Hello all and happy Friday! My 2019 catcher has a bit of a situation and I'm hoping someone might have experienced something similar and have thoughts in retrospect. I'm not really looking for medical advice but I need to describe what's going on for background.
He's had shoulder shoulder pain when throwing that started a little over three weeks ago and says he remembers when it happened. Something about shagging balls in the outfield and throwing in. My assumption is that this was without proper warm-up but that's neither here nor there at this point. I took him to a specialist who did x-rays, and an evaluation, and said that he thought he'd pinched some tissue that caused it to be irritated. He prescribed him a 5-day steroid pack and sent us on our way saying that he wasn't going to limit his activity for now. As it happens, he had one game left in the high school season and giving his arm a rest after that was something we were going to do anyway.
Fast forward to yesterday and it's been two weeks without throwing and we decided it was time to start a short program (taken from a Vandy catchers rehab document) to get him ready for summer ball which starts at the end of this month. He warmed up, stretched, and said that there was pain immediately upon throwing (lobs). I think there may be something more going on in there so I'm setting him up another appointment that will hopefully result in an MRI.
So here's my area of concern, and I'm putting the cart before the horse a bit I know since we haven't even had an MRI. As has been stated many times here and elsewhere, the summer of rising HS senior is maybe the most crucial recruiting time for the majority of kids who want to play at the next level, and my son is no exception. He's got a carefully planned out summer with a mix of tournament play, showcases, skills development, and physical training that could potentially be significantly impacted by even the most modest diagnosis, beyond just soreness from use. I was wondering if anyone else has been in this, or a similar, situation at this time in your player's recruiting journey and would be willing to share information about it, good or bad? I'd also appreciate any advice on adjustments that might need to be made to the recruiting process if it does turn out that he has to miss a significant portion of the summer. To give some perspective on the rough timelines we're working under, my son is targeting–and has had some interest from–higher academic D2 and D3 schools, though no offers have come his way. His metrics are as follows:
5'11" 170lbs
GPA - 3.5 / 4.0
ACT 28 (30 with superscore - and taking again in three weeks)
R/R
Exit Velo - 84 (hasn't been measured/confirmed in a while)
60 - 7.02 (hasn't been measured/confirmed in a while)
Position Velo - 77 (hasn't been measured/confirmed in a while)
Consistent Pop Time - 1.9-2.1
As always, thanks for any and all feedback!
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