Using Constraint-Based Drills During Return-To-Throw Programs

Recently on my Instagram account, I made a post discussing why I feel it’s not ideal to try to make mechanical changes during the earlier phases of a return to throw protocol, something that is done pretty regularly with throwers who are rehabbing from an injury. One of the questions I received in the comments was asking how I would implement constraint-based throwing drills during a return to throw protocol, as a means to ‘chip away’ at mechanical changes that may benefit the athlete. While initially, I was going to attempt to respond with another post or two, I figured the answer was going to be too long to be done justice in a social media post. So, now my website has a blog.

When considering the answer to this question, we need to factor in several principles that will help drive if, when, and how we will implement certain drills with a focus on making mechanical changes. But first, let’s talk about what constraint-based drills are.

Constraint-based throwing drills are a popular type of teaching tool commonly utilized in the baseball and softball training world. Essentially, the throw gets broken down into its various components, and drills are performed to place a large emphasis on those components while allowing the athlete to focus less on the other pieces. This ensures most priority is being placed on trying to execute or feel that specific part of the throw. Typically, they are designed to be done with minimal cueing to allow an athlete to move as athletically as possible while still making improvements in how they execute that specific piece of the throw. Constraint drills exist on a scale of ‘most constrained’ where only certain segments of the body are moving to ‘least constrained’ where the entire body is moving freely, but still with a specific focus. The most common example of a ‘more constrained’ drill is the pivot pickoff shown here.

Now that we have an idea of what constraint drills entail, let’s get into the principles we need to consider when deciding where they belong in a return-to-throw protocol.

Principle 1: Don’t make the journey more challenging than it already is

This was the primary point of my IG post. Especially for athletes who are coming off surgery, the return to throw process is going to be a nerve-wracking experience on its own. This is due to a variety of reasons that are beyond the scope of this blog. They will already be having a ton of thoughts going through their head that are roughly centered around “Am I actually going to get through this?”. The last thing they need is their physical therapist, coach, or trainer to give them more things to think about while they are re-learning to trust their arm again. This is where constraint drills can have a lot of positive impact, but just like anything else, they can have a negative effect if not implemented properly; which leads us to our next principle.

Principle 2: Know the athlete’s previous experience with the drills

This seems obvious, but one of the first things I consider when deciding if I am going to have an athlete start utilizing these drills is whether or not they have experience with them or not. As I stated before, I want an athlete to be thinking as little as possible during their return to throwing protocol, and while constraint drills are great for allowing an athlete to get out of their way and be athletic while making mechanical changes they still do have an ongoing learning curve to them. For an athlete who has performed them before, I’m likely not as concerned about them overthinking the drill and, in turn, impacting their ability to throw as relaxed as possible. If an athlete has no previous experience with constraint drills, it doesn’t mean I won’t use them at all, it just means I am going to be more meticulous with how I program them in terms of what drills to do and their dosage.

Principle 3: Making mechanical changes at low intensity, likely won’t hold up once higher intensities are introduced

I would argue, that if you talked with more experienced pitchers, most would say they don’t like throwing bullpens at intensities lower than roughly 75-80%, give or take. Pitching and throwing are extremely technical movements that require years and years of reps to continually get the timing and sequencing of moving multiple muscles, limbs, joints, etc, in a manner that results in throwing a ball hard. Trying to recreate that timing at lower velocities likely isn’t going to translate once higher intensities are introduced. Good pitchers understand this, which is why the majority of bullpens thrown don't go below the aforementioned threshold.

The same thing could be said with constraint drills. They are generally designed to allow the athlete to move athletically with a specific focus with hopes of improving that intricate timing that I just talked about. Trying to get an athlete to get the same feel and timing throwing at 60% intensity is going to be a pretty different outcome than throwing at 80% intensity. Keeping that in mind, specifically with our less constrained drills, I often won’t have the athlete start implementing these until they have hit roughly the 75% threshold. For our more constrained drills, which are typically done at lower intensities (pivot picks, retraction throws, etc) I will generally be more open to having an athlete start these earlier in their return to throw protocol, depending on their previous experience with them.

Throwing drill on the left executed at 60% effort. Throwing drill on the right executed at 80% effort.

Principle 4: Even if measured stress is the same, we still need to account for how it was achieved

As you may or may not know, arguably the best measure of stress increasing in an individual thrower is throwing the ball with more velocity. So, while we don’t know what the stress on an arm is at any given velocity for a thrower, we do know that if that velocity increases then the amount of valgus torque will be increased relative to the previous throw. Given that, one might assume that if we cap our athlete’s throwing effort at a given arm speed, velocity, or distance (hopefully not), then we could say that all throws at that cap are going to be equal. Well, I would argue that’s not the case as:

1) It doesn’t account for fatigue accumulating throughout the throwing session and 

2) How the body moves is going to account for how much effort is needed to get to that cap, which will also impact fatigue.

This is something we need to be aware of with our drill prescription. Along with the point I made about some drills being better suited for lower intensities, and some more for higher intensities, this is why I make a point of only adding one drill every few sessions for my athletes. Over time, I will expand the number of potential drills utilized along with increasing the number of throws performed, and even at varying ball weights (gasp!).

Hopefully, this provides you with a solid framework for your decision-making process about implementing constraint-based throwing drills for your athlete. The return to throwing journey is a long, and trying process for many throwers. Through proper usage, coaching, and patience your athletes can feel more and more confident in themselves and get back onto the field at their best.