And now this "Teachable Moment" from StrengthCoach.com!
Book Review- "THE ARM BY JEFF PASSAN"
First, let's be clear about my bias. I am a baseball fanatic: I still play (65+ games last year), I train some baseball athletes amongst others and I am a huge fan of the game.
That being said this book is a must read for most on this website as well as baseball coaches, trainers and parents who have young kids who love baseball. To me this book is essentially a metaphor for much of what is wrong with the so called industrial youth sports complex. So though baseball is obviously the topic for this book you could substitute AAU basketball or track, summer 7 vs. 7 passing games for football, all manner of travel soccer/lacrosse/name your sport and the point is very similar.
Jeff Passan spent 3 years literally traveling the globe to try to find an answer to the question of why arguably the most valuable commodity in all of sport, the pitching arm, is so abused and injured and yet no one has really come up with a definitive answer to solving this multi-billion dollar question.
There are all kinds of theories as to why this is the case but the only definitive strong correlation is overuse and especially early overuse.
Try these stats on for size:
- Kids who pitch 100+ innings in a calendar year were 3.5 times as likely to get injured than those who didn't.
- Kids who pitch year round have the highest injury rate according to the ASMI (American Sports Medicine Institute, Dr. James Andrews organization)
- Kids who regularly pitch with arm fatigue are 36 times (yes, you read that right) likelier to undergo elbow or shoulder surgery than those who don't
- Kids who pitch in games more than 8 months of the year need surgery 5 times as much as those who don't. So much for the advantage of warm weather and year round baseball!
- A study published in the American Journal of Sports Medicine found that kids who play travel ball are 5 times more likely to suffer elbow pain.
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