Batting Approach Quotes

The home run became glorified with Babe Ruth. Starting with him, batters have been thinking in terms of how far they could hit the ball, not how often.

I was kind of a slap hitter, trying to get base hits, hit line drives, stay below a certain trajectory with my ball.

When I'm at the plate, I'm not thinking about what I'm trying to do with the bat - I'm thinking about what the pitcher is trying to do with the ball.

Once I found my swing, I feel like if I put a good swing on it, I feel like it's got a good chance to go wherever - left, right, center - it doesn't matter. But I'm not just out here going to swing for home runs of anything. I'm just trying to put a good swing on the baseball.

I want to be a high-order batter in the one-day stuff, to play some long innings rather than just go in and have a swipe.

I'm seeing the ball well. I'm not trying for home runs. I'm trying to hit to right field more. When I do that, the home run comes.

When I grew up, I tried to score off every ball, be it a 10-over-match, a 20-over, or even a Test match. If I stay in the wicket for, say, about 30 minutes, I want to make the most of it and score maximum runs possible. You never know when you get out; try to score as much possible before that.

That's one thing I learned from watching great hitters hit. A lot of hitters, they're ready to hit from pitch one.

I'm the kind of a player who, if you give me something good to hit, I'm going to swing at it. Otherwise, there's nothing else you can do.

One game, one pitch can change everything for a hitter. The way I like to approach it is that every at-bat is its own unique opportunity to go out there and do something really good.

Yeah, I'm going to go back (after hitting his 500th home run, but commenting on reaching the 3,000 hit plateau) to my Punch-and-Judy days, hit the ball the other way, start bunting the ball a little bit.

I enjoyed playing any type of cricket. Didn't matter what type it was because I did not want to change my game. My game was built on one type of cricket: if there was a ball to hit, you hit it, whether it was Test matches, whatever it was.

The fellows that I played with encouraged me to bunt and beat the ball out. I was anxious to make good and did as I was told. When I came to Brooklyn, I adopted an altogether different style of hitting. I stood flat-footed at the plate and slugged. That was my natural style.

When you start off a T20 innings you want someone who is going to be hitting the top of off stump, causing problems and being quite disciplined with the ball.

If I get two strikes, I'll go to a pitch maybe that will help induce that a little bit.

Runs are runs, even if they are coming off playing cut shots or in front, but it's not like T20 can only be played with big shots.

I have been pretty free-flowing in my batting. I have not let situations change my batting around too much.

If you are batting first as an opener, you give yourselves a couple of overs, see what's the wicket behaving, and then try to assess what a good score on that wicket would be, and then you plan accordingly.

Working my way through different formats has not changed my batting approach much.

There are very rare occasions when you get a good wicket to bat on, but whatever wicket you get, you have to play at least 20 overs for your side.

With the new ball, against any bowler, it's important to see off the first few overs.

If I get runs in an entertaining fashion, then great. I like to get on top of bowlers and be aggressive. I don't want to be dominated by them. Hopefully people enjoy the way I play.

I think there's a lot of trust in being selectively aggressive I guess. Looking for your pitch you can drive, but not swinging if it's not there and not worrying about, 'Oh no, I'm down 0-2.' I feel as comfortable as I do at 0-0. I don't know.

If the keeper is standing up, in the fear of getting stumped, the batsman will not try to walk down the wicket to negate the swing.

It's important on any English wicket to leave well.