Velocity vs Growth - A hypothesis

Interesting hypothesis.
Do you recall how this data was presented?
Was it that the average velocity increase with the same kid as he grew, lets say 2" over a year or were these averages attributed to kids of certain heights?
In your experience did your son start throwing 53mph at age 8, and proceed to grow 10 inches and gain 10mph?
I think my younger son has gained more in mph than his height gain in inches over the last two years. But some of that may be attributed to raw motor skill developement.
Could it be that as a child matures motor learning becomes less important and the strength gains that are acquired with growth serve to increase performance in propotionate increments? It sure makes those first coaches all that more important!
Steve

I used two sets of data. One is simply the growth charts from the CDC. They show that kids on the 50th percentile grow a little more than 2.5 inches per year up until the age of 16 and then growth slows considerably. Of course there are always kids whose growth doesn't track the charts.

The other data was the results of some tryouts for an Indiana travel team that I found on the web. The ages ranged from 12 to 17. Each kid was allowed to throw 6 pitches and the average speed on a radar gun was noted. The information was taken in September so I assumed that it was for kids just turning the age noted for each kid. They didn't have the kid's heights posted.

My son has gained 6 or 7 mph in the last year (that's a guess, I'd have to go back and check earlier posts to be sure) while growing 3" and gaining about 25 pounds. Before that he gained about 4 mph per year. However, he has been doing long toss for a couple years now.

Went back and checked on a post I made in January. It looks like he has gained about 3 mph over the last 9 months, not the 6 or 7 mph in a year I guessed above.

Cadad,
Maybe we could get the members of this forum to post data on age, weight, height and throwing velocity.
Then follow it up in a year to see where everybody is.
Averages compiled and projections made.
Then we'ed have a tool that many may find useful.
I'll start.
4'8" 82lbs 57mph
Steve

CADad,

Can only speak for the last 2 years - little guy grew about 3 inches in 2002 - and picked up very little in velocity.

Grew about another 3 inches in 2003 - and picked up about 3 mph.

Grew another inch or so in 2004 - and picked up 6 mph.

He's 15.

I doubt that will continue - and hope to see him pick up about 3-4 mph per year into his senior year. More importantly - I hope he continues to learn how to pitch - and not just throw.

CA Dad:

I am happy to know that I am not the only baseball dad in this world researching CDC growth charts and projecting future speeds. Obviously, such things as genetics, conditioning, and mechanics are major factors in a childs ability to throw at high speeds. One other factor that may affect speed in childhood years maybe weight. I think this subject is indeed intrigueing so here's my sons numbers, (unfortunately, I cant remember all of his height numbers) :

Age 9, 42 mph, 63 lbs
Age 10, 48 mph, 68 lbs
Age 11, 54 mph, 75 lbs
Age 12, 60 mph, 85 lbs, 5'-0"
Age 13, 64 mph, 100 lbs, 5'-4"

It should be noted that he experienced some reoccuring elbow and shoulder soreness during age 12 and 13 which probably slowed his progress. (Yes we watch pitch counts closely, almost no curve balls-according to his coaches its flaws in his mechanics that he will need to fix)

DG

Interesting: a strong correlation with weight gain and velocity.
Is it going to be a simple muscle mass to velocity gain relationship?
Steve

My numbers tend to get messed up a bit because he seems to make his biggest gains each year after the regular season ends and then makes minimal gains from October through July.

A year ago he was 5'1/2" and weighed 90 lbs. I believe he was throwing about 58 and then made some pretty good gains during August and September.

He is currently just over 5'3" and weighs 114 lbs. He will turn 13 in a month. He is currently throwing 62 or 63 and will reach 65 once or twice a session. He has hit a maximum of 67 but that isn't repeatable. He did a science project back in sixth grade on using weighted balls and I'll have to see if I can find that to see what he was throwing at 10yo.

It's a nice hypothesis .... I don't believe it's going to be valid though. There is a generality that "bigger kids throw harder".... Tell that to Pedro --- or Billy Wagner.

You will have a naturally increasing velocity that can be directly related to growth ... yes. The arm is longer, thus you can apply more velocity to the baseball.

But the telling point is still mechanics. Does the pitcher have a nice arm action, does he use his lower body effectively, etc etc etc.

HHH,
I don't think Billy Wagner or Pedro Martinez are what you would call average pitchers.

I wasn't trying to say that all taller pitchers will throw faster than all shorter pitchers. I was simply saying that a kid who grows more will usually gain more velocity than a kid who grows less. If the kid who grows less started out throwing 10 mph faster the the kid who grows more then he may still be throwing 6 or 7 mph faster after the growth difference is taken into account. I've also heard of pitchers picking up several mph after they've stopped growing, so I'm not saying that the only way to throw faster is through growth. I also saw a kid gain around 8 mph while he was in college. Although he was 6'8" tall he didn't grow while he was in college.

So I agree with you that mechanics, fast twitch fibers, etc. can have a big impact on throwing velocity I don't think that disproves my hypothesis.

HiHardHeat,
I dont think the object is to try to pidgeon hole kids by size and the velocity that they might throw.
I think, like growth charts, there are always statistical outliers. When evaluated within their performance parameters, they will still have some predictable path that may lead to some general estimations as to their velocity performance.
For example; Take a kid is 10yrs old 4'10" and 75lbs and throws 65mph. He would not be expected to throw the same at 5'10" and 165lbs
as a kid who only manages to throw 35mph at the same starting point.
The idea is to anticipate, with a little more than speculation, what increases either kid might expect.
It would be like a growth chart for velocity.
Steve

I am curious. I am not a baseball dad, just a baseball mom of a freshman pitcher who attends a D1 school, 6'2.5" and velocity average 86-90 with hitting 93 last summer and 94 recently.
I hope that while you are recording this interesting data on your sons you do not share or discuss it with them. Reason being, they will only try to throw harder while you have the gun pointed on them.
My son never saw a gun reading (he or his parents couldn't care less) until he was almost 17. At that time he was about 6'1" and throwing 79-82. In two years he perfected his mechanics along with his 4 pitches and with that the velocity increased.
DG,
Your sons elbow and shoulder soreness is not normal for a 13 year old. I hope that you have checked it out. Some kids experience trouble at that age due to growth plate issues. The elbow and the muscles and tendons haven't caught up with each other. I know of at least three kids who ruined their pitching careers due to this problem and in one case surgery never helped. Proceed with caution!

At 14, 6'and 195 my son brings it in the mid 70's. As I recollect his mph has picked up on avg maybe 2-4 mph a year. But I'm not so concerned as is his instructor about overall speed as we are about spoting the ball and pitching with your head as well as your arm. He's been able to correct some mechanical and timing problems and now my son throws a cutter/slider/fastball and a changeup. He has learned how to use his wrist and grips to make the ball move and how the bottom half of his body is as important as the top half. We'll see if it pays off in fall ball

Freshman

Agreed, A change up that moves in on RH batters, a cutter that moves three inches and looks like the FB are most important. On the journey from 74 to 87 and beyond you must have movement or your cannon fire.

I have heard many say that Radar Guns hurt arms. I wouldn't doubt it. Pitching is deception. Learn to go into a HS game and give a coach 3-4 innings , ground ball outs,pop ups, lazy fly balls and drawing swings and low pitch counts first. Learn to throw balls in the strike zone that they cannot hit hard and pitches that are not what they look like and you will get some innings out there. Can you hold runners, do you throw wild pitches, can you read hitters set ups,can you play defense, can you hit? 91 is nothing if you beat your own team in 10 other ways.

THe single minded quest to throw in the 90s is like a batter praticing to hit homeruns ....not to smart or productive

quote:

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Originally posted by CADad:
HHH,
I don't think Billy Wagner or Pedro Martinez are what you would call average pitchers.

I wasn't trying to say that all taller pitchers will throw faster than all shorter pitchers. I was simply saying that a kid who grows more will usually gain more velocity than a kid who grows less. If the kid who grows less started out throwing 10 mph faster the the kid who grows more then he may still be throwing 6 or 7 mph faster after the growth difference is taken into account. I've also heard of pitchers picking up several mph after they've stopped growing, so I'm not saying that the only way to throw faster is through growth. I also saw a kid gain around 8 mph while he was in college. Although he was 6'8" tall he didn't grow while he was in college.

So I agree with you that mechanics, fast twitch fibers, etc. can have a big impact on throwing velocity I don't think that disproves my hypothesis.

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A tall pitcher has the chance to throw on a more downward plane than a short pitcher. Velocity has nothing to do with it. If you throw downhill, you have a better chance to get hitters out than if you are throwing on a flat plane.

bbscout,
I agree in general that throwing more downhill is good for most pitchers as it reduces the probability of home runs. However, it also depends on the type of pitcher. One reason, along with the velocity, that Wagner and Martinez can blow the high fastball by hitters is that they aren't throwing as downhill (of course being set up by Martinez CU doesn't hurt when it comes to blowing the high heat by a hitter). When a power pitcher throws downhill they lose a bit of their advantage on the high fastball. Of course the low fastball becomes even more effective with the downhill trajectory.

Despite his height you don't see Randy Johnson throwing over the top. While it probably has more to do with intimidation and an adjustment he had to make to find command he also gets a bit more of an advantage on the high fastball than he would throwing over the top.

One of the problems power pitchers with a long stride who typically don't throw very over the top have is that doing so makes it more difficult to get the curve to break down. I believe that one of the reasons Koufax was so good was that his fastball was so good he could go low or high and be effective and his over the top delivery allowed him to have a great curveball along with the fastball. I believe Don Sutton was a good example of a pitcher who had a relatively short stride and threw downhill although I don't really remember what his arm slot was. He probably could have thrown a bit faster with a longer stride and a bit lower arm slot but I doubt if he would have been as good of a pitcher.

Taller pitchers tend to throw harder than shorter pitchers although there are certainly hard throwing short pitchers. Velocity does have something to do with it. All things else being equal, the harder you throw the better.

This is just speculation but I believe if you go back through all of those clips you've made you'll find that most of the power pitchers threw from a 3/4 slot or lower. That doesn't mean that there aren't great pitchers who don't strike out as many hitters with their fastball who haven't been just as effective or more effective by throwing on a downhill plane.

It also depends on the type of hitter a pitcher is facing. One of the edges professional sports bettors came up with that allowed them to make money was realizing that if a "fly ball" pitcher was facing a ground ball hitting team then the ground balls would turn into line drives. If a ground ball (downhill) pitcher faces a fly ball hitting team then the fly outs turn into line drives. By the way, this is consistent with having more success swinging on the plane of the pitch.

An interesting side note is that as a result you might see a pitcher with only average velocity or slightly above velocity being a fly ball pitcher, Jarrod Washburn for example, while you'll see a taller pitcher with better velocity being more of a groundball pitcher.

My son is 14 yrs, 3 mos., 5'6", 128, and is regularly in the low 70s at this time. I've seen guys on the PG ID pages that are six inches taller, 60+ pounds heavier and only throw four or five mph harder. His hips are higher up than mine, even though I'm still 6" taller. Then I learned that the last thing to grow, generally, is the trunk. The arms and legs go dangling out first, followed by the trunk later on. Based on that, my guess is 6'2" to 6'4". Charts are good averages, but just take a look at your son and you should get a pretty good idea of what's going to happen. And if it doesn't and he still throws 90+ and has command of 3-4 pitches, won't matter anyway. There are American players (virtual unknowns) in the Korean pro league making $350,000 a year. There are opportunities in the world of baseball for excellent ballplayers, regardless of size.

Krakatoa,
Interesting. I'm guessing that at 14 yrs. 3mo, my son will be between 5'6" and 5'7". I hope, but doubt that he will reach 6'2" eventually. If he is regularly throwing low 70s at that time he'll have progressed fairly well.

CADad, for a long time I was worried about him because many of his peers hit their growth spurts as 7th-8th graders. He'd always been amongst the tallest until mid-school when suddenly he was left in the dust. But he seems to be on his own little tear now. His feet are now my size, his forearms are longer, and then there's that weird hip thing. He's still got a pre-adolescent upper body now perched atop these big long legs. It's the classic 'gangliness'. I suppose he could just turn out to be a really weird-looking adult, but I hope not!!

"My son is 14 yrs, 3 mos., 5'6", 128, and is regularly in the low 70s at this time. I've seen guys on the PG ID pages that are six inches taller, 60+ pounds heavier and only throw four or five mph harder."

I didn't intend for this to sound like I think my kid is some kind of phenom. He's not. I just meant that it's interesting about the size. You see guys 6' 180 pounds topping out at 72-74 at some PG ID events, while you'll see much smaller guys equalling or in some cases far outthrowing them. It's interesting. Size isn't everything when it comes to velocity -- but I know it means an awful lot to college and pro houndogs.

Tiger Mom:

I appreciate your concerns for my son and always enjoy hearing from site members that are a few years ahead of where I with my son. You should be very proud of what your son has achieved.

I have indeed had my son checked out by an orthopedic surgeon. Basically, he had a strained UCL. Its been more than a year since that time and he has had only minor soreness from time to time and the doctor has said that his elbow and shoulder looks fine.

My son has worked with two pitching coaches and they have noted three problems with my sons delivery 1)he tends to rotate his wrist at the release point very much like a slider on every throw including warm ups, this makes the elbow hurt, 2)he brings the throwing arm very far back behind his body and 3)he opens up the front shoulder to early in the delivery. The throwing shoulder gets sore from 2 and 3. Were working on fixing these problems with some results. He'll definitely need to fully fix these problems to achieve his dreams.