Alright everyone this is Dan Blewett and I'm gonna go over how to form an
effective pregame pitching routine so I've gotten a lot of questions about
this and this is something I'm extremely passionate about as far as getting
amateur pitchers consistently at their best version of themself it's a routine
I think is stressed a lot but I don't think it's as precise as always needs to
be if you talk to guys who've been the highest levels of baseball whether
they're a trainer or a player they'll talk about these guys routines how it
you know 6:20 to before a game you know this former all-star was always on the
table ready to get stretched out you know it's always very very precise and
this stuff just remember it it helps you ensure consistent results because we're
isolating variables so when you do the same quality routine every single time
you take the field you know that it's not going to be your routine you know
you're always gonna have the same exact dose of the the right medicine to
prepare to eat you to pitch well okay so this is gonna cover like a high school
game adult league game youth game pretty much amateur baseball I'm not gonna get
into college because in college you have a lot more stuff to do you're at the
field a lot earlier in pro ball you have a much longer routine because you're
gonna be to feel a lot a lot sooner as well so we're just gonna go over
basically like the 45 this 75 minute duration I'm just gonna average it out
and call it an hour where you're an amateur it's an amateur baseball game so
you might have a bullpen you might not have a bullpen you want to have a
practice mound to go out there and so some of the other considerations your
exact start time is often erratic so I know that we'll have a 6:00 p.m. game
but they tell us you have to be ready at 5:45 because of umpires show there early
they want to get the game going sooner you have to do it to comply to some of
these tournament and regulations so start time can sometimes be a little
erratic sometimes it's not clear who the home team is I don't know why so many
teams don't flip beforehand but I always seek out the head coach to flip for home
in a way as soon as I can so we know so my starting pitcher can
get on track to be ready exactly when we when he wants to be rather than if you
flip a coin at the start of the game you know one pictures ready to go and
the other ones got a whole inning to go so it doesn't make a lot of sense but
anyway those are some of the considerations that we're looking for to
try to number one just clean up our routine a little bit so first thing
again determine who home team is this is not an overrated thing this is very
underrated if your home team as a starting pitcher and I'm covering
starting pitchers today if your home team your goal is to be in the dugout
about five minutes to game time it could be three minutes you could be five
minutes but not really more than five minutes if you're the away team you can
be in the dugout when the game starts if you want you know you'll sit through the
first half inning just like you would any other happening or then while the
home team jogs out and finish your pregame routine while the other pitchers
warming up or as late as about one out but you don't want to be out there past
that because you always don't play away and you do want to give yourself a
little bit of time just to calm down grab some Gatorade and just get a little
rest before you go out there so if this again is the this is a tournament we're
talking about you know obviously so many youth teams play tournaments exclusively
in the summers you have to be ready or you have to be at least be prepared to
like get it going a little faster if they call you to do that I hate that's
the thing that happens but empires sometimes roll in and they hey we're
starting it's like well we're not ready that well too bad which again I think
stinks but kind of it as it is sometimes it again if it's a tournament get your
coach to flip for home versus away you know if you're a player you don't have
to control this so ask your coach to do it for you there's no reason not to I've
never had another team saying no that we don't want to do that and if you're a
coach yourself you should definitely do this okay so the components I've got
seven components here of a good pregame routine number one stretching
flexibility mobility mental prep arm exercises some calisthenics I know young
kazuma calisthenics are but it's just like running around doing your shuffles
and your skips and all that stuff I think you should have some amount of
100% effort Sprint's because they really get your nervous system going and if you
want to throw it 100% velocity what you need to in a game 100 print efforts
Sprint's get your nervous system and your muscles ready to do that and then
you'll throw in the outfield and then you will throw in the bullpen
so let's will kind of start our countdown here again I'm just gonna
average this out for 60 minutes and again all this stuff that I'm gonna give
you today number one it's in my book so if you haven't read my book it's in
there but number did I say number two number one I don't know one of these
numbers we're gonna count down from 60 minutes so if it's so say you have 75
minutes or you have 45 minutes or you only have 30 minutes you go set the
chopped stuff out or add stuff in but we're gonna start with 60 minutes that's
a good average so I'll you know my team or 14 you and really just most teams in
general in youth summer baseball whether it's 12 u-17 u18 you so usually they're
about an hour before game time because there's not maybe that much to do you
know they don't have on field B P and on field B P is the big thing that takes up
a lot of time so 60 minutes you're gonna walk to the outfit with your water
stopwatch you're gonna be Jersey DUP and anything else you need so I'm a stickler
with this my kids get an earful if they walk out and they're not in Jersey they
don't have their water they don't have their stopwatch they know what time it
is so they can keep themselves on track if the ballpark doesn't have a timer you
know like the other day we were playing at a couple universities that had you
know a big clock out in the outfield so that helped but you need to have
everything you need cuz you should not be having to go back to the dugout once
you started your pregame routine you're in the outfield and then the bullpen
you're not going back in the dugout until it's game time so make sure you
have all that stuff and an extra baseball two baseballs
also make sure you don't want to waste five minutes to chase someone now if you
throw it over the fence or something so from 59 minutes to 45 minutes to go
this is your time to stretch to remind yourself who you are so this is a good
time for headphones in visualize yourself it's quiet time you know your
catcher will maybe stretches you but typically they don't they're just doing
catcher things whatever but this is your time to visualize yourself dominating
your opponent drilling the mitt and reminding yourself that everyone else
sucks and you're the best and today you're
gonna shove it so that's part of your prep so for me stretching and
visualization and mental training that's all a good time to do both of it okay
make that your quiet time get your mind right
at about a 45 minutes till game time this is I think the best time for arm
exercises so everyone's a little different I'm not listing exercises that
you should do but it could include anything I have seven minutes allocated
here forty five to thirty eight bands bodyweight arm exercises arm circles I
think are very underrated I think they're great you know small medium
large front and back or forward and backwards but really we're just trying
to get blood flow and a little bit of a pump into our shoulder and our elbow
joints those are the big things if we get blood flow into there it's gonna
reduce the amount of throws we need to warm up and it's gonna get optimum blood
volume and it's gonna get a lot of warmth into those joints which just
helps reduce the wear and tear just like starting your car when it's really cold
out it's not good for it right this just helps improve the warm-up so your goal
is not to build arm strength it's just to get blood flow into very specific
spots and I think it's best doing this first because then as you start to run
around a little bit more then you kind of flush it all through the body rather
than doing your you're sprinting and your calisthenics stuff first and then
your arm exercises second because for me personally I didn't like doing arm
exercises and then picking up a ball because I kind of feel like I had a lot
of blood in my shoulder and like a pump there and I just didn't feel like is the
most comfortable I liked flushing that out before I start to play catch there's
a reason behind my advice for doing it that way so at 38 minutes till game time
38 minutes to 30 minutes so we got eight minutes here for calisthenics
and Sprint's so again this is like shuffles backpedals power skips Carioca
you know lunges inchworms back pedals whatever you want to do you know all
those are good they're just to get your body moving get you limber up go in all
directions so obviously shuffles and carioca or sideways movements getting
your feet moving and your hips turned forward and back all that sorts off some
explosive movements and you should finish with Sprint's so 70% then 90%
then a hundred percent that should be part of it cuz again Sprint's are great
for getting your nervous system firing on all cylinders so you want to make
sure you allocate some time for that if you want to pitch it your top speed your
body should be going at top speed prior to to warming up alright so now let's
talk real quick about the breakdown of a throwing routine so 25 to 40 throws in
the outfield this is the filled phase of it and your goal here is
just to do drills number one which we'll cover in a second
warm your arm up so get to full speed spin all of your pitches and then enter
the bullpen at a hundred percent speed so a hundred percent your arm is ready
to go you're throwing as hard as you can possibly throw by time you've made your
last outfield throw so you're transitioning into the bullpen up to
full speed you're not using the bullpen to get up to full speed you're already
there from the outfield then when you get in the bullpen
your first couple are boom boom boom as hard as you can just get a feel for full
speed now down a mound and down hill and then you're gonna do again your first uh
your first bunch from the wind up your second bunch from the stretch and then
your final five to ten throws or so from probably wind up again working on things
that aren't perfect so again we'll cover that a little more in depth here in a
second alright so with thirty minutes ago you maybe get a water break you
catch your breath whatever for something else you need in the dugout you go grab
it and then this is again this is out field throwing gonna start at your worst
playing catch so maybe 30 40 feet you know again here's some considerations
what drills do you like to do how much throwing do you like to do are
you a long toss guy are you not a long toss guy what's your max distance if you
long toss what was a long toss mean to you doesn't have to mean 400 feet
it could mean 180 feet it's whatever it means to you I've done various types at
various points in my career and they can all work equally well it's just up to
you some guys like to stretch it out farther some guys don't need to but
again your typical outfield throwing routine is probably 30 or 40 throws
again it's highly individual but this is I think a decent normal average 30 to 40
throws in the outfield will get you about ready to go at full speed okay
considering you already did some running calisthenics arm exercise you have a lot
of blood flow in your arm and we're assuming that it's warm if it's colder
probably need more throws it's really hot you might be at the the lower end of
this so it's completely up to you but you should be doing a structured
outfield throwing program so 40 feet drill a 50 feet drill B 60 feet drill C
and then as you start to go out you probably do
step behind Zoar pictures crow hops or just some sort of shuffle throw as you
get to your full distances as you come back in you're gonna use your your
delivery so the wind up and the stretch and you're going to spend all your stuff
and throw it full speed so that's in general the layout it's pretty simple
again you should have stepping stones and a reason behind everything that you
do alright so here I have again laid out outfield throwing you know we're 27
minutes for game time again drill a drill bead you'll see drill D drill e
you know pretty simple just make sure you have stepping stones that are in
concert with your goals and with your mechanics your strengths your weaknesses
okay so now you're done the outfield throwing meet your catcher you guys walk
over to the bullpen 17 minutes to game time again this could be 15 it could be
20 it's completely up to you it could be 12 minutes but I think this is a decent
average so 17 minutes down to 10 minutes this is the windup phase of your bullpen
so your first thing you got to get comfortable at 100% effort going
downhill on the mound because not the same as starting from flat so you know a
couple of fast ones down the middle I put three to five three two to three on
the glove side two to three on the arm side of the plate so again if your arm
sorry if your righty this is my arm side if you're a lefty this is your arm side
arm side and glove side never change so staying in versus out doesn't make sense
when there's no hitter in there so we use arm side and we use cool outside
after that breaking ball is down the middle just get it going just get it the
shape you want get it full speed just seed you can throw for a strike then you
can start to differentiate now for me I don't throw breaking ball to my arm side
but I do throw a breaking ball to my glove side also balance breaking ball so
this can be different depending on what you do but if you want to throw them to
the arm side and you want thrown with the glove side go for it then ditto with
the change-up champs down the middle just get it there first let's see if we
can throw in a first strike before we then start to specify what locations
we're going to throw it then we Michael arm side with Michael glove side we may
just go halves it just depends it's up to you this is again highly variable
but in general we just got to get all those pitches going and I think over
time you do kind of just throw a bunch of them in clusters first before you
start to go fast change curve slider fast change slider all that stuff so I
think going in a cluster of one pitch at a time is a good way to go about
once you've got everything pretty good and you're done the windup get a sip of
water now we're going to go from the stretch now we've got about ten minutes
till game time so ten minutes down to five minutes or so we're throwing we're
not gonna redo everything we different to wind up but we're gonna do a little
bit of it from the from the stretch so all pitches to both sides of the
plate and sequences so might be you know I have two sets you're listed fastball
to the glove side third changeup down the middle breaking ball middle then it
might be change at middle fastball glove side on the third and then breaking ball
on this on the third right then we're gonna make sure are there any locations
that I feel like I've struggled with okay this is important so if you've got
to think about every pitch in your arsenal as a tool and not just every
pitch but every pitch in every location so for me I threw fastball as middle I
threw fastball to two-thirds for the most part and I have three fastballs up
and I threw them in like kind of like a ball off the plate
so those are my locations those are all different tools they're all different
fast balls so middle each third each arm side glove side and then up that's like
six different fast balls I got to make sure I've thrown all those and I feel
like I can feel for them before I got on the plane again
to the game same thing my curveball curveball middle curveball to the glove
side third below the kneecap where it's a borderline ball strike that's Mike oh
one one two curveball and then the bounce
so those three locations I have to throw all of them before I go on the game and
then changeup down the middle arm side third and then bounce so the same kind
of thing with a changeup so all those locations if you're struggling to get
the ball the glove side of the plate you can gauge your fat you haven't hit the
fastball you've been thrown your FAFSA with a glove side yet make sure you do
that before you go out to the mound don't leave like oh I can't throw you
know away to a righty or I can't throw to my arm side or I can't throw a micro
ball for a strike you'll have to freak out if you're not
everything is perfect in the bullpen it's not gonna be but at the same time
you want to try to fix whatever you can fix before you go out there so as you go
through your normal routine of I'm gonna do this many change ups and there's many
curveballs if they're not great when you do them that at that time come back to
them at the end use your garbage time a lot last couple
you have left to just like okay I haven't thrown a good champion let's
throw a couple more change to see if I can find it alright so then you're
probably an again finish from the windup at that point and because you're gonna
go out to the game in the wind up and then again are all your tools ready have
you hit all the spots that you're going to use
did you throw every pitch in every usable location all right and then if
you have go through a couple sequences that are personal to you so for me
fastball middle curveball middle fastball and fastball up curve ball
bounce that's a typical like five pitch sequence something like that or it could
be fastball middle changeup arm side half changeup bounce
you know fastball in something like that and you just go through sequences that
fit your strengths weaknesses as a pitcher and and you can also allow it
alive guys do is if they know the leadoff hitter or they maybe they've
seen him or whatever they simulate their first at-bat to that first hitter so
it's like if it's a guy they know and they face him before that okay I know
what he does he was in tendencies let's let's have one phantom bat with the
leadoff hitter before actually then you'll have that about with him in a
couple of minutes last thing five minutes walk up game time so once you've
done all that you're just gonna head up get your water sit down make the umpires
wait for you they're not gonna start the game without you so a lot pitchers will
feel rushed be respectful of the officials and all that but at the same
time it's your time calm yourself down get some water
take a breath if you need it you know hopefully you've allocated at least a
couple minutes to sit on the bench before you have to go back out there so
you break up the bullpen and the game so it's not one massive inning sometimes
that happens but again you want to try to get a little bit of a rest and then
just remember you're great everyone else is garbage so go out there with an
aggressive mentality with aggressive mindset your couple mints your you know
two minutes of quiet time before the game starts when your bullpens done and
you're waiting to go out there for the national anthem
those are your your minutes to remind yourself that you're the greatest
pitcher that's ever walked out with that mound well that's true or not you need
to be convinced of it before you go out there okay then it two minutes to a game
time hit the mound with your field I'm so I hit the hit the field and then the
mound with your team and go get them so again pregame routine
is not overly complex but a lot of young players don't learn how to do it right
until they just get some guy to really just be a stickler with them about it
and say no this is how it's done it has to be very precise it does matter how
many throws you make it does matter what time you get into the bullpen it
does matter when you start throwing you know in general if one of our pitchers
is throwing a baseball more than 20 minutes for the start of the game time
they're starting way too soon because they're gonna be warm too fast it's kind
of ten minutes anyhow field ten minutes and the bullpen something like that and
so all that other stuff is to get your mind right to get your body ready to be
as optimally flexible and warmed up and explosive with your nervous system and
all that stuff before you then start touching a baseball and finish up and
get your arm ready to go out there and pitch so very very critical often
overlooked make sure you have an ideal pregame routine so again if you want to
learn more about some of the high level aspects of pitching check out one of my
online courses I have a couple and they're gonna help you just in the same
step-by-step manner that we went through today
you