The Underrated Role of the Nervous System in Pitching Velocity

The nervous system is crucial for velocity. This is undisputed. Yet, the standard implementations of this extend to sprint and jump work while assuming this “trains the nervous system”. Yes, the nervous system is going to adapt to the specific demands of the training regime. However, sprinting faster is not a priority for the nervous system; training the nervous system with sprints and jumps while ignoring the multitude of foundational layers is the equivalent of spending the majority of a 70 mph pitcher’s training economy on seam shifting a sweeper to increase carry. Sure, that is a great final touch, but if the pitcher doesn’t have a strong physical preparation and throwing routine, they will never maximize their success.

To start identifying the true roles of the nervous system in the throw, we must begin by acknowledging the hierarchy of needs for any human being. From an evolutionary perspective, the primary needs of any human being begin with survival, and this is the nervous system’s primary concern. If there is any hint of compromise, every downstream function will be hindered. While there is no overt fear for your life on the mound, there can be other triggers. As each foundational element of the hierarchy is constructed, another follows. Each of these elements builds expressions for high velocity output.

Velocity on the mound is the result of the nervous system expressing a surplus of safety. The nervous system is coded to ensure survival, not to throw 98 with good shape. If the nervous system detects anything that can threaten survival or even pose a slight threat to safety, output will shut down. To achieve the task of consistently throwing high velocity pitches with execution, while it is not a pure requirement, it is incredibly beneficial to identify limitations of the nervous system. Clearing these threatening inputs can widen an athlete’s affordance landscape, which gives them access to more movement solutions. With more available movement solutions, they can then attune their patterns to solve this task at hand to unveil a more efficient movement solution.

A common example of a nervous system threat is a post-surgical scenario. In many post-surgical “fully healthy” athletes, they are entirely pain-free and have completed their prescribed rehabilitation protocol, but their body does not forget getting cut open and operated on. This is one of the ultimate threats that the body can face, and requires immense direct work to clear these inhibitions. When assessing an athlete with an ACL injury, you can assess their range of motion and direct muscle testing, then repeatedly tap or scratch their scar, then retest. In some cases, the tapping or scratch poses a threat to the nervous system and causes significant inhibition. If the athlete has this response showing their nervous system detected a threat, then this should be a primary concern before adding excessive load that can lead to increased layers of compensation. When peeling back the layers of compensations, some athletes may have one compensation, while others can show over a dozen layers all contributing to their presentation of pain or threats to their nervous system.

The majority of nervous system triggers can come from layers of compensation. While inevitable in sport, the goal should be to minimize excess compensation patterns. The primary sources of compensation patterns are: 1) pain, 2) arthrogenic muscle inhibition (AMI), 3) maladaptive neuroplasticity, 4) incapacity, and 5) performance anxiety. In each of these scenarios, the nervous system is detecting a threat based on the output of pitching, so it self-organizes in a way to limit the threat. In the case of pain, this is a direct limitation, where the brain sends a signal to declare a certain tissue is unprepared for the demands of the movement. Both AMI and maladaptive neuroplasticity can result from a history of injuries, either during the rehab phase or over a much greater timeframe. Incapacity leads to compensation when the athlete does not have the physical ability to express a desired movement solution and finds a compensation to accomplish the task at hand (throwing a competitive pitch).

AMI is likely to occur after an excessively conservative return-to-play protocol where the athlete completes their rehab, yet the limiting tissue is severely underprepared for the task at hand. In the case of a pitcher with an elbow injury, if their forearm has not been adequately prepared to withstand the demands of pitching, then they must acquire the requisite compensation patterns to ensure that stress can be diverted from the injured tissue. This is a subconscious limitation where the athlete’s preparedness is not aligned with the sport’s demands, and can be spotted through quantitative assessments such as grip strength dynamometers or individual finger testing. The standard in the industry is to use overcoming isometrics for each of the four fingers; yet there is likely added value in variable assessments to ensure yielding isometric, concentric, and eccentric strength align with their overcoming isometric results. There can be additional conflation here with an athlete’s natural biases, such as a wide ISA (force-producing) who outperforms his narrow ISA (force-yielding) peer, yet may be equally or underprepared for the specific demands of throwing. Comprehensive assessments, along with understanding the athlete’s true cognitive state and relationship with throwing, may provide increased value.

Maladaptive neuroplasticity falls under a similar category as AMI, yet is typically displayed at a later stage in the injury cycle. An athlete who may experience these symptoms may have had a return-to-throw program that is structured around ensuring the surrounding musculature is prepared to handle the demands of the sport, yet fails to take a holistic assessment of the athlete. This is where functional neurology plays an important role in providing a detailed athlete assessment. Using neurology to identify underactive areas of the brain that lead to asymmetrical joint loading and force production can multiply over time. An example of where this may derail an athlete is minor injuries that are typically ignored or under-rehabbed. If an athlete has a bad ankle sprain on their back leg and compensates around loading the joint and does not prepare the ankle to handle forces in each range of motion required to optimally perform their sport, they will always be at a disadvantage. This could be expressed through numerous downstream effects. When the athlete goes into a leg lift, there is a subconscious threat to the nervous system from their individual history and relationship with the act of weight bearing the entire mass over that leg, along with structural incapacity resulting from poor specific preparation. The fastest way to clear the threat detected by the nervous system in the leg lift phase is to find stability, which comes from accelerating landing. The athlete is forced to create an artificially early landing at front foot plant by early pelvic rotation and swinging the front leg open like a gate. No amount of drills tied to ‘staying closed longer’ will override the nervous system’s threat detection. The athlete is now in a disadvantageous position at landing, where the pelvis cannot stabilize for the torso to accelerate around and close the gap created by hip shoulder separation. More importantly, the arm is never given a chance to find a position where it can accept the energy generated by torso rotation. Pitchers exemplifying this pattern will have a lack of horizontal shoulder abduction/scapular retraction and shoulder external rotation. This pitcher is forced to find major compensation patterns to accomplish the task most efficiently, yet will always struggle and may be more prone to offload specific stresses to tissues that are entirely unprepared; this can allow for ‘unrelated’ injuries to arise. Although this athlete may have nearly forgotten about the ankle sprain, their nervous system did not. By clearing the threat to the nervous system, this pitcher will progress at a significantly greater rate compared to a pitcher who trains to address the symptom of under-rotated hips at foot plant and/or early torso rotation.

Incapacity is similar to maladaptive neuroplasticity, but instead of an athlete compensating around a prior injury, this athlete is entirely unable to achieve desired positions. They have a narrow affordance landscape of possible movement solutions, which lacks the specific solutions that best allow them to accomplish the task of sending more energy into the ball and throwing harder. This process is straightforward, but must be built over a longer timeframe, and begins with identifying the specific constraint that is limiting the athlete. This could be an individual constraint, a task-specific constraint, or an environmental constraint. An individual constraint may be that the athlete is too weak, too immobile, etc. A task-specific constraint may be that the athlete can pull down 105 mph but can only throw 88 mph on the mound; this athlete would need to isolate the task-specific constraints of the pitching delivery vs pull-down where the breakdown occurs. Similarly, a common task-specific constraint is where an athlete is capable of pitching at 92–94 mph in a bullpen, but as soon as a hitter steps in the batter’s box, they drop to 88–90 mph; this is another task-specific constraint of pitching vs throwing where the athlete is limited. An environmental constraint may be that there is a huge hole in the mound where they normally throw, their shoes are too big, or the sun is in their eyes. The most common of these constraints will be individual, but it is crucial to identify the exact breakdown in every scenario, then train accordingly.

The nervous system can express the exact outputs needed for the game with all of the task-specific constraints, but until this is blended with the environmental constraints of higher pressure games and practices it cannot be used. A pitcher with an insufficient cognitive state will struggle to transfer the flow state of a facility or local field with friends to a practice where he’s afraid to get yelled at by a coach or afraid to fail in front of teammates. While there is not a physical limitation as with the other compensation patterns, these compensation patterns emerge in the game-like state only in the presence of pressure. So there are 2 initial steps: 1) raise the pressure of the training environment and 2) lower the pressure of the game. Many training protocols prioritize increasing success over increasing failure, which aligns with much of the motor learning research, which indicates a 50 to 70% fail rate for certain activities. This ensures the athlete can deal with failure in a controlled environment, before it inevitably occurs in a faster-paced game. Although the game is faster paced and there is a pitch clock at the college and professional levels, this should allow for the athlete to express creativity opposed to facing pressure. Easier said than done. However, it is a crucial skill to help athletes find their individual flow state and turn the performance related anxiety into joy for competition.

Once the nervous system truly, not just a conscious intention, believes it is safe, velocity can then be expressed through efficient organization of the nervous system.

The nervous system not only governs output, but directs the course of your progression over time. For athletes who are underprepared for the demands of throwing, they will experience pain as a direct signal to display areas that are insufficiently prepared to handle the stress of throwing. The nervous system interprets the signals for pain as a way to understand there is a danger to the body, as increasing the energy sent into and through that specific structure can cause it to fail. While the area of pain may not be the weak link in the chain, it is the last area of compensation. If there is only 1 layer of compensation, then this is the direct tissue that is unprepared for the specific demands required to accomplish this task; if there are additional layers of compensation, then there are other structures which are failing to handle its specific demands. This leads to the excess forces being sent to the next layer of the chain. Some of the common structural limitations in pitchers can be inadequate mobility of the thoracic spine in contralateral rotation and flexion (to give the body a larger range to decelerate and offload the stress by flattening the impulse curve), and/or a scapula that has limited protraction and upward rotation, and/or weak infraspinatus and supraspinatus, limited posterior capsule mobility, and/or weak bicep, and/or weak forearm flexor digitorum superficialis, flexor digitorum profundus, flexor carpi ulnaris, and pronator teres muscles, and/or excess ulnohumeral gapping, which limit the body’s ability to offload stress. Regardless of the presentation of pain that the athlete presents with, each of these factors should be assessed.

The pain signal can be overridden in short term spurts and does not make day to day velo jumps impossible (adequate caffeine, adrenaline, etc. can counter this). Long term velocity progress is facilitated by the goal of sending higher quantities of energy into and through the arm, then into the baseball. If there is pain signaling, then the weak links in the chain must be trained to withstand greater amounts of force; once the body can produce sufficient force and transfer it through the torso, the shoulder must then accept the energy. If there is a significant limitation within a specific tissue, you must prepare the tissue to handle higher stresses so both more total energy can be sent to the ball, but also to avoid surplus energy sent into subsequent tissues that are unprepared to handle the stress they are currently tasked with absorbing.

This is a primary concern for pitchers who may experience prolonged velocity plateaus despite improving power production (the only quality that does not have explicit diminishing returns, unlike strength, hypertrophy, or mobility). These athletes who show up every day with their arm hanging and reliant on non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as Advil are self-limiting. Their body is incapable of withstanding the current stresses produced at their current velocity, so their body is unwilling to send higher amounts of energy through increased velocity. There is never a long term benefit to subduing pain signaling and attempting to override it, the only solution to increased velocity is to first eliminate continuous pain signaling.

Velocity jumps are the result of excess energy transfer and nervous system safety. Once the body has expressed a certain velocity and the body understands it is safe to express that velocity without pain signaling that represents a threat to the nervous system, the governing nervous system can increase output. So the body must generate and transfer the force required for each pitch, then have sufficient surplus energy to ensure survival.

Vitality is the abundance of energy. A direct result of your off-field habits. A lifestyle that supports an abundance of energy via vitality will foster an environment primed for velocity jumps. There is no set checklist of tasks to do to optimize vitality, and the added stress of chasing perfection can be what limits it most for some. This will be the culmination of your diet, light environment, sleep, hydration, and emotional well-being. A high velocity diet should have a set caloric intake, macronutrient goals for each meal, with a focus on minimally processed foods. Foods that are local and seasonal can have a further benefit than foods of equal micronutrient content that have been shipped from across the globe. A healthy light environment is a crucial aspect of vitality to set the body’s internal timing systems and circadian rhythm. The ideal day should begin with sunlight, delayed screen time, exposure to high lux environments in the middle of the day without an excessive short wavelength bias. As the sun sets, spending time watching it can attune your circadian rhythm to the sun and slowly prepare the body for sleep. Melatonin production will occur best with a consistent sleep schedule and a parasympathetic state with minimal arousal before bed, which can be impeded by overhead LED lights that have flicker rates of roughly 120 hertz (flashes per second). Hydration goes beyond just drinking more water. When you decide to drink plain water, avoid the endocrine disrupters that stem from environmental pollutants of the modern world. However, the majority of water consumption should be intentional and include sodium, potassium, magnesium, and chloride, which are the four electrolytes that fuel the electrical charge within every cell. Carbohydrates and water-rich foods aid in the production of EZ water, along with lower deuterium hydration options for those who have inadequate sunlight exposure. The emotional well-being of the athlete is incredibly important. Factors like identity outside of baseball, forcing success, and avoiding social isolation build this underdiscussed aspect of health. While vitality is not dependent on every single minutia, it is the culmination of a generally healthy lifestyle. A lifestyle that leads to an abundance of energy creates a nervous system that has surplus energy to spend on high velocity outputs.

Another portion of the nervous system is the buy-in, enjoyment, and play that determine day-to-day factors. Yes, buy-in can maximize intent and there is benefit to that. The real benefit of these comes from removing the internal governor, which limits the athlete’s true capabilities. An athlete who doesn’t inherently see the benefit to what they are doing yet attempts to push themselves will underperform their peer who truly believes the same program will make them better. Outside of the true output, the athletes will be limited in their ability to explore new movement solutions.

Training should help athletes widen their affordance landscape and explore new possible movement solutions, or attune them to applying the best movement solution for this specific challenge. This is where specific motor learning principles intertwine. Differential learning provides the physical inputs to the nervous system for variability, which allows the body to experience drastic changes and organization in the most viable solution for each problem. Play and flow state are a prerequisite to most efficiently find and apply new solutions, which cannot fully emerge without removing the governor. Novelty in a pressure-free environment erodes the monotony that limits the exploration of movement solutions.

The nervous system is the complex cumulation of every input the body receives and output the body produces. Simply “training the nervous system” with sprints or jumps is entirely inadequate. You must thoroughly assess each individual athlete, tie their compensations together with injury history, and provide each athlete with an environment that allows them to solve movement challenges to widen their affordance landscape, refine their attunement, and increase their outputs to throw harder.