Batter Up: What's Your Stance???

Batting stances are one of the parts of the game that make each player unique.  Stances can be wide and open, short and compact or somewhere in between.  Players can have the bat pointed forward, straight up or backward.  Players can have the bat above their head, or down low to their body.  Any way you look at it, stances are one of the best part of the game to enjoy and dissect.

Different stances serve players different purposes and every stance that works for one guy probably wouldn't work for the next guy.  Many players spend a lot of time working on tweaking their stances to get their best results at the plate, as David Wright has the last three years noted in the above photo.  Below are some of my favorite weird/A-typical stances I have seen in baseball.  These stances are not necessarily bad, just unusual.

Craig Counsell

You can't have a discussion about batting stances without mentioning Craig Counsell.  Just look at this stance, what he is doing?  It looks like he's the shortest kid on the team stretching as high as he will go so he will look taller.  I don't know how this works for him, but it does.  I have tried this stance in real life and couldn't get close to hitting the ball.  He just got signed to a 1 year deal with the Brewers, which will be his 16th season.

Jeff Bagwell

 He had one of the strangest stances in baseball during his career.  As you can see above, he goes into a full crouch with his legs spread far apart.  The bat is leaning slightly forward and tilted back behind his head.  It sure worked well for him though, as he put up .297/449/1529 and 2300 hits in a 15 year career.

Ernie Banks

Ernie Banks hit 512 home runs in his career and won two MVPs with this stance.  Very compact, he must have had tremendous power to hit as many home runs as he did with such a short swing.  It's not necessarily the best stance to become a power hitter, but it clearly worked for him.

Ty Cobb

Ty Cobb used two batting stances in his career which are shown above.  The first stance was the stance he used when he was just looking for a hit.  The second stance was when he wanted to drive the ball to the gaps.  Obviously both stances worked well for him as he is baseball's all time leader in career batting average at .366.  It is interesting that he would use different stances to achieve different results.  It seems like the pitcher would better know how to pitch to him knowing his intentions, but apparently nobody figured out a good way to get him out in his career.

Mickey Tettleton

  

Tettleton had one of the strangest batting stances in baseball history.  He basically looked like he was just standing there with the bat pointed backward.  At the last moment he would grip tight on the handle and swing hard at the ball through the zone.  He hit 30 home runs or more in four different seasons, so his lazy looking batting stance sure did work well for him.

Rod Carew

 

Just like Mickey Tettleton, Rod Carew also had this weird "relaxed" batting stance. The bat is just pointed back lazily as if he isn't even seriously trying to get a hit. However, it worked for Rod Carew also, leading to a Hall Of Fame career of .328/92/1015. His stance was forever immortalized in the statue placed outside Target Field in Minnesota.

Ichiro

Ichiro has one of the most compact batting stances in baseball history.  Look at the way he stands, straight up and down.  He is also one of the best hitters in baseball history.  He has hit over .300 all 10 years of his career and lead the league in hits 7 times.  It seems like this compact stance would catch on more but it's more of a rarity, even though it has shown clear results for some of the best hitters of all time.

Dallas Braden

Being a pitcher in the American League means not having to bat unless it's interleague.  Dallas Braden clearly does not want to bat when it is his time to do so, as evidenced by the above photo.  He walks up to the plate and basically just stands there and doesn't even bother to try.  Not surprisingly he's 0-4 in his career but he does have 2 sacrifice hits.  He must really hate to be on the bases.

Tony Batista

Tony Batista's stance is odd in which he spreads his feet and stands almost sideways leaning forward toward the plate as if he's hovering over it.  He stands at about a 60 degree angle in to the plate.  He's another case of whatever works for you, as he had 4 different seasons of 30+ home runs.

 Kevin Youkilis

Kevin Youkilis' batting stance looks like he is constipated when he's up to the plate.  He also has a very unorthodox swing.  The swing he does in the batters box when he's on deck has been compared to Charles Barkley's erratic golf swing.  His left leg is bent more than his right leg, with his left foot turned toward his right foot.  His right foot remains straight.  He holds his bat right over his head.  Many people have questioned his stance and pointed it out as all wrong mechanically from about every aspect possible.  However, it works for him as he has a career .294 batting average.

Moises Alou

Moises Alou's batting stance looks like a little girl who really has to use the restroom trying desperately to hold it in.  Speaking of urination, lets not forget that Moises admitted to urinating on his own hands to toughen them up.  With both of his knees pointed in and the bat almost straight up in the air, I don't even see how he can get enough power to hit a home run.  He did find the power, though, to hit 332 of them.

As you can see, it doesn't matter how you stand as long as it works for you.  The players all have developed these stances over time and thousands of at bats.  Some players have worked with coaches to stand differently but found that their old batting stances are just naturally better for them.  Whatever stance a player uses, the batter will always be looking to accomplish the same goal of getting on base and helping his team score runs.  All of these stances worked, and there are sure to be many more interesting and unique stances by future players in MLB.