AUGUSTA, Maine — The baseball committee of the Maine Principals’ Association will remove the limits on the number of pitchers and catchers who may participate in a week of arm conditioning practices that precedes the start of formal preseason workouts each year.
High school coaches have been allowed to invite as many as eight pitchers and two catchers to that extra week of practices, which was developed specifically to help those student-athletes build up their arm strength.
Beginning this year, coaches will be able to invite as many or as few pitchers and catchers as they want to the early practices.
“This way you get to choose locally who’s a pitcher and a catcher without having to limit yourself to eight pitchers and two catchers and essentially cut kids before tryouts, which is how some people have viewed it,” said Brewer athletic administrator Dave Utterback, a former high school baseball coach who serves on the MPA baseball panel.
“So if you’re a big school and have 20 pitchers, you can bring them all in.”
Mike Burnham, the MPA assistant executive director, said beneficiaries of the change could include younger pitchers and catchers who might not have been invited to the varsity-conscious eight-and-two sessions but now would get the chance to attend the workouts and build up their own arm strength before the formal start of tryouts.
Those who attend the pitchers-and-catchers sessions, which this year begin March 23, will be restricted in their activities.
“You’ve got to be doing pitching and catching drills, progression throwing,” said Utterback. “You’re not going to have fungo bats and you’re not going to be doing positional work and footwork that’s not related to the art of pitching and the technique. We’re not doing pitcher fielding drills or live batting stand-ins.
“It’s pretty specific about what you can’t do during that extra week, but now you’re just allowed to bring all your pitchers and catchers in and develop them and work on their arm strength.”
