Developing good bat speed is important to hitting. Because of its significance there are all kinds of ways of measuring it. 

You can use a radar gun. You can use an electronic swing analyzer. There are probably a couple of others that involve advanced technology.

And then there’s what’s depicted here. At the start of this session, this was a fully intact plastic chair. The way it looks now is the result of a line drive off the bat of Emma Bartz.

The chair was about 30 feet away. One second it was fine, the next split second it looked like this.

She hit it so hard that the chair didn’t even move. The ball just went straight on through.

Oh, and by the way, this was off a tee. I can only imagine what would’ve happened if you added the pitch velocity to it.

It was pretty cool to see. On the other hand, I also made sure to tell her the time-honored phrase: No chip-ins.