Missed this from yesterday, but file this under good ideas: New York City’s Public Schools Athletic League has agreed to have coaches keep track of pitch counts of high school pitchers, submit them with game results and post them on the league’s Web site.
Sure, they had to be threatened by the city council to do it, and there is no binding rule in place to limit pitch counts, but as with most things, information is power. If people know that a 16 year-old kid was left in to throw 150 pitches some night -- which happens in high school baseball all across the country each and every day -- pressure will mount to stop it.
Not that this is a completely black and white issue. There is a lot of interesting stuff in the article about just how darn hard it is to find kids who can throw the ball over the plate, which causes many teams to lean too hard on those who can.
Still, that’s no excuse to kill a kid’s arm, and when it comes to this sort of thing, knowledge is power.