Posted by: Jack Mankin (MrBatspeed@aol.com) on Fri Oct 5 18:45:50 2001

>>> Jack I understand tht but what does a hitter that only uses bht do initially with their hands.How does the bat drop to horizontal. <<<

Hi RQL

There is a fine line between the mechanics of a hitter using only bht and one using both BHT and THT. Even if the batter has a static bat (no bat-head acceleration from THT), the role of the top-hand is still to stay back near the shoulder and serve mainly as a pivot-point (the oarlock effect) for the pull from the bottom-hand to torque the bat-head around. So the main difference is between just 'holding back' with the top-hand and accelerating the bat-head back by 'pulling back' with the top-hand.

Ron Gant and Matt Williams started their swings with a fairly static bat. They were still able to put up some respectful numbers relying mainly on bht and pitches from the middle-in. But using only bht does have its limitations. Overcoming the inertia of a static bat and staying in sync with the power curve limits the batter to a tighter hand-path. Therefore, the batter cannot take the hands out wider for an outside pitch and maintain good bat speed generation. Once the batter falls behind the power curve, he is no longer in a position to efficiently apply either BHT or THT and just waves at the ball by extending the back-arm.

By applying top-hand-torque before or during initiation the bat�s inertia is much lower during the turn and the batter can stay with the power curve even on more outside pitches. --- I do not think of the bat as dropping to a horizontal position at the start of the swing. As the bat-head arcs into the swing plane behind thw batter's head, it accelerates into the tilted plane from a higher position. From there, it arcs rearward and downward through the lag position (horizontal) until the bat-head bottoms out and arcs a few degrees upward to contact.

Jack Mankin