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With the changing of the seasons outside comes a subsequent change in training seasons, where many summer sports are transitioning into their off-season. As athletes start to file in from a long summer of playing the sport they love, a common theme emerges - these athletes cannot move. They have experienced a significant reduction in their mobility. As I watch them perform their dynamic warm-ups I notice shorter strides, grimacing faces, partial ranges of motion…I could go on and on. It is tough to watch because I know that it is going to take some time to work through these mobility issues before we can get to the phase where we make them better than last season. With off-seasons becoming increasingly shorter, valuable non-competitve training time is being wasted regaining lost mobility instead of being used to make serious physical gains.
But first, what is mobility and why is it so important? Well, this is a complex question that could take countless entries to cover. When people hear the word mobility they usually think it is the same as flexibility, but this is not the case. Here is a really simple breakdown of the difference between the two commonly misunderstood terms:
• Flexibility is the length of the tissue.
• Mobility, on the other hand, is much more complex; it is the ability of a
person to reach a desired position or posture. It is a complex interaction
between tissue length, strength, joint stability, the presence of scar tissue,
and kinesthetic awareness.
The loss of mobility can be the result of many different factors or a combination factors, such as:
• Muscle fibers become shortened after times of immobility (sitting at a
desk all day) or eccentric stress (deceleration from throwing, running,
jumping, etc.).
• Tissues can become stiff because of instability in surrounding joints; a
stiff neck may be the result of instability in the shoulder joint.
• Mobility can be affected by protective tensions; an athlete may feel as
though they have incredibly tight hamstrings, however, this tightness is a
protective measure enacted by the body because of an excessive anterior
pelvic tilt.
• And injuries past/present can cause adhesions to tissue, reducing
mobility.
Of course there are many other reasons, but these are just a few that are common for athletes.
Many athletes tend to neglect their strength training and mobility work during in-season which is a BIG mistake as the majority of injuries during the season are as a result of loss of mobility as the long grueling season progresses. Because of this neglect, loss of mobility becomes a common problem in many athletes, particularly younger athletes. Mobility loss in the early off-season can negatively affect the entirety of an athlete's off-season training, which can negatively affect their next season, and so on and so on - a potentially compounding problem.
Specifcially, here are some areas that baseball players REALLY need to have exceptional mobility if they want to maximize their potential and performance on the diamond:
The Baseball Observer - Jan/ Feb 2016
Mobility vs Flexibility and Why it Matters to Baseball Players
by Courtney Plewes BScKin, CSCS
The Baseball Observer - May/ June 2016