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Reply to "Shoulder Injury"

It's been over thirteen months since my son had surgery for his torn labrum. He has worked exceptionally hard at his rehabilitation, at improving his core strength, and at improving his mechanics. The pitching coach that he has been going to (Thanks for the referral, TRhit) is impressed and mildly surprised at his progress, and believes that he now needs innings. Son is a high school junior, 6'1", 190 lbs and still growing, throws and bats left, and made his high school varsity team as an outfielder. (Seems there's always a big, slow guy who can croke the ball playing first, and son wasn't ready to pitch during tryouts.) Since the team only uses two starting pitchers and one reliever, and one of the starters will be a top draft pick in June and the other is going D1 next year, son asked coach if he could pitch a few innings of JV game. He pitched for the first time in two years two weeks ago, throwing 38 pitches over three innings, no hits, no runs, one walk, seven Ks, two errors, and two runners picked off first base. Varsity coach indicated this week that the JV coach doesn't have any more innings for son to pitch, and it seems unlikely son will get varsity pitching opportunity before next year. The team plays only fifteen seven inning games.

Son throws two and four seam fastballs well, change-up is decent and improving, and is just developing a pretty good curve. His speed has gone from about 68 mph eleven months after surgery, to between 76 and 78 at thirteen months. Pitching coach doesn't want him to focus on speed yet, but expects velocity to continue to improve.

So while his pitching is improving and he throws without any pain or problem, and in fact will be a better pitcher as a result of the injury and resultant dedicated focus on rehabilitation, strength training and conditioning, and improved mechanics, the fact remains that he is entering the summer between his junior and senior years having pitched a total of three JV innings, and no varsity. He was unable to play last summer due to his surgery, and the summer before that couldn't pitch due to his shoulder pain.

We're still considering whether he should repeat his junior year at a different school, which would allow him two more school years to improve his grades (SAT score was 1990, grades B minus to C at very challenging school), give him two summers and two varsity seasons to pitch competitively and gain experience(no rules against), and two summers to attend showcases. Otherwise he will have to have a great showcase in August, when he should be peaking, to get noticed.

Any thoughts, suggestions or experiences to share?
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