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Mental Game Strategies You Should Try · The Mound Visit

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Today's topic is the mental game. Josh and I are going to dive into
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all aspects of the mental side of baseball, how to overcome obstacles, how
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to stay in the present moment, as well as give you resources and use
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real life examples of how you can apply this to your own game. But
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before we jump into the episode, we need a huge favor of you.
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We're trying to grow this podcast to be as big as we can to help
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as many coaches, players and parents. To do that, we need you
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to download on Spotify and Apple and follow us on YouTube. If you can
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do that, we're going to be able to reach more people and impact the
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game of baseball even more. Appreciate you, guys. Let's dive into the
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episode, all right, Josh, Let's start today with a story of one
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of my all time favorite pictures, Roy Holiday. For those of you that
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are a little bit younger listening, you may or may not know who Roy
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Holiday was Big League picture for fifteen plus US years, played from I want
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to say late nineties up until like twenty twelve, twenty thirteen, maybe a
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little bit longer. But what I love about Roy is his ability to overcome
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adversity, his ability to not let his pass determine his future. And I
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think he has a pretty cool story that's worth sharing. He was a first
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round draft pick, so he obviously was very talented. He was a first
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rounder out of high school. Got to the big leagues pretty quickly, I
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want to say, by the time he was like twenty two years old something
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like that first year crushed it, did really good, had like a three
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something ERA as a rookie. The next year, though, something happened.
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He completely lost it. He wasn't throwing strikes, he was getting hit.
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Just everything went backwards and he ended up actually having a ten point six y
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for ERA to be exact in like sixty seven innings and to this day that
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is still the worst ra in Major League history for a pitcher that threw at
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least sixty innings, which is absolutely insane when you think about who Holiday is
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and what he accomplished in his career. And what's interesting is after that season
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they sent him all the way down. The Blue Jay sent him all the
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way down to single A. So go from the major leagues to single A
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is quite the demotion. Like obviously you hear about guys going from the big
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leagues to triple A, but going all the way down to single A is
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I would think for him was probably embarrassing in a way, humiliating, just
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a lot of I can imagine there was a lot of mental demons going on
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in his head. And I was reading an article about it, about this
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story that came out in Sports Illustrated I think twenty ten. The reason the
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Blue Jay sent him all the way down to single A was, I guess
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there was a pitching coach down there, Mel Queen was his name, who
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was really good with helping pitchers, and the goal was that Mel would help
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him get good enough just so they could trade him and get rid of him
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like that was their main goal. It wasn't to necessarily make him a major
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league star again, but to get him fixed just enough to where they could
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try r him. Mel ended up helping him lower his arm slot. He
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added a sinker and a cutter, which is what Roy became known for throughout
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his career is that sinker cutter combination. And from there he just gradually worked
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his way back up to the big leagues and just crushed it at every level,
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and within two years he won his first cy young. So the fact
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that he overcame that adversity and that amount of time to go from the very
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top in a first rounder, being a major leaguer at a young age,
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having a good rookie year, to going all the way down to single a
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holding the record for the worst era in baseball, and to overcome that is
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pretty impressive. And one of the things that the article was saying was what
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helped him was his wife. So his wife, Brandy, like didn't know
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what to do because he was, I guess a mess mentally at home.
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He just wasn't himself. So she went to a bookstore looked for any self
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help books, baseball books, anything that she thought could help him, and
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she came across this book called The Mental Abcs of Pitching by Harvey Dorfman,
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and she says in the article like she couldn't believe that there's actually books like
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this for baseball players. But she's like, okay, I'll take it home
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and give it a shot. And she brought that home, brought a journal
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and basically said, here you go, Roy, like, read this,
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let's try to see if we can figure this out. And it completely changed
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his mindset of the way he attacked things day to day. And he ended
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up working with the guy that wrote the book, Harvey Dorfman, who later
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passed away but was a phenomenal sports psychologist. He worked with him throughout his
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career and he attributes a lot of the work he did with him to the
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success that he had on the mound. And you know, he went on
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to win I want to say, three or four sions, multiple multiple All
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Star appearances, threw a no hitter in the playoffs, Like, just accomplished
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a lot of great things, a Hall of famer, But it didn't start
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off the way you'd expect, the way you typically see Hall of Fame careers
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or the way you think of people like him. You just assumed they were
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always successful and that they always had it. But the truth of the matter
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is, I don't care if you're a big leaguer or if if you're fighting
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for your life on your high school baseball team. Every single player at some
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point is going to face adversity. The question is how are you going to
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handle it? How quickly are you going to be able to adapt in what
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are the tools that you're going to use? So I thought that was a
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good story, Like it motivated me when I was a player, cause I
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knew about this story a while ago, but like, I still use that
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to help players that are going through things and it's pretty cool. But have
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you heard that story before? No, I actually haven't heard that story,
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but that's super interesting, just the importance of the mental game. And that's
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actually really similar to the Colvin's Burns story that I'm super familiar with, And
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if you guys aren't familiar with it, it was you guys probably know about
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Colvin Burns now who's just absolutely dominated baseball for the past two to three years,
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but that actually wasn't the case in twenty nineteen when he hit I had
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one of the worst seasons for a starting pitcher. And what happened was he
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actually a step back from the game. He came down to Arizona to work
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on his stuff, but ultimately what helped him get to the next level was
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his mental game. And he attributes the mental game to all of his successes.
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And he worked with a guy called Brian Kane, and I guess they
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went through a lot of like mental game preparation and techniques to get him to
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where he is today. But it just highlights the importance of the mental game.
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And because It's not as like people don't focus on it as much as
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like the physical side, which is starting to change now, especially in Pro
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Bowl. We have so many mental skills coaches and even with the Texas Rangers,
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we have meetings with the mental skills department, you know, multiple times
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a week. But I think there definitely has to be more importance placed on
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the mental game. What do you think about that? Yeah, I totally
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agree. And what's interesting is the mental game impacts the physical game. If
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I'm not mentally sharp, if I don't have confidence in myself, if I
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don't have the mindset of being present, it's going to impact my physical skills.
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I might be able to throw hard, I might be able to have
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nasty off speed pitches, all those things, but when the moment comes where
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it's a pressure situation or the game is speeding up on me, if I
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don't have those mental skills, my physical skills aren't going to be as sharp
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because I'm going to lack the confidence in the field for everything that I need
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to do. So I'd be curious, like, from your perspective, how
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is the mental game tied into the physical side for you? If at all?
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But I'm assuming it has, But what does that look like for you?
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Yeah, it's It plays such a huge role, especially when in twenty
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nineteen I had the yips. And for anyone who knows what the yips are,
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it's basically when you have a mental block and you're on a to throw
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the baseball to a target. And so you know, at that time,
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I was still throwing hot. I was still able to throw in ninety five
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ninety six miles an now with disgusting off speed. But because I had that
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mental block, I wasn't able to perform well at all. I wasn't even
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able to throw strikes. I couldn't play catch. And that's pretty much why
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I started to dive into the mental game, and I started to really place
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an importance on the mental game, because if you're not mentally right, then
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you're not going to be able to showcase your skills on the field. And
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yeah, that's why I'm placing so much of an importance of the mental game.
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What do you think led to the yips? Like I've talked to a
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few people that have them, but what do you like for you personally?
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What do you think allowed that to happen? Or a spiral like that Yeah,
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so I think with the yips, I've written about it before, but
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it's mostly an anxiety and fear thing. And so I was so caught up
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in the anxieties of and the fears of failing and making failing bigger than it
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actually was. That's what really spiraled into the yips in my case. And
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so that kind of ties into my advice for the mental game is one of
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the biggest things is you have to get to know yourself, and you need
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to get to know your fears, your anxieties, what you're scared of.
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It might be, you know, fear of failure, fear of rejection from
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other people, fear of what other people think of you. And that's the
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biggest mental game piece for me because once you're able to work on that,
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you can start to change the things that you can start to change your men
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obstacles, you can start to work on those roadblocks that are preventing you from
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performing at your highest level. Yeah, I mean it's to me that makes
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sense why that's step one, Like you have to get to the root cause
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of what you're actually feeling and explore those things. And I think one thing
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that's important understand is like It's normal to feel anxiety, it's normal to feel
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stress, and I always think of it this way. The reason you're feeling
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those things is likely because you care a lot. You care a lot about
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your performance and the issue with it, though, if it gets too far,
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is you start to place your identity in your performance. I know I
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did this time and time again. I still do it even as a coach.
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At times. It starts with a good reason, right caring. You
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want to care about your performance, you want to care about your career,
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you want to care about you know what you're doing on the field. But
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the second it starts to get to the point to where it becomes your identity,
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to where whether you win or lose, pitch good or pitch bad,
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determines how you feel about yourself as a person. That's when it's field you
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are more than winning for your team, and the second you start to realize
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that and to see that and understand the value you have outside of baseball.
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For me, that allowed me to free up a little bit when I was
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on the field and to trust the work that I was putting in and knowing
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that win or lose it didn't change who I was as a person. It
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didn't change how people that I actually love and people that love me, it
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doesn't change the way they feel about me. And that just allows you to
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trust the work that you're putting in and to go out there and just let
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it hang out. That is for me that was a big unlock, is
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separating the identity from what I do. M Yeah, that's such a big
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component of it. I'm curious how did that mental shift happen. Was it
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like something that happened that made you think that way or did you start doing
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something? What created that change? I think, truthfully, it was while
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I was dating my wife. We started dating when I was playing independent ball,
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and she could just see how much I was wrapped up in everything.
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I mean, you know me too, Josh. Now at this point I
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am obsessed with baseball and she's been able to see it first hand since we
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started dating, you know, nine years ago, and it just what changed
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for me was I could just see how it could it would impact our relationship.
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When I would take home feelings and anxiousness and anxiety and worry about my
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performance. Am I going to get released today? All these things that you
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think about that are negative And she would constantly tell me in different ways that
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I don't care whether you pitch good or bad. Do I want you to
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pitch good, absolutely, but that doesn't change the way I feel about you,
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doesn't change the way other people feel about you. Oftentimes we put these
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thoughts in our heads that we're project seeing on someone else that they're thinking or
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feeling or saying something to themselves or other people that they actually aren't, because
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that's, at least for me, that's the way our minds work. We
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think of the worst possible thing. We think about how we're letting people down,
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people believe in us. We need to get to a certain level because
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there's people counting on us and all those things and more times, and I'm
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sure there's situations where there's people that that is the way they feel, and
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that's unfortunate. But for the most part, the people that truly love and
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care about you, they love you and care about you regardless of your performance.
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So just the more I got to just be around my wife and her
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speak speaking truth into me about those things, it just allowed me to free
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up and just trust the work that I put in. I think that was
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more than anything. We just hearing confirmation from the people that I care about
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about my true self worth and that it's not tied into my identity as a
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baseball player. M Yeah, an identity is such a complicated topic, especially
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for athletes, because especially as a baseball player. I think the mast already
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a baseball players identify as a baseball player, and so when you're doing badly,
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you're like, oh my god, I'm a baseball player who just sucks.
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And so I think one of the things that really helped me was just
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developing hobbies outside of baseball and becoming a more multi dimensional person. And so
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something that I started doing in twenty nineteen when I was going through a pretty
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hot time was I would just go and read books and I would journal a
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lot, and so i would go to Barnes and Noble and I'd sit down
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for like a couple hours and I'd just read. And that started to spark
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some interest in my head of like, Okay, like maybe I want to
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be doing this in the future. What would I be doing if I wasn't
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playing baseball. You know. It started to spark a lot of these curiosities
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to where I'm like, Okay, even if I'm not a baseball player,
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I have these interests and curiosities that I can pursue and I'll be fine.
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And so my identity started to change from Okay, I'm a baseball player,
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I'm a professional baseball player and that's it, to okay, like I'm a
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multi dimensional post I'm interested in these things. I'm interested in reading, writing,
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business, self improvement. And so the mole hobbies and interest that I
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started to accumulate, the more my identity started to separate from baseball, which
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actually really helped me on the baseball field. Dude, that's so good.
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I love that because let's be honest, even if we play, you play
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in the big leagues till you're thirty five years old, you still have the
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rest of your life after that. So like baseball, you're not always going
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to be a baseball player. But the tools that you're learning, the things
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that you're doing as a player, they can help you with the rest of
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your life. Right Like, I'm sure you're learning things as a player from
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a work ethic standpoint, from a mindset standpoint, obviously, here, teamwork,
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all those things. There's so many many things in baseball that you're doing
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now that are going to help you outside of baseball. If you allow it,
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right, like, you have to be open to understanding the opportunities that
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are in front of you right now and learning from them. But I think
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that's that's really cool that you're getting hobbies outside of baseball and understanding that your
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worth is more than just as a player, because when this is all you
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do and this is what you live and breathe every single day, it can
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be easy to not have anything else outside of baseball to go to. And
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I think it's really important because I think it is gonna you know, number
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one, you're going to play better, probably because you're not going to be
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thinking about it as much. You're going to have more of a free mind.
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But you're also going to be exploring other things that interest you. And
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I actually had a tweet about this yesterday where I just wrote about the exact
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thing and you just said about hobbies and how it's important to have an outlet
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outside of baseball. For some people it's golf, some people it's fishing,
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some people it's reading, hiking, it can be anything. But finding something
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outside of baseball I think is really important just because just allows you to get
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away from the game, and that's sometimes what people need, especially in the
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middle of a season, if you can get away on an off day and
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do something else, it's amazing how much that helps. Yeah, for sure,
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And I'm sure the listeners are thinking, well, if I'm having all
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these hobbies and starting to accumulate all these interest and curiosities, we're going to
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take away from my drive and passional baseball. What do you think about that?
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Yeah, I mean, I would say there's definitely a fine line.
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If you actually care about playing at the highest level, if you're trying to
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be the best player you can be, it is going to take out the
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majority of your time, like there's no way around that. But I think
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finding those opportunities to where it's an off day or an afternoon where you go
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out and do something, or at nighttime, you know you like to play
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the guitar, and you play the guitar and kind of just chill and do
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have other outlets. It doesn't have to be something that takes up the majority
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of your time. But just finding those little opportunities I think is important.
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But like for you, you know, in the middle of a season,
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like what are some things that you do on and off day to get away?
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Yeah, and just touching on that point as well. I think you
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know, obsession can be very healthy and it creates a lot of special things
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to happen. So if you're really obsessed with baseball and you're constantly thinking about
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it, it can really create something special. That's what I did when I
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was sixteen. I was obsessed with gaining velocity, and that's how I really
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gained sixteen miles an hour. But it can, really it can become unhealthy
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at times when if you're going through a bad time and you're still obsessed with
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it and you just keep thinking and thinking about it. This was what happened
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when I was with when I had the yips, and I was constantly thinking
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about, all right, how do I, you know, change something so
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that I can play cats tomorrow, or how can I change my mechanics to
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be able to throw strikes tomorrow? And so there's a fine line between good
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obsession and bad obsession. But something that I really found that was helpful for
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me was that, all right, I have my process. I have the
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things that I need to do to get ready, and I know that'll make
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me a good player, and I'm going to check off that every single day.
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And then if I do that, then I'm good. I don't have
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to think about baseball. I did what I could for today, and now
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I'm just going to move on to my passions and my hobbies outside of baseball.
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And that's something that really helped me so that I don't have the guilt
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of oh, like I should be thinking about baseball because I'm a personal baseball
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player, I should be obsessed with it. It'say, No, I did
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everything that I could for today, and so now I'm going to take my
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mind off and go on and do other things. What do you think about
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that? Yeah, no, that's perfect. I mean, there's only so
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much you can do right like that, you could fill every hour if you
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really wanted to do with baseball. But it's at some point, there's a
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point of diminishing returns to where it's actually probably going to because more harm than
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good, whether it's obsessing too much, to where it's controlling your mind,
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and to where we get back to the identity piece of if I pitch bad,
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I think that I'm a lousy person or my identity is poor, which
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ultimately leads to anxiety on the mound and lacking confidence potentially, so at the
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end of the day. We want to optimize performance on the field, and
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all these little things tie into that. If I don't feel confident in myself,
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if I don't have if I'm not free of thought, if I don't
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have positive, aggressive self talk when I'm on the mound, it's going to
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affect the way I pitch, it's going to affect the way I perform,
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and then it's just going to keep going in a circle. So all these
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things ultimately are leading us towards higher performance on the mound, because that is
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the goal as a high level player and trying to be the best you can
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be. It's just understanding that sometimes less is more. Sometimes doing a little
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bit less of something baseball related actually helps you play better on the field.
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So it's not just Okay, I keep putting in more and more hours on
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the field, or more and more hours doing something related to baseball and it's
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automatically going to make me better. Sometimes going a notch or two down with
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that is actually going to increase your performance on the field. Yeah, for
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sure. And he touched on confidence and confidence is I think a very misunderstood
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concept. I think everyone tries to rely on confidence and every time they get
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on the mount, it's like, oh, if I'm not confident, then
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I'm not going to be able to play well. But there was a conversation
21:29
that I had with a legendary coach in Japan. He coached a lot of
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the MPB players that I over here in the MLB right now, and he
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said that you don't need confidence to pitch well. You just need to be
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able to do what you do well. So even if you're not confident,
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as long as you're throwing strikes, you're fine. Even if you're not confident
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if you can throw your off speed for strikes, if you can, you
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know, still comp heat, then you'll be fine. And it's funny because
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all my best outings have come from when I'm not the most confident. It's
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when I had a pretty bad outing the week before and then I'm coming in
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and I'm like a little bit self doubting. But I go out there and
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I'm like, Okay, I'm just gonna do what I can. I'm just
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gonna try to throw strikes and go and compete, and then those are usually
22:23
the times when I have my best outings. I remember last year last season,
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I had an outing but I didn't get out of the first inning,
22:32
and I was just walking guys and I was getting hit around, and I
22:37
was scheduled to start the next week, and all throughout that week I was
22:41
kind of anxious about it. I was like, oh, God, like,
22:44
hopefully I can get out of the first inning. But then I come
22:48
out and all I was thinking was, all right, I'm just gonna go
22:51
out compete. I'm just gonna try to throw strikes. And that's what I
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did, and I go seven innings no hit it with no hits, and
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so I think, yeah, confidence just a little bit misunderstood. You don't
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have to rely on it. You can just go out there and just do
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what you can and a lot of the times that's enough to get good results.
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I love the word compete that you said right there, because whether you
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feel good or you feel bad, you can always compete. And to me,
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competing is just giving the best that you have of whatever version you are
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that day, whether you're at the best of your ability that day or if
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you feel like crap. Regardless of how you feel, you're going to give
23:32
it everything you have and you're going to fight pitch by pitch, and I
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think when you do that, you're giving yourself the best chance at success for
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that day. And it sounds like that's what you were doing and that mindset.
23:41
The way you explained that, I actually really liked it because it sounded
23:45
like a low pressure, low stress type of approach. It's like, you
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know what, Yeah, I last outing wasn't my best, but you know
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it. Today, I'm gonna work with what I got. I'm going to
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do my best to throw my fastball for strikes today. Last week it wasn't
24:00
as good. Today, I'm going to compete with that fastball. I'm going
24:03
to attack the zone and whatever happens happens. It's leaving it out there and
24:07
not worrying about the future or what possibly could go wrong. It's just focusing
24:11
on what you have control over right now. And that's kind of my definition
24:17
of mental toughness, if you want to call it. It's your ability to
24:21
stay in the present moment, regardless of what happened before or what could happen
24:25
in the future. If you can stay in that present moment and focus on
24:29
whatever that next pitch is, whatever that next task is, you're going to
24:33
give yourself the best chance of success. Now. With this, people usually
24:36
think about staying present or mental toughness as responding to negative things, like,
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Okay, if I pitch bad last week, I'm going to try not to
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think about the past. I'm going to try to just stay present. But
24:47
one thing that I see with some guys, and this was me personally,
24:51
is I actually got distracted by the future more than I did the past.
24:53
So if I was pitching good, let's just say I'm in the middle of
24:56
a game, first inning, I crush it, I strike out the side,
25:02
I would honestly sometimes be thinking about the seventh, eighth, ninth inning.
25:04
Already after the first thing, you thinking about maybe I'm gonna throw no
25:07
hitter today, maybe I'm gonna throw a shutout, maybe all these things are
25:11
going to happen. And I've only gotten three outs, and I'm already thinking
25:15
about the future. Now they're good thoughts, right, they're positive things,
25:18
but it still distracted me from what I need to do next, which is
25:22
get this next batter out, throw this next pitch for a strike. And
25:26
then you look up and now three innings have gone by, and okay,
25:27
now I've given up two runs. Okay, now now by five innings,
25:30
I hope I've only given up two runs still or three at the most.
25:33
So thinking about the future is just as dangerous as thinking about the past from
25:37
the standpoint of getting distracted by the present. And Alan Jaeger talks about this
25:44
all the time, and I love it. Says, if you want to
25:47
focus on the present, if you want to be present, focus on your
25:49
breath because your breath is always happening right now. So if we were actually
25:53
sitting right here and you just focused on what your breath was doing as you're
25:57
inhaling and as you're exhaling, you can't help but think about what is happening
26:02
right in this moment. So that's a simple queue or fix for guys that
26:07
struggle with getting distracted by the past or future. Is focusing on your breath.
26:11
Now. Everyone talks about it, I know, and the breath is
26:12
an important piece or an important talking point for a lot of people on staying
26:18
present as a part of your pre pitch routine. But it's because it's so
26:19
true, So don't take the breath lightly. There's a lot of pauses that
26:22
can come from that as well. Yeah. I love that, And that
26:27
ties in really well with the motto that the Texas Rangers had last year.
26:33
Which was focused on the right thing at the right time, And that was
26:37
our motto up from the minor leagues to the big leagues, and basically it
26:41
was like, it doesn't matter what you're thinking when you're on the mound.
26:48
It only oh sorry, it doesn't matter what you're thinking when you're off the
26:52
mound. It only matters what you're thinking on the mound. So when you're
26:56
on the mound, you're just thinking about, all right, I'm trying to
26:59
execute this possible down on a way and for that, you know, three
27:03
to five seconds, that's all. If you can focus on that, then
27:07
you'll be able to have success. And that's something that I'm trying to work
27:12
on right now as well, which is that three to five seconds where I
27:17
can really just hone in and be like, all right, this is what
27:19
I need to do. Everything else is out the door. But it's actually
27:23
really it's easier said than done, for sure, especially when you're not doing
27:29
very well. Your mind is just spiraling and it's really hard to get that
27:33
focus. But one thing that's actually really helped me was meditation. Do you
27:40
meditate, Jared in a way? So I actually have done a little bit
27:45
of meditation more so so Alan Jager actually back to him. He has an
27:49
audio recording with him kind of walking through the breath and just like literally just
27:55
going internal, thinking about things in the body and just completely relaxing. So
28:00
I do that type of meditation. I'm also a Christian, so like I
28:03
pray a lot, So like prayer is a big part of it, which
28:06
some people would say it's like a form of meditation. So prayer is a
28:08
big part of it. Like doing yeah, I'm just relaxing, breathing focused
28:12
type of exercises. I definitely do some of those things. What about you,
28:18
Yeah, I do a couple variations of it. I have a really
28:21
hard time doing the traditional way of just sitting down for fifteen to thirty minutes
28:26
and closing your eyes and focusing on the breath. I do some stuff that's
28:32
different. For example, one of my favorite ways is to get in an
28:36
eye bath for about thirty seconds to a minute. And what the eye spot
28:41
does is it kind of gets your body into like an adrenaline state, kind
28:45
of similar to when you're on the mound, and so your body is kind
28:49
of going into shock and I try to relax myself through the breathing and that's
28:57
you could call it a breathing technique or you could call a meditation, but
29:03
that's one of my favorites to try to calm myself down and to really be
29:07
like, okay, like the water is just cold, it's not going to
29:11
kill you. Let's just calm down. And that's something that I've implemented on
29:14
the mound as well. It's like it's just the game. Just calm down.
29:18
You know, A walk isn't the end of the world. Getting hit
29:22
around is in the end of the world. Just go out there and do
29:25
what you can. Another thing that I do is i'd go on a lot
29:30
of walks. And in an age of social media, you know, like
29:33
attention spans are really down and we never really get time to just pretty much
29:40
do nothing. And this is something that's talked about in the business world a
29:44
lot is where if you can take your mind off and not do anything for
29:49
a little bit, it actually reverses the effects of social media and it can
29:56
recover some of that attention span. And so I do that a lot.
30:00
I try to make sure that my attention spent isn't like so short to where
30:03
I can't even focus for three to five seconds, which is super important for
30:08
pitches. And so I do those two things. I do the ice bath
30:12
and the walking a lot. I love the ice baths, so I've done
30:18
some ice baths too. And it's interesting what you said and how you connect
30:21
it to pitching, because, at least for me, the second you get
30:23
in an ice bath, you have every negative thought come into your mind of
30:29
I should get out, I don't want to do this, this sucks.
30:32
All those things do You just get flooded with negative thoughts. So being able
30:37
to focus on your breath or to be able to focus on just relaxing and
30:41
telling yourself this isn't that bad. I can suck this up for thirty thirty
30:45
seconds to a minute whatever. It is like there's a huge psychological piece to
30:49
the ice bath, which I think is really cool. How often do you
30:52
do it? Do you do that like on a daily basis or is it
30:55
kind of a part of your recovery routine for pitching. I try to do
30:59
it every day and it's more of my part of my preparation to get ready
31:04
for the day. And there's so much science behind how I spots are so
31:10
good for you. It's like, if you want to dive into a really
31:14
quick It's like a dopamine effect, where as soon as you go inside of
31:18
it, it spikes dopamine to where it's the equivalent of, you know,
31:26
any of these pleasurable activities, and then it just keeps rising as the day
31:30
goes on. So pretty much you're going to be pretty much you're just gonna
31:33
feel better for the day. And so I try to do that every single
31:37
day. It's a way to get myself going, and it's a way to
31:41
do something just a little bit tough at the start of the day, so
31:45
then everything else in the day starts to feel a little bit easier. And
31:51
also just the just the meditation and breathing effect. I do it for that
31:56
as well. So what you're saying is I need to do an ice pats
31:59
every day. I mean, I like it, but I know it's tough.
32:04
So if you can get into an I spot every day, I would
32:07
definitely recommend it. Well, the tough part is, I mean, well,
32:12
you're at a facility, you're at a complex, you have access to
32:14
one every day. I don't really have access to one, or at least
32:15
that's my excuse. I guess I could make one in the bathtub. But
32:21
that's just a little bit too much work. But no, that's that's really
32:24
interesting and cool. What are some tools that you use? I don't know,
32:30
maybe in games like these are a lot of things that we do outside
32:31
of the baseball you know, field or whatever. But what are some things
32:37
that you do, let's just say, in game, whether it's pregame,
32:40
during the game, in between pitches, like, what are some some mental
32:44
tools that you use? Yeah, I think one of the biggest things that
32:49
I've started to implement in the last year that's really had a big impact was
32:55
I just call it mental preparation. And so you know, when we go
33:01
out to pitch, when we go out to throw, we warm up our
33:05
arms and we warm up our bodies, but we don't really warm up our
33:08
mind. And so that's what I started doing, was like I started warming
33:14
up my mind by feeling out telling myself these things that I want to think
33:17
about when I'm out on the field. And so some of the stuff I
33:22
would tell myself is like, you know, my big thing is just like
33:25
fuck it, you know, like making a bathrob doesn't matter. You know,
33:30
doing badly isn't the end of the world. And I start to tell
33:35
myself these things because you can know it, but you forget about it sometimes,
33:38
especially when you're on the field competing, you forget about these things,
33:42
and everything starts to get magnified, and all the mistakes and doing badly and
33:49
the failing starts to get magnified to where it starts to feel like a lot.
33:54
But if I'm warming up my mind by telling myself these things, it's
33:59
like I can remember it when it really matters. I like that. So
34:05
is it just just kind of like while you're doing your stretches and warming up
34:07
or is this like a dedicated time before you even go out on the field.
34:12
Yeah. I try to dedicate like ten to fifteen minutes on it,
34:15
just telling myself these things. Like I tell myself about you know the fuck
34:20
it. I also told myself about the spotlight effect. I don't know if
34:23
you know about the spotlight effect? Do you know about that? Jared?
34:27
I forget? I feel like, did you tweet about this recently? Maybe?
34:31
Yeah? Yeah, I tweeted about it probably a couple of months ago.
34:36
Okay a couples. Yeah, remind me what it is I do forget?
34:38
Yeah, the spotlight spotlight effect? I love it. It's it's a
34:45
cognitive bias to where when you're doing something, it feels like everyone's watching you.
34:52
If you make a mistake, it feels like everyone's watching you and being
34:57
like, oh my god, how how bad was that? But what's actually
35:00
happening is everyone's thinking about themselves and they don't have time to be thinking about
35:06
other people. So, you know, in baseball terms, if you make
35:10
a bad throw, it feels like everyone's thinking about you and being like,
35:15
oh my god, he just made a terrible throw. But actually what's happening
35:19
in their minds is like, all right, well I need to make my
35:23
throw. I need to make sure that I'm not making a bad throw.
35:28
You know, like they're thinking about themselves instead of other people. And what
35:32
people think is that everyone's thinking about them when they're actually just thinking about themselves.
35:38
So reminding yourself about that is like a way to get away from thinking
35:45
too much about what other people think, because I know that's been a big
35:49
obstacle for me and it can be for a lot of people. Yeah,
35:52
I mean it kind of ties into what I was saying earlier. It's like
35:55
we think people are thinking insane all these things about us because for some reason,
36:01
we think that we're that special, that everyone's always talking and thinking about
36:06
what we're doing, and the reality is they're usually thinking about themselves, and
36:08
that should give us freedom to be aggressive, to make mistakes, to not
36:15
worry about what other people are thinking, because at the end of the day,
36:17
they're worrying about themselves. So that's good. I completely forgot about the
36:22
spotlight effect, but when you started mentioning it, I remember that that makes
36:25
perfect sense. Hmm. Yeah. So I think I'm not as big on
36:34
the mental performance techniques. I definitely have to get better at that, but
36:38
I know you're pretty big on that. What what kind of techniques did you
36:42
use during your playing career? Well, do you mean like techniques during a
36:47
game? Yeah, just like, yeah, what what are you doing during
36:52
a game? What are you thinking? You know, like traditional mental performance
36:58
techniques? Yeah, I mean pre pitch routine is like at the core of
37:01
it, just because it happens the most frequently. So if I'm making one
37:06
hundred pitches in a game, if I'm doing it correctly, I'm having one
37:10
hundred pre pitch thoughts or routines, whatever it might be. So there's just
37:14
a lot of repetition of that, and for me, like that is at
37:17
the core of end game mental strategy because it involves visualization, it involves self
37:23
talk, it involves committing to the pitch, and that's essentially like the three
37:28
core things of pre pitch routines for me. So, like, as you're
37:32
getting your sign, say he's calling a fastball inside, You're already starting to
37:37
flood yourself with an aggressive mindset of he wants a fastball in. Okay,
37:40
I'm gonna pound this fastball in zone, right through the glove. And I'm
37:45
also visualizing it, so I'm trying to throw this fastball inside. I am
37:47
seeing it in my head that ball going exactly where I want it to go,
37:52
right through the glove, and I'm seeing the batter have the reaction that
37:54
I'm wanting to him to have, whether it's a called strike or it's a
37:59
swing of a minat, whatever it is. I am visualizing a positive outcome
38:02
for myself in that moment. And then as I come set, I breathe,
38:07
and then maybe one last positive self talk, something aggressive that just reminds
38:10
me of let's go, let's attack the glove. I'm not giving myself any
38:15
negative thoughts. An easy thing to think about for this one too when it
38:20
comes to self talk, is always tell yourself what you want to happen,
38:23
not what you don't want to happen, because your mind, you can trick
38:27
yourself into into actually doing the opposite. So if I say, don't throw
38:31
this curveball right down the middle, all my mind is hearing is throw this
38:37
curveball right down the middle. And that's usually when you make the mistake.
38:39
So give yourself the positive version or the version of doing rather than not doing.
38:45
So instead of saying don't throw this curveball right down the middle, say
38:50
throw this curveball down to the glove side, or be aggressive down over the
38:54
plate with this curveball. Something that is telling you what to do, not
38:58
what not to do. And I used to fall into this. It's crazy.
39:01
When you're in like a hole, or when you're mentally just not in
39:05
a good place, it is really really difficult to do this. Like I
39:08
remember there would be games I would go through this routine that I had and
39:13
literally last second, right before I was about to make a pitch, I
39:16
don't even know what it was. It was like there was someone talking in
39:19
my head to where it's someone or a voice in my head would say the
39:22
exact opposite of what to do. It would be like throw this right down
39:25
the middle, or you suck or make a crappy pitch, or it was
39:30
really weird. That was when I was in like the darkest place of my
39:32
career from a confidence standpoint and believing in myself in all those things. So
39:38
this does take a lot of practice. It does take a lot of time,
39:42
and it's just because you're telling yourself to do something doesn't mean you're going
39:45
to believe it right away. But the more you do this, the better
39:47
you're going to get at it. So this makes me think about a situation
39:52
my freshman year of college. So out of high school, I did really
39:58
well, had a really good high school career, especially in my senior year.
40:00
Feeling confident, have you know, all the confidence in the world.
40:04
I ended up going to a junior college. I go to South Mountain Community
40:07
College and was named the opening day starter, so I got to start the
40:10
first game of the season. I'm feeling good about myself. Very first game,
40:15
anxiety was just through the roof and I pitched horribly. I ended up
40:20
going I think like one point two innings, I gave up seven runs,
40:23
and to cap it off, it ended with a line drive off my kneecap.
40:27
So it was just like horrible game. Horrible first college game I could
40:30
ever imagine. It was literally so bad. I went from being the opening
40:34
day starter to immediately being moved to the bullpen. So the guy that came
40:37
in after me, he ended up going like four scoreless innings in relief after
40:42
me, he ended up getting the my starting role, and then I got
40:45
into the bullpen. Next game, come in out of the bullpen, same
40:51
thing. Horrible one. I think it was like one maybe two innings,
40:53
gave up four runs. It was just it was awful. Like I remember
40:57
being in the car with my dad and just being and like I don't know
41:00
what is going on. I've never failed like this before, and I'm just
41:04
like I literally telling myself, like I want to quit. This is this
41:07
is stupid. I'm obviously not cut out for college base so I'm not as
41:09
good as I thought I was. And my dad is very i don't know,
41:15
straightforward and just he he's another type of person that's gonna be like,
41:19
okay, whatever you want to do. It was like, no, it's
41:21
been two games. Relax, you're fine. It's just take it one day
41:24
at a time and get back to work. That's all you can do.
41:27
Control what you have control over, and that's what I did. It was
41:31
a slow journey that year. You know, I didn't pitch. I think
41:35
after that point, I didn't pitch for like two weeks, and then I
41:37
finally got an opportunity against a team that was actually the best team in our
41:44
conference and one of the best teams in the country for Junior College of Central
41:46
Arizona. Most people are familiar with Central Arizona. They have a lot of
41:52
a lot of national championships and there's a very good program. So the guy
41:54
that started in my place, he started that game, he did off.
42:00
It was. He gave up like five runs and two innings. The coach,
42:04
our head coach literally looks at me and he goes, we got nothing
42:06
to lose. You're in So you can imagine the confidence that was being spoken
42:10
to me. And so I go in first inning, I gave up a
42:15
run. If it wasn't bad, is like two bloop singles, score a
42:19
run or something like that. Go back out for the next inning, one,
42:22
two, three inning. Go after the next inning, one two,
42:24
three inning. Go after the next inning, work around a single in a
42:27
double or something like that. I end up going five and two thirds.
42:30
I Pitched'll see how manyings it was. I came into the third inning,
42:34
and I pitched all the way into the ninth inning, came out with like
42:37
one out in the ninth inning, and we ended up coming back and we
42:39
won the game seven to six. So at this point, my confidence now
42:45
is the complete opposites through the roof. I went from feeling like I was
42:46
the worst pitcher on the team to now feeling like I'm on top of the
42:50
world because I just beat the number one team in the country for junior college
42:53
baseball. And the rest of the season, I had that confidence. I
42:57
had that extra I don't know if on the shoulders right word, but like
43:00
I had, I just had a better demeanor and a better confidence because I
43:05
knew at that point, okay, if I have a bad outing, it's
43:07
okay because I just proved myself that I can beat Central Arizona. So now
43:10
even though I just had a bad game against Gotsdale Community College, now I
43:14
know next week when we play Paradise Valley, I can bounce back. I'm
43:17
gonna be fine. And it brings me to something I really love that David
43:22
Goggins talks about. He has this this thing called the cookie jar, and
43:29
what it is is he writes down and this is just can be mental.
43:31
I think he does it mentally is think about all the things or all the
43:37
failures that you've had, and then also look at how you have overcome them.
43:40
So for me, one of them was I started off awful of my
43:45
college career, and then I overcame it by beating Central Arizona and then having
43:49
a good season the rest of the way. Another obstacle was I had a
43:52
six point two era my junior year. I bounced back and had a great
43:57
year the next year. So when you are in the whole, when you're
44:00
in these these spirals I'm not believing in yourself, think about all these things
44:05
that you have failed that but then overcame, and that should boost your confidence
44:08
and give you the feeling that just because I'm not doing well right now,
44:13
it doesn't mean that I can't overcome it because I've done it in the past
44:15
and I have the track record to prove it. So I just I love
44:19
that I've used that in other areas of my life when I'm feeling like I'm
44:22
at the bottom and just remind myself that, you know, I'm I'm better
44:27
than this. I've shown that I can do this over and over again at
44:30
various levels in different places. But I thought that's a really cool tool that
44:32
a lot of guys can use. Are you familiar with that or have you
44:36
used that personally? Yeah, I'm familiar with it because I read the David
44:43
Gogan's book and I really love that concept of the cookie jar as well,
44:46
And I think it's just such a bit It's just such a good concept for
44:52
you to keep going and not quit. You know, basebook can get really
44:55
tough at times, but if you can look back and it's like I got
45:00
through all of that just to quit now, I you know, like I've
45:05
used that a lot. I think for me in my cookie jar, there's
45:08
a lot of things such as you know, like at sixteen, I just
45:14
wasn't very good, but I was able to work myself into a professional pitcher.
45:19
I got over the yips, I've gotten over countless injuries. I've had
45:24
a major injury in my back that's you know, really affected my performance and
45:30
I lost five plus miles an hour, but I still went out and compete
45:36
and I'm still competing again. And I think as a baseball player, you
45:42
are going to get those thoughts of you know, I don't know if I'm
45:45
good enough, I don't know if I want to do this anymore. I
45:46
know I've definitely struggled with it, and maybe you struggled with it, Jared,
45:51
But I think the cookie jar is such a great way of thinking,
45:53
putting it in perspective and being like, I've gone through all of this and
45:59
I can't quit now. I'd just got to keep going and putting myself into
46:01
positions to where I'm able to succeed. And yeah, I really love that
46:07
concept as well. I'll be curious your thoughts on this, and I would
46:13
argue that everyone has overcome adversity in some way. But what would you say
46:19
to a player that says, I haven't overcome anything or I can't think of
46:23
anything from let's just say a baseball career standpoint to where I failed that something
46:28
or something went bad and I overcame it. I was just say Roy Holiday,
46:31
for example. You know, we can assume I'm sure he went through
46:35
something, but we can assume that when he struggled in the big leagues with
46:39
that ten point six cra that was probably the first time from a baseball standpoint,
46:45
that he was starting to fail on a larger scale or over a long
46:50
period of time, And that's probably why it was so devastating, and it
46:53
took a lot for him to get out of it, with the help of
46:57
his wife, with the help of a sports psychologist, with all those stains.
47:00
But like, what would you say if, like a player told you
47:02
that they're just like, I can't think of anything, Like I don't know
47:05
how to get out of it. I can't think of real examples where I
47:07
have overcome something. Yeah, I think one of the big things is that
47:13
it doesn't have to be in baseball. It can be in any aspect of
47:16
your life. I think one of the biggest things that helped me was that
47:22
as I started to build confidence in myself outside of baseball, I started to
47:25
build confidence in myself as a baseball player. And so I think everyone has
47:30
overcome or achieved something that they're really proud of, maybe on the baseball field,
47:36
or maybe it isn't, But even if it's not baseball related, it
47:39
can still be part of your kookie jar and something that you can look back
47:43
on and be like, oh, I was able to get over this adversity
47:46
or I was able to accomplish this, and so you can just turn that
47:52
into baseball and be like, if I can accomplish this in outside of baseball,
47:57
then I can do it within baseball. Yep. Couldn't have said it
48:00
better myself. What are your thoughts on shadow work? I know I've brought
48:07
this up before in like a previous episode by like shadow work slash visualization,
48:12
like let's be let's be real, let's be honest. Do you think it
48:16
helps you? Have you done it before? Like? What are just your
48:19
general thoughts on doing those types of things? Yeah, I I haven't really
48:25
found any kind of like really big results from visualizing. I don't know if
48:32
that's just me. But one of the things that's actually helped me, which
48:37
might be actually kind of unhealthy, is that just thinking visualizing the negative just
48:43
a little bit, just visualizing myself doing badly if I don't put in the
48:50
work. And so it kind of forces me to make sure that I'm doing
48:52
everything and following my process on a daily basis. So I think about,
48:59
oh, if I don't put in the work now, then maybe my velo
49:02
will be down in a week. So I'm gonna make sure I follow my
49:07
process and do my stuff. But in terms of like visualizing the game and
49:14
visualizing pitches, I'm not too great at that and I haven't seen the biggest
49:19
benefits out of that. I have definitely tried, but yeah, it's something
49:25
that doesn't really work for me. Is that something that works for you?
49:30
Yes, I would say when I'm really locked in, it definitely helps.
49:35
I would say during the game more so than maybe you know, before the
49:37
game or in another setting. I mean, I think it's hard to say
49:40
because it's something that you can't really measure, so it's hard to say for
49:43
sure, like how much it's impacting it versus not. But what you just
49:46
said about visualizing negative things slightly different relates to what you were saying. But
49:52
I actually do think that that is good and important when you're not in the
49:57
game setting. So, like I said, with the pre pitch routine,
50:00
I want to be visualizing and give myself positive self talk of what I want
50:05
to happen when I'm in the actual moment. But when I'm like, let's
50:07
just say, in a bullpen setting or I am doing shadow work and visualization
50:10
work, you know, before the game. I actually do think there's value
50:14
in visualizing yourself failing, giving up hits, not hitting your spots, those
50:19
types of things, because you are going to do that in the game.
50:22
You're not going to be perfect. And that's one of the mistakes I actually
50:24
see people do when they do visualization in the bullpen setting or just on the
50:29
mounds, you know, without throwing, is they only visualize themselves doing everything
50:34
perfectly. They visualize them I hit my spot perfect he struck out, I
50:37
struck out every batter I faced, or my fielders fielded everything perfectly. But
50:43
that's not the reality. So what I what I like to do and have
50:45
guys do, is visualize that success, of course, but also visualize yourself
50:52
making mistakes with your pitches or your defense, making errors behind you or those
50:55
things, but then also visualize yourself overcoming it. So come back to overcoming
51:00
things, giving yourself a cookie jar of things that you can dive into,
51:05
of things that you have failed that and then overcame. Visualize that in a
51:07
game setting as well, when you're in the bullpen, of giving up hits,
51:13
missing your spots your fielders making airs. But then you overcome it and
51:15
you find a way to get out of the innure. You find a way,
51:19
you know, to go six innings and give up only three runs instead
51:21
of six runs. I think that's a really important piece and you shouldn't be
51:25
trying to be perfect in your visualization because that's not how the game works.
51:30
And the second you do fail a little bit, you'd be like, well,
51:31
what I visualized success? I didn't prepare for this. And as a
51:36
player, we want to be prepared for all those things. We want to
51:37
be able to make sure that we can overcome all those obstacles that we're facing.
51:43
Yeah, for sure. And I think this is something that we talked
51:45
about when we were training together in Scottsdale, was that one of my biggest
51:51
things was that I had a lot of big innings last year and I had
51:55
an issue limiting biginnings, and so we had a talk about it and it
52:00
kind of boiled down to do you actually practice mitigating those beginnings in bullpen settings?
52:07
Are you visualizing a run on you know, runners on one and two
52:10
and then you've got to make a big pitch here. I think not many
52:15
players and I know I don't do enough of This is where practicing making big
52:22
pitches in adversity, and even if it's you know, visualizing it or just
52:25
creating the situation in your head, I think there's a lot of value in
52:30
just practicing getting over those tough situations in bullpens or visualizations. Yeah, that's
52:39
great, remember that talk vividly. I'm excited to see you do that this
52:43
year and compete. So we're about to end spring training. What are some
52:49
of your thoughts and expectations for the season for yourself. Yeah, one of
52:54
my big goals is to have a healthy season. I haven't had a healthy
52:59
season in a while, and it would just it'll be great if I can
53:04
just go out every single week and just go compete with you know, I
53:07
don't have to feel one hundred percent every time, and I won't, but
53:12
just being able to do that week in week out is a big goal of
53:15
mine. I think, you know, limiting big innings is going to be
53:21
huge. That's one of my biggest weaknesses is where I'll have really good outings,
53:27
but then I'll have really bad outings, and I want to turn those
53:30
really bad outings into you know, somewhat decent outings and so if I can
53:37
do that, I think it'll really take me to the next level. I'm
53:42
really trying to work on my velo this year. I've it's taken a big
53:45
hit just with my back. I'm trying to find a way to get more
53:51
out of my body. So those are kind of like my biggest three things
53:59
of what I'm trying to welcome this season. I love it. What's cool
54:04
about us doing this podcast is like there's an educational piece to where we're teaching
54:09
things, but we're also and I think you know, for me as a
54:12
coach and you as a player, we're kind of talking to ourselves in a
54:16
way too. Write like we're learning from ourselves as we're talking. Because like
54:21
I found this when I was playing and coaching at the same time, was
54:23
a lot of things that I was teaching players. It was reminding myself that
54:28
I need to be doing those things as well. So like we're talking about
54:30
the mental game today, I'm sure there's some things that we're talking about today
54:32
that you know, yeah, I need to do a better job of that
54:36
because I'm I'm not consistent with you know, A, B and C.
54:39
And because we're we're doing this, I have a feeling it's going to be
54:43
a good resource even for you as a player, and I know it is
54:45
for me as a coach, So it'll be interesting for us as the season
54:47
goes on and we continue these conversations of how that impacts your performance as well.
54:52
Yeah, for sure. I think a lot of what I said was
54:55
reminded to myself, and I need to keep telling myself these things so I
55:01
keep doing it. But yeah, I'm definitely not perfect with it, and
55:06
it's something that I'm really trying to work on. But I know this would
55:09
be a really good resource as well. Yeah, speaking of resources, is
55:14
there anything that you think would be helpful for listeners to look out on the
55:19
mental side, or any books or anything that you recommend. Yeah, I
55:24
think most of my yeah, most of my resources outside of baseball, though,
55:32
I would recommend people to just start reading. Reading is such a powerful
55:37
way to accumulate new perspectives, new ways of thinking about things. One of
55:43
my favorite books is Can't Hurt Me by David Goggins. I think that's just
55:47
such a good mental skills book for any aspect of life. Also, mindset,
55:54
talking all about growth. Mindset is a really good one called psycho Cybnetics.
56:01
It sounds complicated, but it just talks about identity and self identity.
56:07
And so those are the three big ones that come to my head. That's
56:13
great. I just have one to add that's baseball related, and I mentioned
56:15
it earlier, The Mental ABC's of Pitching. It was like, by far
56:20
my favorite book when I was playing. I think I got it my freshman
56:22
year of college. And they're really short chapters. So like they have chapters
56:27
on big innings, like literally, I think a chapter is called big Innings.
56:30
They have chapters on you know, first pitch strikes, chapters on breathing,
56:35
visualization, like every single aspect, and they're really short chapters. And
56:37
like a part of my routine was like the day before I pitched, I
56:42
would read a chapter, and I think even the day I pitched, I
56:44
would read a chapter, or if I was struggling with something, I could
56:46
thumb to that specific chapter on that topic. Because it's it's not one of
56:50
those books that you necessarily need to read an order. You can kind of
56:52
jump around to whatever topic that you feel like you need. But I would
56:55
highly recommend that one. It's just a really easy to all. The book
57:00
a good actionable book that you can use immediately, so I would definitely recommend
57:05
that we can attach, you know, links to all those books that you
57:07
mentioned as well in the show notes. But I think this was good.
57:10
Do you have any other closing thoughts? No, I think there are a
57:16
lot of gold and nuggets in this one, so I thought it was good,
57:20
perfect. Bless the Pod.