weight training during baseball season

[strike-out]

I attended a local game yesterday and was informed that  players on the baseball team and also play football are required to lift weights two days a week. (the days before a game). Can anyone explain this practice?  Do all local schools engage in this practice? What would this do to your pitchers? Help or hurt

[team first]

yes this is a very common practice. It is only illegal to make kids work out on game day, even though all schools do. 

[Ty Cobb]

yes this is a very common practice. It is only illegal to make kids work out on game day, even though all schools do. 

What do you mean by Illegal???

[team first]

if you are in football offseason, and you have a game in another sport on a tuesday. It is agaist uil rules for them to make a player participate in the offseason program on the day of the game.

[Terrier]

It is common. Football is king in this area. Some schools are worse than others about it. It really depends if your baseball coach is strong enough to stand up to the football coach. Because the football coach is usually the baseball coaches boss.

[Ty Cobb]

if you are in football offseason, and you have a game in another sport on a tuesday. It is agaist uil rules for them to make a player participate in the offseason program on the day of the game.

I didn't realize that it was against UIL rules.  Learned something new today.

[SETEXFan]

This is not true.  UIL does not stipulate that a student cannot lift on game days.  This is a rule that I am sure the summer league daddys would like implemented but there is no such rule.

[t_markum]

I attended a local game yesterday and was informed that  players on the baseball team and also play football are required to lift weights two days a week. (the days before a game). Can anyone explain this practice?  Do all local schools engage in this practice? What would this do to your pitchers? Help or hurt

We are in a small school where most of the kids play all sports.  This year the ad implemented the rule that if your in football, you must complete off season training which includes up to 45 minutes after school before you can go to your other sports practice.  Yes, they don't make them lift on game days, but he forces them to make up the workout the next day which means they are doing a double workout on those days.  How can this possibly be good for the boys muscles.  When do the muscles get to rest.  And it sure seems like we keep having a lot of muscle injuries.

[strike-out]

most of the top athletes around here find their way to Dan Kroesch in beaumont. He has over 70 athletes he has trained from this area in college sports. he makes you stronger, more explosive and faster. Most High schools make you power lifters and slower

[t_markum]

most of the top athletes around here find their way to Dan Kroesch in beaumont. He has over 70 athletes he has trained from this area in college sports. he makes you stronger, more explosive and faster. Most High schools make you power lifters and slower

Mine does go to a trainer plus all the after school workout.  Trainer suggested quitting football to focus on baseball.

[Terrier]

Rest between workouts is the most important part of getting stronger. That is when the muscles repair themselves and your strength and muscle size increases. Constantly overworking the body only makes you weaker not stronger. Having the players workout with weights on the day of a game is sheer stupidity.

[AJ25]

whether you workout or not most of the time depends on the player. most coaches give you the option. i've worked out several times on game days, with no effect what so ever

[skills123]

kids and parents are a bunch of babies, let them grow up and be a man someday, especially you Karen.....take the nipple out and make them grow up sooner then later and it will be ok.....what r u gunna do when college and pro coaches make em lift on gameday and practice? 

[AJ25]

kids and parents are a bunch of babies, let them grow up and be a man someday, especially you Karen.....take the nipple out and make them grow up sooner then later and it will be ok.....what r u gunna do when college and pro coaches make em lift on gameday and practice? 

agree completely. used to here stories about cal ripken jr. lifting before and after games. he credited that for him being able to make his streak last as long as it did

[77]

If ya dont workout regularly the steroids wont work as good just ask ole

Roger. ( dont get mad just a joke)

[team first]

it is most certainly true, do u need the page number out of the uil handbook, or the phone number to uil?

u can believe what u want but it is true, just know one follows it.

[The Old Ball Coach]

baseball and golf are the only two sports in high school that you can actually get fatter in if you dont work out during the season.  The boys need it just not to hard on game days.  But they do need to get a very short, light, intense workout in before the game to get their blood going and their muscles ready.

By Steven Ellis, former pitcher in the Chicago Cubs organization

One of the big misconceptions in baseball is that playing the game keeps you in shape to pitch. I wish that was true. It's not.

Just playing the game of baseball is a poor way to develop and maintain pitching fitness. It does not keep you "in shape" for baseball. That has to happen in practice and in the weight room in-season and during the off-season.

[Terrier]

I think the point is not that weight training is bad all together. But that offseason football weight training on a game day is not a good thing.

This is directly from Cal Ripkens blog

I tend to favor having young athletes perform exercises that utilize their own body weight. This should prevent an overtaxing of their still-developing bones, muscles and joints. My dad, Cal Ripken, Sr., favored many of the calisthenics - such as push-ups, pull-ups and sit-ups - that you often see performed in military boot camps. Maybe it's a bit conservative or "old school," but that's how my brother Bill and I were brought up, and we did pretty well for ourselves.

[football]

Check Nolan Ryan's weightlifting schedule.

[t_markum]

The complaint is not to workout or not.  Definitely believe in working out.  The complaint is the type of work outs.  Some of the coaches are working the boys out like they are power lifters not baseball players.  That is the complaint.  Just because someone questions what a coach is doing to their kid doesn't make them a winer.  Let's face it just because the word coach is in front of your name doesn't make you a see all know all expert.

[Terrier]

Check Nolan Ryan's weightlifting schedule.

Nolan Ryan had an intense regimen. So did Cal Ripken. They didn't work out like that until they were grown  men. These kids are developing more muscle than their tendons and ligaments can handle. On top of that they are not developing flexibility and everything gets so tight until something has to give. That's why we see so many more tendon and ligament injuries to High School athletes.

[t_markum]

Check Nolan Ryan's weightlifting schedule.

Nolan Ryan had an intense regimen. So did Cal Ripken. They didn't work out like that until they were grown  men. These kids are developing more muscle than their tendons and ligaments can handle. On top of that they are not developing flexibility and everything gets so tight until something has to give. That's why we see so many more tendon and ligament injuries to High School athletes.

Exactly!!  My son had an elbow injury last year.  We went to a doctor in Houston and he said his muscle was so much stronger than his growth plate that the muscle overpowered the bone and broke off part of the growth plate. 

[football]

I think a bigger reason than weight training for injuries is select baseball - DONE WRONG.  I am a big proponent of select ball if the coach handles it correctly.  If you have a kid pitching in high school, he needs to let his arm rest either during the fall season or the summer.  He can still play, just another position.  I know of a local lefthander that had a great future but in his Sophmore year he pitched fall, high school, and summer and then had Tommy John and missed his Junior year.  Some kids even play on two or more select teams and pitch for both.

[elhector1]

A football coaches responsibility is to build a football team, whether during the season or the off season.  A baseball coach's responsibility is to do the same.  The problem is conflicting needs.  If you have a big guy that is a lineman, you are going to build him as such.  This means that you are going to build bulk, and not arm.  If he is also one of the pitchers of the team, this is going to conflict with what is needed for the baseball team.  Problem is, the head football coach in most of the area schools is also, TA DA...the AD.  So guess who gets hosed?

In addition, probably the majority of weight training workouts specify alternating muscle groups on alternating days to prevent injury, and allow for muscle growth and regeneration.  It's a physical reality, especially for developing muscles in teens, where not only is the muscle involved, but the bone growth plates as well.  I'm sure many of you know of a kid who was threw heat at 11 or 12, was ridden hard by his volunteer coach as his "ace", and ends up having a "rag arm" by the time he gets to high school.  It wasn't his genetics, it was over use.

So what does this boil down to?  A good coaching staff puts the health of the kids first and foremost.  A good coaching staff doesn't have identified "aces". they have developed a lot of kids at the pitching position, and are ready no matter who they play.  A good coaching staff develops their team in all positions, and has a kid ready to go, if one of the others is hurt.  A good coaching staff doesn't need a couple of "ironmen" playing hurt because they have the whole team ready to play ball.  A good coaching staff has workouts that meet the needs of the kids, not the ego of the coaches.  A good coaching staff doesn't need a UIL rule, because they already had that idea of taking care of the kids foremost in their mind.  I am proud to say that where my kid is...we have a GREAT coaching staff, and they have developed the epitome of what baseball is...TEAM... 

[t_markum]

A football coaches responsibility is to build a football team, whether during the season or the off season.  A baseball coach's responsibility is to do the same.  The problem is conflicting needs.  If you have a big guy that is a lineman, you are going to build him as such.  This means that you are going to build bulk, and not arm.  If he is also one of the pitchers of the team, this is going to conflict with what is needed for the baseball team.  Problem is, the head football coach in most of the area schools is also, TA DA...the AD.  So guess who gets hosed?

In addition, probably the majority of weight training workouts specify alternating muscle groups on alternating days to prevent injury, and allow for muscle growth and regeneration.  It's a physical reality, especially for developing muscles in teens, where not only is the muscle involved, but the bone growth plates as well.  I'm sure many of you know of a kid who was threw heat at 11 or 12, was ridden hard by his volunteer coach as his "ace", and ends up having a "rag arm" by the time he gets to high school.  It wasn't his genetics, it was over use.

So what does this boil down to?  A good coaching staff puts the health of the kids first and foremost.  A good coaching staff doesn't have identified "aces". they have developed a lot of kids at the pitching position, and are ready no matter who they play.  A good coaching staff develops their team in all positions, and has a kid ready to go, if one of the others is hurt.  A good coaching staff doesn't need a couple of "ironmen" playing hurt because they have the whole team ready to play ball.  A good coaching staff has workouts that meet the needs of the kids, not the ego of the coaches.  A good coaching staff doesn't need a UIL rule, because they already had that idea of taking care of the kids foremost in their mind.  I am proud to say that where my kid is...we have a GREAT coaching staff, and they have developed the epitome of what baseball is...TEAM... 

Well said!!!