Strasburg to Have Tommy John Surgery

Great, now his fastball is gonna have 3 more mph of heat on it.

It's not that sad, JJ came back from Tommy John and raped everything in sight.

I think either Pavano or AJ had it when they were here.

 

And he was coddled this year, imho Baseball has went in the wrong direction by so seriously limiting young pitchers innings in the minor leagues as it seems every good, young pitcher, has had serious arm problems.

More fastballs, more innings are needed, less "80 pitches and 5 innings".

 

Strasborg's College Coach was Tony Gwynn, and he went out of his way to limit the amount of pitches he threw NJ.

Imho young pitchers are simply not throwing enough fastballs, think about it, Strasborg throws in the high 90's, but had 4 pitches when he arrived in major leagues..why did he learn to throw 3 breaking pitches when he was already throwing in the high 90's?

 

First off this is terrible news but TJ surgery isn't the death wish it was even 10 years ago. Pitchers who get TJ surgery have a high success rate of bouncing back so although it stinks it will be a lost 2011 season for Strasburg, he should be fine by 2012. Anyway....

You're wrong. Strasburg was not babied or coddled by the Nationals this year. They let him go out and throw normally. They limited his pitch counts like every MLB team does and the plan was before he got hurt to limit his innings count so he probably would have been shut down by the 2nd week so September.

If you want younger pitchers to throw more fastballs and more innings take a look at Kerry Wood or Mark Prior who Dusty Baker ruined because he had them throw so many pitches and so many innings are such a young age. While I myself do have issues with the 100 pitches being a magic number, I do think MLB teams should watch the work loads of pitchers to reduce possible burn outs and major injuries.

If anything having guys throw less reduces the risk of injury, especially for younger pitchers because they're still growing and developing.

Because if he just threw a fastball he'd get hammered no matter how good it is. Strasburg and every other starting pitcher needs at least 3 pitches because MLB hitters are good enough to sit on a fastball and nail it. Any MLB can hit a fast ball if they know it's coming. It's the off speed stuff and the 2nd and 3rd pitches that give the pitcher the advantage of the hitter. This is completely wrong. If Strasburg or any pitcher just threw a fastball even at 97-100 mph he would eventually get hit and hit hard you need those other pitches to keep the hitter off balance.

 

Its a shame for Nats for sure.

Not sure if its his motion (CHW pitching coach says it is)....or just dumb luck....but its not good...even in the long term...its not good.

 

Guys get over pitched in college a lot too. Just look at the pitchers that get drafted out of Rice and I believe Texas. They're pretty much shot. The Texas and BC coach in last year's national championships let their pitchers throw over 130 pitches each. That sort of things should get them fired.

 

Did you think about that before you typed it Ray? Not to be insulting, however keep in mind the claim is "young pitchers are coddled" and the fact you pointed out that "they had him on an innings pitched count and were going to shut him down in September" does not exactly bolster your position.

Strasborg had a pitch count per game, something less than 100 pitches iirc.

They should have put him on a breaking ball count per game as a 21 yr old with a high 90's fastball should not have 3 breaking pitches as it means he has been throwing the things for yrs prior to making it to MLB..why?

Both threw far to many power curves and sliders if one is looking for a culprit, it is not the innings as a #3 starter typically had 6-8 Complete Games in the 90's #1's and #2's would have 12 or more, if they were good, now all are routinely pulled prior to the 7th inning and the league leader in Complete Games will have less than 10, one yr IIRC it was 6 complete games to lead MLB.

Hah, the Nats have had two, good young pitchers have the same problem both throwing less than 100 innings at the time of their injuries.

Fallacy imho, pitchers develop those other pitches simply because their fastball and change up are simply not good enough, when a pitcher is throwing in the high 90's, they do not need slurves and sliders and other breaking pitches.

That and imho, young pitchers are not throwing enough innings to have the type of control of their fastball to make it their dominant pitch.

And allow me to point out, your typical Closer throws what to get hitters out?

Not curveballs..the hitters know what is coming, yet gosh darn, a 97 mph fastball painting the outside corner is just hard to hit..even when they know what is coming.

 

Don Cooper (CHW pitching coach) said Strasburg would shoulder problems. Strasburg injury is to his elbow, which isn't nearly as bad.

 

Well, LL does have the can pitch only once every 5 days rule and at one time had a no breaking ball rule, but watching the LL World Series it seems like they have abandoned that one.

Throwing a curveball puts incredible amounts of stress on the elbow at a time when the body just is not developed enough to withstand that pounding and torque on a rather small joint.

 

Sure as far as Shoulder vs Elbow, but the knife never good news (when compare to no knife - risk is risk).....if you are Cooper you still have to think its all relative.

Feel for Nats...was actually looking forward to next years rotation of Stras, Zim, Wang as top 3.

one step forward, two steps back for that organization....so if not 2011...go get them in 2012

 

Eh, that is out of my league as it were, I will say if a young pitcher has proper mechanics and throws fastballs, their joints SHOULD be able to handle pitching twice a week, as it works out to 10 innings with days off inbetween games.

starting 4 games in a week for a kid is just flat stupid imho.

 

Being babied and coddled and being on an innings or pitch count is not the same in my opinion. When I say babied or coddled I think of what the Yankees did with Joba Chamberlain.

Anyway I do believe that young pitchers should be on an inning count/pitch count to some degree. Asking them to go out there and throw 150 to 200 innings in a year when they have never done that before is just asking for injury. The guys need to slowly build up arm strength to be able to throw that much or they will get injuried (which is what happened with Wood/Prior)/

This statement is just ridiculous putting a pitcher on a breaking pitches pitch count. You talk about not wanting to coddle a pitcher, that's got to be part of the definition of coddling a pitcher.

So them getting hurt has nothing to do with Prior going from throwing 116 innings in 2002 to throwing 234 innings in 2003 as a 22 year old? And routinely throwing over 120 pitches down the strentch? Really you want to blame it strictly on them throwing curveballs?

You know it could just be that pitching causes a great deal of stress on the arm and that pitchers get hurt simply because it happens right? Again don't you think pitchers throwing more causes more risk of getting hurt than pitchers that throw less? Can we just chalk this up to players just get hurt sometimes?

Oh ok so I guess Nolan Ryan, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez or Roger Clemens fastball wasn't good enough right? All 4 of those guys had outstanding fastballs but also had equally outstanding 2nd and 3rd (and sometimes 4th pitches). You simply can't get hitters out by throwing just fastballs.

Just look at Greg Maddux who had an average mph fastball but had great location and command and also had 3 other outstanding pitches.

Closers/relievers are different from starters because they only pitch 1 inning and because of that can rely on 1 pitch (which is the reason they are in the bullpen to begin with because they don't have a good 3rd pitch to get hitters out) although relievers usually still throw at least 2 pitches. Only Mariano Rivera can consistently throw just one pitch all the time and get batters out and that's do to his command, control and movement of the cutter.

I'm sorry but your reasoning is just completely off and wrong on the subject. Starting pitchers can't survive on just throwing fastballs. And young pitchers need to slowly build up their arm since most of them don't even throw 100 innings in college. Asking a kid who's used to throwing 80 innings a year to 180 plus is just asking for trouble.

And for the record the pitch Joel Zumaya got hurt with was a fastball, so even those pitches aren't injury proof. Strasburg got hurt throwing a change up which doesn't put as much stress on the arm as a curveball/slider obviously. Pitchers just get hurt, it happens.

 

I agree seeing the knife is always bad but I'm just looking for the silver lining here. It could be worse. TJ surgery has good success rate.

 

True, which is odd as of all of the teams in MLB, the Yankees could afford to not coddle Joba, but look how he has turned out.

And yet the Braves young pitchers do exactly that consistently..they also are extremely discourage from throwing sliders and cutters.

Hardly, especially a young pitcher, who should be throwing that plus fastball with control, there is little reason to throw a breaking ball more than a once or twice an at bat when the man is throwing 98 mph.

Now think about that, Prior threw 112 innings, or slightly more than Strasborg was to throw this year, then pitched a normal Starting pitcher amount of innings the following season, and his arm blew out, why wouldn't the same thing have happened to Strasbourg in Yr 2?

Odd closers and relievers pitch several times a week, and yet do not suffer the rate of arm injuries that these young 4 pitch pitchers suffer and relievers HAVE to throw everyday whether they pitched the evening before or not.

All 4 of them were mainly fastball pitchers, and everything worked off of the fastball that they had great control of, with two strikes they would just paint the outside half of the plate, or in Ryan's case just drop a hammer in there, the only curve the hitter would see in the at bat.

Put it this way, how many times did you see anyone of those 4 first pitch in an at bat be a curve ball? Not very often to be sure..

Maddux also said if he had Smoltz's fastball he would have been a completely different pitcher, he HAD to develop those things because he couldn't throw a fastball in the high 90's.

Primarily a fast ball pitcher though, the hitters know what is coming, and the game is on the line, and they still cannot hit him...

Nope, a young pitcher who throws in the high 90's has no business with 2 or 3 breaking balls, those are for veterans whose arms have developed sufficiently enough to handle the stress..

Meanwhile, give'm the heater Ricky.

Wow, the fact the joint was already weakened via throwing power curves and all the other assorted garbage that they learned "because they have to have them" had no effect?

Leave the junkballs for the guys with average arms, when you throw 98, change speeds, locate the ball, pitch deep into the game and give the bullpen a day off when you start.

In the 90's, when Atlanta consistently lead MLB in Complete Games, elbow injuries were rare, now they are common enough that even Tommy john surgery is seen as a rite of passage for a young pitcher..something is wrong there Ray as pitch counts and limiting innings apparently is not working.

 

Every kid in NJ is going to be a Yankee..don't you know that stoopid?

 

Only the brightest of them all.......fortunately the "lesser of the bunch" still have the METS (North) or PHILS (South) to cling to.

 

Yet Tommy Hanson throws his curveball 10% and slider 16%, Jairjens slider 16% of the time, which is around the league average of throwing off speed stuff.

And a cutter is simply a fastball just held differently. The pitcher doesn't change his arm angle or snap his wrist in anyway like he would with a slider.

How do you know Strasburg is throwing a breaking pitch more than once or twice an at bat?

Straburg had already thrown 123 innings this year between the majors and minors. He was suppose to get maybe 4 or 5 more starts which would have put him at or around 150 innings pitched this year. Prior in 2002 between the minors and majors threw 167 so those figures are pretty close to each other. Prior threw 256 innings at age 22(!!!!) between minors, majors and playoffs I think that number sticks out. And there was no way Straburg would ahve thrown more than 200 innings in year two and the reason why is becuase of said injuries to guys like Prior and Wood who had heavy work loads at such a young age.

It's not from throwing everyday that injuries happen, it's from the # of pitches thrown. It's more stressful for a pitcher to go out and throw 100 pitches every 5 days than it is for a pitcher to throw 15 pitches a few times a week. Starters throw more than 15 pitches in their bullpen sessions between starts. Starting pitchers usually throw 6 days a week (they usually don't throw the day after they pitch) whether it's simply long toss or a bullpen.

And it's not like RPers don't get hurt. Nathan, Zumaya, Wagner, Soriano, Mike Gonzalez, Isringhausen have all had various forms of injuries and surgeries.

Pitchers get hurt, plain and simple.

And Strasburg is mainly a fastball pitcher with great control (Nolan Ryan didn't have great control by the way). He throws more fastballs and off speed stuff.

I've seen Pedro Martinez throw plenty of 1st pitch off speed stuff, ditto with Clemens. If hitters knew for sure that a pitcher throws 1st pitch fastballs all the time they'd be sitting on it.

Rivera is a freak though. And it's a bad example to use. Papelbon has a good fastball but gets hammered at times because teams know it's coming and they simply wait for it. It's only the times he has either his slider or splitter working that he's dominate.

Again you're completely wrong, just look at Josh Beckett's 2006 numbers and tell me that a starting pitcher can simply live off of a good fastball. Starting pitchers need at least 1 or 2 other pitches or he will either be out of baseball or put in the bullpen (and in the bullpen they still use that 2nd or 3rd pitch as a show me pitch).

So you're a doctor and know for a fact that his joints were weakened by throwing power curves? You don't think throwing a ball over 97 mph consistently had anything to do with it? Or his violent motion?

I really don't think there is a big difference between rookies/younger guys getting TJ surgery compared to older players/veterans getting it. If you want to do some research I'd love to see it.

Anyway about the part I bolded:do you think simply giving the guy the ball and telling him to just pitch and not worry about inning or pitch count will decrease the chance of injury?

Is it possible that a guy got hurt because he was doing something unnatural with a lot of stress on his arm?

 

I had a nice long post that I typed up to refute Padre's comments but I lost it. I'll type up another in a bit.

 

I don't think this is an innings thing. I think it is a make up thing. Some guys arms can just handle a workload and some can not. You can't really compare anyone to Nolan Ryan, dude was a freak of nature, he's Hailey's Comet. Dude was throwing a 95 MPH heater at age 40 for the love of God.

I think pitchers should do more on off days, something as simple as playing catch, more so then they do now.

I've seen the argument that he should not have had a breaking pitch, that is a fallacy. If he threw simply fastballs he'd get murdered in the bigs, ask anyone. Very few guys have gotten by, especially as a starter, throwing fastball and change. You need movement pitch.

The elbow is effected by the fastball and the slider, the shoulder (the one you REALLY want to avoid) is effected by curve balls.

There was a guy on the local radio station a few days ago (Seth Everett I believe) who speculated that Strasburg would get Tommy John within five years. Not because of the breaking ball but because of the torque he puts on his elbow from the sheer speed of his arm. The human arm is not meant to do what these guys do to it. It is more of a surprise to me when these guys DON'T blow up their elbows.

As Ray said earlier, Tommy John is not the career ender it used to be. Sure, in some instances the guy never comes back but that is the exception now. Chris Carpenter is 31-8 with an ERA around 2 and a half since he had it done.

 

Ask Kerry Wood and Mark Prior how that worked out for them. Dusty Baker ignored pitch counts and ran them into the ground. You need pitch counts and you have to stubbornly stick to them even if it effects your ability to win a game.

That is exactly it! These guys, every single one of them (accept Tim Wakefield) is doing something to the human arm that it is not equipped to handle.

Here's something on pitch counts.

...and a little more.

 

As a youth baseball coach over the last 4 years, I know first hand how competitive it can be to keep up. If a kid has any talent at all, they're put into a year long cycle of baseball that can, at times, have up to 5 or 6 games a week on multiple teams. My own brother has been on: a rec team, all star team, travel team, tournament team, summer team, showcase team, prospects team, and his high school team which meets 6 days a week, all since January. Now he's not a pitcher really so we don't have to worry about extra stress to the arm but even then, sometimes his arm is a little sore or weak, and I'll force him to take a break for a week or two.

For pitchers, it's even worse. It's why I think all of these major leaguers are having TJ so early. You would absolutely have to play year long to keep up. Most of these guy throw so many innings before being drafted, it's only natural that they'd need surgery eventually.

Now Strasburg will be fine. I can't think of anyone over the last 10 years who didn't recover fully from TJ. It's also very rare for a pitcher to get TJ a second time, so in reality, it's a good thing he's getting it out of the way early. History suggests that he wont have any more elbow problems for the rest of his career.

For what it's worth, the rehab and strength rebuilding process of TJ recovery is very intense. It's not uncommon to for a pitcher to have increased velocity afterward. The increase is usually minimal but Josh Johnson threw 92-93 and topped out at 94 pre-surgery. He know throws 96-97 and tops out at 99.



Now Padre is correct in that kids are learning to throw curve balls too early. A properly thrown curve puts minimal stress on the shoulder. The problem is 1) they're not taught to properly throw a curve and 2) they're not disciplined enough in their mechanics to throw it properly with consistency. Many kids drop their arm slot when throwing curves because it creates more torque which creates more break. That's a big no-no. The torque originates from the elbow and repeated use really strains it. Most kids can usually be consistent enough around age 13 to throw a proper curve, anything before that should be change ups and cutters.

 

A. Strasborg. Zamaya, were on pitch counts, and innings counts, and still ruptured their tendons, what makes Wood or Prior the standard?




http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/577478

And once again they conflate the two, "they pitch more innings AND throw more breaking balls"

Which one is it?

 

Both?

Why can't it be both?

 

Probably is both, from just doing a bit of searching for my posts, it does seem like both things contribute to T John surgeries, however I still maintain pitchers are coddled in MLB today.

Put it this way, the great Oriole Teams ran 4 man rotations without the bullpen specialization we see today and all 4 pitched for over a decade in a league with a DH, so they weren't pulled for pinch hitters.

That would be unheard of today, a 4 man rotation? Are you crazy?!?!

 

Young kids should remove the Curve ball from their repitore until the age of 18 the soonest.

Focus on Fastball, Change-up, Cutter/Slider for movement. Those 3 are more than adequate to build arm strength from early age to College, and those 3 would still keep hitters off balance, and add movement so they cant just sit STRAIGHT ball.

A cutter or slider is about finger position and grip with FASTBALL arm slot and repetition, and not the torque on the elbow, shoulder, etc.

As far as pitch counts, I am not a modern day disciple of limits...I am far more a Nolan Ryan type mentality...its about arm slot, repeatability, and type of pitch, not # of pitches in and of themselves.

Infielders and Outfielders toss far more balls around during long hours of practice then a pitcher (who are often just in a side session)....its about type of throw (straight ball) for INF and OF and thus you can toss far more in # of throws.

 

I completely agree with you about kids throwing curveballs and sliders way too early, because most of the time they're physically not ready to throw it. Scouts/FO guys have told me that they would never let a kid throw a curveball or slider until after he was drafted and in the organization so he could be taught the proper way to throw it. They said a good high school pitcher should be able to get kids out with a fastball/change up combo. If I was a coach I'd never let my pitchers throw them.

And sliders actually put much more stress on the arm than a curveball does. A lot of organizations have stopped teaching kids to throw sliders and instead teach them cutters instead which have similar movement but less stress on the arm.