Grips, like everything else you do, are very important. In today’s video blog post, I want to talk briefly about the grip, and its’ affect on your hitting mechanics.
Hitting Mechanics: The Finger Grip & Gripping the Bat
When gripping the bat, the key is to always line up your middle knuckles. Whether you use a traditional grip or a finger grip, make sure that your middle knuckles are aligned.
In the Finger Grip, you’re still holding the bat more in the joints of your fingers and not so much back in the palm of your hand, and wrapping the fingers around. The middle knuckles are aligned straight up and down.
- Bring the bat down and lay it in front of you.
- First, start with your left hand and you want to take the bat and lay it across your palm.
- The knob of the bat should be up the upper corner of the palm of the hand.
- Now, wrap your fingers around the bat at an angle.
- Notice, after the fingers are wrapped, now turn the bat and form a V at the top with the thumb and pointing finger.
- Next take the right hand and stick the corner of the heel of the hand in that V and wrap the fingers around, and then wrap the thumb around.
- Now bring the bat up, align the middle knuckles and make sure they’re straight
- Get the bat position where it feels good, and this is called the finger grip
I prefer this grip over using a traditional grip for two main reasons:
Number one – with a finger grip, you have the bat more out on the fingers than you do in the palm of your hands. And think about it – when you use your fingers more, you have more dexterity so you have more control.
Number two: you cover more surface on the bat. You still have the two-inch choke and the same extension of the bat, so you’ll still get the same force generated if you had your hands all the way down to the end of the bat.
The last point that I really want to make about the grip is probably the most common error that is made by the young athlete – over-rotation of the knuckles. Many young athletes take the middle knuckles of the top hand and they over-rotate it with their bottom knuckles. This is a serious mistake, because when they swing the bat with their knuckles aligned like that, it automatically forces them to rotate their wrists underneath. And your wrist doesn’t move in that direction.
The proper technique you want is to snap the bat through and rotate your wrist over the top.
What do you think of the Finger grip? Share your thoughts and comments below! And Don’t Forget to Like Us on Facebook!