Josh Finkle came to us in mid-July looking to up his game. He was a couple of months removed from his first year of college ball and currently playing legion summer ball. He told us he needed to improve his sub-par command and fastball velocity to compete for a high leverage or starting gig. The last bit, he’s also a New Hampshire native and probably worked 60 hours a week or something crazy like that. So coming out to The Lab was few and far between. But we wanted to help.

Josh drove the 3 hours it took to come to The Lab and get assessed. He then became our first full fledge, remote athlete. Here’s a little story on how we leveraged the assessment data and created an individualized program considering Josh’s various constraints.

“If you don’t know where you’re going, you might wind up someplace else” -Yogi Berra

We start at the end by asking Josh what his goals are. Luckily, he stated his main two very clearly and immediately. They were also on par with what the assessment turned in. Those two goals were:

Throw Harder
Walk Fewer Batters

But we also had some constraints, as mentioned:

Long Distance From The Lab
Has A Strenuous Summer Job
The Demands of Playing Summer Legion Ball
Limited Training Equipment

Let’s start with goal number one; throw harder. Everyone is chasing velo and wants to throw harder. But how do we go about that? Each athlete is different, but for Josh, we first had to address the list of constraints, so we don’t ask too much of him and create a realistic program. We fixed the first two by joining our remote training program. That allowed him to train at the time of the day that works best for him. Then when he is ready to train, he would log in to his TRAQ profile to view his workout. This software from Driveline Baseball allows us to create and track workouts for our athletes. Because we are creating workouts for each athlete, we can consider what resources an athlete has. Josh had some basic equipment and eventually got himself a set of Plyos.

Still shot from the Day 1 PitchAI video highlight his early torso action at Foot Plant

We still haven’t addressed the third constraint, and that’s the toughest. With Josh still pitching in legion baseball games, we couldn’t drain his training economy and completely sell out for velo. So going through a proper velocity phase was out of the question. To get Josh to throw harder, we had to find the lowest-hanging fruit mechanically that would lead to the most significant reward (velo gain). When we dove into his video and PitchAI report, we saw something that stood out immediately; his torso was leaking early. During Josh’s athlete meeting, we discussed his flaw and how we would attack it. Specifically, we dove into the plyo drills he would be doing and why we chose them. For him, the Janitor Throws and Drop Steps would be the bread and butter of his training. These two drills are overly rotational, enhancing his flaw of opening up. So it took intent focus to execute these drills properly by letting his lower half unwind while keeping the torso quiet.

We would meet almost weekly via Zoom to check in and see how progress was going. During a later meeting, we decided adding those two drills to his warmup throws on the mound might be the missing link to translating his plyo mechanics to the mound. Once he did this, his training took off.

His gains from July 14th ➡️ August 31st:

Avg Velo: 74.5mph ➡️ 77.3mph (+2.8mph)

Max Velo: 76.1mph ➡️ 79.7mph (+3.6mph)

During Fall Ball, Josh continued what he was working on and hit 80+ mph multiple times with a top of 83mph. (+5.7mph)

His coaches were very happy and “blown away” by his progress.

So Throw Harder ✅

Next up, walk fewer batters.

This is a little more nuanced without a straightforward answer. Walking fewer batters may not even mean just throwing more strikes. So there are multiple routes to attacking this goal. We could do simple things such as constantly throwing at a target, mixing weighted balls into bullpens, adjusting targeting, etc., but those seemed more like off-season work. Josh was playing games now, so we needed an active adjustment. We would also benefit from instant feedback the games would provide on what was and wasn't working.

So we took a peak at his arsenal to see what adjustments could help on that front and if there was a usage problem. So we:

Started throwing the slider more; it was his outlier pitch as he was creating 15-17 inches of sweep (the video to the right highlights this pitch)
Got rid of the 2-seam fastball; it was a slower version of his 4-seam
Started pitching backwards; this came from three factors-
1. He doesn’t have elite fastball velo,
2. He doesn’t have excellent command of his fastball
3. He has a tremendous feel for his Slider
4. His Slider is fantastic

This led to more consistency with his fastball since he wasn’t switching between two versions and relying on it being an “in the zone” pitch increasing its effectiveness. There is also the illusion that it was faster (along with the velo gains he made) since hitters saw it less. The change in the usefulness of his fastball is highlighted in the video below.

As far as pitching backwards, this is a trend we are starting to see with all pitchers. Most hitters want an early count fastball, so they will take a pitch that isn’t a fastball. With the amount of sweep Josh creates, hitters are likelier to take the pitch or swing and miss at a pitch that breaks out of the zone. This gave Josh a higher likelihood of getting ahead in counts by attacking with his slider first and more often. It also kept him further away from deep counts with increased potential for walks and the ability to attack the zone confidently.

Josh’s first start with the tweak to his arsenal and usage: 7IP, 2BB, 5H, 9Ks, and a win in the semi-finals. Next start, he kept the walks down and gave his team a shot at the W in the championship series.

Walk Fewer Batters ✅

Getting each athlete to their goals is a puzzle we love solving. Each athlete has strengths and weaknesses, limitations of time or equipment, and possibly games (baseball or others) to work around. That’s why it’s so important we spend time assessing and getting to know each unique athlete. Josh is an excellent example of that, combined with the work ethic to execute!! Great work!! We are stoked to see his continual progress and can’t wait to put him back to work this winter!

The Finkle Experiment