Latest / The Layback Podcast / Jason Modafari, DPT with Athletic Potential / Driveline Baseball (Ep. 87)

Transcript

Jason Modafari, DPT with Athletic Potential / Driveline Baseball (Ep. 87) · The Layback Podcast

0:00
What's up everyone, Welcome back to the Laid Back podcast.
0:02
Joining us today is physical therapist Jason Matafari.
0:06
Jason has recently joined the athletic potential team.
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For those of you that might not know the athletic potential
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name, that is the rehab physical therapy arm of Driveline.
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You guys probably know the name Dylan Newcomer from us saying
0:22
it, I guess until the cows come home, literally on this podcast,
0:25
working so closely with him. But Dylan has expanded, brought
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Jason in to the fold. And Jason is now located down at
0:33
Driveline Tampa. He has the pleasure of treating
0:36
athletes down there. And he is only about 6 weeks in.
0:41
I know he still kind of feels like he's drinking water from a
0:44
fire hose at this time, but it sounds like it's been a great
0:48
transition so far. With that, I'm going to kick it
0:50
over to Jason, let him introduce himself a little bit and tell us
0:53
a little bit of his background. So, Jason, thanks a ton for
0:56
coming on today. Yeah, thanks for having me.
0:59
This is actually the first time I've ever been on a podcast, so
1:01
it's kind of cool to actually be on this end of it instead of
1:04
just watching podcast episodes. And I always kind of wondered,
1:07
like, I wonder how it would be to actually be on one of those.
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You watch so many podcasts and it it always seemed like
1:14
something that I thought would be fun to do.
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So yeah, it's really cool to be on here.
1:17
Yeah. So like you said, I've been with
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the athletic potential now for about six or seven weeks.
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I've been down here in Florida previously.
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I guess I'll start from the beginning.
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I actually got my undergrad at, it was at the time the College
1:29
of Mount Saint Joe in Cincinnati, OH and athletic
1:31
training. And I see a lot of people that
1:33
have been on the Way back podcast and just in general kind
1:35
of talk about how I was an athlete and I got injured and
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that's what kind of led me to physical therapy because my
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physical therapist was really good.
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And I thought that was really cool and I wanted to do that.
1:44
But for me, honestly, when I was in a College in athletic
1:47
training, I really didn't even know what a physical therapist
1:50
was. Honestly, I never seen one.
1:52
Any time I was injured, the athletic trainer at whatever
1:54
school I was at took care of it. And luckily I never really
1:56
sustained a super serious injury.
1:58
And my brother actually told me we were in athletic training
2:01
together in the same class and he was like, I think I want to
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go to PT school. And I was like, PT sport is that
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personal training? And he said no physical therapy.
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And I was like, so explain to me exactly what that is again.
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And he did. And I thought, you know, that
2:12
actually does sound really cool. So I kind of learned a little
2:14
bit more about it and researched it and ended up applying with
2:17
him. It was kind of cool because we
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got to be in the same PT class. So I did that.
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So that was three years and graduated from while I was
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there, it became the University of Mount Saint Joe.
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So I was the first class there in 2015.
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And I kind of knew that I always that I wanted to treat athletes
2:31
just when going through the clinicals you go through every
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setting. So I did, I did 2 skilled
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nursing facilities and then two outpatient.
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We just had to do 2 inpatient, 2 outpatient.
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I was never at a hospital, never in traveling, but I saved my 2
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outpatient ones for the last because those were the ones that
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I thought I was going to be more interested in.
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And, and that's kind of where I thought my career path would go.
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I was lucky enough to get the job right out of college at an
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outpatient orthopedic clinic. I mean, it said sports medicine.
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I would say I didn't treat a ton of athletes while I was there.
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Unfortunately, that particular clinic it was physical therapist
3:02
on, so they didn't have an affiliation with the doctor's
3:04
office or with surgeons or a hospital.
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And the local hospital system there kind of had a monopoly on
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all of the high school, all of their athletes kind of went to
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those affiliated physical therapy clinics.
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So we didn't see a ton of athletes.
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I would say in the year I was there, I probably saw maybe a
3:19
handful of high school kids and it was, it was good at first,
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but I kind of wanted to get a little bit more into the
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athletic population. So after about a year, I had the
3:27
opportunity to join a clinic that I had done a clinical at
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that was a little bit more sports medicine based out of
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Cincinnati. So I did that.
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I was there for 10 years and luckily they saw a lot of
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athletes. They had surgeons that obviously
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the Reds medical director, Doctor Kremchek in Cincinnati.
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So I got to work with him for 10 years.
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And through their affiliation with the Reds, I was introduced
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to seeing overhead athletes probably my first couple years,
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just because when I went there, I kind of asked like, hey,
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what's what's a niche that I can kind of get involved with here?
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And that was kind of the first thing they said was, well, are
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you willing to see overhead athletes?
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And I said, yeah, that sounds like it'd be cool.
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So my second or third year there, I started doing that and
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I really liked it. The Reds would contract their
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physical therapy out, so a physical therapist would go down
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to the stadium and treat as the Reds physical therapist.
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So I got to go to spring training maybe my fifth year and
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just kind of observe and just kind of see how it went.
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And I thought that was really cool.
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By my 7th year, I was able to be one of the physical therapists
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that went down there and treat the rest.
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So I did that for the past three years, which was great.
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It was a super, super good opportunity.
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I felt like I learned a lot through that.
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But what's been previously said on this podcast by others is I
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think that sometimes the the burnout at kind of some of those
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insurance based clinics, like it's a little bit overwhelming
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and you just end up seeing 2-3 patients at a time.
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And I felt like I just got to a point where I wanted to be able
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to be a little bit more one-on-one with patients and be
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able to offer a full treatment session uninterrupted with no
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other patients, especially if I was going to work with higher
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level athletes and baseball players.
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And the other thing that always interested me was the
4:58
performance side of things, which was a little bit limited
5:00
where I was. It's just hard to kind of
5:02
incorporate that as much with some of those patients.
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So I wanted to get a little bit more involved with that and I
5:07
just kind of wanted to continue to learn.
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You know, I've seen a lot of physical therapists that kind of
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get to a point in their career and they're just, they're happy
5:13
with that and, and they're happy to just kind of continue on and
5:17
just go through the motions. But for me, I just kind of felt
5:19
like, why do this if I'm just going to stay at this level and
5:23
just continue to do this? I wanted to continue to get
5:25
better. And, and I felt like I met Dylan
5:27
last year and we kind of talked about this for a little while
5:30
and he offered me this opportunity and I felt like that
5:32
was going to be a really good opportunity for me to do that
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and to continue to kind of grow and get better.
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So moved down here in September and I've been doing this ever
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since since then and it's been great.
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It's, it's been really cool. So I have zero business
5:46
education or knowledge. I never took a business class.
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So it was a little bit eye opening when I got down here.
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It was just me. And Dylan has helped.
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He's been a tremendous help. He's been huge with helping me
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kind of acclimate to this and, and get in here and get going.
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But he's in Washington, so it was kind of cool to get to
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figure things out and and get this running as the only
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physical therapist here. I think that just allows me a
6:09
little bit more freedom and I can do things the way I want and
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have a little bit more control over how kind of the rehab works
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here. So yeah, I guess that's kind of
6:16
as far as the introduction goes. I think that last bit of the
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answer will enable us to go deep into the weeds straight from the
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jump, kind of where my mind was going when you mentioned the
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burnout that so many physical therapists encounter.
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I was thinking about it when you addressed it earlier.
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I've suffered from burnout. I, I would assume most people
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who are listening on this podcast have suffered from
6:38
burnout, tell athletes suffer from burnout when all they do is
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stare at a training table every single day.
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It seems like rehabbing athletes suffer from that all the time.
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But right now we'll focus on the physical therapist.
6:50
So maybe maybe the lesser served market of the podcast listeners.
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So the, the reason why I think that that latter part of your
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answer kind of leads us this direction.
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Do you think a lot of the burnout occurs in the physical
7:04
therapy industry? Because physical therapists kind
7:08
of are always stuck in this general space?
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It's hard to get specific unless you are in the cash based space
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and can really dictate who you're seeing as opposed to
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being told who to serve and who to treat and how to do it.
7:23
Yeah. I think a lot of it just has to
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do kind of with the business model as physical therapist.
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We do this for the reward of of being able to see these athletes
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and these patients do what they want to do, get back to
7:33
competition and perform at the IRS level, whatever it is.
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So we're not in it just for the money, but I think that with
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cash based physical therapy, you're able to treat one-on-one
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and still make a living. Whereas I think sometimes just
7:45
the business model with with some of those other clinics and
7:49
companies, what ends up happening is you don't reimburse
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the full amount. The money has to get dispersed
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all over the place in terms of the company and in order for the
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company to stay above water and and make make money, it kind of
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turns into more of a volume game.
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So I think that's just kind of the nature of it.
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And I've heard that from a lot of other therapists in that
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setting. I've heard it from therapists
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and skilled nursing facilities and hospital based settings as
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well. So I think that's just kind of
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the nature of it there. And not that it's a bad thing.
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Like I said, a lot of physical therapists are happy in those
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settings because you're definitely going to have
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patients. So your floor is extremely high
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and I feel like your ceiling maybe isn't quite as high, but
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your floor is a lot higher. So you're always guaranteed
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that, hey, I know I'm going to come in today and I'm going to
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have a full caseload and have a full day.
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And I'm going to have patience this whole week.
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And I'm not going to have to worry about going out and
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marketing or being on social media or generating my own
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caseload. There's obviously a good side of
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it too. And we get to work alongside
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surgeons and see that side of it.
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So there's definitely benefits to it.
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And I think for me personally, I just got to a point where I was
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like, kind of want to see what else is out there and what else
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I can do to kind of elevate myself even higher as far as
8:58
this goes. Just because again, for me
9:00
personally, I was just somebody that wanted to be as good as I
9:03
could at this. And through talking with Dylan
9:05
the last year or so, and I'm sure you've know because you've
9:07
had him on this podcast multiple times, but when I started
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talking to him and I met him, I thought, wow, this guy's
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unbelievable as far as his knowledge, his treatment style
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is commitment to treating baseball players.
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And I thought, man, that's, that's what I want to be like.
9:20
That's what I want to do. And I want to be able to be at
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that level. Like we kind of talked about
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before. I feel like I've learned so much
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in just the six weeks that I've been here as far as treatment
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styles, different things I can do, different ways to elevate,
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throwing programs, Flexpro. I hadn't used one before I had
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come down here. We've talked the last couple
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weeks, which has helped tremendously.
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I use it every single day multiple times.
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I feel like a tool like that sometimes isn't as common in
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different settings. Like where I was, I don't even
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think anybody really knew about it.
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Here we have two of them and like I said, I use it every day.
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So just things like that where some of the technology that's
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out there, you're afforded the ability to kind of work with it
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a little bit better. Being able to see one person at
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a time. I can really use it the way that
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it should be used and even kind of alter the way that it's used
10:06
for some of these guys and free to get their own treatment plans
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because you have the time to do it with guys down here.
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Now I have the time to think about, OK, when you come in
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today, this is how you're presenting.
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This is where you're telling me we have an hour.
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How can we make sure we get the most out of this treatment as
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opposed to, OK, I'm going to put these two people on the bike,
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I'll come back over, then we'll get started.
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We'll do some manual work, do some exercises, go out and do
10:30
those. When you finish those come back
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into me. And so I feel like just having
10:32
that full hour to really be able to progress each treatment and
10:36
individualize it for the patient.
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That's the biggest thing for me. That's been huge.
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I'm I'm able to get the most out of doing this at this point now.
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And and I feel like I'm just able to better serve these guys
10:47
at driveline here. We see a lot of a lot of guys
10:49
that are from college all the way up to professional baseball.
10:51
So I think being able to offer those guys the one-on-one time
10:55
is huge. That was just something that
10:56
over the past couple years really wanted to get a little
10:59
bit more involved with and be able to kind of explore that
11:02
Ave. of physical therapy when I was in school.
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I mean, they didn't even like talk about it.
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I didn't even know that that was really a possibility that you
11:08
could do. It took me a couple years being
11:10
out of school to even really know what that really was.
11:13
And then people did that and I think now it's kind of funny.
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So when when I got down here, I just started a business
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Instagram page for this location last week.
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So I just started and I think in the last week of starting that
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I've already had more cash based physical therapists reach out to
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me just to talk or introduce themselves.
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I've met more of them in in the last week than I did in 10
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years. It's almost like it's own little
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community. And once you're a cash based
11:37
physical therapist, then everybody kind of gets together
11:40
and kind of wants to network communicate, which I think is
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really cool because I thought it would have been a little bit
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more kind of like a competition thing where it's like, oh, well,
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you know, you do the same thing I do in the same setting.
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Like I want to keep my information to me.
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And, but it's been really cool. Like I said, I've I've met more
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of them in, in a week than I did in 10 years.
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So I just think it's been, it's been a cool change.
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Like I said, I think the biggest thing is that I feel like the
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ceiling is is much higher here and I can really kind of
12:07
continue to grow and get better at this and just better serve
12:10
this population. Going back to what you said
12:13
about the more traditional clinics or insurance based pay,
12:18
it seems like it's very easy to fall into a clock in, clock out
12:24
kind of routine as a physical therapist as opposed to truly
12:29
being dialed and creative every single step of the way when it
12:34
comes to athlete care. Like you said, you have a single
12:37
athlete for an hour and you have to individualize, personalize,
12:42
tailor plans in order to fit that individual's needs as
12:47
opposed to just trying to keep your head above water, but also
12:51
doing what is prescribed on a sheet of paper in a clinic.
12:57
And it's it's not that every physical therapist, as you
12:59
mentioned, falls into that. Not every physical therapist
13:02
that's in more of the traditional model suffers from
13:04
burnout. There are incredible physical
13:06
therapists that function in those settings.
13:09
A guy we both have talked about before off air and was on last
13:13
week's episode, Nolan Repay. Nolan Repay spent years in the
13:18
select medical system working in insurance based clinic.
13:23
Nolan is a top 1% of 1% physical therapist in the world and he
13:28
was in the traditional model. Now he has shifted into a new
13:32
role in the private sector. But to think that you could get
13:36
that coming out of just a doctor's office in the Saint
13:38
Louis area is crazy. And there's probably others that
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we don't know about that are that good or that skilled doing
13:45
similar things, but I just wanted to bring that up.
13:48
I'd be curious if you feel any differently about that.
13:51
Clock in, clock out. But that's kind of how I
13:52
internalized it. Moving on to what you're doing
13:56
now and having to be prepared or having to work to tailor
14:01
programs, it kind of seems like now you're thrown out to sea
14:06
without a raft. You kind of got to figure it
14:08
out. You have to be able to problem
14:10
solve on the fly. But that's also the beauty of it
14:13
because you're not doing the same thing every day.
14:14
You have to meet the athlete where they're at that to solve
14:18
the actual problem. And although maybe to people
14:21
outside of our world in baseball, everything might seem
14:25
the same, every UCL injury might seem the same, every rotator
14:29
cuff injury might seem the same. It's just a guy who wants to
14:32
throw a ball again. But you now have to figure out
14:36
what is holding this guy back. Why did the injury occur?
14:40
What is the low hanging fruit? And thankfully in your setting,
14:44
you have this tremendous database now to call upon,
14:48
whether it's Mocap, whether it's force plate data on the high
14:51
performance side, whether it's track man data.
14:54
Now that you have this abundance of information to your left,
14:59
right, up and down, what are things that have kind of called
15:03
to you that you are now using in your athlete care plans that you
15:08
maybe never could even fathom before you step foot in drive on
15:13
Tampa? Two things come to mind
15:15
immediately I think 1 is the use of Clio care balls, weighted
15:19
balls in return to throw programs.
15:20
I use it with every single one now.
15:23
I made a post on it last week. It was my first post on the on
15:26
the Instagram because I thought it was just super important and.
15:30
Well, I got to interrupt real quick.
15:32
How'd it do? How'd the first per?
15:34
How'd the 1st post do? I think it did pretty well, I
15:36
got like 55 likes on it, which for one, you know, after only
15:41
having like 20 something followers at the time it did.
15:43
That's pretty good. I just need to continue to scale
15:46
it. But that's right that you know.
15:48
Yeah. I wanted to kind of post
15:51
something initially that I thought was a little bit, I
15:53
mean, I don't even want to say unique because a lot of people
15:55
use weighted balls now, but just something that, at least for me
15:57
last year with the, the working the last clinic I was at, if
16:01
somebody would have posted that, I would have been like, oh,
16:03
that's really cool. I want to, I want to see what
16:05
they have to say about that. We didn't really use them in in
16:08
the return of throws. And I think a lot of it has to
16:10
do with, and I'm, I've mentioned this in my post is there's a
16:13
fairly nuanced way to use them properly and execute them,
16:17
especially if you're just working with a little Leaguer or
16:20
high school kids, maybe never use them.
16:22
I think it, it becomes even more important to have somebody there
16:25
that can coach them properly on it, that can help them make sure
16:27
they're executing it properly. But I think a lot of people just
16:30
look at them as all people use the weighted balls to throw
16:32
harder and they kind of look at it as almost being taboo.
16:35
So I think one thing being down here that I've kind of really
16:38
gotten into is you can safely and effectively use them without
16:43
increasing the risk of injury. And actually with the return of
16:46
throws, you can actually decrease the risk of injury on
16:48
return of throws if you use them appropriately.
16:51
So I think that's one thing that's been huge for me is
16:54
because I really didn't use them before and return to throws at
16:57
all. But I think they've been huge
16:58
down here. Obviously driveline has been
17:00
known as kind of using weighted balls and velocity programs, but
17:04
also now driveline's using them in return to throws.
17:06
And, and I think a lot of that's credit to Dylan too, who has
17:10
done a lot of work with weighted balls and kind of advocated for
17:12
their use as well. And another thing I think that
17:14
that I've done a lot more with here is kind of meshing physical
17:20
therapy and strength conditioning too.
17:22
I think it the, the last place I was at that was a little bit
17:27
more limited, one, just because of the equipment that we had
17:29
access to. And two, it's it's harder to
17:33
develop a strength conditioning program for an athlete and help
17:35
them execute it when you've got two or three other people that
17:37
you're treating at the same time, especially if you want the
17:40
program to be alive and actually evolving here.
17:44
I've had a lot more opportunity to kind of in almost a lot of
17:48
the rehab I feel like is kind of a just a modified strength
17:51
conditioning session, which is kind of what I wanted to do
17:54
because I feel like you get the most out of the athletes with
17:56
that. And I've even talked to a couple
17:57
guys here that feel like the past or other places that
18:00
they've gone. They feel like the goal with
18:02
rehab is just to get them back to, OK, you are healthy enough
18:06
that you can go play in a competitive game, but are you
18:09
100% are is your level of play going to be what it was before
18:12
you got injured? Maybe, maybe not, but that's not
18:15
really the goal. The goal is to just get you back
18:18
and I think being able to do this, being able to do things
18:21
like incorporate weighted balls and incorporate more strength
18:24
and conditioning, I think the goal now becomes let's not just
18:27
get you back, but let's get you back at the level you were at
18:30
playing before you got injured or higher.
18:33
Athletes even feel it that they feel like, you know, I got back,
18:35
but I don't feel like I was really ready to throw a baseball
18:38
off the mound at 100%. So I think those two things,
18:41
like I said initially come to mind that kind of allow me to do
18:44
that. And those are two things that
18:45
I've really done a lot more with here in six weeks than I ever
18:49
did before. It's just been something as far
18:51
as baseball goes that's really been able to help me better
18:54
serve these guys. Because I think that's another
18:56
thing that's interesting. I was thinking about this with
18:58
with baseball is as far as physical therapy goes, like
19:02
where I was at before we called ourselves throwing therapists.
19:05
So it was basically you were a therapist that worked with the
19:07
baseball players. Well, there wasn't a soccer
19:09
therapist or a football therapist or a tennis.
19:12
So I feel like baseball's just nuanced enough that it, you can
19:15
have your own kind of niche within baseball as far as the
19:18
physical therapist, because throwing and hitting and the
19:22
mechanics that go behind those, it's unique to baseball.
19:25
Obviously there's, there's unique aspects of all sports,
19:28
but I think the throwing itself is very niche because of the
19:32
throwing programs. It's, it's not something where
19:35
you can as a physical therapist say, OK, well, you're ready to
19:37
go throw, just go out there on the field and start throwing a
19:39
baseball. It has to be very meticulously
19:43
written out and programmed and executed for them to be able to
19:47
get back safely just because of how stressful throwing the ball
19:50
in. And I think that was one thing
19:52
that kind of drew me to baseball is, is the nuances of it and
19:56
kind of the its own niche that you can kind of have as a
19:58
physical therapist or maybe other sports don't have that as
20:01
much or if they do, it's just a little bit different.
20:03
But that was something too that was just really cool about
20:06
working primarily with baseball players.
20:07
It just offers you that ability to kind of get more involved.
20:10
In that specific nation and kind of get a little bit more
20:14
specific with with your treatments and what you're
20:16
doing. I want to backpedal a little bit
20:18
to what you were saying specifically about the loading
20:22
strategies in, in that regard. So I recall back on what Josh
20:26
Davis was saying on his episode about kind of the continuum that
20:30
we, we see athletes in this physical therapy realm.
20:34
We, we're always separating athletes for some reason and
20:38
treating them, treating rehabbing athletes as if they're
20:40
different, as if they don't have the same goals as a healthy
20:43
athlete. Yes, they want to make it back
20:45
to competition, but they still want to be as good as they can
20:47
possibly be. Knowing that and knowing that
20:51
tissue responds to load, that's ultimately what's going to get
20:55
these guys better. It's not just making them feel
20:57
good. Granted, feeling good is part of
20:59
it. So their manuals matter or doing
21:02
manual therapy matters, but actually loading the individual
21:07
is super important. How are you tying in your
21:11
prescriptive exercises into into the greater development plan?
21:16
Like are you still treating these guys or do you think if
21:20
you put the the athlete hat on when they're coming to see you,
21:24
do you think they feel as if they are injured or not the
21:28
same? Or are you able to kind of still
21:33
ingratiate them into the greater athlete pursuit of perfection,
21:40
greatness, what have you? I think depending on the
21:42
athlete, I think kind of a combination.
21:44
Obviously these guys are coming in aware of the fact that maybe
21:47
they are injured or were injured and are coming back from it.
21:50
What at least kind of some of the feedback that I've gotten
21:53
here and what I try to do is that when they leave, I want
21:56
them to feel like, you know, I feel like that was more of a of
22:00
a workout than just a PT session.
22:02
And I think the feedback from that is ultimately positive.
22:05
And guys like that because they feel like, you know, I feel like
22:07
I really challenged myself here and that's what I want.
22:10
I had a guy last week after we got done, he said, man, I've
22:14
never done arm care like this. But like, I feel like this is
22:16
what arm care should be. This is this is what what arm
22:19
care should feel like. This is what I would expect it
22:22
to feel like. That's kind of the goal that I
22:24
have is for guys to leave and feel like they were challenged
22:28
appropriately, but challenged because I think one of the one
22:31
of the issues that happens a lot, and I was guilty of this
22:34
earlier on in my career for sure was under loading athletes and
22:37
patients in general because it's safe.
22:39
Do you or load somebody, the chances that they're going to
22:42
injure themselves during the session are lower.
22:45
And eventually, just because of the natural healing processes of
22:48
the body, eventually they probably will heal enough to get
22:51
back to doing what they were going to do.
22:53
Maybe it'll take longer, maybe they won't be at the level they
22:56
were at before, but then they'll get there a lot of times.
22:59
So then you feel as the therapist, like, OK, I didn't
23:02
injure them. I didn't hurt them.
23:03
I didn't cause a set back, but just with training in general,
23:08
there's going to be an inherent risk.
23:10
And I think that you're doing them just as much of A
23:12
disservice by under loading them then you might be by overloading
23:15
them. Because at least if you're
23:16
overloading them, they can give you the response of, hey, that
23:19
was a little bit too much. Hey, this is how I felt.
23:20
OK, well, let's dose it back a little bit and kind of work up
23:24
to that. Whereas if you underload them, a
23:26
lot of them don't realize they think I'm injured.
23:28
This is what I'm supposed to be feeling.
23:30
They might not be able to give you the feedback that they're
23:32
being underloaded because they don't know.
23:34
They assume that that's appropriate or that, hey, you're
23:36
the therapist. So if this is the amount of
23:38
loading is if this is the intensity that I'm supposed to
23:40
be out with this injury right now, then I guess it is what it
23:43
is. But I think with that under
23:45
loading, you get guys kind of like we're talking about before
23:48
they get back to the sport, but then they get injured again
23:51
because they might have been healthy enough to play
23:53
competitively, but were they healthy enough to withstand the
23:55
entire season, the year, the intensity of the the level of
24:00
play, whatever that is. That's kind of one thing that
24:02
that I saw happen a lot was that maybe, you know, guys were
24:05
getting injured again. So I think that being able to
24:08
integrate the strength training and, and being able to kind of
24:11
mesh physical therapy with, with strength training and high
24:14
performance training. Ultimately, we put them in a
24:17
better position to succeed and get back to competition at the
24:20
level that they're going to be able to not only compete at, but
24:23
succeed at too. That's kind of what I try to do
24:25
is, is make sure that guys are are working hard enough in here
24:29
to where they're being challenged and to where when
24:31
they're finished with rehab, they don't just feel like I
24:35
could go back to my sport. They feel confident that I could
24:38
go back to my sport and compete at the level that I was at
24:41
before this all happened. There's obviously a razor thin
24:44
line between development and increased injury risk.
24:48
We talked about that when it comes to principles of
24:52
development, overreaching versus overtraining, those two are so
24:57
close together. But overreaching is oftentimes
25:02
where compensation is going to occur, where we're going to
25:05
develop. Your probably, your brains
25:06
probably starting to fire, like, Oh yes, now we're getting to the
25:09
now we're getting to the bodybuilding stuff.
25:11
So yeah, everyone, Jason has a passion that we will discuss in
25:16
bodybuilding. Don't worry, we're going to get
25:18
there. He's probably itching now, like,
25:20
Oh yeah, I can, I can talk about the meathead stuff.
25:23
But yeah, there there is this crazy small divide or crazy
25:27
small gap between development and injury.
25:30
And I think you stated that beautifully that we have this
25:36
chronic issue across the rehab space of being insanely risk
25:42
averse. Not saying that we should start
25:44
gambling like we're playing roulette at the casino when we
25:47
when we're in rehab, but at some point we have to make rehab or
25:53
make training harder than the game because how are we actually
25:57
going to know if this athlete can move on?
25:59
If they can withstand the forces, then that's when you
26:02
that's when you deal with re injury or aggravation or set
26:06
back type situations. When you say, oh, this guy's
26:08
good to go in his first live outing, he has a hiccup or he
26:12
goes to throw long toss for the first time and the neurology has
26:16
now outpaced the Physiology. So you need to push guys.
26:21
And I'm not saying that a hamstring strain here and there
26:25
is like totally OK. And that's just the price of
26:27
doing business. But as you said, that's that's
26:31
kind of where the feedback becomes so important.
26:33
Or in your current location, your current geography where you
26:37
can take force data all the time.
26:39
You can look at a flex Pro grip assessment, You can assess
26:42
trends. So now how are you utilizing
26:45
objective measurements to tow that razor thin line so you can
26:51
progress guys, so you can work them hard and treat them as if
26:55
they are the athlete chasing down that that goal that we
26:59
discussed in the previous question?
27:01
Yes, you said with the objective measures with the Flex Pro and
27:04
the force plates and dynamometers and strength
27:06
testing and all that. I think it just obviously it
27:08
gives you a more, a clearer, more objective picture of, OK,
27:11
where is this guy at? From a, from a readiness
27:13
standpoint in the past, you just do like for example, a manual
27:16
muscle test and they were just graded on #5 out of five, four
27:20
to five, whatever. Well, what is a four out of
27:22
five, A4 out of five me testing them and a four out of five
27:25
another therapist testing it might feel completely different.
27:28
Whereas if they're testing on a dynamometer or a fourth plate,
27:32
the number is what it is. So you kind of have a little bit
27:34
more of an objective value of where they're at that can help
27:37
you determine their readiness. Same with the Flexpro.
27:40
That's a huge one because in the past, there was really no way to
27:43
objectify how strong somebody's finger flexors were.
27:46
And like I think Dylan said on the on the previous podcast, you
27:49
can use other creative ways to try to elicit the adaptations in
27:52
those muscles with bands or kettle bells or ISO holds,
27:56
things like that. But even with that, how do you
27:58
really know how hard that person is is actually pushing
28:01
themselves? You know, I mean, I can't tell
28:03
you how many times I would tell a kid, Hey, let's do these
28:06
banded ISO holds with your fingertip flexion and have them
28:09
hold the band and tell them, Hey, I want, I want you to make
28:12
sure that you're at about a 70% intensity on that hold.
28:15
OK, And then they're sitting there doing it while they're
28:17
texting on their phone. Well, it's, it's probably
28:20
unlikely that you're actually causing enough stress to elicit
28:23
any adaptation with that. Whereas with a device like the
28:25
Flexpro, you can't cheat that because if they're doing it,
28:28
they're either hitting that or they're not hitting that
28:30
threshold. So it gives, it gives the
28:32
athlete to feedback of, OK, I'm working hard enough to actually
28:36
be getting something of value out of this training device.
28:39
Same thing with the force place guys in here.
28:41
Love it when guys are doing their Mocaps.
28:43
They're so fired up to go over there and do it.
28:45
Guys will stand around and watch them and cheer for them.
28:47
And I think that's huge because when a guys over there mocapping
28:50
and doing counterforce jumps or the pushups and guys are around
28:55
and cheering them on and they're yelling and screaming trying to
28:57
get hit of PRI think just that environment.
29:00
It, it brings the most out of these guys to where if it's a
29:03
therapist just sitting there with their hand trying to manual
29:06
muscle test and it's just not as motivational.
29:08
And I think as a competitive athlete, you, they like that,
29:10
you know, you like that motivation.
29:12
You like feeling like you're in a weight room and you're having
29:14
guys cheer you on as you're trying to lift or do whatever it
29:16
is being able to use those objective measures in those
29:19
tools. One, it just it gives you more
29:22
an objective value to know where the person is.
29:25
And I think 2 From a mental side of it, as far as the athletes
29:28
concerned, I think a lot of them, it gives them confidence
29:31
if they hit the number that, hey, I know where I'm at, I feel
29:33
good about my progress. Or if they're not hitting the
29:35
number, they know, OK, I'm not training hard enough.
29:38
And I think the Flex Pro is just an easy example of that because
29:40
that's one where, like I said, I had never used 1.
29:43
So when these UCLA reconstructions were doing the
29:46
rehab and when they would go back to return to throw, we had
29:50
a functional test where we would test, we would objectively test
29:53
the range of motion, their strength.
29:55
We would do some plyometrics testing.
29:57
We would do like just a dynamometer grip strength test,
30:00
but nothing with the finger flexor.
30:01
So at that point, it's like, OK, we're going to send you back to
30:04
throw. But the two or three structures
30:06
that are probably the most directly involved with
30:08
stabilizing the medial elbow and providing support to the UCL, we
30:11
haven't had no idea how strong. We didn't even test them.
30:14
Whereas with this, now you can you can objectively see where
30:18
they're at. And it's funny because almost
30:20
every single person that I've tested in here initially would,
30:24
would, would test as concerning as far as their number.
30:27
So it's cool to have technology like that because guys maybe can
30:32
you can tease out a weakness that they didn't even know they
30:34
had. Because I think a lot of these
30:35
guys that come in here for maybe an elbow or shoulder injury,
30:38
they're not even really thinking about their finger flexors.
30:40
And all of a sudden they test on this device and it's like, oh
30:43
wow, I was really weak there. I wouldn't have even thought to
30:45
train that. It just gives guys even another
30:48
thing where, hey, I need to work on that and I didn't even know
30:51
that it was weak. Kind of bringing this to a head,
30:54
at least this part of the conversation.
30:57
I appreciate you going down the route of Flex program and kind
31:00
of explaining what we have on display.
31:03
But you also painted the picture of what's going on literally
31:06
behind you behind those walls right now on the training floor.
31:11
Guys trying to PR guys working like crazy to reach certain
31:16
metrics. If we put metrics in front of
31:19
people, they're going to try to hit them.
31:21
These are these are competitive athletes and there's a reason
31:26
that we're now able to I guess make the world healthier or make
31:31
our world healthier because of these metrics.
31:35
It matters. It's everything you said, the
31:37
objectivity that we're able to provide, which is huge.
31:40
We we can now train at the correct loads for the correct
31:44
amount of time under tension to actually make an adaptation.
31:47
But it's not like athletes haven't cared about their
31:51
forearm health before. Everybody in baseball has cared
31:54
about the media level, they've cared about the UCL.
31:57
We just haven't been able to target it previously and what we
32:01
have been able to do is train force production from the ground
32:05
up like crazy. We we've gotten really good at
32:08
putting force into the ground or lead leg blocks and other pieces
32:11
of mechanics in shoulder internal rotation force.
32:15
I don't even know the stuff that can be trained on force plates
32:19
and Kaiser machines and all that crazy stuff that we have access
32:22
to now. Not that it's crazy bad, it's
32:24
all crazy good. But what we have found and I've
32:28
talked about it routinely now is weak things break in.
32:33
What we are going to see with Flex Pro Grip is what that true
32:37
weakest link is. We've gotten so good at
32:40
everything else that we had no idea that the forearm was just
32:46
the weak link. And it makes sense because
32:48
everything is going to work up. The chain force has to be
32:51
expressed out through the hand and into the baseball and what
32:55
connects the shoulder to the hand?
32:57
Well, the elbows in there. So it only makes sense that the
33:00
forearm musculature, if it is under trained, it's leaving the
33:04
UCL exposed or we're going to have a forearm strain as in a
33:07
flexor strain and there's going to be issue there.
33:11
So I appreciate you shedding light on that.
33:13
I just kind of wanted to bring that to a head.
33:15
Now I do want to tie in your kind of ulterior passion and
33:21
bodybuilding, not just to have you talk about bodybuilding, but
33:25
kind of the principles that you've learned from bodybuilding
33:29
and how that has now influenced either the way you work with
33:33
athletes or the way you think in this whole problem solving game
33:37
of athlete care. Yeah, so I think in the in the
33:41
fitness industry as a whole recently they've gotten really
33:44
big on science based training. And it's controversial in terms
33:49
of is that the way to go now or do people still want to train
33:53
with the bro splits? Because that's been effective
33:55
and guys grew from that. But I think now there's a
33:57
there's a much bigger, a much heavier influence on on the
34:00
science of training. And there's a lot more
34:02
literature out there and research being done how to
34:05
maximize muscle hypertrophy and minimize fatigue.
34:08
It's interesting because when when I first I started to go
34:11
down that path as far as like, OK, how can I optimize not only
34:14
my own training, but training athletes and training my
34:17
patients and my clients? You, you look at the research
34:20
and you know, like, for example, there's a lot of research now
34:23
coming out with training that has, is saying that maybe do in
34:27
a Rep range of four to 7 or 8 reps is theoretically going to
34:32
be optimal for hypertrophy because you're minimizing
34:35
central nervous system fatigue. But at the same time, you can
34:37
still train with higher reps and grow the muscle the same.
34:40
You're just going to fatigue more.
34:41
And I think it's helpful to have that information, but I think it
34:45
also it comes with a caveat that you need to be able to integrate
34:51
that into your own kind of experience and your own kind of
34:56
anecdotal, I guess, result with your training.
34:59
Because I think some people take the science too far and it's
35:01
like, OK, well, every set I do now has to be between 4:00 and
35:04
8:00 because that's what the science says.
35:06
But I think the interesting thing is the gym I work out down
35:08
here in Florida is a lot of professional bodybuilders.
35:11
And it's interesting because you see none of them training.
35:14
They're the, these are the best bodybuilders in the world.
35:16
So you think, OK, well, if none of these guys are training the
35:19
way that science is saying, how are they making so much
35:21
progress? A lot of it comes down to what,
35:23
what are they supplementing with?
35:24
What else are they taking on? Well, that's why because they're
35:26
taking this or that or whatever. But you know, the more I thought
35:29
about that, I thought that might be true.
35:32
But even if you were taking something, why wouldn't you
35:35
still train the way that has been shown in science to work
35:38
better if it would work better than your bro's foot or whatever
35:41
you're doing? And I think it comes down to
35:43
everybody's different. And I think Physiology, there's
35:46
still a lot of Gray area in, in muscle Physiology, even though
35:50
we figured out a lot more as far as how Physiology works and, and
35:53
how muscle grows optimally with training.
35:57
I think for me, it's been important.
35:58
And I think that's why actually training that way myself has
36:01
helped me because, and if you don't train yourself, it's going
36:05
to be hard to know. OK, Well, like for example,
36:08
that's the way that's the Rep range that has been shown in a
36:11
lot of literature to be the most effective and efficient at
36:14
growing muscle. For me personally, it's not.
36:18
So I kind of vary up Rep ranges. I like to do a little bit
36:21
higher. If I stay in those Rep ranges
36:23
for an extended period of time, I start to get too beat up, my
36:26
joints hurt, I can't train as hard, I need more rest breaks.
36:29
And I think that's true for a lot of people is that everybody,
36:32
there's a lot of individual variability that I think
36:34
sometimes isn't accounted for. So anything for me, it's
36:37
important to use the science and use the evidence as far as how
36:42
to train for hypertrophy and how to most efficiently generate
36:45
mechanical tension in a muscle to provide adaptations or
36:49
illicit adaptations. But then at the same time,
36:52
knowing your client or your athlete and and seeing how their
36:54
body responds because sometimes not everybody's going to respond
36:58
the same way to training. So I think honestly that's
37:02
probably been the biggest thing I've learned is, is being able
37:04
to kind of meet in the middle as far as the science and then as
37:09
far as the kind of bro science goes.
37:11
Because it seems to me now like it's huge on Instagram to be
37:14
science based and science based training.
37:16
And you see all these science based muscle hypertrophy coaches
37:20
out there that are training full body three times a week, and
37:24
then all these crazy splits that they swear up and down.
37:26
That's the best split. But I think ultimately it just
37:28
comes down to the individual and what works best for them.
37:30
And I think it's physical therapist that's important
37:32
because I mean, everybody's different and we're treating
37:35
people that are playing different sports, different
37:37
levels, different positions. And obviously also you take into
37:41
account the fact that a baseball pitcher's main goal shouldn't be
37:44
to be as big as they possibly can be.
37:47
So I think it's also important that in that case, to be able to
37:52
use some of the principles from bodybuilding training and
37:54
hypertrophy training with the way that I train guys here.
37:57
But also at the same time look at what the end goal is.
38:00
The end goal is it for these guys to step on stage on the
38:02
bodybuilding show. The end goal is for them to be
38:05
able to throw a baseball as hard as they can, as safely as they
38:07
can and as effectively as they can with minimal injury risk.
38:11
So I think that's been kind of an interesting thing for me,
38:14
being able to incorporate some of those bodybuilding principles
38:16
into training these athletes, but at the same time keeping in
38:21
mind that they're not bodybuilders and that they need
38:23
to be able to do something totally different.
38:26
But I think it's cool because I feel like it maybe isn't as much
38:31
of A passion of a lot of people that work with baseball athletes
38:34
or play baseball to be super into bodybuilding training.
38:37
So I think it's just, it's something that's different.
38:39
And sometimes I kind of feel like I'm an outlier because a
38:42
lot of the physical therapists that work with baseball players
38:44
play baseball in college. And I've even had players ask me
38:48
like, Oh, where did you play? And it's like, well, have you
38:50
ever heard of elder high school? And since you know, like you
38:52
play it like Our Lady of victory grade school.
38:54
I didn't play high level baseball and I don't play
38:56
baseball now. Like when I when I leave work, I
38:58
go to the gym and I work out. It's different, but I think it
39:02
definitely has helped me because I think using the principles
39:04
that I've learned from my own training have helped me to be
39:07
able to more efficiently train some of these guys.
39:10
It has helped me to be able to kind of minimize fatigue
39:13
sometimes with with these guys with their training.
39:15
It's helped me to be able to kind of better understand where
39:19
a muscle has better mechanical advantage, if a muscle responds
39:23
better to being trained at longer or shorter lengths or
39:25
what the resistance profile of a different muscle is or a
39:29
different movement. Just so you can kind of use that
39:31
to help you decide what's going to be the best way for me to get
39:34
the most out of this guy. So I think that's kind of those
39:38
principles of what I use the most.
39:40
But like you said, it's a lot different.
39:41
So I feel like I, I just have to make sure that don't get too
39:46
excited about the bodybuilding training when I'm training guys
39:48
in here because they're not bodybuilders.
39:50
But having said that, I, I feel like I do, I do train and, and I
39:56
do treat a lot of that community because when a bodybuilder or
39:59
somebody that competes in strongman or powerlifting or
40:02
whatever finds a therapist that also trains like that.
40:05
Oh man, they're all about, you know, like I had a guy in
40:08
Cincinnati, he was a strongman competitor.
40:10
He weighed over 400 lbs. Tour his quad and.
40:13
Then tore it again and the second time he tore it, his
40:16
surgeon told him you're never going to be able to squat again.
40:20
You you probably shouldn't ever squat again if you want to be
40:23
able to live a normal life. That was like a crushing blow to
40:26
this guy because that was all he did.
40:28
He actually just text me recently.
40:29
He's about 10 months out, 1011 months out of that.
40:34
And he just squatted 750 lbs this week with no pain.
40:40
And he said it felt better than he did when he before he was
40:42
injured. So I think, you know, being able
40:46
to work with those guys I think is really unique too, because I
40:49
think working with fitness competitors and bodybuilders is
40:53
unique because the way that they train obviously is different and
40:57
what they need to be able to do is different.
40:59
And you know, this guy being able to squat, you know, having
41:01
to squat £700, obviously it's, it's unique in terms of kind of
41:06
the rehab that needs to go into that because you can't treat
41:08
that guy like, you know, just, hey, I want to go back to the
41:12
gym and just work out. So actually that, you know,
41:15
there have been quite a few fitness competitors and
41:17
bodybuilders that have reached out to me that I've treated, you
41:20
know, here and there. Obviously being in the baseball
41:23
facility, they're a little bit fewer and far between right now,
41:26
but I guess that's kind of how I how I kind of mesh the two.
41:30
But I think it's also nice too, because having another passion
41:34
besides just baseball and treating baseball, I think has
41:36
allowed me to continue to stay excited about both because it's
41:39
not like I'm, I'm here doing baseball and then when I leave
41:41
here, I go throw or I go ahead or I go train baseball, I do
41:45
something else. So I think it's allowed me to
41:47
kind of stay fully invested in both because again, you know, we
41:51
talked about burnout before. I'm not getting burnt out with
41:53
either 1 and I still really enjoy being able to kind of wear
41:57
both hats and treat both kind of population.
42:00
There's a few things you addressed in that answer that I
42:05
feel like we could go any which one of these ways, and each one
42:08
of them would probably take an hour to fully get through.
42:11
So I don't know the best way for me to respond, but I'll address
42:15
the topics that I'm very interested in nonetheless. 1
42:19
hypertrophy based athletes versus force expression based
42:23
athletes being baseball players specifically in a rotational
42:26
manner. The other you, you called upon,
42:29
which I was very interested in. So maybe this is the route we'll
42:32
end up going. Workload management, knowing
42:35
that bodybuilding is very much a train to fatigue type sport or
42:39
type endeavor. I mean, granted, I, I don't know
42:42
much about it. People can see me, I'm 190 lbs
42:46
on my good days. So I, I don't even know if I can
42:49
begin to talk about the fatigue that bodybuilders experience.
42:52
But from what I've witnessed in gym, that's what it seems to be
42:56
just train to fatigue. So workload management becomes
42:58
extremely important. Those are probably the main 2.
43:01
So we'll stay, we'll stick there.
43:03
I'll let you go choose your own adventure.
43:05
What do you, which route do you want to go here?
43:07
Jason? Do you want to talk about the
43:09
the workload management, how that has kind of really
43:12
influenced the way you're treating athletes now?
43:15
You want to go the force expression route?
43:17
And if we have time, we'll get into both.
43:18
I think there's something interesting that we could that
43:21
we could bring up with the workload management is that and
43:23
kind of you touched on this just with when you were bringing up
43:26
the topics. Bodybuilding is interesting
43:28
because you're not training to perform in anything.
43:31
You don't, you don't really need all that muscle and what you're
43:34
training to do anything. It's your training to look good
43:38
on a stage and it's all about the aesthetics and the looks.
43:41
So I think that just differs a lot because with a baseball
43:44
player, it doesn't matter how you look, it matters how you
43:47
perform. So it's very different in terms
43:49
of what you need to be able to actually do.
43:51
You know, like with the bodybuilder, for example, it
43:53
really doesn't matter how strong they are or ability to an
43:57
extent, but it doesn't really matter how how well their
44:00
muscles can perform as long as they can go out on a stage and
44:02
pose and look good. That's what essentially their
44:05
success is based off of is how they look.
44:07
Whereas with the baseball player, the success is based off
44:10
of how they perform. So I think with bodybuilding, as
44:13
far as training goes, if you find a training method that
44:17
works for a guy in terms of he's growing on it and he's
44:19
responding well, then he looks the way that you want them to
44:24
look or that he wants to look, or that he's happy with, or he's
44:27
bringing up lagging body parts that maybe a judge told him that
44:30
he needed to work on or whatever.
44:32
It's all about the look, which is I just think unique because
44:34
all other sports need to be able to perform.
44:37
And I mean, I guess you could say to bodybuilding you're
44:39
performing is being out on the stage and posing, but it's a lot
44:42
more about just kind of the look of of the muscle.
44:44
Whereas with baseball, you've seen baseball players look all
44:47
kinds of different ways. I've seen baseball players look
44:49
like they've never worked out a day in their life.
44:51
And then I've seen baseball players that look like they're a
44:53
body. That's different too, in the
44:54
sense that when you're training just to look good, it doesn't
44:57
necessarily matter your rate of force development as much.
45:00
It doesn't necessarily matter how you can express force on a
45:04
on a force played or a Flexpro or something like that, because
45:08
that's not really what you're being tested on.
45:10
Whereas in baseball, if you're not able to do that and if
45:13
you're not able to express that force efficiently, you're not
45:16
going to perform and you're not going to succeed in your sport.
45:18
So I think that's where the training is just a little bit
45:21
different. Like you don't see a lot of
45:22
bodybuilders doing a lot of high velocity explosive stuff unless
45:25
maybe they just enjoy it and they want to.
45:28
So I think that's where it's just the training styles a
45:30
little bit different. Hypertrophy training is is kind
45:33
of unique in it in its own way, just in that that's your main
45:37
goal is how you look. And I think a lot more
45:39
bodybuilders like to use as with baseball, it's a little
45:43
different. You know, if you look at our gym
45:44
out here, there's a lot of power racks, the dumbbells, kettle
45:47
bells, bands, things like that. They're not very many machines.
45:51
If you go to a bodybuilding gym, it's almost the opposite.
45:54
A lot of machines and there's power racks and dumbbells and
45:58
things like that. But the majority of the gym is
46:00
machines. Because again, when you're able
46:02
to train on a machine, the inherent stability that the
46:05
machine allows you to kind of isolate a particular muscle a
46:08
little bit better so that you can focus on developing that
46:11
individual muscle group muscle. Whereas in baseball, again, it
46:14
doesn't necessarily matter as much isolating a muscle or
46:17
making sure that your muscle is fully developed.
46:19
It matters how you're performing.
46:21
And a lot of time with performance, it's a group of
46:23
muscles and it's more of a compound movement.
46:25
So it's just kind of interesting too.
46:27
And you, you see a bodybuilding gym verse football weight room
46:31
or a baseball gym, they just look totally different just
46:34
because the goal of, of what you're going to get out of that
46:37
training is, is totally different.
46:39
Sticking on the the theme of workload here, specifically in
46:43
training or in physical therapy, what have you, knowing that
46:48
baseball is more of a force production esque sport or force
46:54
expression. There's only so often you can
46:59
expose an athlete to those high loads or high expression bouts
47:05
versus as you were starting to mention, it does not matter if
47:09
you are tired when you are bodybuilding because we we can
47:13
kind of just keep going or as you said, it's not like the
47:17
competition requires force expression is just do you look
47:21
good knowing that you have so much experience on the feel side
47:27
of things working in this bro science area or having a passion
47:31
in the bro science area? If someone isn't at driveline
47:35
and they don't have the amazing data-driven tools that you have,
47:42
you're probably super well positioned for this.
47:45
How can they begin to judge when to cut off a Rep or when to cut
47:49
off an exercise so the athlete can get back to baseline the
47:55
next day or be ready to train again to keep inching forward
47:59
towards their ultimate goal? Are you talking in terms of more
48:02
of like a baseball player training?
48:03
More for baseball. So I think a lot of it, it just
48:08
kind of depends on the individual and, and if they're
48:10
going to go in to train on a separate day or if they're in
48:13
physical therapy, how they feel, if they, if they just feel
48:16
rundown and fatigue, I think is a big thing.
48:19
I think that's kind of, I don't know.
48:20
I feel like it's, it's kind of hard to answer just because I
48:22
think it's depends a lot on the, on the athlete in general,
48:26
though, I think like when a guy comes in here, I'll kind of ask
48:29
him, OK, well, how do you feel today compared to, to yesterday?
48:32
Say they trained yesterday. If they come in the next day and
48:35
they feel like, you know, I felt like I was really sore after the
48:37
workout and today I feel a little bit better, but I still
48:41
feel the effects of of the workout yesterday.
48:43
I'm still feeling sore. And this kind of go into the
48:45
bodybuilding with this too. You hear a lot of people say
48:49
that in order to grow muscle, you have to damage it first and
48:51
then it builds back stronger, which that's actually not what
48:54
you want to do. So if you're causing muscle
48:56
damage, that's not necessarily a good thing because now not only
48:59
does your body have to repair that damage first, then it can
49:03
grow on top of that. If you're training a muscle hard
49:05
enough to where it's damaged. And a lot of times that's where
49:08
that's where they might still be sore the next day if they
49:11
actually train hard enough to cause muscle damage.
49:13
So sometimes you just you look at, you ask them how they feel
49:17
and you go off how they feel in terms of determining what they
49:20
would maybe do the next day as far as training goes.
49:23
If they come in the next day and they're like, I feel great.
49:25
I don't, I can't even tell I worked out yesterday or I feel
49:29
totally recovered. And then they go and perform and
49:32
the performance doesn't look good.
49:33
It's like, OK, well, maybe you feel good, but your performance
49:35
isn't quite there. So I think just using a
49:37
combination of those kind of listening to the athlete, how do
49:40
they feel and then also observing them and how they're
49:44
performing at the beginning of the workout or how the warm up
49:46
looks or whatever it is. Which I think is another kind of
49:49
an important component of being able to be in this cache based
49:52
setting, this one-on-one setting.
49:53
Because if you're in a big busy clinic and you have a couple
49:56
people at a time, it's hard to have that conversation with the
49:59
athlete because you've got three people going.
50:01
So that guy might come in OK, you know, go out there and warm
50:03
up on the bike, not even realizing that that guy doesn't
50:07
feel good from the last time he trained or the last time he did
50:09
PT or he threw yesterday and he doesn't feel recovered from it.
50:12
You don't even know that because you really weren't able to have
50:14
the conversation with him. Then you go send him out to do
50:16
his warm up or his first couple exercises while you're working
50:19
with somebody else and you really don't see him.
50:21
So I think being able to have the conversation with them and
50:24
kind of get an idea of how they feel and then also see how they
50:28
look too. Because like I said, some guys
50:30
might just not realize that they're fatigued or they might
50:32
just be so amped up to train that they just don't really
50:34
realize it. But that's a good question.
50:35
A lot of that just kind of depends so much on the athlete.
50:37
But that's something that is one of the really nice things about
50:40
being in the setting though, is because I feel like I'm able to
50:43
tease that out of somebody and figure out their general
50:47
preparedness to work out a little bit better than if I
50:50
would have been in a clinic where I'm seeing two or three
50:51
people. And I think that helps me to
50:54
maybe modify that next training day so that they're still going
50:57
to get something out of the day. It's not going to be a waste.
51:00
But you're also just not overtraining.
51:02
And just like you said, building more fatigue on top of the teeth
51:05
they already still have in in that one-on-one setting here.
51:08
It's a little bit easier to do that.
51:10
You can just kind of get a better idea of where an athlete
51:12
is coming in and kind of use that to modify your day instead
51:17
of just inherently ramping up. Again, some of these athletes at
51:21
the higher levels, I think they're a little bit more in
51:22
tune with their body. But high school guy, you might
51:25
think, well, I'm supposed to feel this way and we didn't have
51:28
a conversation about it. I guess if this is OK, this is
51:31
how I'm supposed to feel. Not realizing that they're
51:33
overtraining. You're not realizing that maybe
51:35
they needed to have their day modified a little bit.
51:38
Just being able to have those conversations is a huge part of
51:42
it. And I think that's a lot easier
51:43
to do when you have more time with that athlete one-on-one.
51:47
As we're starting around things out here, what are some things
51:50
you're excited about going down the line?
51:53
You obviously have a full offseason ahead of you.
51:56
And for you that that doesn't just mean unlocking a new PR for
52:01
a guy or helping him throw a new slider.
52:06
That means potentially helping a guy break in big league camp who
52:11
got hurt and might have lost their spot, something like that.
52:14
So knowing that you have this offseason to kind of help
52:19
athletes remodel themselves or revitalize a career or heal
52:24
something that was hurting all season, what, what are you
52:27
looking forward to? What what's getting you going
52:30
over these next few months? Like you kind of mentioned, I
52:33
think one thing that that I'm really looking forward to is we
52:36
have quite a few guys here that aren't currently with an
52:38
organization. It'll be really cool to be able
52:41
to work with a guy in an offseason and see him get
52:44
signed. And like you said, see him go
52:46
into a spring training where maybe in October he wasn't sure
52:48
if he was going to have a job next year.
52:50
Because to these guys, I mean, this is their, this isn't just a
52:52
game, It's their career too. It's how they make money.
52:54
It's how they provide for the families.
52:56
And you know, it's it's, it's their life, it's in their
52:59
livelihood. So I think being able to be a
53:02
part of that and be involved in that guys ability to get signed
53:06
by an organization and have a job in the spring, I think
53:08
that's going to be really cool because I haven't really gotten
53:11
to be in that position before. So I think being able to kind of
53:14
work with a guy, follow them along the whole offseason and
53:17
and kind of be a part of that process.
53:19
And also just you hear a lot of big league guys they'll talk
53:21
about like their guy that they have in the offseason.
53:23
Oh, I go see my guy back home, whatever.
53:25
I think being able to be the players guy, to be that guy.
53:30
I think it's cool because in the past, I just see how how highly
53:34
the players talk about like the person that helped them in the
53:37
offseason, the person they worked with all offseason.
53:39
To be able to go and break camp on the big league team or be
53:43
able to actually have an organization, be able to be
53:46
healthy the whole next year and not be hurt.
53:47
When you see the excitement and the enthusiasm that those
53:51
players have for the people that help them like that.
53:54
I think just being able to be a part of that's really cool.
53:56
And to me, that's why I do this. I don't do this just for the
53:58
money of it or for the cloud or being able to work with
54:02
professional athletes. I do it because ultimately at
54:04
the end of the day, the most gratifying thing for me is to be
54:07
able to help these these guys and to be able to see them
54:10
succeed. To be able to see how happy they
54:12
are when they throw 90 or when they PR on a mocap or when they
54:16
get signed by our organization and to just be able to see how
54:19
excited they are for that and see how happy they are and know
54:22
that you were a part of that and you were involved in that
54:24
getting into that spot. That's the biggest thing.
54:26
More than money or more than getting a shout out on Instagram
54:29
or anything like that. I think it's just being able to
54:31
know that like, hey, I was able to help this guy and get him to
54:34
this point where at the beginning of the offseason he
54:37
maybe wasn't sure what the next year was going to look like for.
54:39
Speaking of shout out on Instagram, this is now your turn
54:44
to share your social media handles.
54:46
So I know you said you don't care too much about the shout
54:49
out, but you actually want to help the athlete where they go.
54:52
But this is the time where I need you to shout out yourself.
54:55
So if anyone wants to get in touch, follow along with what
54:58
you're doing, or just learn more about you, please share.
55:03
So the one I just made last week for the business, it's doctor
55:07
dot Jason modafari dot DPT. That's kind of the business
55:10
Instagram. It's mostly just going to be
55:12
baseball. And my other one, my Fitness 1,
55:14
is at Modafit 513. I created two different ones.
55:18
I was the kind of thinking about and I was like, you know, I
55:19
already have kind of a following on that one.
55:21
I've already made 100 posts. But I thought to myself, because
55:24
I was actually at the gym talking to guys about it, like,
55:26
man, we don't care to see a bunch of baseball stuff on your
55:28
Instagram. Like I'm doing workouts like I
55:31
don't want to see like all this baseball stuff that I don't
55:34
understand. And I thought, yeah, I guess
55:35
that's a good point. So I just decided to create one
55:38
where it'll be kind of all baseball.
55:39
And maybe I'll just put my bodybuilding handle on it in
55:42
case somebody from that realm wants to see the fitness stuff
55:46
too. But I think the bodybuilders
55:48
would be less interested unless they have a son or, you know, a
55:51
relative that plays baseball, probably aren't going to want to
55:54
see an account flooded with with that as much.
55:57
So I felt like having two separate ones and that
56:00
circumstance might be helpful. It's funny you bring that up
56:03
because I bet there's a handful of baseball players that would
56:05
love to see your bodybuilding content, but of course the
56:09
bodybuilding guys don't want any part of your baseball stuff.
56:12
Yeah, it's kind of interesting. And you're right, there are
56:14
there are the baseball guys that like to see the fitness stuff,
56:17
but I feel like for the bodybuilding, they're not as not
56:20
that they dislike it, but they're just not as interested
56:22
in baseball content, which, you know, I mean, I get it, That's
56:25
fine. But I think and I could see how
56:29
it would be a little bit maybe confusing to post both on the
56:31
same. We're going to look at it and be
56:33
like, all right, I don't understand this page.
56:35
There's a picture of him working on the bodybuilding gym with
56:37
with these huge guys. And then the very next post he's
56:40
talking about weighted balls and return to throw.
56:42
These guys probably can't even throw a baseball.
56:43
They're so big. So what Like what is the deal
56:46
with this page? Which means we might need, I
56:49
know you said you're not training anything baseball
56:52
related, but we might need a Road to 75 video or something
56:55
like that from you. You know, I'm interested.
56:58
I don't even know how hard I could throw a baseball.
57:00
So maybe I'll try and I'll let you know how how hard it goes
57:04
and I'll see what it's at. I feel like I hit one pretty
57:06
hard. I don't know.
57:08
I don't know how I can throw 1. Maybe I'll do so.
57:11
I'll let you know and then I can, we can maybe make a, yeah,
57:15
a road to 75 or a road to 100 X and below or whatever.
57:20
We also might need you to be the first person to be able to do a
57:24
back bridge in your bodybuilding gym, because I doubt there's
57:27
many people in there that can put their hands on the ground.
57:32
Oh, absolutely not. I mean, some of those guys have
57:34
trouble getting off the toilet, much less I think.
57:36
I think I would definitely be the first one to be able to do
57:38
something like that in there. Maybe.
57:41
Maybe that's the unlock in the bodybuilding world.
57:44
People haven't spent enough time on mobility.
57:46
I might not know what I'm talking about, but that that
57:49
could be the thing. I'm sure I thought there's quite
57:52
a few that that don't. Yeah, Although there's you see a
57:55
couple guys that they're pretty flexible, but then there are
57:58
some that are. It's the worst flexibility
58:00
you've ever seen. So train at length, right
58:02
people? People talk about it all the
58:03
time. So if you if you can train at
58:06
length, you might be on to something there.
58:09
Yeah. No, you're right.
58:10
You're right. You, I, I know we, we briefly
58:12
hit on it earlier, but mechanical advantages, I don't
58:16
know if you're training at the long muscle length.
58:18
So if you're, if you're bent over, I mean, it, it works for
58:21
the forearm, it works for the hamstring, it works for the
58:25
quad. Why?
58:26
Why wouldn't it work for the pecs?
58:27
Why wouldn't it work for the delts?
58:29
I'll have to try to do one at the like on the turf area at the
58:32
gym and see see what people think.
58:34
Yeah, the bodybuilders to see if he can do 1.
58:38
Yeah, that's the content that I'm going to be coming for.
58:40
And and hopefully you get a big boost for, for you just inciting
58:44
different bodybuilder mobility challenges, maybe that can be
58:47
your little niche. I can post, yeah, I'll post some
58:50
of those. I'll post on my baseball
58:52
Instagram. I'll I'll post my my throw and
58:54
how hard it is. See what that's right?
58:57
Road to 75, That's probably a pretty good benchmark.
59:00
Right, that, that seems reasonable, at least to start.
59:02
I don't know. I, I don't want to tell you to
59:04
do road to 90 right away and you're throwing 61 miles an
59:07
hour. That might take a little bit of
59:09
time. And I think the hitting, like I
59:11
said, I think I, I think that that'd be all right.
59:13
I'll have to get in there and see how hard I could hit one.
59:16
If I can hit it, that would be the first thing.
59:17
I guess I'm not too concerned with your ability to stop force,
59:22
it's just how quickly can you create it?
59:24
Yeah, yeah, I think yeah. Being being 54 and weighing 190
59:29
lbs is not a a super good comic for throwing against more hard
59:35
but. True muscle hamster.
59:37
Yeah, that will help. Yeah, yeah.
59:39
Well, there we have it. Jason, thanks a ton.
59:42
I know we covered a lot of different topics today that we
59:44
don't normally cover on here, which hopefully it'll create
59:47
some questions from the masses because obviously you can call
59:51
upon some different experiences from most of us in this industry
59:55
who were all washed up baseball players that found some way to
59:58
stick in versus you, you saw. You saw something amazing from
1:00:03
the outside and wanted to get involved, but Jason, it's been
1:00:06
great to get to know you over these past few weeks and I'm
1:00:09
looking forward to growing the relationship and continuing to
1:00:12
make the world of baseball Better Together.
1:00:14
Yeah, absolutely. Thanks again for having me on
1:00:16
this. Like I said, this is first
1:00:17
podcast I've ever been on, so I'm grateful for the opportunity
1:00:20
to be on here. And I think it's really cool to
1:00:22
be kind of involved in in this podcast and just now in in this
1:00:26
kind of world, this space, I guess, as far as baseball
1:00:30
treatment and training goes. So yeah.
1:00:32
So again, thanks again for having me and this is great.
1:00:35
Definitely. Well, Jason, again, thank you.
1:00:38
And to all the listeners out there, thanks for laying back
1:00:41
with us.