Golf Tips » June 2004: A baseball pitcher’s motion is closer to a good golf swing than you think!
Getting into the correct position at the top of the swing seems to be difficult to acheive for some golfers. I use the analogy of a baseball pitcher (who also must develop velocity) to get my students to understand the position more clearly.
The top of the backswing in golf is very similar to the wind-up of a baseball pitcher. He has to transfer all of his weight onto his back foot, but keep his balance. He accomplishes this by keeping his weight on the inside of his back foot while allowing his weight to settle into his back hip.
Pick up a ball and go into a baseball pitchers wind-up to see what I mean.
The pitcher then makes is a forward movement to home plate while still keeping his body "square" to his intended line. Do the same thing with your golf swing: move your weight laterally toward your target keeping your hips and shoulders square to your intended line of flight.
The next move of the pitcher is to unwind his hips and shoulders while keeping the arm back as far as he can. This produces the "torque" needed to create the resulting power. Do the same thing: let your body unwind before you get to the ball to fell that same "torque." Another way to feel this is to put your clubface against a door-jam and push as hard as you can with your body and arms. You will exert much more pressure with the club against the door-jam if you also rotate your body rather that just doing it with your arms.
The final move the pitcher makes is a transfer of all of his weight onto his front foot with no weight on the back foot whatsoever. At the end of a good swing the golfer should have all of his weight on the front foot and the hips turned fully towards the target.
(Apologies to my student and former Major League pitcher Bill Landrum for my weak effort at emulating a baseball pitcher. Growing up in South Africa I know a lot more about cricket than baseball!)
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