Front leg

[randy]

When my son goes from toe touch and to heel plant, his front leg straightens as he drops the heel, causing his front leg to straighten way to early and keeps his weight on the backside. I can't get him out of it. Help!
Randy

[randy]

"anyone, anyone..."

[Jake Patterson]

When my son goes from toe touch and to heel plant, his front leg straightens as he drops the heel, causing his front leg to straighten way to early and keeps his weight on the backside. I can't get him out of it. Help!
Randy

Not certain why or how this would happen. Do you have any clips??

[chesspirate]

i would assume that his stance is somewhat straight up. It should be harder to do what you're describing if his COG is lower. Hard to straighten the front leg to early from a deeper crouch basically.

[randy]

No camera, unfortunately. We are trying to get a little more flex in his knees-he got almost straight-legged. Thanks. I am trying to save enough cash to get Englishbey's dvd's. I've gotten some info off the public side, but not enough to help me a whole lot.

[randy]

Let me re-phrase that...a lot of info, but not enough understanding on my part. Probably enough to make me dangerous...

[FiveFrameSwing]

When my son goes from toe touch and to heel plant, his front leg straightens as he drops the heel, causing his front leg to straighten way to early and keeps his weight on the backside. I can't get him out of it. Help!
Randy

What you describe is a common problem for hitters that shift their weight incorrectly.

Try this experiment.

Stride to toe-touch with nearly equal bend in your knees, but keep your weight back, say 40/60. Pause at the toe-touch position. Verify that your weight is primarily back (40/60). Next move to heel-plant and the flex in your front leg will be largely gone.

Next repeat the experiment with more weight shifted forward, say 60/40. Now when you move to heel-plant you will retain more bend in your front knee.

What you describe is the result of striding without shifting your weight to your frontside.

[tadlock11]

The DVD's will help you out a great deal. Without video (of your hitter) it would be hard to give an accurate account based on assumptions.
Sounds like he is "pushing" off of his lead leg as a cause of it straightening as opposed to allowing the core rotation to turn the hips and in effect the lead leg somewhat straightening. (Imagine the lead foot as an anchor, your lead leg as a rope with some slack in it. Pulling the rope = hip rotation - the rope gets taut.)
Several ways to work through this, try what chesspirate was saying by lowering your COG - get in an "athletic" position. Try it at first static with no-stride. However, the bottom line could be a rotation deficit.

[chesspirate]

good call tadlock