How High Do the Best Hitters Hold Their Hands?

Since lowering the hands was often a topic the last few months, I wanted to look at what the best hitters actually do. For that purpose I’m looking at the so-called “launch position” around front toe touch, and not the stance, since many batters will start to lower and then load up during the stride (David Ortiz or Josh Donaldson), while a few start higher and then load down (Kris Bryant).

As a reference, I used the top of the shoulders and the highest finger on the handle. As a marker for the gap, I use barrel diameter, which is about 2 1/2 inch with wood bats.

Standard height I consider top of the shoulder plus/minus one barrel diameter, and low or high is more than one barrel diameter away from that (it is arbitrary but I have to chose some cutoff). I used shoulder high because that is a common teaching by many hitting coaches.

The hitters are the 2016 wRC+ leaders.

Mike Trout

His hands are borderline between standard and high. I have measured a tick more than one barrel diameter so I will group him in the high category. He is like Bryant also, one of the quite passive and early hand load guys and not a big “rubber band guy” like Donaldson who loads the hands very late to create a lot of stretch. That might be biomechanically slightly less efficient due to the stretch shortening cycle, but it is simple and not much can go wrong, plus he is explosive enough to leave a little on the table

David Ortiz

Very different load from Trout, as he lowers his hands and then loads them late as the lower body already opens. His hands even continue to go up as the elbow starts to lower, creating a ton of stretch. That is the modern Donaldson style of load that might be the biomechanically most efficient due to the best use of stretch shortening cycle. In the modern internet hitting coach circles, this is the most popular load right now, made popular by Bobby Tewksbary, who worked with Donaldson and many other pros. Almost all pros who have lowered their hands have some kind of connection to Bobby (Lamb, Pollock…). Overall his hands end up in a standard height at toe touch.

Joey Votto

More conservative load than Ortiz, although there is a little bit of lift during the load from below shoulder height. Overall his toe touch height is standard.

Daniel Murphy

Very quiet and conservative load that ends at a standard height.

JD

Same load style as Ortiz, ends at standard height.

Miggy

Donaldson loading style light. Hands end up on the low side.

Freddie Freeman

Tried to find his “new swing.” Hard to find a good one but he seems to be on the low side.

Altuve

Definitely on the high side

Kris Bryant

Load is a little like Trout; starts high and then drops to about standard.

Cruz

Not much of a load at all, if anything a very slight drop. Still ends up slightly high but not by much.

Rizzo

Starts low but ends up standard.

JD Martinez

Slight upward load to slightly high.

Belt

Small load to about standard height.

Cano

Small and early load slightly on the low side.

C. Seager

Classic standard load to standard height.

Carpenter

Hard to find a good shot but might be a little on the low side.

Betts

Slightly on the high side.

EE

Simple load to very slightly high.

Cespedes

One of the few very high guys as his hands start about ear to eye height.

Goldschmidt

Very small drop load to about standard height.

This is the top 20 in wRC+ last season. Seven of the guys were on the high side, 9 were on the standard side and 4 were on the low side below shoulder height. But overall most ended up somewhere around shoulder level at toe touch. It might be an advantage to not go very high as only Cespedes made the top 20 with an ear-level high load, but lower than shoulder high is not common either.

In my opinion, the whole lower-the-hands thing is mostly a pre-stride thing. Even Jake Lamb, who is the poster boy for low hands, starts low but then loads up to around shoulder height. Now there might be a biomechanical advantage to dropping the hands and then loading up late. I know Bobby Tewksbary from many hitting forum discussions when he still posted there, and I also recommend getting his excellent ebook if you are into hitting, but I’m not sure if that whole low-hands thing isn’t a little overblown. The Donaldson style of load with the lowering and the barrel tip is now really en vogue and anyone promotes it on the internet now, but the 2016 MVPs Bryant and Trout both don’t do it. It might very well not be quite 100% perfect what Trout and Bryant do there, and they are definitely both freak athletes, but it works well enough for them. I would definitely have young hitters experiment with the JD style to see if it is for them but it isn’t as much of an absolute as many people now try to sell it.

Some hitters did lower their hands in their stance and it worked for them, but others did not and they still hit very well. In either case, both will still load up to around shoulder height. The hands definitely do not start “on plane;” the hands and bat always will start down before they level out and then go slightly up through contact.

Here is Miggy’s hand path to illustrate that:

His hands do start low, but still his hands and bat start to arc down and then level out and turn up.  Basically the swing is like the sign of a famous shoe company, first arcing down behind the body and then going up through contact.