Dodgers star Tyler Glasnow’s pitching injury truth bomb will catch MLB’s attention

Glasnow’s comments are something that has been speculated for a long time. To hear a big league pitcher admit that focusing on velocity is worth the risk of potential injury is important.

It is unfortunate because injuries are almost expected for pitchers today. Instead of truly learning how to pitch, young pitchers are consistently just trying to throw harder. But it is not their fault.

Top baseball colleges and professional teams reward this mindset. There are possibly some expectations, but most D1 schools and MLB teams are going to have more interest in someone who throws 95-plus but lacks good secondary pitches and control as opposed to a pitcher who has terrific command and a plethora of quality pitches, but only throws 85-90 MPH.

Chris Rose later asked Tyler Glasnow if he would have changed his route to MLB amid his velocity focus amid the injuries.

“No I wouldn’t change it at all,” Glasnow said. “You want to know, because the times that I didn’t go after velocity, I didn’t go after all that stuff, I had a 7.70 ERA. I’ve never been Greg Maddux. I’ve never been able to dot. In my life, I’ve never been able to… I’ve always struggled with command until relatively recently, my last few years. I think the decision of throwing hard and getting hurt is going to win every single time.

“And the only negative side is lose time, you can’t contribute to your team and then you’re out for like a year… Everyone is going to throw hard, get hurt, make money… You know what I mean? Logically, that’s just the choice everyone is going to make.”

Pitchers are not going to stop throwing hard, so how can MLB limit injuries?

Is there a solution? Will removing the pitch clock save the day? Should the league allow pitchers to use foreign substances again?

In the end, pitchers, as Glasnow said, are going to keep trying to throw hard as long as big league and top college teams reward that mentality. If a pitching coaching staff decides to start rewarding Greg Maddux-like pitchers, with control and movement taking priority over velocity, then perhaps that could help matters.

That is extremely unlikely to occur, though.

In all reality, unless evidence surfaces that truly supports the pitch clock rumor, the injuries probably are not the pitch clock’s fault. Again, elbow and shoulder ailments have been an issue for years now. Meanwhile, the pitch clock is brand new in MLB. Is the pitch clock forcing some pitchers to completely work in a different manner? Sure, but it is difficult to place all of the blame on it.

It is possible that removing foreign substances, which is something many top hurlers relived heavily upon, is playing a role. The absence of foreign substances does not allow pitchers to get as good of a grip on the baseball, which can lead to injury trouble in addition to command problems.

But the odds of MLB allowing foreign substances back into the game are also slim.

In the end, there does not seem to be a perfect solution to the pitching injury epidemic. It all boils down to the mindset that Glasnow, and surely many other pitchers have: “Everyone is going to throw hard, get hurt, make money.”