Latest / The Layback Podcast / 2025 Wake Forest Player Development Seminar Clean Up (Ep. 97)

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2025 Wake Forest Player Development Seminar Clean Up (Ep. 97) · The Layback Podcast

0:00
What's up everyone, welcome back to the Laid Back podcast.
0:02
I'm going to be riding solo today.
0:04
Well kind of. I have my daughter strapped to
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my chest and we are going to hope she stays asleep.
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I am not sure if anyone joining me visually can see these eyes
0:15
flutter. Hopefully they stay shut.
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She was asleep before I started doing this, but I know I'm not
0:21
going to have a lot of time later in the day or throughout
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the coming weeks, so I figured I'd just try to get this done
0:27
and hope she can stay asleep through my babbling.
0:32
Nonetheless, I am doing a little bit of clean up today on the
0:37
previous episode. That previous episode was Part 2
0:41
of the Wake Forest Player Development Seminar Review with
0:44
Josh Hedgeka and really peeling back the layers even more.
0:47
I'm going to specifically talk about a few additional things
0:53
from the Next Base presentation or Next Base is a player
0:58
development outfit in Tokyo, Japan, one of the most forward
1:03
thinking and biomechanically driven development centers that
1:07
seems to exist on the planet. Not just in Japan, but on the
1:11
planet. Their big focuses are on
1:14
biomechanical efficiency and what they deem as micro
1:18
movements when it comes to their player development approach.
1:21
Josh and I go into this in depth on the previous episode, but
1:25
there are particular pieces that Josh had mentioned in his
1:28
takeaways from the presentation that I did not sufficiently
1:32
address in our communication with so much we had to get
1:35
through. So this episode today is going
1:39
to be specifically dedicated to addressing those few points that
1:45
I feel I kind of left out in the ether and didn't give my proper
1:50
take on, especially given my position with Flexpro Grip.
1:54
Hopefully I've at the stage. All right, given that I'm
1:57
mentioning Flex Pro Grip, I'm sure you can begin to guess that
2:00
this is going to have something to do with the forearm flexors,
2:05
elbow health, and pitcher longevity and performance.
2:08
Also, given the context of the podcast, if that's what you
2:12
guessed, you'd be absolutely correct.
2:15
Backpedaling a little bit and offering a quick review of what
2:19
Nextbase has discovered and claimed.
2:22
I hesitate to say discovered, but what they've claimed based
2:25
on their internal data and their motion capture, they have
2:30
uncovered quote UN quote what they refer to as a ghost torque
2:35
or a second peak valgus load that is occurring on the medial
2:41
elbow. However, this load is occurring
2:45
at the moment of or immediately post ball release.
2:49
Traditionally in all biomechanical assessments we
2:52
have come to accept as an industry that the moment of
2:57
maximum external rotation or peak lay back is the moment of
3:02
highest stress or peak valgus load on the medial elbow.
3:07
Ultimately the danger point per SE of the UCL.
3:12
That is where these medial elbow injuries occur or at least prior
3:17
to Next Base presenting this information where we thought
3:20
they occurred or we 100% believe they occurred as an industry
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hedge. Cook quickly mentioned why Next
3:30
Base believes this second peak torque is occurring.
3:34
They mentioned the extreme rapid flexion of the wrist and fingers
3:41
at the moment of ball release. That is accepted that that is a
3:44
natural action. I would argue it's not
3:47
necessarily a controlled action by the player, by the
3:52
individual. I think it's more passive in the
3:55
sense of the way that we transfer energy naturally as we
3:59
apply force through that ball. The wrist and fingers are going
4:02
to flex. So I don't think guys are
4:04
rapidly. Granted, I'm not pitching at a
4:06
high level, nor did I, but I would argue guys aren't actively
4:11
trying to really flex into ball release or snap that wrist down
4:16
into ball release. But nonetheless, that motion is
4:21
occurring and I believe it is inarguable that that would
4:25
stress the flexors. All the data would show and what
4:28
we do on Flexpro grip would support that a flexion action of
4:34
the wrist and fingers would stress the flexor muscles.
4:38
To me that's a simple A + B = C However, with the argument from
4:43
next base or the presentation from next base stating that this
4:48
intense rapid flexion of the wrist and fingers, there is a
4:55
valgus load at the medial elbow associated with the action.
5:00
Now that to me doesn't intuitively make sense, seeing
5:05
how the flexion of the wrist and fingers is driven by the flexor
5:12
mass, specifically the FDP and FDS.
5:15
Depending on what joint we're looking at, there are some other
5:18
muscles that support wrist flexion.
5:20
But if we're looking specifically at finger flexion,
5:23
it's going to be the FDP and FDS.
5:25
So the flexor digitorum profundus in the flexor
5:27
digitorum superficialis, regardless if we're talking
5:32
flexion, that is our pulling down of the fingers.
5:38
So like shooting a basketball, pulling the fingers into a palm.
5:42
I'm trying to think of doing it doing a simple wrist curling
5:46
action or knocking on a door. That is flexion of the wrist and
5:52
fingers. There is no elbow valgus load
5:55
associated with those actions. And that's part of why Flex Pro
6:01
Grip is designed the way it's designed, so we can implement it
6:05
early and often in the rehab process to avoid valgus loading.
6:09
So finger flexion and wrist flexion exist without stress on
6:15
the UCL or without valgus load on the medial elbow in exercise
6:20
Physiology setting. I'm confused to how in the
6:24
pitching setting wrist and finger flexion would then create
6:29
an elbow valgus load. I'm not here to say next base is
6:33
wrong and what they're claiming. What I am doing at this moment
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is stating where the numbers are not adding up from my side and
6:42
from what we know currently as an industry.
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So that that would be just one claim I would want significantly
6:49
more research on to figure out how a second peak torque is
6:55
being created that is being claimed A valgus load on the
6:59
media elbow when the action that they are saying causes this
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valgus stress does not 'cause valgus load on the medial elbow
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at any point in the exercise Physiology world.
7:14
On the other hand, if the claim was flexor injuries are commonly
7:19
occurring at the moment of release, I think there could be
7:22
some sort of argument there. Whether it's the intense
7:27
eccentric stress of trying to hold supination through release,
7:31
the intense movement of supination to pronation, or if a
7:36
pitcher is actively trying to apply greater force with one
7:40
finger than the other. Or even just trying to incite
7:45
greater spin by really actively trying to pull down on the ball.
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I guess you could make an argument that those things are
7:53
resulting in increased stress on the flexor mass, specifically
7:59
the FDP and FDS. And then if we're talking
8:01
pronation supination, likely the pronator tarries.
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There could be increased rates of flexor pronator mass injuries
8:08
without a doubt. I cannot argue that.
8:11
In fact, I would even support that based on the criteria that
8:15
I presented. However, flexor injuries and
8:19
what causes these flexor injuries is not going to
8:23
necessarily be the same mechanisms that are going to
8:26
cause the UCL injury. The UCL injury is going to be
8:30
caused by the valgus instability or that valgus load on the
8:34
medial elbow that the whole system cannot handle.
8:39
Now, if we want to keep connecting dots and the flexor
8:42
mass is fatigued and can no longer do its job, the UCL is
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going to be predisposed to taking on more stress or more
8:50
torque, ultimately putting the elbow in a more risky position
8:55
inter Flexboro grip, and we can prevent that from happening.
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But I just felt like that was very much worth addressing and
9:02
kind of the multiple sides of it.
9:04
Hopefully I didn't muddy the waters there with my
9:07
explanation. It is a little bit difficult to
9:10
just talk to a computer screen and try to get all of that out,
9:14
but it's an opinion and I tried my best.
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Definitely happy to continue this discussion.
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And I guess for the masses, it's worth saying we connected with
9:25
Nextbase at the after hours kind of celebration get together at
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the Wake Forest Player development seminar.
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We took down everybody's contact information and as a whole we
9:36
are excited to kind of explore this topic more.
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We're, we're certainly open to working with them and better
9:44
understanding their approach and how they are addressing this
9:49
ghost torque as they called it. And if this ghost torque really
9:53
does exist, how we can then address it from a training
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perspective, if anything else or anything different really needs
10:01
to be done. As Josh and I mentioned on our
10:05
episode the other day, our current hunch is this ghost
10:09
torque is occurring because of the skin movement associated
10:15
with throwing a ball really hard.
10:18
The markers that are being used in a mocap, A markered mocap,
10:23
they're stuck to the skin in the skin is not entirely adhered to
10:29
the underlying soft tissue. Thus, when we throw, there's
10:33
going to be some sort of noise. As Josh outlined, there's always
10:36
going to be noise associated with a biomechanical assessment.
10:40
Now marker marker based mocap is probably going to have more
10:45
noise from the movement of those nodes or of those markers.
10:50
So hopefully with some of what Driveline is trying to do or
10:53
others who have markerless mocap systems, hopefully this is
10:58
something that they can look into and uncover a bit more.
11:02
But right now our hunch is the skin is moving drastically at
11:08
the moment of ball release, resulting in a bit of noise that
11:13
pops up as valgus load on the medial elbow.
11:17
I definitely encourage everyone again to go back to the previous
11:20
episode, find this next base section and listen to Josh
11:24
explain that a little bit more for the way they discussed this
11:27
internally with the folks at Dryline.
11:29
Now we're going to move on to Part 2 of the cleanup.
11:33
It is still from the same Next base presentation and this is a,
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I guess another piece that Flexpro Grip is very directly
11:42
tied to is a training ball that Nextbase presented from Mizuno.
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Me talking about this is probably going to get a few
11:51
people excited, but Mizuno I guess has come out with a ball
11:56
as Josh mentioned, with a lower moment of inertia.
12:00
Basically what that means is less force is required to be
12:05
transferred into the ball to generate the same amount of spin
12:11
that a baseball would normally be thrown with.
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Thus, if you throw it at whatever, let's let's say 90 mph
12:20
and 2000 RPMS like a normal baseball, 90 mph, 2000 RPMS, if
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you put the same amount of force into that baseball, it's still
12:30
thrown at 90 mph. I'm going to butcher these
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percentages and I don't know for a fact what this would turn out
12:37
to be, but let's say now the average is the same 90 mile per
12:41
hour fastball, but it's 2100 RPM fastball.
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Hopefully that paints the picture a little bit of what
12:50
this ball is supposed to do, or I guess what moment of inertia
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is and how it impacts ball flight.
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Now Next base is claiming a couple of things with this ball.
13:02
They are claiming that because the ball has a lower moment of
13:07
inertia and it can enable athletes to get comfortable
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putting more force into the ball and generating more spin, they
13:16
may offer a training stimulus that can address either muscle
13:21
tendon unit stiffness or neural stiffness.
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They did not say whether it was muscle tendon unit stiffness or
13:28
neural stiffness. I would have to believe from
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what they are trying to present this would be a neural or
13:37
neuromuscular stiffness thing, given this is kind of a rate of
13:42
force development principle, not as much a fatigue resistance
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principle. However, this is me putting my
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words on to their presentation, not them sharing their direct
13:52
findings. Where this matters is again
13:56
connecting back to the Ghost Torque at the moment of release.
14:02
Next Base claims that these injuries may be occurring
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because athletes, particularly pitchers, don't have the proper
14:11
stiffness in the fingers and wrist or in the flexors.
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Thus, they are exposed to a potential risk.
14:20
Again, they didn't mention the FDP and FDS.
14:23
They didn't mention neural versus muscle tendon unit.
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But this is right up the alley of Flexpro grip.
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From what we know, throwing a ball of any kind is not going to
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change the mechanical properties of a muscle tendon unit.
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Throwing a ball can act as a potentiation effect much as
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throwing a Med ball or swinging a lighter bat or a heavier bat,
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or doing overcoming isometrics as any sort of preparation for
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your next activity. Post activation potentiation has
15:00
been used throughout exercise Physiology.
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It is extremely well researched and is a tremendous tool to get
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athletes prepared for their upcoming event exercise about
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what have you. In my mind, they just created a
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new tool with this ball, as in Mizuno created a new tool with
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this ball to have a little bit of a potentiating effect for
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imparting spin. Kyle Bodhi at Driveline would
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say athletes who throw pile balls and have thrown them
15:38
routinely increase their spin rates.
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There are aspects of that, although not researched
15:45
clinically, make a ton of sense. The ball is softer, so athletes
15:51
naturally grip it harder. Because of the sand or whatever
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the weight is within the plyo ball, it's going to move around,
16:00
so the moment of inertia changes slightly.
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Thus there is an increased impulse or time under tension
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associated with throwing a plyo ball, no matter what the weight
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is, because that weight within the ball is moving around.
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There is a different loading mechanism that if we expose
16:19
ourselves to that stimulus long enough, we're probably going to
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either get used to applying more force, more countering force
16:29
with the flexors back into that ball or we are just going to get
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comfortable pulling down harder to get the ball to go the
16:38
direction that we wanted to go. The third and kind of out there,
16:42
but definitely worth addressing. Variable of change that comes
16:48
with throwing ply balls is because of the weight and
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because of the short distance of the target in front of most
16:58
athletes who are throwing plyo balls, they tend to cut the
17:01
ball. And if we cut the ball, spin
17:03
rates are going to go up. We have to address that.
17:07
Although I really don't like stressing that point here
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because I think it's just convoluting.
17:15
The argument is not important for what we're addressing.
17:19
However, throwing a plyo ball and accounting for spin
17:22
efficiency, or I guess holding spin efficiency constant and
17:26
then comparing that to this lower moment of inertia baseball
17:31
created by Mizuno, I don't understand how those things are
17:34
that different. It really sounds to me like this
17:40
is just a fun new tool that guys can use to prep for a game.
17:46
Maybe it's a better field than throwing a plyo ball for some
17:48
individuals because it is made with leather or some sort of
17:53
composite leather so they can better translate it to a game
17:57
feel. Nonetheless, it all comes back
18:01
to a potentiating effect. There's no not going to be any
18:05
long lasting change that comes to the mechanical properties or
18:10
the muscle tendon units or the neural drivers that ultimately
18:14
apply this increased rate of force development of the fingers
18:20
into the ball. Where those changes come is from
18:24
training and not just training here and there, but sustained
18:28
training. Stiffness of the muscle tendon
18:30
units is well researched to show that it takes 8 to 12 weeks of
18:35
somewhere between 2:00 to 4:00 bouts of training per week.
18:39
We can get into the details or you can reach out directly if
18:42
you want to understand the details further of how much
18:45
volume, how much time under tension we need to create these
18:49
mechanical changes, as I said, or the actual changes to the
18:53
Young's modulus. But we also need significant
18:56
loading. We need those muscle tendon
18:58
units ideally to be activated at 70% of an individual's maximum
19:07
voluntary contraction, so 70% or greater of their one Rep Max.
19:14
If that's the case. And we need time under tension
19:17
associated with it. Throwing a baseball of any kind,
19:20
throwing a ball of any kind is not going to get us that
19:24
stimulus. Now on the neural side, there's
19:27
no question we can increase stiffness through plyometric and
19:32
ballistic movements. You think about this from a
19:35
sprinting perspective or from a jumping perspective.
19:40
Pogos, repeat effort jumps, things like that that require
19:45
Achilles stiffness or quick contractions of the Achilles are
19:50
commonly programmed and well vetted.
19:53
Taking this to the baseball world, I don't know if throwing
19:56
a baseball is going to provide that.
19:59
See now throwing a baseball is a one time effort thing.
20:04
Then you repeat it 20 seconds later roughly.
20:08
But I would think we need to train more directly with the
20:15
finger flexors to apply force more rapidly.
20:17
Which is why we do the rate of force development training on
20:20
Flex Pro RIP someone please. Please reach out and tell me if
20:24
you think I'm wrong or you want to go deeper in the weeds on
20:27
this. I I really just wanted to get my
20:29
thoughts out there and it's it's not to poo poo any of next bases
20:34
research or poo poo anything that's going on with this Mizuno
20:40
lower moment of inertia ball with a very science driven mind,
20:45
I struggle to grasp any claims that don't have significant data
20:50
behind them. That isn't to say I don't get
20:52
excited by them. All of this excites me
20:55
tremendously because if all these things are true, it bucks
20:59
the system. It changes the way that we need
21:02
to look at things in the baseball world.
21:04
It changes development, it changes rehab, it changes
21:07
everything. To be fair, that's what we kind
21:10
of are going through with Flexpro Grip.
21:12
It's been a long road to get here, but we are certainly on
21:16
that road of changing baseball and the way it's trained,
21:19
developed, rehabbed etcetera. It seems like next base could be
21:24
on that path. Are they?
21:27
I'm not sure, but I'm definitely excited to dig deeper on all
21:31
these topics, continue the discussions and read whatever
21:36
comes my way. It's not like we're going to be
21:38
the ones that prove them right or wrong.
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There's going to be a lot of people that read this stuff, get
21:43
excited about it, and I guess continue to dig deeper.
21:47
You guys heard Josh, He said the crew at Driveline is going to
21:52
try to dig into all this and run a bunch of internal studies.
21:57
Hopefully they can uncover something and move us forward.
22:01
Nonetheless, I I appreciate you guys joining me for this long
22:05
babbling ramp today. Hopefully it came out cleanly.
22:09
I guess I'll find out when I go through the editing process.
22:12
So fingers crossed. But as always, and I want to
22:17
thank you for your time. I appreciate you guys going on
22:20
this journey with us. We should be back to our
22:22
regularly scheduled content with Denton Sagerman on our next
22:27
episode. So please, please, please mark
22:29
your calendars for that one. It's going to be a great one.
22:32
We definitely get pretty nerdy, but there's a lot of takeaways
22:35
there. So I I'm excited for it.
22:38
Hopefully you guys are too. And as always, thanks for laying
22:43
back with us.