Flat ground vs. mound

"What is the reason for this?"

I dunno' papi...region wide glaciation eons ago?

Seriously...anyone know?

Do you want to hear the craziest thing? Son and husband went to the local town owned fields to practice pitching. At all four fields every mound had been removed. Dirt gone - good-bye. The bull pens had the rubbers removed and the netting removed from the backstops. The netting had been removed from the cage.

um, yeah.... I guess they are either preparing for snow and ice, or softball season.

flat ground that day.

There are 3 muscle groups that accelerate the arm but only 2 that decelerate the arm. And deceleration happens in about half the time that acceleration takes.

When throwing off a mound, gravity assists acceleration so the decelerators get worked harder. When throwing on flat ground, accelerators work harder (to match velocity of throwing off a mound) since gravity no longer assists. Thus, flat-ground throwing is easier on the decelerators.

As far as rehab goes, an injury to the decelerators would certainly dictate flat-ground throwing to eliminate the extra stress due to gravity assisting the accelerators. Beyond that, though, check with your doctor.

Roger Thomas -
I have heard Tom House say the same thing.

He also says it is very hard to hurt your arm throwing on flat ground. I've asked others the same thing, nobody else has confirmed that opinion.

We throw flat ground thru the winter and only go back to the mound once we can get outdoors. The main thing I've noticed is that the kids who work hard off flat will often see a pronounced jump in velo when they hit the bump in spring. Also, the breaking stuff is super-sharp off the hill once they've had to work on movement from flat ground. That's my experience at any rate.

We only threw flat ground pens when weather forced us to. I would try to take advantage of it by having our kids use thier breaking balls a little more...thought being, if you could keep your hook down on flat ground, than the mound would be a piece of cake.

I used flat ground while getting loose to pitch against ASU at ASU. Those cheating "Scum devils" would have the visitors bull pen mound at about 3ft high, while thier game mound was about 6in high. Other than that, I pitched only off of mounds when given the opportunity.

my son works out with a fellow that is currently in the marlins organization....flat ground is a must according to him....it is a time to work on your grip....finishing out front and balance...it is thrown at about 70% of top speed...and is a regular part of my sons routine all year

For any rehab, it's standard practice.

There are different philosophies in training on moving to flat before the mound, less stress on arm (though there's an argument on that), easier transition, you should practice your stuff where you are going to throw it, and those given above, etc.

I breifly saw my son's pro training workout and flat ground work was included before you throw from teh mound, teh same as osage posted.

quote:

Originally posted by deemax:
I used flat ground while getting loose to pitch against ASU at ASU. Those cheating "Scum devils" would have the visitors bull pen mound at about 3ft high, while thier game mound was about 6in high. Other than that, I pitched only off of mounds when given the opportunity.

There is a rule in NCAA that if the visitors bullpen is not in acceptable condition, they can ask and must be granted permission to use the home teams bullpen.

Rob Kremer,

Everyday position players throw at a variety of distances from flat-ground. In fact, I'd guess most position players make quite large numbers of practice throws from flat-ground.

If the relative elbow/shoulder injury rates for position players vs pitchers are skewed toward better arm health for the everyday players, the difference might be the mound throwing.

I think Roger's comments are right on the money--pitchers usually emphasize training/conditioning of their accelerator muscle groups (everyone is obsessed with more velocity, right?) and they very often underappreciate the importance of building commensurate strength into the decelerator muscle groups.

Another way to think about this is: No one can accelerate their arm into release any faster than their body's capacity to decelerate it after release. At least, they can't do this breaking something.

Year-round flat-ground throwing is a great way to work on pitching mechanics without undue stress. It's also good to work specifically at strengthening the decelerator muscle groups.

My son does prone holds and "triceps push-ups" every day, year-round, to condition the decelerators. ( I do 'em too, right alongside, so we can have a few laughs together about it...).

It isn't unusual for players trying to rehab without surgery from a partial UCL tear to be fine until they start throwing off the mound so there's some empirical evidence that throwing off the mound puts a higher level of stress on the arm.

I think you should read this before assuming that flat-ground work is necessary. I just want to make sure we get both sides of the argument regarding flat-ground work.

This is the thinking by the flat ground throwing advocates: "You will throw harder off a mound because you are helped with acceleration from the decline, but as far as building arm strength and quickness the mound is not the way to go."

The idea here I don't believe makes much sense—to not do the only thing that can possibly make a pitcher more effective and more successful at getting hitters out…throwing from the mound at game intensity. That is how a pitcher will ultimately build his body so he has the capability to pitch deeper into games at full intensity. There is no other place to duplicate that than throwing from the mound. You just can't get it throwing from flat ground…even long toss.

In the effort to save the arm the pitcher prevents himself from getting better since pitching mechanics on flat ground are completely different than pitching mechanics throwing from the mound. The pitchers weight shift and weight transfer is different therefor his stride length on flat ground will be shorter. Because his stride is shorter his front leg will not stay flexed as long which will adveresely effect his ability to rotate his trunk properly. And because his stride is shorter his arm will not get into the correct throwing position. Trunk flexion position will also be different because the trunk will be more upright at ball release than while throwing from the mound.

Because everything is so different while throwing on flat ground then a bullpen thrown on flat ground or mechanics work on flatground will not transfer to throwing from the mound. A pitchers control or command of pitchers will also be different because his release point will also be different. The two activities are completely different and the pitcher's body will interpet them as completely different. This means that a pitcher who throws on flat ground will not get better for throwing from the mound.

For pitchers who have control problems no amount of flat ground throwing is going to help them get better for games because they are two completely different mechanical activities. If pitchers want to improve their mechanics, their control and their velocity they should follow the sports science Principle of Specificity which says that whatever activity you want to perform better at…in this case throwing from the mound in a game…you had better do it as closely as possible to the activity you will perform in game competition.

The pitcher's body must be conditioned to throw a certain number of pitches in game competition. For his body to be fully conditioned to throw downhill at game intensity it would not seem to make sense to not do that activity which is the only way possible to become better conditioned for game throwing.

No other sport that I know of has uses this type of training methodology to help an athlete get better. I know of no sport where athletes save themselves for the game. Their practices are as game specific as possible in order to get better for the next game. Pitching from the mound is about acceleration and deceleration. A pitcher's body must fully be trained to do both of those things at full game intensity if that is what he is expected to do in a game.

Could it be that the idea of saving the pitcher's arm by doing activities at less than game intensity or throwing on flat ground instead of the mound is one of the many reasons that pitchers are becoming injured more often…and why they cannot go deeper into games? It might be something that baseball should address since I do not see pitching getting any better with all the new training methodologies out there.

We seem to forget that pitching is a specific skill—a simple "two phase" movement that to be mastered must be done with proper mechanics as specifically as possible a lot of the time.. And throwing from the mound at game intensity is the most specific activity that a pitcher can do to get better at hitting the glove, perfecting his pitches and ultimately being more effective making hitters more uncomfortable than they currently seem to be.

Playing catch on flat ground is certainly an activity that pitchers do regularly. However the idea that we should save pitchers by having them throw a bullpen on flatground is not going to help them improve for games or make them more successful.

Source: http://www.pitching.com/blog/43/shoudnt-we-begin-to-que...-pitching-absolutes/

If one assumes a pitcher can only throw so often over a given period of time without starting to damage the arm then it makes sense to put together the best mix of full intensity work from the mound, full intensity flat ground, partial intensity from the mound, and partial intensity flat ground work possible so as to maximize both intensity, specificity and repetitions.

Doing only work off the mound will tend to limit repetitions since it does seem to be a bit harder on the arm. Doing only flat ground work would seem to not be specific enough.

Like most things there isn't one right answer and there isn't one right mix that fits all pitchers.

The ideal is to work the arm right up to it's limits so that it can repair itself a little bit stronger each time. The problem is that it is very easy to go over the limits and never have the repair quite catch up with the damage. Getting just the right mix of training activities is an art and is very specific to the individual pitcher.

Personally, I like to see portions of the year dedicated primarily to arm strengthening focused on long toss, with perhaps some limited flat ground work and other portions of the year more focused on bullpens off the mound.

quote:

Originally posted by Roger Tomas:
There are 3 muscle groups that accelerate the arm but only 2 that decelerate the arm. And deceleration happens in about half the time that acceleration takes.

When throwing off a mound, gravity assists acceleration so the decelerators get worked harder. When throwing on flat ground, accelerators work harder (to match velocity of throwing off a mound) since gravity no longer assists. Thus, flat-ground throwing is easier on the decelerators.

As far as rehab goes, an injury to the decelerators would certainly dictate flat-ground throwing to eliminate the extra stress due to gravity assisting the accelerators. Beyond that, though, check with your doctor.

quote:

Originally posted by switchitter:

Source: http://www.pitching.com/blog/43/shoudnt-we-begin-to-que...-pitching-absolutes/

I don't have a dog in this fight, but I would caution paying too much attention to Dick Mills. Some of what he espouses is OK, most is BS.

I just wanted to get both arguments out there and then talk about meeting somewhere in the middle. I am not an advocate nor a disbeliever in Dick Mills because I haven't bought his materials lately. I believe Tom House talks a bunch about towel drills which I think are great if done correctly. Correctly as in the University of Virgina's Pitching coach and his philosophies. He hasn't had an arm injury in 17 years at U of V. That's pretty darn good.

quote:

I know of no sport where athletes save themselves for the game. Their practices are as game specific as possible in order to get better for the next game.

I pretty much disagree with that statement. I don't know of any sport where practices are always conducted at game-like intensity. Games are much more about performing than learning. Practices are much more about learning than performing.

One of the fatal flaws in Mills' reasoning, I believe, is that pitchers can/should strengthen the appropriate decelerator muscle groups by game-intensity pitching from a mound because flat-ground throwing does not do much for the decelerators. The flaw is, high intensity mound throwing provides too much stress in too short a time for strengthening to occur before injury becomes likely.

There are many safe conditioning drills that strengthen the decelerator muscle groups without any danger of over-stressing them. Prone holds (every day, 3 minutes) and sufficient triceps work with weights or via triceps push-ups everyday are very, very valuable for pitchers.

But, the fact is, most pitchers (1) don't know anything about the importance of their decelerator muscles, because they are more typically obsessed with acceleration (2) have not conditioned their decelerator muscle groups to commensurate strength with their accelerators and, (3) are not surprisingly far too weak in these muscle groups.

Flat-ground throwing is a fine low stress way for pitchers to hone and maintain their mechanics all year round. Specific conditioning of the decelerator muscles is probably an overlooked issue for most youth pitchers, and flat-ground throwing probably won't help much. But, obsessive mound throwing for someone who is not functionally strong enough in these areas will also not help--in fact, it places the cart in front of the horse. Pitchers need to develop and maintain functional strength sufficient to support what they are trying to do on the mound--not condition themselves solely with game-intensity mound throwing.

I'm not sure the triceps are that involved in deceleration. Any experts out there?

There are lots of experts, but you have to go to the kinesiology/physiology literature, they usally don't come to this site.

Here's one (of many) references that may be helpful:

Clinical Sports Medicine (1996) April, 15(2) pp 401 - 423

Gill, TJ and Micheli, LJ

Harvard University, Residency Program in Orthopaedic Surgery, Boston, MA

"The Immature Athlete. Common Injuries and Overuse Syndromes of the Elbow and Wrist."

Specific elbow and wrist injuries are predictable in the skeletally immature athlete based on the biomechanics of the sport and the age of the patient. The physician must be aware of the potential for overuse injuries. Modification in training regimens is essential for recovery. A greater emphasis must be placed on the prevention of these injuries. As a general rule, the young athlete should not progress more than 10% per week in the amount and frequency of training. Correction of muscle-tendon imbalances is accomplished by maintaining strength and flexibility of sussceptible tissues.

In throwers, a triceps-strengthening program of progressive resisted extension exercises and a forearm flexor/extensor-strengthening program using the French curl technique are helpful. Careful attention to throwing technique and proper coaching are essential.

The goal for the young athlete is early recognition of the injury and thereby prevention of long-term disability.

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Here's another article that is more specific about the role of triceps in pitching motion:

J. Orthop. Sports Phys. Ther. (1993) June, 17(6) pp274-278

"Biomechanics of the elbow during baseball pitching"

Werner, SL; Fleisig, GS; Dillman, CJ; Andrews, JR

By understanding pitching biomechanics, therapists can develop better preventative and rehabilitative programs for pitchers. The purpose of this study was to quantify and explain the joint motions, loads, and muscle activity that occur at the elbow during baseball pitching. Seven healthy, adult pitchers were examined with synchronized high-speed video digitization and surface electromyography. Elbow extension before ball release corresponded with a decrease in biceps activity and an increase in triceps activity. A varus torque of 120 Nm, acting to resist valgus stress, occurred near the time of maximum shoulder external rotation. Previous cadaveric research showed that the ulnar collateral ligament by itself cannot withstand a valgus load of this magnitude. Triceps, wrist flexopronator, and anconeus activity during peak valgus stress suggests that these muscles may act as dynamic stabilizers to assist the ulnar collateral ligament in preventing valgus extension overload.
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That's pretty clear, right?