For decades now, I've been a very vocal advocate of the need for adults to be more proactive protecting young arms, and with baseball now a 12-month sport for many kids, coaches and parents need to work even harder to help prevent our young ballplayers from suffering potentially permanent arm damage. I had a conversation yesterday with a parent who, after their 12 year old pitcher had some elbow pain after pitching over the weekend, asked me what they should do reduce or eliminate arm pain in the future, so here we go!

The bad news is that the number of youth arm injuries have been spiking dramatically over the past 10-15+ years.

The good news is that it's really easy to keep young arms healthy.

Here's an extensive list of what causes arm injuries in youth pitchers:

1. OVERUSE

That's it.

There is no #2.

OVERUSE, OVERUSE, OVERUSE.

What are the types of overuse?

1. Too many pitches in a single outing
2. Not enough rest after pitching
3. Pitching year round

If you really think about it, the risk of arm injury from this list is a uniquely "youth baseball" problem.

1. Major League starting pitchers these days are averaging about 80 pitches per game.
2. Major League starting pitchers only pitch every 5th day.
3. Major League starting pitchers don't play competitive baseball October through February.

Meanwhile...

1. Little League 11 and 12 year olds are allowed to throw 85 pitches per day (according to Little League's own pitch count rules). 9 and 10 year olds are allowed to throw 75 pitches per day. INSANITY!
2. Little League pitchers "rest requirement" is only rest from pitching, not rest from throwing. Most Little Leaguers don't head to the dugout after they've reached their pitch count...they go play Shortstop or Centerfield (where they throw more)! Then they have practice the next day where they throw across the diamond in infield drills, do cut-off drills from the outfield, or maybe even have a game 2 days later where they catch all 6 innings!
3. Youth Pitchers on club/travel teams are maxing out their pitch counts playing in competitive games/tournaments over the Summer, during the Fall, and into December. Then Little League tryouts take place the first week of January. Zero rest again!

And what's the result of all this overuse? Tired arms. Hurt arms. And ultimately arms so injured that serious medical attention is required. Stories of kids as young as 12 or 13 needing Tommy John surgery are no longer rare.

What can we do as parents to (easily) help protect our kid's arms?

1. Reduce pitch counts. Just because the Little League rules say 85 pitches max, DOES NOT mean that's how many they HAVE to throw. On my Minor team last year, no pitcher ever threw more than 40 pitches even though our 7 and 8 year olds were allowed to throw 50 and our 9 year olds were allowed to throw 75. No win in Little league is worth sacrificing the health of a kid's arm.
2. Implement real rest after pitching. If your ballplayer has practice within a couple days of high pitch count outing, don't let them throw...AT ALL! They can still field groundballs, but then just roll the ball back into the coach. They can still catch flyballs, but have their teammate who didn't pitch throw it back into the infield for them. Etc, etc.
3. Take at least all of November and December off from competitive pitching entirely.

I know that the "Annual Thanksgiving SoCal Regional U8 World Series Tournament Featuring 4 Total Teams To Determine The Travel Ball Champion of The Universe" isn't going anywhere (sadly, that's the youth sports world we live in)...but your child doesn't HAVE to participate in it. And they definitely don't HAVE to pitch on Saturday and Sunday and play every other inning of the weekend in the field.

In my Fall Ball program, no pitcher will throw more than 1 inning (we don't even need pitch counts for 1 inning), we only play 1 game per week (mandatory rest is built into our schedule), and the season is only 6 weeks long (after October 23rd, no player in any Spring Training program will throw a single game pitch until the 2023 season starts).

I know many parents these days feel, in all sports, that if their athlete isn't doing something that other athletes are doing, that they'll fall behind. And in the super short-term, that might be true. The kid who is throwing 85 pitches every game 12 months a year will probably be a better pitcher at age 12 than a kid who is not doing all that. But when the kid throwing 85 pitches year round has his arm fall off when he's 15, your kid (with a healthy arm) will now be getting the innings on the mound in High School.

Youth sports definitely shouldn't be a zero sum of "us vs them" environment but sometimes looking at things from a different perspective can be beneficial.

A quick anecdote from own baseball career. I didn't become a Pitcher until I was 21 years old. I pitched a few times in Little League (I would say less than 10 total outings in my whole LL career) but was never one of my team's "pitchers." I pitched about 5 games my senior in High School in a pinch when our #1 went down with, you guessed it, Tommy John surgery (from overuse) as a 17 year old.

In college, A pro scout saw me throw across the diamond from 3rd base (my position my sophomore year) and told me that if I wanted any shot to get drafted, it would be as a pitcher. So I spent the Summer after my sophomore in Santa Barbara on a wood bat team of all super studs (players from Stanford, UCLA, Pepperdine, Wichita State, Texas, etc). I was there to learn from them and pitched a total of 3 innings in 3 months that Summer.

When I got back to Brown as a pitcher for the first time in my life my Junior year of college, scouts would ask after seeing me on the mound, "How many innings did you throw last year?" I would answer, "Zero." And they would say, "Oh, got it. Elbow or shoulder injury?" I would respond, "Neither, this is the first time I've been a pitcher in my life." And I could see them start to get more interested.

They definitely weren't in awe of my stuff (I only threw 90-91, had an OK slider that I was still learning, and literally no changeup). What they were excited about was 21 year old arm throwing in the 90s with NO MILEAGE on it!

These scouts had found the healthiest arm in America!

And after my senior year the Tigers decided I was worth gambling a 42nd round pick on and I made it to pro ball.

Were there hundreds of other pitchers in 2003 who could throw 90mph who didn't get drafted? I'm sure of it. So why did I get picked? Because I had something that literally zero other high school or college pitcher in America had...a 100% healthy arm.

So while bad actors in all youth sports in all parts of the country push parents to go harder and harder with their kids at younger and younger ages, I absolutely believe the single biggest reason I got drafted was because I didn't pitch as a kid or in High School and because I didn't play year-round baseball.

Emotional burnout from year-round sport-specific participation is a real problem in every sport. But baseball is unique from a potential injury standpoint because of how fragile throwing arms are and we as parents and coaches need to be more vigilant, with our pitchers especially.

It really is easy to protect our kid's arms. Just stick to guidelines above about avoiding overuse and your ballplayer's arm will remain healthy for years and years to come!

Play Hard, Have Fun!