SBA NEW Strength Coach, Developing Young Athletes, what separates Athletes? | Ep 8. Live at the Show

On today's episode, Jake and Zach reveal the new Strength and Performance Coach at SBA! Jarrett Thompson comes with tons of college level experience on top of personal experience! They sit down and talk building athletes at all different levels and what separators they have at each age! 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Was it for you the last helmets on?

SPEAKER_01 0:05

The skill of baseball like that, it's a high-level skill. Redefining, like using data to like redefine success.

SPEAKER_04 0:13

That goes against the Mc McDonald's mentality of I gotta have it now. Right. This is a game of repetition, it's a marathon, not a sprint.

SPEAKER_01 0:20

Oh like plummet. Like I made you a worse baseball player, and that's a problem.

SPEAKER_04 0:25

Reminded of the interview with Josh Donaldson if your coach tells you to hit the ball on the ground, tell him no.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Like baseball IQ is why it's a huge reason why I played in the big leagues. This game will break you down to the point where you want to quit, and like the best persevere through that. Sounds like everyone should be getting in here with JT to figure out what they got going on.

SPEAKER_04 0:50

Welcome back to Live at the Show. Today we have uh Zach Rimelard and Jarrett Thompson on the show. Jarrett's a the newest member of the SBA family, uh straight from Belmont University. Uh Jarrett, share with us what you've been doing the last five or six years.

SPEAKER_02 1:05

Yeah, so went straight out of undergrad, played college baseball at Belmont, pitched over, or excuse me, played baseball at Gardner Webb University, pitched over there, then transitioned into a career of strength and conditioning, went over to Belmont University, started working with a few different teams, and then kind of transitioned to the baseball relute. Um been there for the last five years and just recently decided to move over this way and kind of change a different pace of life and kind of get more into the developmental side of things.

SPEAKER_04 1:35

Awesome. Awesome. Getting on the ground floor with some of these athletes. Um, Zach and I have been talking about um instituting some foundational movement practices, some FMS. What do you call yours? You're you don't go with the FMS version, you do something different.

SPEAKER_02 1:48

Yeah, the FMS is kind of just like a you know, just your basic clinical background of things. We kind of want to more so gear our movement assessment more towards the sport of baseball, you know, kind of the demands, hip mobility. Obviously, we both we all know hitting and pitching, like there's a efficient capacity that the athlete has to have to move. Um we also know we work with athletes that are elite compensators. Um we don't all move perfect, but our goal in our movement assessment is to see how can we tweak something or improve something of the athlete's capacity just to kind of help improve their performance in the slightest bit and kind of go back to what their sport is and then reverse engineer it from there.

SPEAKER_04 2:29

Gotcha. Um this wasn't around uh when I was playing, was it for you the last helmets on?

SPEAKER_00 2:37

Back in Nom.

SPEAKER_04 2:39

No, I mean it was I think it was around, but it was like hidden information. Only the trainers knew, only like they didn't share with us, you know, what they were trying to accomplish with us.

SPEAKER_01 2:48

Oh yeah, I feel like that is always like I feel like the open market per se, like is always like years behind like what's actually going on, and it just kind of like hits the surface. And right now it's like finally tricking, trickling down to the amateur space, and like kids are starting to get access to this stuff, but it's like, what is this? And it's just nice to have like the go-between. I think it's really important for coaches who can kind of like work as translators per se to be able to like target these things to give a kid some understanding in the direction he's going. Because like we uh we talk about it all the time. It's like the most important thing for like an effective development process, it begins with buy-in. The kid has to believe that the direction we're going in is for his benefit, and he has to believe in what we're doing, so it's like that's where the communication aspect and the translation aspect is huge.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

And even just saying, like, you it wasn't around for you back then, like even five, six years ago, you get a college freshman and they have no idea what they're doing when they first step on campus. And then the last two to three years, you start to see a big difference in the freshman now compared to what it was when I first started the profession. Um, guys are coming in a lot more physically gifted and having a better background of understanding of how to move and how to move with load on them. So it's it's gotten pretty cool to see and that it's kind of hitting this level now as well.

SPEAKER_04 4:14

Yeah, I'm liking the where we're going in the game of baseball um in the fact that information knowledge data used to be like everybody thought it was their own proprietary, you know, confidential information, they didn't want to share with the next person. And now we've gone into the uh the age of content and social media, uh that readily available information that we have has started to be shared, so that you said players can buy in. But what does proper movement actually mean? Like, what do we if if a player is like you know, back in the old school days, evaluators, you know, ourselves coaches, like he moves good versus like here's some data that shows he moves good. Like we can always like he's a dude, he's a player. What is actually moving well or proper movement look like?

SPEAKER_02 5:01

Yeah, you just I mean can it be different for different things? Yeah, it totally is. Like, I mean, obviously, you know, you think of a squat, like there's a lot of qualities in a squat that look a certain way. Um, but there's also a lot of anatomical differences athlete to athlete, like the way their hips are set, uh, the way their femur length might be. Um that that forces them to be a little bit different. So, more so is can I put them in a loaded position that is more based on their build? Um, are they like a narrow ISI guy or wide? So, like, are they broad? Um, maybe they're not as good as a bilateral squat, so like just a back squat or something like that. But like, does this athlete have rhythm and timing in their movements? Are they able to slam on the brakes, get in and get out, or are they able to rotate efficiently? Um, and however that athlete does it, it it's gonna look different from person to person.

SPEAKER_04 5:51

Does a salsa dancing help that? There's rhythm, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

It's like we didn't need you, we needed a dance instructor. Um, but like when you're looking at an athlete like, and you're going down this road and you know that a like deficiency, if fixed, would be beneficial for what they're doing. How far down that road do you go before you're like, okay, like we're banging our head against the wall. This is now going to like be a deficiency that we're not going to overcome, and now we change course. Like, how do we overcome this the most efficient way possible? Because it feels like like you're constantly running into walls and you don't know if that's like a wall we can break through or a wall we have to turn away from. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:34

Yeah, it's tough because I mean, I think of a couple pitchers I've worked with in the past. I was just so keen, like, man, he can't get his back hip to internally rotate at all, and he's having a hard time with it. And honestly, it comes down to probably just the way his hip socket is set, and it's probably rotated just the way he's you know built. And from there, are we able to change his foot position on his, you know, um when he comes set or when he's in the windup, whatever that might be. So then we just look at yeah, then we look at different setups because we're unable to improve his range of motion. Like now, let's say this kid has really good active range of motion, like I can get him into the position, but he can't get himself into the position, then I think we can attack that a little bit more. We might be able to find different ways to load it that he can start to recruit properly and get into those positions. But if he can't and I can't get him into those positions, we're probably in a little rut there, and we probably need to alternate our view and try and take a different route to get there.

SPEAKER_01 7:38

See, and I think that like is like super, super beneficial and helpful for like all ages. I don't care if you're eight, I don't care if you're 16, like the earlier you attack it, the better. It's like it's like would you rather fight a baby lion or a girl? Yeah, and so it's like when you're addressing that with like an eight, nine, ten-year-old, does it become much more like external cue focused to not trick them into the position, but like have them like all their feedback's gonna be like, wow, that felt better and I threw it harder. You know what I mean? And that like that's rewarding for them. So you have to kind of get like strategic on doing some unique things to get guys in certain positions.

SPEAKER_02 8:26

Yeah, I mean, figure like drills you do pitching, drills you do hitting. Like you gotta step behind into the T-work, or um, you do a bound into your throw. And it our goal there is just to get the athlete to feel different positions, um, to create shapes that allow them to deliver on the field.

SPEAKER_04 8:44

You guys kind of walk me right into my next question. You know, why do some athletes generate elite velocity or bat speed while others struggle despite working just as hard? Like I work hard, but I'm not why do I not throw as hard as that guy?

SPEAKER_01 8:58

I think that there are like we fall into like we try to put things in boxes that don't really fit in boxes, and we just want answers that don't necessarily like exist in a linear way, but like I think at its most base, if you tried to put a 10,000-foot view on it, I think that the better the motor, the more inefficient you can be. I think the slower the motor, the more efficient you have to be. I think it's hard to overcome a bad motor with bad movement, if that makes sense. Um, but I think one can pick you up, and I think when you get both of them, you get a special combo. Um, and now, like that, with that being said, like you have guys performing at the top end of the major leagues who have movement inefficiencies in their motors just off the charts. Like if you look at Otani, like there might be, call me crazy, like a little bit of like a hip slide in there. And it's like, don't shoot the messenger, but this guy's special. He organizes in a way where that's how he does it.

SPEAKER_04 10:05

He still has some inefficiencies on the mound where they're saying he could blow out again because of the way his arm's not getting up. And I mean, no, he's he's a freak because he's six, six, two hundred and fifty pounds.

SPEAKER_02 10:16

And then you also have the other side of the spectrum where, like, you know, who who sail, like, he's tall, lanky, he he doesn't have a whole bunch of muscle mass, but dude's just elite at the sport of baseball. He's across his body, his hips are hypermobile. So you gotta find that balance of like what is this athlete's superpower? Is it the sport itself? And how can I really just fill the buckets that aren't full, but also maintaining that bucket that's slammed.

SPEAKER_01 10:43

See, that's why for me, it's like I think all of this, like the data, it's super helpful, but like if you don't reverse engineer it, like you're going to make giant mistakes. Like if a k if you make an adjustment with a kid, and like you're gonna have some like some regression sometimes before like making extreme progress, but like trying to recognize that like even though it doesn't fit like an a normative data range of guys that do it at the highest level, like what makes this kid unique and leaving it alone when you look at the result. Like, if ball fight's good, if spin's good, if carry's good, if he's not hurt, like guys, leave the kid alone. Like tweak like here and there, but like the kid's on a path because there still is a reps developmental piece that like like some kids just need to be supported and like get need time to compete at a higher and higher level, and things will clean themselves up. But like where coaches come in is like this guy has something hindering a potential that he can't pull out of himself, and it's that's where we step in. So we like nurture and support this kid that's overcoming and it looks different, but then like you have a kid who's blocked and knows that he's blocked, and we try to help unblock him.

SPEAKER_04 12:02

Yeah, going uh kind of to my next question, I think of Alex Wood. How much of baseball performance is skill versus movement efficiency? And as you just said, uh Woody was the first kid that I ever had the opportunity to coach who got to the big leagues and funkiest delivery, top three all time, probably, totally sideways, but always through strikes, always competed well, had top end VLO for his age, like he was he was there. So, but could we through movement efficiencies helped him not or overcome some injuries that he also had? So the question is you know, baseball performance is it skill or is it movement efficiency? Is it both?

SPEAKER_01 12:42

I think it's both, and I think it's repeatability. Yeah, I think consistency like gives you like you could have a broken, like messed up tool, you know, but like if you've used that tool your whole life, your measurements like in your like how you like attack it is consistent, it's what you're used to. It's it's it's your measurements, you understand how it works, and the more that tool is bent or like fixed the same way, the more repeatable your motion can be. But like the more variation you find in the movement, like what are you even working on and who are you? I think that's a hard place to um go from.

SPEAKER_02 13:22

And then and with the the skill of baseball, like that, it's a high-level skill. Um, you've got to be able to repeat it over and over. So the the things we try and do, like especially on the athletic development or the physicality side of it, is we've got to develop an athlete's nervous system. Something that they have to be able to repeat, repeat, repeat. You can't beat a bad uh nervous, or excuse me, you can't overcome a bad nervous system. Once that thing is fried, it's a ticking time bomb sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

I mean you're taking us right into the next conversation. I mean, the nervous system, yes, coming into play is like no movement efficiency like overcomes like competitive anxiety or performance anxiety.

SPEAKER_02 14:04

And then you circle it back all the way to the rhythm and timing portion of it. I mean, there it is, like you that CNS goes down, your rhythm, your timing, it gets all out of whack, and then all of a sudden, you know, you become a little bit more vulnerable to you know, an injury maybe, or a hamstring, or whatever that could be. But you just can't overcome a weak or a fatigued nervous system.

SPEAKER_04 14:28

It's interesting uh when you help athletes move better, let's just call it, you know, the way their hips work, the way their posture is coming off the rubber. I'll I'll speak to pitchers, like their arm slot needs to be down, and all of a sudden it clicks. You see that he moved better, you see that it was smoother, you see the ball came out of his hand better, but the velocity was down. Well, because I haven't thrown, I've thrown from this slot, not this slot. Now I've got to train different muscles. So it may have come out of his hand slower, and he and he's wondering, like, how is that better? I just threw the ball slower. But once you start to move right, then those muscles in moving properly got to be strengthened.

SPEAKER_01 15:03

So, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 15:04

So that goes against the Mc McDonald's mentality of I gotta have it now, right? And this is a game of repetition, it's a marathon, not a sprint. Well, that's you gotta trust now. They can see the data points. Yeah, exactly. Then we can get points buy-in.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

Gets buy-in in patience sometimes. It's like, hey, here's what we see, here's the process, here's what we saw with this guy who was on the same journey, and look where he ended up. It's like redefining, like using data to like redefine success. Like, success isn't a isn't one data point. Like, if I make your top end VLO go up or your exit VLO go up, but your contact and your chase and your uh adjustability all like plummet, like I made you a worse baseball player, and that's a problem.

SPEAKER_04 15:53

Yeah, I mean we see it on the mound all the time. A guy's VLO goes up and all of a sudden he can't throw strikes. Because now my release point can't be the same. I've got to get better extension, I've got to get down the mound further because I'm throwing the ball faster. And you know, be careful what you wish for. You don't want a seven, eight mile an hour increase. You want to be steady eddy and climbing as you get older.

SPEAKER_02 16:11

I think that's the big issue sometimes I have with uh you know very generic movement screening is like we're trying to put these athletes into a box and say they have to do a certain thing a certain way. Um, but that's not the case. We've got to, I mean, the arm will drop at some point in an outing or a pitch is different, and I've got to be able to um make an adjustment in mid-swing. Like so we there's a part that we have to expose these athletes to different scenarios or different slots at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

Because, like you said, if you just randomly change it and all of a sudden you're not used to that, then if coaching isn't like if there is no relationship component, if there is no interaction and learning the uniqueness of the player, like you're going to fall into like you're gonna fall into like a trap of like projecting what you think works overall. Like there is no cookie cut approach, each mover is so um uniquely different, and I think that like having a coach invested in the like personalization of your development is so important, and that's where the relational component will never be lost because like there is no copy and paste method because you're going to miss. Yeah, you know what I mean? So it's it's the balance of using these as tools, developing relationships, understanding how kids learn and how kids respond. And like I mentioned it before, but like one of the best things I think you can do as an instructor is have a kid grade each rep. Be like, what do you like one to ten? Like, what do you have that? And then you start to find out like, oh, this kid is like 100% if the ball, if it feels better, it was better. This kid is like looks at the scoreboard, and if it's faster, then it's better, and like just you start to learn how kids like engage with the information you're sharing with them because like at the end of the day, you can think you're great at what you do if it never reaches the other end and is like comprehendable or like applicable, it's like you're doing nothing, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_04 18:14

Yeah, I like that giving yourself a score or a grade on each swing or each throw because it it slows them down, and you know, we're not just here to maximize reps, but we want quality reps, and and when you have intent on each pitch or each swing, then you can actually grow a little faster in that. Um are there um common inefficiencies in young athletes that you see, like top three?

SPEAKER_01 18:43

Yeah, I mean, for a hitter, like I wouldn't say guys like like I mean guys f fly open quick, like everyone's looking to pull the ball in the air, so you see guys exiting quick, um, which is a huge one. I think that like with this day and age, it's funny. Like you used to get most kids like launching forward and being steep, but now the way the game's like kind of transforming, you're seeing a lot of stuck back. Like you'll see guys move forward and be really stuck back because like they're so worried about staying back that they're just like they're moving their body from a position that's like not aligned or centered, so they don't have much adjustability. Um and then probably I mean it it kind of goes hand in hand, but like direction. Like I mean, you're not getting a lot of kids, like most a lot of kids don't need to learn how to hit a middle and fastball. I think they need to like learn how to cover the outside corner, then relearn how to pull the ball well, if that makes sense.

SPEAKER_04 19:53

One of my uh pet peeves in in hearing coaches talk about hitting is you know, hit the ball the other way. You don't have to hit the ball the other way.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

No, but you have to hit the ball outside. Right.

SPEAKER_04 20:04

Well ultimately, like a better practice is how many times you're gonna hit the ball up the middle.

SPEAKER_01 20:09

Up the middle, great.

SPEAKER_04 20:10

Up the middle, hit the top of the back of the s of the cage every single time. Then you can then I'm a little bit out front, then I pull it or if I'm a little behind, I go the other way. But learn to hit the ball up the middle and stay behind it.

SPEAKER_01 20:21

Yeah, I think like you're saying, like you don't have to hit the ball to right field, but you need to hit the ball like two balls off or like two balls on from the outside corner. Like we can't have a hole on the middle away pitch because like that's probably where, especially at the younger ages, like like people really like to go away. It's not until you get to Pro Ball where people start going like hard in to set you up. So it's like we have to have coverage on the plate, but like that could mean the left center gap. You know what I mean? Like it could for it, depending on how you hit and how you function, like some guys like really organize well to the pole side and do a really good job. Uh like I I played with a kid, Carlos Perez, who literally hit like two fifty, three hundred every year, hit homers, and I that guy, I I mean, he he used probably 10% of the field. He lived in the corner, he could pull an outside fastball into the corner, he could catch a breaking ball out front, and he hit everything like a dead straight arrow. And it's like the worst thing you could do for that guy is to start pushing him in the fore hole. I mean, he loses everything. Yeah, it's like goes back to the original point of like players have strengths. You don't have to be the most well-rounded player ever because you're gonna make your best tools average, and you're only gonna get a little better at the things you're not great at. So you might as well focus on like identity, what makes me great, and make those super good, and that separates you, not being good at everything. Right.

SPEAKER_04 21:51

I'm I'm reminded of the interview with Josh Donaldson if your coach tells you to hit the ball on the ground, tell him no. And like we Can talk about this and argue all day, but ultimately I wanted to say the same thing. If your coach tells you to hit the ball the other way, say no. If you can't, yeah, if I can't hit the ball the other way and I'm gonna constantly get myself out just to prove I can hit the ball that way, that makes no sense.

SPEAKER_01 22:14

Yeah, or just ask how. Coach, can you show me how you show me how to it's like you probably can't make it happen, you know?

SPEAKER_04 22:22

How does mobility, stability, sequencing influence baseball performance?

SPEAKER_02 22:26

Yeah, so that's a lot. That was yeah, but it's it's honestly so it goes it to simplify it, it's all motor recruitment. So Rems talking about what he sees a lot of early on is like you know, shifting through or the inability to stay back or over-emphasize staying back. It comes down to the recruitment portion, like especially in youth athletes and high school athletes, it is the inability to break or slam on the brakes and change direction, um, whether it's throwing, whether it's running, um, whether it's swinging. Athletes have poor recruitment, and a lot of this is because the musculature of an athlete is just underdeveloped at that point, and it will always be that way. But can we put them into different scenarios that force them to slam on the brakes, whether it's a tempo and a squat, or I say, I want you to sprint as hard as you can, and when your teammate gets in front of you, slam on the brakes, don't hit them, or something like that. You know, like make gamified a little bit for him too. That way the athlete has to react. Um but yeah, you know, I do I've played with plenty of athletes, I've worked with plenty of athletes that don't move at all. Um and they can get away with it with other physical capabilities that they have, whether they're just you know, strong as an ox, or you have someone on the other side that I've had a picture in the past where dude was super twitchy. I mean, he could move, I put any weight on the bar and he's moving it at the same speed no matter what until we hit 90%. And that's just the way his nervous system is. He can't handle intensity like that. But up until then, dude is just like a pogo stick and just going, going, going. Um and that's just feeding off their superpower and kind of figuring out what they are good at. But you know, there's a blend of everything that needs to be efficient enough, I would say, okay, to allow you to be the most resilient athlete you can be and to be durable on the field. Um because at the end of the day, my side of it is I've got to keep guys on the field. Um yes, we want to improve your performance, but if you're not on the field, who cares if you're performing at the high level? Right. Yeah, exactly. So we gotta be making sure that you know they are improving physical capabilities, but they gotta be available, right? Um whether it's you know 60 games a year or 85 games a year.

SPEAKER_04 24:46

Um what types of assessments should every serious baseball player go through? And is um is there is there a hindrance to the assessments you know that baseball players are are going through now at all?

SPEAKER_01 25:03

Um I think that every player could use like I I do think like I think the like performance end of like a movement screening and like a twitchiness and uh a 10-yard sprint and uh like uh broad jump and a high and yeah in a vert, like I think that you'll see that there is an overwhelming correlation between like high output between the lines and high output in those movements because like it's a very like fast paced game. I know there's a lot of standing around, but when it happens, it happens quick. Like your first step, your um ability to like launch late, hold a spot, like it's all like it's all milliseconds. Like if you miss a millisecond, like you're beat. And it's like that's kind of the measurements that you're seeing a lot of these, like all the stat cast stuff. It's like catch probability. Like, where does catch probability lose like gain the most traction? Like, probably early, you know what I mean? It then efficiency of the read, but like a lot of guys can read, a lot of guys react differently. So it's like I think that overall athleticism, like elevating that ceiling is very, very important when you get into the movement-specific stuff. It's like, how do I take that foundation of an athlete and like organize a little bit more specifically to do a task? Yeah, but like it begins and ends with like it kind of rolls into the do I play multiple sports debates, this, that. It's like we're looking to take whole people, elite athletes, and like tailor movements to like what they do well, provide data points for them to see. Yeah, but it starts for me in like in the performance end in the athleticism end.

SPEAKER_04 26:58

I got another one for you, another Josh Donaldson episode. You ready for it? If your coach tells you to run polls, tell him no. You guys you mentioned sprints, you mentioned sprints, like baseball, the longest play in baseball is 13, 14 seconds inside the park home run. Why are we running polls? Yeah, so I go on. Yeah, get in there.

SPEAKER_02 27:17

Yeah, so all right, there is a benefit. Um it's outdated. Obviously.

SPEAKER_04 27:22

The benefit is outdated.

SPEAKER_02 27:23

The benefit no, excuse me. Running poles is outdated. Yeah, 100% for sure, but like there is also a portion that you have got to have an aerobic base enough as a baseball player.

SPEAKER_04 27:36

But I can use shuttles there, back, there, back, there, and it's a bigger ball. And you could do anything.

SPEAKER_02 27:39

Yeah, you could do anything. But and I don't think poles are a bad option. Um, but we got to remember what our goal is of running them, and it's to improve our aerobic capacity. Our aerobic capacity is what allows us and gives us the capability to recover at a high level. Um, you think of a game, you like Rim said, we're standing around for a long time. It's it's not a super high intensity all the time. There's a lot of standing around. I've got to be able to do that for three to four hours. You get into college and you get into Pro Bowl, you show up to the field at noon for a six o'clock game. Like that is a long day that becomes a big aerobic day. So there is benefit on running long distance or running for a longer duration of time, more so to promote the emphasis of I need an aerobic base so I can recover at a high level. Promote having balls. Yes, exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 28:33

No, I couldn't be more on the like the importance of like cardiovascular, like being like endurance and recovery, like he's saying, it's like it's an exaggeration, but like let me ask you questions, like sitting at this table right now in this environment, and then like let me get you like to hold your breath for a minute, and then I'll ask you questions and see how you're functioning. Because like you hit a triple in the heat of summer, and now you have to read a dirt ball on the next pitch. Like, how are you functioning? Are you like, are you calm? Are you present? Are you locked in, or are you still trying to recover? And I think people think I think viewers that watch baseball think there's no way that's a thing, but like that's a thing, you'd be very surprised, especially with the clock with pitchers trying to like tie their cleats and stuff after they have to get over a couple times in a row and have a couple long at bats. You're like, you're looking at like uh last night, Bobby Witt Jr.

SPEAKER_04 29:28

Yeah, diving play in the hole, comes up, makes a great play, lead-off double the next inning.

SPEAKER_01 29:33

Next inning. Yeah, just it's always and then stealing bases. That guy was that guy's workload, like the thing is like elevating workload. If you go into the season, like the chances of you building your workload ceiling much higher than it is when you enter spring training is slim to none. Like it is it is peaked. So like you're going to start holding the line as long as you can. So the higher that ceiling is, the more room you have, and the more endurance you have. Like, maybe the cardio doesn't show up one, two, three weeks in, but like talk about 60 games in in the heat of summer, like that guy looks different than that guy. Yeah, and it's better have a pretty big work capacity. Exactly. And it's like if you're playing every day, like you're gonna feel the difference. Even waking up, you feel a difference. Like that's something I really emphasized. And it's like I've found that it didn't make me less twitchy. Like as long as you're supplementing with like jumps, spread, doing the speed stuff, like moving weight fast, like there's a very, very sh like beneficial. Um like it's very beneficial to do like that kind of like endurance training, and like even when you're not doing sprint work, like time under tension stuff, like stability stuff, controlling your body weight for long periods of time. It's like everyone's worried about moving fast, but no one can catch the speed. We're outrunning ourselves and we're finding ourselves hurt a lot.

SPEAKER_02 31:04

Yeah. I mean, it it comes down to like our base. When I program for an athlete, our first phase will always be a work capacity phase. That allows us to build from there. But if we have a horrible work capacity, I can't load this athlete up. Um, they're just gonna crumble.

SPEAKER_04 31:20

And it's like trying to get a kid to throw the ball, you know, increase his VLO in the first session you've ever been with him and you don't know enough about him.

SPEAKER_02 31:27

Yes, exactly. And it's the same thing in in running or being on the field. And obviously, I I do think a big portion of conditioning is a really good tailored practice plan. Um I think you see it at really good high-level college programs. They probably don't condition a whole lot because their practice plan is efficient and planned out appropriately throughout phases of the year where it needs to be longer. Um, not in season, like it needs to be a s a sprint, let's get them prepared for the game and go. But in the fall, like let's have some long drawn-out practices and keep these kids on their feet a little bit. Um, and the good thing is like once you have an aerobic base and it's it's sturdy, you don't have to train that quality often. Your aerobic base will last. Um, it's usually one or two sessions every 21 or so days, and you can pretty much hold on to that from there as long as you're not being a slob and take care of yourself. Yeah, exactly. Just be a healthy human. My junior. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, no matter what. Those are terrible for you something.

SPEAKER_04 32:25

Um I remember my junior year of playing basketball in the winter. My goal was, regardless of what's happening in the game, my goal was to get up and down the floor every single time with the ball. And playing the two, three, or four position. Sometimes you might find yourself on the baseline and the ball gets picked off, and I gotta go. But what I found was the better my aerobic you know conditioning became, um, the easier it was to shoot, like in the third and fourth quarter. Uh, and then when baseball season came around, I was I was glad that I, you know, I guess challenged myself to get up and down the floor no matter what. And was it a mentality thing that helped my physical abilities? Possibly. And that it that takes us to another argument. You know, it's a mentality versus mechanics on the field. You know, so I'm a big mentality guy, right? Um, and I feel like your physical preparation can increase your mentality and your your toughness and your aggressiveness and how you go about playing. So I would you can almost argue that this is the the biggest part of the game that can unlock a lot of inefficiencies or can unlock some inefficient mentality that a that a player that athlete has.

SPEAKER_02 33:38

I mean, think about you know hitting under fatigue or throwing under fatigue mechanics and everything start to get sloppy. Now, that doesn't mean go out there and we're gonna hit a hundred balls no matter what today, because we need to get you know enduring or swing, you know. We don't need that. Um, because you you don't want to go, you know, volume and skill together. You know, you kind of want to be smart and how you manage that. But you know, there is a portion of making sure they're able to repeat over and over and over the skill of baseball.

SPEAKER_01 34:08

Well, I also I think that like one of the things we miss on, I'd say, is like the uniqueness of like what a kid needs, like based on his mindset and stuff. But like when you're programming out an athlete, there's so many variables that like there will never there will never be a system that works. Like it's going to be coaches implementing tools for a specific athlete that works there. Does that make sense? So like there's so many things we talk about, whether it's the mental side, whether it's um, like you're saying, mentality, physical conditioning, um, movement efficiencies, mechanics, um, baseball IQ, uh competitiveness. Like you're talking about layers and layers and layers of things that impact the game at like a very deep level. And there's different buckets of those things that like like baseball IQ is why is a huge reason why I played in the big leagues. And it's not because of the other things. Like I overcame a lot of deficiencies in some ways because of I always knew what to do, where to go. It doesn't mean I made perfect decisions all the time, but like I have a good understanding of how the game worked and an internal clock. And it's like we want to focus on the two things we can control, which are super important and probably need to take up the bulk of your time, and like the other things like are why we will always have like an impact because like it there's so many things to plug in play to help a guy get better.

SPEAKER_04 35:51

All right, so like you hear coaches and evaluators talk about first step on the basketball floor, um, reaction time in the game of football for baseball, it's instincts, like your baseball instincts to get that first step as a center fielder, as a shortstop, as a base runner. Can you train that?

SPEAKER_02 36:08

Yeah, I mean, you can. You can you know make drills out to be more reactive and um you know have that instinctability where, okay, say, like we talked about with slamming on the brakes, whether I step out in front of the person or I don't, and they just they have to adjust accordingly. But a lot of it is just having an athlete, in my opinion, and I think the better athletes do this well, is they can focus at a high level and kind of see where that pitch is going and what the tendency of maybe a swing before the athlete was. That's how they can compensate that maybe they're not the quickest guy, but they can kind of have they have a predictability to it where they can, all right. I've seen this guy swing, I know what the pitch call is coming in, and I kind of have an idea where this ball might end up, and I'm I'm ready for it. And then from there I can adjust on the go.

SPEAKER_01 36:58

I think that's like that's spot on. I think that most people think that that is a like conscious, like, what am I gonna do here? Like this like um like predictive model you're running in your brain of like all possible outcomes, and I think like that actually makes you slower. I think understanding the game runs at a subconscious understanding internal clock level of like you don't even have to speak the words to your brain, if that makes sense. It happens and you're engaged in it. There's no like, oh, balls hit to my left, I'm going over here, this is where I'm going. It's literally like you flow with the game. It's it's like you hear flow state and it's a real flow.

SPEAKER_04 37:48

Yes. Can you train that, or do you just want athletes who have ADHD?

SPEAKER_01 37:52

I think it's I I do think it's like the better athletes do it better because there's this confidence and trust. Like they trust that they'll figure out a way to get the job done. They're not on their way there with a plan on how they're gonna do it. It's they're responding to what stimulus is happening in front of them.

SPEAKER_02 38:14

They have the ability to get there and orient themselves to perform the outcome that they want.

SPEAKER_01 38:20

In a way, that's the first time they've ever done it in that game in their life. Like did Derek Jeter footplay. I know we talked about it before, but I was about to bring it up. There's certain things that happen where like Derek Jeter wasn't like sitting on an index card for the last five years studying, like, when this happens, here I go. It's like he saw a need, he understood where the base runner was, and he had no conscious thought. He reacted to what his body responded to what he knew needed to happen. The desired.

SPEAKER_04 38:51

And he saw in his head that if this gets overthrown or Giombi doesn't cut and make the throw, I somebody's gotta be.

SPEAKER_01 38:58

But what's operating him? Because that runs in order. Scoring is a huge problem. Yes, and we need to do everything we can to like workshop this problem and solve the problem of getting that guy out of the plate, and he saw an opening and said, I need to fill that gap. And he went and filled that gap, and it's like, and everything fell into place, but like he wasn't like it wasn't planned, it wasn't practiced. He like responded. No, it's like he understands the game in a way that is like is super instinctual, like you're saying, and it's like, can you train it?

SPEAKER_04 39:33

Yeah, and like a backyard play, like everything can't be organized.

SPEAKER_01 39:37

Do you play baseball? Right. Like, do you play baseball a lot? Right. Do you watch baseball? Do you care to be super educated and understanding? Like, do you want to know where the right fielder is on every butt play? So you start to understand the flow of the game without having to consciously see people. And it's like, I know where my shortstop is when this ball's hit here because like I understand how the game works. So that having a pick like a scope of like where everything is happening, even when you're not seeing it, makes the game a heck of a lot easier.

SPEAKER_04 40:09

So transferring energy front leg to back leg, hitting, or excuse me, back leg to front leg to be crazy. That would be crazy. Um and which, you know, kind of brings something to mind left guys who switch it, or guys who throw righty hit lefty, or throw lefty hit righty. Like the hips gotta be able to move both ways. Energy and force has to be transferred from the back leg to the front leg. Um obviously you can train, how would you train that?

SPEAKER_02 40:35

Yeah. So I mean, I'd be doing an athlete a disservice if we didn't train their non-dominant side. So we'll do we'll do more excuse me, medicine ball work, so med ball work often. And we're gonna do the opposite side because there's a part of you've got to learn how to separate at the the hip and shoulder, but also more so just like being able to slam on brakes and rotate efficiently both ways is going to more so than anything keep an athlete's spine healthy. Um, you see it in the sport of baseball, like low back injuries, they happen. The spine is not made to have the torque and rotation that that it the demand of baseball requires. So, with that being said, we have to train those qualities. We have to build the capacity, the work capacity for that athlete to handle that. And we can do that whether it's through different core exercises, med ball exercises, carries, um, any type of different pressing variations that forces the athlete to brace and maintain a good pelvis position and a neutral spine throughout those positions. Now, with that being said, we also have to, and this is kind of starting to come about more and more in my side of things is how can we expose the athlete to moving their spine in a controlled fashion? That way, when it is in their sport and it's not controlled, we're not setting them up for failure. Like if we're always just if we're a perfect person, I'd be sitting up straight right now. Um, I'd have a neutral spine.

SPEAKER_01 42:01

I like to teach myself to hunch oil, yeah. That's where I'm gonna live. I kind of just round the shoulders or something.

SPEAKER_02 42:06

Yeah, but we're not robotic and we bend our spine and we do things like that, so we have to have that quality in us to do that. Right. Um now, with that being said, you also have to understand the volume. Like, say we're you know, game 30 of a college season or we're we're late September of a professional season. I'm probably not gonna rotate the athlete as much because they are getting that demand from their sport. Now, if I rotate them, I might actually rotate them only on their non-dominant side to kind of fix those movement inefficiencies that may have occurred throughout a season and kind of compensate from that pattern of it is doing the opposite side.

SPEAKER_01 42:48

Do you find that um like in season, like big overhaul, not big overhauls, but like I did a lot of like body work in the last like couple years of playing, and like I noticed that like when I got some like uh like fascial release and like I gained some range of motion that I had lost over time, that immediate opening like caused an issue on like my calibration for like a couple days until I tightened back up a little bit, and I was like, okay, like now I'm I'm adjusted because like if you gain too much range of motion too fast, it's hard to know what you're doing inside that range of motion. Yeah, there's an argument for that for pictures.

SPEAKER_04 43:30

Like, I don't I don't some organizations and people, you know, coaches talk about I don't want to be too mobile, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:36

Like after you think of it like a rubber band. Um, there's no snap to it. Like you so there's a test that it's like it's called uh RSI. So we're testing an athlete's elasticity. How twitchy is this kid? Um can he get off the ground fast and float through the air at the same time? Um, those are pretty high level athletes, those are your track athletes that can you know get up and burn. But if we're constantly just stretching this kid and lengthening them out, they're gonna lose some of the things.

SPEAKER_04 44:07

So proxyl versus distal. Yes. Right. So if I get too far away from my body, there's too that I don't I can't repeat.

SPEAKER_01 44:13

Is symmetry more important than actual like range of motion? That's a good question. Because like I found that like I got I tore my UCL, don't get me wrong, but like I wasn't hurt much at all unless it was like here and there with like a hit by pitch. Nothing you can really do. But the point is, like I was always low on like they'd be like, oh, like your hamstrings are pretty tight, like, oh, this is pretty tight, your chest, your external, like this and that. But it's like I've always been pretty symmetrical and pretty like twitchy. And like I found that the more I tried to open up my range of motion, the less like I actually found myself not like with like lingering things more often. The tighter I was, the better I felt, and the more in control I felt like I was in my body.

SPEAKER_02 45:08

I think it comes back to what we talked about in the passive versus active mobility portion. Is are you still able? Like, can I get you into that position? Okay, then we're probably okay. Or is it becoming a recruiting problem where you know posterior shoulders just fatigued and we're starting to recruit lat or bicep to throw more so than anything now? Like, can I get them into an assessment and see how that scap rotates up the rib cage more so than anything? And it's still okay, it still moves well. Maybe it is a mobility thing we've got to attack. If it's not, then we need to focus on a little bit of recruitment. Maybe it's a little bit more isometric work or eccentric loading that gets the athlete a little bit more feel into those positions.

SPEAKER_01 45:51

Yeah, so it's pretty hands-on, pretty unique to the player, and yeah. Sounds like everyone should be getting in here with JT to figure out what they got going on. No doubt.

SPEAKER_04 45:58

Hopefully so.

SPEAKER_01 45:59

Hopefully so.

SPEAKER_04 45:59

No doubt. We'll get it going soon. I love that it's not gonna be cookie cutter. Yeah, um, the relationship between movement quality and measurables, like exit velocity, bat speed, uh pitch velocity, spin rates, you know, sprinting, right? How fast I can run. That force output, um, and and um seeing that data on paper, striving to for more. How do you manage a player's um the mental part of the game when you're they're going through failure? Right? They're working over here really hard in the gym, they're over here honing their craft, their skills, things just aren't clicking. You know, baseball's never been X plus Y equals Z. And it kind of goes back to our very first question that we talked about, you know, players who are not seeing um, I guess maybe the the jumps they're wanting to make. Um, they're not, and all of a sudden eight miles an hour comes at the you know, the most random time when the body finally catches up, the brain kind of catches up. The the eight inches between our head is so important, right? The brain and how it's how it's functioning as we're growing physically is so important. Yeah. So okay, so I'll kind of I'll I'll bring that into into scope. How do you manage a player's uh mental well-being while he's striving to increase his measurables?

SPEAKER_02 47:27

Yeah. From my side of it, it is just consistent, maybe small gains, but consistently doing the same thing just a little bit better each day. Whether it is in your warm-up moving just a touch better, whether it is 135 on a front squat for you know a freshman in high school, and he gets it for one more rep this week than he did last week. Everyone wants that big magic red pill, and shoot, I just got 400 pounds on a squat. This is awesome, but I'm still throwing 85. Why is this? Correct. Like we are not going to we have to keep in mind we are not going to have these big jumps all the time. There's going to be a time you do, but how can we have consistency in our day-to-day life that will ultimately hopefully lead us to that big jump or that performance indicator that goes up on the mound or exit velocity or whatever it is. So it's hard for me as keeping that big picture in check sometimes. And that's why, yeah, I will have my assessments and they're really great, and they're gonna be something that hopefully will transfer to the sport. But that's the thing, it has to transfer to the sport. And they have ultimately at some point see their performance on the field go up, yeah. As long as they are doing the right things outside of it.

SPEAKER_04 48:46

The the day of so the day and age of social media, consistency versus sexy. Like everybody wants to post their pull down, everybody wants to post their best swing, or like, but the consistency of baseball and the patience within it is so important.

SPEAKER_02 49:01

Yeah, we had a coach at Belmont. It's he will always say it was I'd rather you be consistent consistently good instead of can occasionally great. Like an occasionally great day, and don't get me wrong, it feels good. But if I know I can kind of do the same thing over and over at a high level, then I know at the long haul I'm gonna be better than this guy on the field. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:24

Yeah, I mean, I think it gets interesting, it's hard when like I found that the hardest athletes to work with are the ones who have like this obsessive extrinsic goals that like nothing else matters besides these specific things, and if this isn't getting better, I'm not getting better, and there's no convincing them otherwise. And it's like what they can't see is like one of the sayings that I like I say is like trying is great, but it like it doesn't really matter. Everyone tries, and it's like if you try harder, you're in doesn't mean you're entitled to anything. It's like this is a perseverance game to where if you try and it doesn't work, like we have to try different, and we have to try different, and it's like this game will break you down to the point where you want to quit, and like the best persevere through that. Some guys have to go through more, like more no's. Some people get it a little bit easier on the yes side, but it does come and it does catch up, but like working hard is not something where you're now like something's indebted to you. You're not owed something because you work hard, but like people want that like direct correlation. But it's like you could be molding your character, you could be building endurance, you could be moving slightly better for this one thing, and like you you're putting something in the bank that like even if you never see the fruit of, like industriousness or working hard, like will have an impact on your character, like your life, your direction, your development in a positive way. But like when your scope, like you're trying to control the scope of how this work needs to pay off, it becomes very difficult because like it isn't always as direct as you're saying, as like the X, Y, Z formula.

SPEAKER_04 51:23

Yeah, I mean, we watched the players um who are now 16-17 here at SBA, they're you know, they're having great high school seasons, but when they were younger, um the work ethic and the discipline they were creating, they weren't seeing jumps back then, but now that they've created that discipline to get after it every single day, the 1% better cliche. Um, if you were designing ideal development, an ideal development system for a young athlete, what would it include?

SPEAKER_02 51:54

Can you squat? Can you hinge? Can you skip, jump, run, those type of things? And can you control your body weight for a very young athlete? So can I do a pull-up, can I do a push-up with great technique and do it for repetition? Um, it is very basic as that. From there, if I you can do that really well as a young athlete, we can go so many avenues from there. But if you can't move your body and some of those, then it's gonna be really hard for me to put you under load in a safe fashion to really develop your physical capabilities. So that would be like Route One. And that's why we do some of the movement screening stuff because we gotta we gotta check that box and see where we can improve it.

SPEAKER_03 52:39

Right.

SPEAKER_02 52:39

Um, is it strength that's hindering you, or is it true move mobility issues that are hindering you? But can you squat, hinge, push, pull, and skip, and run? Those those qualities right there, if we can nail that base down, then we can go. From there, you know, we'll load you up, we'll build your capacity, we'll put some muscle on you. Those are the easy things to do. Um, we'll get you a little bit faster, we'll we'll get you, you know, jumping a little bit higher. But if we can't do the first part really well, then we're kind of just always gonna be in this like middle gray area with that.

SPEAKER_01 53:15

What you got? Yeah, but to that is like part two is like the skill, like the specific skill movement. It's like pitching or hitting. I I guarantee I could go sit in um and watch JT run an athlete through a movement, like athleticism um evaluation, and I could probably get pretty close to what I'm about to see over in the cage. Because like if you can't hinge over here, it's a good chance we can't hold our hinge over here, and there's a good chance like we can't create good direction because like a body posture that like becomes like straight up and down, like it's really tough to hold angles and create length in the zone. So it's like, and if you're watching a guy doing a um like jumping, the hinge and then like watching the knee like fly over the front toe, like you're probably gonna see a guy that shifts his weight to load and actually doesn't know how to like use his hips and like allow his body to um like coil or load or stretch the correct way. So it's like movement is movement, yeah. And that's why progression in baseball like correlates very much to do whatever you have to do to like create space or movements that like directly correlate to what's going on in the cage, but it then like on that end for me, it's all going to translate to like using like an evaluation process where we're collecting like high-speed video, we're getting some joint angles, some biomechanics, and sequencing stuff that parallels great with the strength portion, if then um just collecting exit data and bad data, like with blast and having wrapped soto, it's like, hey man, like a lot of the stuff lined up, it felt good, it was smooth, and it created a result. Like that's a win, a win, a win. It's like when you're looking at exit data, like if you reverse engineer like that felt good, that was easy, and the data says it was good, like that's a win. Like, let's try to repeat that. You know what I mean? Like, there's a way to utilize these tools, but like gathering a sample size, um, breaking it down, seeing the correlation between what they're doing in their movements here and a parallel over here, like you'll see the impact of like I know it's a stupid example, but like if you watch a kid in the on-deck circle and he's trying to do something directly opposite, because he's just like doing some weird thing that doesn't help his swing and honestly might be causing the bad habits because like you're doing that 50 times a day and you're swinging three times, it's like you're actually like reinforcing a bad move, and it's the same thing in the weight room. If I'm not moving correctly and I'm doing something different or like opposing what I'm trying to do in the skill part, like that's a recipe for disaster and inconsistency.

SPEAKER_02 56:15

One of the big things that over the last three, four years that we started at Belmont doing um is basically they're recruiting, and when we an athlete would come on campus, one of the first comments the softball and baseball coaches would tell me is, You're gonna love this kid, great mover. Like on the field, moves well. Like it sticks out when an athlete has flow to their game. It sticks out when they move well, they can get into positions efficiently. Um, one of the softball coach would always ask me, Hey, is so-and-so moving better? Like, are they starting to kind of get it going a little bit? And it's not like, okay, they could squat deeper, or they could, it's just, do they have the ability to orient their body in different movements?

SPEAKER_01 56:59

Or like you could watch a guy walk through the door, have a 15-yard walk right at you and be like, Oh, he's got interesting carrying something. Yeah, yeah. And it's not even like just the confidence piece, but it's like the way that their body, like the athleticism in the walk, the way they pick up their feet, the way like are they walking in a straight line? It's like, I know it sounds crazy, but like movement like parallels through everything you do. That's why good movers, good athletes, like are a lot good at a lot of sports. Like, look at Mookie Betts. Yeah, that guy moves really well, really efficient, has giant range of motion, and he's his motor's incredible. If you don't move well, you better be pretty skilled at your sport. Yeah, you better get real strong in that ground. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_04 57:41

Yeah, Mookie Betts, the ability to play at a high level in the outfield and then move to short stance. That's that's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 57:48

That's made up. Yeah, seriously, made up.

SPEAKER_04 57:50

AI.

SPEAKER_01 57:51

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not even really. You're not even watching. Yeah, it's fake.

SPEAKER_04 57:54

Uh no, what the one thing I'm excited about is you know, when when kids see the the metrics, the data, and they start to um have the flower bloom in their their craft, they see the velocity go up. I've always taken the at coaches at a young age, you know, if 10 reps of a set or a or a sprint exercise or something is the requirement, always do one more. That would be my, you know, um, that would be my I'm black, I'm I'm freaking blanking here, but that would be my So you're coming off the beach trip, so you're just you're getting back something.

SPEAKER_01 58:33

You have a good tan, it's good for the camera, but we're not firing. Yeah, Jake, he might have he might kill over and die with uh just do an extra rep. Yeah, yeah. You might not like that. No, but the idea of one more do the program. Follow the program. He's like I don't do one more. I didn't write today. If you can do one more, we should have up the way.

SPEAKER_02 58:53

Exactly. Yeah. No, but there is a point to that. Like, I mean, there is a point to doing an extra rep. Yes.

SPEAKER_04 59:01

It can help gain confidence.

SPEAKER_01 59:04

In the right spots. In the right spots. In the right spots. Yeah. No, I definitely agree. I have that mindset. If I lose count of like a set, like I'm probably gonna do an extra one. Exactly. Like, yeah, it's just I think that's kind of it blends the old school thing with the new school thing. It's like everything now is very like programmed, do the number, like in like old school kind of is like, let me see how far I can push. You know what I mean? Let me see, like that one extra rep feels like you you did something, and like sometimes that goes a long way in the mentality game. So, like, you got the mentality, yeah. And like I know you know that's important, but like you're very structured and organized as you should be for what you do for a living, and it's like yeah, I think there's a win on both ends. There's definitely a blend to it.

SPEAKER_02 59:47

Yeah, because that that one extra rep might actually give a kid a little confidence that he needs.

SPEAKER_01 59:52

Yeah, yeah. I think I'm the perfect mix of both. So I played a guy named Todd Todd Airdose.

SPEAKER_04 59:58

Todd Airdose in spring training. I showed up, you know, 45 straight days of spring training, and I always tried to be the first one in the clubhouse, last one to leave, just be that guy who's always present, be available. And Todd was there before me every day, every morning. And I asked him, I was like, why are you doing 45 minutes to 60 minutes of cardio before we go out and work out? And then you know we're gonna do cardio at the end of the day. He's like, this is where I gain my confidence from. Nobody's outworking me. I'm gonna outwork everybody. And so there is there is an area there, uh a mentality there of I'm gonna outwork everybody.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:31

I think that there is some benefit to that, and hot take, I value it to a certain degree. Like it is a character quality that I feel like if I see it can be molded. And if it stays at that capacity, like it's limited in efficiency and effectiveness sometimes. It's like first one in, last one to leave, but like efficiency level is a four out of ten. It's like you're trying to win a race that doesn't matter. Like at the end of the day, if your best schedule isn't first one in, last one to leave, and you're actually more rested and ready to go and have a higher output of performance, getting 30 more minutes of sleep because that's what you need, then like stay home and show up last. Yeah, like I'm a huge proponent of like be if be efficient with your time and don't try to win the um the perception war. Yeah, like if you're just sitting here, if you're the guy that like there's a like I said, it's better than not, but like if the coach looks at you and you start running hard and he looks away and you walk, like you're as a character, right? Yeah, we have an issue on our hands. It's like it's not a means to an end, but it is a uh gifted mindset to be back pocket. Yeah, what are the habits you wash?

SPEAKER_02 1:01:54

What are the habits I what are the habits you're doing that lead you to this situation? Like, all right, are you just in the office then when you leave you're you know going home and eating a Big Mac and doing whatever too?

SPEAKER_01 1:02:04

Yeah, or are you making sure when you walk in, you knock on the manager's door and say good morning, like go home. Yeah, go home. Like just that you're doing it for the wrong reasons. You're doing it for the wrong reasons. I'm a big proponent of doing it for like the right reasons. If you think showing sure, but if you think showing your work ethic means that you'll be rewarded, like you are very, very wrong. 100%. Like you better show, like now, they just they measure you. Like if you if you show up first, but like your bat speed's slower, like then like they don't care.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:36

We could we could take this conversation like for the next seven hours. But I do have one more thing. Um I've been training uh amateur athletes for the last 20, 21 years, and I hear gain weight, you need to put on weight more than I would like. Yeah, for sure. And so like gaining weight, mass doesn't equal gas all the time. And Pedro Martinez is the one of the smallest guys ever been around, and he'd throw 100 and had a you know multi-year big league career, 15, 16 years, whatever it was. Gaining weight is not the answer all the time. Gaining weight can be good, you can't be hiring, right? It's not it's not like in winter.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:13

Fatigue, like like if you don't have like if you don't have gains in your like like whatever, your RSI, your athleticism, your jumps, like, and you are literally the same like strength, like taking on the same strength load with a 10-pound weighted vest, like great, you just made this job very much harder. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:36

Exactly. So a big thing we'll look at is relative strength. So I may go squat 400 pounds, Rem might go squat 400 pounds. Who's the stronger athlete? Rem. He's 20 pounds lighter than I am, and he's moving the same weight. So his relative strength is through the roof. And if he's at a much more lean mass than I am, and he's that strong, he's probably gonna be able to produce force way more efficiently than I am. And it's going to take a lot more speed for me to get that thing going than it is for him. Um, now don't get me wrong, there is a lot of equations out there, and there's a lot of standards if you're this height and you're between this weight at also probably about 12 to 15% body fat. So you've got lean mass. This should be a recipe that could fall stars aligned that get you to a position. It's like a position for the same.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:46

Because it's going to create more force if you're rotating similarly and you have like more mass. Does that make sense? So like lighter athletes, smaller guys can move faster generally, but um, so it becomes a sliding scale to where like if putting on, I think everybody has a like a weight capacity kind of thing where their body functions best, and sometimes that's losing weight, sometimes it's gaining weight, but then you'll find the ceiling where it's like, man, at 205, I feel really good, but at 207, like it starts to get a little weird and gonna work a little bit harder to and you start to like notice that and become attuned to that, and it's like maybe my like maybe my ceiling becomes 205, and maybe I try to um get like shift myself into more lean muscle mass at that weight. So instead of 15% body fat, maybe I'll move toward 12, maybe 10. But it's like being smart on like yeah, putting on weight for a number is like worrying about your batting average. Like, guys, we're past that. Like, let's get into the body weight.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:48

I mean, it's a goal to have, and goals are great, and there's parts of it that are can be necessary, but body weight fluctuates so much on a regular basis as it is. That I think it can be overkilled very fast.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:06

I mean, I I literally I mean I've done it. I did it as a younger morning and night, like through a period of time. And like I would like, there was times where I was like 184, 185 at night, and I would be 177 in mid-morning. Right. Like, I mean, that's I always weigh myself in the morning for that reason. Yeah, say what I do.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:26

Um all right. We're gonna continue this conversation in uh in our next podcast. But that was awesome. Thanks for your time, JT. That was fun, yeah. I appreciate it for sure. Well, we're looking forward to helping your son um gain and uh um increase his his abilities, obviously, and and accomplish his goals in the long run. So thanks again. See you soon.