Reconstruction In Baseball

Superior Essays
Baseball is America’s favorite pastime. Calvin Coolidge even said, “Baseball is our national game!” The history of baseball and the history of the United States go hand-in-hand. In 1860, during a pickup game of baseball, Abraham Lincoln was approached by a messenger with important pre-election news. Abe simply asked him to wait as he did not want to miss his turn at bat! The north and south would even play games of pick-up baseball during the Civil War after a long day of fighting. Now-a-days, American’s pick their favorite teams, or even players. For some, they pick their favorite pitchers. What happens when the favorite pitcher tears his UCL? Society suffers.
Research Question: What effect does revision UCL reconstruction surgery have on
…show more content…
They started with 43 MLB pitchers who had undergone UCL reconstructive surgery, Tommy John surgery, and then required revision reconstruction between 1996 and 2012. Ten of the forty-three were excluded for various reasons. With the remaining thirty-three, they conducted a case-controlled study. They found the player’s history on open websites and verified the pitcher’s surgeries by cross-referencing the date of the surgery and a gap in pitching statistics. They did this for the year of the first reconstructive surgery and then the year of the revision reconstructive surgery. To maximize effectiveness, they collected each pitcher’s demographics (handedness, date of birth, age at surgery, and position (relief, closer, starter)) for their time in the MLB and also the minor league. From there, they evaluated only MLB pitching performance statistics for three years before and after revision reconstructive surgery. These statistics included innings pitched, earned run average (ERA), walks, and hits per innings pinched (WHIP), wins, losses, in percentage, walks per nine innings (BB/9), strikeouts per nine innings (SO/9), strikeouts per walk (SO/BB), hits per nine innings (H/9), home runs per nine innings (HR/9), wins above …show more content…
Although not found to reach statistical significance, SO/9 increased from 6.99 to 7.51. There were no differences detected in innings pitched, ERA, WHIP, WAR, RAR, wins, losses, win percentage, H/9, HR/9, and RA/9. (“Pitching” 5) Comparing the two groups, the CTL group pitched more innings and had a higher number of wins and losses. CTL pitchers also threw less balls than the UCL-R pitchers, which can change a games outcome. (“Pitching” 5-6)
Overall, the study found that players who have the revision reconstruction surgery are less likely to be able to return to MLB play. This means they will possibly have a shorter career. The UCL-R group could not pitch nearly as many innings that they could prior to the surgery. All in all, reinjure of the UCL after having Tommy John’s surgery once, does not have to technically end the pitchers career, but it will limit the amount that can be played once the pitcher

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Tommy John Injury

    • 1135 Words
    • 5 Pages

    As a result, orthopedic surgeons report that parents of some young pitchers request the procedure on their un-injured athletes in the hope of enhanced performance. Most authorities believe any post-surgical increases in performance are due to the increased stability of the elbow joint as well as the pitchers’ increased attention to fitness and conditioning. Rather than allowing pitchers to gain velocity, the surgery and rehabilitation procedures usually allow pitchers to return to their pre-injury levels of performance. In conclusion, Tommy John surgery mends a damaged elbow ligament.…

    • 1135 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The 1920’s were such a booming age of sports that the title “The Golden Age of Sports” was given to it. Baseball in the 1920’s launched a foundation to current baseball, though media popularity and leagues of the roaring twenties and today differ due to more advanced technology and social change, the rules and foundation of baseball have essentially remained the same due to tradition. First, baseball captured attention to America throughout the roaring twenties. “Three strikes,…

    • 1076 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Elite pitchers have been the story in Major League Baseball(MLB) this past season. Many pitchers were outstanding and fantastic all year, but there were two pitchers that set themselves apart from the rest by becoming the true elite pitchers, Clayton Kershaw and Jake Arrieta. Clayton Kershaw was brought into the MLB in 2006 by the Los Angeles dodgers. Being an already effective pitcher, Kershaw got drafted in the first round, getting the seventh pick overall. He would make his MLB debut on May 25, 2008.…

    • 1031 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The Arm

    • 519 Words
    • 3 Pages

    He is therefore able to give the reader an inside look at the experiences of those under the grueling rehab in their attempt to return to doing what they love most. Passan does an excellent job at telling the story of two pitchers who were trying to return from Tommy John surgery, namely Todd Coffey, who was on the Dodgers at the time of his injury, and Daniel Hudson, who was on the Diamondbacks. He shadowed these two for years, and tells over the…

    • 519 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Yes, the 27-year-old right hander finally looks like the pitcher everyone envisioned when he was a highly touted prospect six years ago. But the dominance he's displayed since mid-2015 doesn't — and shouldn't — erase the other five years of his injury-riddled career, which makes the Nats' extension a puzzling gamble that seems based on wishful thinking and a way-too-small sample size. Anything but a reliable rotation presence during his six-year career, Strasburg already has had five separate DL stints, missing time for ailments including shoulder stiffness, neck tightness, muscle strains and, of course, a torn UCL in 2010 that required Tommy John surgery. Not to mention the few times he's left games with non-DL concerns such as heat exhaustion and shoulder irritation.…

    • 333 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The player that I think has the most team-friendly contract is Edwin Encarnacion. This last off-season he left the Blue Jays to sign with the Indians for a 3 year 60-million-dollar contract. While it is a big contract one thing that makes this unique and beneficial to the team is the Indians have a 4th year option to keep him if they wanted to and having that kind of long term flexibility is an advantage every team can use. His last 5 season with Toronto make him worth his contract. Each year he was either named to the all-start team or at the very least a top 15 MVP candidate.…

    • 718 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Athletes, parents, and even coaches are not aware of the risk and consequences of the procedure. Many young pitchers and their parents believe that after the procedure their performance will actually improve. According to Pitch Smart, “35% of parents incorrectly believe that overall pitching performance would be enhanced following surgery. While there are notable instances of players improving following surgery, the most optimistic expectation for a pitcher undergoing Tommy John surgery is that the procedure allows the player to return to his previous level of performance.…

    • 1533 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Carlos Ruiz Statistics

    • 1168 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Over the years, statistical analysis has changed the face of almost every major sporting event during the twenty first century. This is especially true for America’s pastime, professional baseball. Since the beginning, scouts and other club executives bought and sold players based on a variety of attributes such as looks, physique, personality, and whether or not he is a multi tool ball player or not. Sabermetrics shattered this way of managing players and changed the behind the scene action of ball clubs forever. Sabermetrics is formally known as the empirical analysis of baseball, especially baseball statistics that measure in-game activity.…

    • 1168 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Trauma In Sports

    • 942 Words
    • 4 Pages

    This joint connects the humorous to the ulna of the forearm. Some of the symptoms of UCL injuries are tingling of the figures after throwing as well as minor swelling along the inside part of a person’s arm (Farber). Like most arm injuries, a player can still play with it, but every pitch will be painful, and due to this pain, a player won’t be able to throw the baseball with the same velocity or accuracy as he would have had before the injury had occurred. Unfortunately, there are only a couple ways to treat UCL injuries. One of the ways to treat this injury is by having what is called “Tommy John Surgery”.…

    • 942 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    The Effects Of ACL Tears

    • 758 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Anterior Crucial Ligaments tears, commonly known as ACL tears, are the most common and most debilitating knee injuries known to athletes. Sports today have become such a fast paced style of play some that players bodies can’t keep up with the quick movements they have to perform causing sudden tears in ligaments and muscles. The ACL tears because of these quick movements, which is a significant problem because it is one of the main stabilizing ligaments in the knee. The ACL is the most important of the four main ligaments in the knee, providing 90% of mobility in adult knees. The ACL has several mechanisms that causes it to be commonly torn, different sexes have dissimilar reasons as to why they tear it, and the process of recovery are…

    • 758 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Sabermetrics In Baseball

    • 440 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Whether it be riding to Citi Field to watch my Mets play on a warm May night, or sitting on the couch at home, watching baseball has always been my favorite pastime. And a few years ago, I was introduced to an element of baseball that involves another passion of mine, mathematics. The study of the utterly distinct, yet blissful marriage of baseball and mathematics is known as sabermetrics, and it has brought my love of baseball to a new level. “Sabermetricians,” attempt to analyze baseball from a mathematical perspective in order to obtain a statistical edge over the competition, and many baseball teams today even employ groups of math whizzes to analyze the sport.…

    • 440 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    usually get by with two or three bats for all players. For more competitive play, you’ll need cleats and a uniform, but the essential gear is minimal. With a few minor exceptions, baseball today is the same sport with the same fundamental rules that your parents, grandparents and perhaps great-grandparents knew. For a sport so rich in its simplicity, baseball is a sport that is often handed down from one generation to the next with ease.…

    • 334 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Anterior Cruciate Ligament tears have forced both amateur and professional athletes to end their participation in sports. ACL reconstructive surgery is perceived as one of the most common and invasive reconstructive surgeries an athlete can go through with over 100,000 procedures occurring annually (UCSF Sports Med 2014). More often than not, ACL reconstructive surgery can a patient in worse condition, even after having gone through the procedure. Orthopedic surgeons typically harvest tissue from another area of the body to reconstruct an ACL for a patient, which makes the healing process more painful, or they use a cadaver tendon which holds a slight but lethal risk for the patient receiving the cadaver tendon. Even with procedural advancements,…

    • 196 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Usain Bolt will be slow and Michael Jordan will only be known for his shoes. With the new technologies that sports medicine will bring about such as, new innovative stretching and conditioning techniques. These will help reduce the common injuries in sports and with the new idea of baseline testing we will be able to tell when an athlete has sustained a concussion and give them the proper care need to get them back to full strength. Although ACL injuries can take a minimum of six months to recover from and possibly be career ending, the future look bright for these athletes. Through advancements in surgery and techology, improvement are being made to shorten the recovery time and improve the atheletes post- injury performance.…

    • 1196 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    It is important anyone to take care of their shoulders very well, because once if you get shoulder surgery and it is no fun while recovering, because it will be long to recovery and pain. If you don’t want to get shoulder surgery, then all you need to do is taking care of yourself very well. The goal for the Rotator Cuff repair result are the results of arthroscopic rotator cuff repair by to analyze the results to make sure whether there are any significant predictors of outcome of repair, such as age, sex, tear size, preoperative tissue quality and tendon retraction. The statistics about shoulder arthroscopy related to rotator cuff repair were more than couple years ago because many athletes will ignore their injury when they were young and they will start to notice it when they get older because the pain has increased and arthritis. The more longer they ignore their pain when they were young, more surgery will happen inside your shoulder because of might more tears happening over years and years.…

    • 478 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays