Coach, your balls are too big!

[Will Haskell]

Your baseballs that is....

I've recently begun work for one of the largest Physical Therapy/Rehabilitation group in the country as part of their Performance Enhancement staff. A segment of their services includes a Overhead Athlete Program. Being a new employee, it looked as though a bunch of PT's got tired of seeing countless athletes in their clinics each day due to throwing-related injuries. They've developed an education curriculum as a resource for their PT's and ATC's to outline the various causes, injuries, and rehabilitation methods to help these athletes---I think it's a fantastic idea and got to see some of the program in action yesterday afternoon.

The part of this story that has any relevance to the title of my post happened towards the end of the presentation. We were watching video of a 12-year old throwing to a target while pointing out some mechanical flaws--the presenting PT showed that the foot being planted facing the 1st base dugout (righty) was the issue behind some of the shoulder and elbow trouble he was having---hips open too wide, torso follows and leaves the shoulder and elbow out to dry. The evaluation was spot on, but we were also witnessing the negative effects of baseball tradition.

What many don't recognize is that the major problem is the baseball itself. The athlete was an immature 12 year old and was cupping the ball throughout the entire range of motion. Every time he threw the ball, the freeze frame looked as though he was trying to flex his biceps for the camera---seriously, it was that bad! If you still can't picture what I'm talking about, pick up a basketball and heave it across the room but, do it with sound pitching mechanics.

Take away the lack of instruction this kid has probably had to deal with, and look at the baseball itself. Even on video, you could see that this athlete had a difficult time holding onto the ball. In a recent discussion with a pitching coach, he tried to explain to me that the difficulty comes when the athlete isn't taught to split the ball with the thumb on the underside of the ball---absolutely correct but, what if the athlete's hands aren't big enough to get the thumb underneath the ball effectively to hold onto it?

I've done a quick internet search and found two websites that sell smaller baseballs. Next to providing proper instruction, I'd recommend getting baseballs such as these that are smaller for the obvious reason---they can be handled by kids. I've written about this topic before---basketball uses a smaller ball for kids, football uses a smaller ball for kids, horseback riding---they put kids on a smaller horse! Why is baseball the exception?

I found a lot of websites that carry baseballs like these--feel free to check them out.

http://www.funtasticsports.com/catal...ls_4711783.htm
http://www.onlinesports.com/pages/I,JU-B5120.html

It has to be understood that we create and reinforce habit when we repeat an activity. Are we creating good habits or bad habits? While this particular athlete was dealing with acute shoulder and elbow pain, it is clear that by the habit of throwing a ball too big for his hands has created bad mechanical habits that have to be broken down and re-taught or else the chance for success will decrease tremendously, while the risk of greater, more serious injury will increase exponentially.

Here is another article that mentions the smaller-baseball concept that is used in Japan and other countries---near the bottom under Japan's Little Sluggers. It mentions the Japanese school baseball as being smaller than what Little League plays with.

http://mlb.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/a...tnered=rss_mlb

Thanks for the time as always. Feel free to shout at me about this topic.

Will Haskell
siriusperformance@yahoo.com

[Deserve]

Good thoughts.

[Kevin T.]

As an ump I see the effects of kids not being able to grip the ball. Plate umping the 8-10 year olds is horrible. Most of them can't get a grip on the ball and they float out of the strike zone - its ball after ball after ball. The bigger kids who can grip the ball are unhittable because they can put speed on the throw. I've seen the small balls but, I don't know I'm at the point where this has been irrelevant to me for a few years.

[Jean-Paul]

They need to quit using dinosaur technology like video on these kids (was that dartfish?) and start using motion capture technology. THey could get a lot more accurate in their coaching techniques with that kind of data.

[Will Haskell]

JP---

That's very true--we have all this great technology available yet it's confined to university research labs producing information that is eventually tucked away in medical journals to collect dust over the ages. My first statement that I'm sure some will disagree with, why do we need video capture if we are doing all the right things to develop athletes? So many coaches and parents have disagreed with myself and other professionals in this industry because they feel that their way is the right way. If they were teaching kids the proper techniques in the first place we wouldn't need to rely on video to teach a skill such as pitching mechanics. When in the weight room, we don't need to video tape our kids squatting so we can show them the technique and what they are doing wrong. We instruct them well the first time and reinforce the technique, providing instant feedback to create ideal habits. Video capture, in many instances is trying to introduce another method of learning to an athlete that really wouldn't be necessary if they were coached correctly the first time around. In this particular case, we're using advanced technologies to correct a cultural flaw in the sport. Again, in this particular case, instead of investing major dollars in video analysis, get smaller baseballs and find a coach that can effectively teach athletes the proper mechanics at a young age.

Now, I'm not saying that capturing video is bad, or that the technology is useless. Besides the video-based research studies that never reach the most fundamental levels of coaching, a huge disparity exists within the very people that are working on these programs. The highly educated MD's and PT's are taking clinical facts and applying it to pitching research. That's great, but if they were given a young baseball player that had mechanical flaws needing correction, they wouldn't know where to begin. Then we have ex-baseball players that are now skills coaching kids, that's great too, but they don't have the education or experience to work with kids on the more physiological-based aspects of development. Then we have the average little league dad trying to help his kids out. That's awesome, but they don't have the knowledge on either side of the coin to develop kids at the most fundamental level of sport. To compound the problem further, we also have the ex-baseball players that try to be strength coaches that in many cases, impose inappropriate volumes and methods on kids that are seriously detrimental to success.

The direction we are heading is towards the positive as we now have guys like myself, Dan Huff, Jon Doyle, Tom Hanson and Mike Griffin who played the game and are highly educated and experience in the industry.

With these guys out there in the field, we can finally combine the clinical and practical elements of the sport along with technological breakthroughs to really make a difference in the lives of young athletes.

The best advantage of the video technology is that it can take already sound pitching mechanics to a whole new level. The video technology can help correct minor flaws in technique to boost performance and irradicate injury instead of its current use of trying to conquer major mechanical deficiencies caused by poor coaching and outdated tradition.

Thanks for the time JP. I really appreciate it.

Will Haskell, YCS Lev. II, ACE.
siriusperformance@yahoo.com

[RedLefty]

Excellent thoughts! One of the caveats that crossed my mind was if this increases the difficulty of hitting. Some of the kids at that age already have a tough time making contact, and the only way they do it at all is because some of the pitches are "floaters" due to weak grip. Would they stand a chance with a smaller ball?

What I like about this concept is the flexibility to custom-tailor the sport to the age/ability level. I know little leagers have a shorter and closer pitcher's mound, closer bases, etc... but perhaps there are other changes that would be beneficial as well.

Excellent point by Will that other sports do this all the time. When I was eight years old I played in a basketball league that used a mini-ball and 7-foot goals. But it was still basketball.