Bo Bichette’s beautiful swing gets some major love on MLB Network
Photo credit: Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sport
By Ian Hunter
Aug 3, 2019, 11:55 EDT
Does Bo Bichette’s swing remind you of anyone’s? Aside from his father Dante, when Bo hacks at the plate, his swing takes a page out the book of Josh Donaldson, Javier Baez and to a lesser degree, Jose Bautista.
There are worse swings to emulate, right?
There are many working parts to Bichette’s swing, but it’s like watching poetry in motion at the plate. The leg lift, the foot plant, the hip pivot and the hands exploding through the zone. I feel like I’m writing baseball erotica here.
Blue Jays fans aren’t the only ones gushing over the team’s 21-year-old shortstop. The number eight prospect in baseball received some love from the analysts at MLB Network.
Former Blue Jay Mark DeRosa broke down Bichette’s swing on this highly informative segment from MLB Central.
Just like Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bichette isn’t hoping to punch holes in the infield; he’s swinging for the fences every single time. DeRosa picked up on that, too.
“What I love about Bo Bichette is with no strikes and with one strike he is trying to do exactly the same thing, he is trying to go deep.”
Bichette’s aggressive home run cut is especially evident in this tweet Drew Fairservice sent the morning after Bo’s first career home run.
When a hitter has a big leg kick like Bichette, they can often get exposed if they don’t change their approach with two strikes. Bichette gets into defensive mode with two strikes and the leg kick turns into a modified toe tap as a timing mechanism.
I never picked up on this until DeRosa pointed it out in the video, but notice that Bichette’s torso is facing the pitcher at contact? That tells you the amount of torque Bichette generates on that swing. He uses every ounce of that 185 pound frame of his.
By far, the coolest thing about Bichette’s swing is that it’s nearly a carbon copy of Donaldson’s. DeRosa touched on this in the video and there are some similarities to Baez’ swing, but side by side, aside from a slight hand adjustment, Bichette and Donaldson’s swings mirror each other.
MLB Network
The funny thing is Bichette didn’t model his swing like Donaldson’s, it just turned out that way. I asked Bo about the Donaldson comparison for a piece at The Athletic last May.
“I’ve used the leg kick my whole life. I think we do a lot of things similar, but his hands work a little bit different than mine. He’s more into his mechanics and he’s more in tune with his body.”
There you have it; one of the Blue Jays’ brightest young stars receiving praise not only from the folks at MLB Network, but Bichette’s making a believer out of many people around baseball.
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