Dr. Mike Marshall Training: Iron Balls
Following last week's question regarding Dr. Marshall's wrist weights exercises, I exchanged several emails with Dr. Marshall and one of his students.
The student addressed the question, but claimed that the two arm actions are the same despite the obvious visual differences. He then took the opportunity to tell me that I don't understand how Dr. Marshall's pitchers throw a baseball. The student also claimed that the vertical elbow extension was the result of centripetal force. Apparently, this student wasn't paying much attention to Dr. Marshall when he explained forearm flyout.
Dr. Marshall had more useful things to say. He explained that his pitchers are taught to drive their upper arms in a position described to be "as vertical as possible." From this position, a pitcher clearly can only extend his elbow vertically. This matches exactly what I have seen from his pitchers when they throw baseballs.
When performing the weighted exercises, Dr. Marshall's pitchers appear to me to be powerfully extending their upper arms toward the target. This is because their upper arms seem to move from nearly vertical to nearly horizontal in the direction of the throw prior to release. As a result, their elbow joints extend their forearms toward the target instead of the sky.
Take another look at some of Dr. Marshall's students performing a weighted training exercise. This time, they are throwing iron balls which are obviously more similar to baseballs than the wrist weights are.
Again, his pitchers appear to be driving the heavy weights in a nearly straight 3-dimensional line. Some of them do this better than others. In this video, it appears that the pitchers who raise the ball higher are better able to keep the ball on a 3-dimensionally straight path through release.
Compared to the wrist weight exercises from last week's entry, the iron ball exercises appear to result in more skyward elbow extension. This could be an illusion caused by the arm's reaction to the release of a heavy object. Without high-speed video, it's virtually impossible to tell which happens first.
Because Dr. Marshall wants his pitchers to accelerate their upper arms in as vertical a position as possible, elbow extension is necessarily skyward. This is really the answer to last week's question. In Dr. Marshall's view, when performing his motion, skyward elbow extension is expected and unavoidable.
It seems that the difference in arm actions is the result of the weights being too heavy for Dr. Marshall's pitchers to duplicate the intended arm action.
Dr. Mike Marshall, Training
Reader Comments (7)
There have been a few studies looking at throwing with overweighted and underweighted balls and most of them showed at least *some* short-term increases in velocity... to the best of my knowledge, none of these studies were longitudinal in nature... but I've always been of the opinion that for as much flak as Marshall receives for some of the unorthodox ideas he preaches, his best work comes in the strengthening he does for his pitchers...
This also made me wonder if some of the velocity increases his pitchers see aren't just a short-term result of these weighted exercises... Until someone does a long-term study on the effects of over/underweighted apparatus on velocity there probably won't be a clear answer...
Powerlifters do something similar with dynamic and max effort workouts designed to increase muscle contractile velocity/starting speed and overall strength, respectively... of course over-arm throwers have different needs than powerlifter, the training principle is similar...
I'd be interested in your opinion...
I whole heartedly agree with his arm-strength training methods. At this point in time, I just don't see a reason to disagree with them. There is no strength training exercise as specific to pitching as these exercises are.
I believe the velocity gains that his pitchers experience are real, and I believe they are able to realize those gains because they are able to perform these exercises every day without soreness or injury thanks to Dr. Marshall's delivery. If these exercises were attempted with traditional mechanics, the results would likely be disastrous.
I also think that any pitcher who routinely and correctly practices these drills will eventually, even if inadvertently, alter his mechanics to be more in line with the actions he executes during the drill.
I'm not sure exactly what you mean by short-term gains. If I haven't already addressed your comment/question, please explain.
maybe short-term isn't the right word... but the papers i read described high-school and collegiate pitchers experiencing some pretty significant velocity gains following an offseason of training with over/under-weighted balls... but there was virtually no follow up to these studies... so there's no literature that i know of documenting how long these gains lasted or if all the pitchers' arms exploded or something a month after the paper was published...
but in terms of injury prevention you might have said it the best... there really aren't very many pitching-specific training regimens... so until one of marshall's guys rips his shoulder apart or gives me a reason to suspect his methods, i'd say more power to him...
another thing you said also made me think a little... to throw heavy objects you have to put the arm in a position of good leverage and minimize moment arms so joint torques stay small... because that's kind of the basis of marshall's mechanical ideas this method of training works well for his guys...
i'm wondering the effect this type of training would have on the mechanics of a conventional thrower... i'd think you'd have to use this almost exclusively out of season... just out of fear that it would alter a pitcher's mechanics in a way he may not necessarily want... or you could always try and develop a program specific to conventional throwing.
If a pitcher with traditional mechanics trained with these methods, I think his arm would eventually align itself in a high-leverage position. The end result, I think, would be a traditional body action combined with something very similar to Dr. Marshall's arm action.
In college, I did something similar. I performed shadow drills with a pair of 6 lb weights. I didn't do it as part of a training regimen, but because I was really focused on how I could powerfully accelerate the weight, my arm action slowly changed. If I'd known what I was doing at the time, I would probably would have been able to get even better results.
The gains were measured in the short term, but there's no reason they shouldn't be sustainable. I'm guessing this study didn't measure (estimate?) joint torques or look for a mechanical injury risk which would obviously be a limiting factor for sustaining the gains.
I would say that if you use Dr. Marshall's interval programs to strengthen your arm, velocity gains will be sustainable, but anatomically sound mechanics would still be necessary to be able to train everyday and maintain that level of arm strength/fitness.
yeah, none of these papers looked at kinetic or kinematic differences... BUT it should be noted that a football is about three times as massive as a baseball and the kinematics and kinetics of throwing a football and baseball are pretty well documented... besides some obvious timing differences, a football can't be accelerated to nearly as large an angular velocity as a baseball due to its mass, so slowing the arm down becomes much less of an issue, decreasing the stress on the shoulder and elbow structures...
of course those data are with footballs that have a mass of less than a half kilogram... peanuts compared to the 15 pound shot that guy in the video was throwing...
When I was 17 I did a similar exercise and injured my rotator cuff and went from topping at 89 to topping at 80. I honestly don't think any of these exercises I've seen Dr. Marshall use are necessary and all I'd say they do is add increased risk. The best way to train for a specific exercise, such as throwing a baseball, is to do the exercise. A solid long-toss/bullpen program with proper nutrition and mechanics should be enough for any young pitcher to develop the strength necessary to increase velocity. Naturally leg and core workouts would be beneficial, but I don't really see the merit in these unconventional exercises. Take Tim Lincecum for example, I don't think he's ever lifted a weight in his life he's just very flexible and powerful and his mechanics are able to harness this energy and transfer it to the ball. I'd hate to see promising young pitchers get into an edgy new training style like this and then wind up hurting themselves, but if it works, to each his own I suppose, and best of luck to you.
Stephen: Doing these exercises without understanding them will most likely lead to injury. If you understand the proper way to perform the exercises, you will not hurt yourself.
The exercises mimic Dr. Marshall's throwing motion. None of his pitchers have suffered an injury resulting from his training methods. His methods are designed as much to prevent injury as they are to improve velocity.
Exercises like these are misunderstood by most people who see them because they do not understand what they are seeing.
As for your rotator cuff injury, I doubt that this exercise had anything to do with it. Your rotator cuff is minimally involved with acceleration. Almost every pitching-related rotator cuff injury is the result of a deceleration problem (after the weight has left your hand).
Improper use of weights like these is far more likely to result in a problem with the glenoid labrum or the anterior shoulder capsule.