Do you still teach extension in hitting?

Extension after contact, yes

"Extension" i.e. Letting the hands get away from the body before contact?  No

I floated your question to a trusted resource and have included his response below.  I hope that it helps.

“I do believe in extension. For me staying connected is something that SHOULD happen through the swing and at the point of contact. Yes you do want to stay connected during finish too but more importantly at contact.

Now I have not of the heard of the box theory. The pro guys I’ve been around always have said that there is a difference between getting extended and extension.

Extended is getting the barrel to the point of contact on time and clean. Extension is what happens after contact.

I’m not a rotational guy. Rotational hitting leads to disconnection in my opinion.”

I think the box thing was from Paul Nyman if I recall it correctly

Here is an image

http://imageevent.com/siggy/hi...;w=4&s=0&z=9

When a figure skater wants to spin really fast where are their arms?  Tucked tight to the body because if the arms our extended out it slows them down.  The tight / fast spinning generates more power than the arms extended version.  While it's a loose comparison it still holds true - closer to the body will generate faster / stronger swing.  Obviously, we don't want the hands next to the torso but it's more of an overall idea than exact.  I think extension after contact is a normal process of the body because you are trying to stop the swing and head to first.  The outcome is you end up letting the arms get long as you regain balance to head to first.

Extension after contact, as an intent, keeps the barrel in the strike zone longer, as opposed to being quickly in and out of the zone.

I like Craig Wallenbrock's samurai sword analogy. It does relate to extending.

http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/...-unbelievable-season

Extension adds thrust to the already-built-up power of connected rotation.  I use the analogy of a boxer.  His ultimate power position is somewhere between the start of extension and fully extended but not too near the beginning and certainly not after full extension has been reached.  

Sticking with the boxing analogy, no matter how much lower half and core rotation I initiate, if I just "alligator arm" it (without extension), I have minimal force.  On the other hand, if I get fully extended with my punching arm first and then hit, I have little power there either.

True rotational and linear hitting are both false ideas, IMO.  There is some degree of rotation and extension in every swing.  And as 3and2 said, the very important added benefit of extension is keeping the barrel in the zone longer.  This ties into the samurai sword principal with the three warriors representing the different pitch types and angles.

There are exceptions.  "Both arms extended" was a teach, at least for some, 40 years ago.  I have a player who has this as sort of his goal at contact.  His dad played in that era and is his primary instructor.  I fought it for a while, largely unsuccessfully.  He is an extremely hard worker and makes it work.  When timing is precisely on or when he is a hair late, he has good success and with some power.  If he is early at all, there are some serious barrel hooks and swing-and-misses.

Also, you can look at just about any sport activity that requires a swing...  hitting a golf ball, a tennis ball, kicking a field goal, throwing a baseball or football, a slapshot, etc., near but not quite full extension at contact (or release) while retaining some connection is optimal.  And, all have a significant element of rotation.

extension is part of every athletic movement of every sport I can think of where a human being attempts to move an object with their body away from them...except the baseball swing by a smallish hardcore minority who thinks it is wrong.  

So extension should start before contact but finish after?

Is it active extension or the arms getting pulled straight by the forward accelerated weight of the barrel?

Dominik85 posted:

So extension should start before contact but finish after?

Is it active extension or the arms getting pulled straight by the forward accelerated weight of the barrel?

 

Ha, Dom, I know you ... you have a definitive opinion on this.  My answers are...

So extension should start before contact but finish after?

Yes, usually, but depends on timing... sometimes timing is such that contact happens at full extension.

Is it active extension or the arms getting pulled straight by the forward accelerated weight of the barrel?

Yes and yes.  It is active extension.  The hands and arms are involved with purposeful extension.  The directional force of the barrel is a "plus" participant in the force of the extension.

I think the more intriguing question back to you is...

For most balls hit, at point of contact, is the hitter still actively driving through the ball with hips, hands, arms, core (truely connected) or is there a release toward the ball by that time?

No I don't teach extension.  In fact, just tonight when we were hitting, I mentioned to my hitters that we don't have to teach that.  It is a natural result of a good swing after contact.  We teach that if the hands leave connection, the further away from the core, the weaker the arms are.  We want the ball to get to one of three locations around the plate, sit on the back hip, let the ball travel and then, knock the heck out of it.  If you ask any of my hitters what we do, they will say, "we hit bombs."  

CoachB25 posted:

No I don't teach extension.  In fact, just tonight when we were hitting, I mentioned to my hitters that we don't have to teach that.  It is a natural result of a good swing after contact.  We teach that if the hands leave connection, the further away from the core, the weaker the arms are.  We want the ball to get to one of three locations around the plate, sit on the back hip, let the ball travel and then, knock the heck out of it.  If you ask any of my hitters what we do, they will say, "we hit bombs."  

I can agree 100% on the bolded...some kids need different cues, some kids have different swings!

I also tend to believe the passive extension thing but not so sure. I'm starting to coach my first hitters next weekend so I want to do a bit of fact checking before that on a couple topics that I'm not quite sure about.

Teaching 'extension' almost always leads to kids disconnecting their front bicep from their torso - prior to contact. So, no.

Almost every cue that's used in hitting is either backwards or detrimental.

Edit: apologies for my poor wording, added 'prior to contact' for oldschool below.

Call it what you want just make sure it happens