Speed development in baseball is evolving. For years, training has focused on weight room numbers, 60-yard dash times, and straight-line speed. But real game speed is more complex and coaches are beginning to treat it that way.
In a recent Coaches Corner roundtable (full video here), three coaches:
-Kevin Hollabaugh (ProForce Sports Performance)
-Ian Connors (Cressey Sports Performance)
-Diwesh Poudyal (Champion PT & Performance)
joined us to talk about how they develop speed for their baseball players. From acceleration to arm care, high schoolers to pros, and even return-to-play, their approaches show what modern baseball speed training looks like.
Here are the highlights.
1. From Drag Races to Decision-Making: Rethinking Speed in Baseball
Baseball speed isn’t just linear, it's both curvilinear and context-driven.
“It’s great to have drag race-like qualities,” said Hollabaugh, “but we also have to train the athlete to make decisions, round a base, decelerate, or change direction.”
All three coaches emphasized that athleticism, not just straight-line speed, matters most. That means understanding foot placement and shin angles, deceleration, base running decision-making, and transitional acceleration.
Recent years have seen a shift toward integrating speed and baserunning skills, valuing change-of-direction and stopping mechanics, and using tech to analyze real in-game patterns (like peak speed at 20 yards instead of just 60-yard dash times).
2. Applying 1080 Tech for Baseball-Specific Speed
Each coach uses their 1080 Sprint to measure and train baseball-relevant patterns, especially acceleration, curvilinear sprinting, and deceleration.
“It’s not just for testing. We use it for curvilinear runs, assisted wave sprints, and variable loading,” said Hollabaugh.
A very practical use of this is with curvilinear sprinting: starting with resisted baserunning arcs, progressing to mid-arc slingshot-style assisted arcs.
Then the data is used for real-time adjustment, manipulating the loads to reinforce specific positions and reduce compensation patterns, as well as draw out higher outputs.
3. Profiling, Individualizing, and Bucketing Athletes
Coaches are moving away from one-size-fits-all speed training and into force-velocity profiling and bucketing athletes.
Athletes are often divided up into buckets like acceleration-focus, max velocity-focus, and transitional-focus to improve their weakness.
From there, training is modified, not overhauled, based on what the profile shows.
“They still get exposure to all sprinting types, but we bias the programming based on the force-velocity profile,” said Hollabaugh.
This also promotes competition amongst athletes of similar speeds, creating motivating group dynamics.
4. Letting Load Do the Coaching
Rather than relying only on verbal cues, coaches are using load as a constraint to shape the athlete's movement.
“Load is load. It wins,” said Poudyal. “If shin angles or projection aren’t clean, the 1080 will reveal that.”
Examples of constraint-based teaching:
-Layered Progressions: broad jumps → bounds → moderate resisted sprints → light resisted sprints
-Self-organization drills: letting athletes feel projection and directionality through the drill, not just relying on verbal cues
By individualizing loads and progressions, coaches help athletes explore more efficient mechanics through feel and self-organization, not force-fed instruction.
5. Making the Invisible Visible: Coaching with Curves
All coaches emphasized how valuable the velocity–distance curves are, especially when the output doesn't necessarily match the movement.
“There are a lot of ways to run a sprint. The curves help show if the mechanics are getting better, even when the time doesn’t,” said Matt Tometz.
Specific examples:
-Coaching feedback: “that felt worse” from the athlete can be flipped and supported with curve shape and data confirmation
-Supporting learning: high school athletes can see they’re improving even when they don’t feel it or the numbers might not show it
-Movement quality vs. output: coaches use curves to show progress in force application, not just speed
6. Return to Play, Shoulder Health, and Rotation
Beyond sprinting, coaches use 1080 technology for rotational power, shoulder care, and rehab tracking, especially in baseball's upper-body-dominant population.
“Can we train the shoulder to decelerate 8x body weight?” said Poudyal. “Because that’s what happens at ball release.”
Examples:
-Isokinetic shoulder work: slow but forceful shoulder internal and external rotation
-Eccentric overload: in throwing positions like trap raises with an overloaded arm lowering
-ACL rehab: using jumps and bounds o track progress, supporting "training is testing"
-Data-informed return to sprinting: matching drills like resisted marching and skipping to previous sprinting data
Whether it’s a rotator cuff muscle or a force curve during a lateral bound, coaches are using data to connect rehab to performance.
7. Final Takeaways
Training speed in baseball isn’t just about getting faster, it’s about moving better and making training transfer to the game.
Key points:
-Don’t chase speed in a vacuum, context matters
-Tech like 1080 helps coaches individualize training, problem-solve to get better results, and promote competition
-Data shapes decisions, but coaching still drives the process
“I don't think it's ever a bad thing to make an athlete a freakier athlete..." said Connors. "We talk about all these nuanced things in baseball, but you watch these athletes in the Big Leagues do it, and they're just incredible athletes first and foremost."
Listen to the full 56-minute conversation here.
Learn more about the technology used by these coaches for their overspeed and assisted sprinting: the 1080 Sprint 2.
A big thank you to the speakers:
-Kevin Hollabaugh: Owner of ProForce Sports Performance in Ohio
-Ian Connors: Strength and Conditioning Coordinator of Cressey Sports Performance Florida
-Diwesh Poudyal: Director of Fitness at Champion Physical Therapy and Performance in Massachusetts
Published: August 6, 2025