Demystifying the Curveball, Pitch Counts, and Weighted Balls- Part 1
You know what I love about the holidays? Good food, time with family, and the unspoken rule that nobody brings up religion or politics at the dinner table.
Why? Because they're powder kegs. Topics that bring out deep-seated beliefs and strong emotions.
Well, I accidentally lit one of those powder kegs recently, except it wasn't at the dinner table. It was on social media.
Our team posted a short clip of me at Boot Camp making what I thought was a pretty straightforward point: simply avoiding the curveball is far from a guarantee of arm health.
I wasn't trying to be provocative. I was just stating what I believed to be obvious after 30 years of doing this work.
But boy, did a few people have problems with it.
It became one of the most discussed posts in Ranch history. Comments flying. Opinions everywhere. And it reminded me that in the baseball universe, few things stir up more debate, angst, and vitriol than curveballs, pitch counts, and weighted balls.
So I figured, why not tackle all three here?
Over the next few articles, I'm going to demystify these hot-button topics for you. No drama. No agenda. Just a logical, practical look at what the evidence actually shows, so you can make better decisions for yourself or your athlete.
Let's start with the big one.
The Curveball: Baseball's Boogeyman
I've been hearing the same warnings for 40 years:
"Don't let him throw a curveball until he's 15."
"Curveballs destroy young arms."
"He's too young for that pitch."
And look, I get it. People mean well. They're trying to protect kids. But meaning well and being correct aren't the same thing.
Let me walk you through the four most common arguments against teaching curveballs to young pitchers and why I believe each one misses the mark.
Argument #1: "Young arms are still developing. The curveball is too risky."
The Claim: A prepubescent athlete's bones and soft tissue are in a critical phase of development, placing him at greater risk of injury. Therefore, the curveball should not be taught until age 15.
My Take: The first sentence? Absolutely true. Young tissue is vulnerable.
But here's where the logic falls apart: that conclusion assumes fastballs are automatically safer than curveballs. And that's simply not supported by the evidence.
A young man can injure his developing soft tissue in plenty of ways, including throwing a fastball. In my 30+ years of training pitchers, I've found that mechanical inefficiencies and mismanaged throwing volume are far more prevalent contributors to injury than pitch type.
Yet nobody's calling for a ban on fastballs.
The curveball got assigned a villain's reputation somewhere along the way, and that reputation has been repeated so often that people accept it as truth.
Argument #2: "The curveball creates more elbow torque than a fastball."
The Claim: Greater torque means greater injury risk. Therefore, no curveballs before 15.
My Take: The science here is actually very clear and it says the opposite.
A curveball thrown correctly produces less stress on the elbow than a fastball. Period.
Now, can a curveball thrown incorrectly create additional stress? Absolutely. But so can any pitch.
The critics say, "Well, young kids can't throw it correctly, so why risk it?"
Here's our answer: readiness is not determined by age. It's determined by proficiency.
We've seen 16-year-olds who aren't ready for a curveball. And we've seen 11-year-olds who absolutely are.
Kicking the can down the road to some arbitrary birthday isn't a development strategy. It's avoidance dressed up as caution.
That said, developing a curveball at 10 and throwing it 25%+ of the time in games? That's not smart either. We're not advocating for building a pro repertoire at age 9.
But refusing to teach proper mechanics because of fear? That's not protecting anyone. It's a false flag.
Argument #3: "The curveball is too complex. Kids can't learn it safely."
The Claim: The pitch requires advanced skill. Young athletes can't execute it properly, so it shouldn't be taught.
My Take: This one has a kernel of truth, the curveball is the most complex pitch, biomechanically. The hand moves from supination to pronation faster than you can blink.
If an athlete tries to manipulate, twist, or "shape" the spin during that window, yes, that can create additional elbow torque.
But here's the thing: the problem isn't the pitch. It's the teaching.
Think about the cues that were (and still are) given to young pitchers:
Every one of those cues adds complexity. They encourage manipulation right at the moment of launch, exactly when you don't want it.
What we teach instead: preset the supinated hand position early, simplify the arm action, and let the ball come out clean. No twisting. No snapping. Less stress.
At 66 years old, I'm convinced that the curveball's bad reputation came from decades of awful cueing not from anything inherent to the pitch itself.
Argument #4: "Learning a curveball too early will stunt fastball development."
The Claim: Fastball development is critical. If a kid falls in love with his curveball, he'll neglect his heater. Therefore, no curveballs before 15.
My Take: This one sounds clever, but it's built on a logical fallacy.
It takes a behavior that might occur and treats it as inevitable, as if every kid who learns a curveball will automatically abandon his fastball.
By that logic, we should also say:
"Learning to hit home runs at a young age might cause a hitter to fall in love with the long ball and neglect contact skills. Therefore, home runs should not be introduced until age 15."
Sounds ridiculous, right?
Of course fastball development matters. So does arm health, command, recovery, and the ability to adjust. These aren't competing priorities, they’re part of a synergistic system.
Develop your fastball, but not at the expense of arm health. Develop command, but not at the expense of velocity. Develop secondary pitches, but not at the expense of your fastball.
With proper planning and awareness, we can walk and chew gum at the same time.
For decades, the curveball has been baseball's scapegoat, blamed for injuries that were far more likely caused by:
The research is clear: a properly thrown curveball is no more dangerous than a fastball. In some ways, it's actually less stressful on the arm.
The danger was never in the pitch.
It was in the teaching. It was in the application.
Telling a young athlete to "snap his wrist," watching his elbow flare up, and then blaming the curveball is like handing someone a hammer, teaching them to swing it at their thumb, and then blaming the hammer.
The solution isn't to ban the tool. It's to teach it correctly.
At the Ranch, we don't believe in arbitrary age cutoffs disconnected from individual readiness. We assess mechanical proficiency. We teach proper arm action and hand positioning. And we integrate secondary pitches when the athlete is ready, not when a calendar says so.
Avoidance is not a development strategy. Education is.
The curveball isn't the enemy. Ignorance is. And fear dressed up as caution has done more to delay proper development than it has to protect young arms.
It's time to stop fearing the curveball and start teaching it effectively.
Coach Ron Wolforth is the founder of The Texas Baseball Ranch® and has authored six books on pitching, including the Amazon Best Seller Pitching with Confidence. Since 2003, The Texas Baseball Ranch® has had 141 of their players drafted, and 651 have broken the 90 mph barrier. Coach Wolforth has consulted with 13 MLB teams, numerous NCAA programs, and is often referred to as “America’s Go-To Guy on Pitching.”
Coach Wolforth lives in Montgomery, TX with his wife, Jill. They are intimately familiar with youth select, travel baseball and PG events as their son Garrett went through the process. Garrett, a former catcher in the Cincinnati Reds and Houston Astros organizations, still holds the PG Underclass All-American Games record for catcher velocity at 89mph which he set in 2014 at the age of 16.
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