STOP BEING COOKIE CUTTER! STOP CHASING THE FAD! EMBRACE THE LONLEY WORK!

I’m just so over it. The cookie cuter way. Here, here is the booklet that will show you how to be a great pitcher or hitter. Every kid that walks in the door doing the same drill.  It just doesn’t work like that! Every kid that walks in the door has different issues or areas to improve on and fix. So not everyone can move like that, or honestly, they may never be able to move like you want them to, or do it a specific way. So even when the expert says you must do this……… it still may not work for you!!  YOU MUST ADAPT! I’ve been an educator for 24+ years now, teaching Drivers Ed, Physical Ed, and Health Ed, if there is one thing I have learned in those 24 years, it’s how to adapt, and how to adapt on the fly!

Today’s day and age, it seems as if we are so focused on the movement patterns, the HLPs, the HLMs, that we are missing the boat on several things! We are no longer creating pitchers and hitters, we are creating robots! Players who just know what to do, not how or why to do it! Drives me crazy!

I find it extremely funny that the best pitchers to pitch in the game are all older, 36+ years of age. Cat Osterman, Monica Abbott, Sarah Pauly, and Yukiko Ueno. Not to sure they had all these expert feet people, and movement assessment people their whole career, but they still get the job done, and at the highest level. Oh, and still are the best pitchers in the world!

Plyo balls have been around for years! But now it’s the crazy! Why? Well the experts say to use them to help teach movements……Lets put some between our elbows, our knee, heck on top of the head! Whatever the experts say and do, whatever we see those on-line instructors doing on their fancy tik tok videos! I must do that as well… yet, lets not fix that same kid who is opening early, replanting off the mound, could use a better spin axis on their curve….. nope just train those movements, with fancy plyo balls, and wide stances!

Embrace the lonely work! – You in front of a mirror looking at your mechanics, letting your eyes work for you, not just trusting a movement pattern. Video tape yourself, look for areas of inefficiencies, then tackle those areas! Don’t work on what you’re good at, work on the areas you need to improve on!

I love my plyo balls I bought back in 2019 from The Velo Lab that came with a great pitcher arm care and speed workout! Guess I or they were ahead of our time! Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about tech and gadgets, and I love new things, but some of these drills I see are so counter productive….. but hey don’t miss out! You keep developing movers, I’m going to keep developing college ready pitchers and hitters.