Overall Efficiency Grade: 50.2

Mobility, Flexibility & Stability Screening

Eric is in the “tight” mover category. Gilgenbach’s thoracic mobility falls in the “tight” category. He turned less than 45 degrees in both directions. His hip mobility falls in the “tight” category as well. His right hip IR was 30 degrees, and right hip ER was 45 degrees. His left hip IR was 45 degrees and ER was 45 degrees. In terms of patterning his loading mechanism, smaller moves will suit him best.

He struggled during the pelvic tilt and torso rotation tests. This should be a focus of his mobility/prep plan, to create proper disassociating movements. This will help inhibit energy loss as it moves from his legs to his core, if he can separate his lower body and upper body independent of each other. He did pass the pelvic rotation test, indicating good upper body stability.

He failed the overhead squat test completely. His lack of depth was due to poor ankle mobility. However, he did lack proper thoracic flexion and extension to keep the bar overhead. Ankle mobility should be a focus of his mobility/prep routine. Poor mobility in the ankles can lead to poor stabilization and energy transfer from the ground through the legs.

His scapular region is under-developed and should be a major focus of his strength plan. His scapular retraction was 6” on the right side, and 6” on the left side, which would put him in the “neutral” category, approaching “loose”. He will require a moderate range of motion to get into a scap load. Shoulder flexion was good, and external rotation was good. He showed limited internal rotation on both arms. During his reach, roll, and lift test, he showed good scapular stability, however, he struggled to get into child pose, which could indicate lack of mobility in his hips and/or knees.

His lower body showed good stability during the glute bridge test, and he also showed good core stability during anti-rotation. He failed his single leg balance test on both legs, lending further evidence to a lack of lower body stability. This can affect his loading mechanism, because if he is on one leg for an extended period of time, he could rush the loading mechanism which would affect timing. Also, instability in the landing leg will inhibit quick energy transfer from the ground. He also showed poor hamstring flexibility, particularly in his left leg. This should be a focus of his mobility/prep routine.

All wrist, forearm, and cervical screens were a pass. His side bend numbers were adequate, reaching 45 degrees on both sides.

Force Plate Jumps

Eric has a significant unilateral leg bias in his right leg. It’s in a “danger” stage for likelihood of hamstring pulls. The bias ranged from 26% per jump. The unilateral balance will need to be addressed with strength and conditioning.   Counter movement jumps were equal to squat – pause jumps at 280% BW. This gives him flexibility in a loading mechanism as the body is in a neutral state of conducting energy.

Force Plate Swings

Below is video of the swing analysis. I will walk you through this matched up with video.

Eric prefers to create speed through horizontal force. Guys that tend to produce good speeds through horizontal force do so from a wide base. He does slip into his front leg early in this style and can hold his back foot force into the ground longer. He loads into his toes so loading forces aren’t maintained as well. He creates 90% of BW in back leg load, but doesn’t hold it as well on way out into his forward advance. His back leg torque numbers are slightly low at 40 Newtons. His vertical front leg force is low and dissipates over a longer period of time. He creates 150% BW of Z-axis force. His preferred method of creating speed is horizontal force. He uses a front leg block to transfer energy (77% of body weight on X-axis, which is high). However, he loses back shoe force early and slips into front leg prior to rotation. This reduces his adjustability. To add, the front leg although producing good force, dissipates it over a longer period of time. This would be normal on an off-speed adjustment but not ideal off of fastballs. Leg to leg transfer numbers thus suffer as the energy has shifted into his front leg before rotation. He would need to be actively pushing into the ground while gaining ground versus pushing away from the ground to his front side, which he is doing currently.

KVEST Sequencing & Rotational Speeds

The 3d readings are on kinematic sequencing and rotational speeds.

Eric was good sequentially for the most part. The improvement he could have is the decel rate of his hips. He stabilizes his front leg slowly, so it happens over a longer period of time. He would need the feeling of aggressively getting into heel plant versus dissipating energy through the front leg. When he drifts he separates greater from his hands and causes slack in the sequence.  Leg speeds are “average” at 660 deg/sec, on the Real Speed equation (which factors in player diameter). Torso speed ranged from “averager” to “good” at 880 deg/sec to 980 deg/sec.. The core is stable which allows for good energy gain into the arms at 1150 deg/sec. Wrist speeds are good at 1740 deg/sec.

Bat Sensor Data

Eric creates good speed, and accelerates well. He is good amongst college players at 150 milliseconds. Bat speed was average at 77 mph and ranged from 74-80 mph. Rotational acceleration was at 26g’s, which is outstanding. That was lowered to 20 g’s on balls he over-separated on by slipping into his front leg more.  Good is 20-23 g’s.  26 g’s is elite. From the illustration below, you can see he turns his body to turn the bat and maintains his arc that way. Attack angles to the ball were at bit uphill at 18-20 degrees but appropriate for his average exit velocity.

Summary & Recommendations

• Get with strength and conditioning and monitor the right leg bias which is in a “danger” range.

• Work on ankle stability – it is a likely cause of the lack of stride control and longer dissipation of heel plant.

• Sequencing is good – hip decel can be improved.

• Biggest take-away is staying into ground with back shoe longer to avoid slipping into front leg early and losing adjustability. This will reduce his swing and miss and chase.