The National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) announced their new officers and board members for the 2016-17 season.
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Under the old rules, one pitch constituted an inning.
The NFHS baseball committee also revised Rule 2-32-2 regarding sliding into home plate.
Josh Stowell, who recently completed his second year as head coach for Deering High, said he thinks pitch counts offer a better measure of fatigue than innings. “The innings never made sense to me. Everybody’s strength and size should go into it but I don’t know how you would do that”.
Moreover, schools must post a pitch count for all its athletes within 24 hours of the completion of a game. He said the NFHS informed the TSSAA staff Tuesday that the rule must be in place for next season.
The existing NYSPHSAA rule limits pitchers to 12 innings in one day and 18 innings over any six-day span. For example, if a player threw 39 pitches in the first game of a tournament and came back to throw 45 the second day, Young said, you would add the two together to get 84 pitches – and then refer back to the original guidelines, which would require three calendar days of rest before he could throw again.
Childress said he hopes to meet with the state’s baseball coaches association prior to the August 15 Board of Control meeting in Hermitage. “Is it going to be the individual team to track pitches?” he said. The limits will go into effect in the spring of 2017. Two days are required for 51-75 pitches and one day for 36-50 pitches. The maximum amount for a junior varsity pitcher is 100 in a day and the maximum for middle school pitchers is 85.
States like Texas have already established their limit at 125 pitches, and Alabama, Colorado and Kentucky have said that will be their number, too, Hopkins said.
“It’s still early, but there are some questions”, he said of the new procedure. “We have to keep pitch counts to protect our kids’ arms”.
“Regulation will be the hardest part”, Reavis said. Minnesota will use 105 during the regular season and 115 or 120 in playoffs. “It’s not how many you throw, it’s getting the proper rest”. “Also, is the pitch count going to be predicated on number of days rest in between starts?”
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“We were down in that game, so we could have done that”.
