A Pitch is a Pitch

       Over the last month, Playoff Fever has hit Major League Baseball.  Some of its symptoms are coaches on the hot seat, debates over innings limits, and constant talk over which teams will be able to grab hold of a spot in "the dance."  The greatest symptom, however, is the heavy scrutiny of a "key series" or a play late in the game.  This symptom is known to influence players to try to raise their level of play and is probably the most dangerous of all of Playoff Fever's symptoms.  Worse yet, this last symptom has been known to be contagious and to infect an entire team (2011 Braves anyone?).

       Now that we have addressed the symptoms, let's talk about how to avoid Playoff Fever if you are a competitor.  There is a very simple solution with no expensive antibiotics or organic diet necessary.  All you have to do is understand one very simple principle:  "A pitch is a pitch."  What I mean is that the reality of baseball is that no singular pitch carries greater value than another unless we assign that value.  Whether it's thrown in the first inning or the last, the pitch is still only worth one pitch.  The value assigned is certainly influenced by circumstances.  A pitch thrown with runners in scoring position could be considered "more important" than one thrown with nobody on.  What creates this illusion of "the biggest pitch of the game" is the influence situations often have on us.  The moment wouldn't exist without all of the others that led up to it.  Constant challenges to "find out what you're made of right here" may be seen as ways to motivate players, but again this is dangerous.  Implications of whether a player is successful in a singular situation being used as the evaluation for their makeup is unfair for so many reasons.  Also, coming from the world of rational thinking, what makes the games in September any more important than games in early May?  Again, it only happens with our way of evaluating the situation.  It influences players to "do a little more" or to "try a little harder."  With that being said, I'll admit playoff baseball games are more important.  They aren't important enough to change the way you have always played the game though.  One of my favorite concepts introduced to me by a mentor of mine whose influence has appeared multiple times on the blog, Geoff Miller, is that of trying too hard.  Trying too hard's result can be just as bad as not trying hard enough.  The message sent to players who have had success all year is that somehow what they did then wasn't quite good enough for late season baseball.  What are the dimensions of the field in late season baseball again?  Channeling my inner Coach Norman Dale, I'm fairly certain the ball still needs to be thrown over a 17 inch-wide plate.  Hitters, you still should see the ball, hit it, and run.  As coaches, you can either add to the external pressures of help to minimize.  Why create more of that fickle beast known as indecision?

        As I've started to pay attention, I am more and more convinced the teams who have the most success in these late season playoff pushes and into the playoffs are the ones who, I think with absolute intention from the coaching staff, continue to play how they have all year.  The Royals from 2014 come to mind.  They won last year in the regular season by running the bases, playing great defense, and having a lights out late-inning bullpen.  They won in the postseason by running the bases, playing great defense, and having a lights out late-inning bullpen.  I can still remember watching the 2013 Red Sox play a World Series game against the Cardinals.  Some of the details escape me, but the basics are that it was fairly early in the game, the Red Sox had runners on first and second, and there were no outs.  Twitter Coaching World exploded with calls for the Red Sox to sac bunt and exploded again when whoever was hitting swung away and fouled off a pitch or two.  "How are they not bunting here?"  "Doesn't John Farrell know how to coach situational baseball?!?! #BuntThemOver."  John Farrell very much did know what he was doing.  The Red Sox were a team that had swung the bats all year.  Why change now?  Because expert analysts say so?  Me thinks not.  To bunt the runners over would have been a message to the team to change the way they had played all year.  It would have been to place doubt in the preparation for this very moment.  The player who "should have bunted" went on to bang one off the wall, the Red Sox went on to put up a crooked number, and they won the World Series.  In what can only be called a broadband miracle, all of those coaches who somehow thought they knew the Red Sox better than their manager must have lost their connection at the same time.  Only crickets ensued.  Did  I cherry pick a situation?  Absolutely, but I am reminded of something I have heard several times before.  Just because something doesn't work out doesn't mean it was the wrong decision.  This is something I think managers and coaches have to live by in order to not drive themselves crazy with second-guessing.  There are so many variables to whether something works out or not.  Sometimes, the hitter gets out.  Sometimes, the pitcher gives up a hit.  We lose games!  That doesn't mean you didn't do what gave your players and team the best chance of being successful.  It means we are human.

        Lavar Burton would say, "You don't have to take my word for it," right about now.  Here is a piece of an interview I found with Hall of Famer John Smoltz on "handling pressure on the big stage."  The principles apply throughout late September and into October.  Enjoy:

I really believe there’s a makeup. There’s a mental toughness that allows you to handle things that maybe the game, for people, goes too fast. The ‘what if’ scenarios suffocate them. To me, I don’t think you can be afraid to fail. Most people think, “oh, that comes with the territory,” but it really doesn’t. There’s a lot of players that put themselves in situation where they have that out-of-body experience and the next thing you know you’re like, what happened? I truly believe that if you’re not afraid to fail and you allow the moment to not be bigger … you can slow the game down and actually make it to your advantage. Look I feasted off guys who got aggressive and wanted to be the hero. I feasted off situations where the aggression and the moment makes people do things differently. I relished in it. I feel that moment was something I prepared my whole life for.

What stands out to me, among others things, is what Smoltz says about feasting off of guys who "wanted to be a hero" and "the moment makes people do things different."  Smoltz relished the situation and pitched as he always did.  He had an ultimate level of trust in his stuff and preparation for the moment.  Derek Jeter, Madison Bumgarner, and David Ortiz are in this class of player as well.

       In conclusion, remember, "A pitch is a pitch."  Everything else is create by our perception of these external influences we allow to creep in.  If you allow the influences to affect you, that is COMPLETELY NORMAL.  There is no need to beat yourself up about it.  My advice to you would be to reconnect to the moment and choose to focus on your job during that pitch to the best of your ability.  This is where the recommendation of performance routines and using your breath tend to come into play.  Do what has always made you successful, and let everyone else have situations dictate their approach.  "Consistent behavior gets consistent results."  Bingo!

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Nine Lessons for Incoming Freshmen From the Mental Side

        All over the country, thousands and thousands of student-athletes have started their college careers.  I touched on it a couple of weeks ago with the Avoid the Overhype piece, but I felt like it had the makings of an entry on its own.  I'd be remiss if I didn't mention a little inspiration for the topic I got from Casey Fisk.  Casey is a baseball coach in the midwest and has become somewhat of an ambassador for the game via the Twitter forum.  He has a lot of really good ideas about a variety of topics and never shies away from a chance to interact and learn from others.  Casey had a series of tweets with tips for incoming college freshmen, and I think the topic stuck with me.  They led to my idea for some lessons from the mental side.  Many of the lessons within the blog were learned through my own experience, and I'll put a spin that will hopefully allow today's freshmen to learn from the mistakes of my past.  I hope you enjoy them and learn a little bit along the way.

Lesson 1:  Find the balance between knowing you're good and being willing to make adjustments.

You are there for a reason.  The coaching staff thought you were good enough to play for them and be a part of their program.  It doesn't matter what others thought of your commitment to the school.  You're good enough to be there.  It may seem a little overwhelming right now.  Those other guys may be much bigger and stronger.  Yes...that is a player!  He's not a coach!  I'm reminded of something I read in one of Harvey Dorfman's books about a player who was in rookie ball and made a comment to Dorfman about the other players, saying something to the effect of, "Those guys are PROFESSIONALS!"  "So are you!" Dorfman replied.  Well here is your "So are you!" reminder from me.  You're now a college baseball player, and you belong there just as much as those other guys.  That being said, you need to be willing to make adjustments.  Just because something worked for you in high school doesn't necessarily mean it will in college as well.  The quicker you understand you still have much to learn about the game the better.  The college game has its differences.  You don't know everything, and that is okay.  You're not supposed to.  Be willing to adjust for the sake of improvement over the long haul.

Lesson 2:  Understand that struggling/needing to work harder doesn't mean you don't have ability.

This lesson relates to the first in some ways.  You're likely going to have to make adjustments to be successful at this new level.  I can remember really struggling as a freshman and being red-shirted.  It beat me up pretty good.  Failure to me was personal.  I allowed it to affect my value as a person and a player.  Was I not talented enough to be here?  Everywhere I turned I had people criticizing me:  the way I hit, the way I shuffled before throwing on a ground ball, etc.  My problem was my perception of these messages.  I took them as attacks against my ability.  Did they not think I was good?  A much healthier perspective would have been to understand that struggling is part of growth as a player.  Needing to work harder and to make those adjustments had nothing to do with actual ability.  It was much more about experience.  I was just doing what I had always done and what had made me successful in the past.  If I had realized that the changes were not connected to ability, it would have helped me significantly.  So to you, college freshmen, you're going to be there for a long time.  You'll be there 3,4, or 5 years, and you're going to have times of struggle.  Needing to work has NOTHING to do with your ability.  Understand this, and keep plugging along.

Lesson 3:  Don't allow yourself to obsess over "The Other Guy."

For many of you, this is the first time you have had to really compete for a position and for playing time.  You were really good in high school, and it was generally accepted that you would probably play no matter what.  It's likely going to be different in college.  That being said, one of the worst things you can do is allow yourself to do is view the competition for playing time as a threat against you.  The healthier view is that of a challenge.  The healthiest view is that of a challenge to continue to improve yourself.  You will drive yourself crazy constantly making comparisons between you and the guy or guys you are competing with.  I can remember actually focusing on whether the competition was getting hits in intrasquad games.  It makes me want to vomit to think about today how much of my time and focus I spent worrying about what they were doing instead of just focusing on my own improvement and performance.  You only have so much focus to expend.  Please do so on things within your influence.

Lesson 4:  You won't like everyone.  Everyone won't like you.

This is a harsh reality of team sports at the college level.  When you think about it, the logic makes sense.  An increase in the size of the roster from the HS to college level only makes it more likely for there to be people you don't like because there are more people.  I'll use the term jerks when there are probably much stronger, more accurate terms available in the English language.  There will probably be sophomores who are jerks to you simply because you are a freshman.  The same can be true for seniors.  Equally likely, there will be some who just have very different views on college, sports, and life in general.  There will be some who like to engage in activities and substances you may not choose to participate in off the field.  All of that said, there will be sophomores and seniors who are awesome and want to help you out.  There will also be those you get along with very well.  My advice to you would be to spend your time wisely.  Don't allow the jerks to win out over you.  Also, understand that you are still on a team with them even if you don't like them.  You ultimately don't have to like everyone, but you still want to be able to coexist and compete WITH them rather than AGAINST them come spring time.  No matter how little you have in common, the hope would be the commonality of being on a team together outweighs the other stuff when it matters most.  Hopefully, your team leaders and coaching staff understand the toxic influence jerks can have on the team and don't allow it.  Then, as you become a sophomore and later on a senior, be sure to remember the negative impact it can have on the team.  Don't allow it!

Lesson 5:  Extrinsic vs Intrinsic Motivation

The difference between being extrinsically motivated and intrinsically motivated is great.  In a nutshell, being extrinsically motivated means you are driven by things outside of yourself.  You may really respond to the approval of others and rewards.  If you're intrinsically motivated, you're driven by the feeling the experience of sports brings and the experience for its own sake.  In all likelihood, it isn't 100% one way or the other for you.  What I will say is being largely extrinsically motivated is a dangerous path that will likely end at some point negatively.  Someone who is on a constant search for the approval of others is likely to be disappointed often.  If your motor is dictated by how much coaches stay on you and encourage you to work, then college will be a tough experience.  The player to coach ratio is greater, and the time of the coaches is more limited.  The athletes who are able to stay intrinsically motivated and self-driven will likely be better off in the long run.  They will be able to better handle "the grind" of collegiate sports.

Lesson 6:  Close the yearbook...it's a refresh for everyone.

This lesson ties in some with Lesson 1, but it's time to close the yearbook.  Nobody on your team cares if you won a state championship, where you were ranked by any scouting services, or what "elite" travel team you played for.  Everyone who plays in college was "good" in high school.  The longer you are stuck in the past, the more you will miss the present.  Looking back (ironic, given the topic of this lesson I know), it is still amazing to me how the college experience worked out for guys I played against in high school.  Some REALLY good high school players did nothing in college, and some solid players worked themselves into being really good college players.  The same has held true since entering the coaching profession.  Guys everyone loved in high school end up doing nothing and vice versa.  My point is it ultimately doesn't matter how you got to college.  You're there now.  Make the most out of the experience given to you in the present.  The quicker you are able to do so the greater your chances the future looks like you want.

Lesson 7:  Find YOUR healthy balance.

Everyone is going to give you advice about how you spend your college time.  "If you're not in the cages, someone else is," you may hear.  The amount of time you have on your hands can be overwhelming at first.  Yes.  You will spend more time as a team working on baseball and baseball-related activities than you ever have.  What people largely fail to get you to realize before you get there, however, is how much less time you are actually in class compared to high school.  What you do with all of this new-found time and freedom will likely determine both the length and quality of your experience.  The key here is you have to find out what works for you.  One player's balance may be different than another's.  This may take some learning and growing to find.  Who am I to tell you to do nothing but work on baseball?  Who am I to tell you not to spend all of your time working on baseball?  What I would encourage you to do is to reflect every now and again on how you are spending your time.  That may help you realize you need to spend more attention in one area or another.  Find what works for YOU, and understand you'll only have one college career.

Lesson 8:  Take control of your career.  Discover YOUR process.

This absolutely connects with finding your healthy balance and really with Lesson 6 as well.  You are in as much control of your career as you decide to be.  You may have read my thoughts on the process and how it can be an empty term if there is nothing to back up what the process is.  Process, without direction, is nothing but wandering around aimlessly.  This is how you may feel as a freshman trying to find your way.  My advice is, like with balance, find what works for you.  See how others go about working on their craft.  You'll likely take something here and something there until you find your process.  I didn't really discover my process as a hitter until sometime during my redshirt-senior year.  Don't get me wrong.  I hit, and I hit a lot.  I didn't really begin to understand what I was doing until then though, and I think often about why that may have been.  There were multiple variables that contributed, but I wish I had discovered it sooner.  This ties into the reasoning behind what you are doing.  Understand the why, and you'll discover your process.  The purpose for your work is AT LEAST as important as the rigor behind it.  Unlock this purpose, and reap the rewards.

Lesson 9:  Adjusting to the speed of the game

As you move up through different levels of baseball, there is a speed adjustment.  It happened as you moved up to various levels when you were little and again in high school.  Well, no matter how well-prepared your high school teams were, there is an adjustment to the speed of college baseball for you too.  You've likely had the feeling before of everything moving just a little too fast where you can't quite catch up.  College will likely bring this feeling at some point too.  You're bombarded with new information as you get there.  Changes in mechanics, approach, how we do this, how you do that, and so on and so on.  It can be a lot to take in, and it all can contribute to the speed being a little too fast.  Slowing things down is something that helps and can take a variety of forms.  Losing yourself in the routine of playing the game is something Dr. Charlie Maher talks about that has stuck with me.  To me, this is being in the present moment where the action happens.  What makes us feel like everything is too fast is all the other crap that keeps us out of that moment.  It's the doubt of whether we really belong.  It's being fearful of making a mistake.  It's the uncertainty of what to do in a situation.  There's nothing I can tell you that will fix that 100% of the time, but connecting to what your job is on a singular pitch will help.  You do belong.  You're not going to know everything.  You're going to make mistakes, and that is okay!  Or it should be.  Being fearful of mistakes can cripple performance.  Understand the game will slow down over time, but I do think having perspective helps.

Hopefully these nine lessons have helped you just a little bit.  Enjoy the next few years because they really are some of the best you will ever have.  The good will be easy to enjoy.  The bad won't be quite so easy.  This may not help a lot now, but some of the best stories I have are about what was bad at the time.  It's funny how that works.  Those experiences really are great opportunities to learn if you allow them to be.  Ultimately, how you choose to respond to them will have a lot to do with the other experiences to follow and who you become as a person.

Do you have other lessons for college freshmen to learn?  Feel free to tweet them to me, or shoot me an email.  Have a great fall!

Strengthening the Links

        Team sports are great for many reasons.  The feeling of accomplishing something with a large group of people somehow supersedes the euphoria we get after working hard individually and achieving.  One of the elements of team sports I love is the unlimited amount of variables that go into a team being successful.  Quality of talent, mixing of personalities, team chemistry, and efficiently working hard are a few of the many.  As coaches, we all long for figuring out that way we can make a group of people work as well as possible together.  Then, we want to do it again and again.  Rarely are we satisfied.  There is always something we could have done better.  With that in mind, I think there is a way we can improve the quality of team that often gets overlooked.  We have all heard the adage, "You're only as strong as your weakest link."  Well, I think we sometimes focus so much on the creation of this amazing chain that we neglect the links.  In reality, wouldn't it make sense to focus on making each and every link of the chain as strong as possible?

        So how do we go about making each link as strong as possible, and how does that differ than what is already done?  The way to strengthen the links is to focus on development of the individuals.  Rather than teaching everyone to hit the same way, work to the individual strengths and weaknesses of the player.  The same goes with pitching.  If every pitcher has his own velocity level, command, and mix of breaking pitches, should the entire staff then pitch in the same fashion?  The same also goes with the mental side of the game.  Not everyone is the same, and teaching mental skills to everyone in a cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all way makes very little sense to me.  As many of you are aware of, it makes me feel nauseous when I see an entire lineup of hitters have the exact same routine in between pitches.  It makes me wonder if they truly understand the purpose behind having a performance routine or if someone has simply brushed over a topic with them.

        While I do think there are certain concepts everyone can benefit from, the real reward in the implementation of sport psychology lies with an understanding of self.  Becoming self-aware and creating a healthy perspective trumps individual mental skills.  Most of us, after all, are in the business of helping young men and women develop into the best possible people they can be.  Why then do we not spend more time on the development?  In the ideal setting, I think a great mental skills program combines both group and individual sessions.  The group sessions are targeted more at educating, and the individual sessions focus on helping players figure out themselves.

        Over the last several weeks I have been working on a final project paper where I have been researching and writing about the possible effects of implementing a mental skills program at the minor league level over a period of time.  Although the research is extremely limited, I am confident it backs up what I am discussing here.  The question then remains:  Do you want to incorporate the mental side of the game to say you do it, or do you want to because you want players to perform as well as possible and develop as individuals?  Think carefully about that answer, and I'd challenge you to do the same with every element of your coaching.  For the record, I am not against team concepts and have seen firsthand team chemistry make up for shortcomings in talent.  My only point is, at the least, there should be more of a balance of the two.  Focus on the development of individuals within a team concept, and then I think you're onto something.

         Some of you may have seem my analogy the other day of a great team being like a beautiful painting.  The artist doesn't focus solely on the grand totality of the painting to make it happen.  Rather, the artist takes care with each individual brush stroke while keeping the overall painting in mind.  The individuals on your team are the brush strokes.  Take care with each one, and the result will be the "Mona Lisa" you want to create.