Throwing ( don't over do it !!! )

From the sounds of it, you've done your homework and are taking every reasonable precaution. Under those circumstances, there probably would only be minimal danger.

The thing that always scares me is, its impossible to know for sure that everyone who reads that its ok to throw the day after pitching will take those same precautions. I'd hate to be the person who said something like that and some poor dad read it, took it on its face, and as a result his kid got hurt.

There's a big difference in allowing a kid to work out and throw alone, supervised or watched with a knowledgeable and careful eye. I see it all the time when some dad spends a lot of time "working" with his kid alone. There's never any substitute for the quality time that provides for them both, but 9 times out of 10, the baseball advice they give is just flat bad!

Then the kid goes to a team practice with a coach that has some knowledge and the kid just won't listen. After all, who would you listen to at 7-12? Your dad who shows a great interest and spends lots of time with you, or a coach who you see a couple times a week for a couple hours and has to spend time with 12 other kids. Dad will win out every time.

As I think about it, that could well be a reason the HS coaches get the attitude they get. I think you'd agree that the scenario I described is more likely than what you and I do, so if you take the natural next step and assume that's the case with 15 out of the 20 kids on a HS team, it makes some sense that those coaches take the total control approach.

Ya know what though? Even giving 'em that, there's still no excuse for applying the same standard to everyone other than for the coach's convenience. If they just took the time to get to know the parents a little bit, they should be able to tell the difference and deal with it accordingly.

See! Even when I try to look at things from their point of view, they still come out to be the bad guys! LOL

Your 5 day plan looks reasonable, but here's another HS reality check. Our teams play a 3 game per week schedule. Normally it Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday with make ups coming catch as catch can. Everything seems to go pretty well with the rotation, until crunch time comes. Since here in Ca the pitchers can throw 30 outs per week rather than 10 innings, there are some strange things that can happen.

The one I see most is the normal one you might expect. Juggling the rotation because of the opposition. Personally, I don't like to see that because the pitchers never really know when they'll be throwing making it very difficult to get into any routine. But, since winning is everything, it will never stop.

The next worse one is throwing the #1 on Tuesday for the whole game, and then dragging him out for a major problem on Wednesday or having him throw a couple innings on Friday to close a game. that happened at least 10 times that I saw this your on our JV and V teams. it gets worse if your team is in the title hunt and you're in the middle of the league schedule.

The thing is, the normal HS pitching staff just isn't very deep. There are usually lots of kids who can throw, but usually only 2 or 3 who really have a good chance of getting people out, so they don't get used. What I've done is make it clear that I have the final say about my kid going out on that 2nd stint. The coaches hate it, but even as much as I trust my son's judgement, Once that testosterone gets flowing during a game, his brain turns to the same mush as any other kid. That's when I feel that its my job to exercise my parental voice.

Your goal of the mid 70's at 15 is a reasonable one and don't let anyone tell you different. There aren't a whole lot of HS pitchers throwing harder than that, and of the ones that do, there aren't a lot of them who are "pitchers".

We had a freaky team here who 2 years ago had 3 kids who were legitimate 85-88 throwers. One was a senior, one a junior an one a sophomore, with a freshman right at 80. The senior went on to be the athlete of the year, got drafted by the Braves, but ended up taking a full ride to USC and this year transferred to Texas with another full ride.

The 2nd kid graduated this year and got a full ride to Cal Poly SLO and can now hit 90 regularly. The 3rd eventually got to where he could get to 90, but got it into his head that, that was all he needed to do. Las tyear he couldn't find the plate with a searchlight and got routinely pounded. The last kid is gonna be a Jr this yea, but hasn't really improved. Great athlete, great skills, but his dad's the V football coach. Need I say more?

But, those kids were very much among the exceptions. Most of the pitchers who kept going were the 75+ kids. They get lots of offers from the JV colleges and some from Sac State, Chico State and Davis. But its pretty rare to get offers from the bigger "local" schools because there are so many of those pitchers running around locally for those schools, they just grab a "known" local kid.

From what I can tell, that's pretty much the outline for HS players everywhere. The freaks have no problems because there are so few of them, and the others just become part of the vast "pool", and if they get lucky and keep progressing, move up using the smaller school as a springboard.

But all kidding aside, what with the influx of foreign born players and those who get a break because of nepotism, there really aren't a lot of chances to get to the majors for the run of the mill players. their saving grace is that there are so few really good ones anymore, the above average 18-22 YO still has an opportunity.