Pre-season time line

Today is only January 3rd.  Our first practice is three weeks from today, on January 24th.  Our first game is on February 26th, which will give us five weeks of practice before playing game #1.  I am used to having six weeks of practice prior to our trip south.  When I was a head coach I experimented with seven weeks and even eight weeks one season, but that was too much time in the fieldhouse, especially with each day beginning at 6am.  I eventually became comfortable with six weeks of practice as being ideal to help pitchers prepare to throw about 90 game pitches.

So now that we have just five weeks for preparation, our pitchers know that they need to have about one week of throwing done as a base before entering into the first week of practice.  Throwing six days per week at practice is significantly more challenging on the arm than throwing a few days a week to build up some stamina and strength.  We will experience that first hand in a few weeks.

What I try to do is to begin our practices with our daily progression throwing drills.  I prefer not to have our pitchers throw to live hitters much at all during our pre-season practices, but we will start doing so during the second week of practice.  The live pitching is much more beneficial for the hitters than it is for the pitchers, but the team is ultimately better for it.  The first live outing will consist of about thirty pitches for each pitcher, with no breaking balls.  They will throw two-seam and four-seam fastballs as well as changeups, and nothing else during those live sessions.

This year our plan is to have each guy throw live only once per week, which will emulate what we do during the conference season, when we play four league games per week, with two doubleheaders approximately a week apart.  The past few years we have had the pitchers throw live (pre-season) sessions with 3-4 days of rest in between.  I think the change this season will be good, as the pitchers will have more opportunities for building arm strength through long toss with the additional days in between their live outings.

After the initial session of about thirty pitches, each week the pitchers will increase their pitch count by about ten pitches, though some may have instances of fifteen more and others may miss turns or stay at lower pitch counts if they are experiencing any tenderness in their arms.  In addition, as we get closer to our trip south, we begin to figure out which pitchers will most likely be starting, who may be used out of the bullpen early in games, and who might be used for shorter stints.  As we get into mid-February, our projected starters will continue to increase their pitch counts up to nearly ninety pitches.  Guys who may be closers, set-up guys, or situational guys will decrease their number of pitches, but will prepare for games by throwing live a few days per week, sometimes even on back to back days.

Off subject, tomorrow I get back to school with the little kids.  I have had a relaxing Christmas Break from school and have enjoyed staying awake later at night and sleeping in longer in the morning.  Hopefully I'll remember why my alarm is ringing in the morning!!