Dipping back knee

[pstein]

Knightsb: Here is a video of my DD starting with her feet close together to emphasize the sequence. I'm throwing windmill from behind a screen about 25' away. I always throw windmill when I pitch so that the kids can get comfortable with the timing of their sequence. I always try and utilize drills that can be adapted to live pitching in order to get the kids used to swinging at a pitched ball. My experience has been that tee swings and slow motion dry swings almost always break down against live game pitching.

Ignore my DD's back leg. Her rear knee is misaligned with her hip, giving the appearance that she is turning it in when she is really not. IOW, her rear knee is always turned in. When she bends at the knee, it turns in even more. It's the way she was born; nothing I can do about it.

As I've said before, I feel like my DD's hands lag behind a little bit too much. When I compare her swing to the pros, I see her hips finishing about a frame or so, prior to her hands getting the barrel to contact. She needs to do a better job of using her hands IMO. Also, now that she seems to be getting comfortable with the sequence, we will be working on quieting down her movements some.

She needs to learn to "coil around".

I'm not sure if that's a "Power-V" at the ''swearing-in" position, it seems a little looser that it should be. Hips stall, as correctly identified. She pushes through contact. PLEASE teach her top hand swivel. Her hands look a lot like the old BM "torque into contact" which he (thankfully) has gotten rid of (to my knowledge).

PM me if you're interested in some (potentially helpful) videos.

 

[stiksdad]

Could you elobarate more on "top hand swivel"

 

[Wellphyt]

Juding by the pitch loacation, her swing should not sit her.
She strides with a load upper body (down hill/level shoulders) then adjusts to the higher pitch location.
IMO. Well's DD has a great swing and much can be learned from watching it.
My only comment would be to work on a better front side blocking. ( I am a Yeagerite and that's big in his world)
That's based on this ONE swing. It's a very good swing.

Agree on the front side block. When I reviewed the video with her I pulled up clips of pro hitters and pointed out how they block a frame or so before she does. Good observation on the pitch location, she typically does a really good job of getting on plane of the pitch. Something we learned from Epstein's "Weather Vanning" concept.

 

[Wellphyt]

The pendulum motion. Forward by coiling. Separation. Instead of "sitting" and then forward. More of a kick stride look I think would describe it. Not a lean back move, more of a coiling move.

IMO the excessive anterior tilt is a pre-swing movement. I don't like it, and I agree with FFS that it's not ideal, but it occurs prior to her lifting her front foot to coil her hips. IMO the performance of the swing begins when the front foot gets lifted to coil the hips. In this clip I see her coiling as she strides as evidenced by her front knee/foot turning in during her stride. I'll let others debate the quality of her coil; I can't really tell the quality of the coil in this clip. However I do believe she attempts to coil during her stride. She is clearly not coiling in her stance. IMO she gets lots of separation...I would argue too much separation due to what I consider to be the biggest flaw in this swing.

I consider the excessive anterior tilt more a bad pre-swing habit than a swing flaw. Again, this is strictly based on my belief that the performance of the swing begins when the front foot gets lifted to coil the hips. Regardless, it's not something that she was ever taught.

 

[theaddition]

I think "weather veining" and "leveling" are the same concept.
I stumbled across Sparky Parker's leveling concept.
I've not bought anything from him and can't say if he is the real deal, only that we used his concept of leveling.

When my DD gets back from San Fran, we are sittin down and viewing your clip. Most notably her separation.
Thanks for posting the clip.

 

[Wellphyt]

She needs to learn to "coil around".

I'm not sure if that's a "Power-V" at the ''swearing-in" position, it seems a little looser that it should be. Hips stall, as correctly identified. She pushes through contact. PLEASE teach her top hand swivel. Her hands look a lot like the old BM "torque into contact" which he (thankfully) has gotten rid of (to my knowledge).

PM me if you're interested in some (potentially helpful) videos.

Finally someone who has identified what I believe to be the biggest flaw in this swing.

When my DD begins to flatten her hands or flatten the barrel to the swing plane, her hips get way too far out in front of her upper torso/hands. Right now she flattens way too many frames prior to throwing the barrel. IMO what is happening is that all the while she is flattening, her hips are unwinding. Because she waits so long to release her shoulders (throw the barrel), her hips get too far out in front, which is why they stall. When her upper torso begins to turn, her hands are caught napping which leads to the tension in her front arm.

IMO this is a sync issue. She needs to figure out how to get her throw better in sync with her hips. Here is Jen Yee flattening during her stride.

Notice how Yee coordinates the throw of the barrel with the action of her getting her butt into it. I see my DD getting her butt into it but not her hands. My DD is at minimum 1 frame late with the throw of her hands, and I would argue she's more like 1 1/2 to 2 frames late.

My DD's swing would improve immensely if she ever figures out how to get her hands moving earlier. I believe the dead hands is likely the result of her doing thousands of swings starting with the bat on the deltoid beginning at age 9. The material I started her off with was very big in not using the hands.

She can do the correct action just fine in slow motion swings, so she knows what she is suppose to do. I went over the video with her and discussed in detail how she is basically flattening and them swinging. It's amazing she recovers as well as she does and hits as well as she does, doing what she's doing. Thank goodness for fastpitch bat technology.

The push through contact that some see is IMO due to her hips stalling because she is not in sync. I believe the swing is a hard push swing as described by Williams. There are many clips of MLB players pushing towards contact when they are early. IMO if my DD's hands where turning the corner 1 to 1 1/2 frames earlier, her hands would be in better sync with her hips and the push before contact would be none existent because her hands would be coming into contact closer to when her hips are coming into contact.

I don't think you can get this type of follow through without a good throw of the barrel:




I'm always open to ideas on how to correct swing issues. However the ideas have to be based in logic and I would prefer that they be aired out in the open if possible. One reason I posted my DD's swing is so that others can learn from it.

I'm hoping to demonstrate that there is no shame in a 15 yo girl not swinging like a MLB player or an accomplished D1 athlete. Much of it comes down to athleticism and work ethic. I've told my DD numerous times that you can't become a great hitter if you don't pick up a bat from November to February, and don't work all that hard during the other 8 months. I also believe that if you want your kid to be the best hitter they can be, it's important to compare them to slow motion video of the best. I think it's fine to disagree and debate what we see as the problem when a kid's swing doesn't match video of the best, but I don't think it is beneficial to the player's long term development to just ignore what the video shows. I don't think my DD particularly cares for that part of the process, but she does seem to get a little more motivated when she sees visual evidence that she doesn't match what the best do.

 

[tom.guerry]

Gomez at ULL had a lot of tilt/side crunch. might look at her as comparison.

 

[Wellphyt]

I think "weather veining" and "leveling" are the same concept.
I stumbled across Sparky Parker's leveling concept.
I've not bought anything from him and can't say if he is the real deal, only that we used his concept of leveling.

When my DD gets back from San Fran, we are sittin down and viewing your clip. Most notably her separation.
Thanks for posting the clip.

I think it likely that the "Leveling" and "Weathervane" concept are similar if not the same. All I know is that if the kids can figure it out, it works Tilting on the low pitch never overly impresses me, but when my DD levels out on the high pitch, it always brings a smile to my face. It just looks really good when she gets on top and squares up a letter high pitch.

 

[knightsb]

I'm hoping to demonstrate that there is no shame in a 15 yo girl not swinging like a MLB player or an accomplished D1 athlete. Much of it comes down to athleticism and work ethic. I've told my DD numerous times that you can't become a great hitter if you don't pick up a bat from November to February, and don't work all that hard during the other 8 months. I also believe that if you want your kid to be the best hitter they can be, it's important to compare them to slow motion video of the best. I think it's fine to disagree and debate what we see as the problem when a kid's swing doesn't match video of the best, but I don't think it is beneficial to the player's long term development to just ignore what the video shows. I don't think my DD particularly cares for that part of the process, but she does seem to get a little more motivated when she sees visual evidence that she doesn't match what the best do.

Thanks and well said.

 

[Wellphyt]

Gomez at ULL had a lot of tilt/side crunch. might look at her as comparison.

Thanks Tom. I honestly just don't care for the scrunching. Epstein talks about how hitters do different things in their stance to break inertia and get themselves moving, but she's going to have to come up with something else because it will drive me nuts. The other issue is that when she does the scrunching, she also bends at the knee. Anytime she bends at the knee it accentuates her rear knee to hip alignment issue. I've been trying to get her to keep her back leg as straight as possible to reduce the look of her doing the "Elvis" move.

I don't know why she can't just stand at the plate, bend at the waist, soften the knees, and just stride from there using a little hand pump to cock her hands. I keep telling her that umpires don't give out style points when hitting

I would almost prefer she flap the back elbow like Joe Morgan, twirl the bat like Yaz or do a pre-swing toe tap like Chipper. We went to the cages yesterday and she worked on quieting it down, but it is going to be a hard habit to break I'm afraid. She doesn't like how her back leg looks on video, so that's the motivation I'm going to use to change it. Get rid of the scrunch and the back leg doesn't look so bad