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In golf, that first picture would be of the (near) top of Zunino's swing.
That is a classic position. It's would be hard to be athletic and strong and not hit a bit from that position.
moe
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This is a 3-part series ... the click-through links are bottom right.
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Settled in at 7 pm sharp with a five-pound bag of cotton candy and a diet creme soda. That, or something dissimilar. Zuumball is in the present tense, babe. Mo' Dawg, Lonnie and I still remember Junior's first AB off Dave Stewart in 1989.
As we all know, Zunino was on pace for 200 whiffs in the PCL, which projects to 512 in the American League. We flipped the switch on the jumbo electron arms in the lab, they hummed up to a nice crackle, and were all set to Detect-O-Nate the cause of the 512 strikeouts.
Except there isn't a cause. Mike Zunino's swing is the truth. It's one of the best in baseball, fully the equal of David Wright's or Edgar Martinez' ... well, sorry, fully the equal of Wright's. We'll see whether Zunino can alligator-arm the inside pitch like Edgar could.
A great swing does not an MVP make. But it don't hurt none. Thusly:
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Tension
Zunino achieves his tear-jerking torque with the classic tension-stretch between right hand and left foot.
We documented this in Nick Franklin as a minor leaguer; since then, Nick has stripped down the hand action, keeping the foot action and "moving without motion" in the hand department.
In case you don't want to go watch this superb video, which gives you three angles on the same swing, it only takes one still to get across the point:
Can you feel, even from this still-life portrait, the way he is reaching forward with the left foot, against the rearward press of the right hand?
That's classic David Wright, and is the way that Edgar used to generate tension and power. Both of those men, of course, had the powerful "core" abdomen muscles that Zunino also has. As you know, we live to serve ... below are four snaps from David Wright's home run last night:
eful; Canseco, and Zunino, keep both hands firmly on the bat all the way through and you predict Fuzzy Zoeller-type spinal problems for the lad once he's in his 30's.
The point is. Given such excellent leverage, the intersection with such mammoth physical strength, this guy is going to have a nice collection of tape-measure shots before he's done. Think Jay Buhner, about 10% wider in the T-shirt. Bat and Terry remember the ambulance shot in New York...
But can he hit?
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