Youth Baseball - Pitcher Health

How to Keep Your Pitcher’s Arm Healthy

Are you coaching a youth baseball team and want to make sure you keep your pitcher’s arm healthy?  If you are thinking about it then you are already moving in the right direction.  Since I was a pitcher through college, I thought I knew how to properly take care of an arm, but a lot has changed in 20 years.  Luckily, I know some great Physical Therapists at TheraCORE who have helped me understand how to really take care of a young pitcher’s arm.  It really comes down to just three things.

Warm-up, Workload, Rest

Warm-up - When I played baseball, I always threw a baseball to warm up my arm.  I will talk about total throws next under Workload, but if you don’t want to waste a high percentage of your pitcher’s total throws just to get warmed up, then consider using a dynamic warm-up to get your arm and whole body ready to play.  You can also have your pitchers do band exercises to warm up their arms prior to throwing.

Workload – For a while now, most youth leagues have used pitch counts to limit the workload on a young pitcher’s arm.  I have come to learn limiting the total number of throws a player makes in a game or a practice should be used along with pitch counts in order to maintain a healthy arm.  Youth pitchers should limit their total throws to 125 in a day.  If a 10 year old has a max pitch count of 75, think about how quickly he will get to 125 total throws if you include pre-game warm-up throws, pre-game warm-up pitches, in-between inning warm-up pitches and in-game pitches.  You should also take into consideration the number of throws that will be made if he is playing another position during the same day that he pitches.

Rest – If you are coaching a travel baseball team in the Midwest, then the majority of the games your team plays are in weekend tournaments.  It can be a lot of fun to play 4 to 6 games in 2 days, but it can definitely make it tough for a coach to follow the recommended rest guidelines for a pitcher.  Per the guidelines, if a 7 to 14 year old pitcher throws more than 35 pitches on Saturday, then they should not throw any pitches on Sunday.  Winning a youth baseball tournament should never come before the long term health of a young pitcher’s arm.  Remember, proper rest includes taking at least two months off each year from throwing.  Have your kids play a different sport during this time.  It helps to protect their arm and makes them an overall better athlete.

Recommended pitch count/rest - http://m.mlb.com/pitchsmart/pitching-guidelines/

Brad Goebbert, CFO

TheraCORE, Inc.

Pre-Season Training

The best athletes are made in the off-season.  When the season rolls around and you are about to start your first game or event, it is too late to prepare.  That is why it is essential to take advantage of every opportunity you are given in off-season training and workouts.  Progress should be constantly strived for to reach your goals.  Each day you are either getting closer to reaching your goals or farther away, you have the power to make off-season success happen.  Here are a couple of things that coaches, players, and parents should keep in mind with -training:

Training does not mean over-training

Although it is important to strive for improvement every day throughout the off-season, this should not be confused with training every day which will likely lead to over-training.  Recovery is just as important, if not more important, than the time spent training.  Over-training can lead to increased fatigue, decreased performance, increased risk of injury, as well as several other physical and psychological side effects.  On the other extreme, that does not mean sitting on the couch all day with an XBOX controller on off days.  Active rest and mobility work will be the best way to prioritize time outside of training to set the body up for success the next time training.

Leave your ego at the door

Proper technique is the most important component for improvements in performance and reduced risk of injury.  Regardless of what off-season training program being used, performance will be greatly hindered if ideal technique is not prioritized. However, this is often a sacrifice in the amount of output produced in the short-term and requires some patience as new movement patterns are learned.  In the long-term, this is a critical component that needs to be mastered in the controlled environment of the weight room before it is translated into competition. 

Don’t get fancy

Master the basics.  It is critical to be very proficient at basic movement patterns and have the required strength through the muscles required to stabilize before progressing too quickly through a program.  If the program requires progression in intensity or difficulty of movement before an athlete is ready, the athlete will be limited in reaching their optimal performance as well as being put at an increased risk of injury.  Programming throughout the off-season is key and is the coach’s responsibility to put their players in a position to succeed while keeping their players healthy and on the field.

It should be FUN!

Training should never be boring, and while there are certain necessary components to an off-season training program, athletes should constantly be challenged in order to grow physically and mentally. Training isn’t always synonymous with fun, yet still something that should be enjoyed as it is a great way for teammates to bond and grow more disciplined as a team.  Provide an environment for your team training that players enjoy showing up for!

There’s only one important measure when it comes to pre-season training, and that’s the results you see when the season is finished.  Are you doing everything you can now to succeed later?

 These are just a few tips on considerations for off-season training.  Please contact us with any further questions on pre-season training or regarding our packages for team training led by physical therapists.

- Dave Paczkowski, PT, DPT