Most people don’t think of baseball as a high risk injury sport. Unlike football, hockey or boxing, baseball seems tame in comparison. While it’s true that baseball is not a high contact sport, a variety of injuries can occur to the players in virtually every part of the players body but most notably in the shoulder; some of these injuries can be career ending.
One of the most common injuries is due to overuse of the shoulder because of the repetitive motion required in pitching. Major shoulder injuries include bursitis, inflammation or tears of the tendons of the rotator cuff or rotator cuff tendonitis, shoulder instability, shoulder separation and labrum inflammation or tears. In order to understand the shoulder injuries of baseball players and especially of pitchers, you have to understand the motion involved in the act of throwing. Pitchers perform a wind up, cocking, acceleration and then deceleration and follow through when throwing the ball (see Figure 1) (source). These motions can be performed up to and over one hundred times per game depending on the age and ability of the athlete. Add to the amount of weekly practice time and you can see how this repetitive motion can cause problems over time. The anatomy of the shoulder joint allows the pitcher to generate velocity when throwing the ball. The shoulder joint fits loosely in the shoulder socket or glenoid (see Figure 2) (source). The further the player can bring the arm back raised away from the body (abduction), the more velocity the ball will have when released. Because of the lack of restriction in the shoulder joint a larger demand is placed on the soft shoulder tissue that is responsible for maintaining stability. These are the structures that eventual...
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...nge of external and internal motion while strengthening the muscles of the shoulder. When rest and physical therapy fail to correct an injury, surgery may be required. Common surgical procedures include labrum repairs, posterior capsular release, anterior capsular placation, or rotator cuff surgery. Many athletes are focusing on just one sport and training year round resulting in an increase in over-use injuries. It is recommended that athletes not play one sport year round to prevent overuse. Breaks should be taken and pitchers should not pitch on multiple teams.
The parent’s, coaches and players all have a responsibility in being alert to signs of injury and following guidelines to prevent injuries. Proper warm-up, rest periods and early detection are key to maintaining shoulder health and all symptoms should be gone before a player is returned to the field.
On History- The patient was a 49-year-old Caucasian male with a chief complaint of pain and weakness in R shoulder abduction and external rotation (dominant shoulder). He was a retired baseball player. He has been a baseball pitcher for 12 years before he retired 5 years
Pitching overhand is a particularly stressful motion; the strain it puts on a player's joint is commonly injurious. Pitchers such as Kerry Wood, Matt Morris, John Smoltz, Mariano Rivera, Tom Gordon, and Eric Gagne all have a four inch scar on their pitching arms as evidence of this career saving surgery.
There aren't as many spots needed in baseball which makes it a little more easier and isn't time consuming such as wrestling is. Baseball is more like holding a pitch right and with the correct fluent arm motion. When wrestling is more like shooting a sweeping single and swiping the other leg out placing them on their back or stomach. Batting takes time to learn and lot of it. Its confusing if they drop their elbow on their swing and attack the ball with their hands it will take many reps to fix it. Baseball is where players get a rude awakening. No matter how amazing athletes are or think they are they always have bad technique somewhere. More than likely players will grow up playing that way. Although once they get a little higher it hits them, and it hits them hard. All those bad reps come and hit people by surprise when they got to restart from the beginning.
Baseball?s reputation has been painted with a red asterisk. The non-medical use of steroids has been banned according to the Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 1990. Many baseball athletes have been caught or presumed illegal users of HGH or Steroids since the act passed in 1990. All these athletes have one thing in common, they want to have an edge or advantage on the game. Some athletes even admit to administering the drug to other athletes and themselves. Jose Conseco testified to personally injecting the steroids into Mark McGuire (Cote).
Baseballs require a coat of white leather stitched with red seams to cover the nine-inch circumference and 2.8 inch diameter. They are easy enough for a child to hold. Also, a baseball weighs only five ounces, which is like holding a deck of cards. Because a baseball is lighter and easier to hold, baseball players have better control of the ball. When I played little league baseball, I never witnessed any teammates suffer from being hit by a baseball. In that sense playing baseball does not create much of a risk of
Baseball is not a difficult game to comprehend, but it can a very long time to achieve a high level of performance. Usually one starts playing this game at a very young age and the first thing they start out with is throwing. Throwing a baseball involves exploiting all major muscle groups in the body to generate a large torque on the arm that will in turn create a high potential for speed when it is released.
For example, "Little League Elbow" describes overuse injuries in kids who are repetitively throwing the ball. Kids are sustaining severe injuries to their growth plates, neck and spinal cord that could end their career in pro-sports before it begins....
The article titled “Concussions increasingly common on the football field,” was found on the Alabama News website. This article takes a look from the coaches perspective when he finds that four of his players have suffered from concussions on his high school football team. The coach from the Greenville high school football team Josh McLendon, raises concern about football and practicing the sport. He talks about his players injuries and how most of the concussions occur during practice. Even though the team works hard to change practice routines and rules, they are not able to prevent concussions from happening. The article talks about symptoms that players do not notice. Often times a player will feel dizzy and he will just assume he took a hard fall, but players start to get blurry vision, dizziness, and headaches. Before players would hide their injury and play through it, but with the heavy effects concussions have had on retired football players, McLendon urges his team to speak up when they start to feel ill. He hopes that other coaches will learn from him when they stress the seriousness of concussions “Wouldn’t tell the coach, wouldn’t tell a parent, it would just kind of go away. But know since we have made people more aware of it I think they’re coming to the forefront of it a little more,” athletes who do not hear about the severity of something will not stop to think
Baseball is considered America’s past time. Legends like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jackie Robinson, and many more have come and gone. Throughout baseball’s history certain players have excelled more than others, and like any sport they were successful by exploiting their strengths. It isn’t the rules, uniforms, stadiums, and fan base that make baseball a beautiful sport; it’s the players. Anyone competing, whether it is at a professional level or not, has their own unique mechanics that allows them to perform the best they can. No pitcher throws the ball the same way as another and no batter hits the ball the same way as another. Every baseball player has a routine in everything they do that makes them special. It has been said that hitting a baseball is the hardest task in all of sports. To accomplish that task, all factors come in to play; the type of pitch being thrown, the release point of the pitch, the break of the ball, etc. All those factors occur before the batter’s swing is fully initiated. As mentioned earlier, no batter swings the same way as another however, the mechanics of a swing is a different thing entirely. The mechanics of one’s swing begins when a batter enters the box and ends when a batter exits, what happens in between is up to the batter. By perfecting a batter’s mechanics while in the box, their chances of making contact increase greatly.
Concussions can spring from practically anywhere; at home during cleaning, playing catch in the yard, or even slipping and falling. One of the most common reasons concussions happen is from sports, most often from football. It should be common knowledge on the symptoms of a concussion and what to do to help it heal, especially coaches. Because of the mindset that coaches give towards their players and the spirit of the game, athletes do not report their injuries to their coaches. One reports states, “The culture of sports negatively influences athletes’ self-reporting of concussion symptoms and their adherence to return-to-play guidance” (Waldron). This means that athletes could have any injury, not just a concussion, and they would be afraid to tell the coach because they are afraid of getting taken out of the game. More coaches, however, are starting to come around to educating the team and support staff about head injuries. Some coaches are actually sitting their teams down and making them watch a video on what happens during a concussion. In one report, the athletes said that after they watched the video, “they would be su...
Baseball is known as America’s pastime and is one of the most popular, respected sports on earth. Since the beginning of the sport, it seemingly advances with technology every year making faster and stronger players. The use of steroids became rampant and spread among players and has carried them away from the true history of the game they play. Controversy still today runs around the sport today about fines, punishments and record breaking. The past two decades of Major League Baseball have been tainted because of the use of performance enhancing drugs, also known as steroids, causing the loss of many fans and the true meaning of America’s favorite sport.
Growing up, I have always had a passion for baseball. To me, it is much more than just a sport. There have been times when it has acted as an escape from many problems in my life, as I feel that when I am on the diamond, nothing can hurt me. I am aware that many people feel this way about the sport they love, but sadly their careers often come to an abrupt end due to injury. I have a personal connection to this experience. The summer before my fourth grade year I was attending a basketball camp at Davidson College, when in the final seconds of a scrimmage game, my ankle was kicked out from under me. I immediately fell to the ground in pain as my ankle rolled over on itself. Coaches aided me in limping off of the court and to the training room
An Athletic Trainer working at the high school level gets to enjoy a variety of sports and with different sports comes different injuries. With football, the injuries an Athletic Trainer has to tend to are often more on the severe end of the scale. It is not uncommon to see a concussion (see Figure 2) or a torn ACL (Anterior Cruciate Ligament in the knee) in a football game compared to a softball game where a concussion or an ACL tear (see Figure 1) is less likely to occur. But in a softball game in comparison to a volleyball game, it is more likely to see a black eye or even just a very painful bruise. The more contact in the sport, the more injuries the Athletic Trainer gets to see and try to
This case involved a 53 year old man who sustained a significant tear of his rotator cuff while playing baseball. He underwent surgical repair and was given a referral for physical therapy. The referral was to begin passive ROM 3 times per week for 2 weeks then initiate a supervised home program of active exercise for 2 weeks, and elastic resistance exercises for internal and external rotation every other day for a month. 2 weeks after surgery, he had his first PT visit in a sports medicine clinic that was managed by an athletic trainer (ATC).”
Rotator cuff tear – The muscles adjoining the shoulder joint are required for rotating the shoulder, amid other movements. The tendons of these muscles furthermore influence the structural strength of the shoulder joint. Harsh, rapid actions, for example in tennis and baseball, can result in tearing of one of these tendons. This then causes pain as well as a decline in range of motion. Surgery possibly will be necessary to repair a torn