Tagged: Home Runs
Hitting like an MVP – Day 19
What makes an MVP hit like an MVP vs. an average major leaguer? We’re attempting to learn how to hit like a major leaguer. That’s hard enough, then there’s the people who do it better than all of the rest of the major leaguers. This year’s winners have been doing it consistenly better than others for years and this year were rewarded for being outstanding in both average and in power.
Does it have anything to do with the way A-Rod finishes as viewed in this picture? 
How about what we see in the picture from Mr. Pujols?
Mark McGwire and others finished their swings with only one hand but others who hit well have used the two handed approach, so I’m going to discount that as a MVP type of swing. But if you’re still learning and your coach tells you that you need to finish with two hands on the bat, you now have a picture to show them that will disagree with that. I have a coaching friend who really cares less what happens after the ball has left the bat. On the surface that makes sense, since there is nothing you can do afterwards to add any more to the ball. Where I would possibly take exception to that is if you don’t finish quickly, you may have not swung quickly through the contact point or worse yet actually started slowing your swing down before contact. So it’s not contrary to what my coaching friend says, it is a caution to watch out for.
The swing Albert Pujols is exhibiting has a lot of good elements to it — head and eyes on the ball (or contact area), hips turned, bat still back and coming through, his body is matching the pitch plane of the ball, enabling the ball to travel to the outfield (possibly over the fence).
Since we’re modeling swings of MLB players, and because we can’t emulate everyone, it’s probably just as well to mimic the very best. And while the balloting was close, these two will be as good of models to follow as anyone.
A great video – Day 15
Less than a week ago I challenged you to get pictures of hitters. Did you do it? Good for you.
Well, I took my own advice and I found a picture of baseball hitters that was from the cover of a video jacket. It was to a video called "Hitters on Hitting, Finding the Sweetspot". So I hunted around for it and found it was an actual video produced by MLB on getting the best hitters of the day (2001-2003) to talk about how to hit. They even talked to hall of famers, Ted Williams, Al Kaline, Cal Ripken, Wade Boggs, Rod Carew, et al. There’s footage of each homerun derby from 1989 – 2000. They have scientists help break it down and even some shots of pitchers talking about how they try to disrupt the hitters.
If you’re a serious student of hitting and want to hit the way Major League Baseball Players hit, I can’t recommend this more highly. You can order it through Amazon.com.
It won’t be a step by step instructional video, so you will have to infer the proper way to hit from the way these great hitters describe it through their eyes. But I saw enough things in there to make up 2 weeks worth of entries in this blog and more. So get the video and we’ll discuss certain points as we go.
Don’t drop your back shoulder? – Day 14
Have you heard a coach say "You’re dipping your back shoulder" as if that’s a bad thing?
Remember we’re looking at what MLB batters do to determine how to hit like a major leaguer.
I want you to look at the pictures in my photo album "mlb hitting HR" that’s linked on the left hand side. I have about 5 pictures in there so far and I have a question for you. How do you get into the position they have if you don’t dip your back shoulder?
What do you think is going on? What do you think your coach is trying to say? Is there possibly a difference between what actually happens and what a coach says?
We’ve got lots of time to discuss lots of these things before the Void is over and Baseball starts up again. After all we’re only into it 14 days 🙂
The right bat – Day 11 in the Void
Have you noticed how all we talk about on how to hit like a major leaguer has to do with hands, legs, head, eyes, technique, etc.
Nowhere do we really mention the bat itself. And yet I get questions all the time on how to choose the right bat. In fact you can spend $hundreds on a bat. Why the disparity between what coaches are concerned about and what kids (and parents) are concerned about.
Major leaguers hit with wood bats, how come most kids (even up through college age) don’t?
It used to be, when we were kids we did use wood bats, but they found a way to make aluminum and steel into bats and in the long run they were cheaper for leagues and teams, since they never broke. I would imagine many of you reading have never grown up hitting with a wood bat.
A wood bat normally is heavier and has a smaller sweet spot, which is why some great high school and college players can’t make the adjustment to wood bats and miss out on making it to the major leagues.
A number of coaches (and many colleges) are now encouraging kids to practice using wood bats. Not so much that they are going to be a pro player one day, but that you have to have a perfect swing to make it go off of wood. Then if you have a perfect swing, whether you use wood or metal, you’ll hit fine. Because a perfect swing is a perfect swing.
Sometimes the high priced metal (or now composite) bats give you the false sense that you’re hitting well, due to the fact it comes off the bat quick, but it could just be the physics built into the bat itself and not the combination of bat and a great mechanical swing.
Try practicing with wood and see if it doesn’t help you hit better or maybe it will point out to you your flawed swing (at which point you can fix it and hit better).
We’ll talk more about bats as we go.
Since I’m posting 6 days a week, some of the prior posts, like the one that references how "the Void" is in the title a lot, get archived and you’ll need to review the prior posts from October, etc.
Day 8 in the Void – how did a .366 lifetime hitter do it?
This is the only picture I could find that shows what I wanted to discuss. Here’s the batter with the highest lifetime average of all time and notice how he holds the bat.
Why do we as coaches insist that kids hit with their hands together?
What are the advantages or disadvantages of doing either way?
If you’re attempting to learn to place the ball where you want to, split hands are a great way to learn it. Even if you revert back to batting with them close together, splitting them while practicing will help you learn how the hands interact. It does detract from power, in fact when Ty Cobb wanted to hit it harder, he’d bring his hands together as well.
This kind of refers back to our discussion as to having singles hitters or home run hitters a few days back. Hit for average or for power
Have you seen someone hit this way? Do you think it would work today? Let me know your thoughts.
The picture CREDIT: American Tobacco Company. "Ty Cobb" 1909-1911. Baseball Cards, 1887-1914, Library of Congress.
Day 6 in the Void – imitate a good hitter
In our efforts of learning how to hit like a major league hitter, there’s no better place to start than by watching the very best of the hitters in the MLB. Every year Louisville Slugger presents what they call the Silver Slugger awards. These are awarded to those voted to have the most outstanding offensive season in the prior year by league per position. Here’s the list of this year’s award winners. Find pictures and/or videos of these hitters as a very first place to learn how to hit like a major leaguer.
| 2005 Silver Slugger Award winners | ||
| American League |  |
National League |
| 1B – Mark Teixeira, TEX 2B – Alfonso Soriano, TEX 3B – Alex Rodriguez, NYY SS – Miguel Tejada, BAL OF – Vladimir Guerrero, LAA OF – Manny Ramirez, BOS OF – Gary Sheffield, NYY C – Jason Varitek, BOS DH – David Ortiz, BOS |
1B – Derrek Lee, CHC 2B – Jeff Kent, LAD 3B – Morgan Ensberg, HOU SS – Felipe Lopez, CIN OF – Andruw Jones, ATL OF – Miguel Cabrera, FLA OF – Carlos Lee, MIL C – Michael Barrett, CHC P – Jason Marquis, STL |
|
| Complete 2005 coverage | All time winners > | ||
Day 2 in the Void – thoughts I forgot from Tony Gwynn
"Baseball is 90% mental, the other half is physical" – Yogi Berra
I almost forgot one of the best things I heard Tony Gwynn say. He said 2 things and they relate to one another and the above quote.
He said "Man, if I had the equipment they have today, I think I could’ve made a really good run at .400." The other was "It’s not guessing if you know".
What he was referring to is that today every team is on video for every game. So if someone was willing to do their homework, you should know what pitch is coming if the pitcher’s in trouble, or what’s coming after 2 strait curveballs. You should know his release point. You should know what his best pitch is. You should know this about every pitcher you will face. Since they’ve gone to the unbalanced schedule, you’ll now have a huge library of knowlede of their pitchers for the 18 – 19 times you’ll face one another.
Now instead of having to cover the entire strike zone and react to whatever the pitcher throws, if you "know" he’s thowing you an 2-0 fastball low, you can just look there and hit it. If for whatever reason he doesn’t throw that, you just don’t swing. "It’s not guessing, if you know".
At the lower levels, just concentrate on picking up the pitcher’s release point and see what he likes to throw the most in practice. I guarantee you, that’s what he’ll go to if he’s in trouble.
If you’re playing in high school/college or above, start studying videos of the pitcher’s you’ll face, or clue in the advance scouts what you’d like to know. They’ll be happy to get the information for you as they’ll be excited that they have a player who finally gets it.
Day 1 into the Void – Hank Aaron’s hitting style
I questioned earlier about how much weight do you feel a major league batter has on their back foot when contacting the ball.
A lot of coaches believe (and I used to be one of them that you hit from the back side), but I was always bothered by footage I would watch of the guy with the most home runs all-time in the Major Leagues, Hank Aaron.
I’d swear he actually lifted his back foot in the air, when he hit. I couldn’t find many pictures of him hitting but here are two.
What does that mean? do other hitters do it? Should more hitters be doing it?
Post your comments, but seriously think about it in relationship to how you hit now and if you’re not the all-time home run king, is there anything that you can use from his style, or do we just discount it as unique to him, like Ty Cobb’s splitting his hands to hit (that will be another post :)?
And Now … The Void
Congratulations to the World Champion White Sox.
My title comes from maybe one of the greatest quotes (and I don’t even know who said it) of all time — "There are two seasons in sport, Baseball and the Void".
For the other teams and maybe for you, it’s wait until next year. The Hot Stove League has officially started heating up.
Use this time as a player to get the jump on everyone else who’s "taking a break". Learn the proper techniques to hitting and fielding, make the commitment to take those 300 swings a day and see if you won’t be a much better player next year than you were this year.
I’ll make the commitment to you to continue coaching through the fall and winter, so keep coming back and we’ll see if we can get through the void together.
What can you learn from a lifetime .338 hitter?
What a terrific opportunity I had yesterday, taking my son and a couple of my students down to a clinic put on by Tony Gwynn and his coaching staff and players from San Diego State University.
I got to listen in as he was instructing the kids and as he was talking to the parents.
He reiterated what I had said in an earlier post that hitting is the toughest thing to do in sports. But having said that he made it really simple. He really was focused on just 2 things. He said the rest seems to take care of itself.
They were 1) take the hands back and 2) pull the bottom hand through the ball.
He also said things that I thought were important, but those were the 2 themes he harped on all night.
Here are some of my other gleanings: To one parent who quizzed him on what the top hand did in the swing, he stated it mostly came along for the ride, basically what you’d see in every picture of a major leaguer hitting would be that the top hand would have the palm of their hand pointing to the sky at contact.
That everyone can hit the inside pitch (assuming he was talking about higher levels of play), it’s the outside pitch that caused the most trouble, so guess what he worked on the most? Having the kids hit it the opposite way, letting the ball travel deeper into the hitting zone and driving the ball that way, no rolling of the wrists. His reasoning is that if you can hit that with authority you can easily hit the stuff down the middle and inside.
A lot of coaches have lots of theories about hitting, and some of these theories might fly in the face of what you’ve seen here. And it may be true that some people can do better than teach, but unless you can show proof via video tape or pictures, I’ll take the .338 lifetime batters opinion first.
What I’m hoping to do in this blog is get pictures and/or video’s of different points and have the people who do this at the highest level (MLB) show us with their actions, because I have a confession to make, I was never a lifetime .338 MLB player (maybe in my fantasy life where I actually hit .650 Aw, what the heck, it’s my fantasy life, I hit 1.000 with a slugging pct. of 4.000 🙂
How to Hit Like a Major Leaguer 