Which would you say is more important for power?
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While brute strength has some importance, I feel bat speed is most important in hitting for power because of the fact that if you can't catch up with a good fastball, it won't matter how strong you are.
There have been numerous young hitters who were strong as bulls but just couldn't adjust to higher velocities or afford to wait on breaking balls simply because they didn't have the bat speed to allow them to stay back on offspeed stuff. Some of the greatest HR hitters--Mel Ott, Henry Aaron, Ernie Banks, Al Kaline, Jimmy Wynn, Joe Morgan for example--were not large men who would be associated with simply brute strength. But they were great power hitters. There have been many big brute strength guys who just couldn't connect often enough to even show their power except on rare occasions. Some of this can be blamed on a lack of bat speed.
There have been numerous young hitters who were strong as bulls but just couldn't adjust to higher velocities or afford to wait on breaking balls simply because they didn't have the bat speed to allow them to stay back on offspeed stuff. Some of the greatest HR hitters--Mel Ott, Henry Aaron, Ernie Banks, Al Kaline, Jimmy Wynn, Joe Morgan for example--were not large men who would be associated with simply brute strength. But they were great power hitters. There have been many big brute strength guys who just couldn't connect often enough to even show their power except on rare occasions. Some of this can be blamed on a lack of bat speed.
Brute strength is only only important if it increases bat speed.
Bat speed has nothing to do with your ability to time a fastball.
Bat speed has nothing to do with your ability to time a fastball.
Albert Pujols has one of the slowest batspeeds in the majors, 80 mph... guys in the minors that never make the show have 100 mph batspeed.
plane of the pitch.
Mike Epstein says 85 % of the power Hall of fame guys before steroids era, less than 6 foot and 185lbs.
plane of the pitch.
Mike Epstein says 85 % of the power Hall of fame guys before steroids era, less than 6 foot and 185lbs.
Here is a link to a thread on this topic in the hitting forum.
http://hsbaseballweb.com/eve/f...91034941/m/641101035
http://hsbaseballweb.com/eve/f...91034941/m/641101035
Force = mass x acceleration + hand/eye coordination.
This is the way I understand it.
This is the way I understand it.
quote:Originally posted by showme:
Albert Pujols has one of the slowest batspeeds in the majors, 80 mph... guys in the minors that never make the show have 100 mph batspeed.
Please post a link to anyone with 100+ mph bat speed.
The highest exit speed in MLB in 2010 was 121.0. The formula is "exit speed" = q*(pitch speed) + (1+q)*(bat speed) where q is roughly 0.2 for wood bats. The average fastball speed is 91 mph out of the hand - 83 at the plate.
So based on this formula, it would seem nobody in MLB has 100 mph bat speed. The highest would be in the 80s. Pujols measured 86.99 off a tee.
To summarize 2010 info:
Average MLB exit speed (measured) = 103.3
Pujols average exit speed (measured) = 104.9
Highest MLB exit speed in a live game (measured) = 121
Pujols highest exit speed (measured) = 113.6
Average MLB bat speed in a live game (derived) = 72
Highest MLB bat speed in a live game (derived) = 87
I suspect that the bat speed at contact is not always the max bat speed of a given swing. I have never seen anyone measure bat speed at different points in a given swing.
The best way to measure individual performance is by measuring exit speed, using a wood bat, and a tee that enables a slight upper cut. Minimizes variation in pitch speed, bat ratings, and bat speed optimization. Then, work on adjusting your swing plane using the same exit speed, to generate backspin/distance.
The best, bar none, article on hitting a baseball.
Kevin Reese 98mph.
"Performance: How To Build The Perfect Batter."
http://slowthegamedown.com/Media/Articles/GQ%20Article%20-%20How%20To%20Build%20%20The%20Perfect%20Batter.pdf
Kevin Reese 98mph.
"Performance: How To Build The Perfect Batter."
http://slowthegamedown.com/Media/Articles/GQ%20Article%20-%20How%20To%20Build%20%20The%20Perfect%20Batter.pdf
quote:Originally posted by showme:
The best, bar none, article on hitting a baseball.
Kevin Reese 98mph.
"Performance: How To Build The Perfect Batter."
http://slowthegamedown.com/Media/Articles/GQ%20Article%20-%20How%20To%20Build%20%20The%20Perfect%20Batter.pdf
Reese would be hitting faster than any known human. My guess is that they confused exit speed with bat speed.
This article also says Babe Ruth used a 52 oz bat. I understand he used a 52 oz bat in BP once in Yankee Stadium for the cameras.
You may have just unearthed the source of the Pujols bat speed myth - this is an article from that great baseball reference source, GQ Magazine
.
Whatever dude.
Washington University Data. The are the MLB of research and data collection.
No guessing or preference science in any of this. Might read it.
Washington University Data. The are the MLB of research and data collection.
No guessing or preference science in any of this. Might read it.
I thought bat speed as well. A question about swing plane, Ted Williams in his book says that a slight upswing is ideal, but a player on our HS team who will be attending a top JUCO and had a 8 as his PG rating, says that the trainer he works with says that swinging "down" on the ball slightly is best, because it creates backspin, really causing the ball to fly. What is everybody's opinion on that matter? Upswing, or downswing for backspin?
Based on the question, I'd vote for bat speed.
But I'd also add the quality of the swing or the swing plane or whatever you want to call it.
How about timing? How about the ability to read the pitch?
It probably has to be a combination of those many things.
Based on my son's swing, I'd have to put brute strength last in this list. He's relatively scrawny at this point in his life and can launch it pretty good compared to the "bigger" players around him.
But I'd also add the quality of the swing or the swing plane or whatever you want to call it.
How about timing? How about the ability to read the pitch?
It probably has to be a combination of those many things.
Based on my son's swing, I'd have to put brute strength last in this list. He's relatively scrawny at this point in his life and can launch it pretty good compared to the "bigger" players around him.
WILLIAMS: I don't think what you're telling me is right. My impression is that, even with all your success, you don't really realize what you're doing.
MATTINGLY: I think I realize what I'm doing. I don't believe in the total Lau thing, but I think I need some sort of weight shift to hit the ball with more power. It's simple: I have to go back before I can go forward.It has helped me to put the ball in the seats, which I never did before. I always got a topspin, and I'd hit the ball to the warning track. Now I get the backspin, and the ball carries for me. Everything before was an uppercut and I was hitting on top of the ball, so I was getting line drives that would drop down.
WILLIAMS: What you're saying is that you're swinging down on the ball and -- get me some paper, O.K. There's a great thing in life called logic. If you say you like to swing down. . . .
MATTINGLY: I didn't say that.I just said I like to get backspin on the ball.
WILLIAMS: O.K. You want backspin, so you're cutting the ball. We'll say you're swinging level. At the moment of impact, in order to hit the ball just right and cut it, you have to hit it on the underneath side with the ball coming slightly down. Now, if I swing slightly up, I hit it with the greatest impact. This swing incorporates the single most important thing -- not shifting your weight but getting your butt moving, your hips working. Do you believe that?
MATTINGLY: Yes, definitely.
WILLIAMS: [Standing in back of Mattingly.] Try to swing down. There's no hip movement at all there. If Don Mattingly wants to swing up, you're pretty well forced to move your hips, are you not? Two reasons I like slightly up. First, it incorporates your hips, which makes it possible to be quick and fast. Second, you're hitting in the exact plane of the pitch.
BOGGS: How do you think I swing?
WILLIAMS: You swing up a little, but you practice, practice that stuff. [He puts his head down and chops downward. Boggs gets up and swings, keeping his head down.] Yeah, that downswing. Since whatever you practice, you're more inclined to do, that's what you do in games. Everyone tells me that in batting practice you're hitting them out of sight, that you're pulling the ball and getting it in the air and going to hit 30 home runs. Why not in a game?
MATTINGLY: But by exaggerating the downswing -- if I'm an uppercutter -- I'm not really swinging down in games, but I'm at least going to try to get my hands extended. . . .
WILLIAMS: I want you to show me how you think your hands are. This is funny, because you don't realize what you're doing. Let me ask you something. How do you think your hands are at the moment of contact?
MATTINGLY: It depends on where the ball is.
WILLIAMS: Is your left hand on top of your right hand?
MATTINGLY: I don't know.
WILLIAMS: Ohhhh.
MATTINGLY: Really, I don't -- I don't know what my hands are doing and all that stuff. I just know what feels right.
WILLIAMS: Try to open up and hit the way you first showed me. [Mattingly swings with hit top hand coming over his bottom hand.]
BOGGS: Ground balls to the right side.
WILLIAMS: Now this. [He pulls at Mattingly's hands so that Mattingly strains, with his left fist following behind his right.] Which is stronger? No doubt. This is a quick, strong game. I want to get the bat there as quickly as I can. They're going to say, listen to that old man Williams telling those good young hitters what to do, but you're 24 and 27. I've analyzed hitting as much as anyone ever has, and I know you've got to be logical.
MATTINGLY: Didn't you shift weight when you hit?
WILLIAMS: I'm going to ask you what your definition of shifting weight is.
MATTINGLY: The transfer of weight.
WILLIAMS: Where to where?
MATTINGLY: From anywhere -- from where the head is to six, eight inches.
BOGGS: All right, let's put it in boxing theory. If a boxer hits you, is he going to generate more power from here [indicates a long punch] or more power from here [short punch].
WILLIAMS: He'll generate more power if he doesn't do a thing, then goes umph with his hips.
BOGGS: You're saying all you do is throw the hips? Nothing else? Where do you get the initial movement in the action-reaction process?
WILLIAMS: [He draws two fighters on a piece of paper.] If this guy strides and puts all his weight on his front foot, his weight's forward. I don't want to cheat myself six or eight inches toward the pitcher. Why give him that?
MATTINGLY: I agree with you. I think you have to wait, then explode. I don't think you have to shift to the front leg.
WILLIAMS: That's what you said earlier.
MATTINGLY: No, I didn't. Well, I did, but I didn't mean to the extent that you're saying all the Lau people do. What I was always taught was to wait, wait, wait, see the ball and then hit it. I get my weight back -- wait, wait, wait, then throw it. [He practices his swing.]
WILLIAMS: But you're not really exaggerating the weight shift there.
MATTINGLY: I'm already leaning back, so I've got to get forward some way. From waiting, where I'm giving myself the extra time to see the ball and the extra leverage, I'm exploding. It's the same thing as you're saying.
WILLIAMS: What's impressing me about the two of you is that you talk sense. I don't think you know yourselves as well as you will. Already you're in doubt about some of the things you do, Don. But they're teaching young hitters to hit down, give the pitchers a big advantage with that weight shift and turn over the top hand with that Lau theory.
BOGGS: No, they aren't.
WILLIAMS: You don't think so? If you transfer weight, you tell me how you can get your hands underneath. [Boggs take his stride.] Exaggerate it a little. [Boggs does.] Now that's transferring weight. [Boggs takes his regular swing.] I don't call that transferring weight.
BOGGS: I do, and so would Walter Hriniak. And I've got pictures at home that people have taken at the point of contact where I almost look like you.
GAMMONS: If you look at pictures, the first movement, the cocking of the front knee, is almost exactly the same.
BOGGS: That's how I learned to hit. I read your book in high school. My father would see me on television and could call me and tell me what I was doing wrong just by the way my front knee was or wasn't being cocked at the beginning of the swing.
WILLIAMS: Did you think I transferred weight?
GAMMONS: As you start your swing, you **** your front leg, and at the point of contact you're coming up off your back foot ever so slightly. That's a shift.
WILLIAMS: That's a hard thing to do. It's very little weight shift, more of an unwinding of the hips. A weight shift upsets balance.
BOGGS: I don't know what else you can call it. O.K., tell me how you think I swing?
WILLIAMS: I think you're balanced. But you talk about shifting weight.
MATTINGLY: All good hitters shift their weight. I can't believe they don't. Show me how you get back.
WILLIAMS: I'm doing it with my hips.
BOGGS: **** your leg. Where's your weight going?
WILLIAMS: Which way am I shifting my weight?
MATTINGLY: I think you're shifting it back.
WILLIAMS: Only because it's the only way I can stand. O.K., watch me swing. I drop my back shoulder. I don't have to force myself to keep my head down. [Boggs takes his swing.] You're dropping your back shoulder, too.
BOGGS: That's the way I hit, and you try to say I don't hit like that.
WILLIAMS: I didn't say that. I never told you a thing about your swing. Your hands are right, but you don't practice the way you hit. When you get in the cage, you swing through with your head straight down -- Dewey Evans pretty near makes me vomit the way he swings.
MATTINGLY: I don't buy that, either.
WILLIAMS: All I've heard around the Red Sox for the last five years is to keep your head straight down all the time, and it's a terrible thing. Mr. Brett does it sometimes and gets himself all screwed up. You know why? There's no way you can complete your swing. These are the things I hear, though. Swing down. Let the bat handle go. Why do you think they let the bat handle go?
BOGGS: To get extension.
WILLIAMS: Nah.
BOGGS: And a follow-through.
MATTINGLY: If I'm hitting the bal the other way, I can't hold onto the bat.
WILLIAMS: Sure you can.
BOGGS: When do you let your hand go?
WILLIAMS: I never let my hand go.
BOGGS: I know. But when do Lau, Hriniak and the guys who preach it say to let your hand go?
WILLIAMS: Just at contact.
BOGGS: Wrong.
WILLIAMS: Just before contact, then.
BOGGS: Wrong. [He takes a swing. His hands separate after the imaginary contact, and his bat follows through.]
WILLIAMS: But that's not the way the Lau people do it.
BOGGS: It is, too. That is the proper way to do it. You do it. [Williams stands up and takes an imaginary swing.]
MATTINGLY: You're letting go somewhere.
WILLIAMS: You gotta let go somewhere.
BOGGS: See.
WILLIAMS: Do you think you miss more balls on top or underneath?
MATTINGLY: I really don't know.
WILLIAMS: Oh, boy. One of the best hitters in the game and he doesn't know. O.K., when you don't hit it good. . . .
MATTINGLY: More often than not, I pop it up. I would say that when I miss, I swing underneath.
BOGGS: Same thing, without a doubt.
WILLIAMS: What is that, early or late?
MATTINGLY: Probably early.
WILLIAMS: It's late!
BOGGS: Fly balls late, ground balls early.
WILLIAMS: When you hit the ball to leftfield, do you hit more ground balls or fly balls?
MATTINGLY: I hit more fly balls.
WILLIAMS: As did everyone else who ever played the game.When you pull the ball, you have a tendency to hit more ground balls. You tend to hit the ball on the ground because the toughtest thing is to pull the ball and get it in the air. That's the premium, par excellence hit.
MATTINGLY: If you hit the ball on the ground, it's because you don't get your hips open.
WILLIAMS: We're talking about the same things, aren't we? I hope you don't hit .409. Wade, what did I tell you when you were in the minors?
BOGGS: Don't change a thing.
WILLIAMS: I also told you to use the count more. Attack that first-pitch fastball. At 2 and oh and 3 and 1, try to get a fastball you can drive in the air. You should be doing that now. There's no reason you shouldn't hit 18 or 20 home runs.
BOGGS: What's so great about you, Ted, is that you teach the scientific foundations of hitting. I try to do that with high school players.
WILLIAMS: What do you teach?
BOGGS: Slightly up because of the plane of the arc, hit through the ball whether you're a pull or opposite-field hitter. I teach them to keep the head down and on the ball, but I don't try to change them too much.
GAMMONS: Do you realize that you three just agreed that the basics of the Ted Williams and Charley Lau theories are really the same and that you've been debating semantics?
WILLIAMS: I still say that what they do isn't what the Lau book preaches.
GAMMONS: Are there hitters today that you particularly like?
WILLIAMS: I love Dale Murphy. He's really got style. I like Mike Marshall's style. I like Bobby Horner, but Horner hits the pitcher's pitch too much. I like Keith Moreland's style. Greg Brock's got style, and he's got great mechanics; I don't understand why he doesn't do better. Darryl Strawberry's big, strong and really quick. He could eventually get a little more opened up and hit 45 home runs. I love to watch him. When you see him on the ball field, you just can't keep your eyes off him. Guys like that don't come along often. You should have seen Jimmie Foxx. He hit them like Mantle. They had a unique sound.
BOGGS: Don, the next time you're in Boston, look in Fenway for the one red seat most of the way up in the bleachers. That's where Ted hit one. Absolutely awesome.
WILLIAMS: Back to guys who should be good hitters who aren't. They swing at too many pitchers' pitches. You do, too, Don. I know you do. What did you have, 45 walks last year? At least Wade makes the pitchers give him something to hit.
MATTINGLY: I take a lot of first pitches, but after that I hack away.
GAMMONS: How does your approach differ from pitcher to pitcher?
MATTINGLY: If I've got a guy that I feel I can handle everything he's got, then I get right on top of the plate.
WILLIAMS: Do you vary your stance?
MATTINGLY: No, I vary my placement in the box, though. Closer to the plate and back. With a pitcher who can't throw the ball by me, I don't want to give him the outside corner, so I move up.
WILLIAMS: I find it interesting about the movement. If I moved, it was more up and back. I stayed the same distance from the plate most of the time. However, if I had a real sinkerballer who got them low and away, down, down, I might move up an inch and let that nibbler get me out.
BOGGS: I never vary my placement in the box. My front foot is right on the plate, my back foot's in the same place and it's been right there, cut and dried, for the last 18 years. Guy who throws hard, be a little quicker. Guy who throws the off-speed stuff, slow everything down.
MATTINGLY: What about a nasty lefthander with the ball in on your hands?
BOGGS: You mean like Matt Young?
MATTINGLY: Young, [Mark] Langston, [John] Candelaria. Candelaria I say is really tough.
BOGGS: You haven't had to face Rags [Dave Righetti]. He would definitely be in that group.
WILLIAMS: Who has got the best stuff of any righthanded starter?
BOGGS: Mike Moore of Seattle.
WILLIAMS: Young, Langston, Moore are all with Seattle. I thought Kansas City won the World Series. Who's got the toughest righthanded and lefthanded curveballs?
BOGGS: Bert Blyleven and Mike Witt for righties. Bruce Hurst for lefties.
WILLIAMS: Sinker?
MATTINGLY: Doyle Alexander for me, because he can do so many things with it.
BOGGS: Or Dennis Lamp. He's straight over the top.
GAMMONS: Ted, who was the toughest for you?
WILLIAMS: Boy, Bob Feller had great stuff. I can't name one who was toughest for me, but Eddie Lopat and Whitey Ford were really tough because they never gave me a pitch to hit. Bob Lemon was as tough as anyone. Now, if I could give you any advice, it would be that the tougher the pitcher, the tougher the situation, the tougher the count, the worse the light, the worse the umpires, the tougher the delivery,
the single most important thing to think about is hitting the ball hard through the middle. You'll never go wrong with that idea in your mind.
As long as you hit, and especially as you get older, hang in there and be quick.
MATTINGLY: I think I realize what I'm doing. I don't believe in the total Lau thing, but I think I need some sort of weight shift to hit the ball with more power. It's simple: I have to go back before I can go forward.It has helped me to put the ball in the seats, which I never did before. I always got a topspin, and I'd hit the ball to the warning track. Now I get the backspin, and the ball carries for me. Everything before was an uppercut and I was hitting on top of the ball, so I was getting line drives that would drop down.
WILLIAMS: What you're saying is that you're swinging down on the ball and -- get me some paper, O.K. There's a great thing in life called logic. If you say you like to swing down. . . .
MATTINGLY: I didn't say that.I just said I like to get backspin on the ball.
WILLIAMS: O.K. You want backspin, so you're cutting the ball. We'll say you're swinging level. At the moment of impact, in order to hit the ball just right and cut it, you have to hit it on the underneath side with the ball coming slightly down. Now, if I swing slightly up, I hit it with the greatest impact. This swing incorporates the single most important thing -- not shifting your weight but getting your butt moving, your hips working. Do you believe that?
MATTINGLY: Yes, definitely.
WILLIAMS: [Standing in back of Mattingly.] Try to swing down. There's no hip movement at all there. If Don Mattingly wants to swing up, you're pretty well forced to move your hips, are you not? Two reasons I like slightly up. First, it incorporates your hips, which makes it possible to be quick and fast. Second, you're hitting in the exact plane of the pitch.
BOGGS: How do you think I swing?
WILLIAMS: You swing up a little, but you practice, practice that stuff. [He puts his head down and chops downward. Boggs gets up and swings, keeping his head down.] Yeah, that downswing. Since whatever you practice, you're more inclined to do, that's what you do in games. Everyone tells me that in batting practice you're hitting them out of sight, that you're pulling the ball and getting it in the air and going to hit 30 home runs. Why not in a game?
MATTINGLY: But by exaggerating the downswing -- if I'm an uppercutter -- I'm not really swinging down in games, but I'm at least going to try to get my hands extended. . . .
WILLIAMS: I want you to show me how you think your hands are. This is funny, because you don't realize what you're doing. Let me ask you something. How do you think your hands are at the moment of contact?
MATTINGLY: It depends on where the ball is.
WILLIAMS: Is your left hand on top of your right hand?
MATTINGLY: I don't know.
WILLIAMS: Ohhhh.
MATTINGLY: Really, I don't -- I don't know what my hands are doing and all that stuff. I just know what feels right.
WILLIAMS: Try to open up and hit the way you first showed me. [Mattingly swings with hit top hand coming over his bottom hand.]
BOGGS: Ground balls to the right side.
WILLIAMS: Now this. [He pulls at Mattingly's hands so that Mattingly strains, with his left fist following behind his right.] Which is stronger? No doubt. This is a quick, strong game. I want to get the bat there as quickly as I can. They're going to say, listen to that old man Williams telling those good young hitters what to do, but you're 24 and 27. I've analyzed hitting as much as anyone ever has, and I know you've got to be logical.
MATTINGLY: Didn't you shift weight when you hit?
WILLIAMS: I'm going to ask you what your definition of shifting weight is.
MATTINGLY: The transfer of weight.
WILLIAMS: Where to where?
MATTINGLY: From anywhere -- from where the head is to six, eight inches.
BOGGS: All right, let's put it in boxing theory. If a boxer hits you, is he going to generate more power from here [indicates a long punch] or more power from here [short punch].
WILLIAMS: He'll generate more power if he doesn't do a thing, then goes umph with his hips.
BOGGS: You're saying all you do is throw the hips? Nothing else? Where do you get the initial movement in the action-reaction process?
WILLIAMS: [He draws two fighters on a piece of paper.] If this guy strides and puts all his weight on his front foot, his weight's forward. I don't want to cheat myself six or eight inches toward the pitcher. Why give him that?
MATTINGLY: I agree with you. I think you have to wait, then explode. I don't think you have to shift to the front leg.
WILLIAMS: That's what you said earlier.
MATTINGLY: No, I didn't. Well, I did, but I didn't mean to the extent that you're saying all the Lau people do. What I was always taught was to wait, wait, wait, see the ball and then hit it. I get my weight back -- wait, wait, wait, then throw it. [He practices his swing.]
WILLIAMS: But you're not really exaggerating the weight shift there.
MATTINGLY: I'm already leaning back, so I've got to get forward some way. From waiting, where I'm giving myself the extra time to see the ball and the extra leverage, I'm exploding. It's the same thing as you're saying.
WILLIAMS: What's impressing me about the two of you is that you talk sense. I don't think you know yourselves as well as you will. Already you're in doubt about some of the things you do, Don. But they're teaching young hitters to hit down, give the pitchers a big advantage with that weight shift and turn over the top hand with that Lau theory.
BOGGS: No, they aren't.
WILLIAMS: You don't think so? If you transfer weight, you tell me how you can get your hands underneath. [Boggs take his stride.] Exaggerate it a little. [Boggs does.] Now that's transferring weight. [Boggs takes his regular swing.] I don't call that transferring weight.
BOGGS: I do, and so would Walter Hriniak. And I've got pictures at home that people have taken at the point of contact where I almost look like you.
GAMMONS: If you look at pictures, the first movement, the cocking of the front knee, is almost exactly the same.
BOGGS: That's how I learned to hit. I read your book in high school. My father would see me on television and could call me and tell me what I was doing wrong just by the way my front knee was or wasn't being cocked at the beginning of the swing.
WILLIAMS: Did you think I transferred weight?
GAMMONS: As you start your swing, you **** your front leg, and at the point of contact you're coming up off your back foot ever so slightly. That's a shift.
WILLIAMS: That's a hard thing to do. It's very little weight shift, more of an unwinding of the hips. A weight shift upsets balance.
BOGGS: I don't know what else you can call it. O.K., tell me how you think I swing?
WILLIAMS: I think you're balanced. But you talk about shifting weight.
MATTINGLY: All good hitters shift their weight. I can't believe they don't. Show me how you get back.
WILLIAMS: I'm doing it with my hips.
BOGGS: **** your leg. Where's your weight going?
WILLIAMS: Which way am I shifting my weight?
MATTINGLY: I think you're shifting it back.
WILLIAMS: Only because it's the only way I can stand. O.K., watch me swing. I drop my back shoulder. I don't have to force myself to keep my head down. [Boggs takes his swing.] You're dropping your back shoulder, too.
BOGGS: That's the way I hit, and you try to say I don't hit like that.
WILLIAMS: I didn't say that. I never told you a thing about your swing. Your hands are right, but you don't practice the way you hit. When you get in the cage, you swing through with your head straight down -- Dewey Evans pretty near makes me vomit the way he swings.
MATTINGLY: I don't buy that, either.
WILLIAMS: All I've heard around the Red Sox for the last five years is to keep your head straight down all the time, and it's a terrible thing. Mr. Brett does it sometimes and gets himself all screwed up. You know why? There's no way you can complete your swing. These are the things I hear, though. Swing down. Let the bat handle go. Why do you think they let the bat handle go?
BOGGS: To get extension.
WILLIAMS: Nah.
BOGGS: And a follow-through.
MATTINGLY: If I'm hitting the bal the other way, I can't hold onto the bat.
WILLIAMS: Sure you can.
BOGGS: When do you let your hand go?
WILLIAMS: I never let my hand go.
BOGGS: I know. But when do Lau, Hriniak and the guys who preach it say to let your hand go?
WILLIAMS: Just at contact.
BOGGS: Wrong.
WILLIAMS: Just before contact, then.
BOGGS: Wrong. [He takes a swing. His hands separate after the imaginary contact, and his bat follows through.]
WILLIAMS: But that's not the way the Lau people do it.
BOGGS: It is, too. That is the proper way to do it. You do it. [Williams stands up and takes an imaginary swing.]
MATTINGLY: You're letting go somewhere.
WILLIAMS: You gotta let go somewhere.
BOGGS: See.
WILLIAMS: Do you think you miss more balls on top or underneath?
MATTINGLY: I really don't know.
WILLIAMS: Oh, boy. One of the best hitters in the game and he doesn't know. O.K., when you don't hit it good. . . .
MATTINGLY: More often than not, I pop it up. I would say that when I miss, I swing underneath.
BOGGS: Same thing, without a doubt.
WILLIAMS: What is that, early or late?
MATTINGLY: Probably early.
WILLIAMS: It's late!
BOGGS: Fly balls late, ground balls early.
WILLIAMS: When you hit the ball to leftfield, do you hit more ground balls or fly balls?
MATTINGLY: I hit more fly balls.
WILLIAMS: As did everyone else who ever played the game.When you pull the ball, you have a tendency to hit more ground balls. You tend to hit the ball on the ground because the toughtest thing is to pull the ball and get it in the air. That's the premium, par excellence hit.
MATTINGLY: If you hit the ball on the ground, it's because you don't get your hips open.
WILLIAMS: We're talking about the same things, aren't we? I hope you don't hit .409. Wade, what did I tell you when you were in the minors?
BOGGS: Don't change a thing.
WILLIAMS: I also told you to use the count more. Attack that first-pitch fastball. At 2 and oh and 3 and 1, try to get a fastball you can drive in the air. You should be doing that now. There's no reason you shouldn't hit 18 or 20 home runs.
BOGGS: What's so great about you, Ted, is that you teach the scientific foundations of hitting. I try to do that with high school players.
WILLIAMS: What do you teach?
BOGGS: Slightly up because of the plane of the arc, hit through the ball whether you're a pull or opposite-field hitter. I teach them to keep the head down and on the ball, but I don't try to change them too much.
GAMMONS: Do you realize that you three just agreed that the basics of the Ted Williams and Charley Lau theories are really the same and that you've been debating semantics?
WILLIAMS: I still say that what they do isn't what the Lau book preaches.
GAMMONS: Are there hitters today that you particularly like?
WILLIAMS: I love Dale Murphy. He's really got style. I like Mike Marshall's style. I like Bobby Horner, but Horner hits the pitcher's pitch too much. I like Keith Moreland's style. Greg Brock's got style, and he's got great mechanics; I don't understand why he doesn't do better. Darryl Strawberry's big, strong and really quick. He could eventually get a little more opened up and hit 45 home runs. I love to watch him. When you see him on the ball field, you just can't keep your eyes off him. Guys like that don't come along often. You should have seen Jimmie Foxx. He hit them like Mantle. They had a unique sound.
BOGGS: Don, the next time you're in Boston, look in Fenway for the one red seat most of the way up in the bleachers. That's where Ted hit one. Absolutely awesome.
WILLIAMS: Back to guys who should be good hitters who aren't. They swing at too many pitchers' pitches. You do, too, Don. I know you do. What did you have, 45 walks last year? At least Wade makes the pitchers give him something to hit.
MATTINGLY: I take a lot of first pitches, but after that I hack away.
GAMMONS: How does your approach differ from pitcher to pitcher?
MATTINGLY: If I've got a guy that I feel I can handle everything he's got, then I get right on top of the plate.
WILLIAMS: Do you vary your stance?
MATTINGLY: No, I vary my placement in the box, though. Closer to the plate and back. With a pitcher who can't throw the ball by me, I don't want to give him the outside corner, so I move up.
WILLIAMS: I find it interesting about the movement. If I moved, it was more up and back. I stayed the same distance from the plate most of the time. However, if I had a real sinkerballer who got them low and away, down, down, I might move up an inch and let that nibbler get me out.
BOGGS: I never vary my placement in the box. My front foot is right on the plate, my back foot's in the same place and it's been right there, cut and dried, for the last 18 years. Guy who throws hard, be a little quicker. Guy who throws the off-speed stuff, slow everything down.
MATTINGLY: What about a nasty lefthander with the ball in on your hands?
BOGGS: You mean like Matt Young?
MATTINGLY: Young, [Mark] Langston, [John] Candelaria. Candelaria I say is really tough.
BOGGS: You haven't had to face Rags [Dave Righetti]. He would definitely be in that group.
WILLIAMS: Who has got the best stuff of any righthanded starter?
BOGGS: Mike Moore of Seattle.
WILLIAMS: Young, Langston, Moore are all with Seattle. I thought Kansas City won the World Series. Who's got the toughest righthanded and lefthanded curveballs?
BOGGS: Bert Blyleven and Mike Witt for righties. Bruce Hurst for lefties.
WILLIAMS: Sinker?
MATTINGLY: Doyle Alexander for me, because he can do so many things with it.
BOGGS: Or Dennis Lamp. He's straight over the top.
GAMMONS: Ted, who was the toughest for you?
WILLIAMS: Boy, Bob Feller had great stuff. I can't name one who was toughest for me, but Eddie Lopat and Whitey Ford were really tough because they never gave me a pitch to hit. Bob Lemon was as tough as anyone. Now, if I could give you any advice, it would be that the tougher the pitcher, the tougher the situation, the tougher the count, the worse the light, the worse the umpires, the tougher the delivery,
the single most important thing to think about is hitting the ball hard through the middle. You'll never go wrong with that idea in your mind.
As long as you hit, and especially as you get older, hang in there and be quick.
quote:Originally posted by xbaseballkidx11:
says that swinging "down" on the ball slightly is best, because it creates backspin, really causing the ball to fly.
If you hit the top of the ball, where is it going to go?
The optimum contact point is 1/2 inch below center line using a 9 degree upswing.
quote:Originally posted by SultanofSwat:quote:Originally posted by xbaseballkidx11:
says that swinging "down" on the ball slightly is best, because it creates backspin, really causing the ball to fly.
If you hit the top of the ball, where is it going to go?
The optimum contact point is 1/2 inch below center line using a 9 degree upswing.
good point and true.
When you got .4 tenths of a second and you eyes can't communicate with you're mind fast enough the last 35 feet of the pitch, you are effectively blind the last 25 feet, just how do you purposefully get that done hit the last 1/2 in below center?
quote:Originally posted by showme:quote:Originally posted by SultanofSwat:quote:Originally posted by xbaseballkidx11:
says that swinging "down" on the ball slightly is best, because it creates backspin, really causing the ball to fly.
If you hit the top of the ball, where is it going to go?
The optimum contact point is 1/2 inch below center line using a 9 degree upswing.
good point and true.
When you got .4 tenths of a second and your eyes can't communicate with you're mind fast enough the last 35 feet of the pitch, you are effectively blind the last 25 feet, just how do you purposefully get that done hit the last 1/2 in below center?
Nice find showme, I enjoyed that
quote:Originally posted by showme:
When you got .4 tenths of a second and you eyes can't communicate with you're mind fast enough the last 35 feet of the pitch, you are effectively blind the last 25 feet, just how do you purposefully get that done hit the last 1/2 in below center?
Great point and great question... Swing plane.
That Williams/Boggs/Mattingly conversation was absoutely fascinating.
Thanks it was like I've read this conversation these guys are having before, Deja Vu.... all over again.
Willaims was the hitting GURU.
Sultan plane of the pitch is right, and in the prevoios article and conversation they refered to it.
uhols matches the plane of the pitch he gets with the plane of his swing for a measured 9 foot of the 60.6 travel of the pitch measured by Don Sluaght. Longest match ever.
When you late to the plane you hit the bottom half of the ball, fly balls, when your early top half, ground balls, perfect match line drive.
No body can tell me you can purposely hit the bottom 1/2 of a ball, physics don't allow it. What does happen is early and late to the plane and it's all timing and adjustments to the pitch you get.
Willaims was the hitting GURU.
Sultan plane of the pitch is right, and in the prevoios article and conversation they refered to it.
uhols matches the plane of the pitch he gets with the plane of his swing for a measured 9 foot of the 60.6 travel of the pitch measured by Don Sluaght. Longest match ever.
When you late to the plane you hit the bottom half of the ball, fly balls, when your early top half, ground balls, perfect match line drive.
No body can tell me you can purposely hit the bottom 1/2 of a ball, physics don't allow it. What does happen is early and late to the plane and it's all timing and adjustments to the pitch you get.
quote:Originally posted by showme:
Thanks it was like I've read this conversation these guys are having before, Deja Vu.... all over again.
Willaims was the hitting GURU.
Sultan plane of the pitch is right, and in the previous article and conversation they referred to it.
Puhols matches the plane of the pitch he gets with the plane of his swing for a measured 9 foot of the 60.6 travel of the pitch, measured by Don Sluaght. Longest match ever.
When your late to the plane you hit the bottom half of the ball, fly balls, when your early top half, ground balls, perfect match line drive.
No body can tell me, you can purposely hit the bottom 1/2 of a ball, physics don't allow it. What does happen is early and late to the plane and it's all timing and adjustments to the pitch you get.
The one thing that's clear to me is that stronger legs and core are better, other things equal. It gives a much more controllable "platform".
The other thing that is an absolute truth is that your forearm strength allows you to handle the bat in a way that will maximize your own personal bat speed. The longer you can look at pitch and still make proper contact, the better hitter you'll be. Bat speed allows that to happen. That's what Mattingly is talking about regarding the 'stay back and then explode'. They are related. If you can't explode, you sure as heck can't stay back and have any hope of hitting anything.
The other thing that is an absolute truth is that your forearm strength allows you to handle the bat in a way that will maximize your own personal bat speed. The longer you can look at pitch and still make proper contact, the better hitter you'll be. Bat speed allows that to happen. That's what Mattingly is talking about regarding the 'stay back and then explode'. They are related. If you can't explode, you sure as heck can't stay back and have any hope of hitting anything.
quote:Originally posted by Pedropere:
That's what Mattingly is talking about regarding the 'stay back and then explode'.
What's 'staying back' exactly? Hips, foot drop, shoulders, hands, weight shift? I'm easily confused
Great stuff; thanks for the reprint!
To me, nothing is more interesting than listening in on the great hitters talking hitting!!
As is evident with many athletes, often they DON'T know exactly what they are doing. The very reason they don't always make good Coaches.
To me, nothing is more interesting than listening in on the great hitters talking hitting!!
As is evident with many athletes, often they DON'T know exactly what they are doing. The very reason they don't always make good Coaches.
quote:What's 'staying back' exactly? Hips, foot drop, shoulders, hands, weight shift? I'm easily confused
At the risk of mis-stating, I believe it's simply keeping the great bulk of your weight over your back foot/leg. Epstein teaches this. Once you've moved a fair amount of weight over your front foot, a substantial part of your power is dissipated, and according to Williams in tne quotes above, you can't easily get the bat on the right swing plane.
In the
quote:Originally posted by Pedropere:quote:What's 'staying back' exactly? Hips, foot drop, shoulders, hands, weight shift? I'm easily confused
At the risk of mis-stating, I believe it's simply keeping the great bulk of your weight over your back foot/leg. Epstein teaches this. Once you've moved a fair amount of weight over your front foot, a substantial part of your power is dissipated, and according to Williams in tne quotes above, you can't easily get the bat on the right swing plane.
In the
That's the way I interpret it.
Brute strength is more important. Thats why the chubby hitters and run slow tend to be the power hitters in youth