Welcome back to Finding the Edge Podcast.
I'm Garrett Boyam, joined with Robert Fry and Garrett Baker.
And today we have on Tanner, Pruitt.
Tanner, it's great to have you, if you'd like, give us an intro
on yourself and then yeah, we'll kind of get rolling that way.
Yeah, happy to be here. I'm I'm excited to to have a
good conversation with you guys. Let's see, I started off my
coaching career kind of in the facility doing one-on-one
lessons. Eventually Got to be a pitching
coach at Saint Cloud State for a year after that.
Left to go work at Tread Athletics for 2 1/2 years and
then wife and I decided to move back to Minnesota, which is
where we met. Got married and now I am working
at MASH Baseball, and I recently took a volunteer position with
North Central and Minneapolis, so I'll be helping out the
pitchers every once in a while this year as well.
And I suppose I should mention I met you at starters back when
Rich and Tyler from emergence were were there and so you were
just getting into or getting exposed to ecological dynamics
by those guys. And so I guess a good place to
start would be, you know what's, what's been your coaching
journey. And part of that, I think it's
important to talk about your own playing experience a little bit
and so talk a little bit about that, but and how your journey
as a player and coach has evolved over time, especially
now interacting with these ideas.
Yeah, so I guess, I mean, at an early age, I guess the the best
thing that that happened to me, I guess as far as sports goes,
was I I played as much as I could when I was young, so I was
exposed to just anything and everything.
Baseball, football, basketball. I played soccer for a couple
years, but you know, those are those are the four that I
played. But then it stuck with just
football, basketball, baseball, like those are the three.
I was always playing something. So as far as athleticism goes, I
felt like I was doing everything I could there.
However, when it came to football and basketball, I had
nobody, you know, to teach me how to properly throw a
football. I was a quarterback or shoot a
basketball. So I kind of learned on my own.
But when it came to baseball, I had, you know, coaches trying to
tell me exactly what to do and and how to pitch, like how I
should be moving according to whatever they thought was ideal.
Now sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.
But when I got to high school, it was like, well, I'm just, you
know, this is how I throw. These are the the checkpoints
that I need to hit. And because of the athleticism I
had, because I was still playing football and basketball, it it
worked at that time. So in my mind, I was thinking
like having perfect mechanics, that's what's going to get me to
the next level. That's what's going to help me
propel myself to eventually playing professionally, because
that was, that was my goal. But looking through an
ecological lens, you know, everything matters.
And when I was in high school, I didn't really lift weights.
I was 135 lbs all four years, right?
Like, that's not good. So I didn't really have the size
to be able to develop the quality scalable to go to each
next level. So because of that, I ended up
going to a junior college. They really tried changing the
way I threw because then they didn't like how I threw and I
wasn't pitching much. And so it was like, well, I'm
just going to say screw it. I'm going to do what I need to
at least feel good on the mound because they wanted me to throw
sidearm. I used to be, you know, straight
over the top. They didn't like how I had a big
turn in my leg lift. Like they didn't like all those
things. And it really kind of irritated
me. I'm like, it's not always about
mechanics. Like, that was my freshman year
of college. I'm like, I'm throwing strikes.
I'm getting out, but I'm still not getting opportunities.
So I left, went to Crown College D3 in Minnesota.
Now there is where I really got lost in the mechanic situation
or the deep dive into being perfect rather than focusing on
getting out. So while I was there, we didn't
have a pitching coach and I was an exercise science major.
So I was thinking like everything I was learning in the
textbook was gospel, basically, and I could apply that to my
pitching and I'm going to be the best pitcher out there.
Well, if you look at my ERA in conference, my sophomore year,
my first year at Crown, it was 27.
So you can kind of see how that didn't work.
Junior year I was, I still went down that rabbit hole.
But I think a big part of it was I took the weight room a little
bit more serious. I think that helped me.
So building is general qualities, but I didn't see it
that way. I always saw it as like
mechanics, the weight room. I'm just, I'm just doing it to
put on weight. Like that's what I was doing it
for, not necessarily to build general movement qualities.
And so I had a good year there. Senior year, we finally had a
pitching coach and of course he wanted to change everything.
And of course I was coachable. That's what I was taught to do
growing up. Like when a coach says
something, you do it. And I think the first half of
the year I had twelve walks per nine because I was trying to fit
this coach's mold. And halfway through I I had a
similar situation with my freshman year.
I said screw it, I'm going to do me.
And so that's what I did. And I finished with, I think the
second-half of the year was like 10 or 11 strikeouts per nine.
So significant performance increased when I was myself.
Now, I didn't see it that way until I met Rich and Tyler when
they were talking about, hey, this, it isn't all about perfect
movements. Everybody's going to interact
with the world differently, and because of my experience as a
player, it clicked right away. Now, not necessarily the all the
underpinning ideas and the terminology, like I obviously
didn't understand that, like I had no idea what affordances
were. But the idea that it is much
deeper than just how you move, it's who you are.
What information do you find important?
How, how are you going to move or how are you going to.
I don't like using the word interpret, but like how are you
going to bring that information? Like what's meaningful, what are
you, what are you going to do with it?
How do you interact with those constraints?
And to me it made sense because every time I said, hey, I'm not
doing what you want me to do, I'm going to, I'm going to do
me, I'm going to be myself. Significant performance increase
almost right of way. Now, as I continue to dive
deeper into these subjects, things start to make more and
more sense. You know why I was so good in
high school? Well, I was on a mound every
single day, right? I was exposing to myself to
slices of the game. Now, maybe not enough, as I
probably needed to, but being on the mound six days out of the
week is a lot better than in college where I was on the mound
one day a week. You know, So being exposed to
certain things, it's like, OK, so then it started started going
down. How many different things can I
expose my athletes to now that I'm done playing?
This was at starters, boy. And when I met you and it was
like, well, I don't really know. But they're on the mound every
day, whether it's plyos or, like, throwing bullpens.
So it's like that's got to be better.
And then it was like, well, what are they adapting around?
What are they becoming attuned to?
Well, we're throwing the 9 pockets.
We probably need a catcher there, you know, just because
throwing to a nine pocket is nothing like throwing to a
catcher. And I knew that, but I didn't
know why. As I begin to understand these
things, then it again, it becomes how much more can we
expose them to while they're still trying to get better?
Like we don't want to just give them enough to where they're
successful every time, but where is their challenge point?
Where can we work through that? And I think as a coach
continuing to go over these things, continue to think about
them. It's like, you know now at MASH,
you know we're we're velocity testing, but we have catchers.
We have a live stand in hitter. They don't have a real bat.
They have a handle because we don't want them swinging yet
just because like there's too many things in the cages.
We don't have enough space, which is a constraint that we're
dealing with. But we're exposing them to a
heck of a lot more in the second week of December than they ever
have in their careers. Right.
Like I had a kid go coach, I don't know if we should really
have a hitter in. I said, well, you're going to
have to figure out how to throw to a hitter eventually, right?
And he goes, yeah, I guess. I said, if you're worried about
hitting him, you shouldn't be pitching.
And if the hitter is worried about getting hit, he probably
shouldn't be playing baseball. And he goes, all right, then
I'll do it. Then like, just no big deal.
He PR Ed by 4 miles an hour and he threw 6 out of 10 strikes.
So like that, not only did he, like have another level of focus
and intentionality with what he was doing, but it legitimized
every number. Because you can throw 6 out of
10 strikes and PR to a nine pocket any day of the week.
But when you add the stress of, oh, now I got to worry about a
catcher catching it and there's a hitter in the box, I feel like
it just legitimizes those numbers so much more because
they are being exposed to what they're facing in game.
And this whole time throughout this on ramp leading up to
testing, like we haven't touched mechanics at all.
Everything we've done is Rep without Rep Hey, you know we're
going to do shot foot Med you know, for Med balls today.
But I don't really care what your footwork looks like.
Do whatever you want. So we'll kind of switch it up
those ways. Maybe we have them do overhead.
Hey, maybe try not moving your feet or take a step here, take a
step with your other foot. Just getting them to explore
different movements, different solutions to the task and in
general areas. And then we bring it into
throwing with, hey, we're going to do single leg throws.
I don't care what leg you're standing on, Figure out how to
hit the nine pocket. Maybe we do jump throws, figure
it out. All these things where we're
telling them figure it out, Here's the activity, have at it.
And again, we weren't working on mechanics, but they're allowed
to move freely and however they need or however they want to
depending on the task. Engagements up.
Performance is up. There are a lot of good things
happening that way and that's I guess where I'm at today.
So hopefully that kind of gives you an accurate picture of where
I've been and where I'm at. So I kind of want to explore a
little bit more the exploration stuff.
I'm I'm kind of curious because I know I want to Luke Baker in
on this. How have you guys gone to like
utilize exploration within? How do you see the role of
exploration within developing pitchers?
This is a question for for both you, Tanner and and Baker.
Garrett, you want to go? Yeah, I mean First off I'm fired
up that we actually have a pitching episode right here this
is, this is this is an exciting one I feel.
Although the last one we we did release again I don't know the
order we're going to release these I guess we I slanted it
towards pitching a little bit but yeah the the cell fires me
up. I mean I I think a lot of a lot
of what you said definitely resonated with me Tanner.
And I think any time we we hop on a call together I feel like
the the juices get flowing and I feel like a lot of ideas come
out. But like even something just
bringing up like you talking about like the Rep without Rep
and like changing up how they how they move every throw and
like we're not working on mechanics.
But that's the one thing I think people may not be able to
understand is how that could potentially influence your
overall movement, even if you're not working on exactly the
perfect way to move, right. And I think that's one thing
I've seen and just allowing people to have a little more
freedom, maybe even if just regular catch play.
But we're moving around and we're throwing different ways.
But you have a goal attached to it, like you're trying to throw
it here every single time in the reorganization.
And something I'll bring in there is like and Sean Miska
really challenged me on this, but it's a reorganization of the
system. Like perceptually I have to
connect differently on every single throw.
Like just like my thoughts are going to be shaped a little
different every single throw we go and we're organizing the
cognition, the perception and then the motor system all
intertwined together. And I think those that
reorganization and even just like challenging, challenging
like the the movement itself will be challenging how well you
can just reorganize your intentions to that throw to be
able to lock in and get it to where you want to go every
single time. So I think that's that's really
cool. Again, there's a lot of places
you could go with it, but I think like that and that's kind
of one thing I want to ask you, Tanner, based on that is like
everybody wants like the change in movement, right?
Like they want to, they want better mechanics quote UN quote
like where do where are you starting to see or how do you
see like the Rep without Rep or the freedom of movement start to
change that Or like how you potentially how that potentially
happens within the time scale like how does that actually take
place because that's where people I think get stuck in this
this idea. So, so as I I'm trying to
understand your question. So I guess understanding or
you're asking about like when we do the exploration, how it
transfers to pitching? Yeah, yeah.
And how we see change in movement.
Yeah. So like, you'll probably see
like them actually start to move a little better on the mound.
And like to the quote, UN quote, mechanics may look a little bit
better than they did in some form or fashion.
And but we're not working on technical mechanics, right?
So like that that's where people get stuck.
And I'm just curious to like your thoughts on that, like
where is it coming from? How does it happen?
Or just like, what are you seeing as you do it?
Yeah, I think that when you allow them to explore and you
give them the freedom when they get to the mound with that
mindset, it's less robotic. Because almost every kid that
I'm working with at MASH, they have had pitching coaches in the
past where they need to hit these positions.
I have one kid that has never been in a pitching program,
never done lessons or never done group classes.
And he PR by like 7 miles an hour or 6 in just five weeks of
throwing on an on ramp. And we're like, hey, we're just
going to let it rip today. Batter's in the box.
You got to catch her like throw as many strikes as you can.
You've got 10 pitches. His old PR was 81.
That was last year in game. This year he hits 86.
And I asked him, I was like, yeah, who who have you worked
with before? And he goes nobody.
And this was right after he asked me about working on
mechanics. I said honestly, with your age
and you sat 85 and touched 86, I'm not messing with you.
Like that's my job right now. I'm not.
I'm not messing with anything. And with the other kids, it's
like they're trying to understand that they don't have
to fit this perfect mold and as soon as they understand it,
they're plyos. When they throw plyos, it just
looks athletic. It looks smooth.
Now we only spend like 5 to 10 minutes on plyos.
Give them just some things to do with it, have at it.
There's a lot of choice built in.
But then they start to gravitate towards constraints or throwing
activities that just feel really good, gets them in a positive
mind state. So when they go to the mound,
everything feels good. They feel loose, they feel free,
and they're not trying to hit these perfect positions.
And then what I see is I start to actually see what kind of
physiological constraints are at play when they're free, because
when they're trying to force things, it's not authentic.
When they can move authentically, then you can
start to see like, OK, this guy probably has a lot of T spine
extension, whatever. So that's that's something to
look for. Like if it starts to go away,
maybe we start giving them more activities where they get back
into some extension. Cool.
And we can start to look at it that way Because when you look
at is it Newell's triangle, Do I have that right?
Yeah. The Organism environment and
task well. And through an ecological lens,
I see a lot of coaches going way towards environment and task and
then ignoring the actual Organism, right, which you can't
ignore any part of that triangle.
But we also can't put too much stock into one over the other,
but being able to see that. So then I can see, like, OK,
cool, maybe we don't need to have this guy do a specific
movement just because we don't need to force him into a certain
range of motion that he just doesn't have.
Like, give him something that he's good at.
Have him explore that. Now you can argue that, well,
what if they need to open up range of motion?
Well, do they Do they really need to open up range of motion
or do we just need to get them ready to move on a mound?
And if we can give them things that they are going to enjoy and
going to be engaged with, then why not just give them what they
favor or what they're good at already, if that makes any
sense. Yeah, no, for sure.
And I think son you even you're even pulling on right from the
get go talking about like it just opens them up and freely
move authentically. And I think sometimes that's
like the mechanic work quote UN quote mechanic work that guys
need in general because like the all the fixed and frozen degrees
of freedom just because you're like chasing this ideal model.
And I think that's that's the complete difference of what
you're talking about. And like I love the way you're
you're approaching it because once you see that how they
authentically move then you might be able to see some those
physiological constraints that you could OK like this may this
may be a rate limiter to you just physiologically and that
could be something that we could let you go explore over here and
you may you may find something over there.
But even just in general, just allowing people to explore and I
think you you wrapped it up really nicely, it's like that
may just free him up in a way where there's moving that much
better and the mechanics just changed naturally because of
that. And you get a better version of
that picture just because he did that.
And I always wonder like how many, how many people need that
and just the OK to go do that and you're going to see some of
the changes that people are looking for in the 1st place.
Because I think a lot of it and I I've always been interested in
the idea of like getting getting or understanding what cues
they've been taught early on because that could directly
shape how they move and they're trying to force that.
And like we would never know that if that conversation ever
happens or you just never give them the freedom to go explore,
move differently since then they're no longer thinking about
that. Oh I had, I had this coach tell
me I need to sit sit deeper in my back leg.
So those dudes over cooking that and he's been over cooking in
his entire life and that was in the the spot he should never be
in physiologically and he's trying to move from there, you
know? Yeah.
And I think with most coaches through that traditional
approach, you don't, you don't even have them asking the
athletes questions. Like it's just they they tell
them what to do and hopefully the athlete does it.
But like there were kids that I was asking where, you know they
trying to work on their their ideal hinge position.
I said well what have what have you been taught?
Like what are what are you trying to feel?
And he, like, couldn't answer because one, I don't think he's
ever been asked that question of what he is trying to do.
And the only thing he could give me was, well, I've just told,
like you just said, get deeper. And I said, well, what if we
just didn't do that? And he, like he, he couldn't
comprehend it. I said, let's go, let's go grab
a bat. We're going to take a donor,
donor activity here. I said, I want you to swing this
bat as hard as you can. And he did it.
I was like, OK, now I want you to do it again.
But when your front foot lands, I want you to freeze.
And so he did it. And I said, how does that feel?
He feels powerful. I said, OK, there you go, Go do
that on a mound now. And he goes, oh, so that's what
I'm supposed to feel. I was like, sure, yeah, I'm not
in your body. But if it feels powerful, then,
yeah, that that's probably how you should throw.
I'm not going to tell you to do that.
Exactly. But you should probably create
some kind of feel where you're powerful.
He goes, oh, OK, that makes sense.
And he's doing, he's doing a lot better.
He's not locked up. His degrees of freedom are not
frozen as much as they were before, but athletes being asked
questions and given ownership, they they tend to just kind of
freeze when you talk to them because they're not used to it,
which I think is very sad. And I think it's funny like you
mentioned, like when they get that kind of freedom or ask the
question, it's like they don't. They have no clue where to go.
Like they're stuck right there. Like they've never explored,
like they've never, never had the opportunity to actually try
something on their own versus like just being told exactly,
especially like in the in the facility.
Like you're in a facility like doing it completely different.
But the majority of facilities it's and to be fair, like you're
in a tough spot, like you do lessons and the parent expects
you to be coaching the entire time and telling them what to do
the entire time. And that's perceived as good
coaching. Which to be fair, like not to
knock everybody in facilities, but that's that's kind of like
you almost constraint on you and trying to work around that, kind
of like what you're doing there, asking questions, getting them
to do things is if you can get to the spot where it kind of
clicks, like they're going to want to keep coming back since
they're going to have some freedom and be able to do that.
But getting to that point's really hard since no, no kid,
even at school, right? Like I've heard that talked
about a ton. Like they don't have that
freedom in school either. So they never have that time to
go there and maybe maybe in a video game, but even that has
certain constraints, but they're more willing to explore there.
That's about it, right. So it's like that whole new
light bulb that comes off is like, oh, like I am my own
unique individual. Like maybe, maybe I do need to
find what actually works best for me versus like this one
pitcher that this coach modeled me to And then side by side and
I was supposed to get to that exact position.
But again, like, to be fair, like in the facility setting,
you have constraints and it's tough to be able to find that.
And that's where I think you guys at MASH are doing it really
unique way, which I really like to hear.
Appreciate that. Yeah, it's been fun.
Yeah. And so kind of build off what
Garrett and Tanner have been talking about.
And Tanner, you mentioned newest theory of constraints and you
also mentioned, you know different PRS.
In your experience with MASH, how have you kind of intertwined
both the newest theory of constraints and ecological
dynamics into something where we can track better in terms of,
you know, analytics slash you know, just odd numbers theory to
be able to intertwine those two and, you know, be able to have
results with those teachings? Yeah.
So I think like like a big thing that we're doing is every time
they're on a mound there is something that represents a
hitter in the box whether it's the plastic dummy hitters that
we bought or as of recently what we did.
And which I think is incredible that the staff at MASH has like
bought into this and we started doing since the second week of
December is the the hitting classes at the 30 hour mark will
send hitters over to stand in and that's that is a a drill or
a whatever you want to call it as part of their their classes
their curriculum like OK you two you're going to go over and
track pitches you each get 10 come over next to go over.
So they've really bought in because one like they understand
that OK if we want to be better as a facility everybody needs to
be better. So we have that environmental or
even a task constraint too, because you got to throw to a
hitter now. But there's all, you know,
hitter in the environment. It's all kind of put together,
but they're understanding that hitters probably need to at the
very least, track pitches out of the hand.
Some of them are even taking swings, They just have a a
handle of a broken bat. Some of them are actually
swinging at pitches like to try and get the timing down, which I
think is great. So pitchers are getting better,
hitters are getting better, we're getting more and more
catchers, so they're getting better.
So environment and task wise, I think that's huge.
And then sorry, what was the second part of your question
tracking? Yeah.
Like how does tracking that kind of, you know, the PRS, the
strike percentage, how does that help within your kind of that
newest theory of constraints? Yep.
So what it shows us is OK they we they gave us their old PRS
right. And so OK, that that is your in
game PR. That's the most accurate, the
best picture we're going to get from you.
What you're how hard you're throwing in game.
Now I don't believe that velocity is everything but
unfortunately a lot of these college coaches like if you
don't throw X miles an hour, they're not going to give you a
look. So it is I think part of our job
to at least help them get to that next level best as
possible. But for example, there were,
there were two extreme cases that we saw.
One, this guy is this kids old PR.
He told us it was like 80. I think it was he's like 415
years old 1516, and he throws to a batter in the box and he's 75.
And I asked him, I was like, hey man, like how's everything
going? Like are you feeling all right?
He goes, honestly, coach that hitter in there is messing with
me. I said, OK, well, there there is
our starting point because he only threw maybe 2 out of 10 for
strikes and his average was way down.
And so it was like, OK, so this tells us that this is our
starting point for you. We really need you to spend more
time in this environment, right? So that's that's big for us.
Like, there's a lot of anxiety as soon as the batter's in the
box. Then I found out the PR he was
giving us was into a net 10 feet away, not full distance.
So there's that. The other extreme case was that
kid that never had a pitching coach and he PR by like 6 miles
an hour and he threw. I think he was our top strike
thrower for that day, not just for that hour, but for that
whole day he threw. I think it was 7 or 8 out of 10.
I'm like, OK, cool. So maybe that isn't his
challenge point, but it's definitely good that he's being
exposed to it. So now we or I have to then
figure out like, OK, is it lefty versus righty, because we only
had righties in that day. So does he need to face
different handed hitters or is he just that good and that
skilled with this fastball? Do we need to start looking at
other pitches now? So like, now what we're doing
for a while is when they get to when they're on the mound, the
batter's in there, they're going to throw all pitches.
So like yesterday we played a rolling count game because we
don't do one-on-one lessons. It's all group stuff.
So they're in a line. First guy throws the first
pitch. OK, now the count's O1.
He threw a fastball in. You've got the next pitch.
What are you throwing next? OK, what is the next guy
throwing next based off of what the previous guy threw.
So now they're starting to work pitches starting to understand
like, OK, if you went fastball in, probably should go something
soft away. OK, now what is the next guy
going to do after that? And we kind of let them problem
solve through it. So then now I can really start
to see like, oh, that guy Yanks his slider every single time
that he tries to go to the outside.
So he probably needs to look or start the pitch somewhere else
because he keeps yanking at 10 feet.
Catcher can't even get to it. So then we can start to see, do
they struggle with certain pitches?
Do they struggle in certain counts?
Do they struggle with certain hitters, that type of thing.
And then we're not necessarily keeping track of it then, but
then at the end of the program, we're going to have live A BS
and that will be like basically the final Test like, OK, the
everything that we were exposing to everything that we discussed,
like can you do it on your own now?
And we're going to start live ABS probably in like February.
They're going to get at least a full month of live ABS once a
week. So that's kind of how we're
using the tracking to understand, you know, the
Newell's triangle theory of constraints, like what part of
it do we need to manipulate for the athlete or for the group?
Because I have some groups where it's like they all seem to be
not the same but struggling with similar things, which I find
very interesting. And I found it pretty
interesting that you have like these different pictures come in
for essentially one pitch. Just say, hey, here's, you know,
pitcher X through this pitch previously picture Y through
this. So I wanted to ask, are you for
those instances too? Are you incorporating a catcher
in a batter? As much as we can, yeah, so.
So the the tough part with catchers is it's an open sign up
sheet and sometimes there will be 3 catchers and sometimes one
catcher will sign up and he doesn't show.
So this is the first year we're doing it.
I got here like 2 weeks before we started our offseason
programs, so we weren't necessarily able to get all of
that figured out right away. But for the next winter, we kind
of have a pretty good idea of OK, we we need to do this and
this to make sure we have what we need.
But as often as possible, we're getting a catcher and basically
we just tell the hitters, hey, at the 30 mark for these hours,
this is when we need you guys and they send them over.
What what I like about, you know, your your thought process
of incorporating the individual task environment constraints
when like using numbers to analyze this kind of stuff.
If you don't have all three intertwined, you can't really
put a, you know, a clear clear model behind it because you're
you're missing out on some key ingredients.
So that's just something I kind of wanted to bring in a little
bit because it's hard to be able to say like I know what happens
a lot in in, you know, kind of small college baseball, but
throwing to just a catcher or again throwing to a nine pocket
and saying, oh, you know, this was about 70% command.
Well, does he actually because when in game does he ever throw
to a nine pocket? Never.
So And you know, there's no battle there.
So how can we actively, you know, incorporate that when
that's just never going to happen.
So I appreciate the fact that you can incorporate all three at
MASH and that's really kind of what what's pushing it to the
next level because you're trying to get as representative as
possible to what is actually going to happen.
Yeah. And something that I I just
really appreciate working here is that Weston Jermaine has been
totally on board with it. He's, he's the director of
pitching, I guess you want to say and and he's like look like
we this is what what we need to start doing.
And I was like sweet, this is what I do like perfect.
Like they were on board basically before I even got
hired or at least Weston was. And then when we were able to
explain how valuable these things are, it was like, OK,
yeah, why are we not doing this at this point?
That's good. I wanted to kind of loop back.
I mean, there's so many different ways to go.
We can go actually down like the the tracking, you know, and
analytic side of things. I mean, there's one at some
point I want to go and talk about bio mechanics, 'cause
that's that's something that we touched on.
But I wanted to at least go back to exploration for a second.
And just for me, what I've seen or just noticed when thinking
about this whole idea and this concept of Rep without Rep, What
I tend to notice is that, OK, the idea is Rep without Rep,
like different every single time.
But I think sometimes it's about finding because each Rep is
going to have its own subtle nuance to it.
You know, just by the mere nature of the fact that you
know, previous previous experience or things that have
have recently happened are going to influence how we're
perceiving the current environment.
So just by that small change alone, not to mention that the
fact that like your fatigue level or your energy level is
going to fluctuate moment to moment as well.
You have all these different things.
So just by that alone you're going to get some variation.
But what I've noticed in in my own practice design and
interacting with athletes or just watching athletes naturally
try to explore, you know, you give them sort of a like, hey, I
want you to try to do this Rep without Rep But what eventually
happens is they find and I'm going to use like from dynamic
system theory here, they're going to find this attractor
state. So everything is going to
converge, like it's going to start fairly random or there's
going to be not random, but like there's going to be more
variation. And then as time goes on, even
though you have you've you've, you've told them like, hey, I
want you to do Rep without Rep Often times what I see is that
there is some variation, it's pretty small and then it just
comes back to being fairly consistent there with with
hardly at all any variation. And So what I tend to think is
that if since that is the case, we have to continually help the
athlete search. And by that I mean sometimes we
have to give them inspiration and I want to use that word
specifically because by inspiration I mean showing them
possible ways of of moving. So for example, I've been
thinking about this and I want to throw this to you guys.
You know, I've talked a little bit with oh, I can't remember
his name right now off the off the top of my head, but he does
like the flow stuff. Does anybody know who I'm
talking about? Gallo.
Dockflow or whatever what's is? My own Gallo is.
My own Gallo. Yes, Ishmael Gallo.
Forgive me Sir, if I got your your name wrong.
I've talked with him on the phone.
He's a great guy. Some of the.
I like some of the stuff that he's doing.
It's it's not fully ecological, but you can take it and make it
ecological. That's where I've been getting
really excited with the stuff. I didn't, I didn't love it
initially just because of the fact that it's kind of rote, you
know like hey here's the mover moving pattern.
Here's how you how you should move.
And then you know in some ways I mean because in talking with
him, he understands. You know, like I don't think
he's 100% trying to force a person to move this way.
These pattern like these movements that he's giving
people, they tend to clean up just by doing more repetitions
of them. You know it, you know because
again everything works back towards an attractor state.
If the way that I'm thinking about it is with the tractor
states or or these landscapes of a possible ways of moving.
The more you go down a path or like you let's say for example
you go outside OK based upon the environment.
Let's say you're walking through the woods based upon the
environment. Certain areas are going to Ford
walking through more and are going to be more accessible to
you. And so as you navigate through
the forest eventually you're going to now you're going to
tend to go through certain routes because they tend to be
more appealing to you and then they become more efficient for
you. And so I say all that to say
that that this helps explain like, OK, why is it through
variation we tend to see consistent patterns and and so
if we want to be able to understand how to navigate
through more parts of the landscape, we have to begin to
introduce like hey, what happens if we go over here, let's go
over here. And so for example, I like to
take because in the past when I have said, hey, I want you to
explore, show me how many different ways you can do this.
Most of the time they're only going to express it in one or
two, maybe three different ways. But if I want to, if I want to
continue to pull out more exploration and because again,
like we talked about before, athletes have not been because
of the one, how people have been coaching them and two the school
system they have not their the creative side has been often
times really dampened. And so to start to pull that out
and help foster that for them, we have to begin to give them
and show them different ways and eventually over time, they'll be
able to do that on their own. But in the early stages we have
to foster it and so I think what's his name Doctor Doctor
Flo Flo guy I anyways I was trying to pull up his his
Twitter. I I don't have it off off hand
but anyways so with his stuff I really like it because I I see
it as a potential for for different exploration.
So like kind of pulling from his system that he's developed.
You know like there's there's all these cool different ways
for example of guys, guys going and sliding picking up a ball
and like planting and and turning and throwing.
I think that's really cool. And why why do I think that's
cool? Well, because when I look at
infielders and where let's just say for example I want to I want
to work and help a guy improve their lead leg block.
Well, if you watch an infielder go to their backhand and then
have to quick off their quick plant and throw, often times
they block really, really well. And why is that?
To me it's because of the constraints of of that movement
affords blocking, like having a really good lead leg block.
And so as a result, like OK, if I want to help a guy, a player,
explore blocking lead leg blocking, maybe I put them in
different environments and like, OK, how can I kind of do this?
To me this is where it gets interesting.
And just as I'm thinking about this, OK, what if, what if we we
actually turf, you know how I tread they have you know those
banks and mounds you know that are all wood, right.
Well what if we we actually turf that and then now all of a
sudden we go, we we create this like mound or hill and we can
start doing different things and different explorations on it.
So one being like OK I slide in you know I, I grab, I pick up
the ball like he has any like spins and turns and then throws
it you know quick. So like to me like how many
different ways can we explore when we start to manipulate the
environment. I see it as being harder you
know with your traditional mound, portable mound, it's just
not enough space. But so that's that's to me like
you know, could we explore because I know I'm, I'm even
thinking about DCTC for a second.
Here we have, we have these kind of like low hills and slopes
that are outside the field. You know, like how can we begin
to utilize our space a little bit better for exploration and
throwing and being able to throw in different ways off different
slopes Because that, you know, obviously there's there's a
place for this athletic, this athleticism for pitchers, right,
because of your PF PS. Like how can we make PF PS more
interesting? I think, you know, starting to
think about it in terms of like infield plays and throws and all
that sort of stuff is is one thing.
But for me anyways. That, to me, is what I think is
important when we begin to. Utilize exploration for players
is that we sometimes have to shift either the intention or
the task constraint a little bit and shift their attention to be
able to explore more of the the space, the possible ways of
moving a little bit more. And so because I think if we
want to see players begin to express more athleticism on the
mound, they need to also have explored more athletic ways to
move. And so because I what what has
bothered me a little bit is that everybody talks about athletic
throws for pitchers and all it is is a jump throw and it's like
well that's actually a very small narrow band of throwing.
You know like yes you do have to be athletic to do it.
But there's more ways to be athletic than just a jump throw
or throwing from one leg And so for me that's where I I've I've
liked what what's it? Doctor Doctor Flo.
I want to see if that if yeah I should yeah doctor Doctor Gallo.
I can I can actually pronounce that well.
So Doctor Gallo his stuff like I think.
I think that's a good good space to like borrow inspiration from
is like the the system that he's he's worked really hard to put
together. I think you know there's a lot
that we from an ecological perspective could borrow from
what he is doing and like adapt it to more of an ecological
approach. So if you guys are not following
Doctor Gallo it's A at flows doc on Twitter.
So anyways that's my that's my little rant there.
I'll let if anybody has any thoughts jump in on that before
I switch to the next thing. Yeah, No, I and I'll just touch
on this real quick son. I've been thinking a little bit
about and it was from a graph that Keith David showed, I
believe it was him in the SMSC, where's the attractor Wells was
he brought those up. But to be able to be in a
created a creative and more innovative or authentic mover,
right. The deeper we get these movement
wells, right, the less creative we're going to be able to be and
less like unique and novel. We can't we can be.
And I think I think especially what you're talking about, I
think the same with us as coaches as being able to expand
our toolbox a little bit because we'll create these deep wells of
how we coach and like yeah with athletic throws we we maybe make
it a little more shallow where it used to be like perfect
repetition and we'll do a jump throw.
But not doing the same thing every single time as a coach or
deploying the same thing and being able to us explore a
little bit, we'll get those to be a little bit shallower and
now we can surf a little bit differently.
And I liked your idea of like the the path.
And because I was thinking because we've been doing a
little bit hiking since I've been back in the Northeast, it's
like if there's a path that's really like really set and it's
very obvious where I should go, like I'm probably going to
follow that almost every single time.
But if it's a little, a little bit little murky and you don't
know exactly where you go, it's I'm probably going to go
different depending how, how the day speaks to me.
I may go over here, I may go over there, I may go around this
tree or that tree or whatever. But it's because the the path
isn't so obvious of where I should go.
So I'm a little more open to the what is in the environment and
how it's speaking to me that day.
And I think us as coaches can get stuck in those deep
attractor wells. They just do the same thing over
and over and over and they get deeper and deeper and deeper.
First, like being open to Doctor Gallo, what he's doing, where
can I take that? How could I borrow that?
What could that potentially do for me?
How could that work on the lead? Like how could that work on the
quote UN quote, arm action or the mechanics or whatever it may
be? I'm sorry, I don't know.
That kind of sparked something and it's same same for coaching
as it is our players. When we explore like, we'll be
able to be a little more creative, innovative, and may
find something that we otherwise would not have found, right?
Well and two off of that, one of the one of the things that came
up in the SMSC with Stu Mcmillan's talk was asking the
what if question. So for example, you know going
back to like what you talked about Tanner, the constraint LED
approach. So based upon what I understand
about the constraint LED approach is if if we manipulate
A constraint within the system, so it can be anything that you
talked about due to the Organism, the environment or the
task, it's going to affect how the athlete moves, it's going to
affect their mechanics or how they express their movement.
So I I I tend to think of it this way.
I ask what if, what if we tried, if we manipulated, say for
example, like I'm just going to keep using this for right now
for, for ease of use is you know that that one where we put the
ball on the ground, we slide up to it, grab and pick it and like
turn and throw. OK, what?
How is that influencing the movement?
And then what if I manipulated that a little bit?
I changed either the speed that they come in to come pick up the
ball or if I change the the angle that they come in like how
does that then begin to shift and alter their movement.
And then if you begin to think about it like OK, what ways
would I might be more beneficial for them to move?
OK, so now this, this, this segues nicely into bio
mechanics. Like for me how I begin to think
about this and I was talking with ASCII recently and he was
challenging me on this, which I think is good.
When we begin to think about bio mechanics, the way that I think
about is that there are bio mechanics help us with our
search process for we might not know what the perfect bio
mechanics are for an athlete, but if we're struggling and
they're struggling to find it, I can maybe I have an idea of like
where to begin to educate their search.
I don't know where along this, this continuum towards like you
could say this biomechanical ideal because in my mind you
could maybe it is the ideal for them.
Maybe it's actually further beyond the ideal and maybe it's
actually short of it. And so I don't know where that
that is but I have, I have a space to you know you need a you
need a if you are trying to go someplace.
Meaning we're trying to help the athlete find a more functional
fit to the environment and have more functional solutions so
they perform better. OK, well that to me is like
having a destination. OK.
So if I'm trying to get to a place I need to have an idea of
like what direction to go. So to me, I use biomechanical,
my biomechanical understanding of things to help direct where
we're going to search and the direction that we're going to
move. But it doesn't mean that we have
to get to this destination. Why?
Because what if we find a better place to be that's a better
destination for the athlete along the journey.
And so for me, that's that's how I begin to think about bio
mechanics and how we're doing this exploration of OK, I think
I I want to see, OK, if I manipulate this or I change the
task up and I follow this principle, how their movement is
going to change and then does that actually manifest in
something that's more functional where they actually have more
success? Because to me, when I'm doing my
exploration, the way that I think about it is I'm trying to
put my back pocket, what is working better for the athlete,
what is trending in a more functional direction.
I'm going to put those things in my back pocket and then once we
have kind of we hit our we people who are more interested
on this you can watch we have a different episode up
specifically on exploration. We're kind of go into this more
but I'm going to what we we we hit this certain point of the
most that we're benefit that we're going to get out of
exploring and trying wacky stuff or like really trying to push
our edge because then everything starts to like our performance
starts to decline heavily. So what I found is OK you you
start to notice for that decline then you stop and then you go
back to those things that you put in your back pocket of like
hey I had more success doing stuff like this.
Let's explore that and hone in on trying to get more
consistency of results and then you begin to take those things
and move towards more functional solutions and more consistent
results or more consistent. I think the results is is a good
enough word for for this right now.
So anyways to me that's kind of the my, my thought process on
like how to successfully use exploration to get the most out
of it. Because otherwise I think you
know people's knock on exploration is like OK, they're
doing all this this stuff. But how is it translating to I
don't see how this translates to to to a guy being a better
pitcher for example. And so to me that's this is how
you do it, that you keep things focused on what's the main goal
that we're we're here to do as far as training is, is to get
the person to be a better pitcher and so making sure that
your exploration actually achieves that goal.
And I think like just when, when and how much you explore too.
As always, I think we talked about that a little bit.
But like I think that's always important conversation, like you
need to know when you got to be there too and how much you're
willing to explore first, try to get him a little bit closer to
that. But Tanner something I want to
throw back to you since I mean Gary you brought up kind of the
what if and especially like what if I do this and it kind of
brings me and I think you kind of were were asking that
question. I'm assuming like what if we
added a batter in and I think that that too.
And let me talk about exploration.
Do you think when you you kind of add that constraint of the
batter in because I see it in, in two ways, I'm probably lean
more towards the way you think about it.
But what if you add a batter in there and how that's going to
influence the movement? And is it I think people may
think like, oh, that's going to restrict them too much like when
when they're going and working on anything basically like, all
right, we're trying to throw as hard as we can, you got a batter
in there. Do you think that limits them
too much or that or does that make it more meaningful and
you're still can explore with the batter in there or do you
feel like you got to take all exploration out completely if
you had a batter in there or catch her in a little bit of
consequence? If that question makes sense?
Because I think that's an extremely important point is
like, can you still explore as we ramp up this
representativeness, I guess is the way to put that.
Yeah, I mean, I think you definitely can explore, but I
think the bandwidth is lessened like there's less room to
explore. It's it's kind of like, you
know, squatting, doing a barbell squat in your warm up, you can
explore quite a bit. But when you start to get to
8090 to 100%, there's a lot less room for exploration that's
actually going to work. So I think, I think you can
explore and for for one kid that we have, he is 15 top to 86
which is incredible. But he was struggling to throw
strikes and his velocity was it fluctuated quite a bit, like he
was sometimes 80 sometimes 83. He got up to 86 and I started
looking at how he was moving and he strided a little crossbody,
which I never I don't really have too much of an issue with.
But then his front leg was just, it just wasn't stable.
Like he was releasing some like differently, a little bit like
every pitch. I got some videos and it's like,
OK, there, there's nothing really consistent.
Not that it has to be the exact same every time, but I think
there was too much variance for him to be able to functionally
pitch. And So what we're starting to do
now is experimenting with landing spots.
So I said you can try landing more closed or you can try
landing more open. And I I said I think landing
somewhere a little bit more open is going to help you out because
of when you land your whole front leg bows out to that side
to try and allow you to rotate and throw the ball.
Sometimes you rotate recently, Sometimes you don't rotate
really as much as you probably need.
So it's affecting how you release the ball, which then is
going to affect where it goes, how hard you throw it.
So we do it in plyos, we do it in Med balls, and now we're
doing it on the mound with hitters in there.
It's like, hey, can you open or can you stride a little bit more
open? If that doesn't work, maybe go a
little more closed off, like figure out what's going to work
for you. And this was the first week that
we did it on the mound because testing was last week.
So we've been doing it in plows and Med balls second-half of
last week and we did it yesterday with them.
And it's like, OK, your velocity was pretty much in the same area
the whole time. And it looked like you were
throwing some more strikes and it looked like your front leg
was a little bit more stable. So I think he was able to
explore to find something functional.
And then now he's like Garrett said, like he's he's honing in
on it, like he's getting better at it, be more functional.
Did he get up to 86 again? No.
But he also wasn't feeling that great and was sitting 83.
So I would call that a good day. Throwing some more strikes, a
little bit more stable just looks more comfortable.
So I would say All in all, I think you can explore, but not
as much of A bandwidth as a more general activity.
Does that make sense? Yeah, no, for sure.
And I think I think too you can explore in different in
different ways. I guess something I've been kind
of thinking about, especially as you kind of make it more
representative is like what are we exploring too, right.
Like I think there are definitely things because I
think a lot of times again I guess we're, we're slant, we're
slanting it towards bio mechanics here for a second.
But like I think we get stuck on the bio mechanics, right.
But you can, you could start exploring like different
thoughts. You could potentially go into
the pitch like what's my intention going into this?
You could play with that or there or you could feel like,
oh, why don't, why don't you set up this way or that way or this
speed or that speed and different variations of those.
And there's still room to kind of explore and play a little
bit, even with it's a little High Representative.
At least that's something something I've been kind of kind
of dwelling on. It's like where where does the
exploration live if we want to make it more representative?
Originally in my mind, and this was a flawed flawed view with
kind of like you ramp up exploration you ramp down
representativeness. But that's not necessarily the
case where we can keep representative up, but we can
keep exploration up too. It may look a little different
like obviously it it you'd probably get a little dangerous
and parents may stop bringing it.
If you like are letting this guy like try every different kind of
move in the book while there's a batter down there like that's
probably not where you want to go.
But I I'm always intrigued by that thought, and I think it's
not as easy to like, OK, how do we keep exploration kind of high
while we're keeping representative kind of,
especially in the pitching space?
This is inherent risk, right? You stick a batter down there,
right? Well, I also think like, you can
explore pitch selection, pitch location, right?
So like, I do some classes that they're not necessarily part of.
Like a development offseason program is just like a one time
sign up. I might get two kids, I might
get six or seven. But for those classes, we don't
usually have catchers or live humans.
So something that I've done recently is with our plastic
dummy hitters. I'll either have them crowd the
plate or go way off the plate. I'm like, OK, we're going to do
the rolling counts based on where he is in the box.
Where do you think your best option to throw it is?
And some of them have no idea. Some of them are like, well,
he's crowding the plate, Probably want to go inside.
Perfect. If you can get it inside, it's a
strike. If you leave it down the middle
or outside, we're going to call it a single.
And it's like, oh, OK, now they have to figure out how they can
throw pitches based on where the hitter is.
As soon as they're done with that batter, I change something
about it. Maybe I go from lefty to righty.
Maybe I go crowding the plate, back them off.
Maybe I just go normal position, see what they do, But it is
interesting to see them know that, OK, this guy can't hit an
outside pitch. How am I going to get it over
there? Do they freeze?
Do they change their direction completely to get it over there?
Or are they able to handle it no problem.
And it's kind of fun to to watch them explore.
And usually the kids that actually change something where
they're not necessarily frozen, but they're moving a little bit
differently, they're able to get it there, which is, I think I
find it interesting. It's like, oh, their direction
changed. Oh, they're actually falling off
more to the side after they throw it, but they're actually
throwing it where they want to. So it's just just interesting.
When they get out of that repetition, same thing over and
over again. It's like, hey, figure out how
to get it outside. I don't care what it looks like,
batter's off the plate. You're going to have to throw it
outside. Yeah.
And and you'll see what you may actually see within the game
setting too, which I think is, is extremely important like
versus living within the like we're just pumping the ball into
the nine pocket over and over and over with no, no change of
intentions or like what you're actually trying to do, pitch the
pitch. So actually, I, I, I, I really
like that idea because I'm sure you do see, if you watch it,
like you're going to see if you're going inside, outside or
you put a righty in versus a lefty in there or just like you
change the count on them, you put them behind or up in the
count, whatever, like the movement's going to be
influenced by those. And I don't think that's talked
about because, I mean, to me, that's where the skill component
lives within this whole thing. Because like throwing harder is
going to help you get out. And making those changes does a
lot for you as far as what you could potentially select.
And it may open some things up for you.
But then placing it within context is like everything
because it is going to be influenced by all those
constraints we kind of talked about.
So I think that's cool that in that facility setting, you're
kind of already adding that in since you're going to, it's
going to expose them to a lot more and you're going to see a
lot more to actually be a good pitching coach versus a good
just throwing coach, which I think is a big difference.
Yeah, and and most of the time it's just me just cuddle,
letting them figure it out for the most part.
And if a kid absolutely cannot figure it out, then I'll pull
them aside and I'll ask them questions and we'll have that
conversation and then we'll go on to like, hey, try it, try
doing this or try doing that. What are you seeing?
What do you feel? Because some kids will move to
the complete other side of the rubber, Like if they're not
comfortable, they're just going to move completely away and try
to hit, hit their spots. Now they're able to which it's
it's functional, they move to the other side, That's fine.
I have no problem with it. But it's you can easily see what
causes anxiety and what doesn't. Yeah, I do think it's
interesting though. Just set and I think it's it's
kind of cool if that's what some of your guys are doing, even if
they're just sliding to the other side of the Rover since
they're they're searching, right.
And I think that's that's extremely important.
They're searching for and you're allowing exploration.
Like, even if it's not like what potentially is the most
functional within a game setting, at least they're
starting that process of searching for something that
will help them get to where they're they're trying to go,
and if even if that's where they start, it's something.
Yeah. And honestly, I don't really
have an issue with guys switching sides of the rubber
depending on who they're facing. Like.
I mean, I'm sure we've all seen that Paul Skeens clip.
He changes side of the rubber depending on, you know, whether
he's facing a lefty or righty. And I think more guys should
probably do that because your stuff is going to play different
because that's almost a whole foot that you're changing your
release point, how it's going to break, how it's going to come
out of your hand, where you're striding.
I think that could be pretty valuable for a lot of guys.
They just have to be willing to explore it.
And with the kids that have done it, it's more like, I don't want
to hit the guy, so I want to move to the other side.
Yeah, well, cool, like you're throwing it where you want to.
You should probably keep doing that.
Yeah, yeah. No, that's a good point.
And I think those are stuff that's probably not explored as
much as it could potentially be in pitching.
I mean for a host of reasons. But I think one, it's like how
do you find if it's functional too.
I think that's that's a tough question to really answer
without being exposed to representative problems is if
you're just switching side to side in bullpen settings and it
feels good or like you're on left ear righty, like, oh, I
think this would work better to a left ear versus right ear.
Coach told you like, it's great, but how do we actually know
without those slices of the game where we're getting exposed to
if it actually is better versus about it or not better versus
about it, right? And are we getting feedback from
them? Are they are they in there?
How they're interacting with us, telling us, which I think is a
huge part of the like. Why representative this is
extremely important, like how do we know if it's working right
like. Otherwise you're going to find
out in the game like that's how you like.
You're going to find out, oh, this don't work and that's and
then maybe won't get to pitch again for, you know, for for a
little bit. And that's that's where I think
that to your point, Baker of like, why it's so important to
to have representative practice sessions so that you're not
finding out in the game when it matters.
You're finding out beforehand so that when you get into the game
you can just fall back on what you know works that you have
experience working to. To go off of what you were also
saying. Baker of how how do you how do I
deal with the problem of keeping representativeness high as well
as exploration within a practice setting?
I I would. Here's how I've dealt with the
issue of worried about a hitter getting hit that stand in.
I just think that if you give the guy a glove, if the ball
comes at, you just catch it like all these guys, right?
Who who if you're if you're. We're not talking about little
kids, right? Who?
You know, it's iffy whether or not they can catch the ball.
But once you get to a certain level, everybody can catch a
ball if it's thrown at them. So if you're looking at the
ball, which I hope you know, if you're standing hitter, you're
looking at the pitcher in the ball and seeing where it's
going. You know, if you feel
uncomfortable, just catch the darn thing.
You know there's no. I will say that's that's harder
than said that because that's what I do.
I stand in a ton and like I wear a glove and I and to be fair
like I need to train myself as a hitter more and like that's one
thing that I've thought a ton is I'm I'm bailing so much it's
bad. It's just like you throw a
breaker and I'm I'm I'm gone. Which is not giving a very
representative look whatsoever. And I have a glove on because
it's the the here's the issue they think of intentions right
intention shape action. When I'm thinking, oh shoot,
he's coming inside, like I need to be ready to catch it.
Like I'm almost always going for the ball when it's not even
coming at me because my intentions I'm searching for
like I got to catch it, right? And then if I'm not and I'm
trying to give a super representative look like my
glove stays here, like I'm almost never ready to actually
catch it. Like occasionally, like maybe
swat it from my head, but like I'll still get hit, you know,
that's where it's hard. That's where the gloves actually
like it is still a limitation, but I think it's the best
solution that I've seen too. I don't know if anybody else has
any better, but it's hard. I.
Mean. I don't know real quick, Robert,
having having been at Missouri State standing in because that's
the closest I can get to the guys that you, that you're, you
know, standing in for, you know, at least for me, Honestly
though, I actually never had to catch a ball.
Nobody ever, like, got that close to me.
I also just maybe it's partially because I was a catcher.
Like, I have to wait, usually fairly long before I can even
try to go catch a ball because like, I've caught
knuckleballers, dude, if you try to go out and stick a stick a
ball that's a knuckleball, you get.
I caught cast Crayolo and he was throwing just nasty knuckleballs
to me and I was really good at just going out there and
sticking it. Well, I didn't have any of my
gear on. I wasn't wearing a mask and I
went to go try to stick it and that sucker hit me right in the
face. So like, that taught me, like,
all right, you know, you got to, you kind of have to wait as long
as you can let that ball move and then go get it at the end.
So to me, that's that. Well, that was also too, right,
Being a hitter, if I want to give myself because this, this
to me is why I understood why I like Stanton and these guys get
hit in the face, is because they can't move if they move early,
right? A ball that comes at him and
it's going to be a sweeper like you're done.
You have to, you have to stay in there as long as you can and
move at the last second. So to me, that's what, like,
that's why it's so hard to come back after getting hit in the
face with a ball. That hard is because you need to
then retrain yourself not to flinch, not to move to.
Because to me, that was how I gave myself a chance to hit the
the nasty breaking ball slider or whatever is.
I'm just, I'm not going to move and I'm going to stay in on this
and trust that this ball is going to, you know, it's going
to come back in or whatever, 'cause that was the only thing
that gave me a chance on those type of breaking balls.
So to me that's where it is to your point of like it is
somewhat of your natural reactions like you have to kind
of train some of that. So anyways, Robert, you were
going to say? Yeah, I basically the same
variation of what you and both both Garretts have said.
So yeah, like intention shapes action.
So like if if you anticipate A fastball coming in and like out
of the hand it looks like it's a fastball but it ends up being a
well tunneled slider, you know, then you you're going to catch
the ball before it breaks and then it does not become, you
know, as representative. And that's kind of like a poor
feedback system for for the pitch event, because then
they'll be like, oh, you know, it's going to hit the batter.
Well, I mean I think the hardest pitch, right, is that because
you're usually looking when he gives like fastball slider or
whatever, but it's that backup slider, the bullet slider is the
one that's going to, it's going to be a little bit tough.
But I mean I think you know it's.
I don't know it's I think it's way different if you're standing
in you know, for Diaz than it is.
I mean yeah, I stood in a for younger and younger was up
tonight like 9495, you know, with a good slider.
But I don't think, you know, I don't know.
You know it's it's different, right.
Like he had good control. It's different than like a young
Dominican kid who's still, you know, is 18 and trying to get a
feel for the zone. Whereas like when I when I met
younger, he was like a junior. So like there's there's
something different about that. So I get it.
It's it's not easy. But I think for me it's at
least, you know you can put a catcher's mask on.
I don't know. You know, like there's there's,
I think, I think we shouldn't let the challenge of the ideal
get in the way of trying to find creative ways to make the ideal
work. Yeah, I think.
I think maybe this is where like calling myself out like as as a
pitching coach and maybe maybe this is an idea all pitching
coaches should be doing. It's like we maybe we should be
training as hitters a little bit to be able to give a little bit
more representative slices. And I think that's something
when seeing Sean and Tyler do their in person at the SMSC,
like they are trying to give representative looks to the
football players. And I'm like, I can't
necessarily give a representative look to a single
pitcher. I will get my doors blown off.
You throw a breaker, I'm out-of-the-box like that, right?
Like, so it's like training like a hitter may actually be the
best thing I could do as a as a pitching coach.
I should see more pitchers. Maybe I should be going off a
machine. Whatever.
Again, how much time do I have? I don't know if I have that much
time, but, like, there should probably be some investment in
that as far as, like, my coach growth, right.
And that's something I've been thinking about this offseason,
is how I could potentially do a little more of that.
Just because, again, like, I'm not giving as representative of
a look and like, they might find functional solutions against me
that they thought it was nasty. And then you actually put
somebody who can track the ball. Again, like Gary, you were
actually a hitter. So, like, you're probably a
little bit better than I am, right?
So just something I've been dwelling on for us pitching
coaches. But on that point, what I've
recognized right is, for me, I've had to learn how to pitch,
right. If I want to help hitters, I
have to learn how to pitch. And I think you know you brought
it brought it up like if we begin to you know study our
opponent begin to inhabit the life that they that they live.
All of a sudden now we have more insights.
Because to me I think it's fun as as a more of a hitting guy to
go to like a pitching conference and then just listen to how how
they talk about how to get hitters out.
I mean they're basically giving giving you their playbook like
hey we want to go you know how we you know how our school
thinks about pitching is attack that low and away corner.
We want to pitch guys away low and away.
You know to get ground balls whatever.
And you're like OK so then we're going to get good at hitting
lone away you know it or you know I I, I heard one big league
coach talk about like yeah, we we we just told guys to throw it
down the middle. Now there's a reason for that.
But I was just like you know because he was saying well
because you know only 11% of those balls down the middle end
up as hits. And I was like, yeah, but how
much of the damage also comes from that that percentage?
Like I to me that doesn't eventually, unless your guy that
you're telling this to all has a ton of movement to their pitch.
Always, then yeah, that makes a ton of sense for that guy that
he should just focus on throw it right down the middle and let
the ball move. But if you're not a guy, you
know your guy, you're a guy that has maybe more more ride to your
ball. Maybe there's some some level
into that. But at the same point still like
if your ball doesn't have a ton of movement or your movement is
fairly average to the league standard.
Like I think if you leave that ball middle middle like it's
going to get crushed or like yeah, you might get away with it
the majority of the time. But when when those small
moments come up that low percentage because I mean what's
the percentage of that? Robert, you might know this.
What's the percentage of all pitches that end up as runs you
know that produce runs It's it's a very small percentage of the
pitches. So like to say that like you can
just throw it down the middle because like only a small at a
small time you're going to get burned.
Well yeah but those are the only times that matter you know so I
I to me that just doesn't make any sense to to say that because
what it what are what are hitters if you if you're on the
pitching side like what are what are hitters focused on a ton now
swing decisions that's and and what is their what are their
their focus when it comes to swing decision it is mostly
looking middle So something doesn't add up here when both
sides are trying to do the same thing right back into the back
in the day when hitting coaches were telling hitters to hit
ground balls and pitching coaches were telling pitchers to
try to get ground balls. Something's not right here.
If we're both trying to do the same thing like this don't make
any sense to me like because one like we should be trying to beat
the other person So if the goal is to is to for in the pitcher's
mind to limit fly balls then I would think that the offense
should try to hit fly balls. I don't know, but you know, So
anyways, that's that's kind of my my thing here of like when
you're developing your pitching strategy, it should counter what
the offense is trying to do. It should not be trying to do
the exact same thing and vice versa.
So anyways, that's my little rant on that.
I guess Tanner I want to ask you this as I mean I've, I have my
own thoughts, but I actually have another pitching guy on the
on the call. Finally like as far as that goes
because a lot of times we're limited to to not having batters
that swing, even if they're just standing in just do the space or
just do it do them a myriad of things or you just don't have a
hitter. How do you how do you help your
guys necessarily train that aspect of it where like you're
still trying to get an out and they're still like the batter
could be behaving in different ways based on how you just
pitch. So if you're doing like a like
potentially A simulated count or whatever, since if it's in a a
non representative slice and we don't have people swinging, how
can you potentially continue to still work some of those things
even without that? Because I mean I run into that
all the time and that's where I've been trying to think on
ways to do it a little better, even if I have the constraint of
that since that's an excuse like oh, I just didn't have a hitter.
But I still think there's got to be better ways to get it done.
Yeah, I mean I probably don't have the greatest answer for you
just because like at Match right now we are making it pretty
representative. But I will say like if if we
don't, some of the things that I've been doing, especially with
those those one time like drop in classes that we do like we'll
play like Pig or something with the nine pocket or like a point
system game. And so like pretty much
everybody can throw it either up in the nine pocket or like in
the middle. So then what they'll start doing
is they'll start calling like, oh, you got to hit the left
black frame. So they're trying to live on the
edges. Or if we have the standing dummy
hitter and it has like an orange string hanging from the arm, so
they'll try to hit that orange string.
And so for as pitching coaches, we like it because how many
hitters actually like hitting the inside pitch?
Not many. They don't like hitting it.
So if they're going to continue to try to hit that orange
string, well, now they have more practice throwing it inside.
So I haven't really been directing, I guess, their
attention to a hitter when there isn't one or trying to do it
because most of the kids I'm working with just don't have the
mental capabilities to try and think through that yet.
Because they're they can be 9:10, 11-12 years old.
And it's like, how deep do I need to go into this?
Or do we just need to just try and get better at hitting
targets in general? How can we make that a game now
for older guys, so guys that may be a little more skilled, it's
like, OK, like if we have Trackman on and we have we're
throwing a bullpen to a catcher with a dummy hitter, it's like,
OK, this pitch is moving in this way.
You probably want to avoid throwing it in these locations.
So like that's kind of how I would go that way.
It's like OK you've you've got a a righty in and you're it's a
lefty on the mound and your cutter is 90 to 92.
You probably want to live inside with that because if you leave
it out over the plate, it's base of the MLB average, hitting 92
isn't a big problem and it's going to go right into the
barrel. You probably want to live glove
side with that pitch, just based on the profile.
If it's got good carry, hey, it's probably going to be more
effective up in the zone. So let's try and figure out how
we can set that pitch up. And then we practice setting it
up, go to live ABS when it's appropriate, and then we try it
there and then it's like, OK, did that work?
OK? If not, why didn't it work?
OK, if it did work, was it because of how you actually set
it up, or did you miss some spots and that somehow set it up
just as well? Or like was the hitter you were
facing just not to your skill level by trying to figure out
those things. So I don't know if I can give
you a a great answer just because like I said like we're
doing pretty good job of getting hitters in there and and
catchers so. Yeah.
No, no, that that definitely makes a lot of sense.
And even even that last point, it's kind of like, you know,
it's like building the general capability of throwing it to
regions that you should potentially work and then you go
battle test them within a representative slice.
I think that's kind of kind of what you're getting at, which I
think I think makes a lot of sense to me.
And I guess I I I'd open this up to everybody.
So I mean this, and I could be completely wrong in this, but
something I've I've thought about almost to challenge the
idea of like your ten 1112 year olds and not necessarily adding
any form of context and just trying to hit a target.
Like I've always wondered and I'll have an answer.
I could be completely off on this and it's just me wondering
because I'm not currently working with that age group.
So like I could be completely off base on this.
But training at that age, if they were to only if they're on
the mound and they only were to throw pitches as if there was a
quote, UN quote batter in there and the pitch is to get an out,
like would that help them as they continue to go up levels
transfer that quicker. That's just something I've I've
thought of. Again, like it was quick
thoughts since I'm not working with that.
But like imagine again, this is like the perfect setting and
maybe my son will go through this and he'll be my my dummy as
we as we grow up. But like if he's on the mound,
even if I don't have a catcher or a hitter.
But I say, all right, I want this fastball in a way that
you're going to try to get a rightie to ground out or I'm
going to, you're going to try to get him to swing and miss or get
the ball above his barrel. Or I want you to try to like get
the inside part of his bat in the zone on this pitch.
Like I always wondered if that's the only way they threw pitches.
If once again to game is that much easier, could be off on
that. And it may not work.
The intention may not be there and they might not be able to
control his pitches, maybe frustrate, I don't know, but I I
that's always something I was curious on.
But that's a long time scale project that I don't have to go
down, but I think there could be something there.
My initial thought is that if they're young, right, you know,
like with my kid, they don't. It's not going to work with
regards to if they don't have the experience, right?
So they need the experience in order for them to even
understand that context, right? So.
The. Experience of facing a hitter,
you know, and seeing those different things before you can
introduce that. So like, for example, I mean,
I've, I've taken stuff from, you know, what other people's
experience, right? Like driveline or Lance, you
know, talking about just trying to throw the ball hard.
Like that's the first one of just learning how to throw the
ball. And to me, it's not, I don't, I
don't use the word hard anymore. I say fast because if I say
hard, a guy's going to probably tense up more and if I want him
to throw fast, that's that means something different.
And so I I at least tell my kid to swing, either swing the bat
fast or to throw the ball fast, you know, And so that that to me
is just how I'm initially talking about.
And then maybe I might educate his attention.
So we have these I so actually, Tanner, this is another thing
that might be fun in your setting.
I got for my kid for his birthday to blow up, you know,
like punching or kicking bags or whatever.
So when you hit them, right, they come back up.
And So what, what made me think that I wanted to do get this for
him was we're outside playing and he there's like a sprinkler
hole or whatever. And he took the the plastic bat
that we had and and shoved it in there.
And then he had like a ball and he was trying to like just knock
it over. So we played this game of, like,
throwing it and trying to, like, knock this thing over and then
we'd have to go and set it back up.
I was like, well, what if I had a thing that just, like, popped
it back up? Because it became this game of,
at least for me, I throw the ball and if I miss it and I
don't actually hit the thing, I have to go run and get it.
So all of a sudden this becomes like, I was thinking about this
like a fun conditioning activity for pitchers of we have this
target, you throw the ball and you try to knock the target
over. Well, if you miss, you have to
go run and get the ball. And so you know in a way it
becomes this conditioning thing or or even too if you hit it and
the ball bounces off whatever, you got to go run and get it.
So now it becomes this, this game that becomes a form of
conditioning where the the further I throw it, the further
ball or the harder I throw it, the further ball is going to go.
So then I'm going to have to run further to go get it and then it
and then I pick it up and as soon as I can like I get set up
and I try to hit the target again.
So it was kind of fun because now all of a sudden there's
these different ranges. So if I don't throw it as hard
to try to knock it over, well then my next throw if I miss is
going to be closer so it's going to be easier.
So anyways I thought that was like you could come up with so
many different games though with this with this like thing that
you can hit and knock it over and it'll like bounce back up.
So that was at least my my initial thought going back to
what you were saying. Baker is like it comes back to
where are they skill wise like and then trying to educate their
intention or attention to meet the the meet the athlete where
they are. And so for me like sometimes
like because Ezra will throw to me and I'll hit off of him and
sometimes I have to tell him like hey buddy, you got to throw
it lower you know. So I'm educating his intention
there or you know I'll put the put that that knock up thing up
and it has like a little target. I'm like, hey buddy, try to
throw it right here. You know.
So sometimes it's it's it's those things of like, but I
don't always tell him that. Sometimes I'll just simply tell
him to throw it fast and just see like because maybe he's,
he's naturally attuned to a target and it's fine because
there's sometimes too, when I mean, how old's your son now,
Baker? He's like 1.
Yeah, 1515 months. 15 months. So you know, early on, it's just
right where where he's at. Hey, throw it right.
I say the same thing to OB. He's just like, throw the ball,
just just throw it. And obviously it's not.
Doesn't look like anything, but it, like with Ezra's, is really
interesting to see. Like at some point you're like,
oh man, that was actually pretty decent and it was like actually
at a target. I didn't even tell you to throw
it at a target, but it actually went towards either myself or,
you know, whatever. And you're just like, man.
So this is to me why I say like they naturally I think are going
to pick up on trying to throw to something specific.
It's just, it's just an affordance, right?
Like the ball of Ford's throwing at a person.
Partially because when you are throwing it or whatever modeling
it for them, you toss it to them like they naturally, you know,
see that this is how we want to interact or this is how I should
interact with this thing. So I think you only need to
educate their attention or intention when you see is
necessary. So that's my thought process
with that of like when they when do they get to that stage of OK
we can start they've had enough experience or they have enough
cognitive awareness that we can start to introduce this concept
to them. So that's my thought process of
of how to kind of scale it from a, you know, in terms of like
youth to to your you could say pro.
Yeah. And I and I guess like where my
thought was is the reason I would do that or the reason I
thought of it is because you're always keeping problem and
solution kind of coupled like like what's the actual problem
or what are we trying to solve in doing that every single time.
I just don't. In my brain it was like that
would always keep them directed there.
So once again, to game, it'd be harder to almost like pull them
away from that, where they're almost always searching for the
way to get it out versus just becoming a thrower, which is I
think the natural way that it's taught nowadays, where they just
will naturally kind of become a thrower verse, like always
trying to solve a problem with your pitch.
And I just wondered again, this is kind of like one of my
thoughts when I was like, how can I make the most creative
pitcher possible? Like as as far as the
development path, this is where it kind of sparked.
I was like, I wonder what kind of creative ways they may
potentially come up with if they were trained in this way, where
every single pitch was to get an out in some form or fashion and
if it would be, if it if the development would look a little
different, then differently and again like that.
Maybe I don't have like the the original when they first started
baseball, like footage of that. But maybe pitchers were doing
some unique like weird creative stuff or like that wasn't even a
thought at that point because all it was was getting out, like
we just wanted to get this guy out.
But you look at like a Wiffle ball, like when we used to play
like with the with the Wiffle balls, all the holes in it, like
you literally just did whatever. Like your your movement changed
every single time and you're just trying to find a way out
just because there's no constraints, right?
So I don't know, could be completely out there and
completely useless. I'll probably try it at some
point in my life, but like, I think there may be something
there. I think so.
The the one thing that I would say is that we have to leave it
open. Meaning I can see that for some
players just based upon their constraints and their natural
you know how their how their pitches profile.
It might be that focusing on getting it out might not be the
the thing that is most successful for them.
So I think we have to leave it somewhat open like we can start
with an intention and see it because to me this is the whole
the whole like test, retest you know thing that's been in
baseball for a while now, right. Like whatever it is we should
test and retest, you know, and just see how it goes and then
you know, find what works the best for the athlete.
I think for me that's that's just been the thing that
ecological dynamics has done well for me is just let me go
and feel free to just always go with what works best, what works
best for this person right here, right now in front of me.
And yeah, we do have to have some thought for the future, but
how we get to the future also is dependent upon this moment right
here, right now. So if I can get you success
here, right here and right now set you up for wanting to stick
with it, it gives you motivation and then we can start to
eventually in the future maybe if some things need to be
changed or whatever, we can deal with it when when we get closer.
And so that's at least been my my thought process or how I
think about it. So I at least say that I think
that's a good starting place. You know, I think that's going
to get you probably minimum 80% of the results that you're
looking for. I think it's more than that.
I think that'll work for probably 90 to 95 to 99% of
people. But just you know we we can't I
think in some ways get too married to like this is the
answer per SE. But I think it is a a a good
one. I I do want to transition a
little bit here back-to-back to pitching mechanics because this
was something else that you brought up earlier.
Baker I I saw this and this for me resonated with me and it's
funny because my old boss and and and the the this, this other
company are kind of got into a little debate and it's going to
be a debate at ABCA. So Baker, if I know you're going
to be there is anybody else going to Abca?
Robert, correct me if I said that wrong.
No, you you said it right Tanner, a little little back
story. So there was a period of time
where Boyam would say. ACBAA.
CBA. Every.
Time. So every time it drove me nuts,
for I don't think either of us corrected them for like a while
and then it just got. To a point, they just let it.
It's like I had something in my teeth.
They just let it go for for for a long time.
It was functional though, right? It got the point across, but
certain point it wasn't. Functional, Yeah.
And it provided humor, so. Yep.
But anyways, so there's this tweet by arm care.com.
Pitching mechanics don't cause arm injuries and I'm curious
what your thoughts on this are. Because for me like Eco D kind
of help break me of this like mechanic stuff.
And because to me this is the whole reason that a lot of
people will say, well This is why we actually need to focus on
mechanics is it prevents injury. So I'm curious what your guys's
thoughts are on one each of you individually.
What are your thoughts on mechanics?
What is the role? Is there a place for them with
an ecological approach? It can be different from mine.
You can disagree with my thought and then we can dive into this
this this whole kind of conversation about pitching
mechanics and injury along with what is it like because because
Bleecker I because for for Bleecker I think it's it's not
just mechanics for for injury's sake.
It's also about efficiency. I think that's one of the other
arguments is you know mechanics lead to a more efficient
movement, and so you know based upon your guys's understanding
of ecological dynamics and what efficiency means from an
ecological dynamics perspective. What are your guys's thoughts
when it comes to mechanics? I I would pretty much agree with
that tweet, I believe. I don't think it's a mechanics
thing. I think Rich actually kind of
begged a question. He goes is it a mechanics thing
or is it a workload thing? Is it a poor workload?
Like, like, which one is it now? And then does the poor workload
cause issues with movements? And then you also have to think,
like, are they too weak to be able to throw it in a efficient
way? And efficient is different for
everybody, but I think it's more of the general qualities that
can cause injuries. Now, are there sometimes where
mechanics might cause injury? Yeah, but I don't think it's as
big as the baseball industry makes it, if that makes sense.
Like of all the guys that I've coached at my previous job job
now, like the guys with some of the best looking mechanics
usually are the ones where their arms are sore or hurt all the
time. The ones with the worst ones,
well, those movements usually aren't functional to throw hard
enough to where their arm hurts. So to me it's not necessarily
the mechanics, it's workload management.
Are they strong enough? Is there a certain muscle that's
weak and everything else is being overworked?
I don't know. I honestly don't know if there
is a specific answer to what causes injuries and then you
have genetics on top of that. So like, is it really is
mechanics? Are bad mechanics really the bad
guy? And then through an ecological
lens, is there such thing as bad mechanics or just functional
versus not so functional? Yeah, and I I think I tend to
agree with pretty much everything you said there.
And something that Rafe Kelly said that's always stuck out is
the the idea of like the calluses on your hand.
When you, when you're like in a gym, you get calluses in one
spot. So it's really hard tissue next
to really soft tissues and those tear.
But like in Rafe's world where he's climbing trees and doing
all these diverse movements, his whole hand gets calloused and
it's hard tissue next to hard tissue and those stay together
and they don't break off. So one thing he said it was I
thought really fascinating, if you train in a certain way and
you have really strong resilient tissue next to tissue that's not
trained at all, like that's where some of your non contact
injuries come from. And that's where I think it's,
it could be just weakness within the body and you just can't
handle that type of stress or you've developed a capacity in
certain areas and not other areas and that's what could
potentially leading to to some of the some of the injuries.
But I think like you could you can move in the worst way
possible, have a ton of stress, extra stress, put on ligaments
or soft tissue, whatever. But you, you can be able to
withstand that because of the stress you put on yourself
previously and you can withstand that type of stress, you're
probably not going to get hurt. Or you could have less stress
put on you, but you're not trained up to a certain point
and you're not strong enough to withstand that and you're going
to get hurt. So is it mechanics probably not
do. Can they like, contribute?
Like probably, yeah. But is that the sole reason?
I I wouldn't think that's ever the sole reason for it, right?
Robert, you got any thoughts on this?
You know, even Tuesday? Have you have you seen any data
related to this or just even from searching your own
experience what what are your thoughts on this?
Yeah. So I haven't really seen any
data to report it, but at the same time, I think it could be
an interesting use case if you know the data is presented
itself. We just haven't, there hasn't
really been an opportunity to kind of view this on a on a
large scale, especially on you know, bio mechanic side of
things too, just because that data is just not presently
available. So I would find it interesting
if you know there's an opportunity there where maybe we
can play around with some bio mechanics data and then be able
to marry it together and see if there's something interesting
there. So that's my take out.
Because the the additional thing that I would say and add to the
conversation for me, what was most illuminating for me was
going to take Dr. Andrea Ospino's of course is functional
range conditioning. And in the in the first one he
put up there, you know in in his mind it's a capacity issue.
So if the demand exceeds the capacity of the tissues or the
structures or whatever, you're going to get injured like that.
It just and to me it's like, yeah and like in what cases is
that not true? You know that and so but if you
build up the capacity of the tissues and the structures to be
able to handle whatever demand that you put on place on it,
you're not going to get injured. And so to me that is the
fundamental principle by which I look at almost all injuries now
well-being because even in contact, right, if it's a
contact injury, what happened? Well, the force exceeded the
capacity of those tissues or or structures and and destroyed
them or broke them. So to me the goal is with and
This is why right and on ramp is so important.
What are you trying to do? You're trying to build up the
capacity of the tissues to be able to with to withstand
whatever, whatever load you're going to place on them later.
And you do it in a way and you have to think because to me this
is actually the hardest part is to think is to think about it in
reverse, reverse order order. OK.
I have a specific date and time by which I need to have the
capacity to do XY or Z. And so a lot of times, you know,
you want to sit there and think about it like, OK, how many
pitches and how frequently because these are, these are the
two elements of frequency and and and and load or volume.
OK. Because these because.
Right. The implement that we're going
to use isn't going to vary much at all, right.
It's going to be a 5 oz, 5 oz ball.
So we have to think about, OK, what are the two main things
that are going to vary? It's going to be a frequency and
volume. So what is the, how frequently
is a person going to throw? And then two, what type of
volume are they going to throw and what's that going to look
like? And so you want to work work
backwards of like OK, how do I get them built up to there and
how much time do I need? And I think that is actually the
harder piece is how much time because a lot of times
especially in my context in college well we have winter
break and winter break is can be anywhere from three weeks long
maybe 2. But generally you're looking at
like 3 to 5 weeks long of the of an athlete right before our
season just gone on their own doing whatever, who knows what,
right you can give them something.
But this is the other thing too of like shutdowns.
It's like how long can I shut a guy down if I need him to be
ready by a certain date? And then two, when we come back
from break, OK, do we on ramp again like you know and what
does that look like? How does that cut into other
things that we could be doing? If I'm on ramping, can I on ramp
in such a way where I'm still getting work done?
I think so. But you know initially I think
that's a hard thing to figure out of.
Well, it's because for me the way that I approach on ramping
is high volume, low intensity. That's how I think about on
ramping is I want to build up a ton of capacity, build up a ton
of endurance, so that when I go back to whatever it is I want to
work on, I can do it. But I also think the hard part
is, is also building up the capacity to throw at high
intensity and so you also have to have a transition period of
high volume, low intensity to higher intensity.
Now the question is, and this is actually a question for you,
Tanner, you know, interacting with with Aaron.
You know, I think you can throw at high intensity more
frequently, but how do you do that?
How do you build a person up to throw high intensity more
frequently and not only that at a higher volume?
Because again when I start to think about things from a weight
room perspective, we can't go in there and Max out every single
day like you know with with moving the most tonnage.
Now could I go in there and try to move as fast as I could every
single day at a specific weight that I do the same weight every
single day? I think that is more doable.
But I guess the question is because this is to me is like I
look at trying to throw the ball as hard as you can as being
very, very similar to trying to go in the weight room and pull
as much weight as you possibly can for one RMI and and I think
the jury has has concluded and the evidence shows that you
cannot do that every single day unless maybe you're on steroids,
OK. With the exception of like the
ability to recover very quickly. If you can't do that then we
can't come in every single day and and and hit APR every day.
So this is my question I guess maybe throwing it back to you
Tanner of like you know working with being around Aaron all the
time, like what does it take to actually be able to throw more
consistent, how do we, how do we make this transition to higher
intent, you know hitting new PRS in terms of velocities etcetera
and you know can we do this in an on ramp, what does this look
like? Yeah, I'm honestly not sure how
Aaron does it. He just does it like, you know,
I I, I can't really give you a solid answer, but it it's fun to
watch because it's like every day he calls it his high, high,
low program, right? So he does 2 high in 10 days in
a row and then it's either low intensity or completely off and
then right back to a high intensity.
And I don't know. I think for him he just has the
ability to just be able to handle it, 'cause he didn't
throw hard for most of his career up until he got to Indy
ball and then he just started throwing Max effort, long toss
or something like that every single day.
And then all of a sudden he had a big velocity jump.
So watching or hearing him do it, it just seemed like his body
could handle it when he did it. Now in an on ramp, I'm honestly
not sure. I mean I think you need to
expose the body to throws at high intensity whether it's
medicine balls, swinging a bat, maybe just rotating in a Max
effort way. I think that's a place to start.
But once you get to that high intensity, like I guess if you
want to call it a phase or like after the on ramp is over, I'm
not sure maybe maybe you go after, you know you have a high
intent day, a moderate intent and a low however you want to
structure it. But like at the end of each
session it's one Max effort throw.
I don't know, like maybe you just start with one and then the
next time you get to a lower moderate and you go 2 and then
maybe three. I have no idea.
I haven't tried it yet. I haven't done it, but that's
that's maybe how I would do it. Well and and for me having
worked with a guy one of our players, he had some arm pain or
whatever some of his like medial and some of it was like on the
posterior side of his his elbow with the tricep.
And so we we did my, my, my like weighted ball on ramp which
actually kind of gets extended out.
It works best about 8 weeks, 6 to 8 weeks because I we we'll
we'll spend a whole two to three-week block just on like
not going out super far and using higher heavier weighted
weighted balls and do that for about you know two to three
weeks is usually a good good amount to build up a good solid
base. And then we start working back
and then we start transitioning down in terms of the the
weighted balls and we work our way all the way back to to a
regular baseball. And if I if I transition or I
drop or I add a a lower weighted baseball going down to a 5 oz
that you know if I start at 9 oz and I add 8, So what So it's
nine, so it goes 8765, that's 5 weeks or at least four weeks
right there just to transition. So we go 2.
So I think it's like 2 weeks, so about six weeks it just to do
that. And we haven't done any high
intensity throwing. All we've done is just increase
the distance and drop the weight.
And so now I've been thinking about, OK, so now if I want to
properly do it because we did, we did that whole thing and then
I had him throw to bases after that and it went OK.
It kind of still kind of bugged him.
It was still there. So I'm like, well, if I actually
wanted to make this go away, I would have to actually then
after that whole block slowly reintroduce high, high intensity
throws to make it so that the tissue and like the nervous
system can do that and then make that cause The way.
The way I think about it is I like this analogy that Tyler
used, used for, you know, what we do in the weight room.
And then the skill coach, right, is we we, we help them out and
then they get to this bridge. And then we just pat them on the
butt and say, hey, good luck taking what we did in the weight
room and figure out how to translate it to the field, you
know, and. And so to me it's all about
like, how can I walk the player further along that bridge so
that the jump is actually more gradual.
Because I found this is for me, for like weighted balls.
You know how when you when you switch to like a lower weight,
you usually, like, Shank it or just like, it's just super
weird? Well, I found out if you, like,
are constantly alternating between the ball, whatever new
ball that you're wanting to do eventually you can just pick him
up and you don't. You don't end up, you develop an
attunement to the to the differences in the weight and
how to move. So anyways that is what I found,
at least how I think about how to transition as you if the more
we can smooth it out, the easier the transition is going to be
for the athlete anyways. All right.
So I know at least one person needs to go soon so I want to, I
want to try to land the plane here and see if I can do it in
in 5 minutes is the goal. So anything that you guys want
to wrap with closing thoughts, closing words and then we'll go
into where can everybody be found and if you want to keep up
with them. So any any closing thoughts from
from any of the anybody here? I guess the, I guess the only
thing I'll say is I hope anybody who's made it this far in the
episode takes takes what people are doing over at MASH as like
as an example what you could potentially do at a facility and
actually change it up a little bit compared to your traditional
model. Add representativeness into it,
like encourage freedom, actually create some authentic movers on
the mound. Since I don't think you see it
often and I think a lot of people are scared to try it
within that setting. So like I think they're they
could be a really cool model going forward of how to
potentially do it. So I kind of like tip the hat
again like only hearing it from and seeing it from afar.
But from from what I'm hearing and what you're kind of talking
about, Tanner, I think this would be a really cool place for
people interested in these ideas that work in a facility to gain
some inspiration of how they could potentially go do it.
And then Tanner, where can people find you?
And then also too, are there any resources that you would
recommend? It doesn't have to be
specifically about Eco D You can plug Eco D stuff.
It could be to do with baseball, or it could not do with baseball
at all, like any resources that you recommend that people check
out. Gotcha.
So yeah, if people want to follow me, Instagram is TJP
under score training. That's just one I kind of have
fun with. You get a look at what I do for
myself training wise and then on Twitter, TJ Pruitt 2310.
That's going to be more of, I guess educational, just things
that I've been thinking about different ideas.
But as far as resources, going to be honest, really anything
from emergence I found extremely valuable.
Other than that, not really. I mean, I don't know.
I mean that's really what I what I kind of look at with all the
different ideas and taking ideas from other sports and asking,
OK, how can we apply it to baseball?
Because there really isn't a whole lot of people writing
about these ideas in a baseball setting.
So I would say anything from emergence and you're pretty much
going to be set to at least get started into these ideas.
Within, within it within 60 seconds, Could you speak briefly
on your experience and your thoughts on the Movement Academy
and because I, I, I know both you and Baker did that I want.
I'm curious if you have any thoughts on that.
Yeah, I really liked it because I had already been looking at
these ideas before I started Movement Academy for probably a
year and a half to two years. So then being able to be like,
OK, this is what you understand. This is where you're at.
Let's look at some of these ideas that maybe you're still
struggling with or you don't fully grasp.
And it was nice to be able to have that one-on-one or two on
one conversation with Sean and Tyler to be able to actually
like, OK, this is where I am, they're meeting me where you
know exactly where I am on that bridge and they're helping me
get across it like, OK, cool. Like, yes, that was a good
activity, but you could have made it better by adding XYZ or
taking away XYZ and being able to talk through those ideas and
actually becoming a better coach and understanding the theory and
the practicality of what I was doing and then being able to
hear in the big group discussions about what other
coaches are talking about. It's like, oh, I haven't really
thought of that idea in that way because I thought I had a good
grasp on it. But hearing somebody else's
perspective, it's like, oh OK, I can see where that comes in.
How can I tie that into who I am So extremely valuable?
I felt like it was the equivalence of, I don't know,
maybe a college level course maybe.
Or even even higher. Maybe like a master's level.
I don't know. I just know that the amount of
information and education I got was probably worth more than
what I paid. Sweet.
So on that note, if you want to be get get a small discount on
some of the their courses not not the movement Academy.
Use the code Edge 7 to get 7% off and so without further ado
till next time.