Introduction: Coaches are required to need to be able to evaluate players’ performance on the field. Therefore, in order to evaluate pitching motion, regardless of the experience level of the coach, evaluation criteria is needed. The purpose of this study was to create evaluation criteria for pitching motion by focusing on the motion on the frontal plane, which is often observed on the field, and which can be used in actual sports coaching.
Methods: In this study, we created evaluation criteria for pitching motion by extracting common elements from medical science papers, literature, and players’ subjective opinions. To examine the validity of the evaluation criteria, we scored the motion of fifteen Japanese major leaguers namely Nippon Professional Baseball pitchers, based on the evaluation criteria and conducted a correlation analysis of the evaluation scores and ball velocity. To analyze the objectivity and reliability of the evaluation criteria, we calculated the inter- and intra-subject agreement of the evaluation scores given by six former Nippon Professional Baseball pitchers, coaches, and medical staff, who had a lot of experience working in the field of baseball.
Results:There was a significant positive correlation was observed between the evaluation scores for all phases of the pitch and the maximum and average ball velocity. The intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) for both the inter and intra-rater scores were above 0.7 for all assessment scores, indicating a certain level of correlation.
Discussion: The results of this study suggest that the evaluation criteria we have developed have a certain degree of validity, objectivity and reliability. Therefore, the evaluation criteria created in this study suggest that they may be useful in actual coaching situations.
