Baseball Development AMA

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a 10 year old in his first season in the Majors in a fairly competitive LL. Throughout his AAA time, he was a starting pitcher. It seems his velocity is definitely slower than others, though his accuracy is pretty good and he gets a good number of strike outs. It's almost like he throws so slowly that kids can't figure out how to hit it Is there anything he can do to increase his velocity while remaining accurate, or is that just something that will come with time? He does have low muscle tone. Thanks!

Younger kids have trouble judging arch which is why your son has some success. That will change with time so he needs to eventually develop speed. Best thing is playing long toss with a throwing partner and J bands jr. this is a full proof method that works if you stick with the process. A huge difference can be made by just doing these 2 things 3x a week.

[Anonymous]

Is it better to develop in multiple sports or focus on baseball. Year round travel baseball can be started at 8.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is it better to develop in multiple sports or focus on baseball. Year round travel baseball can be started at 8.

I don’t advise in any specialization at a young age. Kids should cross train and play as many sports as they can. 13/14 is when they can start to narrow down how their time is divided up.

[Anonymous]

Do you have any recommendations for PTs? My son hurt his arm pitching (even though he'd been very careful with pitch counts, etc.), due to some underlying conditions, but now it hurts to throw. He did some PT, last fall/winter but with the baseball pause when the pandemic hit, he lost a lot of what he accomplished. We may not be able to follow up with our previous PT. Do you have any suggestions on who to reach out to for PT for sports/baseball related injuries? Thanks!

[Anonymous]

What's a good league for high schoolers who are good players and enjoy the game, but don't want to commit to a travel team?

[Anonymous]

Alot of them quit at 13 after intensive travel and constant practice year round from 11 or so. My son started to feel dumb in the uniform.

[Anonymous]

Pp. He wanted to smoke pot and join a band instead.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Alot of them quit at 13 after intensive travel and constant practice year round from 11 or so. My son started to feel dumb in the uniform.

Mine would like to continue. He didn't do Travel, just loves to play.

[Anonymous]

Where should one go to high school if he is good? Does private or public matter if on a good travel team. This site has been pretty negative about St. Johns even though the program has a good reputation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you have any recommendations for PTs? My son hurt his arm pitching (even though he'd been very careful with pitch counts, etc.), due to some underlying conditions, but now it hurts to throw. He did some PT, last fall/winter but with the baseball pause when the pandemic hit, he lost a lot of what he accomplished. We may not be able to follow up with our previous PT. Do you have any suggestions on who to reach out to for PT for sports/baseball related injuries? Thanks!

Gosh I really don’t. I’d find a good orthopedic surgeon and ask for a referral.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's a good league for high schoolers who are good players and enjoy the game, but don't want to commit to a travel team?

Tough question because there really aren’t many options. “Travel” isn’t quite what it used to be and there are plenty of teams that play in NVTBL that are composed of kids that aren’t high school caliber players. The commitment is usually 2 practices per week and a doubleheader on the weekend. It’s really not that bad time wise. This is the time that tryouts are happening.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Where should one go to high school if he is good? Does private or public matter if on a good travel team. This site has been pretty negative about St. Johns even though the program has a good reputation.

I have some experience with the program you mentioned. If your son is a good player and looking to continue I think my main goal would be to have him play on a competitive travel and showcase team which SJC doesn’t allow. They ask their players to stay “in-house”.
There’s nothing wrong with playing for a public high school provided that your son likes the coach and is developing under him. I do think that there’s a higher level of play within the northern va high schools vs Maryland.

[Anonymous]

At what age, if any, should kids stop both pitching/catching and focus on one or the other?

12U DS has always done both (has a rocket arm), and coaches have generally managed him well. This fall he is playing in a Sunday doubleheader league (only- he isn’t playing rec this fall). He will often pitch 3-4IN in game one and then catch most of game 2. Is that too much? It seems a lot for one day but then he gets a full week of rest- which is the only reason we’ve allowed it. They will be playing tournaments over the winter (we live in a warm weather location)- not many, they are only planning to do one/month (along with practice 2x/wk)- because kids (including my DS) play other winter sports as well. He’ll play LL in the spring and probably AS in the summer.

As he gets older and is playing more, we wonder if he should stop catching? Or stop pitching as much? Neither? He likes both. On his current team, he’s the #2 pitcher and #1 catcher (basically splits time with the #2 catcher, and there are a few others who play here and there in a blowout). We have no idea how this will be managed during tournaments (DH plans to chat with the coaches at some point to ask).

Is it a matter of (a) with careful managing, doing both is ok? Or is it (b) kids have to choose one or the other at some point?

Thanks!!!!

[Anonymous]

Great question. This is a touchy area because there’s nothing wrong with doing both. The issue is doing too much of both within the same day or even the same weekend on no rest. My players that I manage for doubleheader’s will only be allowed a total of 6 innings combined pitching and catching. So if he catches 4 can pitch ONLY 2 or vice versa - however you want to mix it up. Catching a full game and then pitching the next I think is excessive if done as regular practice at the 12u level. In a pinch fine, but generally I think it’s too much stress on the arm. Certainly it’s something I would discuss with the coach.
Just remember this - it’s not about what they can do today it’s about what they can potentially do in the future. Protecting a young players arm is priority 1.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Great question. This is a touchy area because there’s nothing wrong with doing both. The issue is doing too much of both within the same day or even the same weekend on no rest. My players that I manage for doubleheader’s will only be allowed a total of 6 innings combined pitching and catching. So if he catches 4 can pitch ONLY 2 or vice versa - however you want to mix it up. Catching a full game and then pitching the next I think is excessive if done as regular practice at the 12u level. In a pinch fine, but generally I think it’s too much stress on the arm. Certainly it’s something I would discuss with the coach.
Just remember this - it’s not about what they can do today it’s about what they can potentially do in the future. Protecting a young players arm is priority 1.

This is a good strategy for those players who both pitch and catch.
We have a few players on my son’s team who do this for 11U. Our current coach keeps them at under 50 pitches in 1 game and they catch 2 innings in the 2nd game.

As noted above, protecting young arms is the first priority. We have been to tournaments where really young kids (under 10) are throwing over 100 pitches for the weekend. Just trying to remind people that they are still developing and no one is getting a scholarship or getting signed by MLB today.