Neal Heaton

I will start off by saying it is the coach’s responsibility to take care of a pitcher’s arm. No kid in their right mind will tell the coach they don’t want the ball in a big game–especially not a team’s ace in a playoff game. Assuming the pitcher is healthy and he is asked to take the ball on three days rest, as opposed to the usual four or five, it is now the pitcher’s job to properly prepare. If you know that you will be going on short rest, it is very important to keep a few things in mind: Do not lift weights in between starts: You are putting enough strain on your pitching arm by throwing on short rest, so there is no need to make matters worse by doing any upper body workouts that may compound the issue. Make sure you get your long-distance running it: I consider a long-distance run ...

No two pitchers are exactly alike. A major reason for this is because everyone has a slightly different release point. For that reason, certain pitches will be more effective for pitchers. I’ll go over the three most common types of release points, as well as which pitches work best for pitcher’s that employ those arm slots and then you can choose which one is best for you… High 3/4 (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren) Very rarely is a pitcher directly “over the top”. Clayton Kershaw is probably the closest to that. Most pitchers throw from a high 3/4 delivery. The reason for this is because it enables pitchers to maximize their velocity and their command while also putting less strain on their arm than dropping down. The reason it puts less strain on your arm is because you’re using your larger muscl...

One of the things people always ask me is–“how did you get noticed by the University of Miami?” Well, things are very, very different than they were in 1978. First off, the school only recruited from the list of the top 25 or so players in the country and I was fortunate enough to have had a good enough junior year that I was on their list and they found me. For the average Long Island baseball player, though, that may not be an option. On the bright side, there’s so many more resources available to you in 2019 than I had coming out of Sachem HS in the ’70s. So here is my advice given my years of experience involved in this baseball community on how you can pick which college you want to attend based on your baseball ability and your academic prowess without wasting your time. Don’t overra...

You only get one shot at this. For me it was in 1979, when I was a senior at Sachem High School. When you have dreams of getting drafted, you have to learn how to make sacrifices. That means staying in when you’re friends are going out. It could mean not going to prom. It means not going to the beach when your friends are. Not many kids now want to make the sacrifices necessary or put in the work. If it’s raining, that’s no excuse not to run outside. In fact, that’s the best time–because most likely nobody else is getting that work in. You need to have the mentality that you’re trying to get a little bit of an edge. That’s really what it takes to have success at the higher levels. It means doing more things that involve the game of baseball–r...

A pitcher should be treated like a race horse–carefully groomed and you cannot accelerate that process. When a pitcher picks up the ball for the first time in January, they haven’t pitched off a mound for over two months. I tell my pitchers before I see them on the mound they should have done a bit of long-tossing. You should not be going from inactivity to a mound. I took a lot of precautions to stay healthy in my career, and for that reason I landed on the DL only once–and it was a freak accident during BP while running sprints. Here are some crucial steps young pitchers should be following in order to avoid injury and be at their best by the time the season comes around. You should not be lifting heavy weights at all once you start throwing from a mound. Doesn’t matter how strong you ar...

(Editor’s Note: This story was originally published by Neal Heaton in January 2017) One of the things people always ask me is–“how did you get noticed by the University of Miami?” Well, things are very, very different than they were in 1978. First off, the school only recruited from the list of the top 25 or so players in the country and I was fortunate enough to have had a good enough junior year that I was on their list and they found me. For the average Long Island baseball player, though, that may not be an option. On the bright side, there’s so many more resources available to you in 2017 than I had coming out of Sachem HS in the ’70s. So here is my advice given my years of experience involved in this baseball community on how you can pick which college you want to attend based ...