MLB: Cardinals trying to get McGwire up to speed

The season is young but Cardinal fans are already getting nervous. Many things have gone right for them including a comeback from Ray Lankford and a phenomenal start by rookie Albert Pujols. But the most pressing need, the question that everyone was asking about during the long winter has been answered. Mark McGwire’s knee is not healthy.

No, Big Mac is not on the DL, not yet anyway, but he might as well be. The Cardinals quite possibly would be better off with him on the DL.

Strong words spoken by someone who is not privy to Mark McGwire’s sessions with the Cardinals physicians. But one does not need to be a doctor to see McGwire is hurting. He can only play every other day and has been largely ineffective in those few starts (just one homerun). He is limping down the base path after weak ground balls and clearly grimacing.

For McGwire this is really nothing new. Even when healthy, he looks uncomfortable running the bases his hulking frame is more suited to trotting than running around those bases.

But the frightening thing is that McGwire looks uncomfortable swinging the bat. McGwire is swinging through balls that he should have no difficulty making contact with. In the past, even a fooled McGwire could pound a baseball 450 plus feet. But no, he is missing his pitches more often than not and the few he makes contact with are being weakly popped up out to right field.

The problem lies in McGwire’s (and almost everyone else’s) batting stance. His stroke is the epitome of efficiency with every part of his body contributing maximum effort to produce his short, lightening quick stroke. Vital to this is the back leg, which pushes the body forward and helps propel the bat through the strike zone. McGwire’s bad knee is the back one, and it does not allow him to push off with his back leg.

Looking at stats alone it would be easy to assume that McGwire is merely rusty, after all he has not played consistently in over half a year (playing in just 82 games last year). But watching him at the plate makes one believe it is much worse than that. He is not rust at all he is still the very intelligent hitter we have come to know. He has rarely been fooled. He is anticipating the pitches that are being thrown and these pitches seem to be right where he is expecting them. He just can’t hit them.

Once more, this lies in the injury to his knee. The forward motion provided by pushing off the back leg does much more than produce bat speed. It is a timing mechanism, allowing the batter to put the bat right where it needs to be when it needs to be there.

When McGwire sees his pitch coming, his body begins a series of motions like a countdown, but that countdown stumbles ever so briefly when it is time to push forward and so the bat arrives an instant or two later causing the ball to be hit lightly to the opposite field or to be missed entirely.

To put this problem in simple terms for Cardinal fans, this is exactly the problem Ray Lankford experienced last year. That thought should be enough to strike fear in the hearts of the most optimistic fan.

All is not hopeless through. McGwire is strong enough in his upper body to put up decent numbers without being able to push off. Strength is not the issue, timing is. He won’t hit 60 home runs, but he can hit enough to be productive in the cleanup spot. The secret is to not allow frustration to lead to bad habits. As mentioned before, McGwire is a smart batter who can make the necessary adjustments, but he can’t allow himself to swing freely (as Ray Lankford did last year). But Cardinal fans may want to say a quick prayer that Walt Jocketty has kept Jack Clark’s number on speed dial…………