The intent of the Baseball Collegian Pitching Project is to inform coaches and players and parents of some of the many theories on being a successful pitcher.
Most every concept has advocates with very strong opinions on either side of the argument. Too often, a theory is chosen based on popularity, conventional wisdom, or because someone famous does it that way, as opposed to one’s own analysis. With so many contradicting theories, it is essential to have an understanding of all of the possible options, before deciding which one to commit to.

These pitching theories are presented without judgment, without confirmation bias, with no preconceptions, and without dogma or commercialism. In turn, the strong hope is that people are inspired to do the work to make up their own mind based on as much information as possible – and in turn, do what makes most sense to them.

Last month, the discussion was about the cause of arm injuries. This week, the discussion turns to staying healthier.

Q. HOW DO YOU STAY HEALTHIER?
General Belief:
• Pitch Counts & Technique
American Sports Medicine Institute — Thus, the recommendations for preventing injuries in adolescent baseball pitchers are:
1. Watch and respond to signs of fatigue (such as decreased ball velocity, decreased accuracy, upright trunk during pitching, dropped elbow during pitching, or increased time between pitches). If an adolescent pitcher complains of fatigue or looks fatigued, let him rest from pitching and other throwing.
2. No overhead throwing of any kind for at least 2-3 months per year (4 months is preferred). No competitive baseball pitching for at least 4 months per year.
3. Do not pitch more than 100 innings in games in any calendar year.
4. Follow limits for pitch counts and days rest.
5. Avoid pitching on multiple teams with overlapping seasons.
6. Learn good throwing mechanics as soon as possible. The first steps should be to learn, in order: 1) basic throwing, 2) fastball pitching, 3) change-up pitching.
7. Avoid using radar guns.
8. A pitcher should not also be a catcher for his team. The pitcher-catcher combination results in many throws and may increase the risk of injury.
9. If a pitcher complains of pain in his elbow or shoulder, discontinue pitching until evaluated by a sports medicine physician. Inspire adolescent pitchers to have fun playing baseball and other sports. Participation and enjoyment of various physical activities will increase the player’s athleticism and interest in sports. (asmi.org)

• Pitch Counts & Coaches
Glenn Fleisig – “Pitch counts are an artificial control,” said Dr. Glenn Fleisig. “We know that overuse is accumulated and that pitching when fatigued is damaging, so this works for a broad population. It’s not individualized. Some pitchers could go 100 pitches and some could go 50, but we set the limits to do the most good possible. It’s up to the coaches and athletes at some point.” (bleacherreport.com)

• Biomechanical Analysis
Thomas Karakolis – Karakolis said the “golden ticket” in gauging injury risk is biomechanical analysis, which has been embraced by some MLB teams to varying degrees. One of the biomechanics tools currently available is the so-called “Tommy John sleeve,” which is a fitted sleeve embedded with sensors that is worn by the pitcher and can transmit data on how much stress is being put on the elbow with each pitch and whether or not the pitcher is growing fatigued. (www.thestar.com)

OTHER PHILOSOPHIES
• Throw More, with less exertion
Leo Mazzone – “The bottom line is this: Pitchers at that age need to be throwing more often, with less exertion,” said Mazzone, whose tenure with the Braves included a 14-year run of division titles and a championship in 1995. “Everyone is so enamored with how hard kids throw now. Youngsters see this guy throwing 88, this guy throwing 90, and getting scholarships and signing professionally.
“To them, they’re thinking they need to hit a certain number on the [radar] gun. And in trying to get there, they are tearing apart their arms. It’s not pitch counts.” (archive.northjersey.com)

• Strength Training
Eric Cressey – Simply stated, strength training is helping guys throw harder; there’s no doubt about it. It’s how that strength training is programmed and what’s done to complement it that determines if the increased velocity will lead to an injury. Nothing happens in isolation. (ericcressey.com)

• Nothing
Jeff Passan – Baseball never will eradicate arm injuries. Any suggestion it can do so presupposes that the inherent genetic differences between people somehow can be mitigated through modification, and I like to think about the future of baseball without a side of dystopia. At the same time, as technology improves, leaps in understanding are inevitable. Whether they’re tangible enough to solve for the perils that velocity presents I can’t say. (nytimes.com)

• Forearm muscle relationship
Jeff Passan – (Jeff) Buffi’s initial research confirmed the importance of the flexor-pronator muscles in the forearm. Perhaps they were what enabled R.A. Dickey to pitch without a UCL. Maybe they explained why some pitchers stayed healthy and others didn’t. To further test his hypothesis, Buffi worked with researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital’s biomechanics lab, which captured the throwing motions of 20 college pitchers with markers as well as ground¬-force data collected with force plates. Buffi’s optimization algorithm fit the markers in the model as close as possible to those on the real pitchers. “The goal,” Buffi said, “is to get the model to move in exactly the same way the real pitcher moves.”
Of the 20 pitchers, 13 had no previous major arm injuries and seven did. Blinded to the results, Buffi correctly identified six of the seven injured pitchers and 12 of the 13 without injuries based solely on the model’s data. Buffi then used inverse dynamics, the standard method, to assess all 20 pitchers. It could not tell the difference between who had been injured and who hadn’t.
“I don’t want to say I can fix elbow injuries, but I think I can compensate for the thing that I found with training,” Buffi said. “It’s a really, really hard problem to solve. Hopefully I’m making some good steps toward solving it.” (sports.yahoo.com)

• Technique
Mike Marshall – I know the injurious flaws in the ‘traditional’ baseball pitching motion that injure baseball pitchers and how to eliminate all pitching injuries. I also know the mechanical flaws in the ‘traditional’ baseball pitching motion that decrease release velocity, release consistency and the variety and quality of pitches pitchers can throw and how to correct these mechanical flaws. (drmikemarshall.com)

• Long Toss
Alan Jaeger – There isn’t any reason why a player should have a chronically sore, weak, or injury prone arm. If the arm would get the same kind of attention that our hitting, defense or pitching gets than it too would have a chance to thrive on a daily basis. Unfortunately, most baseball players neglect their arms or take them for granted.
As the arm begins to develop endurance it will not only want to throw more often but it will want to throw more distance. The stretching phase of throwing will commonly go from, per se, 150 feet to 250 feet in a few weeks time. (jaegersports.com)

• Weighted Balls
Kyle Boddy – High intent ballistic throwing creates increased dynamic range of motion (ROM) at the shoulder joint. By using overload implements, a greater stretch is realized, which is vital in both amateur athletes and professionals who have suffered an arm injury in the past and have significantly reduced ROM in the glenohumeral joint. Elite pitchers have much higher external rotation ROM in the shoulder than mediocre pitchers (source: ASMI), and by using high intensity throwing training methods, dynamic ER ROM is built. (drivelinebaseball.com)