Joe

Joey,

Once again good job. I guess the Mets didn’t watch your clip on Tebow, as they already signed him to a minor league contract. Perhaps they feel he will draw fans and become the new age version of George Plimpton. His swing isn’t all that bad for someone who hasn’t played in awhile. I have more reservations with his throwing motion.

I don’t think he bends the front enough in his abbreviated stride, thus he keeps weight on his back leg (he does that in a more pronounced way when he throws). And, he continues to do so into impact with no back foot skip. He’s a back foot hitter and loses momentum into impact – his center of mass shifts forward but his backside doesn’t shift enough, though he does come up on his toe. So, he loses force into contact.

Yes, he doesn’t counter rotate enough – show his #s and hide his hands – perhaps his musculature has something to do with it. He is a big dude.

Once again, good job!

Joey Myers

Thanks for the kind words Joe! Yes, I think he’s falling into the big slugger syndrome…if he succeeds, it will be despite ineffective mechanics. As we all know, we don’t model big sluggers for our young (lower poundage) hitters.

Joe

One other thing I noticed is that his front arm is a little rigid in his counter rotational movement. Looks like his movement takes his hands away from his body a bit. I feel that is slower. Wonder how he will react to fastballs up in the zone.

Keep up the good work, Joey.

Joey Myers

The word on the street is he’s been doing some extensive Pitch Recognition training 🙂

Djura

Nice job once again Joey… I love your stuff… I’m actually impressed since he hasn’t hit since high school…I really hate the he’s a natural athlete thing as Jordan and others… Yes the baseball swing is an athlete move…but the hard thing is to do or perform the athletic swing… To spot it….The athletic part of the swing is not so obvious and as Joe already noted Tebow didn’t throw a football purely athletically… He willed it….And that’s why he had issues in the NFL…

Just to keep it short… I wonder if he stood up taller and than got shorter…just as short as he does now…If that would have that added time to pull more of his Calapult and it would give him more freefall and perhaps fix his bat path with a little more bat speed…. All in one move, just starting a little taller and getting short as he normally would…. Obviously he needs to LET his load get deeper with the extra drop… And he would have to know how to control the lead hip and lead leg too…He did seem really focused on his lead leg… If you look at victor his lead leg is loose and lengthy until it sets…Obviously there are many things he can do but given his size it seems like a few inches taller will be an easier multipler.

I bet if he fixed this he would have some real pop…The funny thing is if you swing his way it’s so hard to hit hard… And the “short to the ball” people frame it as its making it easier to hit that way… The way we advocate not only gives the batter pop but it’s really easier as you mentioned with the bat path and for timing….

Anyway… Nice video…Later…

~DM

Kyle

I believe Powell was saying “keep the ball in play” not “keep the bat on plane” …which makes a lot of sense considering the field of play differences.