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How to Prevent Youth Pitching Injuries?

In an effort to help prevent youth pitching injuries the American Sports Medicine Institute has posted their Position Statement for Youth Baseball Pitchers. The three major factors which is a primary cause of most youth pitching injuries is; overuse, poor mechanics and poor physical fitness as mentioned in this statement. In my own research, I find this to be the case in all levels of the game. It is just more important at the youth level.

The Position Statement also mentions that the use of the curveball at the youth level may be an issue but no research exactly shows why. ASMI states that the problems could be that throwing a curveball enhances the effects of the three major factors of primary injury for youth pitchers. Here is a list of their recommendations for preventing injury. Read more

Why Some Pitchers Throw Harder than Others?

Why Some Pitchers Throw Harder Than Others is a big question in baseball and it is a question that seems to continue to go unanswered. Determining why some pitchers throw harder than others was the basis for a study by the American Sports Medicine Institute, the School of Health & Sports Sciences Osaka University and the Department of Surgery Duke University. The study was called KINEMATIC DIFFERENCES BETWEEN HIGHLY-SKILLED AND LESS-SKILLED BASEBALL PITCHERS. This study took place in 1999.

I wanted to title this article, “Why Some Athletes Throw Harder than Others?” but conventional wisdom does not label pitchers as athletes yet so I didn’t want to confuse anyone. I hope I can help change this perspective of us Pitchers in the near future. Read more

Olympic Lifting Increases Pitching Velocity

Both Strength Training and Pitching Velocity are NOT on different ends of the spectrum of sports as conventional wisdom would have you believe. Specifically Olympic Weight Training and Velocity are both closely related and this article will help explain how and why.

To understand the effects of Olympic weight lifting and velocity on pitchers, you must first understand how velocity is measured. I will use Newton’s second law of motion, along with the Catapult Theory, to explain pitching velocity.

Newton’s Second Law:

States that the acceleration (velocity) of an object in motion is dependent upon two variables – the net force acting upon the object and the mass of the object. As the force of propulsion acting upon the object increases, the acceleration of the object increases. As the mass of the object increases, the acceleration of the object decreases.

Newton’s 2nd Law of Motion

a = f/m (f = force, m = mass, a = acceleration)

Let’s put this into baseball terms. Newton’s second law of motion would state that to throw a baseball 90 mph would require 6.5 pounds of pressure applied to a baseball, with a mass of 5 ounces, for two tenths of one second (.20). Read more