Mobility Screen

Taylor showed a “neutral” posture during athletic movements, which is good. Her thoracic mobility falls in the “loose” category on the left side, turning 65 degrees, and “hyper mobile” on the right side, turning 80 degrees.  During the pelvic tilt test, she struggled to get to anterior tilt, which should be a major focus of her movement prep plan.  She also vibrated during the test, which indicates an imbalance of strength between her lower abdominals and lower back. This should be addressed in her strength plan.  She failed the pelvic rotation test, but then was able to pass with assistance, indicating a lack of stability in her upper body.  This should be a major focus of her strength plan.  She passed the torso rotation test, but showed some instability in her lower body during that movement.

She failed the overhead squat test, and also failed the squat test when her arms were behind her head.  When we got to the lunge test, we determined she had lack of ankle mobility in her left ankle.  Her left ankle was severely limited during dorsiflexion, and this should be a major focus of her movement prep plan. Lack of ankle mobility can lead to poor energy transfer from the ground during the swing.

Her muscles in her scapular region were adequately developed on her right side, but under-developed on her left side, which should be a major focus of her strength plan. During her reach, roll and lift test, she showed a lack of stability of the scapula during overhead movements in both arms.  This should be a focus of her strength plan as well. She showed adequate mobility in external and internal rotation of the shoulder, but a lack of strength kept her from holding external rotation in her left arm when she was in athletic posture. Her scap retraction mobility falls in the “neutral” category on the both sides, so a moderate move with her upper body during the loading mechanism is appropriate.

Her hip mobility falls in the “tight” and “neutral” categories. She turned 45 degrees internally on the right side, 60 degrees externally on the right side, 40 degrees internally on the left side and 55 degrees externally on the left side. She will require minimal pelvis rotation during the gather and forward advance portions of her loading mechanism. She did ok with the single leg balance on both legs, getting to 11 seconds with both legs. She could also benefit from some unilateral lower body work in the weight room.  Her hamstring flexibility was good. During her glute bridge test she showed good stability in her lower body, but could likely benefit from some glute activation during her movement prep plan. She also showed core instability during that test, so some anti-rotational exercises should be added to her strength and prep plan.

All wrist, forearm, and cervical screens were passed showing no limitations.  She also showed greater than 30 degrees of range to each side during the side bend test, which shows no thoracic limitation when bending side to side.

Force Plate Swings

Below is video of the swing analysis. I will walk you through this matched up with video.

Taylor holds her load in her toes, instead of her heel, and loses her back shoe pressure early as she makes her forward advance. If she can increase her counter-rotation of her pelvis against her back leg, she will create more torque, and therefore more speed at the beginning of the turn.  Also, if she has a more forceful interaction with the ground (through the heel), her deceleration rates will be higher and send more energy up to the core and torso.

KVEST Sequencing & Rotational Speeds

The 3d readings are on kinematic sequencing and rotational speeds.

Taylor has a swing that’s in sequence, but has ample room for speed gains. Her pelvis speeds peak at 688 deg/sec, which is a real speed of 24.77, which falls under the “good” category on our scale.  A good gain gets her torso to peak at 942 deg/sec, which at 44.27 on our real speed scale factors as just barely “below average”.  Her biggest energy loss is between her torso and lead arm, indicating an inability to hold a scap load.  Instead, she inwardly rotates her torso, which makes her torso and lead arm move at basically the same speed.  Her lead arm peaks at 989 deg/sec and she reaches an overall kinematic speed of 1672 deg/sec, which is well below average.  If she added some rotary stability, and held a scap load to anchor her upper body, we would see an increase in separation between the segments of the swing, and an increase her overall kinematic speed.

Bat Sensor Data

Her bat speeds were between 63 mph and 66 mph, which is “average”.  Her exit velocity was between 58-68 mph, which is “below average” to “average”.  Her attack angles fell between 11 and 16 degrees (4 to 12 degrees is ideal), which is fine but we don’t want them to get any higher. Her time to contact was between 0.16 and 0.17 seconds which is slower than ideal (under 0.15 seconds),  and her rotational acceleration was 7 Gs, which is “below average”. This indicates a turn that is not tight, further supporing an inability to hold a scap load during the beginning of the turn. With added rotary stability and a proper scap load, TTC and RA should be the areas that show the most improvement. Her vertical bat angles fell between -20 and -31 degrees, which is a good range when balls are up in the zone.  We generally like to see between -20 and -30 degrees on pitches up in the zone, and between -30 and -40 on pitches down in the zone.

Summary & Recommendations

• Physically, Taylor needs to improve her overall stability both in her upper and lower body.
• Her ankle mobility needs to be addressed in her prep plan.  Her low rate of force development during her force plate swings is likely due to some mobility issues here.
• She needs to hold a scap load better, and decrease the amount of inward turn of her torso as she loads.  This will help decrease her time to contact.