1. The Coaching Situation: Why One Calendar Does Not Fit Every Arm

Fall practice begins with a throwing schedule, dates, distances, and a plan to build toward the season. That is useful, but it is not enough by itself.

Two pitchers can open the same calendar on the same day and arrive from completely different places — one may have kept a regular throwing routine through the break, another may not have faced a hitter since spring. The calendar tells you when the season begins. It does not tell you where each pitcher should begin. A preseason audit helps a coach answer that question before the workload rises.

Previous articles introduced Floor, Ceiling, and Time as a planning framework. The audit turns those ideas into a first decision: what the pitcher can repeat now is his floor, what his role will eventually require is his ceiling, and the weeks available to build the bridge are the runway.

2. The Four Audit Questions

A roster may list two pitchers as the same age and position. An audit does not. Their first demands should not be identical.

Role demand is not the same for every pitcher. A starter needs to build outing length and repeatability across innings — the ability to hold velocity, command, and mechanics deep into a game. A reliever needs availability and quick readiness — the ability to be effective on short notice, sometimes on back-to-back days, without a long warm-up runway. A swingman may need parts of both, which usually means a broader base rather than a deeper one in either direction. Knowing which role a pitcher is building toward changes what “ready” actually means for him.

3. The Performance Battery: What to Actually Test

A conversation gives a coach context. A short battery of measured tests gives a coach a number to compare against later — for this athlete, not against a teammate or a published norm. Five tests cover most of what “current floor” actually means for a pitcher: strength, mobility, power, mound performance, and recovery.

Every result below answers the same underlying question: is this quality already close to where the athlete’s role will eventually need it — his ceiling — or is it the gap that will take the most runway to close?

Run the full battery once at the start of the fall and again at the mid-window checkpoint. The change between the two matters more than either number alone.

Strength: Plank Hold and Pull-Ups

Trunk and hip endurance has research support specific to overhead throwers — one study of cricket fast bowlers found trunk endurance measures significantly associated with ball release velocity, and a study of professional pitchers linked lumbopelvic control to days missed because of injury. A standard prone plank held to failure is a practical, no-equipment field version of that same quality. Pair it with max pull-up reps as a simple, repeatable upper-body strength marker. Neither test diagnoses anything. Both give a baseline worth repeating.

A single result means more in context than in isolation. The primary comparison is the athlete against himself over time — this test, repeated at the checkpoint. But a result that stands out sharply from the rest of the roster is also worth noting in the meantime. If most of the staff’s pitchers hold a plank for two minutes and one taps out at thirty seconds, that gap is real information before you ever have a second data point to compare it against. The same logic applies to pull-ups: a wide gap from what the rest of the group can do is itself a signal worth acting on, not just a number to file away.

Mobility: Squat, In-Line Lunge, and Push-Up

These three map onto three of the seven tests in the Functional Movement Screen, a battery with real baseball-pitcher-specific research behind it. A 2025 prospective study used the FMS specifically as a screening tool in high-school pitchers. Score each movement for quality rather than pass or fail.

What to watch for without a formal scoring system: on the squat, whether the heels stay down, whether the knees track over the toes or collapse inward, and whether the lower back stays neutral rather than rounding or overarching. On the in-line lunge, watch for a loss of balance, a noticeable side-to-side difference in how far the athlete can comfortably reach, or excessive forward lean through the trunk. On the push-up, watch whether the hips, trunk, and shoulders move together as one unit, or whether the low back sags or the hips rise first. A pitcher who cannot repeat these positions cleanly on both sides is showing you something worth addressing before adding load or velocity.

Power: One Upper-Body Test, One Lower-Body Test

For the upper body and trunk, a rotational medicine-ball throw or scoop toss for distance or velocity is the more consistently supported field test — one study found it the strongest single predictor of throwing velocity among several power tests measured. A weighted, minimal-bounce ball such as the TAP® Pummel Ball is one practical option for this test, since its shape and lack of rebound make it easier to throw safely and repeatably in a confined space. For the lower body, a standing broad jump is the most practical option a coach can run without equipment, though the research here is mixed: some studies find a real association with throwing velocity, others find none, and more traditional tests like the vertical jump and 60-yard dash have shown weak or no correlation in several studies. Broad jump is worth testing. It is not a guaranteed predictor.

As with strength testing, the most useful comparison is often within the roster rather than against a published number. A distance or velocity well short of what most of the team produces on either power test is usually the more obvious signal — worth addressing first, even before a second testing comparing the athlete to themselves.

Mound Performance: Velocity, Command, and Endurance

Track three things across a short mound session.

Velocity — radar gun on a set number of pitches, recording peak and average. A handheld unit such as the Pocket Radar is a practical way to track this consistently from the mound or a bullpen.

Command — throws at a defined target, recorded as hits against total throws. A target system such as the Advanced Command Trainer makes this easy to run consistently.

Endurance — a simulated inning (roughly 15–20 pitches with radar and command tracked), a rest interval, then a second simulated inning, rest, and repeat. Watch both numbers for decline. Multiple studies, including one in pitchers aged 13 to 16, have found velocity declining across simulated innings under fatigue. One recent study adds an important caveat: in some pitchers, ball speed stayed essentially flat across seven simulated innings even as objective fatigue markers rose sharply — meaning velocity alone can miss real fatigue that a second or third simulated inning, tracked alongside command, is more likely to catch.

Recovery: A Forced-Choice Wellness Check

Subjective self-report has real research behind it as a monitoring tool — a systematic review of 56 studies found subjective wellness measures more sensitive to training load than objective measures in athletes generally. The specific format below is an Oates Specialties suggestion, not a cited research protocol, and we label it as such.

Ask the athlete to rate how his arm feels on a 1–5 scale the morning after a demanding session, with no option to pick 3 — forcing him to indicate a direction rather than default to neutral. Ask once before any activity, then ask again after a few minutes of light, easy throwing. If the number improves meaningfully after light throwing, some of what he reported was normal morning stiffness that warms out. If the number does not move, or gets worse, treat that as more meaningful information.

All tests described here are general coaching tools. They are not medical assessments, and no combination of results clears an athlete to throw or diagnoses a problem.

4. From Testing to One First Priority

Five tests will rarely all look equal. One will usually stand out as the clearest gap between the athlete’s current floor and where his role will eventually need him to be — weak trunk endurance next to strong mound velocity, or a mobility limitation showing up as an obvious compensation, or command falling apart in the second simulated inning while velocity holds.

That gap is the lowest-hanging fruit — the shortest distance between floor and ceiling that the available runway can realistically close first. It is the one thing worth prioritizing, rather than trying to build all five qualities at once. Combine the battery results with what you learn in the audit conversation below to sort where things stand.

An audit is complete not when you have five numbers, but when you can name the one that matters most for this pitcher’s first weeks.

5. Practitioner Perspective: From Information to Action

Ron Wolforth and Randy Sullivan both work with individualized throwing-development models. Their public work is useful because it illustrates how experienced practitioners move from information to action — it does not validate this specific battery or establish a universal protocol.

Wolforth describes an assessment-to-action sequence: Assess, Categorize, Customize, and Prioritize. The transferable idea is not that every program needs a private-facility workup. It is that information should change the plan — sort what you learn, decide what most constrains the athlete now, and choose the first priority accordingly.

Sullivan’s public work emphasizes starting with the athlete’s actual history and present context rather than a template. For a coach, the principle is simple: collect what happened before your program began, identify what has changed, and let that shape the first demand.

Neither framework proves that a specific screen diagnoses a problem or predicts injury. Their value is organizational.

6. Research Findings and Limits

A one-time preseason shoulder screen did not predict which of 832 high-school players would sustain a throwing-related injury during the season — supporting the point that a single screen should not become a pass/fail test. A Division I study found some subjective measures associated with missed time while several objective measures did not predict injury in that cohort — supporting the value of asking the athlete directly. Game pitch counts capture only part of total throwing exposure; catch play, lessons, and showcases can add substantially more.

Research does not yet give coaches one score that predicts a season, one screen that clears or disqualifies a player, or one universal battery for every age and level. A screen is information. It is not a verdict. The coaching response is practical: collect the history, measure the current floor, define the ceiling, use the available time honestly, and choose the first priority accordingly.

7. The Fall Pitching Audit: History, Role, and Calendar

Alongside the performance battery, a short conversation fills in what testing cannot show.

Total throwing volume deserves more than a line item. Ask specifically about the last two to six weeks: games, bullpens, catch play, lessons, private instruction, showcases, and any throwing outside the program. Programs consistently undercount this — a pitcher who looks fresh on paper may have thrown more in the last month than his own coach realizes. A companion guide, How Much Should a Pitcher Actually Throw?, covers why pitch counts alone miss most of an athlete’s real exposure. For this audit, the goal is simpler: get an honest total before assuming anyone is starting from zero.

At the end, a coach should be able to name three things: what is known, what is still unknown, and what has changed from the athlete’s usual pattern.

8. Coach’s Takeaway

• Start with the pitcher’s recent history and measured current floor, not a generic calendar
• Run the five-domain battery once at the start of fall and again at the checkpoint
• Identify the one clearest gap and make it the first priority
• Ask about all throwing, including outside work
• Treat every screen and test as context, not a verdict
• Recheck the picture as the first weeks reveal more

9. Equipment, Safety, and What Tools Cannot Claim

A target, radar gun, or command-tracking system may make the performance battery easier to run consistently and observe. The tool belongs after the testing objective is clear, not before it. A radar number, target score, or movement screen cannot tell a coach that an athlete is ready, diagnose a problem, or replace qualified evaluation. Assessment tools add information. The coach still interprets that information alongside history, role, and available time.

This is preparation guidance, not medical diagnosis or injury clearance. Persistent, sharp, unusual, worsening, or function-limiting pain is outside a training article’s scope and belongs with a qualified professional. Existing restrictions or qualified-professional guidance should lead the plan when they apply.

For athletes: Be honest about all throwing, and tell the coach when something feels meaningfully different from normal. A test result is not a verdict about your arm.

For parents: Share information about outside lessons, showcases, and any existing guidance from qualified professionals. The best audit sees the athlete’s whole week.

10. What We Have Already Said, and the Next Question

How to Build a Fall Pitching Program explains the larger preparation framework this audit operates inside. What Actually Happens After You Pitch? explains why a throwing outing is a whole-body demand. Why Can’t My Pitcher Stay Healthy? develops the full injury-history and recurring-problem conversation only briefly touched on here.

The audit chooses the starting point and the first priority. It does not tell a coach how quickly each quality can change. That is the next question: How Long Does It Take to Build Arm Strength? — which develops the different runways of strength, endurance, movement control, and throwing tolerance once you know where a pitcher is starting from.