I am happy to say that the Certified Pitching Biomechanics Course is now live in the course library. I have had many emails and texts about the content and newness of the information and its applications.
DEATH BY THE CURE
In response to my content on pitching, I get a lot of technical questions about developing pitching mechanics.
For example,
“If an athlete has a stride length under 80% of body height, should we elongate it?”
Or, “If my pitcher has his arm lower than 90 degrees at weight-bearing foot flat, should I coach them to elevate the throwing arm so that they land in a perfect T position?”
I love these kinds of insights, but as my mom always told me, “If the door isn’t broken, don’t fix it.”
The problem with these questions is that they lead to trying to make mechanical changes when everything is normal.
Essentially, changing something not led by the hinging criteria of PAIN AND POOR PERFORMANCE, which can cause “Death by the Cure” when enacted without a process.
Death by the Cure is a term used to describe when the cure becomes worse than the original problem. It can occur with any intervention, including drills or mechanical modifications, because it may alter loading or cause additional fatigue when muscles are unaccustomed to the new demands.
The bottom line is that this course is as much about identifying problems that need solving as it is about creating solutions to solve them.
MAKING CHANGES
In the course, I talked about how I came to understand adjustability and variability in the delivery.
In my early days with the Cardinals, I watched some really cool videos on the athletes in the organization and watched some of them practicing in person.
One that stuck out to me was Adam Wainwright and how his stride length was visibly shorter when throwing a curveball. Of course, this adjustment is not unusual as the athlete’s release point will be higher, and the action of a curveball will be steeper, but what concerned me was talk about implementing this strategy with other pitchers in our minor league pitching development based on this one player’s success.
This put me on the path of strength and coordination training and how strength measurements are affected by changing mechanics. I concluded that a change in mechanics must come with different training approaches due to changes in loading on the body.
The Wake Forest Conference further confirmed that this insight was on the right track with a presentation on a pitching case study where a pitcher was instructed to shorten his stride in favor of improving pitch qualities.
Although the ball flight metrics looked better, further biomechanical and strength testing responses also needed to be optimized. For example, within Certified Pitching Biomechanist Course, we also consider the following optimization factors:
1. Strength-Velocity Ratio,
2. Pitch Efficiency Ratio,
3. Biomechanical Efficiency Ratio,
4. and Stress Shielding Ratio.
Here you can watch one of the free classes we put out to understand what I found in exploring the Adam Wainwright phenomenon and how haphazard mechanical adjustments can lead to “Death by the Cure.”
You can also learn more about mechanical changes that occur when athletes experience lower body fatigue in the ArmCare IQ posted below. You’ll learn how strength testing provides critical cues for adjusting training, workload allocation, and testing.
Imagine losing force from your drive leg. What do you think happens to your arm?
There’s only a week before Pitchers and Catchers camp, and the NCAA college season is ahead.
Take our Certified Pitching Biomechanist Course for a comprehensive 9.5-hour training that will connect all the dots through our Strength and Coordination Tree.
It will help reduce the risk of “Death by the Cure.”