In the News

2022-02-20 The Detroit News Tigers reliever Drew Carlton thirsting for another big-league taste

At minicamp, he’s taken full advantage of director of pitching Gabe Ribas’ laboratory, including drills with a core velocity belt that helps with weight distribution and staying directional in your delivery.

“I’ve never used it before, but I am really glad they are implementing that stuff,” Carlton said. “If definitely all helps and it’s fun. I can feel a difference, for sure.”

2022-02-18 Detroit Free Press What's a core velocity belt?

2021-07-14 NBC Sports: What White Sox’s All-Star presence says about Ethan Katz 

Pretty quickly, Katz earned Rodón’s endorsement as well.

“He has a lot to do with the success, for sure,” Rodón said.

Guidance over FaceTime eventually turned into in-person workouts with the core velocity belt before spring training. Rodón’s old mechanics made him “calf-dominant,” and he was losing power and command. Katz helped him find both.

“I’ve never been an All-Star before,” Rodón said with a chuckle, “so I think it’s helped.”

2021-04-16 Diamond Digest: CARLOS RODON’S ROAD TO REDEMPTION   What gave Carlos this success in the 2021 Spring training season was newly hired pitching coach Ethan Katz getting him to use his lower half more in his delivery along with working with the core velocity belt.

2021-03-23 Chicago Sun-Times: Carlos Rodon, motivated by non-tender, wins job as White Sox’ fifth starter   A tweaked delivery — less crossfire and more straightforward — and the use of a core velocity belt helped.

2021-03-16 Chicago Sun-Times: White Sox’ Carlos Rodon almost perfect in first Cactus League start    “With the velo belt, it’s easier to hone in the command of the four-seamer,” Rodon said. “And it seems like the spin’s getting better, getting a little more carry, having that cleaner delivery.”

2021-02-02 The Athletic: White Sox pitcher Dylan Cease is tightening his belt for a 2021 rebound (subscription required).    “The last couple offseasons, I was doing my throwing but I didn’t really have any drills or anything like that. It was kind of going more off of feel and what I thought,” Cease said. “You can say stay closed and do this and do that. But unless your body feels it, you’re not really experiencing it. But this is giving you the experience of what it’s like to be closed. You do it and it kind of gives you that muscle memory. I’ve definitely noticed a difference in using it.”

2020-12-11 MLB.com: Positive offseason signs for confident Cease    Doing drills with the core velocity belt, a tool adeptly employed by Giolito, is just one of the changes that Cease and Katz have discussed.

2020-07-08 Trib Total Media: Pirates ace Jameson Taillon uses rehabilitation to shorten arm action, change delivery   So Taillon dove in head-first, using everything training trick from weighted balls to medicine balls to a core velocity belt to strengthen his grip. He focused on using his back leg and keeping his back foot on the ground longer so he wouldn’t come up on his toes and found concentrating on his foundation allowed for a smoother motion.

2020-02-20 The Athletic: Can White Sox starting rotation mirror Lucas Giolito’s rapid turnaround? (subscription required).    The belt ... used to be a defining image of Giolito’s uniquely engineered turnaround, as he dutifully walked out to the bullpen to strap himself in, alone, between every start. Now, the belts are spread across the spring training complex, and Carlos Rodón, now entering his seventh season in the organization, is strapping in.

2019-05-19 The Athletic: ‘I’m going to fix this right now’: How White Sox pitcher Lucas Giolito reinvented himself in California (subscription required).   Giolito arrived in Glendale with his core velocity belt, which he would hook up to a fence and mime out his motion with it tethered around his legs. His first side session of the spring featured his new motion almost realized — without the White Sox being a part of the change.

2019-02-28 The Athletic: Lucas Giolito is back in the lab, trying to start a prove-it season on the right foot (subscription required)   Even now, he can regularly be found on a bullpen mound at the White Sox spring complex with a core velocity belt — designed to build the muscle memory for rotating his hips and driving through his legs — mounted to a fence in front of him and tied around his waist and upper thighs.

2019-02-24 MLB.com: Giolito in spring with new routine, optimism; Former top prospect aims to be more consistent and not overthink    Take a drill Giolito was doing recently ... He was focusing on his delivery on a side mound at Camelback Ranch, without a baseball and wearing what appeared to be a harness. Giolito explained the purpose of that device, known as a core velocity belt, with an overriding target of steadying his mechanics.