Pitch counts will be part of new restrictions placed on high school baseball pitchers this coming season.
The CIF-Southern Section Council, the section’s legislative body, approved a pitch-count proposal at its meeting Wednesday in Long Beach.
Already there was a 30-outs-per-week cap on the workload for pitchers. But with growing concerns over the rising number of serious arm injuries to high school-age players in recent years, the CIF-SS put in place new restrictions that will limit pitchers to 110 pitches per outing and additional restrictions.
The new rule includes required rest based on a pitcher’s workload. A pitcher who has thrown 76 or more pitches on a day must have at least three days of rest before he can pitch again; 51-75 pitches in a day will require two days of rest; 31-50 pitches in a day will require one day of rest; a pitcher who has thrown 1-30 pitches can pitch the following day.
Teams will be required to keep track of pitch counts for both teams’ pitchers during a game. If there is a discrepancy between the teams’ pitch-count totals, the home team’s book is the official book just as it is for other matters in baseball.
A team in violation of the pitch-count rule would forfeit the game.
Two county coaches, El Toro’s Mike Gonzales and Cypress’ John Weber, who both are on the CIF-SS Baseball Advisory Board, stated that high school coaches already were cognizant of the benefits of pitch counts.
“Our coaches have intregity and passion and a commitment to the health of our players,” Weber said. “This is not a high school issue. It’s a travel ball issue and it’s an incompetent parents issue.”
Gonzales said logging pitch counts will require little if any adjustment for coaches.
“This is not really going to affect what we do,” Gonzales said. “We do a good monitoring our guys and we take into consideration how much they throw when they’re not with us.”
Weber said he has heard that some leagues will use uniform pitch-count charts and other leagues might keep track of pitch counts by using manual scoreboards.
Editor’s note: This article has been updated to reflect that pitchers may throw a maximum of 110 pitches per outing.
