Making pitches count
High school coaches adapting to new pitch limits
Local coaches adapting to new pitch rules
One month into high school baseball’s regular season, it’s safe to say the nationally mandated pitch count rules, implemented for the first time by the R.I. Interscholastic League, have yielded a mixture of opportunities and challenges.
The belief that strict pitch limits would make life a lot more complicated for coaching staffs was voiced during the preseason. There’s making sure the pitchers on your staff remain in compliance, and now the incentive of keeping tabs on the other dugout.
At Tolman, head coach Theo Murray enacted a strategy where three people are responsible for tracking pitches, two players and assistant coach Tom Bilodeau.
“That way there’s no messup,” said Murray, also president of the R.I. Baseball Coaches Association.
Sometimes, Murray has looked across the way and seen one kid tasked with making sure pitches are being denoted. Whenever that’s proven the case, it’s even more incumbent to cross-reference the numbers prior to the start of each inning.
“I’ve got a slip and they’ve got a slip. It’s informal. We’ll meet and say, ‘Your guy had 23 pitches during the last inning and
my guy had 12,’” Murray said. “If there’s a one- or twopitch difference, we’ll agree on the number in the middle.”
The art of confirming pitch counts between innings doesn’t sound too intrusive or taxing, especially when taking a big-picture view with arguably the most valuable commodity in sports.
“Player safety is first and foremost. The mindset has to be that we’re dealing with kids, and that’s the most important aspect of a limit itself,” Cumberland head coach Andy Tuetken said. “We don’t want them to have arm issues when they’re 35 because of what they experienced in high school.
“Most coaches have a pitcher’s best interest at heart to begin with,” Tuetken added. “Now it’s more prominent in our minds.”
Last week, Tolman and Cumberland had games where decisions had to be made on their starting pitchers.
Facing a Cranston East squad that was undefeated at the time, Tuetken lifted Cumberland senior Austin Cabral with one out remaining in a game the Clippers won, 8-1. Cabral’s pitch that enabled him to record the second out of the seventh inning left him at 75 pitches for the contest.
Calculating innings to pitches had a major impact on Tuetken’s strategy. Had Cabral rocked back and dealt just one more time, he would have required three days’ rest before becoming eligible once again. For interscholastic pitchers who toss between 51-75 pitches, it’s two days’ rest.
For 26-50 pitches, it’s one day of rest. The approved limits require no calendar days of rest for 25 or fewer pitches in one outing.
With two more games on the docket later in the same week, Tuetken sought to ensure that if he needed to call upon Cabral to pitch in a relief capacity, he would be able to pull the trigger with no questions asked. Ultimately, Tuetken did not use Cabral in either last Friday’s 6-2 win over North Providence or last Saturday’s 6-5, 10-inning loss to Central.
“You want to put yourself in a situation to win later in the week, so we had to take (Cabral) out. Having depth in the bullpen is huge, especially when utilizing someone who you started earlier in the week,” Tuetken explained. “We ended up not using (Cabral), but knowing we had him at least available made us feel good heading into those last two games of the week.”
A pitcher who reaches the prescribed maximum of 110 pitches in the middle of an atbat may finish pitching to that batter before being replaced. Tolman senior Peter Microulis had exactly 110 pitches under his belt when Murray took him out during the seventh inning of last Monday’s 7-5 win over St. Raphael at McCoy Stadium.
By Thursday, Murray informed his ace righthander to be ready in case his services were needed for Saturday’s contest against Juanita Sanchez. Against the Cavaliers, Microulis provided a scoreless seventh inning, and the Tigers completed their seven-run comeback with a 12-11 walk-off victory.
“The number is one thing. How every kid handles it is a different story,” Murray said. “Peter can throw 110 pitches, take it easy in practice the next day, and play shortstop the following day. He’s got a rubber arm, but there’s some guys who really need that rest. If we’re doing defensive drills in practice, I’ll say, ‘Don’t make the throws.’”
Having definitive numbers has placed an even greater sense of urgency when it comes to pitchers attacking the bottom third of the lineup. Errors or dropped pop-ups in foul ground are viewed with even more teeth-clenching by coaches, since they directly force the pitcher to extend himself unnecessarily.
“We talk to the guys about being efficient and not wasting pitches,” Murray said.
Added Tuetken, “The players know the limits, but in high school baseball, attacking certain hitters in certain situations isn’t always going to work out like you want.”
Each team is responsible for posting its own pitch totals under the team schedule feature on the Rhode Island Interscholastic League’s website (riil.org). If the pitch counts aren’t publicly noted within 24 hours of the game and it comes to the league’s attention, that head coach is automatically suspended for the next game. To date, there have been no examples of said punishment.
“The good thing is there’s been good communication between all the coaches,” Tuetken said.