Three Years of Cressey Performance: The Right Reasons and the Right Way

Written on July 14, 2010 at 7:16 am, by Eric Cressey

Though a somewhat “normal” day at the gym, yesterday marked Cressey Performance’s three-year anniversary.

While my business partner’s blog post yesterday did an excellent job of doling out “thank yous” to a lot of the important people who have been so involved in our success – from clients to parents, coaches, interns, and significant others – I wanted to add my own two cents on the matter today.  More than anything, I really wanted to highlight a sentence that illustrates what makes me the most proud about where CP has been, where it is, and where it’s going.

We’ve done this for the right reasons, and we’ve done it the right way.

I read a business development blog post by Chris McCombs the other day where he wrote something that really hit home for me.  When he was talking about how he decides to accept or reject a new project/opportunity, here is one of his guidelines:

“Only Take on Projects That Are In Line With My Current Values and Fulfill Me Beyond Just The Money – A project must fulfill me in some way BESIDE just money…too many people spend their life JUST chasing a buck; to me, that’s no way to live.  For me, the money must be there, but it should fulfill me personally, be fun, help a lot of people, and build and be in line with my current brand and brand equity.”

Back in 2007, I had a tough decision to make.  My online consulting business had really taken off, and the Maximum Strength book deal was in the works.  My other products – Magnificent Mobility, The Ultimate Off-Season Training Manual, and Building the Efficient Athlete – were selling well and getting great reviews, and I’d just had a study published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research.  This website was growing exponentially in popularity, and I had just wrapped up my first year on the Perform Better tour – so lots of doors were opening for me on the seminar front to present all over the world – and I could have stayed home and just written all day, every day.

I was getting really crunched for time, as I was already training clients 8-13 hours per day, seven days per week, as my in-person clientele had rapidly grown. My phone rang off the hook for about three weeks after Lincoln-Sudbury won a baseball state championship after I’d trained several of their guys, and one of my athletes was named state player of the year.  And, after being featured on the front page of the Boston Globe with a nipple so hard I could cut diamonds, I was in demand as a t-shirt model (okay, not really – but it made for an awesome blog post, The School of Hard Nipples).

I was exhausted and stressed – but absolutely, positively, “living the dream” that I’d always wanted.

To make matters a bit more interesting, I had just started dating a great girl (now my fiancee) who I really had a good feeling was “the one” after about three months.  The work days, however, were insanely long and I was worried that I’d screw up a good thing by not spending enough time with her.

Every business development coach out there would have seen a “simple” answer to all my problems: stop training people in person.  Just write, consult, make DVDs, and give seminars.  It would have cut my hours by 80% and still allowed me to earn a pretty good living – and enjoy plenty of free time.  There was a huge problem with that, though; as Chris wrote, it wouldn’t “fulfill me personally, be fun, help a lot of people, and build and be in line with my current brand and brand equity.”  I like doing evaluations, writing programs, coaching, sweating, training with my guys, cranking up the music, helping people get to where they want to be, collaborating with and learning from other professionals, and watching my athletes compete – whether it’s at some high school field or at Fenway Park.  Giving that up wasn’t an option; I guess I’d have just been a crappy business coaching client, as I would have been stubborn as an ass on giving that up.

Fortunately for me, Pete Dupuis, my roommate from my freshman year of college, had just finished his MBA and was in the midst of a job search.  And, during that MBA, he’d started to train with me and packed on a ton of strength and muscle mass – making him realize and truly appreciate the value in what I was doing (especially since he was and is a goalie in a very competitive soccer league).  Pete had also met and become friends with a ton of my clients – and taken a genuine interest in my baseball focus, as a lifelong Red Sox fan.  Almost daily, Pete would encourage me to do my own thing and let him handle all the business stuff for me.

Simultaneously, Tony Gentilcore was ready for a change of scenery on the work front.  Having been Tony’s roommate and training partner for almost two years at that point, I knew he was a genuinely great guy, that he’d read everything on my bookshelf, and that he could coach his butt off and “walk the walk.”  He, too, had met a lot of my clients – so there was continuity from the get-go.

So, on July 13, 2007, Cressey Performance was born.  Here is what we started with.

Boatloads of renovations and equipment additions later, it wound up looking like this.

Of course, we outgrew and demolished this space after about nine months and moved three miles east to a facility twice the size.  And, we’ve continued to grow right up to this day; June was our busiest month ever, and July should be busier.  We’ve got regular weekly clients who come from four states (MA, NH, CT, RI), and in the baseball off-season, I have college and pro guys who come from the likes of OH, AZ, CA, SC, NC, GA, FL, and VA.  And, we had 33 applicants for this summer’s internships.

To be very candid, though, I don’t consider myself a very good “businessman.”  No offense to Pete or Tony, either, but I don’t think they even come close to the textbook definition of the word, either.  We just try to be good dudes. “We’ve done this for the right reasons, and we’ve done it the right way.”

We don’t allocate a certain percentage of our monthly revenues to advertising.  In fact, we haven’t spent a single penny on advertising – unless you count charitable donations to causes that are of significance to us.

We don’t search high and low for new revenue streams to push on our clients.  In fact, if I get one more MonaVie sales pitch, I’m going to suplex whoever delivered it right off our loading dock.  Rather, we bust our butts to set clients up for success in any way possible – and trust that those efforts will lead to referrals and “allegiance” to Cressey Performance.  We ask what they want from us and modify our plans accordingly.  It’s what led to us bringing in manual therapy, a pitching cage, and, of course, pitching coach/court jester Matt Blake’s timeless antics.

Along those same lines, we don’t measure our success based on revenue numbers; we measure it based on client results.  In three years of seeing LOADS of baseball players non-stop, we’ve only had three arm surgeries: one shoulder and two elbow.  All three were athletes who came to us with existing injuries, and in each case, we kept them afloat as long as we could and trained them through their entire rehabilitation.  I don’t want to toot our own horn, but this is a remarkable statistic in a population where over 57% of pitchers suffer some form of shoulder injury during each competitive season – and that doesn’t even include  elbows!  And, our statistics don’t even count literally dozens of players who have come to us after a doctor has told them they needed surgery, but we’ve helped them avoid these procedures.  The college scholarships, draft picks, state titles, individual honors, and personal bests in the gym are all fantastic, but I’m most proud of saying that we’ve dedicated ourselves to keeping athletes healthy so that they can enjoy the sports they love.

The same goes for our non-competitive athlete clients.  The fat loss and strength gains they experience are awesome and quantifiable, but beyond that (and more qualitatively), I love knowing that they’re training pain-free and are going to be able to enjoy exercise and reap the benefits of training for a long time.

We don’t penny-pinch during our slowest times of the month (late March through mid-May – the high school baseball season).  We see it as an opportunity to do more staff continuing education, renovate the facilities, and get out to watch a lot of baseball and support our athletes.  And, we adjust our hours to open up on Sundays and stay later on weeknights during the baseball season to make it easier for athletes to get in-season training in whenever they can.  If a pitcher wants to come in and get his arm stretched out before or after an outing, he stops by and we do it for him – but don’t charge him a penny for it.  It’s about setting people up for success.

We don’t try to just “factory line” as many clients through our facility as possible with everyone on the same program.  You might walk into CP and see 20 different clients on 20 different programs – because a 16-year old pitcher with crazy congenital laxity is going to have a markedly different set of needs than a 16-year-old linebacker with shoulder mobility so bad that he needs help putting a jacket on.  One program on one dry erase board for hundreds of athletes isn’t training; it’s babysitting.

Taking this a step further, we don’t boot clients out after a certain amount of time.  Clients take as long as needed to complete the day’s program. And, when they’re done (or before they even begin), loads of our clients spend time hanging out in the office just shooting the breeze and enjoying the environment.  As an example, Toronto Blue Jays Organizational Pitcher of the Year Tim Collins spends a minimum of five hours a day at CP all off-season.

Tim has sold girl scout cookies for the daughter of one of our clients, and he’s been our back-up front desk guy when Pete is out of town.  Yesterday, he was back to visit on his all-star break – and he said hello to every client he saw – and remembered them by name.  If you’re a 15-year-old up-and-coming baseball pitcher, how cool is it to get that kind of greeting when you walk into the office?  Well, at CP, kids get that greeting from 10-15 pro guys all the time.  And, if they’re lucky, they might even get to throw on a bobsled helmet and join these pro guys in a rave to Miley Cyrus, apparently.

At least once a week, I get an email from an up-and-coming coach asking for advice about starting a facility.  When I get these emails, I now think about how Rachel Cosgrove recently mentioned that more than 80% of fitness coaches leave the industry within the first year. In most cases, this happens because these people never should have entered the fitness industry in the first place – because their intentions (money) were all wrong.  They usually leave under the assumption that they could never make a living training people, but in reality, these folks are going to have a hard time making a living in any occupation that requires genuinely caring about what you do and the people with whom you work, and being willing to hang your hat on the results you produce.

As such, the first advice, in a general sense, is obvious: do it for the right reasons, and do it the right way.  Sure, making a living is essential, but only open a facility because it would fulfill you “personally, be fun, help a lot of people, and build and be in line” with who you are and what your values are – which together constitute your “brand.” Making the move to start up this business was one of the most daunting decisions I have ever had to make, and all the efforts toward actually getting the business started were equally challenging.  However, in the end, it has been more rewarding both personally and professionally than I could have ever possibly imagined.

Thank you very much to all of you – clients/customers, parents, EricCressey.com readers, seminar attendees, and professional colleagues – for all your support over the past three years.  We couldn’t have done it without you – and look forward to many more years of doing things for the right reasons and in the right way.

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29 Reasons to Smile

Written on May 20, 2010 at 2:27 am, by Eric Cressey

I turn 29 today. And, while a lot of people look at birthdays as a reason to feel badly about getting old, I like to think of them as a reason to reflect on the cool stuff that’s happened in the past year.  Or, at the very least, I look at a birthday as good blog content!  So, without further ado, here are 29 reasons I’m smiling on my 29th birthday.

1. I’m still not as old as Tony! (okay, that was wrong).

2.  Several of our high school athletes have gone off to college and been among the strongest (if not the strongest) in the weight room.  The really rewarding aspect of it, though, is that they have an appreciation for the fact that it isn’t just about strength; it’s about combining that strength with a host of other factors – flexibility, soft tissue quality, etc. – to stay healthy.  I just love that they are informed consumers and advocates for themselves.

3. Lincoln-Sudbury Baseball has been #1 in the state, according to the Boston Globe Rankings. We train over 30 players who are currently in the LS program, plus quite a few younger guys and LS alumni.

4. Along those lines, LS junior Carl Anderson was batting .500 with 6HR and 21 RBIs through the first 11 games.  He was also 4-0 with a 0.78 ERA and 25K in 18 innings pitched.

5.

Enough said.

6. A reader sent me a great article in response to my Is Pitching Velocity Really that Important? Blog: Change-up has become Great Equalizer.  Awesome article!

7. CP athlete and Toronto Blue Jays prospect Tim Collins has 32 strikeouts in 18 innings pitched.  Opponents are hitting just .206 against him.  He also made a surprise cameo in the office at CP the other day on his only off-day of the month and hung out for the whole afternoon.  Tim, one of our college prospects, and I all went over to watch a high school game in which a lot of our guys were playing.  It’s pretty cool to see pro and college ballplayers coming back to watch high school kids’ games when it’s usually the other way around!  It makes me really proud of the camaraderie we’ve built among all our clients at Cressey Performance.

8. A buddy of mine is involved with Humblecock clothing (www.humblecock.com), so he sent me some free goodies.  I like this stuff!  I passed out a few samples to my pro guys and they loved it.

9. Brian St. Pierre, our first employee at Cressey Performance, is unfortunately leaving us at the end of this week as he returns to school to do his master’s degree.  While we’re really bummed to be losing him, I can say that I’m really proud of how tremendous a job he’s done for us since early 2008, when we first hired him.  He’s improved tremendously as a coach and really turned himself into an industry leader (actually just had his first article published at T-Muscle HERE).  It’s funny how good things happen for great people who work hard.  Check him out at BrianStPierreTraining.com.

10. Recently, a local scout informed me that the Massachusetts baseball class of 2011 was ranked as the 5th best in the country.  In other words, our juniors here in little ol’ Massachusetts are competing with the likes of Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Texas, and North Carolina – where the populations are not only bigger, but they can also play baseball year-round.  Whoever said that early sports specialization was necessary to compete with these big dogs doesn’t understand development at all.  While the Southern boys are having Tommy Johns and labral repairs in the winter, our guys are training their butts off and attacking things with a specific plan.

The results?  At Cressey Performance alone, we have eight juniors verbally committed to play for Division 1 baseball programs – including Virginia, Vanderbilt, Boston College, and UCONN.  And, there should be at least a half-dozen more on that list by the time everyone signs national letters of intent this fall.

11. Head over to Amazon.com and check out the reviews on Maximum Strength HERE.  This sucker is getting more stars than an astronomy textbook!

12. It gets even better than that.  In the next few months, I’ll release a new product that’ll blow the doors off of what I did with Maximum Strength.  If you liked Maximum Strength, you’ll LOVE this one.  Subscribe to my newsletter at the right of this screen to be among the first notified.

13. Awesome!

By the way, when I was watching this video on YouTube, one of the recommended videos was Will Ferrell’s 2003 Harvard Commencement speech.  It is absolutely hilarious; talk about a way to make a graduation actually interesting!

14. In the past few months, I’ve gotten invitations to present in both St. Thomas and South Africa.  For those of you who prefer visual representations of how sweet this is, please take note (respectively):

We still have to plan our honeymoon soon as well, so it’s going to be a very sunny year for a couple of Bostonians!

15. It’s getting to be that time of year when pitchers come in and act all surprised that they are hitting homeruns now.  It just goes to show you that when you get more athletic, a lot of things fall into place – and not just in terms of pitching!  Rotational power is rotational power; the hitting just requires more hand-eye coordination.

16. I’ve got my own office now!  Unfortunately, it’s still buried under boxes and clutter from the move, but it is nice to know that I have a little bit more organization coming to my life soon!

17. I am pretty darn proud of the Cressey Performance website.  It’s a huge improvement from our old one, and I’m psyched to have an online presence that reflects how much hard work we put into making CP a special place to train.

18. CP athlete and San Diego Padres prospect Will Inman has a 3.03 ERA through 38.2 innings pitched in AAA.  Opponents are hitting just .221 against him.  For those who aren’t familiar with the Pacific Coast League, this is the single-hardest league in which one can pitch at any level of professional baseball.  There are small ballparks and insane winds that turn pop-ups into 450-foot HRs.  Will is doing awesome and we’re all really happy for him; it’s a lot of hard work rewarded.

19. This one really cracks me up.  We uploaded this video of CP athlete Sahil Bloom back in October of 2007, and it’s become the second most popular of all-time.  The funniest part is all the 13-year-olds arguing in the comments section about how this is “just good for football players” and how they all throw 97mph at age 13.

The funniest part is that Sahil is now pitching consistently over 90mph – and doing so at Stanford.  He’s 1-0 with a 0.00 ERA through six outings in his freshman year. It’s amazing that he’s had this success just “training for football!”

20. The past year has brought some collaborative efforts for me that have been absolutely tremendous in not only enhancing my productivity, but also educating me (and my readers/customers).  Matt Blake has brought a great new dimension to Cressey Performance with his pitching instruction and video analysis, and to EricCressey.com with his blog contributions.  Nate Tiplady has been a huge addition to our programs with the Graston and ART services he provides to our clients.  It was also great to collaborate with both Mike Reinold and Bill Hartman on projects for the first time, with Optimal Shoulder Performance and Assess & Correct, respectively.

At the end of the day, you are only as strong as your network, so I’d encourage you all to seek out collaborative efforts with other professionals who complement your skill set as well.

21. Slacker.com.  This thing is an awesome source for music; I listen to it all the time when I’m at the computer writing programs.

22. Just got this feedback from a very happy Optimal Shoulder Performance customer:

“Awesome job on the Optimal Shoulder Performance DVDs with Reinold. I just finished watching them this past weekend (I need to get a life) and I found them extremely educational and helpful. I really thought the information you both provided complimented each other well. There were some variations to some movements that I will definitely be implementing into some of my programs.”

While the financial side of things with product sales is nice, the thing that I actually enjoy the most is knowing that the information we’re putting out is helping people to improve their bodies and stay out of pain.  It’s even better when I know it is helping a fellow fitness professional or some rehabilitation specialist, as it means that they’re taking that knowledge to help more people beyond just themselves.  At the end of my career, I really want to be known most for the always putting my athletes first and always doing my best to contribute to the body of knowledge.

Click here for more information on Optimal Shoulder Performance.

23. On Tuesday morning, I had an absolutely terrible training session.  I felt weak the entire time, and couldn’t even stomach a shake post-training.  About an hour later, every joint in my body hurt and I had a raging headache.  That night, I was in bed early and was pouring sweat in my sleep.

I almost never get sick.  We are taking once every 3-4 years.  My attendance is so good at work that my business partner, Pete, has to force me to take days off.  Surely, there is something to the idea that regular exercise and proper diet reduces one’s likelihood of getting sick – and this is certainly demonstrated in the reduced absenteeism

Wednesday morning, I woke up feeling a ton better.  It turned out to be a really productive day.  This little experience reminds me that taking care of your body doesn’t just prevent you from getting sick; it also helps you to bounce back quickly when the unavoidable illness happens.

24. CP athlete Danny O’Connor looks to run his professional boxing record to 12-0 this weekend at Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut.  A huge CP contingent will be out to support him.  Danny works his butt off five days a week at CP in addition to all his boxing training, and deserves all the success that comes to him.

25. Chris Howard is the newest addition to the Cressey Performance staff, and we’re excited to have him on board.  A former CP intern, Chris went on to massage therapy school and is now a LMT – on top of his CSCS and master’s degree in nutrition.  Needless to say, we’re lucky to have a guy who brings so much versatility to our facility. I especially like Chris right now because he’s motivated me to brush up on my anatomy knowledge since he just retook it all in school!

26. Bill Hartman is in town for a seminar at Northeastern this weekend, so it’ll be a nice birthday present to catch up with him.  He’s joining us at CP today for the day.  His blog is always full of good stuff, but chatting with him in person is even better!

27. Tony Gentilcore wrote a great two-part series called “It All Starts in the Kitchen.”  There are some great tips in there for those of you who might struggle on the diet side of things.   Check out Part 1 and Part 2.

28. One of our pro baseball guys told me to check out the “Baseball Made Easy” series on YouTube, and it’s absolutely hilarious.  Check a few of them out:

29. I already knew I had the greatest girl in the world, but when she took me to a Sox game last night for my birthday for the third year in a row, I was reminded once again!  Here we were last year – when I had more hair.

Random Friday Thoughts: 5/14/10

Written on May 14, 2010 at 5:09 am, by Eric Cressey

1. It’s been a while since I published a Random Friday Thoughts blog, but in reality, it’s by design.  You see, if I just publish every Friday, it isn’t very “random,” is it?

2. Pretty cool stuff: Cressey Performance and Lawrence Academy athlete Tyler Beede was featured on the cover of ESPN Rise magazine this month.  Tyler’s headed to Vanderbilt on a baseball scholarship.

3. After seven years, I’m switching from Sprint to Verizon for my cell phone.  I feel liberated…like an old man busting a move.  That’s a random – but awesome – way to kickstart your weekend!

4. At the other end of the spectrum, you have THIS GUY, who was awarded (in a court of law) the title of “Worst Tennis Professional on the Planet.”  I wonder if he gets a trophy for his mantle for that one….

5. Here’s a book recommendation for you that’s somewhat related to fitness: The 7 Rules of Achievement.  It’s written by Tom Terwilliger, a former Mr. America.  I met Tom at a seminar back in January, and his enthusiasm is absolutely contagious.  He’s got a pretty cool story himself, but the real gold in this book is how he breaks things down step-by-step in helping people get to where they want to be in their professional and personal lives.  It’s self-help stuff, but more entertaining and less preachy than anything else I’ve read in this regard.

6. In addition to my own article at T-Muscle last week (Favorite Supersets), I also contributed on a compilation by Nate Green, Your Training Split Sucks.  Check ‘em out, if you haven’t already.

7. Here’s a short, but solid piece about CP athlete and NY Mets Prospect Jim Fuller, who is having an excellent season this far: Marlborough’s Fuller off to a Good Start in Class A.

8.  In the past two weeks, I’ve had four people email me asking about a mentorship at Cressey Performance.  If we were to do a 3-4 day mentorship consisting of lectures, hands-on teaching, and observing athletes in action, would you be interested?  If so, shoot us an email at cresseyperformance@gmail.com.  It would occur sometime between October and March.  Nothing firm, but I thought I’d throw it out there to gauge interest.

9. I’m looking for some good recommendations for books on CD.  I just finished up my last one, and always like to have a good one in my car for whenever I’m driving.  The last three good ones have been What the Dog Saw, Switch, and Born to Run.  I prefer non-fiction.  Thanks in advance to anyone who has some suggestions to make in the comments section!

10. Finally, a big happy birthday goes out to CP pitching expert Matt Blake, who – as you can tell from the following video – turns 11 today.

Crazy Dads and Kids Who Throw Cheddar

Written on March 14, 2010 at 5:00 am, by Eric Cressey

Q: I run into a TON of Fathers who want their son to gain velocity.  What are your keys to gaining velocity?

A: To be blunt, Step 1 is getting away from your crazy overbearing father and realizing that if you’re going to throw the ball hard, it’s because YOU want to do it, and are willing to put in the hard work.  There are millions of American fathers who want their sons to throw 95+mph, but only about eight guys in the big leagues who consistently throw that hard.

Taking it a step further, the average fastball velocity is actually higher in A-ball than it is in professional baseball, so while throwing hard is important, it’s just one piece of the puzzle.  I’d love to hear more fathers talking about learning to command the fastball and master a change-up.  And, most importantly, I’d like to see more fathers who are interested first and foremost in keeping their kids healthy so that they can have the continuity necessary to realize their potential.

Next, you have to consider what kind of velocity we’re actually discussing.  Is it what the radar gun reads: actual velocity?  That’s really just one of three kinds of velocity.

You also have perceived velocity – which is higher in a pitcher who gets down the mound further than his counterparts and therefore gives the hitter less time to react. Chris Young (at 6-11) gets the benefit of perceived velocity in spite of the fact that his average fastball velocity doesn’t even approach 90mph.

Perceived velocity also explains the success of many pitchers with deceptive deliveries where the ball seems to just jump up on hitters.  Often, these pitchers stay closed and throw across their bodies.  While it may not be healthy, correcting it could take away their effectiveness.

Lastly, back in 2008, Perry Husband introduced me to the concept of effective velocity, which is a bit more complex.  The effective velocity a hitter appreciates is actually impacted by:

1.     pitch location (high and inside are faster, and low and away are slower)

2.     previous pitch location, type, and velocity (coming up and in with a fastball makes it seem harder if it follows a low and away change-up)

3.     the count (when behind in the count, the hitter must cover a larger strikezone, and therefore a larger effective velocity range)

If you need any proof of the value of effective velocity, just watch Jamie Moyer or Tom Glavine.  They nibble away over and over again, and then they come back inside on a guy and he looks blown away by the velocity even though it may only be low-80s.

That said, getting down to the nuts and bolts of throwing the ball hard (actual velocity) mandates that you understand that there are tons of factors that contribute to velocity, but they aren’t the same for everyone.  Very simply, there isn’t just one mechanical model that allows one to throw harder than others.

Some guys have congenital laxity that allows them to contort their bodies all over the place.  Others “muscle up” and shotput the ball to the plate.  Most pitchers are somewhere in the middle and rely on a balance of elastic energy and mobility to make things happy.  With that in mind, having mechanical efficiency and thousands of perfect throwing reps in this efficient model is what every pitcher should strive to achieve – just as a golfer would practice his swing or an Olympic lifter would practice the clean and jerk or snatch.

Second, it’s imperative to prepare young pitchers’ bodies for the rigors of throwing a baseball.  I’ve written extensively about the overwhelming extremes the throwing arm faces, and while it’s important to improve arm strength, flexibility, and soft tissue quality, the rest of the body cannot be ignored.  Improving function of the scapular stabilizers, core musculature, and lower half is essential for taking stress of the throwing arm.  We encourage kids to get started with foam rolling, targeted flexibility work, and resistance training as soon as their attention span allows.  As I have written previously, the “stunting growth” argument doesn’t hold water.

Third (and this piggybacks on my last point about resistance training), it’s important to understand how to manage a young pitcher throughout the year. Contrary to popular belief, playing year-round is not a good idea.  In fact, it isn’t even good enough to qualify as a “bad” idea; it is an atrocious idea.

If you want my ideal competitive season for a youth baseball player, it’s to pick up a ball and start tossing around Thanksgiving, progressing to bullpen wok in early January after long-tossing distance has been progressed.  Then, the athlete throws up through his competitive high school season (late March- early June) and summer ball (through early August).  That’s about 8-8.5 months of throwing throughout the course of the year – and it’s plenty.

You’ll see that this competitive year fits quite nicely with participation in a fall sport – whether it’s football, soccer, or something else.  And, athletes can still “get away” with playing winter sports as long as they’re willing to commit to a throwing program, even if they have to start playing a bit late.  If I had to give my ideal scenario, I’d say play football or soccer, and then play pick-up/intramural basketball in the winter alongside a throwing and lifting program.

Within this year, you have several crucial blocks during which to increase resistance training volume.  One, there is the entire winter break, obviously.  Two, there is generally a decent break between spring and summer baseball (late May-early June), and another during the month of August.  Three, kids can (and should) still train in-season, regardless of the sport.

This, of course, speaks to the high school athletes who have practice/games just about every day.  Managing a 10-year-old is a lot easier.  His sport practice may only be 2-3 days per week – meaning that he can participate in different activities throughout the week.  However, he can’t do that if Dad thinks that playing on four different AAU teams at once is the secret to getting him to the big leagues.  He has to play multiple sports at a young age.

So, if I had to give the synopsis of my thoughts on how to get a kid to throw hard, it would go something like this:

1. Appreciate that throwing hard is just one piece of the “being a successful pitcher” puzzle – and that there are different types of velocity (actual, perceived, and effective).

2. Clearly outline his competitive season and stick to that outline.  Don’t add showcases, camps, and additional teams.

3. Let him play for two teams: one spring (school) and one summer (AAU, Legion, etc.).

4. Find a skilled pitching instructor to work with him to optimize mechanical efficiency.  Before you start working with this instructor, have him explain his approach to managing your son both during a typical lesson and throughout the competitive season.  Then, go and observe him as he works with other pitchers.  Do they just “show and go,” or do they warm-up before even picking up a ball?  Does he ask kids how they feel prior to each session, and does he pace them throughout the session?  Or, does he just grunt and spit dip juice all over the place.

5. Get him involved in a comprehensive strength and conditioning program that incorporates resistance training, medicine ball work, flexibility training, and movement training that all take into account the unique demands of baseball.  The strength and conditioning coach should provide a thorough evaluation that screens for all the flexibility deficits and stability issues we commonly see in throwers.

6. Make sure that the pitching coach and strength and conditioning specialist communicate and collaborate. The CP staff is fortunate to have this kind of productive collaboration with Matt Blake all the time:

Kidding aside, very rarely will a pitching coach know about strength and conditioning, and very rarely will a strength and conditioning coach know about pitching.  It’s unfortunate, but true.

7. Have him play multiple sports.  The younger the pitcher, the more sports he should play.  Specialization shouldn’t come until age 17 at the earliest.

8. Make sure he continues to take care of his resistance training and flexibility work in-season.

I could go on and on about all the subtle details of what we do with pitchers on a daily basis, but the truth is that I envision this blog as something that will be most popular with the Dads in the crowd who really just want to help their kids realize their potential and remain injury-free.  So, I’m keeping it more general – and referring you to the Baseball Content page for the more “geeky” stuff.

I do have one more closing thought, though.  We deal with a lot of very talented young pitchers who throw the ball very hard.  One anecdotal observation has been that their fathers are the ones who “get it.”  These are the guys who are concerned about the important things: staying healthy, enjoying baseball, finding the right college, etc.  They don’t boast about how many guys their sons struck out in little league. They are genuinely humble and respect the game – and this carries over to their kids, who work hard and carry themselves the right way.

Conversely, the kids who are always told that they’re the best and get raved about by their fathers are the ones who invariably struggle to succeed long-term.  It may be because they’re overworked, over-pressured, or just overrated in the first place.  It may be because coaches get frustrated with having to deal with an overbearing father, and the kid gets punished for it.  It may be that the kid doesn’t think he needs to work as hard because he’s already the best – because Dad told him so. Or, maybe he misses out on crucial development because he spends all his time playing in baseball games when he should be practicing, training, or participating in other sports – or just having fun and being a normal kid. Worst of all, a kid may just flat-out start to dislike the game because all the fun has been taken out of it because of Dad’s hype and excessive pressure.

Is velocity important? Sure.  Can it sometimes be the trees that prevent us from seeing the forest?  Absolutely.

For more information on developing pitchers the right way, check out the 2009 Ultimate Pitching Coaches Bootcamp DVD set.

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Wrapping Up a Great Pro Baseball Off-Season

Written on March 5, 2010 at 10:37 am, by Eric Cressey

Today marks the end of one of the funnest “eras” of my life.

Back on September 9, we officially kicked off the pro baseball off-season with Tim Collins’ arrival at Cressey Performance for his first training session of the off-season.  Coming off a great season that included a promotion to Double-A at age 20 and a Blue Jays organizational pitcher of the year award, Tim was ready to get after it – and that’s exactly what he did.  From that day in September through February 6 (when he was called to Florida for mini-camp), Tim added 21 pounds to his frame while getting leaner – and increased his vertical jump by four inches (to 37.9 inches).

Tim was one of over 30 pro guys we had this winter.  Results were typical.

Chad Rodgers (Atlanta Braves organization) went from 206 to 233 while adding just under three inches to his vertical jump.  And he dominated “No Shave November.”

Jeremiah Bayer (Red Sox organization) packed on muscle mass faster than just about any athlete I’ve ever seen – to the tune of 13 pounds in only two months – while adding an inch to his vertical.  That’s a 5.6% improvement in predicted peak power in a short amount of time – and one that is carrying over to the mound already.

Heck, Pat Bresnehan packed on 14 pounds and jumped 37.5 inches (a 6.3 inch) improvement – and got himself signed by the Mariners – after coming to us in the latter phases of his rehab period!

Craig Albernaz (Rays organization) increased his vertical jump by over five inches while adding seven pounds before heading to big league camp – and this is a guy who has always struggled to put on any weight, let alone good weight!

Cory Riordan (Rockies) and Steve Cishek (Marlins) win the awards for the longest commutes to train.  Cory drove two hours to CP, and two hours home to Connecticut to get in his work with us – and he’s got a new body and a lot more athleticism to show for it.  Cishek wasn’t far behind with his 1 hour, 45 minute commute from Cape Cod four times a week all the way up through January.  I can say without wavering that both of them would tell you that the ride was 100% worth it.

Two other Braves guys – Derick Himpsl and Matt Kramer – also put in some great work that is already carrying over to the field.

Zach Piccola’s headed to White Sox camp with a great few months of training under his belt alongside free agent Nick Asselin.  Jim Fuller (Mets) committed himself to train like he never had before, and looks fantastic now.  Another Mets guy, Tim Stronach, has busted his hump to get better alongside his rehabilitation from shoulder surgery.

Steffan Wilson leaned out and dramatically changed the way he looks and moves – and it helped get him a much-deserved call-up to big-league camp last week.

Kevin Youkilis had a great off-season as well – due in part to his love of pushing the sled.  So far this spring, Youk’s looked good (much better than his strength coach, as is shown below), and we’re excited about the Red Sox season ahead.

Will Inman (Padres), Phil Negus (White Sox), and Kevin Nolan (Blue Jays) put in a great few months in the fall, and Steve Hammond (Giants), Kevin Pucetas (Giants), Nick McBride (Rangers), Benji Johnson (Braves), Matt Morizio (Royals), Justin Edwards (Cardinals), and Howie Clark (Blue Jays) made the most of all their visits to Boston this winter.

And, some “distance-based” guys of mine – Chad Jenkins (Blue Jays) and Anthony “A-Tan” Seraterelli (Royals) – made some excellent progress by following everything to a “T.”  A-Tan, Howie, and Morizio even made a hilarious video about their experiences (a joke, FYI):

One athlete, though, stepped it up big time on Thursday to set himself apart from all the rest. Tim Kiely (Angels) added 11 pounds and seven inches to his vertical jump, but his biggest claim to fame is that he took home the Gold in the first ever Cressey Performance Elite Baseball Olympics on the last day.  Granted, the “Olympics” were limited to five participants who collectively agreed to not tell the most athletic guys of the bunch about the event ahead of time – but that doesn’t mean that the boys didn’t bring their A games!  The Silver (5-lb) went to CP pitching coach Matt Blake, and the Bronze (2.5-lb) went to free agent Alex Szymanski.  Shawn Haviland (A’s) finished fourth, but he has a Harvard degree, and probably would have won if Sabermetrics trivia and word searches had been part of the contest.  Here’s the much-anticipated medal ceremony:

I am not sure where the championship belt fit in, but the entire day didn’t make much sense, so it seemed right.  Congratulations, Tim.

From these videos, a lot of people might think that we’re all about goofing around – but that couldn’t be further from the truth.  Our guys have a good time, for sure, but it always comes after they’ve busted their butts in the gym.  And, frankly, if we didn’t have such great camaraderie and the guys weren’t such good friends, the motivation to train would never approach the level it has.  A good culture and outstanding results absolutely, positively go hand-in-hand.

Most of my writing on this blog is obviously geared toward educating folks on the training, research, nutrition, and other geeky science stuff.  However, I should make it absolutely clear that all the knowledge in the world in these regards won’t matter if you don’t have a good culture established for your athletes and clients.  They need to enjoy training and look forward to each and every session because they enjoy the process as much as the destination.

They need to be willing to come to you to critique the best man’s toast they’ve written (happened this winter).  They need to feel comfortable staying at your place if they’re in town for a few days (happened multiple times this winter).  They need to feel welcome spending Thanksgiving with your family (two of my athletes came home with me this past November).  And, they need to respect you enough as a person to value your opinion as a professional.  As the saying goes, they don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

That’s why most of our pro guys train six days a week from September/October all the way up until now, whereas many other places pro guys frequent consist of 3x/week “workouts” for the 4-6 weeks before spring training starts.  And, I feel like it is one of many things that differentiates us from our competition (whatever that may be).  We are about making athletes better, not just “working them out.”

I’m proud of all our guys not only for their hard work this off-season, but for taking an ownership stake in Cressey Performance to make it something special now and in the future.

Thanks for an awesome 5+ months, guys.  We can’t wait to do it again.

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From the Little Leagues to the Big Leagues? Nope.

Written on February 3, 2010 at 4:22 am, by Eric Cressey

Today marks another great blog Q&A from Matt Blake.

Q: I was quite shocked to learn that only three pitchers have ever made it to the Big Leagues from the Little League World Series (LLWS). It makes perfect sense, as the mature kid at 12 generates more velocity than little Billy. Most parents assume that since he is more mature he can handle more stress when in actuality it just means his muscles are stretched out farther and are more susceptible to injury. More specifically, Tom House claimed that the stretched out muscles could be counteracted by dropping your center of gravity. Any input would be great!

A: I think this speaks to a lot of problems with how the players got to Williamsport and the developmental path that carries into their teenage years. The main concerns with the 11-12 year olds that are competing in the LLWS is how skilled they are for such a young age. Typically, this means that they have had a tremendous amount of repetition at a young age, and have competed in a very large number of games over the course of the spring and summer to make it to Williamsport.

Three issues that might speak to why only three pitchers have gone on to play professional ball include:

Issue #1 – These players are not skeletally mature to handle the amount of stress placed on their bodies, so they will probably turn up with more overuse injuries in their teen years that have been accumulating due to the high demand from 9-12.

Issue #2 – This could be a simple timing of maturation. A lot of the dominant players are taller, weigh more, throw harder and have probably entered certain stages of maturation quicker than their peers. This doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll be ahead of their peers at 13-15 or even 16-18; it just means that at the age (11-12) we happen to televise, they were more developed. There are at least six more years before this player can even think about playing professionally, so a lot of things can happen to level out the playing field.

Issue #3 – There’s a good chance the amount of repetition that these players have put in at an early age could lead to “burnout” down the road or a feeling of satisfaction and less of a demand to work hard, because everything came to the player so easily at a young age. This game will eat you up if you don’t continue to get quality repetition over the long haul.

At some point, an abundance of talent will be matched, whether it’s in high school, college, or the minor leagues. This is where the intangible qualities separate players and hard work is required to keep your competitive edge. Needless to say, I’m still shocked that only three pitchers have made it from the LLWS. For me, this signifies a serious red flag in the way we are developing talent in the baseball industry if our best players at age 12 don’t translate well to the upper levels.

Have a question for Matt?  Drop him an email at mablak07@gmail.com.

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When Should Kids Learn Curveballs?

Written on January 29, 2010 at 8:45 am, by Eric Cressey

Today, we’ve got the first in a series of Q&A contributions from Matt Blake.

Q: What do you think of Ron Johnson’s presentation at the ABCA convention where he stated that curveballs are okay for youths to throw and that they do not cause any structural damage beyond what a fastball does? Rather, it was the frequency the curveball was thrown that was the indicator.

A: I was at Ron Johnson’s presentation and have had the chance to read much of the research that has been presented on this topic. I do generally agree that curveballs are not inherently more dangerous than fastballs, but I think the idea of curveballs sends a conflicting message at the youth levels.

Fundamentally, I’d like to believe that this game is centered around the pitcher being able to locate a fastball to the center of the plate 100 out of 100 times. Obviously, this is an idealistic perspective, but above average fastball command should be the trademark of an advanced youth player, not the fact that he can spin a baseball with his hand in a supinated position so that he can fool unsuspecting 11 year olds. We don’t teach hitters to focus on curveballs at this age, so why should we teach pitchers to throw them?

Squaring up the fastball over the middle of the plate is step one for both hitters and pitchers. In order to put a player in the best chance to succeed down the road, I think a pitcher should be able to repeat his fastball mechanics and create a certain amount of hand-speed, before he is taught to craft his pitching skills. This is generally considered to be a throwing mechanics versus pitching skills debate and would prioritize mechanical knowledge and the sequencing of the body’s rotations.

If a player has demonstrated above average command of his fastball to the center of the plate, then obviously, the next progression would begin to zone the plate off for him. Once he can dissect the lanes of the plate with a straight fastball, then maybe teach him a different grip on the fastball or even a changeup. Start by working the changeup down the middle, etc….This game is built on efficient pitching, so to skip steps at these early developmental levels or to place too great an emphasis on winning at this age would compromise the player’s development. Obviously, all of this is just simply my opinion.

When would I teach a breaking ball? I guess it would be when a player looks skeletally mature to repeat his delivery and can demonstrate effective use of his fastball/changeup combination. If these pieces are set as the foundation, introducing spin tilt and depth might follow. If a player at the age of 11 or 12 is capable of doing this because he has put the necessary repetition in, then I suppose you can’t hold him back, but for some reason, I think people might be skipping steps 2 and 3 to get to 4, because 4 gets outs easier at age 12.

Have a question for Matt?  Drop him an email at mablak07@gmail.com.

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Talking Pitching: A Recap of the 2010 ABCA Pitching “Hot Stove” Discussion

Written on January 20, 2010 at 7:07 am, by Eric Cressey

Today, we’ve got another great guest post from Matt Blake.

“If I embark on a voyage of exploration, and I set as my goals the willingness to follow any lead, pursue any interesting observation, overcome any difficulties, and I end up in some exotic locale that might be very different from my predictions before setting out, have I changed my destination in any way? I would say not; the sine qua non of science is not the conclusions we reach but the process we use to arrive at them, and that is the polestar by which we navigate.”

-PZ Myers, Biologist, University of Minnesota

One might ask why the heck a pitching coach is leading off his article on a fitness expert’s blog with a quote from a biologist, and how it would have any relevance to the topic at hand. Where could this possibly be going?

Well, I recently attended the American Baseball Coaches Association “Hot Stove” Pitching Discussion in Dallas, Texas on January 10th with about 200-300 coaches from all over the country.  And, I would say that this notion was the overriding theme to take away from the event.

This “Hot Stove” pitching discussion was part of the bigger national convention that takes place every year. This event provided an outstanding forum for people to hear some leading thinkers in baseball discuss pitching in an informal public setting. Some of the notable attendees of this event were Tom House, Alan Jaeger, Brent Strom, and Derek Johnson.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with these names, I’ll give you a brief description of each.

Tom House is a former major leaguer, former major league pitching coach, and is regarded as one of the great modern day pitching gurus and currently coaches at the University of Southern California.

Alan Jaeger runs Jaegersports.com and has an outstanding understanding of long toss, arm care and how it should be applied to your player’s development.

Brent Strom is a former major leaguer, is an instructor in the St. Louis Cardinals system, and teams up with Ron Wolforth to run the Ultimate Pitching Coaches Bootcamp every year. They also run some outstanding Elite Pitcher Bootcamps during the summer. These two presented early in the weekend and are proponents of the “Blending” and “Chunking” theories and advocate for training pitchers through the use of athletic and aggressive throwing drills.

Derek Johnson is currently the Pitching Coach at Vanderbilt University and is regarded as one of the premier pitching coaches in the country. Producing ten drafted pitchers (including three first-rounders) over the last three years will usually do that.

Honestly, this is just a handful of people in a room that included dozens of D1/D2/D3 pitching coaches, as well as numerous outstanding high school coaches, but these guys really stand out with their contributions to the pitching community’s knowledge base.

Tom House did his part by speaking to the crowd about the importance of being able to accept new ideas that run counter to your current train of thought. He brought up an interesting point regarding the need to be strong enough to change your positions and adapt your training methods as the information presented to you deems necessary. This is not too far from what you see happening on the strength and conditioning front every day. If I remember correctly, it wasn’t too long ago that Mike Boyle questioned the value of the almighty squat. Who would have thunk it?  This is a great example of a man following a process of logical thought to create his own philosophy even if it runs counter to much of the traditional thought. You don’t need to agree with him on this, as we still use a lot of squatting variations at Cressey Performance, but based on his interpretation of the research, this is what he thought gave him the best value in the risk/reward category for his athletes.

On the baseball side, this idea was none more evident than when Tom House was challenged about the effectiveness of the towel drill and admitted he was wrong about this drill in its original form. This drill has been a staple in many pitching coaches’ dry work for years. In coming to understand where the towel drill was lacking, Tom has recently changed the weight of the implement in the drill from 2 oz to 5/6/7oz depending on the training intentions. This essentially changed the deceleration demands to be more similar to a baseball and worked to counter the argument at hand, by letting everyone know, that as science has progressed he has needed to adapt his training methods.

One of the other important topics that House brought up was the need to understand the science behind the overhead throw. If we expect to train players at the highest level, we need to know what is actually happening in the body. By incorporating information relating to a player’s “Kinematic Sequence,” one is more apt to see where players are either efficient or inefficient in creating energy and delivering force to the ball. Understanding the sequencing of the body’s rotations is essential to getting the timing of the delivery right and avoiding stressful mechanic flaws.

The way he phrased it may or may not have gone over a lot of coaches’ heads and split the camp into science-based vs. common sense/feel coaches.  But, I obviously believe Tom is right on this point or I wouldn’t spend my waking life in Eric’s facility. On the flip side, I can also understand where coaches who do not naturally gravitate to the analytical style would find other ways to communicate this information than the technical jargon House used. At the end of the day, your players either understand what you’re saying or they don’t.  If they don’t, you need to come back to their level of thought before they tune you out.

Along these lines, one of the points I strongly agree with Tom on is the need to look at the golf industry and how advanced their level of instruction is in the private sector. Greg Rose and the people of the Titleist Performance Institute are doing some great things on the technology front, as far as analyzing swings and doing physical assessments to improve golf technique. Obviously, this is a different beast with the way their market dynamics have been established, but there is enough money within the baseball industry to start dedicating some of our resources to making sure we have the best information available to the general public. The rate at which players are getting injured because people are simply uninformed is not okay in this supposed “Information Age.”

One of the refreshing things to see is that people are at least beginning to recognize that we can’t be so rigid in our approach to training pitchers. We are just now leaving an era where we thought we had all the answers and we could box up our pitchers to 90 degree angles and call it a day. Funny that injuries are up at nearly every level of the game from little league to the Pros, so obviously something isn’t working. With that said, I’ll leave you with one last short story that Tom House provided us at the convention. It has do with a time when he was coaching Nolan Ryan on the Texas Rangers. Nolan credits a lot of his success later on in his career due to the physical shape Coach House got him in.  Obviously, this is a second-hand retelling of a story, so I’ll leave it up to Tom to come over to Ericcressey.com and correct me in the comments section, but I think you’ll get the gist.

As many of you know, Coach House is famous for really being a pioneer on the biomechanical analysis front. One day, House was attempting to talk to Nolan Ryan about his famously high leg kick, by letting him know that it might make more sense to bring his leg kick down a bit and get himself a little more under control. In Nolan Ryan’s Texan drawl, he calmly responded, “Tom, with all due respect sir… I understand you know a lot about the game, but if there’s one thing I know…. It’s that the higher I lift my leg here, the harder I’m gonna throw this baseball. So you can go ahead and stick that in your computer of yours.” And if that doesn’t bring this discussion full circle, I’m not quite sure what will.

In the end, I think as important as it is to follow the research, it is just as important to let the common sense/feel aspects drive the questions being researched. Obviously, science is continuously digging deeper, but if we don’t listen to our athletes, we may be digging in the wrong places. Like I’ve said before, the athlete throws the baseball, so giving them the necessary information and letting them find their own signature style with it is essential to their development.

Matt Blake can be reached at mablak07@gmail.com.

Related Posts

A New Model for Training Between Starts: Part 1
Philosophizing from Goliath’s Shoulders
A Baseball Training Interview with Eric Cressey

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What’s in Store for 2010?

Written on January 1, 2010 at 5:36 pm, by Eric Cressey

Happy New Year, everyone!

I thought I’d use this first post of 2010 as a way of looking forward to what’s on tap at EricCressey.com for the year.  In true “Random Thoughts” fashion, here we go:

1. Nate Green just interviewed me for what I think will be a great feature at T-Muscle in the next week or two.  It will be similar in structure to this piece Nate did with Dave Tate, which definitely turned out to be an entertaining read.  Keep an eye out for it!

2. Speaking of interviews, I’ll be doing one with Brian Grasso for the IYCA on Tuesday.  Brian’s a very forward-thinking guy and I’m excited to catch up with him.

3. Speaking of T-Muscle, I’m finishing up my “What I Learned in 2009″ article this weekend.  It follows the articles I wrote for 2006, 2007, and 2008.

4. Also coming up in the next month or so will be the release of the DVDs of Mike Reinold and my seminar from November: Testing, Treating, and Training the Shoulder: From Rehabilitation to High Performance. It’s being edited as I type this.

5. This January 24, Cressey Performance will be hosting Neil Rampe of the Arizona Diamondbacks for his seminar, .  You can register HERE, or for more information on Neil’s background, click HERE.  If you’d like to see a seminar agenda, please just email me at ec@ericcressey.com.

6. I’ll be presenting in Tampa, FL (Jan); Winchester, MA (Jan); Las Vegas, NV (March); and Vancouver, BC (March); and Boston, MA (May) in this first part of 2010.  Check out my schedule page for more information on these events.

7. I’m very anxious to hear more of the feedback on Assess and Correct, which has already sold in more than two dozen countries.  This is a product I truly believe will help a lot of people, and the short-term feedback we’ve received since its release in October has been tremendous.

8. At Cressey Performance, our staff has started up what (for lack of a more masculine term) we’re calling the Staff Book Club.  Each staff member will present on what he learns in a different book each week.  I think it’ll be a great way to cover more material and keep us all accountable to each other on getting our continuing education done.

9.I’m pumped for more content from Matt Blake in 2010.  He’s been a fantastic resource for all our athletes and I’m excited to share with you all how Matt and I collaborate to make our pitchers better.  I think it’ll make for some great content.

10. I’d really like to continue to grow both the newsletter and blog.  You can sign up for notifications on both fronts to the right of the screen, if you haven’t already.

11. I’m really pumped for all our guys who have found great college choices; it’s an exciting time for both the 2010 and 2011 guys.  Most recently, CP athlete Adam Ravenelle committed to Vanderbilt on a baseball scholarship.  Adam’s been with us since before his freshman year, and we’re all really proud of him.  He actually joins another CP pitcher, Tyler Beede, who committed to Vanderbilt just a few weeks ago.  Both guys are in the class of 2011, and join Barrett O’Neill (University of Virginia) and Joe Napolitano (Boston College) as our early committees from that class.

There should be plenty more guys with exciting news along these lines in the months to come as well.

12. I’m really excited to watch Cressey Performance grow in the months ahead.  While I was certainly thrilled at the growth we saw (15%) in 2009 and I hope it continues, I am most thrilled at how many clients we’ve seen change their bodies and their lives since they started up, and how many friendships we’ve seen cultivated inside CP. If you’d have told me a few years ago that we’d have over 25 people in on Thanksgiving morning, for instance, I would have told you that you were crazy!

In addition to our clients’ accomplishments, I’m so proud of our staff. I could never do what I do without such great guys working alongside me, and the best part is that they are insatiable in their desire to get better.  We’re constantly getting better and it makes every new day fun.  The best part is that I feel like it’s something that’s carried over to our interns, too; there are some really talented people with bright futures coming through here.

13. I’m very excited for the new CP website, which should be done in a matter of a few days.  Along those same lines, there is a pretty sweet training and testimonial montage being pulled together about our Elite Baseball Development program.  I was actually getting pretty fired up just watching some of the footage that had been gathered thus far.

14. I can’t wait to attack all the books and journal articles that are in my stack of “Things to Read” right now.  There’s too much material to cover, but never enough time!

15. Last, but certainly not least, it’ll also be a very busy (but exciting) year for me personally in 2010, as my fiancee Anna and I will be getting married this October.  And, even before we get to that, we’re planning to buy our first home in the next 4-6 months.  Obviously, we’re already doing a lot of planning!

Needless to say, I’m looking forward to all of this – and probably a few surprises along the way.  Best wishes for 2010, and stay tuned!

Shortening the Learning Loop with Effective Communication

Written on December 18, 2009 at 4:55 pm, by Eric Cressey

Note from EC: Great content from Matt Blake today.  If you want to read more of Matt’s stuff, enter his name in the search box to the right of your screen, and you’ll get some of his previous writing here.

Since the Christmas pre-sale is over on the 95 MPH arm, I figured I would follow up with some more insight into the way we are working with a wide range of pitchers here at Cressey Performance.

To give you perspective, recent throwing sessions in the CP cage have included anything from minor leaguers working through controlled  flat-ground drills and some simulated long-toss, to high-school guys working on velocity drills or throwing bullpens getting ready for college winter camps (for better or worse). We’ve also had a handful of players come to us following injuries as they try to build their arms back up from essentially scratch. With the wide variety of development and training that needs to take place as a result of these different situations, a strong need emerges for an effective communication style with your athlete.

For me, this is tremendously important if I expect to push a player in a sport that will have 57% of their population suffer some form of shoulder injury during a playing season (1).  It seems a little absurd to think that more than half the athletes in this population will get hurt in a given season, but it’s not that crazy when you consider the fact that we’re asking the shoulder to internally rotate at velocities greater than 7,000 degrees/second and the elbow to extend at 2,000+ degrees/s during the throwing motion. If that’s not bad enough, at maximum external rotation the torque placed on the elbow is equivalent to 40lbs pulling down on the hand.  When all of this is considered, it becomes clear how serious it is to actually ask an athlete to perform 80-100 repetitions of a skill at near human capacity.

Once you understand the implications of what you are requesting your player to do, the ability to effectively communicate in a manner that gains quality feedback from your pitcher becomes essential. With the tremendous amount of stress being placed on the body and no objective way to know how a particular player’s arm or body feels during practice or competition, we need to have open lines of communication to make sure each and every piece is monitored for stress.

Obviously the easiest way to gather information is to verbally ask players how they are feeling, or have them rate their fatigue on a 1-10 scale with 1 being, “My arm feels like gold”, and 10 being, “I think I just tore something”. The only problem with this is that every player will have a slightly different pain threshold and one person’s “3″ may be another person’s “6.”  So, if you are going to use this scale, it is important to stay on top of it and ask the player on a regular basis to calibrate the stress and watch how it slides one way or the other as they get loose or as the discomfort begins to build.

The other problem with the verbal scale is that you have to account for each player’s personality and level of competitiveness. Some players will run themselves through a wall and not think twice about the damage they could be doing. These players will under-report their pain levels in an attempt to continue throwing.  With players like this, you need to resort to other means of monitoring pain levels. This is where understanding a player’s natural temperament is important. By knowing how a player normally acts, picking up subtle behavioral cues can play a large part in identifying underlying pain.

These subtle behaviors can include anything from the way they make eye contact, their facial expressions and head talk, body gestures, postural changes, etc… For example, if they grimace after throwing, shake out their arm after throws, or cross their arms when they’re standing still, then you are probably looking at some tenderness building somewhere in the arm. Mechanically, you can watch the elbow/arm slot begin to drop as they throw, the torso might become more upright, and the ball to begin to stay up in the zone more often. Velocity changes may or may not occur as well. As you begin to see one or more of these traits, it’s important to make sure you open the dialogue with the player to make them verbalize how the arm feels.

Identifying these traits and gaining trust from your pitcher to speak honestly with you about his arm’s health is the foundation for developing them to their ceiling. Once you understand how much a player can be pushed while maintaining a healthy volume or amplitude, driving the development with this same mindset becomes just as critical.

One of the problems that I believe stands in the way of a lot of players/athletes in their personal development tends to be their inability to relate to new information that you are trying to give them. It’s not that they weren’t listening or the fact that what you gave them was right or wrong, but more that it didn’t fit neatly with what they had previously learned. Different personalities, different backgrounds, different learning styles, can’t all be expected to work off the same lesson plan.

Each piece of the development needs to be looked at dynamically to see how the information is registering for the player. Two of the main things I work hard to identify early in the process are:

1) what style of learning does the player prefer?

2) where are they in their development?

Once you have the answers to these questions, you can begin to provide the necessary information in the right form for the player, so they understand why they would want to apply it and, more importantly, how they apply the new information.

By using multiple avenues to find out what the player is looking to learn or needs to learn, you can optimize the use of certain tools to flush out higher levels of performance. One of the main tools we use here is slow-motion video analysis. I find this to be very effective in getting everyone on the same page regarding what is actually happening during these highly complex movements. From there, we’ll agree on a plan of action going forward that might use lead-up drills, velocity drills, weighted baseballs, medicine balls, etc. All of these pieces help to teach something, whether it be rate of force development, knowledge of the kinetic chain, or simply a consistent rhythm and tempo in the delivery.

Obviously, the examples I’m using here are baseball related, but this can be just as easily applied to strength and conditioning, as well as other skill-specific sports. It really just comes down to the proper application of each drill or exercise with targeted work that fits the developmental needs of the athlete. If player and coach are effectively communicating, the learning loop can certainly be shortened and the sky is the limit for your athletes’ development. With that said, I hope everyone enjoys the holidays and the rest of 2009, and I certainly look forward to continuing this ongoing conversation with you guys in 2010.

References
1. Ouelette, H et al. Spectrum of Shoulder injuries in the baseball pitcher. Skeletal Radiol. 2007 Oct 3.
2. Fleisig, GS. The Biomechanics of Baseball Pitching. Spring 2008 Southeast ACSM Conference.

Matt Blake can be reached at mablak07@gmail.com.

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