Athlete Highlight: Nolan Geisler’s Journey from 77 mph to 89 mph

U. Mass Lowell Baseball commit Nolan Geisler, a rising senior at Bayonne High School in New Jersey, has been having quite a spring and summer season. Nolan started training at RPP, in September 2021, near the start of his Sophomore year.  On July 9th of the same year, his peak velocity according to a Perfect Game event was 77 mph.  Fast forward to this spring and summer, Nolan has been sitting 86-88 and touching 89.

How did he do it?

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What are the Most Common Pitching Mechanics Issues?

When you train as many pitchers as we do, often times common themes begin to emerge. One such theme is the types of baseball pitching mechanics issues that we observe most often in pitchers.  Well, here they are, along with some things we do (barring any glaring mobility issues observed in the assessment) from a corrective standpoint both in the tunnel and in the weight room to address them.
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Podcast #59: Pitch Design with RPP Pitching Coordinator Jake Lebovitch

Jake Lebovitch

Today, we’re sitting down with RPP Pitching Coordinator, Jake Lebovitch and discussing all aspects of pitch design.  This is a great episode and topics include:

    • Evaluating pitcher’s movement patterns
    • Source of pitch movement
    • Most relevant metrics
    • What’s good movement and what’s not
    • Sequencing and tunneling
    • Time it takes to see results

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Athlete Highlight – Wake Tech’s Andrew Holub Recent Exit Velo as High as 109 mph

Rising College Sophomore Andrew Holub joined us this summer for the 3-month college hitting development program. Andrew is an infielder who has just finished his first year at Wake Tech Community College in North Carolina. At 6’2” and 215 lbs. he is strong and physical. This past spring, he finished the season with a .335 batting average. His plan for the summer is to elevate the ball a bit more and increase his overall slugging average. He began training in May, and needless to say, a lot has already changed. Andrew recently hit a PR of 109 mph exit velo, his previous peak EV before the summer program was in the mid- to high 90s.

How did he do it?

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Implementing Workload Management with the Driveline Pulse Sensor

After testing and working with Driveline Pulse sensors this past off-season, beginning this summer we decided to fully implement a workload management system for our pitchers. The purpose is to help manage throwing workload in our throwing programs on a year-round basis. Workload is a general term used to describe how much stress is being placed on a pitcher’s arm during both a single throwing session and over a period of time (as in a week or month).

The basic premise is as follows.

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How Strong is Strong Enough?

Why Do We Test Strength?

To better maximize our training time in the gym, we need to focus on only what the athlete needs without taking away the attributes that they are already good at.

Testing max strength helps us determine what the focus of training will be throughout the upcoming training period. This enables us to prioritize the athletes “lowest hanging fruit” when it comes to Strength (> 80% 1RM) vs Power (between 30-80% 1RM). We utilize VBT to help better pinpoint specific strength zones. Continue reading “How Strong is Strong Enough?”

Podcast #58: Assessing and Prioritizing Training Pitchers and Position Players

Today I’ll be talking in-depth about the most recent version of our in-house assessment, what we test and how we use it to create the ultimate programming for our athletes.

Topics include:

    • Individualizing strength / power training
    • Using it to make mechanical adjustments
    • Going after the lowest hanging fruit
    • Reducing injury risk

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Athlete Highlight: Seton Hall Commit Reno Spagnoli Velo is up 10 mph, T92

Reno Spagnoli

Seton Hall Baseball commit Reno Spagnoli, rising senior at Columbia High School in New Jersey, had quite a spring. Reno started training at RPP Baseball, in October 2021. At the time, he was just coming off a PBR event where he sat 81-82, touching 83 mph. Fast forward to this summer, Reno was recently sitting 90-91, touching 92 at an event in Boston. His velo has increased approximately 10 mph. Additionally, he had a stellar spring both pitching and at the plate, with a 1.50 ERA and a 0.414 batting average.

How did he do it?

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How to Improve Pitchers Shoulder Mobility

pitchers shoulder

Today, we’re going to review some of the topics we look at during an assessment in regard to pitchers shoulder mobility as well the major players that can affect it. The four big guys are as follows:

    1. Shoulder
    2. Scapula
    3. T-Spine (Extension)
    4. Lumbo-Pelvic Control

Let’s review and discuss each and go over a handful of shoulder exercises that may be helpful for each segment.

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How to Increase Hitting Power in Baseball

How to Increase Hitting Power in Baseball

The underlying factor in all things powerful and explosive when it comes to performance is “STRENGTH”. It’s the foundation that athleticism is built on and there can be no better example of this than hitting a baseball and I don’t mean just making contact, I mean hitting the ball with power and… HARD! So, how to increase hitting power in baseball? Let’s read on…

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