do curveballs hurt your arm

ball-slinger21,
Depends on your age and physical maturity. The main thing I'd worry about from your post is the "bread and butter" part of it. If you are really relying on your curve that much you probably aren't working on your fastball velocity and command enough and also aren't working hard endough on developing a good change.

You've probably thrown the curve more than is good for your arm over the past 3 years but what is done is done.

Hey a curveball is not really necessary at the high school level. You should work on velocity. I throw in the mid 80's and prolly throw less then 10 curveballs a game. If you can work strikes and change speeds and location, you should be fine. Just long toss and work on velocity

Im not really throwing it every other pitch. I know that will hurt your arm. In a three to four inning outing I probably only throw 10-15 hooks, I was just wanting to know if that amount hurts you arm. At one point I did throw too many but then I discovered the cutter. Its definitely an arm saver. But you're right I do need to long toss. As a matter of fact I just got through long tossing this evening. I was just wandering could the amount of hooks I am throwing now be hurting me?

"Hooks" should be the icing not the bread and butter. Not necessary in HS, good pitchers in college don't rely on it heavily. If you are a freshman throwing CB's on a regular basis, it is eventually going to catch up with you.
Concentrtste on your fastball.

10-15 cb's in 3-4 innings for an HS freshman is about 4-to-8 too many. To me, this equates to approximately 30% of a good pitcher's pitch count for that number if innings, and that's too high. Everyone has given you great advice - work on the fastball (2 and 4) and location, location, location. I'd also work on a beauty of a change-up, too, before going deeper into curves, slurves, and sliders.

The question might be better restated as : DO curveballs place so much stress on your arm that the risks of throwing one outweigh the benefits?

That would be tough to answer yes.

TPM,
You have a lot more exposure to the college game than I do so I won't dispute what you've said about "good college pitchers" but I will say that because of aluminum bats there are a lot of college pitchers throwing a lot of curves and sliders and probably hurting their arms and slowing their progress as a result.

Depends on how many you throw in an inning. If your feeling a little soreness then just hold back and rely on your fastball, if your trying to mess a batter up throw a 2 seamer and get a groundball it always works for me. If not then do what your most comfortable with. Throwing to many cirveballs could possbily hurt you in the longrun so just stick with the fastball and changeup and once you feel like you have a strong enough arm to throw a breaking ball then work with that but dont overuse it.

I am a High School Sophomore now that is a lefty pitcher. Last year i got a stress fracture in my elbow by throwing about 10% of my pitches a curveball. it then resulted in tendonitis and has been slightly progressing ever since. Since I cant do curve ball drills, My pitching coach has made me work more on my circle change and now it is my number 1 pitch. I dont even throw a curveball now and i wont till I am 16 or 17. Curveballs will eventually tear your arm up one way or another. But their are always some who dont get hurt but just because they dont doesnt mean you wont. Learn location and changing speeds before you start bringing the deuce.

Interesting that you don't blame the pitch you threw 90% of the time.

phillyfan,

Exactly what I was thinking!!!!!!!!

I believe the curveball gets a bad reputation because when someone gets hurt they assume it was a result of throwing a curveball. How do they know for sure? I've never seen any test prove that a curveball was more stressful than a fastball, but I have seen one that suggested a curveball was LESS stressful.

I'm not trying to say you should start throwing a curveball at an early age. In fact, I believe you should wait until you are older just to give yourself the opportunity to develop a good fastball and change up. I just believe we should blame arm injuries more on bad mechanics and poor conditioning rather than assuming that curveballs are the reason for an injured arm.

Remember, kinetic energy increases with the square of the velocity. Baseballs are thrown at a high velocity, thus a relatively high kinetic energy. When someone throws a baseball at 95mph, their fingertips reach a velocity equal to 95mph. Now imagine your fingers hitting a hard object at 95mph. Imagine the damage that would be done to your hand if it hit a brick wall at that speed! I'm trying to paint everyone a picture of the magnitude of energy that the body has to absorb on every pitch.

Baseball could ban curveballs at every level, and arm injuries would still exist. I once witnessed a kid break his arm while throwing a fastball.

Do curveballs hurt your arm? Yes, but fastballs, change ups, and every other pitch do as well. When you decide to play baseball, you are willing to take the risk of hurting your arm while throwing.

Again, I'm not saying you should throw curveballs at an early age. But, don't assume your going to be injury free just because you decide not to throw a curveball until your 16 (or whatever that "magic" age is that everyone suggests).


I'm not suggesting that anyone is right or wrong, I'm merely presenting another side of the issue.

Take care.

You all are wrong. Considering that throwing a textbook 12-6 curveball (which is the one that young high school pitchers should learn) places little to no stress on your tendons whatsoever. The reasoning behind this is that the downward motion elongates the tendons in your elbow in a natural path, whereas a slider or sweeping curve twists both your wrist and tendons "against the grain." At our program(Lyons Township High School, IL) our coach instructs us that having a curveball is a must-have for any pitcher. You look at any pitchers who don't have offspeed and you will realize that they give up more homeruns and more hits than those that mix in a decent curveball. I agree that velocity is probably more important to develop for younger pitchers, but learning the curveball should not be stowed away for a rainy day. I think you all are misguided in the fact that kids' arms don't develop until their later high school years, and therefore they should be not even bother with a breaking ball of any kind. However, learning the proper technique for throwing a curve does not lead to the aforementioned shoulder damage that one would think. An example of this is Dan Sorce. Ace of our staff, he throws about 83-84 MPH and nearly 40% of his pitches are curves. He's been throwing a 12-6 deuce since he was 13 and has not had a problem since. Our coach, a former college and minor league pitcher, is the one who set him up with all the off speed pitching. And not only has it kept him healthy, it gained him over 100 k's in 60 innings and a 1.1 ERA his senior year. Unless you want results, continue with throwing fastball variations that pass off as offspeed.

By the way ColinMcMurry, maybe it was improper release technique and improper usage of a "curveball" that hurt you. Throwing a slurve or a slider is different than a real curveball. No 12-6 curveball will ever hurt your arm.

The stresses imposed by a properly thrown curve may not be higher than those from a properly thrown fastball but they are different. As a result the combination of fastballs and curves can be more damaging than throwing fastballs and changes. Any pitcher throwing 40% curves in high school is not doing themselves a favor. Even if it doesn't result in arm damage it is taking away from fastball development.

quote:

Originally posted by boohoo:
. No 12-6 curveball will ever hurt your arm.

that's a little too broad a brush. any picth could hurt your arm if you throw it enough.

Yes, but I think he is trying to say that a curveball will not hurt your arm any more than, say..a fastball or a change. That is his point.

On my curveball I do not snap my wrist at all. I simply bring my thumb over the top of the ball. I've heard all my life that curves hurt your arm. But my dad has always taught me not to snap my wrist on my curve. I am one of the people on my high school and summer league team whose arm does not hurt after I pitch, even the next day.

This is ColinMcMurry and my curveball was actually a biting 12-6 curve..i just started throwing it when i was 11 nd too frequently so therefor i hurt my arm. People who try and throw a curveball too fast or snapping there wrist are the people who get hurt. Curveballs DO hurt your arm more than a fastball or changeup if you throw the exact amount equally distributed. BooHoo, do you think that all of the whole "everyone hurts their arm by throwing curveballs" was just a rumor?

CADad,
Just saw your post.
DK learned to perfect his fastball and change at an early age from his coaches. He very rarely had to rely on his curve and very rarely does to this day. I believe he does well because he has learned to effectively throw all of his pitches with deception. I believe most really good college pitchers, who have a future do the same, they try to lay off the curve as much as they can.
Unfortunetly lots of young pitchers who learn the CB early tend to rely on it because it brings results, will continue to do so later on if the college coach allows it. They tend to overlook perfecting the fastball and the coach sees the team win lots of games when he pitches, so do many college coaches. Actually any pitch can hurt you, reason why teaching good mechanics is and should be the mainstay of LL and HS.
When my son went onto college after years of really really good coaching, he still had to be shown the proper way to throw his curve.
I have been following certain pitchers in college and noticed that after two,three years of having success throwing sliders and curves, they struggled a bit this year, and their struggle resulted in being drafted in later rounds. You are probably right, years of relying on the CB, slider or "slurve" may have caught up with them.

TPM: I agree with much of your post - but maybe those that struggled this year would have been drafted even later or not at all had they not developed and had success with the curveball and/or slider.

I Will say to any one looking at this under 18, do not throw a slide. I have recently learned this through experience. My cutter was actually a slider. And for the past couple of games I experienced arm pain (something I rarely have). And the other day I quit throwing it in a game, an * inning game That is the most I have ever thrown. I also threw around 40 percent curveballs and I experienced no arm pain or soreness even the next day.

Perhaps it's boohoo who's wrong. The very act of throwing a baseball creates massive havoc in the shoulder.