All Throwers: Where should my elbow be?

Get your elbow up is what you hear every little league and rec coach screaming at their players. In most cases little league and rec coaches can give you a lot of bad information, but this common used phrase is actually very accurate and helpful. When you are close to releasing the ball, if your elbow is below your shoulder that is considered a low elbow. It does not matter if you are throwing a slant route to a wide out, a pitch to a hitter, or a throw to third base from right field you can not have a low elbow. Your elbow near release should at least be in line with your shoulder or your elbow should be above your shoulder just as the athletes pictured in this blog post.

What does a low elbow cause? It causes the ball to sail on you. If you were a right handed thrower sailing is when the ball flies way over your throwing partners head and to the right or in baseball that is known as your arm side. Now in some instances in a game when you do not have time you might have to side arm a throw or get it out really quick. For instances, if you are a quarterback throwing a quick screen pass, or a shortstop charging a slow hit ground ball you will have to get it out quick and have a low elbow at times. If you want to throw a ball with maximum velocity and throw it with precision the elbow has to be at least at shoulder height. Now if you are a pitcher with a submarine arm slot that is a different story.

If your elbow and arm slot are extremely high it can decrease velocity, because you lose out on some of your rotational power gained from hip to shoulder separation also. That is why you do not see to many pitchers throwing a 100 mph fastball with a way over the top arm slot. Most of them throw with a generic 3/4 arm slot. You definitely do not see guys throwing 100 mph with a low elbow ever. Having a very high elbow can help in other categories though, like throwing on a downhill plane which is tougher for hitters to hit. The other example would be if you were a shorter quarterback that needed to have a really high elbow to throw over top of your o-line even though quarterbacks mainly throw through lanes.

The best drills for fixing a low elbow are in the video attached to this blog post.