We're excited to welcome mental skills coach Trevor Moawad to this week's podcast. Trevor talks about the shortcomings of unconditionally positive thinking, advocates for neutrality, and recommends strategies that athletes, coaches, and parents can use to optimize performance and quality of life in all sports. Trevor's book, It Takes What It Takes, is absolutely outstanding and I highly recommend it.
How the field of sports psychology as a whole has struggled to solidify its significance in the world of performance and why consumers are reluctant to invest resources in their mental training
Why the bar is set seemingly low for mental skills professionals and how the industry as a whole needs to evolve to provide a tangible goal for consumers to work towards
Why the standard positivity-only, relax-and-breath mental training model is insufficient preparation
How being raised in an intelligent, positivity-focused family influenced and equipped Trevor for the rest of his life
How the lessons he learned for developing and possessing an elite mentality growing up were without context until he became very sick during college, and how this adversity propelled him to the next level mentally
How Trevor’s experience as an athlete, coach, and teacher have provided him with the experience and empathy necessary to connect and collaborate with elite performers
What research says about the true impact of negativity on one’s psychology
Why the externalization of our thoughts is so powerful – especially when negative – and how the tone and context of our language play an influential role on our mental state
What the true impact of consuming negativity in your life is, and what profound research has shown the impact of watching just three minutes of news daily to be
How quality mental training addresses the root of one’s mentality, controlling your thoughts, and how the industry of sports psychology has fallen short of creating real changes in individuals by prescribing meditation, breathing, affirmations, etc.
Where athletes should start when looking to develop and master their mentality
Why the elimination of negativity is the first step for any individual looking to improve their mentality
Why developing a neutral mindset is the answer for being elite in any field of endeavor and how individuals can use honest evaluation to build awareness and focus for the work that needs to be done
How the true parameters of one’s influence are limited to one’s own self and how this fact can alleviate pressure placed on relationships between parents and children as well as coaches and players
How parents can better leverage influence to parent their children and why parents should learn to provide insight and options on the process as opposed to the outcomes
How players can mitigate the impact of negative coaches
What insights and lessons Trevor has from working at different levels across multiple sports
What specific lessons Trevor took from working with the Memphis Grizzlies and NBA-legend Vince Carter, especially the struggle and sacrifice required to play 22 years in the NBA
What Trevor’s “Supersize Me” Experiment was, and why Trevor chose to test his limits and combat the consumption of negativity at an extreme level
What some of the common pitfalls parents fall into are when managing athletes and their mentality
Why champions are actually born and unmade
How defining your goals and acknowledging your values provide the context necessary for aligning your behaviors to who you want to become
How Trevor’s mental approaches translate across multiple sports and how success translates across any discipline
You can follow Trevor on Twitter at @TrevorMoawad and on Instagram at @TrevorMoawad. And, you can check out his book HERE.
Sponsor Reminder
This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens. It’s an all-in-one superfood supplement with 75 whole-food sourced ingredients designed to support your body’s nutrition needs across 5 critical areas of health: 1) energy, 2) immunity, 3) gut health, 4) hormonal support, and 5) healthy aging. Head to www.AthleticGreens.com/cressey and claim my special offer today - 20 FREE travel packs (valued at $79) - with your first purchase. I use this product daily myself and highly recommend it to our athletes as well. I'd encourage you to give it a shot, too - especially with this great offer.
Podcast Feedback
If you like what you hear, we'd be thrilled if you'd consider subscribing to the podcast and leaving us an iTunes review. You can do so HERE.
And, we welcome your suggestions for future guests and questions. Just email elitebaseballpodcast@gmail.com.
Thank you for your continued support!
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When most coaches think of power development for baseball, a big focus is on developing rotational power for throwing and hitting with various medicine throws. Additionally, they'll utilize lateral lower body power development to help pitchers get a better drive off the mound, or even the initial push off the ground of a base stealer. If these are the only types of plyometrics we train, there’s a missing piece - multidirectional plyometrics - that can help prepare athletes for the endless possibilities of movement for which a fielder must prepare.
Any position player may have to sprint forward or backward in any direction, depending on where the ball is hit. Although lateral movement is a huge part of baseball, and prepares an athlete for a lot of the movements they’ll see on the field, it does not account for all of them.
Just like Eric, I’m a huge fan of Lee Taft and his system for teaching and understanding speed. Lee breaks down speed into seven different patterns (detailed in this podcast). For the purposes of this blog, I’ll focus on the hip turn, and how multidirectional plyometrics can strengthen and make this movement pattern more powerful.
A hip turn happens all the time in a baseball. Whenever an infielders runs back to catch a pop-ups, or outfielders are tracking down a fly balls that are behind them in any direction, they are using a hip turn. The fielder pivots the feet and punches a foot into the ground to reposition themselves to sprint in the direction they want to go. There are lots of possibilities in terms of the angle at which the fielder might punch a foot in the ground. If I’m looking to improve this position, changing the planes of movements and angles of plyometrics can greatly improve the strength and power of this movement pattern. Think of how the swing of a batter changes slightly with different pitches and locations. The primary fundamentals are the same, but the swing will be slightly different depending on the location of the pitch. The same idea applies to developing power in all directions for a fielder. There may be slight changes in the angle of force off the ground, and we should prepare the body in training for what we will see on the field.
In the following video, I demonstrate the progression of lateral bound with a push back at three different angles, followed by hip turn at three different angles. You can see the similarities between the movements, especially when the focus is on creating a better “punch” into the ground to limit ground contact time. By limiting ground contact, an athlete is getting a more explosive first step, which can be the difference between making the play and not.
Power should be developed with two different types of focus. We are either trying to create as much force as possible with a jump or throw, or we are trying to reduce the time at which we do it. Going back to the example of a hip turn, the fielder will very rapidly punch a foot into the ground. If the fielder did this slowly with a focus only on creating force, he'd already be two steps behind; power is what matters. Plyometric drills with a focus on force should still be included in every program because they help strengthen different positions, but make sure to include some type of plyometrics with a focus on limiting ground contact. Begin with low level hops variations before progressing to more demanding exercises.
There are many different ways multidirectional plyometrics can help develop a more explosive player. Think of the movement patterns you might see on the field, and start thinking of ways you can help your athletes.
About the Author
Jason Feairheller is a co-owner and strength coach at Function and Strength in Bridgeport, Pennsylvania. Jason attended college at the University of Scranton, where he was also a member of the baseball team. Jason has lectured on strength and conditioning as an adjunct professor at Immaculata University. Recently, he was a guest on the Lee Taft Complete Sports Performance Podcast. He has also contributed articles on speed training, as well as taught the course, “Functional Speed Training for the Fitness Professional and Healthcare Provider.” You can follow him on Instagram at @FunctionandStrength, Twitter at @TrueFXS, or visit www.functionandstrength.net.
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We're excited to welcome biomechanist and researcher Dr. Glenn Fleisig of the American Sports Medicine Institute to this week's podcast. Glenn speaks to how baseball biomechanics research has evolved over the years, highlights key research, and talks about where the field is headed in the years ahead.
How Glenn become one of the first to integrate biomechanics into the game of baseball
How his work as a biomechanist has brought him to be an influencer in the world of athletic performance
How biomechanics has evolved since Glenn first began his work in the field in the early 1980s
How technology has improved over Glenn’s career as a biomechanist and what up-and-coming advancements – like markerless motion capture – are transforming the field
How does the advancement of technology impact the barrier of entry into the world of biomechanics ,and what this means for quality research and forward progress in the industry
What research of his Glenn recommends listeners to read up on
How players, parents, and coaches alike can best mitigate the risk of injury in throwers
Why 100 innings pitched in a calendar year is the golden standard for limiting a pitcher’s risk for injury
What research states about the impact of long toss and weighted balls on players’ arms, specifically the shoulder and elbow
Where Glenn’s research has been misinterpreted in recent years and what clarity he hopes to bring to those searching for answers in scientific research
How the access to biomechanical technology (such as wearable devices) impacts the growth of sports performance science
What biomechanical systems and devices are best for collecting meaningful data on throwing athletes
How in-game biomechanics tools are transforming the baseball landscape and how these systems can be used most effectively to develop better baseball players
What the next frontier for biomechanics in baseball is
Where the industry is falling short of serving athletes and why standardization is required to provide clarity and bring efficiency to the work of biomechanists in sport
This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens. It’s an all-in-one superfood supplement with 75 whole-food sourced ingredients designed to support your body’s nutrition needs across 5 critical areas of health: 1) energy, 2) immunity, 3) gut health, 4) hormonal support, and 5) healthy aging. Head to www.AthleticGreens.com/cressey and claim my special offer today - 20 FREE travel packs (valued at $79) - with your first purchase. I use this product daily myself and highly recommend it to our athletes as well. I'd encourage you to give it a shot, too - especially with this great offer.
Podcast Feedback
If you like what you hear, we'd be thrilled if you'd consider subscribing to the podcast and leaving us an iTunes review. You can do so HERE.
And, we welcome your suggestions for future guests and questions. Just email elitebaseballpodcast@gmail.com.
Thank you for your continued support!
Sign-up Today for our FREE Baseball Newsletter and Receive Instant Access to a 47-minute Presentation from Eric Cressey on Individualizing the Management of Overhead Athletes!
I pride myself on having a training philosophy that is rooted in both “in the trenches” anecdotal experience and evidence-based practice. Both can be challenging to develop, but for different reasons.
Building a sample size in your head helps you to make judgment calls when the research isn’t necessarily there, or you need to make inferences based on limited information. As an example, as I've written previously here, research has demonstrated that lat strains that are managed conservatively have a return to pitching timeline of ~100 days. That information is great if you’re seeing an athlete from Day 0 post injury, but where should that individual’s progress be at Day 40? That’s where in the trenches experience helps. Unfortunately, it takes a ton of time - and learning from mistakes along the way.
Evidence-based information can be accessed much easier and without the need for years of experience. Unfortunately, though, there is a ton of it to sift through. There are countless scholarly journals out there, and full-text access isn’t always easy to come by. Moreover, We often take for granted that study designs are all acceptable if something makes it to publication. The truth is that some scholarly journals have much lower publication standards than others. it could be a full-time job just pouring over all these journals, but it could be five full-time jobs to make sure they’re all legitimate.
Who has time for that? Certainly not me. Luckily, the good folks at Examine.com have built out an amazing team whose focus is particularly in this evidence based arena. And, they’ve got an awesome resource - Examine Personalized - I’m excited to tell you about because I utilize it myself. Here's how it works:
I love this approach because it's both curated content: just like you follow certain people on social media to get the information you want, this allows you to select which categories mean the most to you. Here are the 25 categories you can select from for your targeted education:
One recent update covered 275 studies over 149 pages in these 25 categories. This is going to save me a lot of time and, more importantly, make me a more informed professional. And, it'll help me to come up with ideas for content for my writing and videos on this site, as some of my most popular articles of all time have related to me building on what I've learned from evidence-based research. You can learn more HERE - and save big on monthly/yearly/lifetime subscriptions during their current 13th anniversary sale.
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Here's a list of recommended reading/listening to check out:
Examine Personalized - Examine.com has been around close to a decade and has consistently produced top-notch evidence based information on a variety of subjects related to health and human performance. Now, they have a crazy affordable ($9/month, $75/year, or $299 lifetime) new service that makes it easy for you to stay on top of the latest published research in your chosen fields. The July update is 149 pages alone and features 25 categories!
Coach the athlete, not just the program. That sheet of paper you’re looking at isn’t a checklist on a factory line; it’s a framework that helps to guide a much more comprehensive collaboration with another person to get them where they want to go.
What are the best kinds of recovery drills for after pitching?
With the lost 2020 season, how should NCAA pitchers adjust their throwing and training preparation for 2021?
Do you have any advice for a strength and conditioning coach who is looking to work specifically with baseball players?
Should the strength and conditioning program for high school baseball focus on sport-specific exercises or compound exercises?
Sponsor Reminder
This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens. It’s an all-in-one superfood supplement with 75 whole-food sourced ingredients designed to support your body’s nutrition needs across 5 critical areas of health: 1) energy, 2) immunity, 3) gut health, 4) hormonal support, and 5) healthy aging. Head to www.AthleticGreens.com/cressey and claim my special offer today - 20 FREE travel packs (valued at $79) - with your first purchase. I use this product daily myself and highly recommend it to our athletes as well. I'd encourage you to give it a shot, too - especially with this great offer.
Podcast Feedback
If you like what you hear, we'd be thrilled if you'd consider subscribing to the podcast and leaving us an iTunes review. You can do so HERE.
And, we welcome your suggestions for future guests and questions. Just email elitebaseballpodcast@gmail.com.
Thank you for your continued support!
Sign-up Today for our FREE Baseball Newsletter and Receive Instant Access to a 47-minute Presentation from Eric Cressey on Individualizing the Management of Overhead Athletes!
Today's guest post comes from Cressey Sports Performance - Florida Director of Performance, Tim Geromini.
Cable chops and lifts have been an integral part of strength and conditioning programs for many years, and will continue to be for good reason. They establish proper kneeling and split stance hip positions, create anti-rotation and anti-extension core control, train thoracic mobility, and teach us how to absorb force in multiple planes. To that end, seeking variations where we can challenge clients in new ways led us to the step-up rotational cable lift.
Here is how to make sure you’re doing this properly and seeing the benefits:
1. The box should align your hip to about 90 degrees of flexion; more is not always better in this instance. At this depth you should still be able to create force pushing down through the box and feel your hip extensors engage.
2. Make sure you are in a neutral spine position. In too much hip flexion, it’s very easy to either lean back into lumbar extension or round forward into lumbar flexion. Neither of these positions allows you to create stability in your lower half.
3. The inside foot should be pointing straight ahead and that hip should be extended.
4. The foot on the box should not remain “rooted” the entire set; imagine trying to pick up a basketball with that foot. Focus on keeping your knee from caving in or bowing out. If I’m looking straight at you, there should be a straight line from your toes, knee, hip, and shoulder.
5. Both hip flexors should be pointing straight ahead avoiding any lateral flexion or hips bailing out to the side. Keep your arms in tight on the initial pull and your rotational component will come from your thoracic spine, not lumbar spine.
We typically program these for 8 reps per side towards the end-portion of a training session.
About the Author
Tim Geromini is the Director of Performance at Cressey Sports Performance - Florida. Prior to joining the CSP team; Tim spent time with the Lowell Spinners (Class A Affiliate of the Boston Red Sox), Nashua Silver Knights (Futures Collegiate Baseball League), Cotuit Kettleers of (Cape Cod Baseball League), and UMass-Lowell Sports Performance. You can contact him at timgero@gmail.com and on Twitter (@timgeromini24).
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We're excited to welcome Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Josh Lindblom to this week's podcast. Josh speaks about his path to the big leagues, his time pitching in Korea, and how his expansive pitch mix came about.
How Josh developed as a youth athlete from Indiana into a third round draft pick out of high school
What Josh’s rationale was for attending the University of Tennessee rather than entering professional baseball out of high school
Why Josh chose to leave Tennessee after his freshman season to attend the University of Purdue
How Josh managed switching between starting and relieving throughout his career
Why Josh struggled to remain a mainstay in the show through the 2011-2014 seasons
How battling comparisons and searching for his identity as a pitcher kept Josh from becoming the best version of himself on the mound
Why bouncing around in the big leagues wasn’t the stability Josh wanted for his career and why he chose to take an opportunity to play ball overseas in the KBO in 2015
How Josh managed the increased pressure of being an American, ex-MLB player on a KBO roster and the huge usage spike that went along with that
What the Korean Baseball experience was like for Josh and how the baseball culture, allotment of talent, and accessibility to resources in the KBO differ from that of the ranks of American pro ball
How the game of baseball is played differently in Korea compared to the game played in the U.S. and what nuances Josh had to adapt to to thrive in this new style of play
How Josh’s pitching approach transformed through his experience in Korea, including the development of new pitches and learning to better attack left handed hitters
What Josh’s thought process is for throwing his splitter consistently and how he has worked to shape the pitch to specifically complement his fastball
How Josh’s pitch arsenal has evolved through the progression of his career
How Josh manages his throwing and training regime on a 5-day rotation
Why Josh chooses not to throw the day following a start and why pitchers shouldn’t lose sleep over taking an off day from throwing
How better understanding his daily workload and learning to better manage stress has transformed his preparation strategies
What experience Josh has working with the coaches at IFAST and how they’ve helped him connect the dots between the purpose of his training and performing at the highest level
This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens. It’s an all-in-one superfood supplement with 75 whole-food sourced ingredients designed to support your body’s nutrition needs across 5 critical areas of health: 1) energy, 2) immunity, 3) gut health, 4) hormonal support, and 5) healthy aging. Head to www.AthleticGreens.com/cressey and claim my special offer today - 20 FREE travel packs (valued at $79) - with your first purchase. I use this product daily myself and highly recommend it to our athletes as well. I'd encourage you to give it a shot, too - especially with this great offer.
Podcast Feedback
If you like what you hear, we'd be thrilled if you'd consider subscribing to the podcast and leaving us an iTunes review. You can do so HERE.
And, we welcome your suggestions for future guests and questions. Just email elitebaseballpodcast@gmail.com.
Thank you for your continued support!
Sign-up Today for our FREE Baseball Newsletter and Receive Instant Access to a 47-minute Presentation from Eric Cressey on Individualizing the Management of Overhead Athletes!
We’re excited to welcome Duke University pitching coach Dusty Blake to this week’s podcast for a multi-faceted discussion that covers college recruiting, building a winning culture, optimizing pitch selection, using technology, and reflecting on the unprecedented times in the current baseball world.
What inspired Dusty to start his career in coaching and how his passion for player development originated on his own quest for greatness
What specific coaching experience Dusty acquired prior to stepping into his current role as Duke’s pitching coach
How being a head coach at a smaller university prior to Duke uniquely prepared him for the challenges of being an ACC skills coach
How college baseball has evolved since Dusty first began his coaching career in 2004
Why fastball usage is trending down in professional baseball and how pitchers can learn to develop their own unique advantage by pitching off their best stuff
What the non-negotiables are for being a successful college pitcher
Why Dusty emphasizes winning counts for being an effective pitcher and how working ahead statistically impacts hitters’ performance
How head coach Chris Pollard and his staff have transformed Duke baseball since his hiring in 2013 and what intangibles have the coaching staff emphasized to revolutionize the culture of the program
What specific attributes the coaches of Duke are looking for when recruiting athletes to build their program and how players can stand out through the sheer volume of outreach collegiate coaches are receiving on a daily basis
What big mistakes players and parents are making in the college recruiting process
How the use of video and social media as a tool for exposure is more relevant than ever and how amateur athletes can maximize the usefulness of video when showcasing their skills to recruiters and scouts
How the influx of data in baseball has impacted coaching and developing players at the collegiate level and what the truly valuable resources bring to player performance
What specific analytical metrics Dusty initially evaluates when evaluating a pitcher
Why Dusty focuses on defining what a good pitch looks like analytically and how establishing this understanding with players allows them to be their best coach
How understanding what a quality pitch looks like for an individual is the foundational knowledge necessary for mastering the craft of pitching and creating consistency in a player’s skill set
Why no specific data point or analytical category reigns supreme for developing elite pitchers and how being hyper aware of certain attributes can hinder our ability to holistically evaluate a player’s ability
What specific challenges college coaches are facing heading into the 2020-2021 season
How Dusty relies on honesty and stresses the importance of routine and reliance to perform consistent at the highest level possible and specifically avoid slumping
Why player’s need to free themselves of the outcome and the idea of throwing with perfect command in order to dominate hitters
This episode is brought to you by Athletic Greens. It’s an all-in-one superfood supplement with 75 whole-food sourced ingredients designed to support your body’s nutrition needs across 5 critical areas of health: 1) energy, 2) immunity, 3) gut health, 4) hormonal support, and 5) healthy aging. Head to www.AthleticGreens.com/cressey and claim my special offer today - 20 FREE travel packs (valued at $79) - with your first purchase. I use this product daily myself and highly recommend it to our athletes as well. I'd encourage you to give it a shot, too - especially with this great offer.
Podcast Feedback
If you like what you hear, we'd be thrilled if you'd consider subscribing to the podcast and leaving us an iTunes review. You can do so HERE.
And, we welcome your suggestions for future guests and questions. Just email elitebaseballpodcast@gmail.com.
Thank you for your continued support!
Sign-up Today for our FREE Baseball Newsletter and Receive Instant Access to a 47-minute Presentation from Eric Cressey on Individualizing the Management of Overhead Athletes!
Today's guest post comes from Cressey Sports Performance - Florida coach Derek Kambour.
At Cressey Sports Performance, we utilize several kettlebell windmill variations. A while back, Eric covered the regular standing version HERE. Today, I’d like to cover the half kneeling position, as I think there are some technical elements that should be highlighted in order to get the most out of this exercise.
Often, you’ll see this activity performed similar to the downward portion of a Turkish Get-Up, where the individual is in a half kneeling position, with the back hip in an externally rotated position, and then they will hinge back into that hip as they reach towards the ground, all while holding weight in an overhead position. While there is nothing wrong with this execution – especially if the goal is to challenge the individual’s ability to stabilize load in an overhead position while improving the ability to hinge – I do believe there are some ways we can coach this activity in a specific manner to get more out of it. I originally saw the execution of this exercise from Dr. Pat Davidson, so all credit goes to him for showing how to get more from this activity. This is an awesome transverse plane core exercise that helps individuals learn how to load their hip in the frontal plane. If you are an athlete trying to improve your ability to get in and out of a cut, or a pitcher looking to improve back hip loading or accepting force on the front hip, this could be a great exercise to include. Below is a demonstration that gives you a general understanding as to how we coach this exercise.
When performed in this manner, folks are getting a lot more than just overhead stability benefits. Here are some of the key components of this exercise explained further:
1. Setting up in a solid half-kneeling position is going to be essential when executing this variation. To ensure that the individual is in a good position, we like to have the individual drive the back foot into a wall, especially for those who have never performed this exercise before. The wall allows the individual to feel their hamstring and glute to gain better control of their pelvis on the down side hip. The wall is not always needed, but it can certainly help. The front foot should also be pressed into the ground as well.
2. Once set up in this half kneeling position, the KB can be pressed overhead. It is important to note, this exercise does not need to be loaded very heavy at first. We often start folks with a 15-25lb. kettlebell and they are absolutely smoked by the time they are done with their set. Sometimes, I will have the person I am working with perform this with no load, as it allows them to focus on the more important aspects of the exercise.
3. Before the individual reaches for the ground, they should be shifting into the front hip. Many times, when someone goes to perform this hip shift action, they will lose control of their pelvis and go into an anteriorly oriented position. Be sure that you, or the individual you are coaching, executes the shift while maintaining a subtle tuck of the pelvis.
4. As the individual begins to rotate and reach for the ground, it is important to keep both arms long. While they are slowly reaching towards the ground with the bottom arm/hand, they should be trying to maintain that hip shift without any movement of the front femur. The most common movement fault seen with this exercise is the inability to maintain control the front leg as the hips shift laterally towards the front side. The front leg should not move front to back or side to side, and it may be beneficial to think about pushing the knee in towards the midline. If done correctly, they should feel their adductors working significantly.
5. Most of the time, I will instruct the individual to reach down until the palm of their hand touches the ground, and that is as far as I will have them go. Some individuals are pretty mobile and can get their forearm all the way down to the ground. I’m fine with this as long as everything else checks out and they are feeling the desired musculature.
6. To get even more out of this activity, we can add a respiratory component to challenge this position further. Once the hand reaches the ground, the individual should get a full exhale out, and closing the side of the ribcage that is down. After a full exhale out and maintaining that bottom position, the individual can then inhale into the side of the ribcage that is up (trying to get air into the upper chest wall). After they have achieved maximal expansion in this area, they can exhale out again as they come back up into the starting position.
We will typically have our athletes perform this exercise for 2-4 sets of 6-8 reps per side as an accessory exercise towards the end of the session, or as part of their movement prep before their strength training. Once they’re proficient with it, we might load it up more and use it as part of a first pairing on an upper body training session (similar to how we program Turkish Get-ups). Give it a shot!
About the Author
Derek Kambour serves as a Strength and Conditioning Coach. Prior to joining the staff, Derek completed an internship at CSP-FL in the fall of 2018. Prior to joining the CSP-FL team, Derek coached a variety of athletes and clientele at performance facilities in New Jersey. He graduated from Montclair St. University with a degree in Exercise Science and is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist (CSCS) through the NSCA. Derek is also a competitive powerlifter. You can follow him on Twitter and Instagram.
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