High school pitchers are throwing faster than ever. Here’s what’s behind the trend in Butler County
Josh Sharpless doesn’t want young pitchers to throw the way he did.
“I think if they pitched like me, they wouldn’t be very good,” said Sharpless, the senior director of pitching at Callery’s Battleground Baseball Group.
That’s not to say Sharpless wasn’t a talented hurler. The Pittsburgh Pirates drafted him in the 24th round of the 2003 MLB Draft. As a high schooler at Freedom, he wasn’t hitting 90 miles per hour on the radar gun. Nor were many of his peers.
“Absolutely not,” Sharpless said. “I want to say, in our area, there might have been one kid who threw 90.”
“Maybe 10, 15 years ago, you might’ve had a guy throwing, hitting that 90 (miles per hour) mark,” Mars baseball coach Jason Thompson said. “But that might be one guy on a team, maybe two guys in a conference.”
These days, Butler County has a handful of pitchers hitting the mark, including Butler’s Nolan Stefaniak and Kyle Casteel and Mars’ Kyle Krause. Why is that?
Sharpless played in 20 games for the Pirates, posting a career 4.41 ERA in 16.1 innings of work. He wasn’t sure what he wanted to do after his brief professional career ended.
A friend asked him to work on sharpening her child’s pitching skills, and Sharpless “fell in love with teaching kids about pitching.” He built a clientele through word of mouth and also helped Chase Rowe’s hurlers at La Roche College. Rowe opened Battleground in 2023 and asked Sharpless to join him.
“The knowledge and resources that we have now that’s available, as opposed to 10, 15 years ago, is just off the charts,” Sharpless said. “Even during my playing days, it seemed like everybody was taught the same way.”
Sharpless detailed “motor preferences, like, how you want to move as an athlete. Some guys are more on the balls of their feet, some guys like to play on their heels. Some guys are dominant with their left shoulder, some guys are dominant with their right shoulder. Some guys are left-eye dominant, some guys are right-eye dominant. There’s all these factors.”
Considering such variables in the way he trains, he’s seen pitchers improve their velocity and command. Not everyone throws similarly. Not everyone moves similarly. It’s Sharpless’ job to find the ideal approach.
“They’re able to assess athletes better and give them the best mechanic fixes or mechanic tweaks or positions that they should be in,” Butler baseball coach Josh Forbes said. “The development has gone so far that they just know how to make the kid move to throw harder. That’s where I think a lot of growth is in baseball right now is in the biomechanics.”
One of the contributing factors to the trend, Sharpless said, is “kids are getting stronger, earlier. They’re really buying into the weight room.” Ex-Pittsburgh Pirates strength and conditioning coach Adam Vish has boosted Battleground’s lifting programs.
Sharpless didn’t begin lifting until he was in college. Approximately a decade ago, it became more popular.
“It was such a stigma, especially as pitchers, we didn’t really want to lift,” Sharpless said. “We really didn’t want to get big. ... I don’t think we knew what we were doing, and, as time evolved, pitchers (realized they) can still lift.”
Tracking nutrition, calories and even sleep factor in. Battleground is partnered with Armored Heat, an arm care program pitchers can use via an app on their phone.
“There’s just a lot of resources at these kids’ fingertips, and I think they’re taking advantage of it now,” Sharpless said.
Battleground measures spin rate, efficiency and movement, but there’s no digit pitchers get more excited about than 90.
“Kids are over the top when they hit it,” Sharpless said of the plateau.
Casteel’s velocity jumped in the offseason. He’s since committed to West Virginia University.
“We got him to move how he preferred versus what the industry is trying to get kids to do,” Sharpless said. “He’s a kid that doesn’t want to get a ton of hip-to-shoulder separation. He’s a kid that’s not going to lead-leg block (a pitcher’s plant leg when the plant and rotate their upper body to throw) that well. ... We saw his velocity this winter go from 86 (miles per hour) as high as, I think, his top is 93.”
Speed isn’t all college coaches are enamored with. Four or five years ago, 90 mph offerings had them smitten. Now, they look for something else.
Stefaniak, for example, throws a slider and changeup. Krause throws a curveball and changeup.
“I think, now, it seems like everyone throws 90, so they have to have something else that stands out, whether it’s fastball command or, usually, it’s a good secondary pitch,” Sharpless said.
