First try SnF

[mikecon]

...Share your cues/instruction that has led him to these swings.

Coming along slowly but surely.

Some of the common stuff we talk about and go over:

- Always reiterating the the goals of "depth", "suddenness", and "whip" and putting those things in terms of the competitive advantage they create.

- Demonstrating the stretch and resistance between leg and hip/back/scap that sets up those goals by showing the mechanics and posing at max-stretch/'the truth'.

- Pointing out the line of separation below the hip between the forward-pulling leg and the rearward-pullling hip/back/scap.

- Discussion about similarities in mechanics of throwing, tennis stroke, hockey shot, punching.

- Discussion about launch-and-spend/auto-pilot/where effort stops.

- Most common cues were/are things like "feel the spring", "be one-legged", "feel the barrel in your hands", "turn it!", "turn it at your shoulder", "all in with the uptick!", "get the swing behind you", "launch behind the corner", "turn the triangle", "pull it with your leg", "keep your pull-back", "feel the 'L' in your scap", "swing 'out-from'"... (nothing original here! ).

- In terms of the initial actions, I'm telling him to turn the barrel and drive his knee to the pitch simultaneously. As he's learning to keep the pullbacks without thinking about it, that trigger-thought is resulting in a decent sequence. (Getting buy-in/trust to launch by 'turning the vault handle' is unbelievably challenging. While he is improving, it's still not 'all in'. And he admits he's still not doing it! It's just not intuitive, and especially so for those who have been coached to 'pull the knob'! But as the video shows, I'm breaking him down. )

I'm convinced that the major contributor to his improving swings in the cage is, in order, going through rounds of: snap-stops, SnF drills, 'preset' drills, and full swings all off the tee before live beeps. This preparation seems to remind his system of where it's supposed to be...

Hope to grab some game-swing video tomorrow.


Thank you for your continued support!

[Teacherman]

That is a great warm up sequence.

I like all of them....but I particularly like this one....



The FEELING of this....is avoided by most.

They simply can swing from there because they can't feel momentum. When, in fact, there is great stretch in there.....and the momentum they want REMOVES the stretch.

This may illustrate the biggest frustration I have. Many won't 'just turn it' from there. And it is that turn that activates the stretch. It is that turn....from that position....that FORCES lower back action in order to swing hard and hit the ball hard.

Counter-intuitive.

[mikecon]

...Counter-intuitive.

Without a doubt. In fact, when Matt does this 'preset drill' I think he is still surprised every time at how suddenly his barrel gets up-to-speed (with a 33/30 BBCOR bat in the hands of a 120 lb kid, no less). And I'll reinforce that with a comment like, "Hey, nice suddenness!" and he'll have a little restrained smile on his face. Those are the moments that he is ultimately sold that what we have him doing is right and the effort to change things is well spent.

Almost everyone I first approach with this (coach, parent, kid) gives me the hairy eyeball. But when the time is taken to explain how the immediate torquing of the hands gets the barrel accelerating in a way no other move can, and how the properly moving lower body can catch it and put in on the plane of a pitch, they can comprehend.

But getting someone to actually do it is another story.

The thing that's really funny is that so many of even those who do this in their swing, by whatever means they came upon it, generally don't recognize that, in fact, they 'just turn it from there'.

Check out the pics below. The stud-looking kid is the 23-year-old brother of one of Matt's teammates. This kid was a helluva ballplayer and a truly exceptional hitter with power in spades that belied his size (only about 5'10" 185 lbs at the time he was playing). Sadly, he busted up his leg is pretty good in Georgia or Tennessee (I forget) when he was with the Bayside Yankees as a 17 year-old (he played with Pedro Alvarez). It never healed right; he broke it again after coming back from the initial injury and his promising baseball future was over.

When I was discussing these mechanics with him last year, he too gave me the side-wards glance. He had a concern about not being quick enough to get on a high-level fastball. Meanwhile, lo and behold, as the pictures below can attest, his swing (rusty though it may be; he just jumped in for some hacks out of the blue for shits and giggles) features the very mechanics that are discussed here! I thought it was remarkable how much these two frame-by-frame sequences of positions suggest that the movements (like 'just turn it from there' and 'pivot about the hands'), as seen in the bat blur, are much the same!

This is simply the way that most really good hitters hit -- whether they're aware of it or not.

[mikecon]

That is a great warm up sequence.

I like all of them....but I particularly like this one....



The FEELING of this....is avoided by most.

They simply can swing from there because they can't feel momentum. When, in fact, there is great stretch in there.....and the momentum they want REMOVES the stretch.

This may illustrate the biggest frustration I have. Many won't 'just turn it' from there. And it is that turn that activates the stretch. It is that turn....from that position....that FORCES lower back action in order to swing hard and hit the ball hard.

Counter-intuitive.

P.S. Teach, what are you using to make GIFs from YouTube videos?

[Teacherman]

Great story above....great video comparison.

I use Freemake Video Downloader to download the youtube clip. That software converts it into an mp4.

Then I use Quicktime to convert to a mov.

Then I use Ulead gif animator to convert to a gif.

That works about 50% of the time.

For some reason....some files that I get and convert from youtube, won't load into Ulead gif animator.

It irritates me.

[Teacherman]

If I could point out one thing in the comparison above....the stud is getting more open sooner than Matt.

Why?

I believe Matt is shifting some weight too soon.

Nothing to be alarmed about. I mean....he's just now getting there. But something to monitor and work on.

Said differently, the stud is a bit more one legged than Matt.

[mikecon]

Great story above....great video comparison.

I use Freemake Video Downloader to download the youtube clip. That software converts it into an mp4.

Then I use Quicktime to convert to a mov.

Then I use Ulead gif animator to convert to a gif.

That works about 50% of the time.

For some reason....some files that I get and convert from youtube, won't load into Ulead gif animator.

It irritates me.

Thanks for this info!

[mikecon]

If I could point out one thing in the comparison above....the stud is getting more open sooner than Matt.

Why?

I believe Matt is shifting some weight too soon.

Nothing to be alarmed about. I mean....he's just now getting there. But something to monitor and work on.

Said differently, the stud is a bit more one legged than Matt.

We will stay with and add more one-legged-focused exercises and hopefully continue to improve this. As I said prior, he admittedly is not fully committing to his uptick and I think as he continues to come to terms with that the linear hips/weight-shift issue will lessen, too.

We are always greatly appreciative of your interest and feedback.

[mikecon]

We will stay with and add more one-legged-focused exercises and hopefully continue to improve this. As I said prior, he admittedly is not fully committing to his uptick and I think as he continues to come to terms with that the linear hips/weight-shift issue will lessen, too.

We are always greatly appreciative of your interest and feedback.

We also need to get back to simplifying that front foot action which may also be impeding the back side getting through as per Pronk's RLWI theory.

[Teacherman]

A cue that may really help him, is do what he's doing, I'm not looking for a major change, but do it in such a way that he gets a feeling that his rear shoulder is PULLING the barrel.

Everything else remains the same. Hip socket separation. Pull backs. Barrel turn. But get into a position such that when the launch happens, the feeling is a PULLING rear shoulder.

He's not bad right now. He can be better.

Here is an example from my son....



Middle clip his rear shoulder is pushing the barrel through. Outer clips it is pulling. It comes down to the pull backs holding the hands back and getting the barrel in the right place.....and turning it from there.

The cue 'rear shoulder to the ball' is dangerous. It is very easy to PUSH the barrel using that cue. The look of the shoulder is similar....but the pulling feel has to do with where the resistance is. Where the hands are. Where the barrel is. How the barrel turning keeps the barrel behind.

This is a FEELING. You may not see the difference....but try to feel it.

[mikecon]

"...the feeling is a PULLING rear shoulder...It comes down to the pull backs holding the hands back and getting the barrel in the right place.....and turning it from there."

YES, this makes great sense, thank you!

Didn't have the chance to video yesterday being in the coach's box. Fairly productive. Some fairly well struck balls, 3 hits, a walk and a K in 6 PAs in a double-header. But the issues of weight-shift leading to turning the barrel in front of the corner were evident; definitely not as good as the cage swings.

Will take the "pull backs holding the hands back...and turning it from there" and "feel a PULLING rear shoulder" cues into the cage work and BP this week and get some video evidence.

[mikecon]

Vacation and the lull between summer and fall ball led to insufficient practice. We had plenty of discussions about improving the pull backs/overlap/loading into the unload, rear shoulder pullling, being more one-legged and lateral tilt. But not enough hands-on. Had a good work-out today but, to my eye, separation/overlap/corner is still lacking...

Finally some games to play this weekend.

[redwill]

Hey Mike, y'all have a really nice set up there. We have had a small cage since just after a clinic that Teach did at CCU a while back. A friend of mine asked about buying ours since we can't use it right now but another friend told me over the weekend that they'd let us set it up in their yard so we're not selling. Anyway, the other friend still wants to buy one and asked me for recommendations. Yours seems really roomy which is what he really wants. Would you mind providing me with some info on the setup you have so I can pass it in to him? Thanks for your time!

[mikecon]

Hey Mike, y'all have a really nice set up there...

No I don't... but my buddy does! This is at a friend's house who I coach with. He's got some hook-ups in construction biz and when he does things he does 'em right. It really is nice. Sits on a nice new slab. Even has a swinging gate in the back.

I don't know all the particulars but the net is not that big -- 35' x 12' x 11' (to fit into the space available). It's hung on a "CIMARRON 55x14x12 HEAVY DUTY FRAME KIT" that consists of 1 5/8" pipe that he cut down to the net size. http://www.cimarronsports.com/Catalo...ame/Rookie.php

Good luck.

[redwill]

Thanks! Will send him the link.