The Way of Baseball: Finding Stillness at 95 mph

by Shawn Green

Though lasting only a fraction of a second, the space sometimes felt like an eternity, making a ninety-five miles per hour fastball seem to float in like a beach ball. If I liked the pitch, my swing would begin with my lower half, legs and hips, rotating forward while my upper body stayed back. Next, the turning legs and hips would sling my upper body and bat forward with tremendous force. At that point, I wasn’t swinging; something was swinging me. To illustrate this further, consider again your breathing; sometimes it’s difficult to differentiate whether you’re breathing or whether the world is breathing you. Ninety-nine percent of the time, we pay no attention to breathing, but it still happens. In the past, whenever my bat felt slow, which inevitably happens in a 162-game schedule, I concentrated on speeding up my hands. Like most hitters, I thought I was supposed to swing a bat with my arms. After discovering separation and space, I realized that the best way to hit was to not swing at all, but to get the body in the proper, separated position, then simply allow the body to naturally uncoil. The bat then falls into the perfect slot and comes through effortlessly with great velocity. It sounds simple, but there is a catch. The stride and all the body movements leading up to the swing must be fluid and happen right on time. That’s the tricky part, the timing, which differentiates mediocre stretches from hot streaks. If the stride is late, then the bat rushes forward, th...