The Dirty Little Secret in Youth Pitching

“Limiting the Pitch Count in Youth Baseball Pitchers Decreases Elbow Pain.” 2021

“Survey with Innovations to Increase Response Rate Reveals Low Compliance with Guidelines among Youth Baseball Coaches – Including a Survey of Differences between Cities” 2022

“Increased Medial Elbow Torque Is Associated With Ball Velocity Rather Than a History of Medial Elbow Injuries in Youth Baseball Pitchers” 2022

“Pitching Behaviors in Youth Baseball: Comparison With the Pitch Smart Guidelines” 2021

Pitch Smart Guidelines – CLICK HERE or at bottom of page

KEY POINTS AND SOLUTIONS – scroll to bottom

I’m going to try and not sound like I’m going on a rant, but there is a dirty little secret in youth baseball that needs to be talked about and brought to the surface for coaches, players, and parents.  If you even glanced at the top of this page, you saw several articles that I have linked to give you information on pitch counts and how the compliance of evidence based guidelines, that were put together by HIGH level medical professionals 1.) lead to less injury for youth pitchers, and 2.) the compliance rate among youth coaches is terrible, especially at tournaments. I’m going to give the highlights, and use tables with synthesized data from some of the articles above.

Let’s start with pitch counts vs. inning limits.  Inning limits were, and to some degree still are, a popular option for youth coaches.  I myself use a rule of 15 reps in training my pitchers to simulate innings, but when in competition, the amount of pitches per inning are often underestimated.  Check out the table below to see what 10 year old’s are throwing with controlled pitch counts to inning limits, and it’s clear to see inning limits lead to overuse.  If you’re not into statistics, the pitch count per game is statistically significant with inning limits at 98 pitches per game compared to 52 with pitch count limits, and at this age the max limit for pitchers is 50 pitches.

If you read the article above you might be saying, “Yeah but that’s in Japan, we don’t break the pitch smart guidelines that much.”  And while I hope you are right, the evidence says it’s not likely.  Below are four tables from a recent study looking at 100 youth teams tracking 1046 pitchers and competing in 2439 games in Wisconsin. To synthesize the first two tables, we are looking at the breakdown of age and pitchers per team (approximately 10), with the second table showing percent of pitches in the various ranges. The number of Pitch Smart violations were 1866 total violations: 214 for violating maximum pitch count, 1335 for inadequate rest, and 960 for pitching on the same day.  94% of teams had at least 1 pitcher violate guidelines.  The second two tables show us a more in-depth look at why tournaments cause more pitching violations, and it’s clear that with more consecutive games, the more likely a violation is to occur.  Unfortunately, this tends to stress the better/harder throwers.  The last table shows how the top 3 pitchers per team at the younger ages are the most susceptible.   




Looking at the data it’s easy to see we need to do a better job managing younger pitchers.  Not even history of injury is a good way to track possible elbow stress and future injury as we know higher velocity and body weight is a better predictor of elbow stress.  As younger pitchers, focus on quality of pitches, not quantity/volume.  You will get better with focused practice, drills, and bullpens just as much as playing 52 games in a summer when you are 10 years old.

KEY POINTS

  1. Higher body weight and higher velocity leads to higher elbow stress
    1. These things make a good pitcher as well
  2. The more consecutive games played, the more likely pitchers will break pitch smart guidelines. Inadequate rest is the most likely to be violated and this leads to more elbow stress/injury
  3. Inning limits are not a good way to manage pitch counts
  4. The top 3 pitchers for a team should be monitored for volume as they have the highest injury risk

SOLUTIONS

  1. In one of the articles, it’s stated that elbow flexion loss is present in pitchers with injury, so as a “quick check” see if your pitcher can touch their shoulder with their elbow at their side without symptoms/pain.  If not, they may be having elbow flexion loss and should not throw that day.
  2. Use pitch smart guidelines to effectively manage volume for a given age and follow the recommended rest and volume limits.
  3. Volume equate practices. Often times coaches don’t need players throwing 30-50 pitches (bullpen and scrimmage) when in season.
  4. Have a rotation plan.  We see most teams have around 10 pitchers, and while talent varies, younger kids don’t need the volume on their arms just to win games.
  5. Work with professionals like The Pitching Mechanic to help improve pitchers mechanics to effectively transfer the stress of pitching and manage volume.

At the end of the day, coaches, parents, and players want to compete and stay healthy doing so.  By knowing and following pitch smart guidelines, I would see less 9 and 10 year old kids in the clinic and more kids having fun on the field.  So please reach out to me or other professionals for volume adjusted workouts and/or coaching for improved performance and decreased injury risk.  Please see below for Pitch Smart guidelines.

Dr. David Klaus, DPT, ATC/L

The Pitching Mechanic

Terms and Conditions