06/12/2026
If youâd asked me back then, Iâd have told you I was mentally tough. đ€
I wasnât. I just didnât know what I didnât know.
A lot of athletes, like me, hear that they need to be âmentally toughâ, but no one really explains what that means or how.
There are way more than just 5 things I wish I knew back then about Mental Performance, but these would have made the biggest impact.
1ïžâŁ I lived and breathed baseball. Itâs all I did and cared about. While I was incredibly committed and thatâs great, I also made it my whole identity not just something I did.
That meant if we lost or if I played poorly, I took it personally. I felt like something was wrong with ME, and terrible performance meant I was a failure as a person.
2ïžâŁ I had so many thoughts and they were loud, constant, and mostly negative.
đą Play harder! Thatâs not good enough! This gameâs on you! đą
I listened to all of them, never responded, and didnât even know what self-talk was, let alone positive self-talk. The ability to get ahead of those thoughts? I didnât know that was possible.
3ïžâŁ I loved winning and really wanted to win every game. So much that I would try to do too much or carry the team myself.
I was impatient, and if we were down 2 I wanted to score 3 with 1 swing so we could take the lead back right away. Because I was trying too hard, that often had the opposite outcome.
4ïžâŁ I took mistakes really hard. I basically punished myself and thought my terrible body language and throwing things showed my coaches and teammates that I cared and felt bad. đł
5ïžâŁ Either I would try to control something that was completely out of my control, or Iâd point blame. đ«”đ»
Umpires, the field, the coach, whatever I could.
I wonder how many different outcomes there would have been if I focused more on what I could control, myself and my response.
TL;DR
Iâve been there. Iâve struggled with a lot of the same things I coach on now. đ§
Thatâs why I wanted to become a coach, and I love this work, specifically Mental Performance.
These games, and even life, are much easier than we tend to make them.