About Oates Specialties

We build training tools that change how the body learns to move.

We are not a sporting goods company. We are a product development company built inside a coaching laboratory. Every tool we sell was stress-tested under real training loads before it ever reached an athlete.

We don't run paid ads. We don't chase trends. We invest in equipment that works — and let coaches, athletes, and families tell the story.

Where It Started

In 2003, Brian Oates was a high school pitcher running out of options.

Velocity wasn't developing. The conventional path wasn't working. Brian went looking for a better way and found Ron Wolforth at the Pitching Central (Texas Baseball Ranch).

Wolforth's model was different. He trained pitchers as total dynamic athletes — emphasizing how the body moves through space and interacts with its environment. Brian committed fully. Robert, his father, showed up the same way a good father does: he learned the system, watched every session, and asked what else he could do.

The answer came from Wolforth himself. The tools available couldn't handle the demands of high-intensity training. Robert didn't wait for someone else to solve it. He went to work.

That year, Oates Specialties was born — a father building equipment so his son could train without limitations.

TAP® — The Athletic Pitcher

The company's first brand carried the philosophy in its name.

TAP® — The Athletic Pitcher® — was never just a product line. It was a declaration that arm development starts with whole-body athleticism. Mechanics, movement quality, and coordination come before velocity. The equipment had to reflect that.

Brian went on to play college baseball and pitch in the Seattle Mariners organization. The tools his father built were part of that path.

A Feedback Loop Built on Real Training

Oates Specialties grew because coaches used the equipment and told us what needed to change.

Biomechanists, movement specialists, and arm care coaches tested products in the field. That feedback drove every design iteration. We didn't build for a catalog. We built for a training session.

Over two decades, that community has included:

• Paige Bishop
• Phil Donley
• Perry Husband
• Wes Johnson
• Kelvin Miyahira
• Paul Nyman
• Dewey Robinson
• Brent Strom
• Randy Sullivan
• Jerry Weinstein
• Ron Wolforth

KHAOS® —The Water Training Breakthrough

In 2009, we added water-filled training tools to our catalog, leading to the birth of our KHAOS® brand.

That addition created something conventional weighted tools couldn't replicate: unpredictable, shifting load. The body can't anticipate it. It has to respond to it. That demand drives adaptations in coordination, stabilization, and body control that static resistance doesn't produce.

Randy Sullivan, PT and founder of the Florida Baseball ARMory, put it directly: water-filled tools transformed training by improving strength, body awareness, coordination, and mechanics simultaneously.

Four Brands. One Standard.

Today, Oates Specialties operates four proprietary brands:

TAP® — arm care, resistance, and overhead athlete development
KHAOS® — water-based training for coordination, stabilization, and rotational power
SpeedChain® — overspeed and underspeed resistance tools developed with Kelvin Miyahira
Pitching Pad® — target training tools developed with Paige Bishop

Each brand solves a specific training problem. All four meet the same durability and design standard.

For Families

Robert Oates built this company as a father first.

He understood what it felt like to watch your athlete hit a wall — and the frustration of not knowing which tools, coaches, or methods to trust. That experience is embedded in how we operate. We provide objective, evidence-based resources alongside our equipment. We support parents who need to understand what their athletes are training with and why.

That commitment hasn't changed in 23 years.

The Record

Multiple Oates Specialties products have earned the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA) Best of Show award.

Our tools are used daily by youth, collegiate, and professional organizations worldwide.

We are sometimes imitated. We are never duplicated.

If you are serious about the work, you are in the right place.