As injuries to pitchers around MLB begin to pile up, the Major League Baseball Players Association (MLBPA)'s executive director Tony Clark has publicly said he believes the league has put players in harm's way by implementing and reducing the pitch clock before the 2023 season.
Clark and the MLBPA said since the league reduced the time allotted for pitchers in December, “our concerns about the health impacts of reduced recovery time have only intensified. The league’s unwillingness thus far to acknowledge or study the effects of these profound changes is an unprecedented threat to our game and its most valuable asset — the players.”
MLB responded with its own statement today, blaming injuries on the growing emphasis on velocity and spin rate.
“This statement ignores the empirical evidence and much more significant long-term trend, over multiple decades, of velocity and spin increases that are highly correlated with arm injuries,” the statement reads. “Nobody wants to see pitchers get hurt in this game, which is why MLB is currently undergoing a significant comprehensive research study into the causes of this long-term increase, interviewing prominent medical experts across baseball which to date has been consistent with an independent analysis by Johns Hopkins University that found no evidence to support that the introduction of the pitch clock has increased injuries.
“In fact, JHU found no evidence that pitchers who worked quickly in 2023 were more likely to sustain an injury than those who worked less quickly on average. JHU also found no evidence that pitchers who sped up their pace were more likely to sustain an injury than those who did not.”
MLB, players battle over pitching injuries
Over the years, numerous MLB pitchers have been forced to undergo surgery to repair or reconstruct their ulnar collateral ligament (UCL). The reconstruction procedure is most commonly referred to as Tommy John surgery; John was the first pitcher to have the procedure done back in 1974.
The surgery has become rather commonplace among MLB pitchers, but elbow injuries have seemingly increased this season compared to past years. Cleveland Guardians ace and former Cy Young Award winner Shane Bieber will undergo TJ surgery after making just two starts this season. The Atlanta Braves' Spencer Strider also has damage to his UCL and awaits another opinion. Bieber and Strider are just two of numerous pitchers affected by UCL problems this year.
In 2021, then-Tampa Bay Rays pitcher Tyler Glasnow injured his throwing elbow, which he said was a result of MLB's crackdown on “sticky stuff” or foreign substances that help pitchers grip the ball.
“I'm not a doctor — I know you guys probably know that. But I'm taking a fastball, I'm squeezing the ball twice as hard. So all of this — I'm recruiting all of these muscles. And I'm taking my arm as hard as I can, throwing the ball. So I'm going from, like, a flexed muscle to letting the ball go,” Glasnow said. “Do it in the offseason. Give us a chance to adjust to it. But I just threw 80 innings, then you tell me I can't use anything in the middle of the year. I have to change everything I've been doing the entire season. I'm telling you I truly believe that's why I got hurt.”
MLB will likely not change its stances on foreign substances or the pitch clock.
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