Abbreviated Look at Kikuchi’s Mechanics

by ~ October 19th, 2009 at 8:16 am

Jay Yencich, USS Mariner:

…whereas Kikuchi’s arm motion is more whippy. The majority of the stress seems to be in his arm, which alarmed me a little at first. I also noticed that, among other quirks, his arm can finish low and across his body and sometimes his trailing foot will drag forward as he decelerates. Aside from that, there aren’t any major mechanical concerns; the inverted W, which is in vogue now as the source of all pitching ills, was not present, nor did it look like he was otherwise putting a lot of strain on the other sensitive areas.

When I first started looking at video of Yusei Kikuchi I was also concerned with his whippy arm action.  Yencich is also right in saying no Inverted W is present, but what is there is the Inverted L, a less pronounced version of the Inverted W.

kikuchiinvertedl

The reason some biomechanics experts don’t like the Inverted L is for the same reason they dislike the Inverted W– it tends to cause timing problems that put unnecessary stresses on the arm as it falls behind the rest of the moving parts and tries to catch up.

kikuchitiming

There are worse mechanics out there and this isn’t enough to make me want to stay away from this guy, but I just thought I’d throw this out there.  For a further explanation of the Inverted L, click here.

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  • Jay Yencich

    I was not aware that there was such a thing as an inverted-L. I’ll be on the look for it now. I’m less of an expert in particular signs like that. I have an easier time identifying slots, finishes, and generally giving the eye test to see if anything is out of whack.

    Good to know that we’re mostly in agreement though, i.e., that there is something that’s slightly off about it, but probably nothing so damning as to chase away all interest.

    And I didn’t even know about the NPB tracker article until after I posted the write-up. Man, do I feel silly.