Mike Candrea and Lovieanne Jung from Team USA worked with SportsSkool to create an instructional hitting video.  Coach Candrea demonstrates the basic mechanics of hitting:  the grip, the stance, negative movement (loading), positive movement (striding), contact, and finish (follow through).

Key Points:

The grip: Grip the bat in the base of the fingers, not in the palm or finger tips.  Your door knocking knuckles should be lined up or splitting the difference.

The stance: The stance is the foundation built with an athletic position where the feet are outside of the hips and the knees inside the feet and slightly bent.  The elbows are down and the bat is at a 45 degree angle.

Negative Movement: The purpose of the negative movement is to get the majority of the batter's weight loaded inside the back leg and get the hands in a strong position.  This movement back toward the catcher is initiated with the heel of the front foot lifting slightly.

Positive Movement: The positive movement is the adjustment from the negative move to the position from which you will hit.  This is where you establish the hitting base where the batter's weight shifts back to being equally distributed on both legs..  In the negative move, the front knee moves toward the catcher.  The positive move redirects the front knee back toward the pitcher and starts the batter's forward movement.

Contact:  This phase begins when the batter's weight gets into the front legs heel and the bat head start its rotation forward toward the bat / ball contact point.  The batter's leverage is established when the hands and back elbow move through the point of alignment with the back leg. The next point is bat lag where the bat head is pointed to the catcher, the knob of the bat is pointed at the pitcher, and the hands are in front of the batter's center of gravity.  Bat lag is a key element in generating bat speed.  At contact, the back hand is palm up, the front hand is palm down, pushing against a firm front leg, and the hips have rotated.  A key element during the contact movement is to keep the head still.

Finish:  The first element of finishing is extension where the bat points toward the pitcher.  It is important that the batter keeps both hands on the bat through extension.  After extension, the wrists roll and the front arm guides the bat toward the back shoulder.

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