Scheduled for RC Poster Social: Sharing Research Across the HPERD Disciplines, Wednesday, March 31, 2004, 4:30 PM - 6:00 PM, Convention Center: Exhibit Hall Poster Session


Throwing Profiles of 7-,8-,9- and 10-Year-Old Little League Baseball Players

Gina Barton, Lander University, Greenwood, SC and Karen E. French, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC

Recently, Langendorfer and Roberton (2002 a) developed profiles of throwing patterns which represented varying combinations of trunk, humerus, and forearm actions. A companion paper (Langendorfer and Roberton, 2002 b) described the pathways of change longitudinally. As they investigated the developmental relationships across components, they suggested that the strength of the profile T2-H2-F2 could be interpreted as phylogenetic and the development beyond T2-H2-F2 as ontogenetic. The purpose of this study was three-fold: 1) to describe the throwing profiles of 7- to 10-year old Little League baseball players who may have more practice and experience than those of the sample reported by Langendorfer and Roberton; 2) to determine if similar attractor and/or repellar profiles were exhibited by this sample of more experienced throwers; and, 3) to extend the throwing profiles to be inclusive of the preparatory arm-backswing and the action of the feet components. The throw for distance was observed on 108 Little League baseball players. Process characteristics were identified through videotape observation. Three measures were generated for comparisons: the percentage of the total throwing trials that occurred in each profile, the number of participants who exhibited a given profile modally, and the number of participants who exhibited a given profile on any given trial. Five different profiles out of 27 possible combinations of the trunk, humerus, and forearm emerged. The Little League players demonstrated a T2-H3-F3 profile most frequently (67%) whereas the T2-H2-T2 profile was the least advanced profile exhibited at 9.5%. Five percent of trials observed players demonstrating advanced movement form in all three components (T3-H3-F3). All participants in the study, with the exception of one player, were modal in one of the five throwing profiles (T2-H2-F2, T2-H2-F3, T2-H3-F2, F2-H3-F3, and T3-H3-F3). Out of the possible 432 combinations of the preparatory arm-backswing, foot action, trunk, humerus, and forearm components, only 17 profiles were observed. Ninety-five of the 108 players were modal in one of the 17 profiles. The most frequently observed profile at each age was 4-4-2-3-3. The results of this study support and extend the findings of Langendorfer and Roberton. The baseball players in this study exhibited more advanced patterns for throwing than participants in Langendorfer and Roberton (2002 a, b). These findings suggest that practice and experience may play an important role in developing more advanced profiles.
Keyword(s): athletics/sports, performance, youth sports

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