alert the pitch count police

i have a friend who's head will explode when he read this:

After throwing 13 innings and 201 pitches, Warroad pitcher Lars Anderson had enough Saturday night.

it's a high school pitcher, and the opposing pitcher threw 204 pitches.

i understand this is egregious - were it my kid, i'd be horrified. but here's what makes me angry: a journalist uses the phrase "201 pitches" and readership spikes. it's like a blogger tagging a story "erin andrews" - a cheap way to get site traffic.

this is an incomplete story. if the kid threw 200 sliders, yeah, that would be bad. but if he threw just fastballs/change ups, then that's less arm damage. has the kid proven he could throw this much before in the season? was he fatigued, or was he conditioned to throw a lot? did the other team suck at hitting?

i'm all for setting up general pitching parameters, which that league apparently has, to prevent selfish coaches, but let's not set definitive numbers for pitch counts when pitch counts are not necessarily the best indicator.

if you run the 400m, you don't prepare by just running 400m every day in practice. when we baby pitchers and don't condition them to throw a lot, no one should be surprised at elbow surgeries. nolan ryan (now president of the texas rangers) has recently commented on his hatred of the pitch count. it's about fitness, stamina and mechanical correctness.

protecting high school atheletes is important, but at some point, you gotta let them run. another friend's kid (11th grader - crap, i have friends that have kids who are in 11th grade?!?!) broke his foot in the finals in a volleyball game - stepped on a teammate. but the kid stayed out there. he served the last three points and they won their division finals against their rival. because we are concerned for kids' safety, should they have taken the kid out of the game? he was able to stay in there, stay active (he's a setter), and they won their championship. that's a sporting glory he may never achieve, and because he broke his foot, they should have taken that from him?

as they said in bad news bears 2, "let them play! let them play!! let them PLAY!!!"