over six months now, a lot of very useful and interesting information.

I have a 10 years old kid Gary playing both travel ball and rec ball.

Here is a very interesting video we had when he was 9, playing at the Cal State game tournament in San Diego. Check it out, hear me say holly cow at the end:-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxR6BMFxRmM

Here are two other videos I took just recently about his swing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXvQYyYbQ8o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ex_iIYxf7tQ

Could anybody tell me how to make the slow motion video out of the original one? I would like the board to give your analysis of his swing.

[Mark H]

Love the first clip. His reaction is priceless. Second clip swing looks pretty good to me. Batting cage swing I'll have to see in slo mo. I'd like to see both of the last two frame by frame.

[mightylakers]

Thanks for the qick reply

I really have no idea how to edit the video to make slow motion out of original clip.

My ow assessment of his swing is

1) His front shoulder seems to open a little bit too early

2) His left arm finished too low.

3) From time to time his left foot is a little jumpy, means he's on his toe after landing his stride and pushing back.

4) After the contact, his bat is sort of drop a little

I believe 2) and 4) is a matter of he's still not strong enough and the problem should go away when he grows up. I think 1) is his biggest problem. That's why he usually having problem with slower pitch in rec ball as his power already running out when the contact happened.

[Mark H]

1) His front shoulder seems to open a little bit too early

.

I hear this all the time and it never has made sense to me.

[mightylakers]

I believe it's just another way to say his timing is

off as to when to pull the trigger. By opening the shoulder too early, he released his power before the contact and led to early arm extension at the contact, leaving only his arm power to hit the ball.

[jbooth]

"His front shoulder seems to open a little bit too early"

I hear this all the time and it never has made sense to me.

Me either. If the front shoulder moves before the hips, then that is a problem. Otherwise, since it is what moves the bat, how can it open early? Early in relation to what? It has to be the hips.

Or, if the shoulder moves away from the plate due to moving the head away from the plate, that gives the appearance and feel of opening early, and if you did that before hip movement, it would be severe opening and pulling off.

If you turn the hips and let them turn the shoulder, you won't open early.

[jbooth]

off as to when to pull the trigger. By opening the shoulder too early, he released his power before the contact and led to early arm extension at the contact, leaving only his arm power to hit the ball.

When the shoulder moves it moves the handle of the bat, unless you failed to load your hands back before rotating.

See below, how the shoulder moves the hands.



Watch the front shoulder move the hands initially.

http://firstpickclub.com/video/kaline.wmv

[mightylakers]

I actually used this clicp to ask Gary to maintain

the box, keep hands back.

I also asked him to do what you demonstrated in that no early hand tourqe clip.

[Mark H]

off as to when to pull the trigger. By opening the shoulder too early, he released his power before the contact and led to early arm extension at the contact, leaving only his arm power to hit the ball.

Yeah, he can be early in terms of timing the ball, he can have poor rotation leading to poor connection. That all makes sense to me. Relative to Jim's comments, I always looked at the opening the shoulder too early comment as a cue rather than reality and while any cue can be good at any given time this one was never a favorite of mine.

[Mark H]

the box, keep hands back.

I also asked him to do what you demonstrated in that no early hand tourqe clip.

There you go.

[mightylakers]

I will see if I can find some other clips once got home

Somehow, he hits better in travel ball league than in rec ball, those green pitchers throwing 30 40 mph pitches cause the most problem for him.

he hits those good travel ball pitchers pretty hard who throwing around 60 mph.

His best hitting is actually in batting cage, hitting over 65 mph from 36 feet out hard consistently.

I always told him to be patient and let the ball come to his zone, but still he kept on swing a little too early.

[Mark H]

Great thread title by the way.

If he struggles with slow or fast pitching, better it be slow pitching.

As part of his development I'd have him spend time in the slowest cage learning to wait wait wait BE QUICK, POWERFUL AND SMOOTH, preferably to the opposite field, as opposed to most kid's tendency to slow their swing down when they face slow pitching. This is important because the best of those fast pitchers will throw slow some of the time.