Late to the Party

One of my former assistants with the White Sox sent me an email yesterday that gave me a good chuckle. He was told that one organization in Major League Baseball was doing something really innovative, they had stopped icing their pitchers arms. Welcome to the party – We stopped icing after pitching with the White Sox Minor League system in the 1988 season! Instead of icing which was a complete “shut down” we instituted an extensive cooldown routine. The problem with baseball is that it is a sport that is bound by tradition, because Sandy Koufax iced his arthritic elbow and he pitched well, then everyone began to copy it without asking questions. Monkey see, monkey do. Always ask why? There was and is no science to validate icing a healthy shoulder after pitching – that is the bottom line.