Old Fashion and New Fashion of On-Deck Circle Swing

Starting from left are Babe Ruth, Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, and Ted Williams, as we all know, the great hitters in old time Major League baseball and they mysteriously take almost same pose in their finish of on-deck circle swing.

By the way, in japan, swinging without a ball is called as "SUBURI" and Japanese players work it out so hard for improving muscle memory. However, as for American or Latin American players, SUBURI has allegedly not been worked out so frequently and I heard that they regard it as a mere warming up rather than a drill or practice. Probably, that difference reflects their baseball environment. I mean, many Japanese player can't enjoy the sufficient space enough to hit a ball as much as they want.

Incidentally, the ward SUBURI consist of "SU" and "BURI". And "SU" means "mere" or "plain" , "BURI" means "swing".  (However, SUSHI's "SU" does not mean "mere" and "plane" and it means "cerebration", also, "SHI" means "manage" or "administer". So, Sushi means "cerebration manager".)

example of SUBURI as a drill


Then, let me give an example for understanding to what extent does Suburi make its way into Japanese daily life. How would you feel if you saw a young guy having baseball bat at night parking lot? Most Japanese people even who don't have an interest in baseball would be able to recognize that sight as "oh, baseball player is working out the Suburi". This also means that Japan is keeping public peace well and it probably is due to Japanese national character.

In the first place, the word Suburi had existed before baseball was imported to Japan. Suburi has origin in Japanese sword practice and it was a fundamental training for so-called Samurai, which is a general term for the Japanese traditional soldier class.

Japanese baseball players have unknowingly inherited this tradition from Samurai and eager baseball players work it out some hundreds times per day. This diligence caused japan to win the WBC twice in a row.

However, Suburi doesn't always result in improving hitting skills because it has a pitfall, that is, swinging without a ball means there isn't any yardstick for judging that swing as right or wrong. So some players fall into slump while repeating an incorrect swing in the Suburi. Even Hideki Matsui, former yankees' outfielder, said that "What I think as the most difficult matter regarding batting is the Suburi."

Plus, that it is indispensable for talking about relationship between Japanese player and Suburi is the anecdote of Sadaharu Oh. He worked the Suburi with real Japanese sword, following an advice of Hiroshi Arakawa, familiar with Japanese traditional martial arts. This can be said as a typical example which speaks of the origin of Suburi.
  

Considering above, one of the important reasons why baseball has gained such popularity in Japan is probably that, for Japanese, baseball bat evokes Samurai's sword. Indeed, the sight of baseball kids going to practice with carrying their bat evokes me the sight of Samurai kids going to school with carrying their wood sword.

By the way, Although there seems to be a tendency that many of modern people romanticize Samurais, the real was more complicated. In Edo period, 17-19th century, Samurais, who consisted less than 10％ of entire population, had gained their income from tax which was paid by rices produced by farmers, who consisted over 80％ of entire population. And there was rarely war in that period. 

samurai at late Edo period

In such an era, Samurais had managed to keep their dignity by the custom law of taking responsibility for their failure by death, namely Harakiri, a specific suicide form for Samurai. On the other hand, as for common people, they envied, hated, feared, looked down inwardly, and wanted to be the Samurai permitted to have swords and last name. Yes, Samurai is the privileged class determined by heredity. In these social situations, common people excited at such Samurais' acts at the risk of their life as Chusingura incident, which was dramatized and loved by so many people in those days, and even now.

Chusingra is a story of 47 Samurais who settled the score for their late boss, determining to be punished at Harakiri.

As time passed, in 1868 Edo period ended its 265-year history and the class society was dismantled. All people became equal under the empire of Tenno and conscription system was introduced. As a result, quite a few common guys, former carpenter, fisherman, merchant and farmer, became the "Samurai", that they envied and wanted to be. Probably, that would mean that their family inwardly joined "Samurai class" too, and this might bring them some kind of excitement, especially as for volunteers' family.  Then, militarism flourished among Japanese people like never before and they rushed into World War II.

Samurai values,which was privilege classe values, are infiltrated among common people by drastic social revolution.

World War II ended in 1945 and Japan was defeated. Their excessive militarism was thoroughly demolished by GHQ, US occupation army, and even many of Japanese had came to loath that excessive militarism as if it was a nightmare. Although there were some moving tales concerning Japanese army, those were never told in history classes. Consequently, Samurais who inhabit our mind had lost there whereabouts. So where have they gone? Would they go into underground with organizing something like a resistance army? No. They found a way of survival in the Baseball.

Indeed, baseball was so comfortable place for them because there were sword, canon ball, cheer trumpet, gaiter, helmet and base. So not hesitantly, Samurai in our mind chose baseball, not Kendo, Judo or Sumo. Due to reasons like above mentioned, baseball came to be recognized as a special event in Japan, and it is not too much to say that baseball became a national sport of Japan.

In fact, As for Japanese youth baseball club, there is military like atmosphere even now. Japanese baseball kids, including high school students, are required to have close-cropped hair like army recruit and act on hierarchical relationship between senior and junior student. They related each other as if they are sergeant and private. It can't happen that junior calls senior by his first name. This circumstance probably is vestige of class society that was dismantled and sought sanctuary in the baseball.  In fact, their human relations don't mach with today's Japanese society's it and but, therefore, they often are tied up with strong bond.  Of course, It isn't so beautiful tale than the word expresses.

Left Japanese baseball kids  :  Right US army recruit (from Full Metal Jacket)

　　　　　　　

This may not be easy to imagine except for Japanese, joining baseball club means abandoning everything which teenagers desire to do, like hitting the streets in fashionable clothes, having a date on sunday, forming a rock band and pretend to be bad boys. In this point, baseball is different from football, basketball and the other sports in Japan. This tendency is particularly strong among leading teams. Kazuhiro Kiyohara, former baseball player hitting 525 home runs, said in looking back his high school life at PL gakuen, known as holding one of dynasty baseball clubs, "that was a prison" and added, "my pride." In a sense, as for Japan, baseball club is playing a role of the conscription system.  

A view of national competition of high school baseball; A major Mass communication company invests money in it. In this high-technology civilized society, Samurai has already been a subject for investment and appreciation.

In spite of quite a few "progressive" coaches, managers and critics have been criticizing that military style, it still remains in Japanese baseball education system and is forming fundamental policy because that style can certainly make "wining" team at their category. Think about parenting. If you adopt spartan education for your child, he or she will raise into a "decent" educated, sociable and robust person. But genius will not raise from that way. This is the major problem of Japanese baseball.

However, military style education system has certainly made Japanese baseball strong and created some characteristic baseball style. As an extreme case, in WWll-era, hitters were not allowed to avoid a hit by pitch because it means deserting from enemy. This rule was forced by authority under Japanese military dictatorship for conforming baseball, having origin in USA, to their policy.

Regarding a rule about hit by pitch, it's just a special case, but that mentality is running through the base of Japanese baseball. For example, back hand catch is not liked among old school instructors because they regard it as a deserting from enemy's shot. And as to batting, they liked downward swing, and that tendency associated with swordsmanship.

A typical example of Japanese style downward swing which is recognized among many instructors as one of the fundamental hitting skills

In origin, downward swing was devised for making level swing, that is, It was a device for preventing bat-head from excessively falling down by its weight. So it was particularly emphasized in Suburi, aiming at forming the habit of good swing which they think so. And it was Sadaharu Oh who unwittingly had taken a role of preacher of downward swing with his Suburi practice. Thus, downward swing spread among Japanese baseball and it got a instructors' favor who demanded hitters to hit a ground-ball single hit more than home run because of team play and making it easy to control their players. (Outstanding player isn' easy to control.)

Left Sadaharu Oh : Right Alex Rodriguez

Of course, as it turned out, "progressive" instructors came to have objections against downward swing. So to speak, in Japan, there have been continuing conflicts between liberal and conservative instructors over a broad range of topics. These circumstances probably are due to the history of Japanese baseball which was affected by militarism in its early days. And progressive or liberal instructors generally have been urged that "Why don't we lean from major league baseball?" and "They dynamically hit big home runs with upper cut swing, don't they?"

However, it is ironic that Suburi with downward swing has been defused among major league players since about 1990's. Derek Jeter is a typical example of it. If memory serves me right, this sort of on-deck circle swing, namely, Suburi has been popularized since about mid-1990's in MLB, and in that era, most Japanese baseball players have already been taught that downward swing enough to fed up with. So I wander if today's MLB style downward swing has its origin, at least in part, in Japanese Suburi.

Top, Manny Ramirez : Bottom, Carlos Delgado 

Finally, I write about this downward swing from the point of view of puncher-swinger method. Old timer's Suburi with level swing plane seems to intend to use the power of body rotation. On the other hand, downward Suburi seems to intend to use the top hand's power. Revolution of hitting mechanics,which took place in 1990's, shows its glimpse even in the on-deck circle swing.

※）Repeating downward swing can bring ill effect to correct swing mechanics.