Yeah, I noticed that….that’s why I posted this. :)

For every pitcher that someone claims will get injured there is one who isn’t. I wish it were as easy as some people make it out to be, but it isn’t. Many pitchers will get hurt because of how, as Nixa says above, unnatural pitching is, and how much stress a human body can take.

Breaking down pitching mechanics isn’t work one’s time unless they are professional qualified to do so. Everyone’s body is different and thus will react differently to different stresses. For instance, both my arm’s are “double jointed” which basically means I have extremely strong and flexible ligaments. I can turn my arms in a complete circle without dislocation and bend my shoulders in a way I can’t even accurately describe.

Agree and disagree. Disagree: we know a fair amount about what constitutes good and bad mechanics as related to performance. However, trying to make the leap from kinetics to predicting injuries is a futile attempt (at this point).

Overall, I really like what you said, and it’s something that I’ve been harping for a long time. Even if we knew exactly the mechanisms responsible for injury, the best it allows us to do is to use statistics to predict a pitcher’s health. We’ll be able to say that iInjury becomes more likely given x or y, but that’s all. Statistics tell us how the mean pitcher will behave (i.e. mean build, mean force production capabilities, etc.) and we forget that in reality we’re dealing with an individual that is most assuredly NOT average in many, if not all, of his characteristics. So until we can cut a guy open and measure directly the magnitude of forces his soft tissue can handle, we’re only going to be able to an injury is “probable” or “not likely” for certain mechanical characteristics of a pitcher’s delivery.

There may or may not be something to the inverted W, but even if it spells doom for the average pitcher’s career, there’s always going to be physical freaks that can perform at a level above the mean due to superior body architecture.

Don’t you think that players who have fathers that played professionally might develop into superior players as a result (partly) of growing up around the game, spending time at the ballpark, etc.? You always hear Joe Morgan (a name I had hoped to never invoke in support of any argument I might make) talk about Griffey Jr. always hanging out in the clubhouse and shagging flyballs. Same thing with Prince Fielder, the Alomars, Boones, and Barry. These guys spent their childhood playing baseball and benefiting from tutelage of major league ballplayers. As much as genetics probably DOES play a role, I wouldn’t be too quick to dismiss the factor that tutelage and coaching plays in developing fantastic ballplayers.