White Sox promoting Wikelman González

[ptatc]

1 hour ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

Ironically enough, the last team to get arm maintence right was the White Sox and they were mocked ruthlessly for it. Reserve max effort for big situations, tone done velo, develop and rely on change/slower slider.

Very few peoples arms are built to throw 96-99 MPH all the time. Its not the off speed. Its not the pitch count. It's not the innings pitched. Its not arm angle or extension. Its max effort velocity. Its people building velocity that their arms wouldn't normally produce. It has a cascading effect too because then guys who throw 91 feel they have to throw 94 and they're over throwing too.

You should grow into velocity - meaning throwing 93-94 tops in youth/high school ball and as your body grows and develops you build and add with it. I wouldn't draft a single kid who threw 98+ in high school. 

The Dodgers dont believe they can fix this so they have stocked up on arms to play the numbers.

This is really the issue. The body in general isn't built to do any activity at max effort for any length of time.

However people push that limit to find the best performance. 

With pitching the harder they throw the more likely for outs. So pitching has evolved to this. This will cause injuries. So the issue becomes are there other ways to minimize the risk of injury. Biomechanical analysis is a way to try to minimize the concentration of forces in one area. Strengthen routines and flexibility are others.

However, there is going to be an increase in the injury incidence as long as pitchers use max effort for longer periods of time. This is why starter outings are shorter than in the past and teams institute pitch/innings limts.

[Look at Ray Ray Run]

1 hour ago, ptatc said:

This is really the issue. The body in general isn't built to do any activity at max effort for any length of time.

However people push that limit to find the best performance. 

With pitching the harder they throw the more likely for outs. So pitching has evolved to this. This will cause injuries. So the issue becomes are there other ways to minimize the risk of injury. Biomechanical analysis is a way to try to minimize the concentration of forces in one area. Strengthen routines and flexibility are others.

However, there is going to be an increase in the injury incidence as long as pitchers use max effort for longer periods of time. This is why starter outings are shorter than in the past and teams institute pitch/innings limts.

I think pitch counts and inning limits have actually exasperated the issue because they're really only a pro-ball thing, and so these kids can deload a bit and max up the effort even more at the pro level. They also run counter almost any other endurance training (which pitching is) because maintaining levels and not deloading are really important for endurance training so your body doesn't lose acclimation.

I think you'd need this inning and pitch count maintenance at a much younger age. 

Edited June 21 by Look at Ray Ray Run

[Y2Jimmy0]

14 hours ago, ptatc said:

Yes it is.

 

2 hours ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

Can either of you help me understand the great work the Biomechanics group is doing? I'm surprised to hear that limiting injury isnt one of the goals of the biomechanics department/team. I agree its not the only function, but id expext it to be a component.

A lot of people doing great work in the organization, it sounds like. 

The Hagen Smith reset, Noah Schultz mechanics, Colson Montgomery reset and Miguel Vargas hand shift. It’s not all biomechanics but the departments are all working together for the first time ever. 

[southsider2k5]

1 hour ago, ptatc said:

Iwas talking with some friends last night and we came up with a new hypothesis that I think one of them will turn into a research project with his MLB team. 

Many teams are using the biomechanics team as proactive where they see an issue an can work to change the mechanics of a pitcher in season. What if those changes are making the muscles work differently enough that they becoming fatigued quicker and causing the injuries?

Changing mechanics in the off season when the muscles have time to adapt is one thing. But what if changing in the season while they are still pitching a full load is too fast of a change and the muscles dont have time to adapt?

I have no idea if it is the reason but it makes some physiologic sense. Should be a good study if the tram will go for it.

With the huge number of major surgeries we have seen this year, I definitely wonder if we are running into some sort of unintended consequences, at best, this year.

For all of the hate Don Cooper got at the end, his guys basically never had TJS, and we led MLB in least injuries over a very long term period of time. 

[southsider2k5]

1 hour ago, ptatc said:

This is really the issue. The body in general isn't built to do any activity at max effort for any length of time.

However people push that limit to find the best performance. 

With pitching the harder they throw the more likely for outs. So pitching has evolved to this. This will cause injuries. So the issue becomes are there other ways to minimize the risk of injury. Biomechanical analysis is a way to try to minimize the concentration of forces in one area. Strengthen routines and flexibility are others.

However, there is going to be an increase in the injury incidence as long as pitchers use max effort for longer periods of time. This is why starter outings are shorter than in the past and teams institute pitch/innings limts.

Like is preventing smaller injuries actually leading to more large injuries from, for lack of a better description, because we allow it to get to the point of the body breaking down in big ways, that can't be prevented?

[fathom]

1 hour ago, southsider2k5 said:

With the huge number of major surgeries we have seen this year, I definitely wonder if we are running into some sort of unintended consequences, at best, this year.

For all of the hate Don Cooper got at the end, his guys basically never had TJS, and we led MLB in least injuries over a very long term period of time. 

Could the kick change up grip be a factor?

[ptatc]

1 hour ago, Look at Ray Ray Run said:

I think pitch counts and inning limits have actually exasperated the issue because they're really only a pro-ball thing, and so these kids can deload a bit and max up the effort even more at the pro level. They also run counter almost any other endurance training (which pitching is) because maintaining levels and not deloading are really important for endurance training so your body doesn't lose acclimation.

I think you'd need this inning and pitch count maintenance at a much younger age. 

Its true that limits have made an impact. But the reason its only at the pro level is that is where they emphasize the max effort all the time. The limits in little league are even more restrictive but they are throwing as hard yet.

If they didn't throw max effort they wouldn't need the limits as much.

The body needs rest. So they limit the innings. They could go to 6 man rotations but there aren't enough good pitchers now.

[ptatc]

1 hour ago, Y2Jimmy0 said:

 

The Hagen Smith reset, Noah Schultz mechanics, Colson Montgomery reset and Miguel Vargas hand shift. It’s not all biomechanics but the departments are all working together for the first time ever. 

Exactly. Its amazing what happens with communication.

[ptatc]

1 hour ago, southsider2k5 said:

With the huge number of major surgeries we have seen this year, I definitely wonder if we are running into some sort of unintended consequences, at best, this year.

For all of the hate Don Cooper got at the end, his guys basically never had TJS, and we led MLB in least injuries over a very long term period of time. 

One of his tenants was take off some velocity for movement. Probably a better philosophy injury wise.

[ptatc]

1 hour ago, southsider2k5 said:

Like is preventing smaller injuries actually leading to more large injuries from, for lack of a better description, because we allow it to get to the point of the body breaking down in big ways, that can't be prevented?

Anything is possible. Its a league wide issue so all the minds and people smarter than me are working on it. But the most simple explanation is the most probable. They are pushing the limits of what the body can take. So we need to manage the workload.

But whats the best way? Not throwing max effort seems the most obvious but that won't happen because we know that is the most effective way to get outs. 

They are trying limiting pitches and innings. That has limited effectiveness.

[ptatc]

46 minutes ago, fathom said:

Could the kick change up grip be a factor?

Definitely a possibility. Any new thing will change the muscle use. However, with someone like Davis who has been using it for a year, you wouldn't think it would be.

[kitekrazy]

6 hours ago, ptatc said:

Its true that limits have made an impact. But the reason its only at the pro level is that is where they emphasize the max effort all the time. The limits in little league are even more restrictive but they are throwing as hard yet.

If they didn't throw max effort they wouldn't need the limits as much.

The body needs rest. So they limit the innings. They could go to 6 man rotations but there aren't enough good pitchers now.

How did all of the legends survive the game?

[southsider2k5]

22 minutes ago, kitekrazy said:

How did all of the legends survive the game?

They weren't going at 100% every pitch.  Look up the average fastball over the years.

[Jake]

I feel fairly confident that although a team can certainly mishandle their pitchers, by far the most important factor is the player himself. I don't mean this to victim-blame (my small-time baseball career was cut short by a bad shoulder), but just to say that the players brings important things to the table that are very important for his likelihood of injury: genetic/innate susceptibility (to oversimplify: how weak are the ligaments, cartilage, and so on), his throwing motion, his personal habits, etc. It's very difficult to change an advanced player's throwing motion so I tend to treat that as mostly set in stone; range of motion, the player's build and proportions, and deeply set muscle memory make big mechanical changes probably not worth pursuing by professional teams.

So I tend to think the likely reason that the Sox kept their pitchers healthy better than basically everyone else for many years was that they were scouting/acquiring healthy pitchers. It's nice that they didn't screw it up and props to those who managed to not screw it up...but at the same time if you have the wrong guys on the staff I deeply believe there's not much you can do to avoid injuries entirely for a certain, large subset of players. 

As for the role of pitcher effort and overall stress on the arm from velocity, the evidence definitely seems to support caution around guys who throw with high velocity and those who throw with high effort. Unfortunately, it feels like the incentives aren't well-aligned on either side to deal with it. The vast majority of MLB pitchers are on very thin ice. They cannot let themselves get 5-10% worse and keep their jobs, let alone maintain hope for a significant payday in arbitration or free agency. So they go all out to try to keep their heads above water. Meanwhile, teams aren't very committed to many of these guys either and seem to see it as a better tradeoff to just burn through guys rather than baby a bunch of players who 1. may break down anyway and 2. may be too ineffective if they pitch in a lower-risk way. FWIW, the favorite "Coop will fix 'em" guys seemed to be the select few who had enough raw stuff that they could be successful if they backed off their effort just a little bit if it unlocked more command.

I know Twins pitcher Brock Stewart from my playing days. He straight up says that to resurrect his career, he had to make changes to his training and approach that greatly increased the risk of serious injury. But for him, if he didn't do those things he'd be selling insurance by now. Since he saved his pro career by adding several ticks of velo, he hasn't reached 30 innings in a season. On the other hand, the innings he's managed to give were pretty effective. I think the Twins are accepting of the tradeoff and I'm sure the guy who takes his spot on the roster when Brock is hurt is rolling the dice in a similar way.

For now, I think this is the cutting edge in MLB: look no further than the LA Dodgers who have 7 starting pitchers on the IL with arm injuries and another 4 relievers on the IL with arm injuries at the moment. Widespread practice seems to be maximizing effectiveness today because tomorrow's injuries are too hard to predict in comparison to today's wins and losses.