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Strasburg - All too familiar story

7Steps7Steps100+ posts
50% of velocity is generated from the "arm".

95% can be generated from a no-stride rotational throw depending on efficiency.

quote:
Why would one have their son stand on the mound (as you described) and throw without using the entire body to see how hard one throws?


To test efficency of the arm action via backwards chaining. Without a good arm action energy leaks out along the kinetic chain.
Last edited by 7Steps
GM Gingerbread Man500+ posts
quote:
Originally posted by RobV:
quote:
Originally posted by Gingerbread Man:
Personally, I feel that the Nationals should have made Strasburg a closer, perhaps they will in the future. Not many like the closer role but when a person throws with that velocity and doesn't have the greatest mechanics I think it is smarter to put them in more limited roles.


Yea...I'm sure there are TONS of pitchers who would NOT like to throw with those lousy $15 million dollar mechanics.

Roll Eyes


I honestly believe they paid Strasburg way too much for his capability. Sure, he gets the hype behind him and gets people out to the park to watch, but 15 million is too much.
TPMTPMHSBaseballweb Member since 2003
quote:
Originally posted by 7Steps:
50% of velocity is generated from the "arm".

95% can be generated from a no-stride rotational throw depending on efficiency.

quote:
Why would one have their son stand on the mound (as you described) and throw without using the entire body to see how hard one throws?


To test efficency of the arm action via backwards chaining. Without a good arm action energy leaks out along the kinetic chain.


You want to supply some supporting info on that, or someone else?

The Nats most likely have recouped most of their money paid out to Strasburg this year (remember 15M may be a payout over 5 years). Starters and closers are differnt type of pitchers, perhaps someday, he definetly will be a work in progress, all pitchers are, and most likely return with different mechanics.
CADadCADad5,000+ posts
I've seen people saying that 50% of velocity comes from the arm and if you isolate the arm a lot of people could throw a ball 45 mph with their arm only. The problem is that the first 45 mph is the easy part. It is much harder to go from 45 to 90.

I don't know how much the arm contributes vs the rest of the body. Both are important. Nobody throws 90 with just their arm and nobody throws 90 without using their arm fairly effectively.
CADadCADad5,000+ posts
Relative to all this early vs. late stuff CASon threw a pen this weekend. He warmed up like he was getting ready to go into a game, throwing all of his pitches. Then he threw 5 hard without any feedback. Mostly 86 and 87 with one at 81 for some reason. Then he went into a few sets of 3 fastballs and 1 change with feedback on velocity. This was on a JUGS that reads 0-2 mph faster than a Stalker but usually reads 1 mph faster. The first set was 83, 84, 84, and the change at 73. He kept trying stuff and if anything the velocity went down. We finally got him to stop trying things and just throw hard again. 89, 82, 88, 85, 84, 87. We had planned to have him finish up throwing 5 for strikes to see what velocity those would be at but he'd thrown too many pitches and we stopped.

Later when we looked at video his arm and his torso were later on the harder pitches. We weren't seeing big differences and at 30 fps there's some judgement involved from pitch to pitch. The interesting thing was looking at the change. His arm was way, way earlier and his torso was much earlier on the change. Obviously this is just one person and not equivalent to doing some sort of study. There's also a comparison that I believe laflippin did on youtube of Roy Oswalt throwing a fastball and a change and Oswalt is also way, way earlier with his arm on the change. I was really surprised at just how late Oswalt was on the fastball at initial footstrike in the super slow motion. He moves through his whole motion so quickly that you get the impression his arm is vertical at intitial footstrike at 30 fps but it isn't anywhere close.

What I get out of this is that his mechanics are actually better when he's trying to throw hard so he needs to practice throwing hard to get his mechanics in line so that eventually he can repeat those mechanics without having to try to throw that hard.

BTW, laflippin has put together a very impressive collection of superslow motion videos on youtube for those of you who are mechanics afficiandos.
Last edited by CADad
GM Gingerbread Man500+ posts
quote:
Originally posted by CADad:
Relative to all this early vs. late stuff CASon threw a pen this weekend. He warmed up like he was getting ready to go into a game, throwing all of his pitches. Then he threw 5 hard without any feedback. Mostly 86 and 87 with one at 81 for some reason. Then he went into a few sets of 3 fastballs and 1 change with feedback on velocity. This was on a JUGS that reads 0-2 mph faster than a Stalker but usually reads 1 mph faster. The first set was 83, 84, 84, and the change at 73. He kept trying stuff and if anything the velocity went down. We finally got him to stop trying things and just throw hard again. 89, 82, 88, 85, 84, 87. We had planned to have him finish up throwing 5 for strikes to see what velocity those would be at but he'd thrown too many pitches and we stopped.

Later when we looked at video his arm and his torso were later on the harder pitches. We weren't seeing big differences and at 30 fps there's some judgement involved from pitch to pitch. The interesting thing was looking at the change. His arm was way, way earlier and his torso was much earlier on the change. Obviously this is just one person and not equivalent to doing some sort of study. There's also a comparison that I believe laflippin did on youtube of Roy Oswalt throwing a fastball and a change and Oswalt is also way, way earlier with his arm on the change. I was really surprised at just how late Oswalt was on the fastball at initial footstrike in the super slow motion. He moves through his whole motion so quickly that you get the impression his arm is vertical at intitial footstrike at 30 fps but it isn't anywhere close.

What I get out of this is that his mechanics are actually better when he's trying to throw hard so he needs to practice throwing hard to get his mechanics in line so that eventually he can repeat those mechanics without having to try to throw that hard.

BTW, laflippin has put together a very impressive collection of superslow motion videos on youtube for those of you who are mechanics afficiandos.


This has been my conclusion as well. I too have noticed that my son has his best mechanics when he trys to throw harder- it is more repeatable and the velocity is more consistant. I have always felt that the body is pretty effective and efficient on its own when you just have the mentality of trying harder and performing harder. I have noticed this especially with hitting. When son is in a slump or his mechanics are somewhat off I go out in the yard and throw wiffle balls at him from 20 feet as hard as I can. It forces him to react quicker, swing faster, and in turn have a more efficient and natural bath path with more velocity.

Last year i did the same thing you did with taping a pen on son and had him try various things while taping him. His mechancis actually were the best when on the last few pitches he did it his own way and notched it up another level and just concentrated on throwing harder.
FO Field of Dreams10+ posts
Interesting thread. I am also in agreement that pitchers with the inverted W, scap load or whatever you want to call it are more susceptible to injuries. I feel there are pretty much 2 types of guys. The thigh to the sky guys and the elbow lifts the ball guys. Inverted W guys are more the elbow lifts the ball guys. Ironically I think I have seen on average that those guys throw harder though you take more of an injury risk.

I guess the big thing here in the Strasburg debate is would you change him. Even if you did find solid evidence that he would get injured throwing that way, the hardest thing to change is someone's arm path. This is not a simple fix. It would be a major overhaul and in the end he probably be would be more screwed up.
I know even working with HS kids that it is a tough, tough change to alter arm path. A kid like Strasburg with his muscle memory entrenched would be next to impossible IMO. The question is more what can we do for those guys to prevent injury (bands, stretches, etc).

I also wonder how much of those guys do preventative stuff. You would think they obviously would but you see way to many guys who don't do that stuff until AFTER they are hurt.
TPMTPMHSBaseballweb Member since 2003
quote:
Originally posted by CADad:
I think you'll find that a lot more of the pitchers who are injured are doing all the preventative stuff than you might realize.


I am with you, I think some folks think that these guys just go out and throw the ball every 5 days and then take off the other days.
Whatever your pitchers do to prevent injury, make that 10 times, no wait, maybe more, to prevent them from injuries that will affect their livelihood.

We can all sit around and debate what causes injury, the bottom line is that ALL pitchers at sometime in their careers will experience a setback, if not many setbacks. Example Chris Carpenter, shoulder surgery, elbow surgery, ulnar transposition. I am sure that you can name others.
The object, is to take it slow, through the growing years, and try to do as much as you can to remain healthy (whatever that means as everyone has their own opinion) so that you get the opportunity to get to where you want to go, before you get injured.
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