After reading your material I stopped doing mobility work and foam rolling and non barbell warmups. I would do a few sets with the empty barbell and slowly progress up to my working weight in 5’s 3’s and 1’s. Now, I will say that lately I’ve had trouble getting my arms directly over the top of my head on the press. In the past I’d do some mobility wod warmups and first rib mobs which did the trick. But now I just do a few more sets with the bar until I feel better. However, lately I feel a grinding in my shoulders during the press especially when I shrug at the top. Never had any pain though so I figured it was fine based on austin’s protocol. But the other day on a light set of seated pin presses at only 155 (I can strict press 230) I felt a crackling/pop in my left shoulder. I figured it was nothing because there was no pain. I finished the next few sets and finished the training for the day (even did some dumbbell bench and chins fine). Today, though my shoulder is a tad tender to the touch, but I know I’m fine. However the grinding is still there doing air presses (it’s really the shrug that causes it). I’m just wondering if I ignore this grinding (which never ever happened when I did do lax ball and mob work) or what? This seems to be a case where the mob work actually DID something of value for me so wouldn’t that be counter to what is usually said around here? I’m not sure.
Unfortunately no one is going to be able to give you an accurate “diagnosis” for what is going on (though I’m sure plenty of people would be happy to confidently make things up). These sorts of subjective symptom reports are not especially specific for any pathology, so I don’t know what happened that lead you to experience that. If it would make you more comfortable (and thus able to train more consistently / productively) to do your prior work, that’s fine with me, though I remain highly skeptical that it provided any unique / specific benefits to your shoulder joint compared to training.
I think it’s moreso that, while I cannot provide any empirical data to prove this, during the period where I was regularly performing mobility work and lax ball stuff on a regular basis, I noticed I didn’t have as much trouble (none) getting into these positions as I do now after a few months of not doing them at all. I “feel” noticeably tighter. I could wake up out of bed and get my arms completely overhead, every day, every time without issue as a result or these drills when I did them regularly. For me the range of motion I gained from them seemed to extend beyond just lasting an hour or so after doing them. I’m just noticing, and trying to be objective and just state my observations, that I find it hard to get into these positions lately if I just walk in the gym and do a few sets with the empty bar and then warm up. NOW, having said that, you are correct. Is it useful particularly? Probably not. Did it make me more comfortable and as a result yield better performance because I “believed it?” It’s definitely possible. And I’m speaking only on behalf of the press because it’s the only one I’ve noticed an issue with. However I can understand how you’d not deem these observations useful to myself or anyone else and rightfully so. It’s just annoying that my 25 year old shoulders which are strong are crackling like cereal to get overhead and this never happened in the past. Just an observation, albeit you’re right it’s not a particularly useful one, it’s all I have to go off of because it’s the only thing I changed.