Introduction
Many countries do not prioritize baseball as a major game simply because it as famous as other games such as soccer, American football and basketball. The reason for this is not particularly hard to discern. This is because very few have a complete knowledge of the rules of playing the game. Baseball is a bat and ball game considered and played as a national game in America. The game has created a lot of interest amongst the Americans because of the intense competition it creates between the opposing sides during the game. It is a game played between two teams of nine players each. Fielding and batting are the known two teams playing the game where by the fielders are meant to defend the ball from the batting team.
During the game, the ball is to be hit hard by the batting team and the “hitter” to stop at a base before proceeding to other bases. Once one has become a player in this game, his/her first objective is to be a perfect hitter. Various teams have been facing great challenges and have significantly created weaknesses. Even though the weaknesses might be considered as minor, their effects in the capacity of a team to win a game may be drastically reduced because of the amount of holes created in the team’s offense or defense. This may be due to lack of appropriate skills that normally demand intense dedication to develop. “Here are some drills to help with one such small weakness, hitting. When a team’s hitting is weak, it is important to do baseball hitting drills to help players become stronger in this area” (Goldman and Kahrl, 2010).
Hitting Skills
To develop the hitting skills in this game, it is imperative that a player develops full knowledge in the biomechanics of baseball swing. Studies on the biomechanics swing of this game have been done in recent years with the aim of developing it. According to Albert (2003). “The biomechanics of the baseball swing can be described four phases: Stance, Recoil, Swing, and Follow through”. In the biomechanics swing of stance.
Hitting skills constitute the most complicated skill when a player is not well informed in biomechanical of baseball skills because of the complexities that arise due to ball handling and the ability to hit at right positions and within accurate angles. Coach Jims developed several drills to enhance achieving the perfection of this skill.” Power Hand Drill” one of the biomechanical baseball skill brought by Coach Jims for enhancement. According to Goldman and Kahrl (2010),
“A hitter’s powers come from the bottom or pull hand. This drill develops bottom hand strength. Have batter using only one arm at a time, take stance, inward turn, stride and full cut at balls off of a tee. Take about 20 cuts at a time with each arm, making sure to keep the barrel higher than the hands, and follow through.”
The game demands more energy at the bottom arm in order to balance with the energy at the top arms for stability of the body.
In addition to the above biomechanical baseball skills, “for the hitter to appropriately practice the hitting in Multiple Location Contact Drill, three location pitches must be given and the batter has to learn how to use hips and turn on the pitch pulling it in a recommendable manner” (Shamoo, Silberstein and Germeroth, 2000). The ball is hit by the batter exactly at the center of the pitch and is mandatory that he must not fail to take the ball to the opposite side of the pitch.
Behind Soft-Toss Drill
Tension and rigidity always being experienced by most of the batters at the very moment they enter the batter’s box. Tension and rigidity are two confusing factors that can never transfer or release true power of a batter into the bat. This is one of the biomechanical baseball skills which have to be applied in order to successfully eradicate rigidity and tension in baseball game. When a batter swings and hit the ball at the same time in this situation, the power is locked and cannot be released with a force.
According to Shamoo, Silberstein and Germeroth (2000) “by being relaxed before this point you are allowing all your powers to flow into the bat in this focused burst of intense.” Therefore “Behind Soft Toss Drill” as biomechanical baseball skills, is another very important skill in the baseball game because it focuses on reinforcement of the importance of being inside the baseball. The coach is set to perform with one hitter at ago. The coach therefore has to position himself up four feet directly behind the baseball by either kneeling or sitting down. The coach possesses a bucket of ball in readiness to soft toss and on the other hand, the hitter positions himself in the box changing only the position of his head. This drill as a mechanical baseball skill of course is not being done in a long-toss manner but only changes the angle of flight from the side to the back.
In this particular context, acquisition of all the biomechanical skills a hitter is able to turn his head round by the moment the coach tosses the ball in an ordinary soft-toss drill. The correct measures of delivery must be taken for the position of the ball by the hitter because he must be ineligible to deliver the ball from the middle of the plate to the outside corner. The usual swing as required during the baseball game is then taken by the hitter trying to drive each pitch to the back opposite corner of the pitch. The swing is necessary in order to allow their hands be away from their bodies in effort to pull the ball to fully exercising their drill skills in this game. This drill correctly gives guidelines on how to stay inside the ball while at the same time providing a quick feedback on each swing.
In effort to illustrate this further, Goldman & Kahrl (2010) states that
Always have the players hit balls up the middle, meaning the toe should be set up off the front foot(unless they are working on driving the ball the other way or pulling the ball, which is a little more advanced. If they set up to the tee incorrectly, they will develop bad habits. Also, always have player start with their eyes up (meaning they are not looking at the ball to start…they should make their eyes track back to the ball)
Bungi Cord Drill
This is another mechanical baseball skill of the hitting skills which give attention in helping hitters to feel the impact of allowing the front elbow down in the swing. Being a quite complicated system which has movement stressing several kinds of elements inside the joint, elbow is majorly made to perform tensile pulling during baseball game. Just like in “Behind soft-toss drill,” the coach deals with individual hitters. A “bungi cord” should be of two feet long with a hook on each end on use. By the time a batter is placing his arm inside the bucket, he also loops the cord around his torso. As a matter of facts, Snagging is necessary in this drill to effectively hold the arm in place without rigidity of the load-up. The “Bungi Cord Drill” requires no ball at all but it is authentic that the hitter is to powerfully and effectively take swings with a bat. By following the right instruction, the”Bungi” is removed after several repetitions while the hitter taking his usual swing until he feels he is in full control of his movement.
Drop Drill Hitting
Whiffle golf balls, a wooden stick or a temporally home plate are the required equipments in Drop Drill Hitting as one of the biomechanical baseball skills by the use of a regulation bat or a stick, cut to the length of a bat. A player takes a hitting stance then the feeder makes a safe distance from the hitter. “The distance should therefore be of about 6-8 feet away from the fence” (Albert, 2003). This skill is excellently applied to assist with batting speed in baseball players.
In attempt to record best performance in Drop Drill Hitting, a number of professional have presented varying statements on the biomechanics of the body during the drill. For instance, it is important to make sure that the “clubface isn’t always closed at the top, with the face angled to the sky” (Goldman & Kahrl, 2010). In addition according to Albert (2003) “it is important to make the club’s toe point to the ground at the top by rotating his arms on the way back with the face more open”. It can therefore be ascertained that in performing such simple yet complicated body actions, a perfect balance is achieved.
Albert (2003) illustrates that “performing the drills only once is not satisfactory but should be performed consistently until the punter does them by habit”. It has been established that by performing this repeatedly, a learner manages to achieve success in body biomechanics. Another notable biomechanical baseball kills which has development within this area and aims at finding a perfect body balance is the “drill 1Skill” (Leg Lineup).This illustration was purposely meant to properly line up punting leg with drop arm. It is important to note the fundamental facts and procedures in this exercise so that perfect body balance is achieved. In this regard, Albert (2003) states that “You should move your drop arm into a drop position until your hand hit your thigh as the first procedure in this exercise and suppose it doesn’t, adjust your hand arm position and replace the ball for a drop.”
Probably, this is the most positive step in biomechanical baseball skills to do and to start your drop off correctly. It is therefore mandatory to do this at the beginning of each and every practice session. The position of arm is perhaps best described by Shamoo, Silberstein and Germeroth, (2000), in stating that
“Your drop arm should line up with your punting leg so the ball is dropped directly over your punting foot. This will effectively help you to swing your leg straight up into the ball rather than attempting to swing your leg to a ball that is dropped from different points.” There is a need and the importance in taking note of your drop position to be certain that your arm and the ball lines up directly over your punting leg. To perfectly test this, you have to get a partner to take away the ball in order to move your arm straight down towards your punting leg. Once you have the correct position of the drop, have a good look at and memorize where that location is in reference to the rest of your body after being certain that you are in the right position.
Game Improvement
According to Shamoo, Silberstein and Germeroth, (2000) “There are probably many mental images of the biomechanical baseball skills and softball swing because there are coaches who teach hitting mechanics in different ways.” It is important to note that while there are differences in style that remain relevant in their applications, one fundamental point stands to be true – “all great power hitters use similar rotational mechanics and weaker hitters do not” (Batspeed, 2010). It therefore true that to improve on the skills of the hitters, they must be trained to become power hitters. This involves a complete knowledge on the techniques of hitting the ball in various positions while at the same time maintaining a perfect body balance.
Furthermore, the above discussions of biomechanical baseball skills have projected that battling mechanics are primarily based on linear mechanics. “By linear, I refer to the concept that bat speed is derived from the batters forward weight shift and extension of his hands and that batters are instructed to direct their energies in a fairly straight line back in the direction of the pitcher” Shamoo, Silberstein and Germeroth (2000).Most of the terms used in baseball are from the concepts of linear mechanics. It is therefore imperative that to improve the beautiful game of baseball, concerted research on the link between linear and rotational mechanics would be necessary. In addition to the above, a deeper understanding on the role of both mechanics of a body would definitely play a fundamental role in enhancing the beauty and improving the game.
While the above discussions portray critical steps that are needed to improve the game, there are more options that still remain large and should be exploited. These include the development of cognitive ability of a player. This is because of the fact that, maintaining a perfect balance and staying attentive during the game does not only demand the application of skills but id also a test on the cognitive ability of a player. The role of cognitive ability in this game is well illustrated by Fernandez (2006) in stating that “My main interest has been how to expand the limits of human attention, information processing and response capabilities which are critical in complex, real-time decision-making, high-demand tasks such as flying a military jet or playing professional basketball.” This therefore means that to improve the game of baseball, players must have advanced levels in cognitive abilities that surround their capacity to stay attentive and process information at fast speed.
The training programs that are employed by coaches should be improved for the game to improve. This must involve training programs that takes into consideration all aspects of the basic physiologic factors and aims at building them. These involve underlining the overload, progressive, frequency, specificity and active rest principles of training. Such codes in baseball training will definitely raise the levels of endurance and flexibilities of players and thus improve their performance and the performance of overall game of baseball.
Conclusion
While this paper has achieved much in attempts to analysis the biomechanics of baseball and how this game can be improved, there are still various options that can still be explored. However, I do believe that this paper will serve as a guideline in understanding the aspects of this beautiful and interesting game.
References
Albert, J. (2003). Teaching statistics using baseball. London: MAA.
Batspeed (2010). Batspeed Research. Web.
Fernandez, A. (2006). Cognitive Training for Basketball Game-Intelligence: Interview with Prof. Daniel Gopher. Web.
Goldman, S and Kahrl, C. (2010). Baseball Prospectus 2010. New York: John Wiley and Sons.
Shamoo, A.E., Silberstein, C.E. and Germeroth, R.M. (2000). Baseball. Washington: Informa Health Care.