by Miles Hill
North Oconee High School

Baseball, the one sport that has a player that can decide every play, the pitcher.

The pitcher is the most important player on the field. For example, if he throws a pitch right down the middle, bye bye ball. But if he throws a pitch at the very corner of the strike zone, every player is just going to stare at it until the umpire calls it a ball or strike.

Leighton Finley, a 6’5, 235-pound sophomore walk-on pitcher at the University of Georgia threw 104 pitches in one game. He threw into the high 80’s and low 90’s on every single pitch.

“I compare pitchers that can throw fast to sports cars,” said former UGA baseball coach Scott Stricklin.

Just like cars, when pitchers throw fast constantly without a break, they can break down.

Stricklin said there are ways a pitcher can avoid injuries, mainly focusing on specific workouts. “For a guy like Leighton Finley, when he’s out on the mound — that’s the fun time. No one gets to see the work he puts in before and after that.”

“Pitchers that throw at a high level, have a high-level process,” he said. “When you see them throw on Friday, you’re not seeing what they do on Saturday through Thursday. The real work is when they’re not throwing.”

Stricklin said running, working in the weight room and doing a throwing program is critical for pitchers. He cited Roger Clemens as an example of a pitcher who put in a tremendous amount of work.

“Roger Clemens was notorious for working so hard in between his starts,” he said.

The main problem is the rotator cuff. The part of the arm that moves the arm around in circles. The rotator cuff is the main injury that pitchers get. Pitchers are always moving in that unnatural motion that the arm is not meant to move in and hurt their arms.

“The risk of injury is always going to be there when you’re doing something at a high level,” Stricklin said. “When injuries happen, you have to do everything you can do overcome it.”

The rotator cuff is the main part of the arm for baseball pitchers. There are people as young and even younger than 14 that have to have surgery because they go over their limits. Some experts hold firm to keeping pitchers under a certain pitch count to avoid injury. However, former Georgia third base coach Scott Daeley doesn’t think limiting pitch counts is necessarily the answer.

“As far as pitch counts, everyone is a unique individual,” Daeley said. “I’ve seen a number of pitchers that come through the SEC where coaches have extended them to 130, 135 pitches who haven’t gotten hurt, whereas pitchers on a pitch count of 80 have gotten hurt.”

Regardless of the athlete’s size or the speed of their pitches, training is the most critical factor for avoiding injury. Daeley agreed with Stricklin that maintaining a good workout regime is the key to staying healthy — pitch counts and rest are secondary. “I don’t think anybody really has the formula of what number of pitches or how much rest will or won’t get someone hurt,” he said.