As a baseball player, you want to do everything you can to increase your batting and throwing velocity. Focusing on shoulder strength and mobility, rotiational core strenght, and explosiveness are fundamental to improving your stats. These are 5 exercises you should be doing every day to strengthen those areas and prevent injury.
1. Internal/ External Shoulder Exercises
Shoulder rotations are an important exercise in maintaining flexibility in your connector muscles, which are important in building arm strength. You can do these year-round, throughout your training, whether it is in the winter in your school weight room, before a game, or supersetted with other exercises. It's important to have good posture and focus on the movement in your shoulder. Be slow and controlled.
This video shows just two examples, but you can do these from various starting positions: Internal at 90, External at 90, Internal at side, External at side, etc. Google it for more options!
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2. Rotational Core Exercises:
Any exercises that strengthen your obliques and core, like the Cable Wood Chop/rotational exercise, will help with throwing velocity. These help with explosive rotation. It's important to keep good posture and a powerful stance, be explosive and fast on the rotational movement, and maintain a controlled and braced core on the way back.
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3. Squat VariationsSquats help maintain balance and stability muscles in your legs. It's important to strengthen your legs so that you can take more swings and get groundballs. Squats are fun because you can do a multitude of variations (front, back, split). The best way to do squats is weighted with dumbbells in each hand. Keep good posture, a big chest, and a braced core.
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4. Medicine Ball Throws
Medicine ball throws can be a similar training to the wood chop, except this is more of a full body exercise. These help with positive explosive rotation through your hips and core.
5. Short Distance/ Interval Sprints
Sprints are one of the most important exercises you can do as a baseball player. These help improve agility and quickness, and help you get to the bases quicker. Running 40yd shuttles, 60yd shuttles, and even 10-20yd shuttles can help when practicing stealing bases, taking an extra base, and more. See the video above for even more tips.
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* Originally published on January 21, 2022, by Benjamin Reinisch
