Learn how to stop striking out with this baseball and softball drills to keep eyes on the ball, see it, and hit the ball better when batting.
Andrew McCutchen Hit Ball Better Swing Breakdown
…of the Do This For Longer Drives series, we’ll talk about:
- Breaking the One-Joint Rule,
- Whether Cutch is ‘kinking the hose’, and
- How-To re-pattern the impact position.
Breaking the One-Joint Rule
From the book, Becoming a Supple Leopard: The Ultimate Guide to Resolving Pain, Preventing Injury, and Optimizing Athletic Performance, Dr. Kelly Starrett (KStar) says:
“The musculature [in the spine] is designed to create stiffness so that you can effectively transmit energy to the primary engines of your hips and shoulders. If you don’t preserve trunk stiffness while moving from your hips and shoulders, you will lose power and force. The is the basis for the one-joint rule: you should see flexion and extension movement happen at the hips and shoulders, not your spine.”
Is Cutch ‘Kinking the Hose’?
Just as kinking the hose while watering the lawn stops the flow of water. Bending at the spine halts the transfer of energy at impact. KStar says this about losing head-spine alignment:
“Hinging at one of the segments [vertebraes in the neck]…when we put a hinge across the central nervous system, the body recognizes that as a primary insult, or threat to the body, because you’re basically guillotining or kinking the nervous system. You’ve kinked ‘the tube’, so it [force production] just drops off.”
How-To Re-Pattern the Impact Position
Follow this 12-week exercise progression (at least five days per week):
- Super plank – week one: 1 set, hold for 30 secs, week two: 1 set, hold for 45 secs, week three: 2 sets, hold for 45 secs
- Loaded super plank – week four: 2 sets, for 30 secs, week five: 2 sets, for 45 secs, week six: 2 sets, for 60 secs
- Hip hinge with stick (patterning) – week seven: 2 sets X 12 reps, week eight: 2 sets X 15 reps, week nine: 3 sets X 12 reps
- Loaded hip hinge (dead-lift) – week ten: 2 sets X 12 reps, week eleven: 2 sets X 15 reps, week twelve: 3 sets X 12 reps
Maintain head-spine alignment. Perfect reps. Use Coach’s Eye or Ubersense phone app (free) for feedback. CLICK HERE for Part-4 for the #1 power fix…also, CLICK HERE if you missed Part-2: the faster turn.
