Reporting to spring training a few days early, I was able to get my usual workouts in as well as bull pens in order to be prepared for camp. Our locker-rooms for minor league spring training are away from the big leaguers but we still interact. People like Evan Longoria and Carlos Pena passing by as we all prepare for the season ahead. They have been in my situation and understand as a minor league player you have to put in the time before you have an opportunity to be in their shoes.
Today was my first official day of spring training. I arrived to the field around 6:45amfor complete physicals. They had to make sure my body was physically healthy along with blood work, arm flexibility and strength test. This lasted around 3 hours. We then were allowed to go to the cafeteria to sit down, relax and eat breakfast. A meeting then took place from 11-11:30 followed by a 4 hour workout. This consisted of different stations such as pick offs, pitching fielding practice (PFP’s) bullpens and core workouts. After that we broke off into groups of running, leg workouts, shoulder workouts and upper body workouts.

It was great to be back out on the field with everyone. For the next few days it will just be pitchers and catchers, about 80-100 of us. I am dead exhausted and feel like I cannot move after such a long day in the sun. Tomorrow I will be reporting to the field around 6:30am to start it all over again!

Growing up I was blessed to be able to go through camps and lessons very similar to what Coach Spring puts on.  My father Chris was a professional baseball player in the Oakland Athletics organization, so to say the least I grew up with a baseball in my hand.  I began my baseball career playing almost every position and carried that into high school.  I believe as a kid you should play as many positions as possible, giving yourself a better opportunity to find your niche.  As a three year varsity player at Acalanes High School in Lafayette California, I played third base, shortstop, and first base as well as pitched.  I was recruited as a two way player to many great Division 1 programs. I decided on going to Fresno State.  This is when playing a lot of positions came in handy.  I did not pitch much in high school and all the other positions I played where taken from potential All Americans. I decided pitching was where I would receive the most amount of playing time and opportunity for a future in the Major League Draft.  My first season at Fresno State in 2008, we shocked the sports world and won the National Championship.  We were a four seed in the Regional which would compare to a 13 seed in the NCAA basketball tournament winning the National Championship.  After pitching out of the bullpen my freshmen year I became the number one starter my sophomore season. I fell to a season ending injury which required surgery called “Tommy John”. I decided that it would be better for my future to transfer universities. I narrowed down my schools and decided on transferring to a baseball power house in Cal State Fullerton.  My junior season I had to redshirt due to transfer rule and surgery rehab, but I was still drafted by the Arizona Diamondbacks in the 29^th round. After playing a summer in the Cape Cod summer league, I came back to Fullerton for my red shirt junior season and signed with the Tampa Bay Rays in the 6^th round.  I played my first professional season in the New York Penn league and have been getting ready for spring training ever since.

Spring training for me is right around the corner. In this blog I will be talking about the trials and tribulations of a Minor League baseball player as well as tips and pointers for your child’s baseball career.

I don’t know anyone who enjoys getting yelled at, and after a lifetime spent in competitive sports at literally all levels of the game, I have yet to see the athlete who responds positively to being screamed at. Athletes are motived by all sorts of things (personal pride, money, fame, the desire to win, etc) but one constant that I’ve seen over the years is that screaming, yelling, insulting, shaming, and embarrassing players simply does not work as a means of motivation.

Dave Baad, my high school baseball coach at St. Albans School in Washington, D.C., was intense, extremely serious, and had an unbelievable desire to win (he won the league championship in 12 of his 17 years as head coach and retired with a career winning percentage of over .700). Coach Baad was always demanding and he made very clear his expectation that every member of the team give maximum effort at all times. He was not a yeller. He motivated his players by teaching us to work hard and get the most out of every minute of practice. Many of us would make fun of his daily practice schedules that were literally scheduled to the minute, (3 – 3:16pm, pitcher’s fielding practice. 3:16 – 3:26pm, bunt defenses. 3:26 – 3:29, water break. Etc, etc), but his attention to detail and intensity at practice prepared us to win ballgames. We worked hard because he worked hard. We played games with relaxed confidence because we knew we were prepared. Coach Baad is the best coach I ever had – in any sport, at any level.

College baseball was a totally different story for me. Our Head Coach at Brown, Marek Drabinski, was a yeller. He yelled at his players. He yelled at his assistant coaches. He yelled at umpires. He yelled at opposing coaches and players. He yelled all the time during games. Besides the fact that his on-field antics were embarrassing to himself and to the program, his belief that screaming and yelling was what “intense coaches do to win” actually guaranteed that he got the least out of his players.

Without a doubt, the Brown baseball teams during my 4 years in Providence were, overall, the most talented squads in the Ivy League. We also were a textbook case in underachieving. Most players on my team played scared, for fear of getting screamed at (and I don’t just mean he would talk loudly – he would SCREAM insults at us, call us names, question our manhood, etc). Others with tougher skin like myself, found it difficult to want to win for a coach who treated us so poorly and simply adopted a policy of completely ignoring him. Because most times he opened his mouth during games it was to insult us, the majority of the team (who hadn’t quit already) was forced to either play scared or ignore him – not exactly a recipe for winning. And guess what, we didn’t win. Zero league championships in his first 10 years as head coach at Brown.

The thing that puzzles me to this day about Drabinski’s personality on the field is that it is nothing like his personality off the field. Coach is a really nice guy. He is extremely easy to talk to, has a great family, cracks jokes, and is very pleasant to be around – as long as he’s not coaching. I believe it was this side of him that makes him a tremendous recruiter and made all of us want to play for him. Unfortunately, his coaching style does not work and as a result, our extremely talented Brown team failed to even win our half of the Ivy League in my 4 years on the team.

The reason I wrote this post is that I was recently forwarded an article about how Coach Drabinski has “seen the light” and understands now that yelling doesn’t work. You can read the article here: http://www.projo.com/brown/content/Reynolds_Drabinski_Brown_basebal_04-28-11_FSN_v2.aa7c80.html

I don’t think it’s any surprise that soon after the epiphany you read about in the article (for the record, that 2-1 loss to Harvard is the absolute low-light of my athletic career), Brown won it’s first Ivy League title a few years ago. I’m excited for the program and thrilled to hear that Coach has a new philosophy on how to motivate his players.

So, as we enter the final rounds of the playoffs and beginning of All-Stars, remember that yelling doesn’t work. It doesn’t work on high school aged kids, it doesn’t work on college athletes, it doesn’t work on professional athletes, and it definitely doesn’t work on little leaguers.

Play hard and have fun!

All hitters go through slumps and learning how to deal with and ultimately overcome them is an essential component to the mental makeup of a good ballplayer.

Having been around baseball my entire life and having played with and coached literally thousands upon thousands of players, I am convinced of one thing: hitting slumps are almost entirely mental.

Of course, a hitter might be slumping because of a mechanical flaw with their swing or a problem with their timing, but more often than not when I have a player come see me saying he’s in a slump, his swing is fine and it’s what going on “between the ears” that is caused an 0-4 at the plate to snowball into a full-blown slump.

When a player starts to feel like he’s in a slump, here are a few things to tell him that will help him break out of it:

1) Getting a hit in a baseball game is the single most difficult feat in any sport and all hitters, especially young ones, need to remember that. The greatest hitters on Earth “fail” 7 out of 10 times so when you go through a rough period at the plate, try not to be so hard on yourself.

2) Putting more pressure on yourself only makes hitting MORE difficult. As the outs add up and the batting average decreases, it’s only natural for players to try to do too much at the plate. RELAX! Once players start to press at the plate they often grip the bat too hard, start swinging at bad pitches, pull their head because of a lack of focus, etc, etc. The extra pressure slumping hitters put on themselves almost guarantees to prolong the slump.

3) Think positively! Instead of walking up to the plate thinking about making another out (as often happens during a slump), think back to a ball you hit really hard earlier in the season. By painting a positive picture in your brain before the at-bat starts, you are preparing yourself for success, not failure. Remember the “don’t think of a pink elephant” mental exercise we do at camp. Think about what you want to have happen, not what you don’t want to have happen.

4) Redefine “success” at the plate. Getting a hit is not the only positive result from an at-bat. Remember, your ultimate job at the plate is to help your team score runs, not increase your batting average. When you get in a slump, stop thinking about your personal statistics and start focusing on having quality at-bats, whether or not it ends with a hit. Quality at-bat are generally defined as:
1) Driving in a runner
2) Advancing a runner
3) Hitting the ball hard
4) Drawing a walk
5) Seeing 6 or more total pitches
6) Seeing 3 or more pitches after getting to 2 strikes

Notice how 5 of the above quality at-bats examples might actually result with the batter getting out. Defining a slump as simply “not getting a hit” really isn’t a good way to measure whether or not a hitter is in a slump. If you are able to do something to help your team score runs in most at-bats, then it’s really impossible to “slump” – even if you never get a hit.

Detroit Tigers leadoff hitter Austin Jackson had a game about 10 days ago where he went 1-6, lowering his batting average considerably. However, in those 6 plate appearances, he managed to rack up 4 RBI and scored a run leading his team to a much-needed win over the Blue Jays. Do you think he or his teammates cared that his batting average dropped that game? NO WAY! He helped his team score runs and that’s all that really matters when we put the team’s success ahead of our own.

So why I am talking about slumps now? Well, with post-season tournaments and All-Stars right around the corner, it’s more likely that young ballplayers will put more pressure on themselves to get hits in games of greater “importance.”

As coaches and players prepare for their final games this year, I would encourage them all to focus on staying relaxed and having good at-bats – getting a hit is NOT the only way to help your team score runs!

Good luck the rest of the season and I’ll see you at Summer Camp!

The primary goal for all young pitchers should be to throw as many strikes as possible, constantly challenging hitters. What often happens as a result of this “aggressive in the zone” attitude, however, is that pitchers who throw more strikes at this age, also give up more hits. This is a good thing! As infielders and outfielders improve their defensive skills over the coming years, many of those “hits” will become “outs,” so keep pounding the zone!

That said, I know it can be frustrating to throw lots of strikes and give up lots hits and runs as a result – that’s why I am often asked if pitching to the corners is a good idea. The answer is yes, but usually not until a pitcher can consistently command his ball down in the zone first.

If your son is showing the desire and ability to begin placing the ball in the strike zone, first learning to keep the ball down is much more important than learning to paint the black. As pitchers, we want to pitch to contact and balls thrown consistently at the bottom of the strike zone are much more likely to result in an out. Watch any big league catcher and notice how low a target he gives his pitcher. Of course, at that level, they are also moving the target in and out, but for little leaguers, learning to pitch down the zone is significantly more important to their development than moving the ball in and out.

A final reason for aiming down the middle of the plate, but also down in the zone, is that many little leaguers (even those who throw lots of strikes) have unintentional movement on their ball. If a young pitcher aims down the middle and his ball moves a few inches left or right of his target, the ball will end up on the corners anyway. If the ball stays straight, but remains down, then he’ll be ok anyway as the worst that will usually happen is a hard hit ground ball. When young pitchers start aiming for the corners, the unintentional movement will take the ball either out of the strike zone or back down the middle of the plate. And, as a result of focusing on hitting the corners rather than focusing on keeping the ball down, it is more likely that the pitch will be up in the zone often leading to extra-base hits.

All pitchers get in trouble when they leave the ball up in the zone, so if you want to start working on pitch locations with your son, focus on keeping the ball “at the knees.”

Good luck in the second half of the season and see you this summer!

- Coach Spring

At 6′ 1”, I could try to dunk a basketball 1000 times and not get above the rim – forget about playing Center in the NBA. At 180 pounds, becoming an offensive lineman in the NFL could be my only goal in life – not going to happen. Baseball doesn’t put the same physical requirements on its players. Of course, it helps to be as big and powerful as Albert Pujols (6′ 3”, 230lbs) is at the plate, or create as much downward tilt as Chris Young (6′ 10”, 260lbs) does on the mound. But baseball also allows Billy Wagner (5′ 11”, 195 lbs) to be one of the dominant closers in the history of the game and David Eckstein (5′ 6”, 170 lbs) to win the 2006 World Series MVP Award.

With a ton of commitment and hard work, anything is possible in baseball.

So what does this have to do with 10,000 hours of practice?

Malcolm Gladwell’s fascinating book Outliers (I also recommend Blink and The Tipping Point), theorizes that it requires 10,000 hours of practice to become a master at anything – this number has since been widely accepted by experts as an accurate estimate.

31 year old Dan McLaughlin is attempting to test the 10,000 hour theory in another sport that doesn’t care much about size: golf. He recently quit is job as a photographer to dedicate the next 6 years of his life (10,000 hours of practice) full-time to golf with the goal being making it to the PGA Tour. Dan is 5′ 9”, weighs 155 pounds, and had never picked up a golf club in his life before setting out on this journey just over one year ago.

His ultimate goal, besides making the Tour, is to attempt to show exactly what, if any, limitations humans have in accomplishing their goals: it will be an awesome experiment.

As a big fan of golf (and of hard-work, dreaming big, not letting anyone tell me what’s impossible, and people named Dan), I’m really rooting for him and think we can learn a lot from his desire and determination as we approach our own work on the baseball field.

You can follow his progress at www.thedanplan.com and click to http://www.tampabay.com/features/can-a-complete-novice-become-a-golf-pro-with-10000-hours-of-practice/1159357 to read a good article on his quest.

“Because our season has started and my team demands are greater, it is a little tougher for me to email as often as I would like.  Either you have just started your baseball season or it is right around the corner.  Thought I might drop a few tips on how to perform better.

1)  The only two things you have control over are your ability to PREPARE, and your ability to TRY.  One of the most difficult things in sport to overcome, is the reality that even if you prepare to the best of your ability, and give it your very best effort, that still does not guarantee success or a win.  In the long run if you are talented, preparing well and giving it you all should lead to more successes than defeats.

2)  Physical mistakes happen.  Be much more critical of mental errors.  I listened to Aaron Rodgers from the Green Bay Packers the day after they won the Super Bowl.  The host asked him about the 8 dropped passes in the Super Bowl and whether or not that upset him.  He said “No, physical mistakes happen at all levels”.  What really gets him are mental mistakes, lining up in the wrong spot, no knowing where to go on a certain play, jumping off sides, etc.  Those errors go into preparing well.

3)  Worry about things you have control over.  You can’t control whether or not the wind is blowing in or out, how small or big the ball park is, who is the umpire, etc.  If you are a pitcher you cannot get frustrated if your team is not scoring—you have no control over it–the same thing applies to the hitters when your pitcher is not performing well.

4)  Whether pitching or hitting don’t complain about balls and strikes.  I have been coaching for 35 years and I have NEVER seen a umpire change his call from a strike to a ball because a hitter complained the ball was not in the strike zone.

5)  One of the greatest complements that can ever give an athlete is that he is “competitive”.  That means that no matter how many times you suffer defeat that you get up “off the canvas” and tell your opponent he will have to prove to you that he is the better man again today.  Your effort should not deter in any way just because it isn’t going your way.

6)  Don’t worry about who is watching you, and how did you perform.  Look the college coach has way more “at stake” than you do.  If that coach doesn’t win enough games someone else will be coaching that team next year.  Providing for our families is a great motivator.  That is my major problem with people who run showcases, or recruiting services.  They are simply making money.  Their “livelihoods” (jobs) are not at stake if they are wrong.  No one ever goes back 5 to 6 years ago to see if they were right or wrong with the evaluations of you.  Bottom line for me is I take evaluation as strictly one opinion of you, not the only opinion of you.

7)  Almost everything in sport is done “aggressively”.  Pat Riley, the famous basketball coach has one of my favorite descriptions of “aggressiveness”.  He calls it the “disposition to dominate” your opponent.  Aggressiveness has nothing to do with playing dirty, making fun of, or humiliating your opponent.”

With Little League Baseball in full swing, local lacrosse teams in action, and summer right around the corner, it’s a really exciting time for Spring Training Sports. We couldn’t think of a better time to launch the new website!

Please take a look around our new home (we’ve still got some new features to add in the coming weeks and months) and let us know what you think.

Registration for all Baseball Camp locations as well as All-Sports Camp is now open by clicking the links above, and please check back often to read interesting blogs and articles, connect with other Spring Training families through Facebook and Twitter, check out local scores with the Gamechanger live scoreboard, and much more!

We’re fired up for summer and hope you are too – see you on the field!