Posted by: tom.guerry (tom.guerry@kp.org) on Wed May 22 09:22:22 2002

>
> tom.....besides the other differences between kack & epstein that i pointed out in that discussion below (and i was disappointed that you did not respond to my comments), it seems that the issue of the bent elbow is another difference between jack & epstein (not that i think either of them are always right).....
> it seems like one of your primary reasons for subscribing to epstein's bent elbow/fence drill/tight path is your concern (and epstein's) for keeping the ball fair....can't this goal be accomplished simply by having a closed stance? (or more importantly, landing closed)?....

Sorry if I missed some questions in the flurry.

I don't think closing the stance is a good idea.If you did close it,you would want to rotate your body in the set up without changing the location of your axis/spine.In other words,rotate closed bythe back foot being further from the plate and the stride foot coming dowm closer to the plate,don't get overall closer or farther off the plate or there is too much change.The all you have done is made your swing longer,not a good idead.

What you want to do instead is quicken your body turn by hooking the hand path more.This will result in bringing the bat to contact with more torso rotation and less bathead swinging out which will keep the ball fair without sacrificing batspeed.I would drill this with tee work.I rarely use the fence drill.The danger of the fence drill will be the unsupervised hitter will avoid the fence by extending the hands and dragging the bat instead of hooking the handpath in front of the body.