The schedule does.
Every player who got stronger did the same three things: picked one program, put it on a calendar around games and school, and ran it for eight weeks without switching. This page does the calendar part for you, and points you at programs that cost nothing.
Everything here runs on this page. No sign up, no email, nothing to download. We do not sell a program and we do not write your exercises.
Why players stall in the weight room
It is almost never the exercise. It is the week.
The rule of this page: any real program, done on schedule, beats the perfect program done sometimes. Not medical advice, see the bottom of the page.
Tool 1. Baseball workout schedule: build your week
Put in your season, your game days and how often you want to lift. This lays out all seven days with lifting, throwing, arm care and the one full rest day in the right order.
Week builder
The rules the builder follows
- One full rest day, every week. No lift, no throwing program, no conditioning. Eat, sleep, and let the week land.
- Lifts come after practice unless your team lifts first. A tired body still lifts fine. Tired legs at shortstop do not. A 6 am team lift is a team lift; check the box and the builder moves the note.
- Pitchers never lift heavy the day before a game they might throw in. The builder moves your lifts away from game days. If you know your start day, treat the day after it as a band day, no lift, whatever the grid says.
- In season, two lifts a week is the guideline, not a lock. Games and practice are the training. The gym keeps what you built. Ask for more and the builder places them and says so; your strength coach outranks the guideline.
- Arm care rides on every throw day. Bands before you throw, bands after. It is five minutes twice, and it is not optional.
Built from the NSCA position on youth resistance training (2 to 3 sessions a week on non-consecutive days) and the USA Baseball Pitch Smart guidance on rest. Print it, screenshot it, put it on the fridge.
How many days a week should a baseball player work out?
Three lifts a week in the off-season, two in season, throwing on every practice and game day, and one full rest day. That is the whole answer. The rest of this page is where those days go.
What is the 3-3-3 rule for working out?
It floats around in a few versions. The common one is three days a week, three main lifts, three sets each. It works for the same reason every simple plan works: it is a schedule with a number on it. The week builder above does the same job, but it knows when your games are.
| Off-season vs in-season | Off-season | Preseason | In season |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lifts a week | 3, non-consecutive | 3 | 2, never the day before you pitch |
| Session length | 45 to 60 min | 45 min | 30 to 40 min, after practice |
| What the gym is for | Building strength and weight | Carrying it into throwing | Keeping it |
| Throwing | 3 program days | Every practice, building up | Games and practice |
| Arm care | Every throw day | Every throw day | Every throw day, and between games |
| Full rest days | 1 | 1 | 1 |
Built from the NSCA position on youth resistance training, 2 to 3 sessions a week on non-consecutive days. In-season numbers are the common practice at the college programs we talk to, not a rule from a book.
Tool 2. Find your program, free
Free baseball workout programs exist and they are good. There are three doors. Walk through the one you can actually get to four days a week, and pick a program that is free, written down, and tells you exactly what to do next session.
Your coach’s program first
If your school has a strength coach or a team lift, that is your program. Show up to every one. If nobody hands you a plan, run one of these in the school room.
- StrongLifts 5×5 Five lifts, three days, add 5 pounds every session. The simplest thing that has ever worked.
- The Basic Beginner Routine Same idea, slightly more variety, written for people who have never touched a barbell.
Pick one, run it eight weeks
Any gym with a squat rack and dumbbells covers everything a baseball player needs. Skip the machines and the phone.
- GZCLP Three or four days, main lift plus assistance, progression built in. The best free program for a player with a year of lifting.
- 5/3/1 for Beginners Three days, slower progression, hard to mess up. Good for a player who also practices five days a week.
No gym is not no program
A pull-up bar, a jump rope and a set of bands cover the off-season for a player without a ride to a gym. Progress by adding reps, then harder versions.
- The Recommended Routine Three days, full body, every exercise has an easier and a harder version so it scales for years.
- The J-Band routine The arm care half of the home program, free from the people who make the bands. Every throw day, before and after.
The eight week rule
- Pick one door and one program. Write the date on the first page of your log.
- Run it exactly as written for eight weeks. Do not add exercises from a video. Do not swap days.
- At eight weeks, look at the log. Every number went up? Keep going. Something stalled? Now you get to change one thing.
- When Uncommitted University ships its own program, it plugs into this same schedule. Nothing about your week changes.
These are outside sites we do not control. We link them because they are free, written down, and have been run by a lot of people. Ask your coach or athletic trainer before starting any of them.
Tool 3. Baseball arm care routine and throwing workload
Arm care is any routine you do every single throw day. Workload is the number of pitches you throw and the days off you owe after. The routine is your choice. The days off are not. If you do not pitch, do the bands and skip the counter.
USA Baseball Pitch Smart, the table every league is supposed to follow
| Age | Daily max | 0 days rest | 1 day | 2 days | 3 days | 4 days |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7 to 8 | 50 | 1 to 20 | 21 to 35 | 36 to 50 | n/a | n/a |
| 9 to 10 | 75 | 1 to 20 | 21 to 35 | 36 to 50 | 51 to 65 | 66 to 75 |
| 11 to 12 | 85 | 1 to 20 | 21 to 35 | 36 to 50 | 51 to 65 | 66 to 85 |
| 13 to 14 | 95 | 1 to 20 | 21 to 35 | 36 to 50 | 51 to 65 | 66 to 95 |
| 15 to 16 | 95 | 1 to 30 | 31 to 45 | 46 to 60 | 61 to 75 | 76 to 95 |
| 17 to 18 | 105 | 1 to 30 | 31 to 45 | 46 to 60 | 61 to 80 | 81 to 105 |
Source: MLB and USA Baseball Pitch Smart pitching guidelines, ages 7 to 18, read 2026-09-11. Pitch Smart stops at 18; college programs set their own standards. Your league may run stricter numbers. Stricter wins.
Throwing workload calculator
A rest day means no pitching in a game. Bands, catch and position play follow your coach and your arm, not this table. Count warm up and bullpen pitches honestly, they are pitches.
What to actually buy
Three things. The program is free, the gym is the gym, and the rest is these.
Baseball arm care products: what the kit actually is
Search “baseball arm care equipment” and you get a wall of sleeves, gadgets and weighted balls. The kit that college programs actually hang on the fence is four things, and only one of them costs real money.
The full routine, the day after a start and the Pitch Smart table are in Tool 3 above and on the arm care handout below. Dead arm, elbow pain on the inside, or numb fingers are an athletic trainer conversation, not a product.
Most affordable
Speed jump rope
ball bearing | adjustable | fits a bat bagTen minutes after a lift is the whole conditioning program for a baseball player. No track, no treadmill, no excuses about weather. It lives in the bag next to the bands.
Price shows in your cart.
The arm care tool
Jaeger J-Bands
the routine is free | before and after every throw | hooks on any fenceThe bands every college program hangs on the dugout fence. The routine that goes with them is posted free by the company, linked in Door 3 above. Any bands with a hook work; these are the ones we would buy.
Price shows in your cart.
The one that makes it stick
A paper lifting log
one line per lift | date on page one | no phone in the gymA program you do not write down is a program you are guessing at. Weight, sets, reps, every session. Eight weeks from now this book is the only honest answer to “is it working.”
Price shows in your cart.
Any bands with a door or fence hook work. Any rope works. Any notebook works. These are the three we would hand a player on day one.
Take the handouts
The schedule and the arm care routine on two printable sheets. One for the fridge, one for the bat bag.
Baseball workout schedule
Days per week by season, a blank week to fill in, the three program doors and the eight week rule.PDF | opens in a new tabBaseball arm care routine
Before and after every throw, the day after a start, the Pitch Smart table, and the four signs to stop.PDF | opens in a new tabPrint them. The schedule goes on the fridge, the arm care sheet lives in the bag next to the bands.
Six mistakes that cost seasons
The whole system, in order
This page is one step of Complete Player Development. The steps run Target, Eat, Drink, Train, Recover, and every one of them is live. Pick up wherever you are.
Step 1 | Target: The Weight Target Tool
What rostered college players weigh at your height, level and position, and the honest timeline to get there.uncommittedu.com/weight-targetsStep 2 | Eat: The Shake Protocol
Two shakes weighed to the gram, sized to your target, and the four cheap tools that make them repeatable.uncommittedu.com/shakesStep 2 | Eat: The Sunday Cook Up
Five meals out of a rice cooker, an air fryer and a pressure cooker, with the calculators that size the week to your body.uncommittedu.com/meal-prepStep 3 | Drink: The Hydration Protocol
Measure your sweat rate once, get your game day clock, and pick the electrolytes that actually replace what you lose.uncommittedu.com/hydrationStep 5 | Recover: The Recovery Protocol
Sleep counted backward from the alarm, and the bag that gets a player through a doubleheader.uncommittedu.com/recoveryThe whole system: Complete Player Development
One system, two settings, four inputs. Every page in order, from your target to the calendar on the fridge.uncommittedu.com/player-developmentBeing strong is not the same as being seen
You can be the strongest player in your league and still get missed, because coaches never heard your name. Uncommitted University is the system that fixes that side: the coach vault, the highlight video course, the outreach that puts your name in front of the programs that fit.
Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Links on this page may earn us a commission at no extra cost to you.
Not medical advice. Every page in Player Development is education, built from the public guidance named on the page. It is not a diagnosis and it is not a prescription. Talk to your doctor, your athletic trainer or a registered dietitian before you change how you eat, train or sleep, or add any supplement, and check your league and school rules on supplements first. Pain that does not leave, sleep that will not come, or a game that ends in dizziness or cramping is a doctor or athletic trainer conversation, not a calculator.
Calculator limits. The week builder is a schedule, not a program. It does not know your body, your coach or your league rules. Where they differ from this page, they win.