[Number4]

I'm speaking from my own sports experience as footballer, this might or might not be similar to pitching:

Once you are tired to a point and you stop too long, your limb shuts down into regeneration mode so to speak. It is very difficult to get it going again.

For me it is mostly my legs, for obvious reasons. If I lets say play 70 minutes of a 90 minute game and get substituted off, I will feel dead and tired very soon and I couldn't probably reenter and play very well. However, if I don't stop, I might carry on for the full 90, the tiredness only kicking in afterwards.

I'd assume pitchers have similar effects - if you have the delay at the beginning, the limb will not switch into regenerating so to say and you can get it going again. If the delay is near the end, you're likely done.