19 Ways How to Improve Pitching Velocity

Pitching is one of the most challenging positions in baseball for good reason, as the game’s outcome is often dictated based on how the pitcher performs. We give you 19 ways how to improve pitching velocity. 

Pitching comes with great responsibility and pressure. Therefore pitchers try to get any sort of edge over a hitter possible. Improving pitching velocity is a great way to gain an advantage over hitters. 

While some coaches may downplay the importance of pitching velocity, it’s typically the number one thing college and pro scouts start with as a benchmark in determining if a player is worth consideration. 

Just take a look at how the average MLB velocity is creeping up by year, and you will get an idea of how important velocity is:

Year	Average Velocity
2022	93.6
2021	93.5
2020	93.1
2019	93.1
2018	92.8
2017	92.8
2016	92.3
2015	92.1

Top Ways to Improve Pitching Velocity by 10 MPH or More

In this article, we will look at some of the best ways to improve pitching velocity as a baseball player that I learned from my experiences as a pitcher.

More research and information are available today on gaining MPH on your fastball than ever before, making it a great time to be a pitcher.

While not every method may work for every pitcher, hopefully, some of these tips will help you improve the MPH on your fastball.

1. Functional strength improvement

One of the first ways to improve pitching velocity is to improve your overall strength. Pitching about strength and flexibility of your overall body, staying coordinated, and delivering the ball to the plate. Getting on a good weightlifting program is critical in the first step to building arm strength.

There are many different schools of thought on weightlifting for pitching. Some coaches hesitate to encourage heavy weight lifting; however, almost all of the high-velocity pitchers I knew were some of the best and strongest athletes and some of the strongest in the weight room. 

I was a big fan of squats, hang cleans, and multi-directional weighted lunges for my lower body. For my upper body, I went heavy with free weight dumbbell bench press and incline press, and also spent a lot of time building strength in my forearms, biceps, and triceps. 

Top Velocity has one of my favorite weight training velocity philosophies for Pitchers, and the video above gives a good explanation of their philosophy.

 2. Flexibility program

Once you reach functional fitness, my second key is making sure you are flexible. Some of the biggest, strongest guys I know could barely throw baseball because they had a limited range of motion throughout their bodies and shoulders. 

On the other hand, many of the hardest throwers had extremely flexible shoulders, elbows, hands, and wrists and could generally have high spin rates on the baseball. 

I was fortunate enough to be in spring training with Tim Lincecum in 2008 and was enamored with his level of flexibility. He used his entire body to generate torque and could throw harder than anyone I had ever seen before at his size.

Here is a cool video of his pre-game stretching routine.

3. Long Toss Program

What are the most impactful things I did to improve my velocity throughout high school was by implementing a consistent long toss program. 

During my Junior year of high school, I tore my ACL, which prevented me from playing basketball during the fall and gave me time to work on building my arm strength throughout the year. Going into my junior year, I could only throw around 80 miles an hour. I started a long toss program three times a week over the next year and gradually saw my velocity increase month by month. Toward the end of my senior year of high school, I got to the point where I could throw in the upper 80s and realized I could potentially play in college.

Like anything in life, you want to get good at all it takes time and practice.

One thing I really enjoyed about long toss was I could see noticeable gains in my arm strength and soon got to the point where I could throw the ball over the left field high school fence after months of long tossing. If you’re playing your round baseball, it may be challenging to find time to get long toss in consistently, but communicate with your coaches your desire to improve your arm strength and make time for this important routine.

 

4. Speed training program

Another way to improve pitching velocity is by improving the overall quickness of how fast your body can move. For example, when you’re in your pitching delivery, a key part of throwing hard is how quickly you can explode toward home plate.

How fast you can get from your balance point to your landing spot and explode toward home plate is an important factor in pitching velocity. Sprinting and explosive training help improve your fast-twitch muscle fibers and help generate additional arm speed.  

Getting on a good sprinting and explosive training program is a great way to improve your explosiveness, I liked to do various sprint work as a pitcher, including 100 yards sprints, stop-and-go sprinting, and circuit training. Here are a few great videos and speed drills to consider.

 5. Plyometric Training

Plyometric training is common in basketball and football to help improve explosiveness. It is a great idea for Pitchers as well to consider.  If you’ve ever done things like box, jobs, bounding, or other explosive jumping exercises, those are forms of plyometrics that help improve your stop-and-go capabilities.

I had a great strength coach in college who put all our players through a rigorous plyometric training program that drastically improved my overall explosiveness.  We did medicine ball tosses, box jumps, scissor jumps, dart drills, and more a few times a week.

At first, I was skeptical of how this would improve my performance, but all of the timed metrics I tested improved significantly throughout the season. I recommend mixing in plyometrics a couple of times a week, and you can find many great exercises and drills to choose from.

6. Rotator Cuff Program

One of the most critical ways to improve pitching velocity is to incorporate a good rotator cuff strengthening and flexibility program. Many players show up at the park and simply do a quick stretch and immediately begin warming up and playing catch. I was a big fan of exercise band resistance band training and brought my bands to the field daily.  Going through a quick warm-up routine was critical for me. I also use these bands during the off-season to strengthen my rotator cuff. 

7. Pitching Mechanics/Spin Rate Analysis

The current era in baseball is awesome since there are a variety of tracking and analytical tools to help improve pitching performance. 

Instead of guessing at what’s working, you can now be observed under different analytical tools from companies like TrackMan and Rapsodo determine where there are inefficiencies in your pitching delivery. Taking advantage of this type of technology is something I highly recommend and wish it was available when I was playing. 

I had numerous pitching coaches throughout high school and college, and it seemed like everyone had different perspectives on improving pitching velocity I like the thought of using data to help determine where my weaknesses are to give me exact details on where I can focus on improving my pitching performance. 

Here is a list of trackman locations throughout the country that you can get analyzed at and a good video looking at some of the latest trends and tracking tools on the market.

8. Weighted Ball Program

Weighted balls have picked up in popularity over the last five or so. Prior to that,  weighted balls were seen as an injury risk and discouraged from pitching coaches. 

However, companies like Driveline have implemented weighted ball training with data and analytical research and have had massive success with pitchers making significant jumps in velocity. So if done under the right program that prevents overuse or improper mechanics, they can be very beneficial. Just make sure you don’t overuse them or use improper form while throwing with them, and ideally, follow a proven weighted ball program.

9. Frequent Radar Gun Testing

Having a radar gun accessible is critical to determine if you were making gains in your pitching velocity.

When I was in high school, I had no idea how hard I was throwing except when I would go to a pitching camp or maybe an event where they had a radar gun.  I could feel like I was throwing harder over time, but I needed to have accurate data points to help determine what was and wasn’t working in real-time.

10. Test out different programs

No two bodies are exactly the same, and certain people will respond differently to different training methods. For instance, a weighted ball program may work great for one player, and someone else may respond better to weight training. Companies like Driveline in top velocity offer two different types of methods for pitching improvement. 

The Top Velocity Program discourages weighted ball use and focuses more on explosive weight lifting and medicine ball work. 

I recommend experimenting with various methods to see which one your body responds to the best. Maybe it’s a combination of multiple things that works for your particular skill set.It’s all about putting yourself out there, experimenting, and consistently working at making incremental gains over long periods.

I recommend starting your velocity improvement journey early, and if you have access to a local professional that gives lessons, learning from someone in person is ideal.

Unfortunately, many high schools and sometimes college coaches pitching coaches were never high-velocity throwers or pitched at a high level, so it’s challenging to get great advice from someone who hasn’t proven themselves as either a player or a teacher of velocity improvement.

So, seek out those with that knowledge and try to learn as much as possible through their mentorship and create your own educational journey on the topic as well.

11. Lead with your Heel

One hack I learned from a pitching coach later in college was the concept of leading with my heel toward home plate from my balance point.  Until then, I would have a relatively parallel foot drive toward home plate while preparing to throw the ball.  As you begin moving toward home plate, leading with my heel and keeping my hips back behind the rubber helped create an explosive uncoiling effect late in the delivery.

That helped generate whip on my arm and, as a result, produced additional arm speed. I incorporated this technique late in college and saw a jump of about two to three miles per hour strictly by learning how to leverage torque better with my body. It can feel a little awkward at first to drive your heel toward home plate, and a big element of this concept is practicing to find the perfect timing of when to open up your foot toward home plate.  

For me, it was at the very last second as I began to prepare for my foot strike.  A good drill for this technique is to stand on the pitching rubber, reach your balance point and extend your heel toward home plate as you would when delivering a baseball. Then, bring your leg back towards your balance point over and over again this will train your body on how to stay back without opening up your lead leg too early in the delivery. 

When you open your lead leg too early in the delivery, you’re “leaking” additional velocity since you can’t generate the same torque as the method described above.

12. Optimize Hip to shoulder Separation

Many top pitching instructors focusing on velocity Improvement spend time talking about hip-to-shoulder separation. The concept of hip-to-shoulder separation involves having maximum distance between your lead hip and your back shoulder.

This separation represents a distance that is like a spring being stretched and then let go.  

The thought is to stay back on the rubber for as long as possible while reaching your foot strike and create leverage naturally on your arm through hip-to-shoulder separation that serves as a catapult to generate additional arm speed, which in turn helps improve velocity.

Have you ever played catch with somebody with a great arm but got on the mound and had below-average velocity? 

They likely didn’t understand concepts such as hip-to-shoulder separation and other techniques used to generate arm speed outside of their arms and shoulders. Here is a great video Here’s a great video explaining hip-to-shoulder separation and how it impacts pitching velocity in more detail:

13. Find the Ideal Stride length

I once had a college coach who told me that when they played minor league baseball, they had a big league pitcher named Ryan Dempster who was rehabbing and came down to the minor leagues for a few games.

My pitching coach explained that he was blown away at the distance Ryan Dempster had for his stride length. He said it was nearly a foot longer than the other minor league pitchers that he typically watched throw bullpens.  A long stride length can help pitchers get down the mound and leverage more of their body to generate velocity. 

If you have a short stride length and finish tall on the mound, you likely aren’t using as much of your hips and legs as you can to impact pitching velocity.

Increasing flexibility in your hips, hamstrings, and torso is a great way to improve your stride length.  The more flexible these areas are, the easier it will be to get additional distance on your stride length. 

I experimented with yoga and stretching assistant straps to help get additional flexibility in my hips and noticed a significant Improvement in the distance on my stride. Here is a great video discussing the impact stride length has on getting to an explosive position to deliver the baseball.

14. Fastball Grip

Another easy hack that could add velocity to your fastball is playing with your fastball grip.  Many pitchers hold the ball too deep in their hand or grip the ball too tight. 

I began to grip my fastball lighter in my fingers toward the end of my college career in my hand and instead focused on using my fingertips to apply pressure on focus on generating as much spin as possible on the seams at my release point.  

I also noticed when I held my fingers together, I threw harder than when my fingers were spread out on the seams. Having my fingers together enabled me to allow more direct force directly through the back of the baseball, generating more spin. 

This is a perfect example of why testing with a radar gun is critical. You can find the ideal fastball grip that will come out of your hand the fastest and get real-time data points on what is and isn’t working.

15.Find the ideal arm angle

Another tactic I used to develop additional velocity was slightly changing my arm angle and release point in college. 

I saw myself on video one day and noticed my arm angle was much lower than I thought it was in my head.My hand was much further away from my head than I realized, and my elbow was slightly below my shoulder. One day, I experimented in a bullpen with a slightly higher arm angle with my hand at more of a 90° angle and noticed a significant improvement in creating additional whip on my arm.  

As a result of this change, I can throw my four-seam fastball to spots more consistently and still use my old arm angle for my two-seam fastball.

16. Come set with your hands near your waist

I remember watching a highlight of Tim Lincecum pitching in college and being astonished by his mechanics. I was fascinated by how low his hands were on his body when he came set or was in the windup. 

When I pitched, I had come set with my hands near my chest and extended my arm back towards the second base from this position. What I noticed from Tim Lincecum and some other high-velocity pitchers was a completely different concept of using your arm break from the glove as a way to get your arm and hand in a position that leveraged more torque on the baseball. 

By coming set lower, I was able to get my hand and arm further away from my body and, as a result, created a whipping action from my arm toward the catcher it was almost like a catapult type of concept of getting my body into the perfect position to launch my arm toward home plate. I also learned to relax my arm and let my body do most of the work instead of “tightening” up and forcing the ball to home plate. 

Having my arm further away from my body, I could leverage and use my core and legs to drive my arm like a whip toward home plate and not rely on just arm speed alone as I was with my former handbrake from the glove. 

17. Throw with Intent

Another way I gained velocity late in college was by throwing the ball with more intent than I had previously.  With a few months left in my college career, I decided to start and try to throw the ball as hard as possible because the end was nearing. Instead of saving my arm and focusing on mechanics and all the other things pitchers have to worry about,  I simply let go and tried to throw the ball as hard as possible at the catcher’s mitt.

I found that my command improved, and my velocity reached levels never had before. Who would have known to throw hard you actually have to try and throw hard. The hard part about this concept is having the ability to keep your body control in check. 

One challenge I had with throwing as hard as possible is that I started to leave more balls up in the strike zone because I wasn’t finishing down over my lead leg like I usually did. To solve this, I asked my catchers to set up low in the zone to help remind me to finish out front and drive the ball down in the strike zone while throwing with maximum intent and effort.

In today’s MLB, you can sometimes pick up on pitchers grunting as they release pitches to home plate. These big league pitchers have such good body control that they can rare back, let it rip, and still hit spots perfectly. Listen to the grunting from some of the game’s top pitchers, and you will see that these guys put all they have behind every pitch.

18. Experimentation

One of the most important things on your velocity improvement journey is to continue to experiment and try to get incrementally better.  

Just like my example above, in my mind, I thought I had the perfect arm angle, but video analysis proved differently when I was compared to pitchers like Roger Clemens and other High-Velocity throwers.

The desire to consistently improve your velocity is most important,  and staying on top of new training methods, techniques, and concepts will help you keep an edge over the competition. Use your Bullpen sessions as a way to experiment with different pitch types and velocity 

19. Document your progress

Like any goal in life, it’s much easier to see improvements over time if you document your successes.

I recommend buying a velocity-specific notebook to record your thoughts and velocity milestones over time or use a Google spreadsheet to record your progress. This way, you can evaluate what is and isn’t working and pinpoint timeframes when you made the biggest jump, and try and replicate that over time 

Final Word

It’s amazing to look at the advancements in pitching velocity training and resources that are available to today’s pitchers. 

Coaches sometimes looked at Velocity Improvement 10 years ago as a distraction from “throwing strikes” and neglected it from a practice and training standpoint. 

Now there are velocity improvement training centers throughout the country with endless amounts of information on the web and from major league pitchers directly on YouTube, like Trevor Bauer.

While I believe each pitcher eventually has a ceiling that they will hit based on their physical limitations for velocity Improvement, most pitchers aren’t close to the ceiling. If they want it bad enough, there are so many ways to incrementally throw harder.

I hope this list helped give some good ideas, but most importantly, as the old quote says, “ideas are a dime a dozen it’s the execution of the ideas that are the most important!” So good luck, get out there, and get after it!