January 31, 2006 -
By John Habyan
So your pitchers have followed my preseason throwing plan. They have been throwing twice a week for eight weeks, doing resistive tubing exercises to strengthen their rotator cuffs, strengthening their legs and core muscles in the weight room and building their cardiovascular endurance. Now it’s time to leave the gym and get out on the field. It’s time to get into game situations. What do you do with your pitchers?
Developing a preseason routine when there are no games or full team practices scheduled is the easy part for coaches. When practice starts for real, managing a pitching staff becomes a bit more complicated. As with most aspects of coaching, however, a common-sense approach usually serves you well.
By the time practice begins, often there are only a couple of weeks until teams start scrimmaging. Once scrimmages are underway, it may be only another couple of weeks before teams start competing in league games. There isn’t much time to help your pitchers take the important final steps from mound throwing and drill work to game readiness.
Hopefully, when practice begins officially, your pitchers are physically prepared to throw two full innings in a game setting. That’s when it is a good idea to start playing intra-squad games, with each pitcher throwing 35 pitches followed by a 15-minute distance run. They then will have two or three days of playing light catch, long-tossing, distance running and strength training (one lower-body workout the day after throwing, core strengthening and rotator cuff exercises). A sample rotator cuff program can be found at http://ripkenbaseball.com/cc/?zone=notebook&id=6697 and other pitching-specific strength-training exercises can be found at http://ripkenbaseball.com/cc/?zone=notebook&id=6540.
At this point there are no side mound sessions between game throwing for the pitchers – just playing catch and long-tossing for 5-10 minutes each day. The next intra-squad throwing session lasts for three innings or 45-50 pitches, again followed by two or three days of catch, long-tossing, running and strengthening exercises.
By now it should be time to begin scrimmages, and you should have a good idea as to who your starting pitchers will be. Those are the pitchers who need to be sure to get their innings in during scrimmages. For the first outing they should be prepared to throw four innings and 55-60 pitches, and for their last preseason outing they should be ready for as many as five innings and up to 80 pitches. That will set them up to be able to throw 85-90 pitches in their first regular-season start. They should not throw from a mound for three full days in between outings as the season approaches.
For many regions of the country, the weather plays an important factor in preseason preparation. Coaches have to be prepared to keep their pitchers on schedule in the event of bad weather. Although it can be time consuming, pitchers should stay with their routines by throwing simulated innings with batters standing in on days in which they are forced inside. Make sure that two pitchers work at a time as if it is a game situation. They should go through their warm-up routines, with one pitcher taking the mound first and the other resting. Then they alternate innings just like they would in a real game. This allows their bodies to get used to periods of intense throwing followed by a few minutes of rest.
Once the season begins, most starting pitchers will be throwing in games no more than once per week. Relievers can stay in a similar throwing routine to the preseason – throwing from a mound to hitters or throwing simulated innings with batters standing in every three days or so when they are not seeing game action. They need to continue with their catch and long-tossing, distance running (building to 25 or 30 minutes) and strength work between throwing sessions. Relievers also can incorporate drill work from shortened distances in between appearances to help correct mechanical flaws (please see http://ripkenbaseball.com/cc/?zone=notebook&id=7180 and http://ripkenbaseball.com/cc/?zone=notebook&id=6388).
Starters are ready to throw 85-90 pitches once the season gets underway. Distance running no longer is done after game throwing, but instead on off days between starts. They should work in two lower-body strength workouts during the weekly cycle – one the day after their start and another at least two days before the next start. Intense strength training never should be performed the day before a scheduled outing. Distance running can extend up to 25 or 30 minutes, while rotator cuff and core strengthening can be done just about every day. Again, taking a break the day before a start is okay.
From a throwing perspective, starters should play light catch the day after their start and long toss the following day. Day three should include a mound throwing session. The length of the session will depend on the pitcher’s previous outing. If a pitcher went deep into the game, he might only throw for 10 or 12 minutes. A pitcher who got roughed up and made an early exit might throw for 20 minutes. Use your judgment here. All pitches should be thrown, with the time split equally between the stretch and wind-up. The drills highlighted above can be used to correct mechanical problems. The power position drill is effective for troubleshooting flaws in the upper body, while the 1-2-3 drill is helpful for dealing with lower-body issues.
The mound session is followed by two days of long-tossing and flatwork (drill work from flat ground). Drill work from the mound at a shortened distance is fine on these two days as well. The day before the next start should be free from any serious throwing or strength work. Jogging is okay.
The best time for pitchers to get their running in is right at the beginning of practice or during batting practice sessions. This is the plan that I use for my high school players, however it really translates to pitchers at just about any level. Remember the common sense approach. If you coach a younger team that only plays six innings – or if you are in a league in which a pitcher is limited to a specific number of innings or pitches – your pitchers don’t have to build up to 90 or 100 pitches. Figure that an average inning is 12-15 pitches and do the math from there. Younger pitchers probably don’t need to run for more than 15 minutes. Always keep in mind that players who pitch and play other positions need to mix distance running with sprints or baserunning drills.
Don’t be afraid to alter this plan to better fit your schedule or your staff’s ability or level of commitment. Let us know what works and what doesn’t by sending an email to newsletter@ripkenbaseball.com. Good luck!
