Deceleration Can Be A Pain In The Rhomboids
I have a good friend (we'll call him Tom) up in Carolina who has a 16 year old son named Hunter. Hunter is a pitcher--a darn good one--a sophomore starter on his high school varsity team. He throws in the mid 80s and has a nasty breaking ball and change up. Tom texted me last weekend and told me Hunter was super excited that the coach had chosen him to pitch on Monday against a rival team with 5 D1 commits.
I was most impressed with Hunter's growth mindset (see Carol Dweck). Many guys would...
Can Your Pitching Coach or Instructor REALLY Tell You Why Your Arm Hurts?
Man, I've been busy lately.
The spring baseball season is heating up and my phone is ringing off the hook from guys with sore arms.
It's not my regular guys.
It's the ones I call "the dabblers".
These are the guys who have shown some degree of interest. They've had their initial evaluation. Maybe they've even trained with us a few times. But they didn't REALLY buy in. They didn't commit to the entire process.
One recent call was from a 87 mph high school senior who first walked...
Ice is for Cocktails. Not for Pitchers.
Hello again,
I watched a couple of games this weekend and something caught my attention. I saw a young man come in to pitch for one inning, maybe 15 pitches, and when he walked out of the stadium, he had his shoulder and elbow totally wrapped in ice.
You know, the really cool looking ice wrap where the trainer rolls that cellophane thing that looks like a lint roller round and round and turns the limb into a see-through mummy arm?
As he walked by I said, “Nice job today.”
At...
Rocket Launchers Training Camp Saves a Pitching Career, Changes a Life
Everyone Said He Wasn't Good Enough. Then He Made a Phone Call.
You can't cookie cut pitcher development but you must have a process!!!!
Developing ability in pitcher is an incredibly complex endeavor. Ever pitcher is different--an individual snowflake with his own unique set of attributes and constraints. So there is no way a one-size-fits all approach can possibly work.
But if you're going to develop pitchers, you must have a process for evaluating each guy, and you'll need a tool...
What Caused My Son’s Injury? Questions From a Loving Father
I recently received a very interesting e-mail from the devoted father of a young pitcher here in Florida. He was referred to me by, Kyle Boddy, of Driveline Baseball in Seattle, Washington. Kyle is a very bright and progressive thinking pitching instructor. His ideas are always intriguing, and while we don’t always agree on everything, our approaches are at least in the same ballpark.
The father's email (which he also sent to Kyle) was long, thorough, well-conceived and asked many...
Sunday Shine! Keep Polishing the Rock!!!
When I was in high school, I had a very strict curfew. 11:00 pm. Not 11:10. Not 11:05. Not even 11:01 It was 11:00 pm, and it was non-negotiable. One minute late and there was heck to pay.
At the time, I thought it was unnecessary. I wasn't a big party guy in high school. In fact most of my nights were spent hanging out at my church with friends in my youth group. But still, my mom was very rigid about that curfew.
One summer night, I was driving home in my 1972 school bus yellow...
I’m Blaming it All On My Kids!!!
When I was 13 years old our family drove from our home in Sumter, South Carolina went to visit my uncle Ronnie in Roanoke, Virginia for Thanksgiving 1976.
The country had just celebrated its 200th birthday. In the wake of the Watergate scandal, a peanut farmer from Georgia named Jimmy Carter was elected President. The Viking 1 satellite sent a radio signal from Mars that helped prove Einstein's general theory of relativity.
The country was abuzz with a mixture of nostalgia and hope for the...
Man Survives Bataan Death March: Here’s What He Had to Say About It
I met a 92 year old man named George the other day.
He came into my Physical Therapy Clinic, escorted by his Granddaughter, for rehab after a Total Knee Replacement, and he is truly one of the most remarkable people I have ever encountered.
George looks every bit his age.
Wrinkled and well worn, his back is giving way to gravity and curves froward to make him hunched over when he stands and walks. He uses a cane to get around, but he has all his wits about him and frequently projects a...
Top 10 Reasons Your Arm Hurts
I was recently at an orthopedic appointment with one of my physical therapy patients. He was seeing Tampa Bay Rays’ orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Koko Eaton.
The young man had come to us with posterior elbow pain that had gradually worsened over the past few months. When he didn’t respond immediately to treatment, we referred him to Dr. Eaton. An MRI revealed an avulsion fracture of the olecranon process (the point of the elbow) where the triceps tendon inserts into the bone. Dr. Eaton made a...
You’ll Shoot Your Eye Out Kid!
It's Official
My son, Ryan is a Texan! He came home from Weatherford College last week sporting a brand new pair of ostrich skin cowboy boots, and a tattoo of a bible verse on his wrist.
And now he wants a shotgun.
It happened to his older brother, Ty, when he went to school out there too. Ty came back an avid fisherman, hunter, and collector of firearms.
I blame Flint Wallace, the best college pitching coach in the country. I sent my kids out there to become better pitchers,...
