Hitting A Baseball: The Physics Of Baseball

Baseball is considered America’s past time. Legends like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jackie Robinson, and many more have come and gone. Throughout baseball’s history certain players have excelled more than others, and like any sport they were successful by exploiting their strengths. It isn’t the rules, uniforms, stadiums, and fan base that make baseball a beautiful sport; it’s the players. Anyone competing, whether it is at a professional level or not, has their own unique mechanics that allows them to perform the best they can. No pitcher throws the ball the same way as another and no batter hits the ball the same way as another. Every baseball player has a routine in everything they do that makes them special. It has been said that hitting a baseball is the hardest task in all of sports. To accomplish that task, all factors come in to play; the type of pitch being thrown, the release point of the pitch, the break of the ball, etc. All those factors occur before the batter’s swing is fully initiated. As mentioned earlier, no batter swings the same way as another however, the mechanics of a swing is a different thing entirely. The mechanics of one’s swing begins when a batter enters the box and ends when a batter exits, what happens in between is up to the batter. By perfecting a batter’s mechanics while in the box, their chances of making contact increase greatly.

Hitting a baseball is a task that is learned through trial and error, which makes changing a batter’s swing extremely difficult. Once that batter finds their comfort zone and makes contact they will do the same thing until it fails them once again. Perfecting the mechanics of that swing won’t create an exceptional hitter, but it will create a swing that consistently incr...

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... early he affected the rest of the movements the arms experiences. Upon contact Matt’s hands, wrists, and forearms were facing each other. In his follow through, his arms have already completed their rotation. The last movement should be pronation of the right arm which allows a full follow through. Matt’s right arm is is not supinated upon contact therefore he is allowed little pronation in his follow through. His swing ends with chest and abdomen not fully rotated. This causes problems. When Matt’s chest and abdomen do not complete their rotation his arms can’t complete their follow through. This can cause the right shoulder and latisimus dorsi to stretch even further and can lead to strains in those muscles. In game type situation the chest and abdomen not fully rotating will affect the power of the swing, and quickness of the batter’s start towards first base.