Throwing Injuries and 3 Ways to Prevent Them

Cricket is one of the most popular sports in Australia, and with summer fast approaching patients with throwing injuries are a common sight in the physio clinic. Here are three ways you can prevent them, and keep your shoulder healthy

1. Eccentric Rotator Cuff Strengthening

Eccentric strengthening of your rotator cuff is one of the most important things you could do to prevent throwing injuries. Unfortunately blindly using a theraband isn’t enough!

The picture below illustrates an example of such an exercise. Descend slowly down, and help it back up with your other hand. The heavier and slower your descend, the better

2) Load Management

One of the most common mistakes people do, is overload the rotator cuff in preseason, causing it to break down. Gradual exposure is the way to go.

In your first day of preseason training, don’t just throw as much as you can. Build up week by week, leading into round 1.

3) Mobility through your thoracic spine and wrist

Your ability to throw doesn’t just depend on your shoudler. As you cans ee in the image below, You need to be able to rotate through your thoracic spine, and be able to extend/flex through your wrist to get additional power. Limitations in either of these two areas will limit your throwing ability, and force your body to use your shoulder more!

Mobility work, like rotation stretches for the thoracic spine or general wrist stretches can help prevent shoulder injuries.

If you have any questions, reach out to our team!