JAMMED EYELIDS

The other day, I came across a Pitcher List  article  by Michael Augustine that talked about Bauer Units and how the concept can have real world application with samples of MLB pitchers. First, a quick review of  Bauer Units . BU = spin rate (RPM) / velocity (MPH) This normalizes the effect of spin on a fastball relative to velocity for comparison among pitchers. The league average Bauer Units is 24. The higher the Bauer Units, the more "hop" or "rise" is perceived on a fastball, and the lower the Bauer Units, the more "sink" on a fastball. One of the players in Augustine's sample of pitchers with average Bauer Units was the Yankees' Luis Severino, who notched an average of 24.31 BUs on his 4-seam FB through August of 2018. The article went on to explain how, essentially, Severino had more success living  lower  in the zone but that it didn't mean much considering his OBA on FBs alone (.273) was not very impressive. What could have c...

(Note: this was a post I wrote in March 2019 for True Grind Systems, a sports performance training facility in Austin, TX. You can find the original post here . All media included is my own or was extracted from Rapsodo Cloud. Because I've learned a considerable amount since this post was written, there have been some added notes and corrections italicized in bold throughout.) Of the many new trends throughout the baseball training world, one that I keep seeing pop up is the role of “intent.” Intent can be defined in several different ways, but for the sake of specificity within this post, I’ll simply describe it as the overall level of effort within each repetition. In this case, let’s say our repetitions are individual throws off of a mound. High intent can help us gauge how our training outcomes will translate into game scenarios and can allow us to better facilitate preparedness for our next outing. Generally, we can have a good idea for what type of arsenal we’ve equipped...

(Note: this was a post I wrote in August 2018 for True Grind Systems, a sports performance training facility in Austin, TX. Some media that True Grind owns and included in the original post has been omitted. You can find the original blog post here .) Before I begin this rant, allow me to give you some background information about myself and how this topic came about. Since 2015, I’ve been a pitcher at an NAIA school in Texas. Before I set foot on a college campus, I had already gone through two elbow surgeries: an ulnar nerve transposition in February of 2013 during my senior year of high school, and an ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction – commonly referred to as Tommy John – later that September. After those two surgeries, I took a gap year to rehab and then pitched two full seasons at the NAIA level. During the summer after my second full season, I sustained a shoulder injury that ultimately led to a shoulder debridement surgery in May of 2017. Then, at some point bet...