{"id":5247,"date":"2015-10-14T00:39:00","date_gmt":"2015-10-14T08:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches\/5247\/"},"modified":"2015-10-14T00:39:00","modified_gmt":"2015-10-14T08:39:00","slug":"baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches\/","title":{"rendered":"Baseball&#039;s Arms Race: The Price Of All Those Fast Pitches"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-style:italic;font-size:16px\">By  <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.npr.org\/2015\/10\/14\/448303557\/baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches?utm_medium=RSS&amp;utm_campaign=sports\">Frank Deford<\/a><\/span>  <\/p>\n<div class=\"ftpimagefix\" style=\"float:left\"><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/www.npr.org\/2015\/10\/14\/448303557\/baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches?utm_medium=RSS&amp;utm_campaign=sports\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/media.npr.org\/assets\/img\/2015\/10\/13\/gettyimages-480442256_wide-2560e2b11e53020ad1f56a9a69bb7982306eb48d-s1100-c15.jpg\" title=\"Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Brandon Beachy throws against the Milwaukee Brewers on July 11 at Dodger Stadium. It marked his comeback from a second Tommy John surgery to his right elbow.\" alt=\"Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Brandon Beachy throws against the Milwaukee Brewers on July 11 at Dodger Stadium. It marked his comeback from a second Tommy John surgery to his right elbow.\"><\/a><\/div>\n<div><strong><\/strong> <strong>3:04<\/strong><\/div>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/pd.npr.org\/anon.npr-mp3\/npr\/me\/2015\/10\/20151014_me_baseballs_arms_race_the_price_of_all_those_fast_pitches.mp3?dl=1\"><span>Download<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<p>Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Brandon Beachy throws against the Milwaukee Brewers on July 11 at Dodger Stadium. It marked his comeback from a second Tommy John surgery to his right elbow. <strong>Kevork Djansezian\/Getty Images<\/strong> <strong>hide caption<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><strong>i<\/strong>toggle caption <span>Kevork Djansezian\/Getty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Pitching a baseball overhand \u2014 which has always been a rather contorted, unnatural action \u2014 is now leading to an epidemic of injuries. Incredibly, it is estimated that one-fourth of all major league pitchers have had what&#8217;s called Tommy John surgery, which involves the elbow&#8217;s ulnar collateral ligament.<\/p>\n<p>Part of the reason for this is, obviously, that kids have been throwing too much, too hard, too early in youth leagues. Now that we see all the arm injuries to young grown-up pitchers \u2014 and even some position players \u2014 we can surely expect that better care will be given to young pitchers.<\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<p>However, the other apparent reason for this plague is simply that too many pitchers are now throwing too hard for the human body to bear. It&#8217;s commonplace for pitchers to throw well over 90 miles an hour. That&#8217;s the ticket to the big leagues. Can we expect teenagers and 20-somethings to cut back on their speed?<\/p>\n<p><em>Click the audio to hear the rest of Deford&#8217;s thoughts on the pressures that lead to sports injuries.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><em>This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service &#8211; if this is your content and you&#8217;re reading it on someone else&#8217;s site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org\/content-only\/faq.php#publishers.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Source:: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.npr.org\/2015\/10\/14\/448303557\/baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches?utm_medium=RSS&amp;utm_campaign=sports\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Baseball&#039;s Arms Race: The Price Of All Those Fast Pitches\" rel=\"nofollow\">http:\/\/www.npr.org\/2015\/10\/14\/448303557\/baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches?utm_medium=RSS&amp;utm_campaign=sports<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"ftpimagefix\" style=\"float:left\"><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/www.npr.org\/2015\/10\/14\/448303557\/baseballs-arms-race-the-price-of-all-those-fast-pitches?utm_medium=RSS&amp;utm_campaign=sports\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" src=\"http:\/\/media.npr.org\/assets\/img\/2015\/10\/13\/gettyimages-480442256_wide-2560e2b11e53020ad1f56a9a69bb7982306eb48d-s1100-c15.jpg\" title=\"Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Brandon Beachy throws against the Milwaukee Brewers on July 11 at Dodger Stadium. It marked his comeback from a second Tommy John surgery to his right elbow.\" alt=\"Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Brandon Beachy throws against the Milwaukee Brewers on July 11 at Dodger Stadium. It marked his comeback from a second Tommy John surgery to his right elbow.\"><\/a><\/div>\n<div><strong><\/strong> <strong>3:04<\/strong><\/div>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/pd.npr.org\/anon.npr-mp3\/npr\/me\/2015\/10\/20151014_me_baseballs_arms_race_the_price_of_all_those_fast_pitches.mp3?dl=1\"><span>Download<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<p>Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Brandon Beachy throws against the Milwaukee Brewers on July 11 at Dodger Stadium. It marked his comeback from a second Tommy John surgery to his right elbow. <strong>Kevork Djansezian\/Getty Images<\/strong> <strong>hide caption<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><strong>i<\/strong>toggle caption <span>Kevork Djansezian\/Getty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>Pitching a baseball overhand \u2014 which has always been a rather contorted, unnatural action \u2014 is now leading to an epidemic of injuries. Incredibly, it is estimated that one-fourth of all major league pitchers have had what&#8217;s called Tommy John surgery, which involves the elbow&#8217;s ulnar collateral ligament.<\/p>\n<p>Part of the reason for this is, obviously, that kids have been throwing too much, too hard, too early in youth leagues. Now that we see all the arm injuries to young grown-up pitchers \u2014 and even some position players \u2014 we can surely expect that better care will be given to young pitchers.<\/p>\n<div>\n<\/div>\n<p>However, the other apparent reason for this plague is simply that too many pitchers are now throwing too hard for the human body to bear. It&#8217;s commonplace for pitchers to throw well over 90 miles an hour. That&#8217;s the ticket to the big leagues. Can we expect teenagers and 20-somethings to cut back on their speed?<\/p>\n<p><em>Click the audio to hear the rest of Deford&#8217;s thoughts on the pressures that lead to sports injuries.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><em>This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service &#8211; if this is your content and you&#8217;re reading it on someone else&#8217;s site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org\/content-only\/faq.php#publishers.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5247","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports-recreation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5247\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/associatednews.info\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}