Interval Throwing Programs at Distances Beyond 150 Feet Can Be Equivalent to Pitching Over Five Innings

Area of Science:

• Sports Medicine
• Biomechanics
• Baseball Pitching Analysis

Background:

• Understanding throwing biomechanics is crucial for injury prevention in baseball.
• Elbow varus torque (EVT) is a key metric for assessing elbow stress during pitching.
• Interval throwing programs (ITP) are commonly used for pitcher development and rehabilitation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To quantify the cumulative elbow varus torque (EVT) experienced during interval throwing programs (ITP).
• To establish an innings pitched equivalent (IPE) for each step within different ITPs.
• To assess the impact of throwing volume on pitching workload metrics.

Main Methods:

• High school pitchers utilized motusBASEBALL sensors to record throwing data at various distances (90-180 ft) and game pitches.
• Calculated mean EVT per throw and torque per minute for each throwing condition.
• Developed three ITPs (A, B, C) varying in throws per set (20, 25, 30) and calculated total EVT, IPE, and maximum pitch count equivalent (MPE).

Main Results:

• EVT per throw ranged from 36.9-45.5 N·m, comparable to game pitches (45.7 N·m).
• Mean EVT per minute was highest at 90 ft (193.4 N·m/min) compared to game pitches (125 N·m/min).
• Program C demonstrated the highest IPE range (3.0-5.6) and consistently exceeded 1MPE across all phases.

Conclusions:

• ITPs with 25 or more throws per set approximated 5 IPE per day.
• A 10-throw increase per set led to nearly a 50% rise in both IPE and MPE.
• Careful programming of ITPs is necessary to manage cumulative throwing stress and prevent overuse injuries.