Movement Screens

Short held positions you film facing the camera. They measure the physical capacity behind your delivery, so your plan is built on what your body can actually do rather than a guess made from pitching footage.

Why these are filmed separately

Your pitching video shows what changes in your delivery. It cannot reliably show why. Reading a physical limitation off a 90 mph blur is guesswork, and that guess would drive your entire strength and mobility plan.

These screens are slow and held, and they move in a plane that faces the camera — the one situation where phone video measures a joint angle dependably. Where a screen exists, your report says the finding was measured. Where none exists, it says so and names the screen that would settle it.

Filming any screen

Whole body in frame, head to feet
Do not zoom in on the limb being measured
Phone steady on the floor, a chair, or a tripod
Normal video mode is fine — these are slow movements
Wear fitted clothing so joints stay visible
Film both sides when the screen says Both sides
Move only as far as you can without pain
One clean attempt is better than a rushed one

Never push into pain to reach a better number. A limited screen result is useful information — a painful one tells us nothing and is not worth the risk.

The standard set

5 screens spanning the kinetic chain, from the ground up. The set is kept deliberately short — a long screening session gets rushed, and a rushed screen produces a worse number than no screen at all.

Active Straight Leg Raise

Both sidesHigh confidence

This is the most direct check of how much your hamstring lets your leg travel. A tight or weak hamstring is one of the common reasons a lead leg keeps drifting forward at foot strike instead of blocking and letting the hips rotate around it.

Phone setup: Lie on the floor. Put the phone on the ground about 6 feet away, level with your hips, filming your whole body from the side.
Starting position: Lie flat on your back with both legs straight and both arms at your sides.
What to do: Keeping both knees straight and the down leg flat on the floor, raise one leg as high as you can without pain. Hold it at the top for 3 seconds.

This movement happens in a flat plane facing the camera, so the 2D measurement is dependable.

Ankle Bend (Knee-to-Wall)

Both sidesHigh confidence

This is how far your shin can travel over your foot. The lead ankle has to absorb landing. When this is limited, the landing force usually has to go somewhere less useful, and the front side can give way early.

Phone setup: Put the phone on the floor about 8 feet to your side, filming you from the side with your whole body in the shot from head to feet. Do not zoom in on your leg.
Starting position: Stand facing a wall in a short split stance with the front toe a few inches from the wall.
What to do: Keeping your front heel flat on the ground, drive your front knee forward toward the wall as far as it goes. Hold for 3 seconds.

The shin travels straight across the camera view, so this is a dependable 2D measurement.

Seated Hip Rotation

Both sidesModerate confidence

Pitching asks both hips to rotate a long way in opposite directions. When one hip is short on rotation, that range is usually taken from the low back or the front leg instead, and it often shows up as a side-to-side difference.

Phone setup: Sit on a table or bench with your shins hanging free. Put the phone about 8 feet in front of you at knee height, filming you straight on with your whole body in the shot from head to feet.
Starting position: Sit tall with your knees bent 90 degrees and your thighs together, shins hanging straight down.
What to do: Keeping your thigh still and your hips level on the bench, swing one shin outward as far as it goes. Hold for 3 seconds. This measures inward rotation of that hip.

The shin swings mostly across the camera, but small trunk lean or hip lift can add apparent range. Treat this as a comparison between your own sides and your own follow-ups, not an exact clinical number.

Seated Trunk Rotation

Both sidesModerate confidence

This is how far your upper back rotates when your hips cannot help. Pitching separates the shoulders from the hips, so when upper-back rotation is short, the shoulder and elbow usually end up covering the difference.

Phone setup: Sit on a chair with the phone about 8 feet in front of you at chest height, filming you straight on with your whole body in the shot from head to feet.
Starting position: Sit tall with your arms crossed over your chest and a ball or rolled towel squeezed between your knees to keep your hips square.
What to do: Keeping your hips square and the ball squeezed, rotate your shoulders as far as you can to one side. Hold for 3 seconds.

Rotation toward or away from a single camera is the hardest thing for 2D video to see. This estimates rotation from how much narrower your shoulders become versus your hips, so it is useful for tracking your own change over time and side-to-side differences, but it is not an exact rotation measurement.

Shoulder Lay-Back

Both sidesModerate confidence

This is how far your throwing shoulder can rotate back into the cocked position. It is the single most throwing-specific thing on this list. When it is short, the trunk and elbow usually make up the difference, and that is a change you can see in the delivery.

Phone setup: Stand side-on to the phone, about 8 feet away, camera at chest height, with your whole body in the shot from head to feet. Do not zoom in on your arm.
Starting position: Stand tall with your upper arm out to the side at shoulder height and your elbow bent 90 degrees, forearm pointing straight forward.
What to do: Keeping your upper arm level and your back flat, rotate your hand back and up as far as it goes without pain. Hold for 3 seconds.

The forearm swings across the camera, which reads well, but the upper arm drifting out of position adds apparent range. Treat this as a comparison against your other side and your own follow-ups, not an exact clinical number.

Screens we may request

Not part of the standard set. Staff may ask for one of these when a specific question comes up in your review.

Overhead Reach

Both sidesHigh confidence

This shows how far your arm can travel overhead before your back has to arch to help. When it is limited, the upper back and shoulder often have to borrow range from somewhere else during the throw.

Phone setup: Stand side-on to the phone, about 8 feet away, with the camera at chest height and your whole body in frame.
Starting position: Stand with your back against a wall, feet a few inches out, and your low back flat against the wall.
What to do: Keeping your low back flat on the wall and your elbow straight, raise one arm overhead as far as it goes. Hold for 3 seconds.

Filmed from the side, the arm swings straight across the camera view, which 2D measurement handles well.

Single-Leg Stance

Both sidesHigh confidence

Standing on one leg shows whether your pelvis stays level when only one hip is holding you up. A hip that drops here is often the same hip that lets the front side give way after landing.

Phone setup: Put the phone about 8 feet in front of you at hip height, filming you straight on with your whole body in frame.
Starting position: Stand tall on one leg with your hands on your hips and the other knee lifted to about hip height.
What to do: Hold as still as you can for 10 seconds. Do not let your standing-side hip drop.

Pelvic drop happens side-to-side across the camera view, which 2D measurement reads well from the front.

Cross-Body Reach

Both sidesModerate confidence

This shows how freely your throwing arm can travel across your body. That is the range your arm has to give up after release while it slows down, so when it is tight the trunk usually has to move instead.

Phone setup: Face the phone from about 8 feet away, camera at chest height, with your whole body in the shot from head to feet.
Starting position: Stand tall facing the camera with your throwing arm straight out in front at shoulder height.
What to do: Keeping your shoulders square to the camera and your chest still, pull your straight arm across your body as far as it goes. Hold for 3 seconds.

Filmed from the front this reads well, but turning your chest instead of moving the arm adds apparent range. Use it as a comparison between your sides and against your own follow-ups rather than an exact measurement.

Hip Extension

Both sidesHigh confidence

This is how far the front of your hip lets your thigh travel backward. The back leg needs that range to drive down the mound, and when it is short the low back usually arches to make up for it.

Phone setup: Put the phone about 6 feet to your side at hip height, filming your whole body from the side.
Starting position: Lie on your back at the very end of a bed or bench so that one leg can hang freely off the edge from the hip down.
What to do: Pull one knee to your chest and hold it there. Let the other leg relax and hang down as far as it goes. Hold for 3 seconds.

The hanging thigh moves straight across the camera view, so this is a dependable 2D measurement.

Squat Depth

High confidence

This is a whole lower-body check in one movement: ankles, knees, and hips together. It will not tell you which one is short on its own, but a shallow squat alongside a limited ankle or hip screen tells you the restriction is real and not a one-off.

Phone setup: Put the phone about 8 feet to your side at hip height, filming your whole body from the side.
Starting position: Stand with your feet about shoulder-width apart and your arms out in front for balance.
What to do: Squat down as far as you comfortably can while keeping your heels on the floor. Hold the bottom for 3 seconds.

Squatting happens straight across the camera view from the side, so the depth measurement is dependable.

Ready to film your delivery too?

The pitching video is a separate setup — filmed from your throwing-arm side, perpendicular to the pitch.

Pitching camera guide Start your analysis

Training & Safety Disclaimer

Pitch Nav provides educational baseball training information. It does not provide medical care, diagnose injuries, calculate clinical injury risk, or guarantee increases in velocity. Mechanics scores and position analysis are coaching tools intended to track development in the same athlete over time — not medical scores or laboratory biomechanics measurements.

Athletes experiencing pain while throwing, or who have experienced throwing-related pain in the past 30 days, should stop throwing and speak with a parent, athletic trainer, physical therapist, or qualified medical professional before continuing. Pitch Nav is not a medical service and cannot respond to medical emergencies.

Loading…

Why these are filmed separately

Filming any screen

Whole body in frame, head to feet

Do not zoom in on the limb being measured

Phone steady on the floor, a chair, or a tripod

Normal video mode is fine — these are slow movements

Wear fitted clothing so joints stay visible

Film both sides when the screen says Both sides

Move only as far as you can without pain

One clean attempt is better than a rushed one

Never push into pain to reach a better number. A limited screen result is useful information — a painful one tells us nothing and is not worth the risk.