Biological Age & Injuries

Ibach, I see where one of the boys listed on the travelball select had a record of 23-6 this past season. For the sake of argument, lets say that he had 5 no decisions. How does 34 starts for a pitcher who has not fully matured lend credibility to your argument?

to remove unneccesary stress from my daily routine, I will not comment...

but for all you parents out there I have some swamp land in Fl for you and now that I think of it, I have a 4 part 60 day program on what to stay away from along the way.....

Ibach,

Can I be a TBS contributor?

My area of expertise is BS.

Surely you could use someone like me. No, I guess you have that covered.

My son just turned 16, and is 5'11.333". When do the growth plates in the legs close up. Just wondering if he is going to be 6'.

FBD,

Thanks for making me laugh. It's always a good thing to start my day with a hearty chuckle, and your post provided that.

Happy Holidays to you, Clayton and your entire family.

Tuzy,

I have special lifts for that, but its going to cost you at some point....

Thanks Bruce......and Happy Holidays to You, Jordan and all of your family.

I would like to know how many of Mike Marshall's underlings have ever made it? Sounds like a bunch of Tom House garbage - with a Piled Higher & Deeper degree (PHD).

I'm with you ballfan, how does a kid get a record like that following the Marshall plan?

Deal! Someone should move this thread to the general items forum. Not sure why it is appropriate for us in IL only, AND I think it is going golden.

quote:

Originally posted by Ibach:
TBS-USA contributor Dr Mike Marshall on Biological Age!
04. Between when they are biologically thirteen years old and sixteen
years old, youth baseball pitchers should not pitch more than one inning
per game twice a week.

If Mike Marshall's claim to fame on this is his durability over his carrer, that makes me ask if he limited himself to the above quota when he was coming up? I kinda doubt it.

Lemme weigh in on growth plates. I had xrays performed when I was 14 years old. The doctor that looked at the x-rays told me that I would be 6'5". Well, I'm 30 years old and measure a towering 5'10".

Hey guys, I am not an authority on the this, just thought there might be some information there that could be helpful. We contacted
Dr. Marshall after reading an article in the Chicago Tribune that referenced him and the work he has done to educate parents and coaches about the risk and potential for arm injury as it relates to overuse and the importance of proper warm-up and mechanics. I sent him an email, I hope he joins in on the dialogue.

Some of us (speaking for myself) are probably not smart enough to understand 25 pages on arm pronation. Maybe I will be stuck on the Toll Road when he joins us.

NC, I don't always agree with everything and even had a hard time getting through Playball2's post in Travel Ball for kids thread. Posted December 20, 2006 08:29 PM.
When my BA took a dive I always just went out there and hacked. I'm sure someone will spin that back on me, but it's the truth, sometimes too much "thinking" is bad. Most of the younger kids will probably grasp bits and pieces here, hopefully we can enlighten some of the kids and the parents to take more interest in what the coaches are doing.

I am not so sure how practical it is to think that parents will take their 10-year-old Little Leaguers to go get an Xray. A little common sense can go a long way. I understand how to drive/maintain my car without knowing exactly how it works.

IMO the bigger problem is that people get caught up in winning & a lot of us could write pages upon pages of pitcher abuse that we've seen or directly experienced ourselves. In simple terms, if MLB pitchers are pulled out of games after 100 pitches, than why do we think it is OK for an 11 year old to do it? If MLB starting pitchers do not come into games as relief pitchers between starts, than why do all these teenagers do it? If MLB pitchers do not pitch in 3 games in one day, than why are so many kids playing travel doing it? I really don't think I need Mike Marshall to explain it to me.

My other concern with Marshall is with what he preaches about inning totals that kids should pitch when young, I am not sure we would have enough kids to run youth leagues. Marshall is probably a smart guy, but I don't see him pumping guys into MLB baseball either. Pitching is a little more than how hard you throw and I am not so sure you can learn the "Art of Pitching" throwing as little as he recommends. My older kid's arm seems pretty healthy and he's never had an Xray. We pretty much followed some common sense and let his coaches know we would NOT tolerate overuse, or we would walk. JMO

Merry Christmas to all!!!

Sent to us from Dr. Mike:
Dear Sir,

I will gladly answer any questions that anybody has about my
recommendations for youth baseball pitchers.

To start, I believe that it is the parent's responsibility to make
sure that their children do not do anything that will permanently alter
the growth and development of their body. Therefore, I recommend that,
for their youth baseball pitchers, at ten chronological years old, they
have front and side view X-rays taken of the glove and pitching elbows
from mid-upper arm to mid-forearm within one week of their birthdays
until the growth plates in both elbow completely mature.

If parents do this and find that their youth baseball pitchers can
start 34 games with open growth plate and cause them no harm, then they
will have scientific evidence with which to argue that my concerns are
not real.

I would appreciate this information. In fact, on my website, I have
a Research Study proposal that addresses this very issue. No researcher
could ever get permission to conduct this study. But, parents can do
this study. All they have to do is to get the X-rays taken every year
and send copies to me along with their youth baseball pitcher's pitching
statistics and I will determine their son's biological age and whether I
see any developmental differences between the growth plates in their
son's glove and pitching elbows.

With sufficient numbers of participants, together, we may be able to
determine how much baseball pitching youth baseball pitchers at each of
the biological ages between ten and sixteen year old can safely perform
without altering the growth and development of the growth plates in the
pitching elbow.

Can I count on ballfan, deucedoc, Fastballdad, itsrosy, nc42dad,
Tuzigoot, CPLZ and longshot34 to show this much concern for their son's
well-being?

Sincerely,

Dr. Mike Marshall

Dr marshall, I wish I could help you out, but my daughter (17 months) is more interested in kicking the ball then picking it up and throwing it. As a baseball coach it breaks my heart to see her using her feet in this way, but we are working on getting this corrected.

Boys, I'm getting a pedicure and watching the Bears while writing this. Am I breaking a man law?

I'm not sure how my son got pulled in to this. I don't even know Dr. Marshall.

However, my son was being treated by an ortho for a little shoulder instability. Both of his shoulders were x-rayed, and both x-rays picked up the growth plates in the upper arm bones (near the shoulder). In a nut shell, the growth plate in the upper arm on his throwing side was wider than the growth plate in the upper arm on his non-throwing side. It was not an injury. In fact the ortho said that the difference in the width of the growth plates was typical of what he sees in adolescent baseball players with good throwing arms.

I was hoping some of the parents and coaches would appreciate what Dr. Mike has to say. He is out there just trying to help prevent arm injuries and educate. Dr Mike is a respected authority on the subject and has consulted at every level from MLB to Little league. Hopefully someone will garner something positive from this.
Dr Mike Marshall sent this:

I am happy to answer any question that anybody associated with your
organization has. However, to do this, I will need someone to send me
the questions.
Sincerely,

Dr. Mike Marshall

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Dear Tuzigoot,

As the movie, 'The Rookie' showed, it is typical for youth baseball
pitchers to develop instability in their pitching shoulder. Apparently,
too much competitive pitching lengthens the Gleno-humeral ligaments that
hold the head of the Humerus bone into the Glenoid Fossa.
Unfortunately, like with early closure of the growth plates in the
pitching arm, the youngsters do not experience any discomfort associated
with these alterations in the proper growth and development of their
pitching arms.

The growth plates at the proximal end of the Humerus bone mature
when young men are biologically nineteen years old. However, with too
much youth baseball pitching, in the pitching arm, these growth plates
close early. This explains why when doctors compare the length of the
Humerus bone in the glove and pitching upper arms of major league
baseball pitchers, they discover that the Humerus bone in the pitching
upper arms are shorter.

I would disagree with the assessment that, when youth baseball
pitchers have wider growth plate openings for the Lesser Tuberosity of
the head of the Humerus bone in their pitching arm than in their glove
arm, they have good throwing arms. Instead, I would say that this is
evidence that the attachment of the Subscapularis muscle to the Lesser
Tuberosity of the Humerus bone in the pitching arm has pulled the Lesser
Tubersity away from the shaft of the Humerus bone.

If these youth baseball pitchers continue to apply too much stress
to this growth plate, then they will pull their Lesser Tuberosity off
the bone (complete avulsion). This is what happened to that fifteen
year old, when he pulled the Medial Epicondyle off the shaft of the
distal end of his Humerus bone.

Because the stress associated with the 'Reverse Pitching Forearm
Bounce' injurious flaw inherent in the 'traditional' baseball pitching
motion that avulses the Medial Epicondyle is greater than the stress
associated with the 'Pitching Elbow Behind the Acromial Line' injurious
flaw inherent in the 'traditional' baseball pitching motion that avulses
the Lesser Tuberosity, the complete avulsion of the Medial Epicondyle is
more common in youth baseball pitchers than the complete avulsion of the
Lesser Tuberosity.

Sincerely,

Dr. Mike Marshall

How about if Dr. Marshall spoke for himself directly? Ibach does a fine job of speaking for others.

Every kid is different.....where one kid is at 12 in terms of maturity is not the same as another.....being smart about it isn't that tough....you just have to do it.

Fastball, Then why are so many youth pitchers still getting hurt? Could it be the (parents & coaches) are smart "about it", just unaware of how fragile the scapular area is, in a youth player's arm/shoulder? If I were a parent and read this, I would consider a different approach and make sure my kid was shutting down when appropriate.
As Dr. Mike said in email addressing some of the feedback we have provided him. "I love humor. However, I dislike pitching arm injuries in youth baseball pitchers more than I love humor. What's the point?

Some of you say that you are a baseball coaches. Do you teach youth baseball
pitchers how to pitch? If so, do you know what is happening to their pitching arms? If not, why not?"

*Here is Dr. Mikes contact info
Email: drmikemarshall@earthlink.net

Former Professional Baseball Shortstop and Pitcher

Michael Grant Marshall, Ph.D.
38313 Vinson Avenue
Zephyrhills, FL 33541
(813)783-1357
College Baseball Coaching Experiences

http://drmikemarshall.com/AcademicCredentials.html


01. Michigan State University (1965-1979), Adjunct Coach
02. University of Tampa (1984), Assistant Baseball Coach
03. Saint Leo College (1984-1988), Head Baseball Coach
04. Henderson State University (1989-1991), Head Baseball Coach
05. West Texas A&M University (1993-1994), Head Baseball Coach

Professional Consultant

01. Professional Quarterback Passing (1975-1981)
02. Professional Tennis (1976-1977)
03. Major and Minor League Baseball Pitchers (1975-Present)

quote:

Originally posted by ballfan:
Ibach, I see where one of the boys listed on the travelball select had a record of 23-6 this past season. For the sake of argument, lets say that he had 5 no decisions. How does 34 starts for a pitcher who has not fully matured lend credibility to your argument?

It's not humorous and this (above quote) is what I mean by not being smart. Probably done for the glory of a Travel Team and it's genuis coach. (At the probable expense of the kid later on)

On the other hand if you follow some of the guidlines set by Dr. Marshall and others, we would have 14 pitchers in every youth baseball game, and we could have one game a week.

Reason has everything to do with it.

1. Don't pitch hurt. Leo Mazzone's theories on good pain and bad pain don't apply to kids.

2. Don't over pitch. One start per weekend tourney is enough for a kid pitcher.

3. Accept the fact that you are going to lose some games and your best guy can't be out there every time the game is on the line.

4. Be more concerned about how good a pitcher is going to be at 17 and 18 and beyond than you are about how good he is at a younger age. Throwing 120 pitches in 7 innings with 18 K's at 13 isn't going to do a thing for a kid when he is a Varsity Pitcher or beyond.

I didn't need Dr. Marshall or Dr. Tom House to tell me this.

Is Dr. Tom House related to Dr. Greg House, the outstanding diagnostic doctor from Princeton with the pain killer drug problem?

See House...All new episode January 9!

quote:

Originally posted by bballdad1954:
Is Dr. Tom House related to Dr. Greg House, the outstanding diagnostic doctor from Princeton with the pain killer drug problem?

See House...All new episode January 9!

Doctor House. Greg House that is. One of my tv heroes.

Now that Dr. House could get to the bottom of this pitching issue in about a minute.

Just don't get in his way.

Ok, so I didn't read every post in this thread word for word, but here are my two cents for what they are worth.

As long as their are un-qualified coaches teaching/coaching children in little league, this issue will always be around. This is of course a generality. We all know of and have heard stories of Mr. Smith who is, an Accountant (no offense to accountants) by day and All-Star Little League Coach by night, who has to win the big game tonight to advance to regionals. Mr. Smith does not care about Little Johnnies arm. He just wants to WIN!!!

Here's a novel idea. Instead of little kids throwing breaking balls, how about teach them a changeup? As simple as putting a third finger up on the ball. What does that do? It changes speeds, upsets the hitter's timing, AND does not require elbow or shoulder surgery. But a changeup is not too cool, right? Ask Mr. Maddux...he has made a living on it.

Yes, there are quality coaches out there that have good intentions. They are hard to come by, but they're out there somewhere. Probably even down at your local park. Maybe they don't win the league championship every year, but maybe those kids also don't need surgery when they are 12.

I've shared this story in a similar post, oh about a year or so ago, but I'll share it again. I was helping someone run a clinic a few years ago. The parents/Dads had to catch for their own kids. One boy, let's call him Little Johnnie, threw pretty hard for his age/size. We never taught the kids how to throw a curveball...but stressed fastballs and changeups...and mechanics of course. Everytime we'd turn away, Little Johnnie would start breaking off a few. We'd turn around and he'd stop. Who was encouraging him?? His catcher!! So as much as we try to TEACH the kids the right way, there is a good chance they'll hear something different from "someone else".

Oh, and yes, this stuff does happen in high school!! I know it's hard to believe but, yes, it does.

Oh, and yes, Greg House is the man!

JMO,

Teams with 10 or more pitchers can Play ten, 7-inning games a week and not wear anybody out!

Most top 12-15 year old pitchers can get through 3-4 innings twice a week with less than 50 pitches per outing.

With most TB teams, the top 3 or 4 pitchers can eat up 7 innings with 70-90 pitch count.

These are the teams every pitchers Dad should be looking at...1 year in advance.

If a particular pitch count or number of innings or appearences is crucial to you then get it out there BEFORE you make a decision. Most coaches want to know this and will probably bring it up before you do.

Seems to me that the TB teams you fellows are worried about are the lower-middle etchelon teams. These are the teams to beware of...where they have 1 or 2 studs that get seriously overworked.

Sox...you brought up something I want to touch on. I don't want to get into the whole high school summer team vs TB debate, but, how about the idea of quality innings vs quantity of innings?

Who is better...a kid that throws both ends of a DH vs the worst team in the league/conference or the kid that battles his "behind" off once a week for 5-6 innings vs the top team in conference/state?

Also, when considering pitch count, when is enough enough? Let's look at 100 pitches (high school). One kid might throw 100 over 7 innings, being pretty efficient. Another might throw 100 over 4 innings and walk 4 runs in..not too many quality pitches in that situation. So I don't have a problem letting a kid go 100 (or more) if he is being efficient. Also consider the kid's size, strength, mental strength, etc. Not every pitcher is the same.

I think Sox brought up a good point. Dad might need to ask "how many innings" or "how many pitches". If not, he may be asking the Dr, "how many surgeries" and "how much will it cost?"

Soxnole, if you have kids that throw 70-90 pitches in a 7 inning outing, you must be playing alot of those "lower-middle etchelon teams" that you eluded to in your prior post. Then my question becomes, did you get into travel ball to play "lower-middle etchelon teams"?

Fastball, maybe that is what is needed at the youth level and HS level, one inning per kid.
What about having each kid on the team be required to pitch, at least at the youth level. Maybe the decision makers should rethink the pitching rules.
The days of seeing a youth or high school kid go 6 innings should be numbered.
I have another post from Dr. Mike, but I have sent it to Coach B for review and permission to post. He has done a great deal of research on this, maybe the info will help prevent some injuries. The comment regarding humor wasn't directed at you, rather the overall tone of sarcastic responses. Just a little disappointed myself that a guy with 40 years experience isn't given a little more respect. As for me, and some of the others that post for an entity you are all familiar with, I understand how some of you would view everything I post skeptically, just give me a chance, that's all I ask.

quote:

Here's a novel idea. Instead of little kids throwing breaking balls, how about teach them a changeup? As simple as putting a third finger up on the ball. What does that do? It changes speeds, upsets the hitter's timing, AND does not require elbow or shoulder surgery. But a changeup is not too cool, right? Ask Mr. Maddux...he has made a living on it.

PitchDoc Great Post. I agree we were watching a travel tournament in Florida and the top pitcher everyone was raving about, was getting the job done with his changeup. He also was hitting 87/88 at age 15, but it was his changeup and the mix of speeds that impressed us. He did jelly-leg a few kids with a deuce, but he rarely used it. Saw it three ot four times. This kid was polished! I'm sure he will still be around down the road.