Conditioning for relief and closing

#1

My son is 18 years old. Last fall he got picked up by a very good travel team as a pitcher. He has primarily always been a starter but on this team they use him in closing and relief. He really enjoys his role on the team, as he will make many appearances and gets a lot of mound time. My question is though by the end of a long turny you can see his arm getting tiered. He is not throwing a lot of pitches but consecutive days. What is the best way to prepare for this role? Ive even seen him really limit his bull pin as to keep fresh longer

#2

What kind of work do they have him doing?
Four days in a row, once or twice a day. How many times a day is he getting warm and cooling off?
What is his general conditioning?
Even though he is in relief do they give him a pitch count?

#3

I was a fifth, sixth, and (if necessary) seventh inning guy in HS, but a starter in American Legion. It’s a totally different regimen–starting vs relieving.

Remember that the warm up pitches should count toward your pitch totals as a reliever. Often I would throw at least 15-20 full intensity pitches in the pen before entering so that I knew I was locked on before hitting the mound in a dirty inning. There is no time to work things out unless you are starting an inning clean. I also would only throw 2-3 pitches between innings. Fastball, curveball, and / or change up (coming down).

Starting, I would only take 4-5 pitches from the mound entering the game then a change up for the throw down to second base.

Over the course of a game, you can save yourself an inning of work just in reduced warm up pitches you really don’t need but simply take because they are given to you.

#4

One thing I just remembered my HS coach had the first reliever do each game. We charted pitches until we were told to get warm. I loved it because my head was in the game and I had been thinking about the opposing batting order for the entire game to that point. I knew how we had pitched to each and the results. It was an immense help.

#5

Mostly he is the need a ground ball DP, pop up to get out of the inning kid. He throws from a low 3/4 slot, lots of movement. . No pitch count but rarely goes more than 3 innings at a time. and never more than 5 innings in a day. he averages according to stats about 13.7 pitches per inning. Most consecutive days I have seen was 3. He is in good shape 6, 2" about 190lbs.