Training Articles – Pitch Mechanics 101

Components Of A Quality Throwing Program

February 28, 2019Josh BoggsBaseball Articles, Training ArticlesLeave a Comment

To help parents and young athletes in their quest to become the best players they/their child can be, I wanted to provide a basic outline of what the best throwing programs I’ve seen incorporate to get results. This obviously isn’t a fully comprehensive list but if you are looking to train somewhere that doesn’t have one or more of the following, I would strongly reconsider. So, without further ado, here is my list of what a throwing program NEEDS to have:

Assessment/Reassessment Process

Any program worth a damn should include a movement screen of some sort (FMS, TPI, etc.), video breakdown, range of motion assessment, strength assessment, etc. The Coach/Program needs to understand physical limitations, strengths, weaknesses, of each athlete and know where to begin programming. If a trainer/coach doesn’t appreciate an athlete and what their movement profile, skeletal structure, etc. can present, it’s only a matter of time before injuries happen. A vast majority of injuries that occur while training can be prevented. Making an informed decision on what exercises/drills an athlete should or shouldn’t be doing as an absolute MUST. If where you currently train doesn’t assess AND reassess their clients, RUN. Being able to evaluate if/where improvements are being made and making an INFORMED decision on where to alter programming to minimize this risk. Which brings me to the next point…. read more

Do What Works For YOU

October 2, 2018Josh BoggsMental Game, Training ArticlesLeave a Comment

Recently I was having a discussion with Jimmy Jackson, the PC at JMU. He made a comment to me that I was a bit surprised by. He said he never hands a folder to his pitchers and says, “here’s the JMU pitching program, get to work.” Instead he sits down with each individual player and tries to figure out what has made each of his players successful in the past. Obviously, something had to be done right by the players to be playing at a quality D1 program. I know Eric Peterson, the now HC at Benedictine College, has his “U” Program that he hands each of his pitchers, which is a very loose template designed to allow his players to find their best process to prepare themselves to perform. Now are all coaches as awesome as this? Absolutely not. read more

How to Start a Weighted Ball Program Pt. II – Warm Up and Recovery

January 13, 2017Josh BoggsTraining Articles1 Comment

By Cameron Castro (@Castro_Turf)
In my last article, How to Start a Weighted Ball Program, I outlined a generic template for the Weighted Ball program our pitchers follow – in a follow up I thought it would be beneficial to lay out some of the things that they do daily for warm up and recovery. As stated in the previous article:

I want to be clear, throwing weighted balls is taxing, but then again so is pitching. Pitching is inherently stressful, so we aim to train the body at slightly higher levels of stress than what is experienced in competition… read more

How To Start A Weighted Ball Program

December 22, 2016Josh BoggsTraining Articles1 Comment

By Cameron Castro (@Castro_Turf)

I recently reached out to Josh about writing something for the Pitch Mechanics site and we settled on how to go about implementing a throwing program that uses weighted baseballs – ya know since everyone will be asking Santa for velo this year. Especially considering Dr. Glenn Fleisig’s newest paper on weighted balls, Biomechanical Analysis of Weighted-Ball Exercises for Baseball Pitchers. Soon to follow are the days of the “Completely Safe Weighted Ball Program” that is ‘guaranteed to add 5-10 mph!’ Heck, there might even be a holiday discount if we’re lucky. read more

The 9 Factors That Strongly Influence Pitching Velocity

June 26, 2016Josh BoggsTraining Articles4 Comments

By Ryan Faer

9 Factors That Strongly Influence Pitching Velocity

In today’s baseball age, where a 90 mph fastball is now considered below average in Major League Baseball, the question inevitably comes up: how do I throw harder?

Recently I received a question along these same lines on Snapchat, where I field many baseball training questions each day. The question was a variation on the above: “How can I get stronger and throw harder?”

I did my best to answer this question as thoroughly as I could through social media – and in the process learned that there is in fact a limit to how much you can type in a single Snapchat message – and also posted it on Twitter. But, of course, this didn’t leave much room for elaboration. Thus, I wanted to take a few moments to expand upon the topic for everyone to take in. And, because I’d like to go into as much detail as I reasonably can, I have broken this article into three parts. All three segments, together, will touch on nine highly influential factors that affect velocity in baseball. read more