Swing Analysis - 11year old

[RodCarew]

Two clips of BP session from yesterday.

Would love to hear what we should be working on.. and what he is doing well.

thanks!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMlK2NdcRJU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvzBHvqvjLA

[DukeK]

http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/Apr152009BP2_1.gif


http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/Apr152009BP2_2.gif

I just did an analysis of 3 of my younger son's friends, all about the same age as your son. I can almost cut and paste verbatim from the email I sent them since all their swings represent a fairly typical youth baseball swing.

First of all, I would start bringing the heat dad. It almost appears you're throwing them underhand the way the ball is coming in. That will exaggerate your son's tendency to drop his hands at the beginning of his swing.

Anyway, here's basically an edited cut and paste of the email I sent:

First of all let me say these are pretty dang good youth baseball swings. They all have a very good weight shift (weight off back toe at contact and not squishing the bug), rotate well, and have a decent shoulder tilt (don't crouch or collapse the legs too much to go after the low pitch).

The areas they need to work on are basically the same areas I've been slowly learning and working on with my son the past few years. Let's start from the beginning of the swing:

We'll use Derek Jeter, Jimmy Rollins, and T to compare to:

http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/DJHRMed.gif

http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/Rollins1L.gif

http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/TSwing1Slow.gif

I like to use Jeter and Rollins because the have a very simple batting sequence. (They don't load their hands much and have only a little bit of separation)

The swing should be initiated from the hips (or back knee then hips), with the hands/shoulders slightly behind. Check out these 2 links to see what I mean:

http://members.cox.net/msanda/Loading%20Sequence.htm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmzsBIaRJ0I

This achieves slight seperation between the hips and the shoulders: http://www.chrisoleary.com/Projects/Baseball/Hitting/Examples/Separation.html

Notice in T's swing his shoulder are slightly (just a frame or two) behind his hips at contact.

All 3 kids initiate their swing with their hands and have little or no separation, in some of the swings their shoulders are ahead of their hips. This will cause them to have lots of trouble in timing pitches and can take away a lot of power from their swing. This is fairly easy to fix, but they need to work on it a lot to get that muscle memory. The Mallee video explains it pretty well.


The 2nd major flaw in most youth baseball is swing plane, hand path, etc... I was just reading a baseball forum today and found this:


"My theory on the development of a hitter:
1. The vast majority of young kids (12 and under) develop a swing where they drop their hands and barrel as a first move. They learned this at a young age (unknowingly) to get on plane with the blooper pitches they saw when they were 5-8 years old."


It appears all 3 kids drop their hands as they begin their swings somewhat, if they were hitting off a tee with another tee placed behind it they would hit the back tee first. This also causes them to trap the barrel of the bat behind their head, then they have to unwrap the barrel from around their head and drag it around behind them causing a long draggy swing. What then happens the back elbow will try to catch up and come in front of the hands, causing what is known as "bat drag". The back elbow should stay slotted into the back hip through the swing and the bat should be at a 90 degree angle to the rear forearm at contact, i.e. bottom hand pulling, top hand pushing at contact.

Bat drag example: http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/BatDrag_ISBAD-1.gif


Proper wrist hinge angle: http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/A_WristHingeAngle_Pedroia.jpg


The last thing I wanted to point out is what the lead elbow, rear elbow, and rear humerus do after contact - they should all be travelling on an upward path after contact. Your son's stays level or goes down.

I would start with your son on getting his lower body in synch, foot planted before he launches his hands, and some seperation as stated above.

Then work on that upper body, especially that bat head position at launch. Your son is trapping the bat behind his head and then unwrapping it resulting in a looooong draggy swing. I patched together your son and T to point this out - each video starts at hand launch -look how much quicker and more efficiently T gets the bat to the ball.

http://i706.photobucket.com/albums/ww63/lk2500/April15T1.gif

Good luck, have fun, and please post if you have questions.

[jbooth]

Two clips of BP session from yesterday.

Would love to hear what we should be working on.. and what he is doing well.

thanks!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMlK2NdcRJU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvzBHvqvjLA

He doesn't do well on any pitches from the waist down.

The reason is; his bat is horizontal as he prepares to launch and his back elbow is down. The bathead should be above his head at, at least a 45 degree angle to the ground.

He hits pitches at his chest and armpit just fine, because his bat is set for that plane. Any pitches below that, and he drops his hands to try to get it flat on that plane and then swings. The hands stay above the ball path and the bathead needs to arc to the ball from above the head. You don't drop it down and then take it at the ball.

Huge bat drag also. This is typical of a horizontal set up. The bat is already flat to the ball, so they just drag the bat around, pulling the knob toward the ball. The hands should stay back at the armpit, and the arms/hands should whip the bathead around.

My guess is that he hits slow pitches at the chest very well in games, but probably can't hit anything that is fast and below his belt.

Note the back elbow action, and the bathead position and path on the kid on the right. His elbow doesn't get in front of his back hip, and the bathead is up, and arcs to the ball. That's what your boy needs to do.

http://firstpickclub.com/video/April15T1.gif

[RodCarew]

DukeK and Jbooth - thanks for the replies! (Dukek thanks very much for the slow down video, awesome)

After reading your replies with my son and showing him the video - we have decided to work on two things over the next couple of weeks...

1 - His Bat position at set up / launch. From what I can tell my son doesn't drop his hands much at launch (correct me if I am wrong) but he starts his bat almost completely horizontal and that is what forces him to have such a long slow swing. If we simply get his bat more vertical at launch, this should correct his bat drag, correct?

2- Separation of upper and lower body - back heel lifts when front heel touches down.. hands need to stay back as hips open up.. we'll try to keep that front shoulder closed as long as possible to keep the hands back.

If you guys know any good drills to isolate some of this stuff , I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks.

[benz99]

DukeK and Jbooth - thanks for the replies! (Dukek thanks very much for the slow down video, awesome)

After reading your replies with my son and showing him the video - we have decided to work on two things over the next couple of weeks...

1 - His Bat position at set up / launch. From what I can tell my son doesn't drop his hands much at launch (correct me if I am wrong) but he starts his bat almost completely horizontal and that is what forces him to have such a long slow swing. If we simply get his bat more vertical at launch, this should correct his bat drag, correct?

2- Separation of upper and lower body - back heel lifts when front heel touches down.. hands need to stay back as hips open up.. we'll try to keep that front shoulder closed as long as possible to keep the hands back.

If you guys know any good drills to isolate some of this stuff , I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks.

My kid has been fighting bat drag also & the biggest improvement's I have seen are when he arcs the barrel towards the catcher & swings from his armpit area,,no drag.. As soon as he goes back to flattening the barrel behind him back to bat drag. I have a mirror set up in front of him on dry swings & he can see the bat & has no bat drag when he does it correctly. The hardest part is getting it into his memory to be able to do it in game swings

[Sonny Schmidt]

Looks to me he has problems in keeping his hands up. What I do with my students is have them focus directly on the back shoulder through - rather then ground up. It's quite logical, the quickest way from point A to B is a straight line. He needs to start pushing his back hand harder at the ball to allow maximum extension.

[songtitle]

His hips are opening up as he strides. He probably can't hit outside pitches.

Have him take a slight 'inward turn' as he strides forward. This will bring the hips, shoulders and hands back slightly - just as major leaguers do.

[RodCarew]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxTxeJJ_HxA

UPDATE:

Hey all.. took some video of his updated swing today... we've concentrated mostly on his upper half and will get to work on his lower half later ...

any feedback would be great..thanks.

[Prouddadof5]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxTxeJJ_HxA

UPDATE:

Hey all.. took some video of his updated swing today... we've concentrated mostly on his upper half and will get to work on his lower half later ...

any feedback would be great..thanks.
__________________________________________________ _______________


His swing doesn't look too bad here.
Just wondering, are there any broken windows on the other side of the street? (smile)

[LAball]

swing looks loopy, There seems to be arm barring.

[davewashere]

I think his front elbow should be up higher during his swing. I paused it at about 28 seconds in that last Youtube clip and just after the point of contact it looks like both of his elbows are touching his sides.

[RodCarew]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxTxeJJ_HxA

UPDATE:

Hey all.. took some video of his updated swing today... we've concentrated mostly on his upper half and will get to work on his lower half later ...

any feedback would be great..thanks.
__________________________________________________ _______________


His swing doesn't look too bad here.
Just wondering, are there any broken windows on the other side of the street? (smile)

No broken windows just yet.. we have put a few dents in our garage door while he is pitching to me..

[RodCarew]

I think his front elbow should be up higher during his swing. I paused it at about 28 seconds in that last Youtube clip and just after the point of contact it looks like both of his elbows are touching his sides.

Yes, I see that too... I see a lot going on that I did not see with my naked eye...

I'm hoping DukeK will slow it down for me...