What do you see?

[LClifton]

In this short clip of Cabrerra,,, would everyone post their thoughts on what they see.

Shoulders
Hands
Arms
Hips
Legs
Head

What do you see???

[jbooth]

In this short clip of Cabrerra,,, would everyone post their thoughts on what they see.
Shoulders
Hands
Arms
Hips
Legs
Head

What do you see???
http://firstpickclub.com/images/cabrerrahandset.gif
Shoulders - front shoulder a little lower than the rear, and the shoulders angled slightly toward the plate

Hands - his hands are moving back toward his rear armpit and forming a 90 degree angle between front forearm and the bat. This moves the bathead toward the pitcher and above his head

Arms - the front elbow moves back simultaneous with the hands moving back and setting the 90 degree. The front elbow lowers as the hands go back. All of this, raises the back elbow.

Hips - his hips might be angled in a little bit, but not as much as the shoulders

Legs - his legs are bent and his front leg has removed support of the body weight and he is moving forward from a combination of gravity making him fall forward and a push from the back leg's abductor muscle at the femur/hip connection.

Head - his spine is tilted so that his head is over the plate, and his head will move toward the pitcher with his front foot stride, then at foot plant his head will not move any farther toward the pitcher.

We don't see his swing, but when the swing starts; his hips will turn first, twisted by leg force, his back elbow will drop toward his back hip and side in a motion that will move the bat from a near vertical position, to a more horizontal position, or a position from which he wants to direct the bathead at the ball. When the back elbow drops, he will keep the 90 degree angle at forearm and hands, and this will cause the front elbow to rise. The elbow angle change occurs simultaneous with a dip of the back shoulder. This back elbow drop does not make the bathead start arcing toward the ball, it drops it toward the ground. It happens almost simultaneous with the shoulder turn, so it will appear that the bat is starting its arc toward the ball, but this isn't done by hand or arm rotation. The arm/elbow angle change create momentum in the bat head, but it moves toward the ball from hip and shoulder rotation.

As the elbows change angle, and an instant before actual shoulder rotation, he will move his hands a bit forward into the armpit area and then the hands and shoulders will turn as a unit. He will probably adjust his wrist angle a bit at this point also, to get his top palm facing up.

As the knob of the bat gets around to the front and the bat is now paralell with the inside of the plate, he will decide what adjustments are necessary if any, to get the sweet spot on the ball. He may extend his arms to get to an outside pitch, or pull them around for an inside pitch; drop the back shoulder lower to get a low pitch, or raise it up to get a high pitch. And, any combination of the above for low-away, up-and-in, etc. He may also try to wait longer on outside pitches, and speed up on inside pitches.

Also, after the hands come around, they will start to unhinge from bathead momentum/force, but he will add some force from his hands to "throw" the head at the ball. This is done after unhinging has begun and before ball contact.

[LClifton]

Shoulders
Hands
Arms
Hips
Legs
Head

I might add:

Elbows
Knees

Thanks Jim, I wasn't expecting all the parts to be covered, very nice.

Others, anyone:
Please don't feel as though you need to comment on every body part, maybe just on something that sticks out to you.
What do you like?
Anything you don't like?
Maybe there's something you've observed in a clip
(either of an amatuer or another ML'er) that Miguel doesn't do???
This is for everyone, please join in.

[PJ-34]

i mostly notise the shoulders and hands moving

[Mark H]

Dixon's main point for one thing. As far as the hands and shoulders moving, I would have said loading but yeah.

He's lining everything up to be ready turn into the ball the instant he goes from developing momentum to transferring that momentum into rotation. As always, read Dixon and Englishbey.

[chan7718]

[QUOTE=Mark H]Dixon's main point for one thing. As far as the hands and shoulders moving, I would have said loading but yeah.

This is an important distinction. The hands are moving spatially but not in reference to the "box". The angles created by the arms are all maintained. By maintaining these angles when he moves to the load it causes internal rotation in his back shoulder and scap loading. If he didn't maintain the box the hands could move the same spatially but would not result in as good of load.

Bill