What's up baseball players coaches parents in this video I'm going to cover
our analytics important for young baseball players so analytics can mean
it's it's kind of a big catch-all term right it can mean advanced statistics it
can mean some of these swing trackers we kind of lump it in and it's not really
we shouldn't really lump it with all this stuff but for today's video we're
going to talk about things that sort of fall into that whole umbrella like again
swing trackers like diamond kinetics pitch spin rate trackers like rhapsode
Oh advanced statistics things that game-changer can can track at the youth
level stuff like that words and the major leagues they have all these crazy
stats they have Trackman data they soon have the Hawkeye system they have lots
and lots of interesting statistics so the whole catch-all of analytics were in
a cover is that important for youth baseball players hitters pitchers
infielders all so stick around I think you'll enjoy this video
so let's go over the good things first and then we'll cover some of the things
that I think are negative or just are kind of a waste of time and aren't
probably worth paying for and really spending that much time one so number
one for the analytics and all that stuff the high-tech stuff if it builds
excitement and it get your kid excited about training and if you're a player
I'm talking to you and it makes you more apt to throw a bullpen and you want to
check your numbers with your velocity and your spin rates and and track your
swing and your launch hang on you're attacking all that stuff that's fine if
it's motivating you and it's a positive motivation great on the other side of
that is you can't be constantly expected to trend upward nothing is is completely
linear in baseball like you're not going to gain 1/10 of a mile per hour as a
pitcher every day forever right your velocity is going to fluctuate a lot
until it starts to normalize when you're older in the weight room you're not
going to consistently add weight to the bar every week if you did you'd be like
the strongest human of all kind after like a year of lifting right so even
really small amounts of gains for strength training for your exit velocity
as a hitter or your pitching velocity as a pitcher they're gonna still undulate
they're still gonna go up and they're gonna go down but hopefully trend in the
right direction over time so you can use this to track but you cannot become
obsessed with it you cannot let your self-esteem get hooked to it where if
you didn't exceed last week's numbers you're in despair you're feeling sad
you're feeling depressed and now you know it's this constant emotional
rollercoaster so do not let that happen but if it does motivate you and build
excitement great here's the other thing so number two don't pay for this stuff
under the pretense that it's necessary it's not necessary think of the
Dominican Republic players some of the best in the world why are they so good
it's not because they have tons of high-tech equipment they have barely
have shoes on their feet I went down there and I coached at an American team
we played against the academies they were sharing one batting helmet they
were hitting with aluminum bats that had no paint on them because they've been
hit so many times you hear about American kids complaining that their
bats dead therefore another bat is dead after two months right as I many pop
anymore those kids don't care about that they
just want to go out there and hit and play and they play really really well
and they keep getting better so all this stuff can be a help right if it helps
you visualize and understand yourself as a pitcher as a hitter great but it's not
necessary so do not buy into the coaches says yeah you got to do this if you want
to keep up with everyone else you know this is really important like that's
what all the best players are doing it's BS it can be a good tool it can be a
help to you but it absolutely is not necessary especially an amateur baseball
this stuff is much more necessary when you're a pro I mean you talk about like
Justin Verlander or something he did they made a little tweak the Astros with
his the way he gripped his four seamer and they got an extra boost and spin
rate which had a meaningful effect on his swing and miss rate those are little
tweaks that can help a world-class pitcher get a little bit better a little
bit better but still a meaningful amount better right where's the youth players
they have so much to gain I personally don't care what the rhapsode owe reading
out is of a sixteen-year-old slider like I can play catch with him as a coach and
I can tell him which of the ten sliders he threw me were better and I can
reinforce his arm position and mechanics and help him understand which one was
better without having to go to the readout and say okay that was 1632 rpms
your best today was 1664 rpms it's not really that relevant at young ages it's
still interesting information and it can be useful but it's not necessary
information it just depends how you're training how hard you're working and
just remember some of the best players in the world especially at young ages I
mean you see Dominican players who were 10 11 years old they're incredible it's
because they're constantly working they're constantly taking ground balls
they've just taken more swings more ground balls more fly balls they're in
better condition they're they've just out practiced any American kid for
almost any age that's what matters most lastly I just want you to think about
what's good for you long term as far as like can finding your path in baseball
so whether you're a hitter or whether you're a pitcher whether you're a
catcher the high-tech stuff can be useful like we've covered
a bunch you know learning the different stats I think are helpful one example is
first pitch strikes that doesn't seem like a very advanced stat but for a lot
of players it kind of is like can you use game-changer to break down what your
regular strike percentage thrown as a pitcher is to say it's 70% but then
maybe your first pitch strike percentage is 62% that tells us that there's a
mismatch because your strike percentage should be essentially the same over all
counts plus or minus little fluctuations right and so if there's a big disparity
so little Johnny throws 62% of first pitch strikes but he usually throws 70%
strikes as a whole that's something that as a coach you can say okay hey is there
a mindset thing are you a little bit nervous to just get ahead in the count
earlier you're trying to be too fine are you afraid they're gonna ambush you and
beat you on the first pitch like what can we do about that I think using stats
at a young age is good to make important judgments about players mindsets
situations they excel in situations that they don't excel in and ways that we can
find to help them get better so I think beyond using just swing trackers and
just and spin rate data measurement tools like rhapsode au which are really
cool and they're really interesting and useful tools I think also using some of
the advanced statistics going through your game changer and just are ting to
learn about them can also be helpful but again it's still not the end all be all
the the end-all be-all for youth baseball is having fun developing a good
work ethic developing the mindset that helps you deal with the incredible ups
and downs and slumps of baseball which is the biggest thing that's gonna weed
players out and then also really learning what it takes to to grind and I
don't like overusing that word but just to grind through a season it
consistently be good you don't have to be great you don't have to be amazing
you just need to be consistently good and that is being a good teammate that's
working hard that's it's hustling every inning it's being mentally in every
at-bat whether you're a pitcher or a hitter or catcher or an infielder and
outfielder it's all of those things being physically prepared being locked
in in the dugout focusing on the game those are the things that really really
matter in youth baseball and the analytics and the swing trackers and the
pitch trackers and the interesting and unique stats they're just like icing on
the cake so as a parent I wouldn't spend much
extra money on that stuff if the place you take your kid offers it wonderful
use it as a tool listen when they explain it to you
you take it with a grain of salt and also just learn about the way gait the
game is changing because having some knowledge of all these new tools and
then analytics and the stats is important it's where the games going so
you don't want to be naive to it but at the same time remember that if anyone's
trying to say this is the new way think of the of the kids from developing
nations like the Dominican like Venezuela like Aruba there's some
amazing players coming up from those countries as they have been for years
and decades or decades now decades or years for a long time players have been
coming from those nations where they don't have the wealth and they don't
have the high tech but they're still passionate about baseball and they're
developing so again I just want to impress the biggest message here which
is that it's not necessary but it is useful to learn to listen and to use the
stuff if you want to but don't break your bank with it don't bank your career
on it and don't overuse it and don't let measurement become this negative thing
where again if you're constantly tracking you're gonna see your numbers
go down before they always go up they're always gonna go up and down and that can
be a big pit of despair for players when you're constantly videoing them tracking
them and trying to see progress every day which is unrealistic over time
alright thanks for listening I hope you enjoyed this video and the others on my
channel if you're new here I have a pitching book I have another book about
my career it's a memoir which is an amazing read for any of you who want to
know what your kid's gonna go through in the long term and baseball I have online
courses for pitching I have a mental skills course called the resolute
athlete so if you're interested in learning more about what I do and what
you can learn off the field check out the description below and I'll see you
in the next video