Dave Paetkau's Brain in a Blog

The Great Debate: Baseball vs Softball

2011-10-27T05:50:00.000-07:00

Which is the more challenging task, hitting a baseball or softball? Quite a hot topic indeed. Although these two sports are essentially the same, there are some subtle differences. I'd like to outline some arguments for both sides, and let you make your own opinion.

To assess the two sports equally, we'll examine them at the college level. There is a consistent trend between baseball and softball batting averages with softball stats being slightly higher. Over the past 5 years, the top 3 batting averages for baseball hitters at the NCAA Division 1 level ranged from 0.438 to 0.493. The top 3 batting averages for softball hitters in the last 5 years at the NCAA Division 1 level ranged from 0.466 to 0.568. Maybe these numbers aren't completely convincing, but the trend is distinct, and undoubtedly intriguing. Read on.

Let's examine the differences in the pitching motion. Baseball pitchers release the ball over their head, while softball pitchers release the ball at their hip. In an earlier post I mentioned that it is imperative for softball hitters to focus on the pitcher's hip so they can pick up the ball at the earliest point. By focusing on the hip, it is similar to focusing on the feeder of the pitching machine. Baseball players don't have such a luxury in something to focus their eyes on. While the pitcher always releases the ball in the same general area over his head, the hitter doesn't have a focal point (on the pitcher) for ease of transition from point to ball. Instead, the baseball hitter is looking into space, then has to quickly pick up the ball as it is flying through the air.

Using the same pitching machine analogy, the baseball player would know when the ball is being fed into the machine and the general area of where the machine is set up, but wouldn't be able to see it. Therefore, he must react to the ball after it's fed into the machine. Our eyes are able to focus on things near and far away by means of our ciliary muscles. These muscles contract and relax to change the shape of the lens to focus light on the retina so we are able to focus on objects at varying distances. Hold your index finger 6" in front of your nose and focus on it, you'll notice that the background behind your finger is blurred. Now, shift your focus to the computer screen you're reading from, and now your finger is blurred (doubled). The moral of the story is that we cannot focus on near and far things at the same time. Furthermore, it takes time for our eyes to shift focus from objects near and far away.

Baseball hitters must look for the pitcher's release point at an upward angle, due to the fact the pitcher is releasing the ball over his head as well as he is standing on the mound. Since he doesn't have a distinct focal point to focus on, he must look into a space over the pitcher's shoulder. The next closest focal point for the hitter is the center field fence, 400 ft away. Therefore, there is a lapse of time between the time the pitcher releases the ball to when the hitter can actually focus on it.

In softball, there is a time when the pitcher's hip disappears from sight when she opens her hips to drive off the mound. The next nearest focal point when the pitcher's hip is out of sight is somewhere on the ground behind the mound. Thus, the amount of adjustment the ciliary muscles need to make to focus on the ball (hip) at the point of release is much less than that of a baseball player, and arguably would take less time. We can also consider the size and colour of the ball. Baseballs are just shy of 3 inches in diameter and white, while softballs are just under 4 inches and neon/optic yellow. One could therefore argue that softballs would be easier to focus on from a distance.

Baseball players also have to deal with a large amount of movement by the pitch. Since the baseball mound is 60ft away, compared to 43ft away for softball players, there is more time for the baseball to move. A curveball in baseball can move up to 2ft laterally, while a curveball in softball only moves about 6-10 inches laterally [1]. This also doesn't consider the movement vertically, but in baseball it is significant, while curveballs in softball are relatively flat (sideways riseballs). In softball, since the pitcher releases the ball at her hip, she must always throw the ball upwards or else the ball wouldn't make it to the plate. This phenomenon creates a different dynamic that is the riseball. While in baseball a 4 seam fastball is essentially a riseball in softball in terms of spin, there is a difference in the projection of the pitch. Baseball pitchers always throw the ball down because they're standing on a mound. Softball pitchers throw the ball up, which can then keep rising, or drop down towards the ground. While I mentioned in an earlier post that riseballs in the strike zone don't actually rise, it creates the illusion of rising because the ball's starting point (hip) is lower than the end point (contact), in addition to the spin that fights the force of gravity. One could argue that this "unnatural" ball flight of the softball riseball, along with the natural upwards swing path of the hitter would make hitting a softball harder than hitting a baseball.

Pitches in baseball are thrown harder than pitches in softball. Although the baseball pitcher is farther away from the plate, and the pitch flight times are approximately the same, one has to consider the time through the hitting zone. The hitting zone is the area which the hitter is able to make contact. On average, the hitting zone for a good baseball or softball hitter is 3ft. So, for a baseball thrown at 95 mph spends 0.022 sec in the hitting zone, while a softball thrown at 65 mph will spend 0.032 sec in the hitting zone, giving the softball player a small advantage.

Now, let's consider the types of bats baseball and softball players use. There has been recent action regarding the bats players are using at the amateur level due to the ball's high exit speed. Most recently, Little League baseball has put a moratorium on composite bats, and NCAA baseball has implemented strict testing protocols on their bats, almost eliminating composite bats as well. Softball is also on its way to implement strict regulations on their bats. We know that the higher the exit speed of the ball off the bat, the more likely the player is going to get a hit. Miss-hits that would normally result in outs, will more likely be hit through the infield or even carry over the fence, resulting in higher batting averages. The goal in NCAA Baseball "is that non-wood bats that meet this new standard will perform similarly to wood bats," according to BBCOR as of January 1, 2011. Wooden bats, and the aluminum bats used in baseball today are far less forgiving than composite softball bats, which would also attribute the lower batting averages achieved by baseball players compared to softball players.

Next, we'll consider the dynamics of the different sports. Baseball rosters at the NCAA level consist of upwards of 20 pitchers. That's more than a complete softball team at the NCAA level. The difference is that baseball pitchers need ample rest in between starts to protect their arm, while softball pitchers can pitch every day. There are also different types of pitchers in baseball, starters, closers, middle relievers, etc. Therefore, as a baseball player, you're more likely to see several different pitchers throughout the game. And if the opposing team has done their homework, it's likely you'll face a pitcher that will throw to your weakness later in the game. Unlike softball at the college level, teams will likely have one main pitcher who pitches in all the important games during the regular season, as well as through the post season. Therefore, the hitters gain more of an advantage as the season progresses because they get to face the same pitchers more than once, and the pitchers get worn down.

While hitting in baseball and softball are very similar, there are some distinct differences. Hopefully these arguments have given you a different outlook on the two, instead of believing all that we hear on tv.

References

[1] R.G. Watts and A.T. Bahill. Keep Your Eye on the Ball: The Science and Folklore of Baseball. New York: W.H. Freeman and Company, 1990, pp. 151-175

Keep Your Eye On The Ball... If You Can

2011-01-05T17:00:00.000-08:00

It is impossible for even the best professional baseball hitters to keep their eye on the ball from the time it is released from the pitcher's hand until the point of contact. The best hitters are able to track the ball, that is keep the ball centered on his or her fovea (responsible for visual detail and acuity), up until the last 6 ft of flight [1]. This phenomenon is due to the fact that humans are only capable of tracking objects moving at angular velocities of up to 90 degrees per second [1]. If a baseball is thrown at 100 mph, one would require head and eye movements exceeding 1000 degrees per second as it crosses the plate. Although the ball travels at a constant linear velocity (100 mph) from the pitcher to home plate, the angular velocity with respect to the batter increases drastically. The angular velocity is the rate of change of the angle θ as shown in Figure 1 [1]. To illustrate this point, one finds it easy to track an airplane flying at 5000 ft, but would find it nearly impossible to track if it were flying at 100 ft overhead. Both planes travel at the same linear velocity, but different angular velocities with respect to the observer.

Figure 1. The horizontal angle of the ball defined as θ, is the angle between the line of sight pointing at the ball and the line perpendicular to the batter's body. This angle is about 0 degrees when the pitcher releases the ball, and increases to 90 degrees when the ball crosses the plate.

Remarkably, even though hitters essentially cannot see the ball in its last 6 ft before contact, they are still able to make contact most of the time. A major contributing factor to the likelihood of hitting the ball has to do with how well the hitter can predict where the ball will end up when she wants to hit it. This "prediction" is in direct relation to the 5 questions a hitter must answer. If a softball pitcher were to be pitching from 43 ft, and releases the ball at 65 mph 6 ft in front of the mound, the hitter would only have 31 ft or 0.33 sec to get her bat to the right point of contact. Also, taking into account the time for the hitter to swing, she will start her swing approximately when the ball is 9.25 ft in front of the plate. So, the hitter actually has 27.75 ft or 0.29 sec to decide whether to swing or not. This is not a lot of time to answer 5 questions, therefore it is imperative that a hitter must focus on the pitcher's release point (hip) to give herself the most time to see the ball.

Hitting a baseball is one of the hardest things to do in sport. Not just anyone can pick up a bat and hit live pitching. As hitters, we are trained to swing at strikes and let go balls without thinking. Also, hitters subconsciously create mental pictures in their mind of where the ball will end up, and then gets her bat to that spot to hit it. Hitters create the mental pictures by answering the 5 questions.

This mental picture comes from the experience of hitting soft toss, full pitching and pitching machines. When it comes to the game, most hitters can make contact and be successful by swinging just like they do in practice. However, the best hitters are able to read spin, and therefore adjust their mental picture of where the ball will end up. Those who are unable to recognize spin are more likely to be fooled by pitches that have more movement than what they've seen in practice.

Let's examine what makes different pitchers successful. First, pitchers who throw fast are more likely to strike out hitters than those who throw slow. The simple fact that the ball takes less time to get to the plate, gives the hitter less time to react. And according to golden rule number 2, the faster the ball is traveling the less it drops, which also makes it more difficult to hit. This explains why most fast pitchers are also riseball pitchers, as they use their speed and spin to minimize the time the hitter has to react.

Note: When facing a fast riseball pitcher, hitters must swing higher than they think. That is, swing to a spot where the ball will be, instead of where the ball actually is (NOT EASY!). Hitting a riseball is sometimes a difficult concept to grasp, as the hitter's brain must make an adjustment that goes against the instinctual hand-eye coordination. Going back to spin recognition, the earlier the hitter can recognize the spin, the earlier she can make the adjustment and overcome gravity to get her hands above the ball to make contact. Practice, practice, practice!

On the opposite end of the pitching spectrum, a pitcher who throws a slow change up that drops more than a faster pitch will have hitters swinging over the ball. While change up and dropball pitchers might not strike as many hitters out as fast riseball pitchers, they can be equally as effective. Although hitters are more likely to make contact, they may not be able to get the bat head low enough to hit drop balls for line drives, or wait long enough to hit the change up.

Generally it is harder for hitters to hit higher pitches than lower pitches because a hitter has to hit the ball further out front of her stance. From a low outside pitch to a high inside pitch a player has to hit the ball about 2.5-3 feet closer to the pitcher (more in the front of their stance) which would mean the high inside pitch would appear to be about 8-11 mph faster (reaction time) even if they were the same speed on the radar gun.

References

[1] R.G. Watts and A.T. Bahill. Keep Your Eye on the Ball: The Science and Folklore of Baseball. New York: W.H. Freeman and Company, 1990, pp. 151-175

The 3 Elements to Hitting

2011-01-05T11:00:00.000-08:00

The three basic elements to hitting are (in the order of increasing importance): Mechanics, hand-eye coordination, and mental makeup, where the mental makeup of a hitter is divided into mental preparation, and focus. No matter what the hitter, the latter element will always override the previous, and will determine how hitters perform in different situations. There is a large spectrum of hitters out there, and each one is strong or weak for different reasons, and in different situations. Situations range from hitting off a tee, to a pitching machine, in an exhibition game, and in a tight championship game, with each being effected by the 3 elements of hitting.

Mechanics are what a player works on the most, taking many hours in the batting cage to work on creating the most efficient swing. Unfortunately, when it comes to game time and live pitching, mechanics is the least contributing factor when it comes to making contact. We try to train ourselves to take the same swing from practice into the game, but it's not very often we can replicate it perfectly since it is our natural reaction in a stressful situation is to simply make contact. Stress is any situation where the chance of success is reduced and therefore giving the player the opportunity to perform less than perfect. Perfect is a relative term that is in the eyes of the player, and effects the element of mental makeup which will be discussed later.

We rely more on hand-eye coordination when presented with higher stressed situations (aka games). This is why someone who has poor mechanics can still be a good hitter if she has great hand-eye coordination. This is especially true if she is big and strong, because whenever she makes contact she is still able to hit it hard enough to hit it through the infield to produce scored hits. However, this does not make her the most efficient hitter. Therefore, when faced against pitchers who cannot exploit her weaknesses, she is very effective, but as pitchers get better her ability to hit for average drops more rapidly than the hitter with a more efficient swing, or better mental makeup.

As mentioned earlier, the mental makeup of a hitter is broken up into two parts, mental preparation and focus. The mental preparation is related to how a hitter approaches her at bats. Being prepared includes scouting the pitcher, and knowing what her tendencies are. A hitter should always be prepared, and have a plan before each at bat. Again, this preparation will ALWAYS override both the hitter's hand-eye coordination and swing mechanics. The art of hitting is not how well one swings, it is knowing WHEN to swing. Refer back to the "Hitting vs Pitching" post. The mental focus of a hitter is the ability to block out extraneous things that would distract her from the game. Examples of distractions include fans, school, weather delays, or conflicts with friends or teammates. The better one can block out distractions, the more focused the player is on the game and on his or her performance. Many books and professions are devoted to teaching athletes better mental focus, but it should be noted that if one puts too much effort into blocking out extra emotions or thoughts, this effort can be a distraction in itself. Those who perform well at the highest level are able to manage their emotions, and maintain a high level of focus.

Hitting is a balance of physical and mental skill, but without the mental skill a great swing is just a swing without a purpose. A less efficient swing can become more effective if the hitter understands how and when to use it. In other words, using her swing to her own strengths. For example, if a hitter has a swing that is good at hitting low pitches, but bad at hitting high pitches, she would be most successful if she only swung at low pitches. She would be very unsuccessful if she was unaware of her strength and only swung at high pitches, or if she were to face a pitcher who only throws high. This is a simple concept that often eludes a hitter during a bout of a dreaded slump. Therefore, hitters should assess an unsuccessful at-bat with the question, "Did I swing at the right pitch?" before, "What went wrong with my swing?" Most likely she will come out with a more definitive answer, and a plan for next time to improve.

One could argue that baseball/softball is the hardest sport out there due to the high level of skill and mental ability that is required. After all, the best hitters only get a hit in 3 out of 10 at bats, and on average a player will swing 39 times in 10 at bats therefore a swinging success rate of 1 out of 13 swings. This is quite a significant rate of failure, which can go as far as deter a player from the sport. Those who choose to play this sport know that one can never be perfect, so learning how to deal with failure is very important in learning how to improve and be successful.

Stepping It Up

2010-06-09T13:07:00.000-07:00

A hitter's step is simply something that a hitter does before her swing. It is something that starts the hitter's momentum, like a running start to a sprint instead of a static start from the blocks. While some hitters prefer a no step swing, it is not recommended for smaller hitters with less strength since they need to have the extra momentum to keep their hands from dropping. Referring back to the "Throwing Bows" post, a hitter's hands will drop if they need to help get her hips around faster to hit the ball hard. A hitter who is bigger and has more upper body strength does not need to use their hips as much to hit the ball hard, and therefore will be less likely to drop their hands. While using your hips is the most efficient way to hit, it is an unfortunate fact that stronger hitters don't use their hips as much because they are successful by simply using their arms. It's not saying that bigger hitters can't benefit from a good step however, details will be described in the following.

A good step can be separated into 2 phases: Striding forward towards the pitcher, and the heel drop. Striding forward is automated, it happens as a reaction to the pitcher releasing the ball. The heel drop is the trigger for the swing, when the front heel drops the back heel comes up which is the start to "elvis" (refer back to the "Squishing Bugs" post) and in turn the start of the swing. Remember, a swing is a flow chart, and it is very important to have a good step in order to stay on the most efficient path. Therefore, a good step should have 3 characteristics: 1) The stride must be closed 2) The front foot should land on the inside of the big toe, with heel up 3) When striding forward the front foot should be lifted a few inches off the ground, avoiding kicking front knee up too high.

Although not completely necessary, it is a good idea for a hitter to start with an open stance. With an open stance, she is able to open her shoulders and turn her head so that both eyes are able to look at the pitcher. Compared to a closed stance, an open stance is far more comfortable, as the hitter does not have to strain her neck and eyes to see the pitcher. Figure 1 shows the start of a good open stance and closed stride towards the plate. Striding closed about 6 inches past the toes of the hitter's back foot towards the plate provides a wall, or base for her back leg to drive against and decelerate rotation. Without this wall, the hitter is more likely to fall off balance over the plate.

Figure 1: Open stance and closed step for left handed hitter. Click to enlarge image.

The second characteristic of a good step is landing on the inside of your big toe creating an approximate 45 degree angle with your foot, also shown in Figure 1. It is also very important the hitter's hands load back while stepping forward as shown in Figures 2 and 3, as well as in the video in Figure 4. We'll call this the stretch. Refer back to the “Making Adjustments” post to learn more about loading hands. By having the upper and lower body going in opposite directions, the hitter is in control and is able to freeze in this position. Conversely, if a hitter did not load her hands, and upper and lower body moved in the same direction at the same time, she would create a net momentum towards the pitcher, making it harder to stop. It is very important to be able to stop/pause during our swings because all pitches are not the same speed, and not all pitches are worth swinging at.

Note: The key to hitting a change-up well is the ability to pause and stay on your front toe so the ball can travel far enough into your stance before swinging. Remember golden rule number 1 states that if the ball is low and outside (where most good change-ups should be), the hitter must hit it farther back in her stance aka stay on her toe for the longest time.

Figure 2: Green and blue dots show initial position front foot and hands. Click to enlarge image.

Figure 3: Hitter steps forward landing on the inside of her big toe, hands load back at the same time. Click to enlarge image

Figure 4: The stretch: Loading hands and closed step forward. Note that the hitter lands on the inside of her big toe.

Lastly, it is important that the hitter's front foot not get too high when striding forward. An over-zealous knee kick results in excess downward force from the weight of the hitter's front foot, making it harder to leave his heel up, and making it very difficult to wait for a change up.

Pitching vs Hitting

2009-12-24T13:08:00.000-08:00

Pitching and hitting are complete opposites of one other in that their objectives are adverse to each other. Basically, whatever the hitter is trying to do, the pitcher is trying to not let them do that. Consider these examples.

1. Pitchers throw riseballs to get hitters to pop up, and dropballs to get hitters to ground out. Therefore, it is the goal of a hitter to swing higher than normal to hit a riseball, and lower than normal to hit a dropball well. In fact, if a hitter were to over-compensate and hit a riseball on the ground for example, it is likely the pitcher won't throw that pitch for a strike again. If a hitter is able to get her bat over top of a riseball, she will be fully capable of hitting it square, and over the fence.

2. Both pitchers and hitters have bad games. A bad day to a hitter is one that he cannot hit pitches that he normally hits well. Whereas a bad day for a pitcher is one where he has no control over his pitches. He throws pitches that normally paint the corners of the plate either miss the plate completely, or worse, go down the middle. The best pitchers don't have very many bad games, and don't miss over the plate very often. They are able to throw "marginal" strikes which are thrown a ball off the plate, or ones which curve on then off the plate. Their mistakes are usually pitches thrown off the plate, where the hitter can't hit them. Conversely, the best hitters are consistently able to hit these marginal strikes hard, and don't often mishit pitches thrown over the plate.

Note: Most of the hits we see are a result of a poorly thrown pitch, one that is left too far over the plate, and a mistake by the pitcher. Average hitters are able to hit a pitcher's mistake, great hitters are able to hit pitches that are thrown well.

3. Pitchers and hitters both have strengths and weaknesses. A pitcher's best pitch is one that she gets ahead with, it is one she is able to throw for a strike. A pitcher will win the game if her best pitches are thrown well throughout the game and the other team is unable to hit it. The distinct advantage that the pitcher has over the hitter is that she is able to decide which pitch she wants to throw and when. The hitter is therefore in a reactionary role, and must react to whatever the pitcher throws. The way she chooses to react is the art of hitting.

A hitter's weaknesses can be classified into 2 types, physical and mental. Physical weaknesses are often considered to be "holes" in a hitter's swing. Dividing the strike zone into 4 quadrants, inside, outside, high and low, depending on the efficiency of the hitter's swing will cause them to hit pitches thrown in certain quadrants harder than others. Every hitter has strong and weak quadrants, and no hitter hits every pitch well. What separates a great hitter from a good one is the ability to adjust to the pitcher when she is trying to throw to the their weakness.

A hitter's mental weaknesses are related to her physical weakness. A mental weakness is when a hitter doesn't recognize her physical weakness. Again, no hitter can hit every pitch well, therefore it is a poor approach to an at bat to try and hit every strike. Smart hitters only choose to swing at pitches which they know they can hit well, and swing at their weak pitches when they have to. What separates the great hitters is the recognition of their own weaknesses, and the ability to formulate, and execute their plan of only hitting their own good pitches in an at bat. A hitter will be successful if she is able to recognize and/or anticipate when a pitcher is throwing to her strength/weakness, and even more successful when she is able to force the opposing pitcher to throw to her strength. By doing so, the hitter shifts the roles between her and the pitcher, and is now in a less reactionary position. She then only has to react to 1 or 2 pitches, essentially shrinking the strike zone, and the pitcher has lost the advantage of being able to throw whatever she wants.

Note: If you have any ideas on how to force a pitcher to throw a certain way, post a comment!

Throwing "Bows"

2009-12-18T20:48:00.000-08:00

Did you ever think that someone's hitting problems could be due to their body shape? Try this test on yourself, straighten your arms out in front of you with your palms facing up as shown in Figures 1 a) and b). Notice how in Figure 1 a) the subject's arms form a straight V shape, while in b) the subject's elbows are more inverted, coming closer together when their arms are straight.

a)

b)

Figure 1: Example of straight elbows a), example of inverted elbows b). Click to enlarge images.

But what does this have to do with hitting? Well, someone having inverted elbows will be more likely to slot their back elbow incorrectly. As your hips start to rotate and your elbow starts to slot, your back elbow should come in close to your body with a small gap between your elbow and torso. From a side view, you should see your hands lead your elbow as shown in Figure 2 a) through f), or the blue dots (hands) are always leading the red dots (elbow).

a)

b)

c)

d)

e)

f)

Figure 2 a) - f): Hitter 1. Frame by frame beginning of swing. Representation of properly slotted elbow, with hands leading elbow. The blue dots mark the hitter's hands and the red dots mark the hitter's elbow. The green dot marks the bat head, and the yellow line marks the height of the bat head. Click to enlarge images.

If you have inverted elbows your elbow is more likely to lead your hands as you slot them, because this position feels more natural. As shown in Figure 3 a) through f), the red dot starts to lead the blue dot as the hitter starts to bring her hands forward.

a)

b)

c)

d)

e)

f)

Figure 3 a) -f): Hitter 2. Frame by frame beginning of swing. Representation of an incorrectly slotted elbow. As the hitter starts her swing, her elbow (red dot) drops in to her side, and leads her hands (blue dot). Green dots mark the bat head and yellow line marks the height of the bat head. Click to enlarge images

There are several ill effects of letting your elbow lead your hands. First and most importantly, it causes your top hand to go away from you over the plate creating a circular swing, also known as casting (refer to older post). Notice in Figure 2 f) how straight Hitter 2's front arm is, resulting from her top hand going away from her body. Also, from what we know about casting, it doesn't allow the hitter to reach forward to the pitcher with their top hand, also known as extension. Instead, the hitter's swing is "cut off," and her top hand rolls over early as shown in Figure 4 a) and b). Notice the yellow line marking the height of the bat head, and how high it comes up upon rolling over. In fact, from one frame to the other, the bat head raised almost 14 inches! Now imagine if a hitter rolled their wrists earlier in their swing, closer to contact, how hard it would be to hit the ball!

a)

b)

Figure 4: Subsequent frames of Hitter 2's swing after contact. Lack of extension due to casting. The red circle in b) shows the top hand rolling over causing the bat head to raise up, marked by the yellow line. Click to enlarge images

Figure 5 a) through c) below show Hitter 1's extension. Due to properly slotting her elbow, her top hand is able to face up and reach toward the pitcher.

a)

b)

c)

Figure 5 a) - c): Hitter 1 frame by frame after contact extension. Notice how the hitter's top hand is facing up in all 3 frames. Click to enlarge images

Also, dropping your elbow into your side, as seen in Figures 3 c) and d), causes to bat head to drop considerably. In fact, comparing Figure 3 c) and d) (Hitter 2) to Figure 2 c) and d) (Hitter 1), the bat head drops approximately 5 inches more in Hitter 2's swing than Hitter 1's. This downward momentum thus makes it harder to hit higher pitches. Since momentum is a vector quantity (mass x velocity), Hitter 2's hands must overcome a greater downward momentum than Hitter 1 in order to adjust to the higher pitch, as shown in the schematic in Figure 6.

Figure 6: Schematic of vector addition of momentum. Properly slotting your elbow causes the bat head to have less momentum in the downward direction, therefore less momentum to overcome to hit the high pitch.

There is also another reason why one would slot their elbow incorrectly, with or without inverted elbows. If a hitter rotates their hips too slow, their upper body naturally wants to help them out in order to be in the right position to hit the ball square. The most efficient way that your arms can move your hips is by dropping down lower, aka dropping your hands and tucking your elbow into your side. The most efficient way to move an object is to apply force closest to the center of mass. By lowering your hands and bringing them closer to your waist, the centripetal force applied during swinging is therefore acting on your center of mass more efficiently. The result is that that hitter has opened her hips, but an incorrectly slotted elbow, back to square one.

So how does one fix this problem? Try taping a football on the inside of your bicep as shown in Figure 7, and swing as normal. The football prevents your elbow from getting too close to your body, and making it harder for your elbow to lead your hands. View the 3 swings in slow motion here, you should be able to see the hitter's hands leading her elbow.

Figure 7: A football taped to a hitter's inner bicep prevents her elbow leading her hands. Click to enlarge image

Slapping

2009-12-17T20:18:00.000-08:00

As a left-handed hitter, being able to execute all 3 levels of offense, hitting, slapping and bunting truly makes one an all rounded player and that much harder to defend against. And contrary to popular belief, slapping and bunting aren't exclusive to faster players.

Even having 2 out of the 3, hitting and slapping for example, can cause headaches for the opposing defense, due to the fact they can't play in one spot. Playing a power hitter is easy, back everyone up and expect a deep fly ball. With a power hitter who also slaps, you can't assume a hard hit all the time, you also have to defend a high bouncer, by keeping the infield in. A shallow infield and a regular depth outfield creates a larger space between them, allowing bloopers to fall more often. A shallow infield also makes it easier to hit grounders past the infielders who have less time to react. Probably the most important and valuable aspect of slapping is that it moves the defence and makes them think. Showing slap in early at bats opens up for hits later in the game. Even an unsuccessful slap, makes the defense aware of it and they will position themselves accordingly for next time. It sure makes life easy when a defense is expecting you to slap when your plan is really to hit instead.

As mentioned before, anyone can slap! Just as anyone can hit, bunt, catch and throw. Much of slapping successfully comes from being able to read the defense and choosing to slap at appropriate times. These times would include, when the middle infield is playing deep, and the corners are playing in. Leading off an inning with a slap could also be effective when the defense isn't expecting it. If there's a fast runner on first base, a slap will hold the shortstop in their position for longer, allowing for an easier steal. As well as if there's a runner on third with less than 2 out, a high chopper with the runner going on contact can yield an easy run.

An ideal slap is one which first bounces close to the plate, because bouncing closer to the plate makes for a sharper downward angle, and therefore a higher bounce in the air. The higher the ball bounces in the air, the more time you have to run to first base. A good slap will take 2 seconds from the time it first hits the ground to travel its maximum height and fall back down again. Then, we have to add in the time it takes the shortstop to field the ball, transfer and throw (approx 1.4sec). This gives a total of 3.4 seconds which is generally a slow time from home to first, especially with a moving start. Therefore as a general rule, if you can make the ball bounce twice before the shortstop can field it, you have a pretty good chance of getting a base hit.

Many of the same concepts applied to hitting are the same for slapping, except the goal is different. Slappers want to hit the ball into the ground, and hitters want to hit line drives. Therefore, it is a good idea to teach slappers to have a split grip with their bottom hand a little bit choked up from the end of the bat and the top hand just above the grip. This gives them a different feel than that of a regular swing, keeping them from trying to hit the ball too hard. Remember, a slapper is trying to SLAP the ball down and make it bounce as high as possible so they have time to run to first base.

A major difference between slapping and hitting is that slappers move through the box. It is important to move through the box SLOWLY, and DO NOT RUN. Remember, a well slapped ball will give you plenty of time to run to first base. You do not want to run through the box for two reasons, it increases the relative velocity of the ball, and it takes too much momentum towards the pitcher.

Relative velocity is like vector addition, the faster you move at an object moving at you, the faster it seems to be going. In fact, if you were running 3 mph at a pitch going 65 mph, its relative velocity is 71 mph, adding double the velocity you're running at. Like if you were riding a train, looking out the window you see another train flying by, it seems to be going pretty fast. However, if you were standing at the train station and saw the same train go by, it wouldn't be seem to be traveling as fast.

Momentum is also a vector quantity, mass times velocity. The more velocity you have moving through the box and at the pitcher, the more energy and steps it will take to overcome your inertia to run to first base. These are the slappers that make an "S" curve to run to first. An average home to first time is 3.0 sec, and an average female runner will take 14 steps to run to first base, making each step 0.21sec. Therefore, the two extra steps to run in an "S" instead of a straight line will increase your home to first time by 0.41 seconds, which could be the difference between a base-hit and an out.

A good slap in real time should look something like this. Analysis of it is to follow.

Footwork should start at the same time as the pitcher starts her motion. The front foot steps back to make a 90 degree angle with the back foot, lining up the front heel with the back heel as shown in Figures 1 and 2 below. This 90 degree angle starts to open the hips and shoulders just like hitting.

Figure 1: Side view. First step back by front foot, toe pointing forward with heels lined up making a 90 degree angle. Click to enlarge image

Figure 2: View from behind of first step back as pitcher starts motion. Click to enlarge image.

At the same time as the front foot steps back, the top hand slides up the bat just above the grip as shown in Figures 1 and 2 above. Notice her hands also move over the plate and off of her shoulder. This puts her hands in the right position to hit the ball to the shortstop. If her hands stayed by her shoulder, if would cause her to pull the ball.

Next the back foot comes forward with heel to toe step (important) to the front corner of the batter's box closest to the plate as the pitcher releases the ball. This step is quite big because the slapper wants to stay low to be able to slap the low outside pitch, where slappers are often thrown. Just as the front foot lands, the ball should be just about to the plate. And since the slapper's hands are already over the plate, they have a short distance to move to slap the ball into the ground. From here, you just need to make contact with the ball and start running! This is why the heel to toe step is important, it allows a smooth transition from making contact to running to first base in a straight line.

Note: It is unnecessary to hit the ball hard when slapping. The whole idea is to bounce the ball close to the plate so it bounces high enough in the air to be able to run to first base.

As discussed in an earlier post, the reasons for opening up to the pitcher to hit the ball are the same for slapping. Completely opening up your hips and shoulders to the pitcher will yield better results in hitting the ball to the shortstop by giving you the biggest window possible to hit the ball, much like extension.

Being able to slap the ball to the shortstop while being completely open to the pitcher and hitting the ball out in front of the plate is achieved by proper hand, and bat position. Your top hand's palm should be facing up with your wrist cocked back, so the bat is always angled toward the shortstop. Just like hitting, having your hips and shoulders open to the pitcher allows your top hand to keep from turning over and hitting it at the pitcher. A good drill is to go through the motion of a slap without a bat but instead a ball in your top hand. Practice "slicing" the ball into the ground at the shortstop, like skipping a rock. Make sure your top hand is always facing upwards as shown in Figure 3 below, so your hand always stays under the ball. As you release it, the ball should spin with a vertical axis in the clockwise direction. The drill is shown here.

Figure 3: Proper hand position for slapping. Palm is facing up and underneath the ball "slicing it". Keeping your wrist cocked back keeps the bat angled towards the shortstop.

Spin Class

2009-06-17T19:40:00.001-07:00

So what's the big deal about spin? Most of us understand that different pitches have different spin, but there is some misunderstanding as to how much the spin affects the flight path of the ball, and above all the effects of gravity.

First off, some background. The Magnus Effect is the phenomenon of a spinning object flying in a fluid (air) experiencing a force perpendicular to the line of motion in which it's flying. As in Figure 1 below, the ball spinning like a fastball or dropball causes the air at velocity V to travel
a little bit faster than V underneath the ball, and a little bit slower than V on top of the ball, causing a difference in pressure. And in accordance to the Bernoulli Principle (google it!), the side of the ball in which the air is traveling slower will experience more pressure than the side with the faster moving air. Thus, the resulting force F will be in the direction of the side with least pressure, the ball drops.

Figure 1: The Magnus Effect on a spinning ball. V is the air's initial velocity, more lines underneath the ball indicate the increase in the air's velocity, and hence less pressure. F is the resultant Magnus force towards the side of least pressure.

Ok, so we know that a ball that has topspin will go down, and a ball that has backspin will stay up. But, what about side to side curveballs and screwballs? The Magnus Effect is not exclusive to the vertical direction, but as far as the limitations of humans are concerned, it's impossible to throw a true curveball or screwball with complete horizontal spin. No matter what, the ball will always have a tilted axis of rotation, this is because your hand is always going to be either under or over the ball. It is impossible for your hand to be completely on the side of the ball to spin it. Therefore, most screwballs and curveballs you see are riseballs or dropballs that have some component of side spin making the ball move in or out. What makes the ball go side to side is how much pressure you apply to one side of the ball. Like pushing a big box across the floor, the only way to push the box straight is to push from directly behind it. Pushing just a little off to the side, will make the box turn or spin.

But even with all these fancy terms and differences in air pressure, we cannot forget about the principle force gravity. The forces on the ball due to gravity greatly outweighs the effects of the forces from the Magnus Effect. Gravity is a powerful thing, it acts on all objects all the time, and accelerates them at 9.8 m/s2 or 32 ft/s2. In fact, ignoring the forces from air pressure, if a pitcher were to throw a pitch at 65 mph from a 37ft release point, by the time it gets to the plate, the ball would drop a total of 29 inches! This is why pitchers must throw the ball upwards to compensate for the drop from gravity so the ball ends up in the strike zone. See Figure 2, the green line always has an upward angle regardless of pitch.

Basically spin can be thought to help or hinder gravity, changing the ball's path just enough to make hitters miss. Dropball spin helps gravity, the ball drop a little bit faster than a fastball would, hence hitters generally swing over them and ground out. Riseball spin hinders gravity, the ball drops a little bit slower than a fastball would, and hitters swing under them and pop up. Take a look at Figure 2, from top to bottom, the pitches are: 1. Fastball 2. Roll drop 3. High Rise 4. Strike Rise 5. Low Rise. The red dots are the path of the ball. As you can see compared to the fastball, the drop has a steeper descent. The strike rise which is aimed higher is not quite on its way down because the upward spin is hindering gravity, making the ball plateau slightly at the top of its flight path. The low rise is aimed lower, and if you look closely it's actually going down.

Figure 2. From top to bottom: Fastball, Roll drop, High Rise, Strike Rise, Low Rise. The red dots are the actual path of the ball, the green line how the ball would travel without gravity, the blue lines are the strike zone.

Along with affecting the movement of the pitch, spin also affects the speed of the pitch. Dropballs are always faster than riseballs for the following reasons: The vector addition of the forces on the ball, a larger radius of circular motion, and the amount of force by the pitcher's fingers in the direction of horizontal motion.

Forces and velocities are vector quantities, or they have direction. If two forces are in the same direction, they are added and the ball speeds up, opposite direction, they are subtracted and the ball slows down. When all the force vectors in all directions on an object are added through vector addition (google it!), an overall velocity can be determined. In our case, once the ball leaves the pitcher's hand, the only forces acting on a pitch are gravity and the Magnus force from the spin. Adding these forces will give us the acceleration and velocity in the vertical direction, then adding the initital horizontal velocity using vector addition, we can determine the overall velocity of the pitch. Therefore, since riseball spin produces a force opposite of gravity, a riseball is traveling in the downward direction at a slower velocity than a dropball. So if we assume the same horizontal velocity for a riseball and dropball, through vector addition we can conclude that the overall net velocity for a riseball will be slower.

Try thinking of vector addition like this. Imagine a North, South, East and West coordinate system drawn on a table. A ball is rolled from one end of the table towards the North. As the ball is rolling, it is nudged slightly from the South-West. As you can imagine, the ball changes direction slightly to the North-East, but it also speeds up. If the same ball traveling North were nudged from the North-East, the ball would change to a more North-West direction, but it would also slow down.

The velocity of an object traveling in a circle is directly proportional to the radius of the path it is traveling. So, the larger the radius of the circle, the pitcher's arm, the faster the ball is going at the point of release. When throwing a dropball, the pitcher releases the ball off of her fingertips with her wrist straight to make the ball have topspin. To throw a riseball, the pitcher must get her hand underneath the ball to create backspin, so her wrist is in a bent position at release, a shorter radius of motion. This bent position versus the straight position of the wrist can be the difference of a couple miles per hour.

Note: If you want to know more about wrist position for different pitches, go talk to a pitcher! Talking to pitchers is a good way to learn more about spins as well. Know how the ball spins, know where it's going, know how to hit it.

Finally, a last contributing factor to the speed of the pitch is how much force you apply to the ball in the direction of motion, the plate. Like the earlier box analogy, if you push from directly behind the box, all your force will be used to push the box in the direction you want to go. Any force a little off of centre will cause the box to turn, you have to push harder to slide the box the same distance as the box that slid perfectly straight. When throwing a peel drop, your hand is completely behind the ball spinning it downwards. For a riseball, all your force is applied underneath the ball on the seam to make it spin in the opposite direction. Again, if you can't understand me, go talk to a pitcher.

So what does this all mean? Well from the earlier 5 questions we can use the spin we see to make an adjustment with our hands to hit the ball square. For those hitters who can't see spin, they are put at a disadvantage because their eyes can only recognize the height of the ball. They then swing to where they assume the ball to end up, however if the ball is spinning in a different direction they might miss. Good pitchers are able to throw the ball that is able to spin up or down, as well as have some component of side spin, a curve rise, or a screw drop for example.

Also, as discussed earlier riseballs are slower than dropballs, therefore you should have more time to hit it right? This is not necessarily true, although the ball is moving slower through the hitting zone, as far as reaction time is concerned you actually have less time to hit a riseball than a dropball. Remember, the golden rule says that higher pitches must be hit more out front, lower pitches farther back in your stance. So, for the simple fact that you must hit a high inside riseball approximately 2 feet farther out in front than that of a low outside dropball, the less distance traveled by the ball provides an illusion of increased velocity. The less distance the ball travels, means there is less time to react, an equivilant to an increase in speed. In fact, if a riseball were to be thrown at 65mph high and inside, you would have to have a quicker reaction time of .021sec, equivilant to an increase in speed of 4mph.

Casting Is Left For The Fish

2008-09-28T06:37:00.000-07:00

Casting is often a misunderstood concept. While it's often true that casting is swinging with a straight front arm, it's not the whole story. What actually causes the straight front arm is the top hand going away from the body over the plate, and wrists snapping too early as shown in Figure 1 below. This initial movement outwards is the beginning to a very inefficient swing path.

a)

b)

Figure 1: Side a) and front b) view of casting. As the top hand starts to go away from the body, it causes the front arm to go straight and the wrists to snap too early. Click to enlarge images.

Snapping your wrists too early, that is before passing the body's centre of gravity, also causes the bat head to move away from the body. Like a boat pulling a water skier, when the boat turns, the skier keeps going in the same direction he was going, restricted only by the rope. The bat head is the skier, wrists and arms are the boat. Now imagine the skier is massive, as he keeps going in the direction he was going, his momentum pulls on the rope and the boat (wrists and arms). This force pulling the boat is called centrifugal force. Centrifugal force is the outward force associated with rotation, the equal and opposite of centripetal force, as shown in the schematic in Figure 2. You've most likely felt this force taking a tight turn in the car, or on the tea cups at the amusement park. This force created by the bat head, pulls the hands away from the body, creating a circular swing. So in general, younger players who have less arm and wrist strength are more likely to cast, because the bat is too heavy relative to their size.

Figure 2: Ball is swung around on a string. Centripetal force is acting on the ball by the string. Click to enlarge image.

Hitters who cast are also more likely to roll over their wrists and ground out. To keep a nice smooth bat path the top hand must stay facing up while rotating (snapping). When the top hand rolls over, the bat head goes up making a hump in the hitter's bat path as shown here. This hump is not very efficient as it doesn't let the hitter's hands reach out as far as possible towards the pitcher.

Note: Although the video is in slow motion and an over exaggeration it is still true! Trust me, if you've ever seen someone smacking themselves in the shoulder on their follow through, this is it. This hitter is subject to many groundballs, and a bruised shoulder.

To avoid casting, the hitter must make sure to load their hands, and slot the elbow close to the body, as shown in Figure 3. Then, hold the wrists in a cocked back position until they pass the centre of gravity of the hitter. Notice that in this position would be ideal for a check swing, because the bat is not over the plate.

a)

b)

Figure 3: Front view of check swing, and before hitter snaps her wrists a). b) shows when the hitter snaps her wrists, notice her hands have passed her centre of gravity and are in front of her body.

A good drill is to hit off a tee, but place another plate in front of your front foot, as shown in Figure 4. The extra plate is a reference as to where you should snap your wrists for an outside, middle or inside pitch. Once your hands pass over the outside part of the plate, snap your wrists for the outside pitch, middle for middle, inside for inside as shown below.

a)

b)

c)

Figure 4: Two plate drill. The second plate in front of the hitter's foot is divided into thirds and represents when the hitter should snap her wrists, a) outside, b) middle and c) inside. Click to enlarge images.

Another drill is to set up a two tee points, one in the middle and one 6-8 inches outside. The outside point is set up higher, while the middle one is lower with the ball set up on it. If the hitter casts, they will hit the outside tee. If they keep their hands in close to their body, they should hit the ball with no problem as seen here.

Squishing Bugs?

2008-05-10T12:20:00.000-07:00

We've all heard this one before, "Squish that bug!" referring to pivoting your back foot when swinging. I'm not really sure where it came from, but it seems silly to me making all those unsightly holes in the field. Squishing the bug is an inefficient movement because of the following. First, it moves the center of gravity of the hitter lower and too far back, making it difficult to reach out in front of the plate for extension. Second, it's slow due to the the friction between cleats and ground providing resistance, and not allowing the hips to move as fast as they could. Three, and most importantly, it breaks the kinematic sequence. By squishing the bug, it is impossible to separate the rotation of the hips and shoulders. They instead rotate at the same time, making the hitter use their arms a lot more, resulting in slower batspeed. See what happens when you squish the bug versus kicking <here>. Squishing the bug causes the centre of gravity of the hitter to move backwards over the back foot. Kicking keeps the hitter's centre of gravity in one place, therefore being able to rotate about the hitter's spine. And since the bat head is supposed to move forward towards the pitcher, it is counter productive to have the centre of gravity to be going in the opposite direction towards the catcher. See how much farther the hitter can reach, relative to the tee in Figure 1 below, when the centre of gravity stays still (aka extension).

Figure 1: Differences in position of centre of gravity in squishing a), and kicking b). In a) the hitter's center of gravity is much farther back than in b), and her bat is therefore not able to reach forward as far relative to the tee. Click to enlarge images.

To overcome friction between cleats and ground, we can avoid it all together by having our back foot in the air! No contact, means no friction, means quicker movement. By "kicking" your back foot forward, it keeps the rotation of your hips tighter aka quicker. Also, by kicking forward, you are driving against your front leg for more power, much like throwing a ball, or pitching.

As mentioned before, it's impossible to separate the rotation of your shoulders and hips when you squish the bug. But why? From the kinematic sequence we know that it starts from the feet, moves to the hips, then shoulders then hands. Squishing the bug is a movement initiated by the hips, in the middle of the sequence. Try wringing a towel out by holding the top still and wringing out the bottom. See how the towels twists gradually starting from the bottom moving up, like a nice kinematic sequence. Now hold the top and bottom still and have someone grab the middle of the towel and start twisting. See how the towel twists above and below the initial rotation at the same time, just like squishing the bug.

Note #1: Even though we're using our hips for power, we're not actually "using" them in the sense that we are using those muscles. We must make sure the kicking action initiates the hip rotation, not the hip rotation causing the kicking. Since the hip muscles are bigger, they cannot move as fast as the foot and knee. By using the hip muscles to kick the foot creates a slower, more sweeping movement with the hips.

Note #2: There is an intermediate movement to kicking the foot and hip rotation called "the elvis." It's when the hips shift forward towards the pitcher before starting to rotate, creating a tilt with the upper body, it's also the start of loading the hands. As the hips shift forward, it makes it easier and almost automatic for the back foot to kick forward. Figure 2 below shows first a hitter's load and then elvis.

Figure 2: Hitter first loads hands a), then shifts her hips forward b). This shift is called the elvis, and creates a good angle from the front hip to the head. Click to enlarge images

Making Adjustments cont

2008-05-08T17:10:00.001-07:00

Continuing with the adjustments theme, if we create a swing which can make adjustments efficiently, it will yield better results. From the previous post we learned that loading your hands back away from the pitcher creates a more gentle slope downwards, thus making it easier to bring them back up as an adjustment. Loading also lets the back elbow be in the right position close to the body when the hips and shoulders rotate around, called "slotting the elbow." This position lets your hands stay still relative to the body for as long as possible. This is an efficient movement because your body can replicate it for every swing no matter where the pitch is, rather than "throwing your hands" at any different pitch in the strike zone, which has a much larger margin for error.

So how do we hit pitches in different locations? We do this by adjusting shoulder and torso angles. Changing the angle of your torso and/or shoulders by a few degrees translates into a much larger change in the angle of your bat as shown in Figure 1. By changing the angle of your torso, your hands don't have to move as far up and down to hit pitches at different heights.

a)

b)

Figure 1: Adjustment of shoulder and torso angle to low a) and high b) pitches. Note how the hitter's back elbow is slotted, close but not touching the body, and pointing to the pitcher, not over the plate. Click to enlarge images.

Figure 1 a) and b) shows how much of range you can get with your bat just with changing the angle of your torso and shoulders. This angle is first initiated in the hitter's stance, and refers to the line from the belly button to the head leaning in towards the plate as shown in Figure 2. More lean is better for dropballs, less lean is better for riseballs. Referring back to the 5 questions, we know that pitch height is one of the first questions we can answer. Approximately within the first 10 feet the ball has traveled, we can already tell where the ball will end up. At this point, the brain has already decided how much lean the torso needs, and from here adjustments are made by the arms.

a)

b)

Figure 2: Differences in angle of torso in a hitter's stance. More lean a) is better for dropball pithcers, less lean b) is better for riseball pitchers. Click to enlarge images

Note #1: To make life easier, it's a good idea to start with a lean in your stance like in Figure 2 a), giving you less of a distance to go as the pitch is coming. Trying to lean in and rotate at the same time causes the batter to have too much weight on their toes and fall over. Having a lean in your stance also helps in getting your elbow slotted.

Note #2: By having a stance like this we are somewhat sacrificing not being able to hit the riseball very well. But since the strike zone is from the bottom of the sternum to the knees, we need to be able to hit more low pitches than high. Leaning over in your stance makes hitting dropballs easier because your hands don't have to drop as much to hit the ball. However, to hit a riseball, your hands and elbow must extend upwards faster in order to straighten your shoulders out and get the bat more level with the ground. So, if you're facing a riseball pitcher it would be a good idea to start more upright, making it easier for your hands to get above the ball.

The horizontal plane is much more simple. The only difference in hitting an outside to an inside pitch is how far you let your shoulders rotate before snapping your wrists. Again, see how much range the bat head has just by rotating your shoulders and not moving your hands <here>.

Making Adjustments

2008-05-07T22:02:00.000-07:00

The order in which a batter reacts to a pitch is this: the eyes see the ball released, sends a message to the brain telling it where the ball is going, the brain tells the body to swing, then the body swings in the way it was taught, after all those long hours of batting practice of course. But, from the point of release our eyes only have an idea of where the ball is going to be. Only as the ball gets closer can we pinpoint where the ball is actually going to be. Therefore, as the brain processes the information from the eyes (answering the 5 questions) it has to give the body corrections or adjustments from it's original messages. And given a 65mph fastball takes .420sec to get to the plate, this relay of signals often doesn't happen fast enough in order to hit the ball square.

However, if we are able to watch the ball come in, and delay moving our hands, the ball will be easier to hit. Due to inertia, our hands (and the bat) want to keep going in the direction in which they started on, so once our hands start to move forward, it will be harder to change their direction. Those who have ever been fooled by a change up know that once your swing has started coming through it's really hard to slow down to hit the ball. So contrary to popular belief of "throwing your hands at the ball," it's far more efficient to load your hands, keep them still as long as possible, and bring them to the same position every time. Loading your hands, also creates separation between the lower and upper body, aka the X Factor Stretch and more power.

See the difference between loading and not loading your hands <here>. Since the hands, and thus bat head, must drop to hit the ball, not loading your hands creates a sharper angle downwards as shown in Figure 1 below. And what we know from inertia, once your hands start moving down, they're going to want to keep moving down, therefore making it harder to bring them back up fast enough. But, if we create a less steep angle downwards, making the adjustment to bring them back up for a rise ball will be easier.

Figure 1: Flowchart of hands during swing, with and without loading. The blue lines create a less steep angle between each other than the red lines, therefore making it easier to make the adjustment to the higher pitch.

A Hitter's Golden Rules (to date)

2008-05-06T13:33:00.000-07:00

These are a hitter's golden rules, these rules are incontrovertible at all times. All mechanics aside, these are concepts based on biomechanics and physics. Can't really argue with those two.

1) The lower and farther outside the ball is, the farther back you must hit it in your stance. Your arms can only reach so far, don't make them reach out front as well as outside unless you want to ground out all day.

2) The faster the ball is going, the less it drops. Therefore, you must swing higher than you think you should to hit faster pitching.

Rule 1 confirms why change ups are most effective when thrown outside and low. Not only must the hitter wait because it's traveling slower, but wait because a low outside change can only be hit hard when hit to the opposite field, or farther back in the hitter's stance. Saying this, the odd change up thrown on the inside part of the plate is not a bad thing either. Often hitter's with circular swings won't be able to keep an inside change in fair territory.

Faster pitchers use these rules to their advantage, as they are more effective in the vertical plane. Such that, a drop ball will be thrown with more velocity because of the combination of gravity and spin [down spin+gravity=drop]. Whereas a riseball won't be thrown with as much velocity because it is fighting gravity. It will still appear to be faster though because it drops less [rise spin+gravity=0]. Therefore a hitter must hit a riseball more out in front (opposite of rule 1), giving less time to react.

So how can slower pitchers be effective? Well, since the ball is moving slower, hitters will tend to be ahead in their timing. In doing so, the bat is already through the "good" contact zone and coming around the body aka rolling over. Rolling over (your wrists) results in hitting the top of the ball and grounding out. Also, slower pitching tends to make hitters lunge at the ball. This lunging action lowers the center of gravity, and in turn, the hands. So, if the bat was going down already, it will go even lower, causing you to be under the ball and pop up. Another thing a slower pitcher can do is make the ball move more. Since the ball is moving slower, gravity has more time to act on it. So, with the combination of spin and gravity, a pitcher can really make that drop ball "fall off the table".

Accordingly, as a hitter it's always a good idea to stand in the back of the box in order to see the ball travel and spin as long as possible. For slower pitchers, to take away the element of waiting, try crowding the plate instead of automatically moving up in the box. While moving up in the box makes the pitcher seem faster, giving you less time to react, crowding the plate lets you hit the ball more out in front of the plate. And since slower pitchers are less likely to throw inside to hitters, getting jammed is a lesser factor to take into account.

Also, as a side note to rule 2, if you succeed in getting your hands high enough on a riseball pitcher and hit a line drive or grounder, that pitcher will be less likely to throw you another riseball, taking away her best pitch. Because if you are able to get your bat over top of the rise, then you're sure able to match it and hit it a long ways.

So we've learned that low outside pitches need to be hit farther back in our stance, and in order to hit faster pitching you must swing higher than you think you need to. So for all you pitchers out there, work batters in sequences of low outside and high inside pitches since those two have the most discrepancy in timing. Whereas low inside pitches and high outside pitches have roughly the same timing.

5 Questions

2008-05-05T15:11:00.000-07:00

As the ball is released from the pitcher's hand, before we hit the ball the brain has to process some information in order to react correctly and get the bat in the right position to hit. There are 5 questions the brain answers automatically in this order:

1) How fast is it going?
Is it a change up or fastball? We must see the difference between the two, either from the release seeing the back of the hand, or a change in the pitchers motion in order to not be fooled and transfering our weight too far on the front foot. The quicker one can pick up the change up, the easier he can stop his body and wait (keeping the front heel off the ground).

2) Where is it going?
Is it a high or low pitch? This is the next thing you are able to see, because of the way the ball is (usually) projected. High pitches are easier to see than low pitches from release.

3) How is it going to get there?
Seen from differentiating between spins. Although an artform that requires practice, the skill of seeing spin is one that is most valuable that separates good hitters from great hitters.

4) Where is it going?
Is it an inside or outside pitch? This question is answered last because spin often doesn't dictate location on the plate, and since the plate is only 18 inches wide it's harder to distinguish exactly where the ball is going.

5) Where is the ball going to end up when I am able to contact it?
Finally, after all the other questions are answered you have a pretty good idea where the ball is going to be and whether it is a good pitch to hit. And if it is a good pitch to hit, how to position your body in a way to hit it.

Those who can answer these questions the fastest, or have some of them answered before the pitch occurs (having a pick) are obviously at an advantage. Conversely, the pitcher is at an advantage if she can hide her pitches, keeping her body and arm motions similar, and starting pitches on the same plane, having the spin take the ball in different directions.

So how do we do this? Well personally I like having a pick on the pitcher before I even start (more on how to do that later). If I have the change picked for example, it eliminates the surprise of a slower pitch, and all I have to do is react to location. It also eliminates 1 out of a pitcher's 4 pitches, I like a 1 in 3 chance of guessing what a pitch is instead of a 1 in 4 chance.

Seeing the pitcher's hand at release is also important in gathering information about a pitch. Focus in on the hip at release and differentiate between a rise, drop and change. Catchers should be good at this, and those obsessive batters who stand in on their own pitchers all the time.

Finally, by having a good scouting report on a pitcher or figuring out some tendencies throughout the game can give you some answers to these questions. After all, pitchers are predictable, and will throw what is comfortable to them.

Newton Had It Right

2008-05-03T11:33:00.000-07:00

All initial body positions or movements in a swing will affect subsequent movements later in that swing. A swing is like a flow chart as shown in Figure 1, there are many ways to get to the end (contact), but those who stay along the most efficient path will have to make fewer adjustments mid swing, and therefore have a better success rate of solid contact. As Newton said, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Every movement creates another in the opposite direction to keep the hitter in balance.

Figure 1: Flowchart which represents what occurs during a swing. The path made by the green arrows is the most efficient path, while the red path is a less efficient path. The first movement of striding outwards caused the hitter to stray away from the efficient path and therefore caused him to make the subsequent inefficient movements. Click to enlarge image

The flow chart in Figure 1 is only a particular situation, there are many ways in which a hitter can stray away from the most efficient path to contact. This chart shows that because the hitter steps away from the plate, each successive movement is to compensate for the imbalance. The hips follow the feet away from the plate, and in turn the arms have to straighten out in the opposite direction towards the plate to get back to contact. This chart also shows that because the red path isn't straight, it intersects the contact zone at one point. Much like the circular and elliptical swing concept, the more efficient green path travels through the whole contact zone while the red path only intersects it once, yielding a lower rate of success. The contact zone being the batter's ability to time the pitch, and the longer that the bat and ball are on the same path the better chance the bat will contact the ball.

So next time you're trying to diagnose a swing, work "backward". Or in other words, see the result that is the problem, and work from the beginning. Too often coaches try to make adjustments to the hands and upper body while ignoring the lower body. Trying to make sense of the flow chart from the end is not always easy to do. It all starts with the feet, trace the series of events from start to finish, and often you'll see there is an underlying reason for a hitter's troubles.

It's All In The Hips

2008-04-16T13:32:00.000-07:00

Hips are one of the most important aspects of hitting. I know we've all been hearing that since tee ball, but many hitters don't use their hips to their full potential. To fully utilize our hips we need to rotate them 90 degrees before we make contact. There are several reasons for doing this, first by rotating our hips before our shoulders we create the "X-Factor Stretch", which stores energy then transfers it from each body segment to the next called a "Kinematic Sequence"...google it. Basically what happens is the largest muscles (hips) rotate first followed by the shoulders, then the hands, then finally the bat, creating bat speed with relatively little effort (Efficiency!!). This sequential motion starts BEFORE contact, ending with the hands to create the greatest bat speed AT contact. The longer the separation between lower and upper body rotation, the faster resulting bat speed.

Another reason for opening our hips all the way is so we can create an elliptical motion with our swing. When our hips are rotated a full 90 degrees, the top hand is able to reach out farther towards the pitcher, as shown below in Figure 1. This reach is called "extension through the hitting zone," the more extension, the better chance of hitting the ball.

b)

Figure 1: Overhead view of extension. Without opening hips a), and with opening hips b). Click to enlarge images.

First, let's examine what happens when you don't rotate your hips, and why it's harder to hit this way. For argument's sake, let's assume that a batter has no hip movement at all, and uses just her arms. It would look something like this <here>. Notice the bat makes a circular motion, one which is quite inefficient. Now let's assume this hitter has a perfectly circular swing with a perfectly horizontal swing plane. Let's also assume that the ball is traveling in a straight line. As shown in the schematic shown in Figure 2, the ball only hits the sweet spot of the bat twice within the contact zone, once far back in the batter's stance producing a hard hit ball to the opposite field, and once in front of the batter's stance producing a hard hit foul ball, and last time I checked, games weren't won on foul balls. So, at every other point in this swing, the batter will get "jammed" hitting the ball off the inside part of the bat, this not only hurts your hands a lot, it also produces weak hits. I would not consider this swing to be very efficient, given it is only able to hit to one side of the field fair.

Note: This swing does not generally provide much power since the hips are not utilized, unless the hitter has a very strong upper body

Figure 2: Schematic of overhead view of circular swing. The sweet spot denoted by the green section on the bat traces the circle around the hitter. Notice the ball which travels in a straight line only hits the sweet spot twice on the circle. Click to enlarge image

Now if we examine a hitter who opens her hips all the way, looking something like this <here>.

We see that by rotating the hips, the top hand is able to reach farther out in front, creating an oblong, elliptical motion with the bat as shown in Figure 3. This motion is much more efficient because the sweet spot of the bat is more in line to the path of the ball, which means a better chance for solid hits. Also notice that with an elliptical swing, all balls in the contact zone will remain fair.

Figure 3: Schematic of overhead view of elliptical swing. Compared to the circular swing, the sweet spot is more in line to the path of the ball. Click to enlarge image

In summary, our goals as hitters are to first create separation between the upper and lower body for the X Factor Stretch resulting in power, and second to have the most extension through the contact zone as possible, resulting in more consistency.

Efficiency is key

2008-04-12T17:31:00.000-07:00

The definition of efficiency is the ability to accomplish a job with a minimum expenditure of time and effort. This is the word Dave likes to use for swings instead of better or worse. So after watching enough swings in my time I've realized there aren't two different swings, linear and rotational, but rather more efficient. A swing is a swing is a swing, the bat travels in a roughly circular path, with the objective of hitting the ball. Enough said?

A more efficient swing is one that has the most room for error. Error being in misjudgment of timing or location, we are only human with far from perfect hand-eye coordination after all. Therefore, our goals as hitters are 1) to achieve the highest bat speed possible at the point of contact, giving the most power 2) to create a smooth bat path on the same plane in which the ball is traveling for as long as possible, giving a higher percentage of solid contact. As shown in Figure 1 below, by matching the plane the ball is traveling on with the bat, the hitter has a greater chance of hitting a line drive.

Figure 1: Differing angles of swings. By swinging upwards and matching the plane that the ball is traveling yields a better chance of hitting line drives. Click to enlarge image.

We can achieve these goals by first rotating the lower body BEFORE the upper body, "coiling" the back to create a slingshot effect, and snapping the wrists through the hitting zone. And second by having a slight bend at the waist and opening the hips with the belly button FACING the pitcher at contact, allowing for the arms to reach out in front of the plate as far as possible. This position creates an upward swing path, which is good since all pitches are dropping!! (that crazy thing called gravity)

So now that we've got that cleared out, we can start getting into the nitty gritty.