2013 West Regional - Austin Tx

[108 Stitches]

First I am really happy for him and his team and this should not in anyway take away from that at all. I am just saying that based on the evidence there is a risk of injury. Doing it once will not likely hurt him, but if it is a pattern then there is a significant risk. I took a look at his numbers and he has 109 innings, and this to me is excessive. But it is his life so more power to him .

I did not see all of the games but nearly every pitcher I saw except one was a real pro prospect so if he hurts his arm in the overall scheme of things it won't hurt him pushing a pencil when he gets out of college. He can 1) Go on with life and not worry about it 2) Get TJ surgery and go on and be able to throw BP to his kids.

Now if he was a pro prospect and I was him/his family I would say do not risk your future for a single game/championship. Most pitchers in this category understand this and know how to take care of themselves.

[wildcat11]

Haddeland also had 11 days of rest between his last regular season start and the regional. 

[CalCat]

First I am really happy for him and his team and this should not in anyway take away from that at all. I am just saying that based on the evidence there is a risk of injury. Doing it once will not likely hurt him, but if it is a pattern then there is a significant risk. I took a look at his numbers and he has 109 innings, and this to me is excessive. But it is his life so more power to him .

I did not see all of the games but nearly every pitcher I saw except one was a real pro prospect so if he hurts his arm in the overall scheme of things it won't hurt him pushing a pencil when he gets out of college. He can 1) Go on with life and not worry about it 2) Get TJ surgery and go on and be able to throw BP to his kids.

Now if he was a pro prospect and I was him/his family I would say do not risk your future for a single game/championship. Most pitchers in this category understand this and know how to take care of themselves.

With his father a well respected physican in McMinnville and coach Brosius also well respected, I think they are mindful and understand how to handle player/son...on to Appleton !

[infielddad]

wildcat11,
I think it is very important to keep the Hyde reference I made earlier separate because all pitchers are somewhat different. Not having seen Haddeland, I don't know if his primary pitch is the slider. Certainly he has a very different frame from Scott Hyde and I assume velocity.
With that said, it isn't how much rest coming into the Regional, it is how much rest coming out. I assume he will be pitching on Friday and how much use occurs from then to depends on how much success Linfield has in Appleton.

[forheavendial4999]

Hyde pitched as a pro that summer, started 10 more games. That was probably foolish on the Mets' part. He threw 175 innings in total that year.

Not sure you can link a workload over 2 weeks to an injury that happened the next year.

Just about everything written by Dr Andrews, ASMI and most others on overuse would certainly link what happened with throwing 35-36 innings, all high stress innings, over about 12 days as playing an important role in what happened. Couple  the innings, number of pitches and the fact his very best pitch was a hard slider(really good one) and the linkage becomes even stronger.  When we add that the 10 starts were for a total of 50 innings over 2 months and trying to argue those 50 innings as opposed to the arm stress/fatigue of what occurred from the start of the West Region to the Championship game in Appleton  makes little sense to me.

There's so much more to it than that. I can think of probably 10 questions that are relevant to injury risk and probably no one here knows the answer unless they're from Grants Pass.

But I do know this...175 innings is more than Steven Strasburg was allowed to throw last year. And sliders are hard on the arm no matter who is throwing them or how much. And none of us know much about his training regimen or history. But more than likely nothing that happened in 2004 had all that much to do with it.

Lucero got hurt last year...what was the cause of that? Did you blame the coach for that one? I bet not.

There's an interesting quote from Dr. Andrews...who, significantly IMO, has chosen in recent years to focus his efforts on practices in youth baseball and says pitchers shouldn't throw curveballs before 14 or even later (I imagine sliders are later still). Dr. Timothy Kremchek of Cincinnati (Reds' team doctor who also has a private practice) has campaigned for curveballs to be outright banned in little league.

"You hear youth coaches say all the time, 'I've never had an arm problem under my watch,' " Andrews said. "And I think to myself, 'No, but some high school or college coach is dealing with the damage you caused years ago.' "

Sorry but I don't think it's prudent to jump to conclusions like this. I really don't have much more to say...I'm not really interested in getting embroiled in a discussion in which likely none of us have any real expertise.

[infielddad]

This is from an interview with Scott Hyde himself, describing the pain he was having, the loss of velocity and medication use during the Summer of 2004, following 35 high stress innings:

"When they went in, they found that the Tommy John ligament had not only come completely off the bone, but it brought some part of the bone off with it."

That left no choice but for doctors to perform the famed surgery upon the right-hander, who previously performed as a collegiate standout at George Fox University, a small Christian university in Newburg, Ore.

Hyde, who had the surgery in mid-May, actually didn't even begin pitching until his senior year of high school. You wouldn't have known that watching him in 2004, however, as Hyde went 14-1 with a 1.99 ERA, striking out 191 batters in 122 innings as he led George Fox University to a Division III World Series Championship.

The campaign delivered a heavy workload to Hyde's doorstep, which perhaps could have been a precursor to arm troubles. In a five-day stretch from May 28 through June 1, 2004, Hyde threw 20 innings, firing a pair of complete game victories and two innings of relief as George Fox University battled for a crown.

As a result, the Mets had hoped to keep Hyde's arm quiet for most of 2004, but when Brooklyn pitcher William Quaglieri went down to injury in mid-July, Hyde was called upon to step in.

He performed decently, going 4-4 with a 3.86 ERA in 10 starts, but quietly popped Celebrex pills to help ease the growing pain in his right arm.

"I was noticing my velocity was way down, only throwing 83-87 miles per hour," Hyde said. "I just thought I was tired and my arm would get pretty sore. My forearm would get super-tight and I couldn't get the forearm to loosen up at all.

"... Sometimes in the bullpen sessions, I'd throw just 10 pitches or so, and my arm would get so sore, I couldn't throw anymore."'

Having watched how a number of other organizations used higher round picks with a lot of college innings, it sure makes sense the Mets could have been more careful.  Also, everything I read said Hyde didn't start to pitch until his senior year in HS so the Andrews reference makes little sense.
Saying those 12-13 days had nothing to do with the surgery findings makes little sense to me so we can very much agree to completely disagree.

[forheavendial4999]

First I am really happy for him and his team and this should not in anyway take away from that at all. I am just saying that based on the evidence there is a risk of injury. Doing it once will not likely hurt him, but if it is a pattern then there is a significant risk. I took a look at his numbers and he has 109 innings, and this to me is excessive. But it is his life so more power to him .

(snip)

Now if he was a pro prospect and I was him/his family I would say do not risk your future for a single game/championship. Most pitchers in this category understand this and know how to take care of themselves.

Quick quiz...how many innings did Ben Klimesh throw for Trinity last year?

[CrashDavisD3]

Pitch counts, inning pitched and rest days mean nothing in playoff baseball.

I agree...but +/- 200 pitches over 4 days isn't very smart.

Smart is not in the discussion. Same thing happens in D1 ball also with pitch counts north of 130 many times for many teams. Many College coaches is all about the Winning and very rarely is thinking about next year or future pro prospects. Not all coaches are that way but look at the pitch counts for NCAA Regionals and World Series at all 3 levels and you find high pitch counts and little rest for some pitchers.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/columns/story?columnist=schlabach_mark&id=4252555

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/722716-college-baseball-world-series-2011-news-results-and-analysis/entry/101810-college-baseball-world-series-are-pitch-counts-needed-for-college-baseball

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/06/04/514204/coaches-dilemma-pitch-counts.html

[forheavendial4999]

As a result, the Mets had hoped to keep Hyde's arm quiet for most of 2004, but when Brooklyn pitcher William Quaglieri went down to injury in mid-July, Hyde was called upon to step in.

He performed decently, going 4-4 with a 3.86 ERA in 10 starts, but quietly popped Celebrex pills to help ease the growing pain in his right arm.

"I was noticing my velocity was way down, only throwing 83-87 miles per hour," Hyde said. "I just thought I was tired and my arm would get pretty sore. My forearm would get super-tight and I couldn't get the forearm to loosen up at all.

"... Sometimes in the bullpen sessions, I'd throw just 10 pitches or so, and my arm would get so sore, I couldn't throw anymore."'

Having watched how a number of other organizations used higher round picks with a lot of college innings, it sure makes sense the Mets could have been more careful.  Also, everything I read said Hyde didn't start to pitch until his senior year in HS so the Andrews reference makes little sense.
Saying those 12-13 days had nothing to do with the surgery findings makes little sense to me so we can very much agree to completely disagree.

Did I say "had nothing to do with"? I believe I said I don't think you can make a definitive link between the two. What if him not pitching at all as a kid, then 3 years later throwing 175 innings was a factor? Some people I know would say it might well have been, that kids need to strengthen their arms (not necessarily with breaking pitches, just throwing) as high schoolers -- just as there can be overuse, there can also be underconditioning. We don't know anything about his arm care regimen, I don't know anything about his mechanics (maybe someone here does), etc.

What I do think that interview very clearly shows is two things -- 1. Hyde was not honest with the Mets about his condition, which any coach will tell you is a problematic situation if an understandable ones in some instances; and 2. That the Mets knew the risk they were taking when they started him back up. They had initially shut him down for a reason.

One thing does stand out in my mind though. I remember when he was asked when his arm hurt in that last outing for GF...I believe the quote was very close to "from the first pitch to the last." My next question would have been...did Coach Bailey know that? IIRC, Bailey said he was hoping to get a couple of innings out of him. Was Hyde honest with his coach then (seems fair question given that he wasn't with the Mets)?

Finally, as has been pointed out, none of this is necessarily applicable to Linfield and Haddeland.

[108 Stitches]

It was around 105-110, my point was that the combination of innings and then to throw 16 in 3 games over 4 days.

I want to be sure that I am clear here, I am extremely happy for him and his program. Just saying that IF he was a pro prospect then it could be an issue for him. IMO he is not so I am happy just to let this drop. If someone wants to open another thread on it great, but lets not take away from his performance, it was spectacular.

Congrats and I will be rooting for Linfield later this week.

[infielddad]

Did you say "nothing to do with it?"
Seems to me you did with this appearing to be your summary:
"But more than likely nothing that happened in 2004 had all that much to do with it. "
I think the post which Crash provided and the links are a very accurate summary.  Some coaches are out to win at the college level, at all costs.  I have read message boards posts from a well respected D1 pitching coach who is also a head coach. He  regularly has his starters go 150 pitches,even in February, and he supports it publicly.  That makes sense since their livelihood usually depends on winning.
As your comments illustrate and tigerfan2001 noted earlier, highly competitive pitchers are very, very unlikely to say no. Most coaches love those kids and try and recruit those types. The kid who does not want that ball is not a very attractive recruit.
In between winning as the ultimate goal and highly competitive athletes who won't say no, there are some tough decisions which get made without very good knowledge of the health inside that elbow or shoulder or both.

[forheavendial4999]

Pitch counts, inning pitched and rest days mean nothing in playoff baseball.

I agree...but +/- 200 pitches over 4 days isn't very smart.

Smart is not in the discussion. Same thing happens in D1 ball also with pitch counts north of 130 many times for many teams. Many College coaches is all about the Winning and very rarely is thinking about next year or future pro prospects. Not all coaches are that way but look at the pitch counts for NCAA Regionals and World Series at all 3 levels and you find high pitch counts and little rest for some pitchers.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/columns/story?columnist=schlabach_mark&id=4252555

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/722716-college-baseball-world-series-2011-news-results-and-analysis/entry/101810-college-baseball-world-series-are-pitch-counts-needed-for-college-baseball

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/06/04/514204/coaches-dilemma-pitch-counts.html

The Bleacher Report article (like most BR articles) is trash. Though it's funny because I watched Matthew Price in high school and Legion ball in SC (he was their #3 pitcher as a rising junior!) and 100 pitches was not a problem for him -- he has such a sturdy build, very strong lower body. He would have been physically ready for pro ball as a soph at SC.

Also worth mentioning is that Price didn't pitch as a pro in 2012 after 77IP in the college season.

Quoted in the other two articles is Mike Fox, who as probably many here know is a former Division III national champion coach (and might as well get half credit -- or more -- for another).

[wildcat11]

The Bleacher Report article (like most BR articles) is trash.

First thought when I saw the BR link.

[forheavendial4999]

It was around 105-110, my point was that the combination of innings and then to throw 16 in 3 games over 4 days.

110 2/3, the most ever in a season at Trinity. So 109 was too much if he was a pro prospect, but 110 is fine? Weird. Klimesh started a second game in the regional last year...the only he didn't throw 18 innings is because he was ineffective.

[dp643]

Sometimes coaches need to make the decision even if the player is begging for the ball. Look at RGIII.

I dont care if its tournament ball, playoff ball, or high school ball, or any ball - Throwing 200+/- pitches over a four day period with only one day rest is asking for trouble.