Legion Baseball announces support for Pitch Smart initiative

The American Legion Baseball program has moved to adopt the philosophy and principles of the MLB/USA Baseball Pitch Smart initiative. Pitch Smart is a set of practical, age-appropriate guidelines to educate parents, players and coaches to avoid overuse injuries and foster long, healthy careers for youth pitchers.

As an educational supporter of the Pitch Smart initiative, American Legion Baseball recommends that players, parents and coaches adhere to Pitch Smart guidelines listed on pitchsmart.org.

According to Pitch Smart research, “baseball is a safe game to play at all ages, but research has shown that pitching too much — particularly at a young age — can increase a pitcher's risk of injury.”

“I am proud to bring more attention to the Pitch Smart initiative as one of my final acts as American Legion Baseball’s subcommittee chairman,” said Larry Price, who recently retired after 19 years. “We hope that all of our players, parents and coaches take the time to educate themselves on these guidelines to ensure the safety and health of our pitchers.”

In addition to the educational component of Pitch Smart, American Legion Baseball is moving toward implementing pitch counts and rest regulations in select competitions in the future.

“The guidelines outlined by Pitch Smart provide the framework for potential rules in the future,” Price continued. “The overwhelming majority of our department chairmen support measures to help combat pitching-related injuries and American Legion Baseball will look at ways of implementing measures to do that in the coming years.”

For more information on Pitch Smart, visit www.pitchsmart.org.