They also fail to answer the obvious question of so what? It is obvious that A + B = C the real question is what if any are the long term effects of C. Appears they did not even go there.
Scientific study on pitching in tournament
- Thread starter sluggers
- Start date
Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch
Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.
- Jun 29, 2013
- 589
- 18
I believe the study also used a hand-held device to test shoulder strngth, etc.
- Jun 29, 2013
- 589
- 18
Well, it would be a different study, but there is enough evidence out there in baseball and other sports that lead to the conclusion that muscle fatigue can lead to significant injuries. This study only answers a question that many in orthopedics have speculated about for years. It does blow the notion that the windmill motion won't lead to significant stresss out of the water
Well if you go to the gym and measure shoulder strength at the beginning of your workout and at the end, which one do you think will be higher? That is like a no brainer...
- Sep 29, 2014
- 2,421
- 113
Obviously this is not a comprehensive study...most obvious flaw would be the lack of a control group of pitchers who only pitched once got a day of rest then pitched again. I guess this would set some kind of baseline for pitchers without rest. You also would have to control for pitches and not just games and on and on. Not to mention poor mechanics as others have mentioned.
- Jun 19, 2013
- 753
- 28
Thank you this is exactly what I was thinking!! Maybe next time they can do a study on people before and after a 5ks, 10ks and a marathon and see how there legs feel and how their leg strength is after the races. Then see if a couple days rest is healing or not so that they can then race again.
It sounds like an awesome science fair project through for a middle school student.
I'm no doc, but here's my take...
RE: Overhand throwing - There are two classes of throwers...
For bad mechanics that push the ball (shot put or manual IR'ing at the shoulder), I think that shoulder damage due to overuse is a real concern.
For good mechanics that whip, shoulder damage is a lesser concern, but definitely can still happen after heavy workouts and major overuse such as pitching. I do not think that the pitch count studies do a good job of distinguishing between these two.
RE: Underhand throwing
For bad mechanics, shoulder damage from overuse is also a real concern.
For good mechanics, the shoulder is pretty well protected from damage. IMO of the 4 subgroups (underhand/overhand with good/bad mechanics), the underhand throw is the least impactful on the shoulder.
Assuming good mechanics, the ER/IR relationship between the overhand and underhand throw is very similar. The body will heavily ER the arm beyond the normal unloaded range of movement before the arm whips into IR. The major difference is that in underhand pitching, brush interference acts as a hard stop and limits the ER that the shoulder experiences. For overhand throwing, there is no hard stop. The elbow has nothing to brush into and for IR whip. Instead the thowing arm hits max ER and doesn't whip into IR until the elbow loses some momentum and is over come by whip. Lots and lots of reps like this work the shoulder out.
I would hate to see fastpitch pitch counts start up. Just like most regulation the data behind it is generally incomplete and does not get to the root of the problem. In the end it will only hold back the progress of pitchers who have good mechanics and keep pitchers with bad mechanics in the postion longer than they should be anyway...
RE: Overhand throwing - There are two classes of throwers...
For bad mechanics that push the ball (shot put or manual IR'ing at the shoulder), I think that shoulder damage due to overuse is a real concern.
For good mechanics that whip, shoulder damage is a lesser concern, but definitely can still happen after heavy workouts and major overuse such as pitching. I do not think that the pitch count studies do a good job of distinguishing between these two.
RE: Underhand throwing
For bad mechanics, shoulder damage from overuse is also a real concern.
For good mechanics, the shoulder is pretty well protected from damage. IMO of the 4 subgroups (underhand/overhand with good/bad mechanics), the underhand throw is the least impactful on the shoulder.
Assuming good mechanics, the ER/IR relationship between the overhand and underhand throw is very similar. The body will heavily ER the arm beyond the normal unloaded range of movement before the arm whips into IR. The major difference is that in underhand pitching, brush interference acts as a hard stop and limits the ER that the shoulder experiences. For overhand throwing, there is no hard stop. The elbow has nothing to brush into and for IR whip. Instead the thowing arm hits max ER and doesn't whip into IR until the elbow loses some momentum and is over come by whip. Lots and lots of reps like this work the shoulder out.
I would hate to see fastpitch pitch counts start up. Just like most regulation the data behind it is generally incomplete and does not get to the root of the problem. In the end it will only hold back the progress of pitchers who have good mechanics and keep pitchers with bad mechanics in the postion longer than they should be anyway...
It amazes me.
Repetitive motion injuries are a fact in sports. There is the Tommy John elbow, tennis elbow, golf elbow, bowlers finger, ping pong back, swimmers shoulder...the list is endless. There is even repetitive injuries from curling, for heaven's sakes.
And yet, when it gets to softball pitching...suddenly, we're in an alternate university where kids can do 500 reps a day everyday without injury. The rationale is that you sprinkle Tincher and IR dust around the circle, the kids are immune to injury.
There are more and more studies saying the same thing: Softball pitchers get hurt if they pitch too much.
I can never figure out "why" everyone is so worried about reasonable limits on pitchers. Baseball has been limiting the innings for pitchers for more than 100 years, and it seems to have done quite well.
As to the "good mechanics"...you guys are *really* kidding yourself. The point of good mechanics is to maximize the amount of energy transferred to the ball. The whole point of IR/BI/leg drive is to generate as much energy as possible and channel that energy into the pitching hand.
Repetitive motion injuries are a fact in sports. There is the Tommy John elbow, tennis elbow, golf elbow, bowlers finger, ping pong back, swimmers shoulder...the list is endless. There is even repetitive injuries from curling, for heaven's sakes.
And yet, when it gets to softball pitching...suddenly, we're in an alternate university where kids can do 500 reps a day everyday without injury. The rationale is that you sprinkle Tincher and IR dust around the circle, the kids are immune to injury.
There are more and more studies saying the same thing: Softball pitchers get hurt if they pitch too much.
I can never figure out "why" everyone is so worried about reasonable limits on pitchers. Baseball has been limiting the innings for pitchers for more than 100 years, and it seems to have done quite well.
As to the "good mechanics"...you guys are *really* kidding yourself. The point of good mechanics is to maximize the amount of energy transferred to the ball. The whole point of IR/BI/leg drive is to generate as much energy as possible and channel that energy into the pitching hand.
Last edited:
"Limits" on pitchers based on studies such as these are bias against pitchers with good mechanics. Such limits would surely be based on the average of all pitchers. I would argue that there would be more in that group making up the average that are seriously mechanically flawed, resulting in more shoulder pain (on average). Why should a pitcher with good mechanics be held back in terms of how long/often she can pitch based on what other pitchers are doing mechanically?
That being said, I don't overuse pitchers. And, it is quire clear to me that each pitcher is different in that regard.
That being said, I don't overuse pitchers. And, it is quire clear to me that each pitcher is different in that regard.
- May 17, 2012
- 2,807
- 113
The Level 3 study you posted did not say that. See this post for an excellent summary of that study: https://www.discussfastpitch.com/so...fic-study-pitching-tournament.html#post433631
It's not doing well at all. Pitchers are pitching less and getting injured more often. Pitch counts and inning limits are stupid arbitrary numbers that someone came up to compensate for fixing poor mechanics.
I concede that even with perfect mechanics you still are at risk for injury from overuse.
An analogy is that this is what we measure Blood Alcohol Content and not the number of beers that you drink before you drive. Three beers for you is not the same as three beers for my wife. That would be silly to put everyone on a three beer limit before you drive.
It's a complicated problem but if I were in charge than pitch counts would be guidelines and not rules.
