Today we are going to a unique article regarding the elbow carrying angle. The carrying angle of the elbow is the angle formed between the long axis of the upper arm and the forearm when the arm is fully extended, and the palm faces forward. This angle allows the forearms to clear the hips during walking and contributes to the swinging motion of the arms. Typically, men have a 5 to 10 degree carrying angle and women are typically between 10 and 15 degrees. Scarborough et al (2018) assessed the carrying angle of 33 female softball pitchers to determine whether the carrying angle influences kinematics and kinetics.
They found:
- There is a negative correlation between carrying angle and shoulder flexion torque.
- There were no significant differences between carrying angle and shoulder rotation and adduction torque.
- Elbow extension angle did not correlate with shoulder flexion, adduction or rotation torque.
Implications: Shoulder flexion is when the shoulder raises in front of the person. The authors reported that, as carrying angle goes down, shoulder flexion torque goes up, or stated differently, the greater the carrying angle, the lesser the shoulder flexion torque. Although interesting, shoulder flexion torque hasn’t been related to injury or performance. In fact, more shoulder flexion torque may be a good thing. What seems actionable about this article is that all pitchers have individual differences that may be good or may be bad. As a coach, look first to see if their differences might be a good thing.
People to Follow
I don’t want to make a habit of going back to the same people over and over, but I felt like this post from The Pitching Ninja illustrates the point I was trying to make earlier about individual differences. This story is very intriguing and may be of interest to you. For what it’s worth, I got Driveline pitching certified a while back and I noticed that, according to them, these mechanics aren’t so far off. Ethan Getting on his UNIQUE mechanics.
