I hate Gerry Davis...
 

....well, at least his stance.

I liked everything about it, until I got blasted on both hands the other night. Same spots, in between the index finger and thumb. I put my hands together now, and it shapes a black and blue baseball, complete with threads. My partner said he saw it coming. My hands are far too exposed.

your fingers go behind your knees (on the sides) and you tuck your thumbs up behind the tops of your shinguards.

I just got off the phone with Gerry. He said that he hates you too! :D :D

What LMan said ... I'm thinking you've got your hands wrong.
O/w I'm having trouble imagining how you got hit where you did [web btwn thumb & index] - that's a real odd angle for the ball to be coming from.
That, and you may be standing too close to the plate/batter/catcher.

Unless you are gonna tuck 'em behind your back - face it: your arms/ hands are going to connect with a pitch occasionally, no matter what plate stance you use.

I've been drilled in a couple of [unprotected] places doing GDS - arms mostly, and one wrist; but my hands got clobbered far more frequently, and harder, when I was a "scissors guy". With my hands on the SIDE of my knees, I've had them brushed by a foul/ passed ball .. maybe twice? In 3 years. Hit? Never. It's just not a place/ direction where the ball often goes where I am standing on the field.

And I bet you are standing in the wrong place...most likely too close to the catcher. The closer you are to the catcher, as with a traditional slot stance, the more you get hit (like the catcher).

I'm pretty far back, so I don't think that's the issue.

I wear my shinguards under my pants, thank you. So hooking my mitts underneath is not an option. With a righty up, your left hand is exposed. That's just part of the risk. I was just unlucky enough to take two identical shots on both sides of the dish within a matter of minutes. Really weird and painful.

You should still be able to tuck them behind your guards... just put some pant in there too...

That is, if you're wearing plate pants.

I wear combos behind the plate, and its never been an issue for me. The top of the guard rides up some when I crouch anyway.

Maybe I've been doing it wrong then ... can you show me a picture of someone in the proper stance with his hand exposed? My hands (as mentioned above) are behind my knees - with just a LITTLE exposure on my wrists.

I have used the GD for about 5 years now and have never been hit in the hand. I have been hit on the left arm, though, on pitches that are WAAAY inside to a righty that the catcher's missed completely. You should be relatively protected if you are in a good slot position and nobody moves or misses the pitch...;)

I'm still trying to picture this, and maybe I've been doing it wrong.

I'm in the slot..."double wide" ... my nose is on the inside edge of the plate.
My toes are pointing toward the mound, and my hands [fingers/palms] are on the outside of my knees, fingertips pointing at the ground, tucked in behind the side profile of my shingards; my thumbs are on top of my legs, behind my knees and also behind the profile of my shinguards. My right knee is [usually] behind F2's left shoulder; my LEFT knee is [usually] "behind" the batter's body. My WRIST can get hit, but for the life of me I cannot imagine how I can get a solid hit on my hand as described by kyle ... not saying it didn't happen to him, just thinking, still, that maybe it's GDS/Modified[kylejt ver.] that's the problem.

so how far should you stand behind the catcher when your doing the GDS....anyone got pics??

Ahem,
 

"....anyone got pics??"

Here is one umpiring working the Davis Stance:

http://www.umpire.org/modules.php?na...r=asc&start=15

REgards,

Link doesnt work.

Ok,
 

Jamie, please make a little effort yourself:

Click on the "search" button at the top of this page.

Type in "Davis Stance" . . .

When the threads come up go down a bout 10 threads until you see a couple of "Davis Stance" threads.

Click on them until you find this link.

It works fine from that location.

Regards,

its not jamie, the whole point is to try to avoid the whole search thing.

Sorry if I am lazy, just one of those days.

...A stride to start. 30"-34" :)

Ok,
 

Kyle:

I am not very good at this type explanation so stick with me:

When I worked the Davis at TOP my hands are on my knees with the "v" between thump and first finger inserted down into the area where my leg guards end at my knee.

My "trigger" to set is to push my hands slightly forward. This means, too me, that little of the "bone part" of my hand is showing just the flesh part until you get to the wrist.

The worst hit I got this year (*) was from a batter that bunted at and fouled back a pretty good fastball. The ball hit me about 4" above the wrist bone.

Using the Davis Stance System does not mean that you won't get hit at all it just seems to me that you get hit less. Being back certain lowered the number of times I was hit during the 5 1/2 years I used the stance.

(*) I no longer stand back 4' as I did when using the Davis. I still work "double wide" but I work in the normal positioning just back of F2 (note: please note that Gerry Davis, Gary Darling and Mark Wegner three practioners of the GDS also no longer work deep).

I did this because evaluators, coaches and assignors do not accept change easily and I found being deep was something I constantly had to defend.

Regards,

Thanks Tim,

Your latest stance sounds like what I've evolved to now, and for similar reasons. The two shots on the hands were just a freak happenstance. I was just cursing Gerry for a couple of days afterwards.

Kyle

I work 9' behind the corner of the plate. If you have a correct catcher's box, that extends 8' from the point of the plate -- so I'm just behind that. Most teams that put one down use the batter's box template, so I'm right on the end line.

This lets me work in the same spot 95% of the time -- whether the catcher is up (a little) or back. If the batter is up in the box and the catcher moves far forward, I adjust forward a little.