COVID-19 return to sport: Collegiate baseball injury prevalence analysis

Abstract

In the spring of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic rapidly brought college baseball to a halt. Most college baseball players saw disruption of their training and development due to interruptions of their seasons. With these interruptions, it is necessary to examine the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on collegiate baseball injury epidemiology. Data from a small-school Midwest collegiate conference was tallied for the number of collegiate conference injuries per year, and for the injuries per anatomic region. An unpaired t-test was conducted upon the overall conference mean injuries per year and on each anatomic region for the mean injuries per region per year. Results demonstrated no statistically significant difference between the mean injuries per season, or the mean injuries per anatomic region per year. This study showed that small-school collegiate baseball had no significant difference in injury prevalence after the COVID-19 pandemic, differing from research at the professional level.