Category Archives: baseball

baseball, softball

How to Prepare for Baseball or Softball

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With the winter snow finally melting throughout the chilly parts of the United States, bats and gloves are coming out of closets.

But jumping too quickly back into a sport can lead to all kinds of painful and debilitating injuries. So Sports Without Injury asked Oakland A’s Assistant Athletic Trainer Brian Schulman what advice he can offer weekend warriors about how to prepare for baseball or softball. We added videos to illustrate his recommendations.

SWI: Static stretching has been controversial, with some studies suggesting it doesn’t prevent injury and might even hurt performance. What approach do you take? Continue reading How to Prepare for Baseball or Softball →

baseball, softball

Pitching Drills that Reduce Injury (Part II)

Exercises can prevent pitcing injury and improve velocity more than pitching drills.
Windy Klein pitches for the U.S. Army. Photo by Tim Hipps. Some rights reserved.

Lots of pitching drills can make the thrower faster and more accurate. Now researchers  have shown that the right sort of exercises can also reduce arm injuries.

For years, official baseball authorities have had one piece of advice for people concerned about injuring their arms through pitching: Don’t pitch so much. Continue reading Pitching Drills that Reduce Injury (Part II) →

baseball, elbows, shoulders, tennis, volleyball

How to Avoid Arm Injuries in Baseball and Other Throwing Sports (Part I)

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Shoulder joint. By the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.
Shoulder joint. By the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.

It’s no news to anyone watching the Major League Baseball playoffs that pitchers’ arms tire out pretty fast.

But just how much harm pitchers and other throwers may be doing to themselves is just now becoming clear. Not only does throwing too much damage muscles, ligaments and tendons, it can actually prevent a pitcher’s bones from developing normally. Continue reading How to Avoid Arm Injuries in Baseball and Other Throwing Sports (Part I) →

baseball, basketball, hamstrings, running, soccer

New Studies Show How to Prevent Hamstring Injuries

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When U.S. national soccer team striker Jozy Altidore clutched his thigh and fell to the ground in the World Cup last month, physical therapist Holly Silvers thought once again of Russian hamstring exercises.

New York Red Bulls striker Thierry Henry injured his hamstring in an April 2012 game. Photo by Matthew D. Britt (edited).
New York Red Bulls striker Thierry Henry injured his hamstring in an April 2012 game. Photo by Matthew D. Britt (edited).

No less than three other members of the team  (Fabian Johnson, Matt Besler and Deandre Yedlin) reportedly suffered injuries to this muscle group in the back of the thigh during the World Cup. Silvers, who helped develop the FIFA11+ injury prevention program for soccer’s governing body, tells me most of these injures could be prevented. Besides the pain these players experienced, the injuries literally hamstrung the team in a series of tough matches.

And it’s not only soccer players who suffer these injuries. Four Major League Baseball players (Munenori Kawasaki, Alberto Callaspo, Chris Dickerson and Shane Victorino) are currently on the disabled list because of hamstring injuries, according to ESPN. In fact hamstring strains afflict participants in just about every sport that involves running.

New Studies

Two studies presented Sunday in Seattle at the American Orthpaedic Society for Sports Medicine (AOSSM) show just how effective a few simple exercises can be against this type of injury.

One was Silvers’ controlled study on the FIFA11+. Previously her group showed the program could cut overall injuries by about half in female soccer players, but data on specific individual injuries were mostly not significant. In this new study she and her colleagues showed, among other things, that the program cut hamstring injuries by more than two thirds among over 1700 male NCAA soccer players.
Continue reading New Studies Show How to Prevent Hamstring Injuries →