GHSA sets new pitch count rules.for baseball.

GHSA sets new pitch count rules for baseball, pitchers are limited to 110 pitches and if they throw more than 86 pitches they are required to have 3 days of rest before being allowed to pitch again. If they pitch between 31-85 pitches then 2 days of rest is required, if they throw more than 36 then a day of rest is required. They will be limited to 120 pitches during a tournament setting. IMO protecting the kids should be a number one priority.

One coach thinks the umpires under these rules need to open up the tight zones to allow a pitcher to throw to more batters other wise teams could quickly run out of pitchers.

PEPPERS said:

GHSA sets new pitch count rules for baseball, pitchers are limited to 110 pitches and if they throw more than 86 pitches they are required to have 3 days of rest before being allowed to pitch again. If they pitch between 31-85 pitches then 2 days of rest is required, if they throw more than 36 then a day of rest is required. They will be limited to 120 pitches during a tournament setting. IMO protecting the kids should be a number one priority.

One coach thinks the umpires under these rules need to open up the tight zones to allow a pitcher to throw to more batters other wise teams could quickly run out of pitchers.

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See this in little league all the time; by the 4th or 5th inning when the pitcher gets close to the number they start taking pitches, run the ace out of the game and light up the reliever.

Yet another reason for kids to abandon HS sports.

Who exactly is going to keep track of the pitch counts? Its not like this is little league where everyone plays at the same venue and sees the same teams over and over. High school you are lucky if you play the same team twice in a season and usually separated by several weeks if they do. Its going to be next to impossible to enforce.

riseball said:

Yet another reason for kids to abandon HS sports.

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I agree with you most/majority of time and think you have helped me with DD pitching journey with advice on your posts. I don't understand this one . Abandon the school sport because a rule was implemented to protect the athlete from an ignorant coach. Some school coaches would never do anything that might have long term health damage. There are some who don't care about long term damage only short term wins. I wish hs softball had pitch count rules. I don't have any idea what #s should be used but there should be some. Yes some caution on safe side to far but the child is protected .

Phathead said:

I agree with you most/majority of time and think you have helped me with DD pitching journey with advice on your posts. I don't understand this one . Abandon the school sport because a rule was implemented to protect the athlete from an ignorant coach. Some school coaches would never do anything that might have long term health damage. There are some who don't care about long term damage only short term wins. I wish hs softball had pitch count rules. I don't have any idea what #s should be used but there should be some. Yes some caution on safe side to far but the child is protected .

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Think of the children! Do pitch counts actually work? The answer from the research is no. Poor mechanics is the issue so pitch counts are irrelevant. Proper mechanics will allow you to throw more pitches (but doesn't guarantee you won't get injured). Poor mechanics with limited pitch counts are pointless.

High School softball is a speed bump in the softball journey. It doesn't have to be this way but some state rules are absurd.

Phathead said:

I agree with you most/majority of time and think you have helped me with DD pitching journey with advice on your posts. I don't understand this one . Abandon the school sport because a rule was implemented to protect the athlete from an ignorant coach. Some school coaches would never do anything that might have long term health damage. There are some who don't care about long term damage only short term wins. I wish hs softball had pitch count rules. I don't have any idea what #s should be used but there should be some. Yes some caution on safe side to far but the child is protected .

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Implementation of a rule based on an arbitrary number of pitches is false security. For the kid throwing with poor mechanics, one pitch is too many. Instead of hiring, training, and retaining qualified coaches the solution is not to dumb things down to the lowest common denominator. If they want to implement pitch counts to provide more opportunity then fine. But to do so under the guise of safety is intellectually dishonest.

riseball said:

Implementation of a rule based on an arbitrary number of pitches is false security. For the kid throwing with poor mechanics, one pitch is too many. Instead of hiring, training, and retaining qualified coaches the solution is not to dumb things down to the lowest common denominator. If they want to implement pitch counts to provide more opportunity then fine. But to do so under the guise of safety is intellectually dishonest.

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I'd agree with you except almost no one agrees on what the proper mechanics are.. and even if there were a absolute proven set of proper mechanics, getting everyone to agree to them would be impossible. We have a great set of PC instructors and advice with IR concepts here on this forum - and we also have people who HAVE to teach their kids from this advice themselves because there isn't a local PC to go to they could use even if they want to.

I live in a very strong area for softball - and there is a grand total of 3 instructors who teach IR-type mechanics in the area.


...and enforcement - don't even want to think about it.

PEPPERS said:

GHSA sets new pitch count rules for baseball, pitchers are limited to 110 pitches and if they throw more than 86 pitches they are required to have 3 days of rest before being allowed to pitch again. If they pitch between 31-85 pitches then 2 days of rest is required, if they throw more than 36 then a day of rest is required. They will be limited to 120 pitches during a tournament setting. IMO protecting the kids should be a number one priority.

One coach thinks the umpires under these rules need to open up the tight zones to allow a pitcher to throw to more batters other wise teams could quickly run out of pitchers.

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Interesting as my DD plays under GHSA rules and I wonder if this means anything will be coming for softball in the coming years....While not a pitcher, she is a catcher and from what I can gather at this point - they have the pitchers and catchers fairly "paired up" thus far (and yes, it is still early in the short season).

Here are some links - Bartow Sports Zone | Local sports news and information

High schools sports: GHSA executive committee approves baseball pitch count proposal | The Telegraph

https://www.ghsa.net/constitution

Mom_Coach_Fan said:

Interesting as my DD plays under GHSA rules and I wonder if this means anything will be coming for softball in the coming years....While not a pitcher, she is a catcher and from what I can gather at this point - they have the pitchers and catchers fairly "paired up" thus far (and yes, it is still early in the short season).

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Problem w/ HS softball is that many schools are lucky to have one trained pitcher. The quality of play would be sorely compromised if the best pitchers were limited. Not such a problem in baseball.

Also, the way the GHSA works is through sport-specific committees. This is something the baseball people brought up. It wasn't the GHSA looking at all sports and trying to make them safer. So there is no reason to think softball is next. Softball does their thing, and baseball does theirs.