Unless you have been in a cave for the last 3.5 months, you’ve heard all about Milton Bradley’s struggles at the plate (his struggles in the field too, I’m guessing, though that’s a topic for another day).  There is a lot of speculation as to why he’s having these problems, and most of them have to do with intangibles.  Some people think the expectations of his big contract are weighing him down, while others think its the media and even the fans negative treatment of him since he arrived in Chicago.  What no one seems to be talking about is the actual mechanics of his swing.  Thank goodness we hired a new batting coach, Von Joshua, to address those problems.  Here is his take on the situation:

Joshua thought Bradley had made progress during the Cubs’ series in Detroit, especially from the left side. But he sees the switch-hitter reverting back to bad habits. What Bradley is doing is starting off open with the lower half of his body, but he’s closed with his upper half. That doesn’t work.

“What happens is he dives with his foot toward the plate, and his upper body continues to turn even more,” Joshua said. “You can read his whole name on his back before he starts his rotation. You can’t hit like that.”

And yes, Joshua and others have pointed it out to Bradley and he is aware of it.

“What I’m trying to do is get him to either match his upper half to his lower half, or match his lower half to his upper half and have everything work as one unit,” Joshua said. “What’s happening now, is when he dives with his lower half and closes with his upper half, he can’t see the pitch.”

Switch-hitters can’t match their left side swing with their right. They’re two different swings, Joshua said.

“If you notice, he’s a lot slower and doesn’t jump at the ball as much from his right side,” Joshua said. “He thinks he’s going to be late maybe [from the left side] but, in essence, that slows you up even more. That’s what he’s fighting right now.”

That seems like a lot for a hitter to think about while he’s at the plate.  At least it sounds like Bradley has been told about this and is trying to fix it.  Contrary to popular belief, he may be a coachable guy, even though his temper on the field indicates otherwise.  Hopefully he can fix his swing.  The thing about Bradley is that when he wasn’t hurt or suspended, he always hit.  Most Cubs fans, myself included, were concerned about his ability to stay on the field.  Everyone seemed to think that if he could, he would hit.  That hasn’t been the case, however, and the issues with his swing are most certainly to blame.

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Tags: Milton Bradley, Slump, Swing, Von Joshua