Study finds dodgeball throws load elbows like baseball pitching

A dodgeball throw is not a casual arm fling. In a biomechanics study presented in the International Conference on Biomechanics in Sports proceedings, four male primary-school players were tracked with a Vicon three-dimensional motion-analysis system, and their elbow-torque pattern looked similar to baseball pitching. The biggest elbow load was varus torque, with peak varus torque arriving at an elbow angle of -64.8 degrees.

That matters because the force is going through the same side of the elbow that takes the strain in other overhead sports. The study warned that this load may contribute to medial elbow injury involving the ligaments, muscles, joint surface and ulnar nerve, and it recommended limiting the number of throws per day to help protect healthy growth. In practical terms, the line between normal soreness and trouble is not whether the arm feels tired after a match. It is whether pain shows up on the inside of the elbow, sticks around, or gets sharper as throws pile up.

A related Japanese study sharpened the comparison. It looked at eight male primary-school players, four overhand throwers and four sidehand throwers, and found that overhand throwing produced elbow varus torque and shoulder internal-rotation demands comparable to baseball pitching. Sidehand throwing changed the joint angles, but hip and trunk rotation, along with ball speed, stayed similar enough to show that dodgeball still loads the body like a real overhead-throwing sport.

The injury record backs up the warning, even if the serious cases are rare. A case series published in Archives of Trauma Research in winter 2017 described five young, healthy players who fractured a humerus during the act of throwing in a recreational dodgeball tournament. The break happened on the throw, not from contact, which puts the release and follow-through at the center of the sport’s physical risk.

That is why modern dodgeball has drifted far from gym-class free-for-all status. The World Dodgeball Federation says it was formed in July 2011, staged its first world championship in Kuala Lumpur in 2012 and had grown to 80 member nations by 2021. USA Dodgeball says its mission is to promote and develop the sport across the United States while emphasizing fair play, sportsmanship and safety, and its 2026 rules update was designed to improve fairness and align with the world federation. The National Collegiate Dodgeball Association says it was founded in 2005 by a handful of Midwest colleges.

For competitive players, the lesson is blunt: treat throw count like workload, not background noise. Warm up the shoulder and trunk, clean up mechanics, and respect elbow soreness before it becomes the kind that costs time off. In dodgeball, the arm action is the game, and the elbow is doing real work every time the ball leaves the hand.