No, I’m not talking about Taco Bell’s latest gut-blasting burrito (please read Cynthia Sass’s blogs on nutrition if Taco Bell is on your “regular” list of stops!). I’m talking about seeing the situation right in front of you and using your past experiences to trust your instincts. In baseball recruiting, on the field scenarios, driving your car, handling peer pressure, etc. I have learned that slowing down and taking in all the available data gives me the best overall view of possible outcomes.
Let’s talk about a bases loaded jam I found myself in just a couple days ago. It was the 6th inning in San Francisco and I was facing Jose Castillo with the bases juiced. The last time I faced Jose Castillo was in Philadelphia less than a week prior. In the at-bat in Philadelphia I threw him two-seam and four-seam fastballs away, all well located, until he made an adjustment and hit an RBI double down the right field line. I didn’t throw him a pitch inside to move his feet or change his line of sight in that at-bat. So, Carlos Ruiz, one of our catchers, was thinking the same things I was for this at-bat…lets pitch him in! He called a first pitch fastball, sinker, in. The pitch ran in on Castillo’s hands and he hit a soft line drive to Ryan Howard at first base, and promptly caught the line drive and stepped on the bag at first for a double play. I ended up getting out of the jam and trusting my gut and my catcher’s gut proved rewarding.
Thinking about the previous at-bat against me and what Castillo would be trying to do in a one-run game with the bases loaded and no one out was very important to attacking the hitter. Once we made the decision to throw him in, I needed to have 100% conviction in throwing a fastball in. I also needed to be confident that it is the right pitch no matter the outcome, because as a pitcher you can only control the variables that are controllable, right?
If we hadn’t thought about the possible outcomes and past experiences in facing Castillo, we may have thrown him fastballs away and ended up with poor results. No doubt in my mind that Jose was thinking he was going to see fastballs away like we’d thrown him in his last at-bat. The confidence we had going into that at-bat was high because we had a game plan and trusted our gut instinct.
Now, let’s talk about a specific scenario that might affect a student-athlete. I know it happened with me in high school.
We all have friends who are or aren’t playing sports and might be trying out new things as they gain new freedom. I experienced exactly this going through my junior and senior year in high school. My friends were starting to go to parties and try alcohol and cigarettes; some were even smoking marijuana or trying other drugs. Talk about being disappointed! I’m serious, I couldn’t grasp for even a second why they wanted to lose control or mess with their health and happiness. I knew it is a large part of life in high school and college, I wasn’t that naive. My parents were very open and honest with me, which made my awareness and ability to see things for what they were a little better.
Regardless, my friends were partying and I had to make good decisions based on my gut instincts. I thought about the possible outcomes. The number one fear I had wasn’t that my parents would find out if I tried anything, but that the police had every right to “lay down the law,” if they crashed one of those parties or caught a 16-year old driving after drinking. The next huge fear I had was that coaches would catch wind that I was at one of these parties, even if I wasn’t drinking or doing anything wrong, because I’d be guilty by association! The LAST thing I wanted was Skip Bertman at LSU in Baton Rouge, where I signed to play college baseball, to find out that I had a reputation for partying. So, I had to trust my instincts when it came to deciding what to do. If my dream was to play baseball on a bigger stage than high school, well, I had to do the right thing for my future, right? The decision is yours to make, no one can hold your hand and make you do the right thing.
Having perspective and thinking about whether playing college baseball is an opportunity you’d like to entertain doing will help in making those tough decisions. It is a privilege to play college and professional sports.
Consistently doing the right thing will always yield good long-term results. Trust me.