During this episode of Ahead of the Curve, I interviewed Lorenzo Garmendia, Founder of Gradum Baseball. Lorenzo shares information about his experiences training players from the major league all the way down to children. Lorenzo Garmendia also talks about exit velocity, launch angles, swinging flaws, and how hockey is a great way to train for baseball. Episode Highlights: How did Lorenzo Garmendia get involved in baseball and as a coach?   What is Lorenzo doing with players for training? What are the first things Lorenzo Garmendia does with players? Lorenzo talks about the Tuesday Teaching videos.  How does Lorenzo go about analyzing a player’s videos? What are some things that players are doing the same? What are some practical ways that Lorenzo helps players train their swing in practice? Is he training swings with slider pitches in practice?  What spin rate does he want players to be able to be within? How does Lorenzo train players for decision-making? What is the best way to train hitters individually? How do you balance between staying directionally center to swinging pull side? What types of tools are Lorenzo using? Lorenzo shares his theories on exit velocity and launch angles. What are things his players get excited about doing? Is there anything that Lorenzo Garmendia believes that other coaches might disagree with?  Which things that happen during practice typically that we would notice? What are some learning things that Lorenzo Garmendia is excited about? 3 Key Points: There are typically fives hitting flaws that you can train players on after accessing each player’s swing individually? Hitting is a physics equation. It is force equals mass times acceleration. It is the force you impart into the ball for exit velocity. The best launch angle you want as a hitter is 25 degrees. If you hit a ball at 25 degrees at a 100 miles-per-hour exit velocity, you are hitting a home run to dead center in any stadium in the United States.  Tweetable Quotes: “I have a mathematical background and I was looking at it like, God, what they (coaches) are teaching them (players) really doesn’t make sense from a hitting perspective and from a pitching velocity perspective.” – Lorenzo Garmendia (01:10) “The first thing I look at is lower half. So, one of the main things is if you aren’t using your legs in the swing you’re not going to be very successful.” – Lorenzo Garmendia (05:50) “The biggest thing we see is what we call, ‘Whether you’re a pusher or do you swing the bat?’ Do you push your hands and your hands swing the bat? Or are you letting your body sequence correctly and the body swinging the bat?” – Lorenzo Garmendia (06:01) “Watch a hockey game and if let’s say the goalie is in front of you, you’ll never see a hockey player come around a puck. They are always to and through it. So, when you look at direction, that is huge in regards to baseball.” – Lorenzo Garmendia (06:16) “Every player was taught east to west. When in reality the object of the game is to hit the ball forward. So if you want to hit the ball forward, technically you want to be working from back to front south to north.” – Lorenzo Garmendia (06:35) “Even at the highest levels, guys don’t know what they’re doing. And what I mean by they don’t know what they’re doing, they don’t know what they’re swing is supposed to be doing or how they can repeat it.” – Lorenzo Garmendia (09:22) “Let’s train the swing to be able to hit every pitcher’s pitch and then let’s go to work.” – Lorenzo Garmendia (13:39) “Contact point is huge. But contact point is determined by the pitcher and where you make contact.” – Lorenzo Garmendia (25:08) Resources Mentioned: Ahead of the Curve Podcast Twitter: @AOTC_podcast Lorenzo Garmendia: Linkedin Gradum Baseball Website: gradumbaseball.com Gradum Baseball: Instagram