What do MLB pitchers Justin Verlander, Jacob DeGrom, Shane Bieber, Robbie Ray and Sandy Alcantara all have in common? They are all hard-throwing, MLB Cy Young Award winners who had major elbow or shoulder surgery within a few seasons of their pitching dominance.

The 2023 AL Cy Young winner, Gerrit Cole hasn’t thrown a pitch since spring training due to a stiff shoulder. The 2024 NL Cy Young favorite, Spence Strider, went down early in the season with a sore elbow and subsequent surgery. I could keep on going, arm surgeries sure do. The entire sport of baseball, from teenagers to professionals is feeling it.

Sports injury expert Marty Jaramillo recently reported on CBS News that, “There has been a 400% increase in baseball arm injuries in the last 10-year span and there is no end in sight.”

And the incidence of baseball arm surgeries is not limited to professional baseball, as a study by Chicago’s Rush University Orthopedics Center found that the fastest-rising segment of baseball arm surgery was in the 15-18 age range — in essence youth league and high school aged pitchers.

The answers to why the rise in pitcher’s arm injuries in MLB vary and depend upon whom you are talking to. Orthopedic surgeon Dr. Dale Snead believes that the human arm is just not made to throw a baseball repeatedly over an extended period of time. The excessive torque and twist on the arm’s muscles and tendons will eventually takes its toll. Snead compares a baseball pitch to pulling a rubber band as hard and far as you can, and then releasing it and letting it snap back.

The force of that rubber band snapping back is similar to the force of a pitch on the pitcher’s elbow and shoulder area. After snapping the rubber band back multiple times the fibers in the band weaken and eventually the band breaks. Ditto for a pitcher’s arm. After prolonged and multiple pitches the arm’s muscles and tendons are going to weaken and eventually break down.

Former big league pitcher Ray Burris believes the spike in arm injuries can be traced directly to young pitchers chasing pitch velocity at the expense of pitch location. Burris contends that there is a perception that the harder a youth league or high school pitcher throws, the more likely that pitcher will receive a college scholarship and eventually a professional contract.

Burris sees radar guns at youth and high school games and believes that measuring pitch speed is the wrong message to send young pitchers. According to Burris, the only thing young pitchers should focus on is control and location of the pitch. As in selling real estate, the three factors for pitching success are location, location, and location.

A pitcher who can consistently locate medium-speed pitches on the edges of the plate, at different elevations, and make the batter swing at pitches that are balls, will always fare better than a fast ball pitcher who throws as hard as possible with no idea of the eventual location of the pitch.

Youth and high school coaches and parents who emphasize pitch velocity over pitch location and command are sowing the seeds of future arm discomfort and possible surgery for their charges. W

hile MLB has targeted arm injuries as one of the top problems in the sport, Burris firmly believes that “speed kills, especially young pitcher’s arms.”

Beaver Stadium

The online sports site The Athletic recently conducted a light-hearted, non scientific, poll of the top college football stadiums in America. Utilizing a March Madness type of bracket, readers of the site were asked to vote for their favorite stadium, and the results were used to create a fan-favorite, 32-stadium bracket.

The Final Four stadiums in the voting were LSU’s Tiger Stadium down in Baton Rouge; Tennessee’s Neyland Stadium on the banks of the Tennessee River; Pasadena’s Rose Bowl; Happy Valley’s Beaver Stadium. The final two in the voting were the bayou’s Tiger Stadium and Beaver Stadium. And, according to the final voting, Beaver Stadium was voted the best arena in the country to attend a college football game.

Respondents overwhelmingly responded that PSU’s White Out is a chilling, out-of-this-world environment, unparalleled anywhere else in America. I am sure Buckeye and Wolverine fans disagree with the final results, but the voting speaks for itself.

Ouch

Shortly before the MLB All-Star break, Miami Marlins outfielder Dane Myers had a rather abrupt ending to his 2024 season. After a heated discussion with the home plate umpire over a called third strike, Myers was ejected and sent to the showers.

His first stop in the locker room was a bathroom stall where he proceeded to angrily kick the door, fracturing his ankle in the process. On the bright side, Myers will now have spare time to enroll in an anger management class prior to next season.