Illinois Hammerheads Baseball

Mechanics of the Swing

Hammerheads Hitting Program:  Batspeed Program | Hitting Stations


Hitting Mechanics (Rotational Hitting)

Batting Grip

Most people teach the knocking knuckle grip, however, when you look at most big leaguers, this isn’t the grip that I see them use.  Most of the best seem to be much closer to the 2nd line of knuckles lining up with the 3rd set of knuckles.  Take a look at some pictures for yourself.

Batting Stance

The stance is unique to each hitter.  Relax, have some balance, maybe even some rhythm and make sure you can load and get into a good hitting position from your stance.

Load & Stride

Learning how to load and get into a good hitting position is so important for all hitters.  At the younger levels, this should be taught before getting them thousands of swings with bad mechanics.  There are several different ways to load and we have many of them listed on our load & stride page.  Take a look.

How the Legs Work in the Baseball Swing

The back knee will drive down and forward while the back elbow comes down.  The back hip will turn and if the hitter rotates all the way, the back hip will continue to turn as the knee drives down and forward.  On higher pitches, you won’t see as much of a knee drive down.  It will usually just go forward as the hitter stays taller on the higher pitches.

On outside pitches, especially down in the zone, a hitter will rotate less and on pitches closer to them, they will rotate their hips more.  Most coaches focus on the hips, but you need to teach younger hitters how to use their back knee in the swing as well.

Bat Path

The bat path is super important.  We teach rotational hitting mechanics.  As you watch most of the best big league hitters, you will see a lot of similarities.  As the swings starts, the back elbow will come down and forward.  The legs are working and the knob of the bat will point more down and forward as the barrel of the bat works back towards the catcher.  Try to stay more level on the higher pitches and have more tilt on the lower pitches.  Getting good extension is good also, but don’t worry if you can’t get extended on some of the pitches that are real close to you (up and inside).  As the ball gets further from your hands though, if you make contact at the right time, you should be able to have good extension in your swing.  Having a swing that gets on line and stays on line with the pitch is key.  Some of the power hitters will be more uphill and the smaller single-type hitters will usually be much flatter through the zone.

How to Hit Low Pitches
Hitting low pitches requires you getting your hands down more and having more shoulder tilt.  Some hitters will also drive their back knee down closer to the ground and when doing this, we don’t need to have as much tilt with our shoulders.  One of the big keys with the low pitch is when you do hit it out front, you need to make sure your barrel stands down long enough, so that the bat doesn’t come up above the baseball.  Many hitters will come up to early when they hit a low pitch out front and they will hit weak ground balls as a result.

High Pitches
Staying flat on a high pitch is super important if you want to consistently hit this pitch without flying out or swinging and missing.  You could swing more down angle on this pitch, however, for most hitters, the problem is going to be with them swinging up on this pitch too much.  Learn how to stay flat on the high pitch and you’ll  get a lot more hits when pitchers go up in the zone.

Swing Finish

We don’t focus too much on finish.  If extension is good, the finish usually happens on its own.  Based on the height of the pitch and whether a player finishes with one or two hands on the bat, the finish will end up in certain spots.  If you understand the bat path through the zone for high and low pitches and if you understand extension, you can figure out where the finish will take you.