Baseball Injury Prevention: 10 Things Every Pitcher Should Be Doing
- undefeatedptandper
- 2 days ago
- 7 min read
Undefeated Physical Therapy & Performance | Pittsburgh Baseball Rehab
When we talk about baseball injury prevention, most people immediately think about arm care, stretching, or pitch counts.
Those things matter—but injury prevention starts long before you ever pick up a baseball.
As a physical therapist who works with baseball players and throwing athletes throughout Pittsburgh, I believe injury prevention comes down to taking care of the entire athlete. Your sleep, nutrition, stress, strength, throwing program, and preparation all contribute to how well your body performs and how well it handles the demands of baseball.
Here are the 10 things I want every pitcher to be doing to stay healthy and perform at a high level.
1. Prioritize Sleep
Sleep is one of the most powerful—and most overlooked—performance enhancers available to an athlete.
Your body repairs, regenerates, and adapts while you sleep. Sleep also plays an important role in learning and motor skill development, reaction time, mood, and recovery.
For most adolescent athletes, 8–10 hours of sleep per night is a good target. Adults generally need around 7–9 hours.
Try to maintain a consistent sleep and wake schedule, even on weekends. Ideally, keep your schedule within about an hour from day to day.
Good sleep hygiene matters, too:
Keep your bedroom dark and cool.
Limit screens before bed.
Avoid intense exercise immediately before going to sleep.
Establish a consistent bedtime routine.
One strategy I like is a warm shower or bath before bed. The subsequent drop in body temperature can help promote sleep.
If you want to improve your performance, don’t underestimate the importance of simply getting enough sleep.
2. Fuel Your Body With Quality Nutrition
There is always a new diet, supplement, or nutrition trend.
But athletes don’t need to make nutrition complicated.
You need to eat enough of the right foods to fuel what you are asking your body to do.
If you’re trying to build muscle, recover from training, and perform at a high level, you need adequate calories, protein, carbohydrates, healthy fats, vitamins, and minerals.
Build your diet around nutrient-dense foods such as:
Meat and poultry
Eggs
Fish
Fruits
Vegetables
Whole grains
Potatoes and other quality carbohydrate sources
Nuts and seeds
Dairy or other quality protein sources
One phrase I like to use is:
“If it wasn’t grown or raised, think twice before you eat it.”
You don’t have to eat perfectly. But consistently fueling your body with quality food is going to do much more for your performance and recovery than chasing the newest diet trend.
3. Get Outside and Get Some Sunlight
Humans aren’t designed to spend our entire lives indoors.
Getting outside—especially early in the day—can be beneficial for your overall health and can help regulate your body’s circadian rhythm and sleep-wake cycle.
Try getting outside and getting natural light exposure within the first hour after waking.
Outdoor activity also gives you an opportunity to move, decompress, and get away from screens.
Vitamin D is another important consideration. Your body can produce vitamin D when your skin is exposed to sunlight, although factors such as season, geography, skin pigmentation, clothing, sunscreen use, and individual differences affect how much you produce.
The takeaway isn’t to spend hours in the sun.
Get outside. Move. Get some natural light. Make it part of your daily routine.
4. Learn How to Manage Stress
Stress doesn’t disappear just because you’re an athlete.
In fact, baseball can create plenty of it.
Pressure from coaches. School. Family. Social pressure. Performance expectations. Recruiting. Competition.
Some stress is acute and can actually help you perform. The problem is when stress becomes chronic and you never give your body an opportunity to recover.
Every athlete should have a way to manage stress.
One of my favorite tools is diaphragmatic breathing.
Learning how to control your breathing can help you slow things down, regulate your nervous system, and better manage stressful situations.
You don’t have to eliminate stress.
You need to learn how to manage it.
5. Follow a Structured Strength & Conditioning Program
Baseball is a powerful, explosive sport.
You sprint. You rotate. You accelerate. You decelerate. You throw. You hit. You change direction.
Your training should reflect the demands of your sport.
That doesn’t mean you need to train like a bodybuilder.
You need a structured strength and conditioning program designed for an athlete.
A good program should develop qualities such as:
Strength
Power
Rotational ability
Lower-body strength
Single-leg strength
Trunk control
Mobility
Rate of force development
Explosiveness
And most importantly, it needs to be progressive and consistent.
You shouldn’t just walk into the weight room and do whatever exercises you feel like doing that day.
Training should have a purpose.
6. Have a Pre-Throwing Routine
Your pre-throw routine should prepare your entire body to throw—not just your arm.
Throwing a baseball is a full-body movement.
At Undefeated, we typically build our pre-throw routines from the ground up. This may include:
Soft tissue work
Mobility
Dynamic movement
Band activation
Scapular activation
Hip activation
Core activation
Progressive throwing
Think of your pre-throw routine as a process of gradually preparing your body for the demands you’re about to place on it.
Don’t just show up, stretch your forearms, play catch for five minutes, and start throwing as hard as you can.
Earn the right to throw hard.
7. Have a Customized Arm-Care Program
Arm care is not a one-size-fits-all routine.
The program that works for one pitcher isn’t necessarily the program that another pitcher needs.
Some athletes may have deficits in external rotation strength. Others may have limitations in internal rotation, forearm strength, grip strength, scapular control, or other areas.
Your arm-care program should address your individual needs.
And it should change over time.
At Undefeated, we often change or progress an athlete’s arm-care program every 4–6 weeks rather than having them perform the same wrist curls and band exercises forever.
Arm care should be:
Individualized → Progressive → Consistent → Varied
The goal isn’t simply to “do arm care.”
The goal is to develop the physical qualities you need to throw harder, perform better, and tolerate the demands of throwing.
8. Follow a Structured Throwing Program
This is one of the biggest pieces of baseball injury prevention.
You can’t just throw whenever everyone else is throwing.
Your throwing should have structure and purpose.
Depending on the athlete and their goals, a throwing program may use variables such as:
Distance
Throwing volume
Velocity
Intensity
Recovery
High-intent throwing
Long toss
Mound work
At Undefeated, we like to use both distance and velocity metrics when appropriate because they give us objective information about the demands being placed on the athlete.
Your throwing program should also include periods of increasing workload and periods of reduced workload.
Your tissues need time to adapt.
Constantly increasing throwing volume and intensity without appropriate recovery is not a recipe for long-term health.
You don’t just need to throw more. You need to throw with a plan.
9. Don’t Ignore Pain or Persistent Arm Soreness
One of the biggest mistakes I see in baseball is athletes trying to simply push through everything.
Not every ache means you’re injured. Athletes will experience normal soreness.
But persistent pain, worsening pain, changes in throwing mechanics, loss of velocity, or pain that continues to worsen should not be ignored.
Pay attention to:
Where the pain is located
When it occurs
How severe it is
Whether it gets worse as you throw
Whether it affects velocity or mechanics
How you feel later that day
How you feel the following day
If something doesn’t feel right, address it early.
Waiting until an athlete can’t throw is rarely the best injury-prevention strategy.
10. Have Something Bigger Than Baseball
This last one is a little different.
Baseball is important.
But it isn’t everything.
Your identity can’t depend entirely on how fast you throw, how many hits you get, what your recruiting ranking is, or whether you made the team.
Find something bigger than yourself.
For me, that’s my Christian faith.
Every athlete does not need to believe exactly what I believe. But I do believe athletes benefit from having something outside of baseball that gives them perspective, purpose, and something to lean on when things aren’t going their way.
Practice your faith. Spend time reflecting. Pray or meditate. Find something that helps you keep baseball in perspective.
You are more than a baseball player.
And ironically, having that perspective can make you a better one.
Baseball Injury Prevention Starts Before the Baseball
Injury prevention isn’t one exercise.
It’s not one stretch.
It’s not one arm-care routine.
And it’s certainly not something you start thinking about after your arm begins to hurt.
It’s the combination of sleep, nutrition, stress management, strength training, preparation, arm care, throwing workload, recovery, and overall health.
At Undefeated Physical Therapy & Performance, we work with baseball players throughout the Pittsburgh area to help them recover from injuries, build resilience, return to throwing, and perform at their highest level.
If you’re dealing with an injury—or you’re a healthy athlete who wants to become stronger and more durable—I’d be happy to help.
Dr. Carmen Jansante, PT, DPT, CSCS Undefeated Physical Therapy & Performance Pittsburgh Baseball Rehab & Sports Performance
📱 412-627-2131
📸 Instagram: @undefeated_pt
References
Watson NF, et al. Recommended Amount of Sleep for a Healthy Adult: A Joint Consensus Recommendation of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and Sleep Research Society. Sleep. 2015.
Paruthi S, et al. Recommended Amount of Sleep for Pediatric Populations: A Consensus Recommendation of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine. 2016.
Fullagar HHK, et al. Sleep and Athletic Performance: The Effects of Sleep Loss on Exercise Performance and Recovery. Sports Medicine. 2015.
Mountjoy M, et al. IOC Consensus Statement on Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (RED-S). British Journal of Sports Medicine. 2018.
Cormier P, et al. The Effects of Strength and Conditioning on Baseball Performance and Injury Risk. Sports Medicine.
Fleisig GS, et al. Prevention of Elbow Injuries in Youth Baseball Pitchers. Sports Health.
Camp CL, et al. Epidemiology of Injuries in Youth Baseball and Factors Associated With Injury Risk.
Wilk KE, et al. Current Concepts in the Rehabilitation of the Overhead Throwing Athlete. International Journal of Sports Physical Therapy.
Comments