What's up? Coach Dan Blewett here. In today's video.
Let's talk about how to get ready for baseball season.
All right, so revenue here.
I'm Dan Blewett.
I'm a former pro pitcher and a former baseball and softball academy owner.
I sold that to transfer full time into my writing,
my speaking and all my YouTube and online endeavors like this one.
But today's video, let's talk about how to get you ready for baseball season.
I helped lots and lots of players get ready over the years
and obviously for me as a high school and college and pro player,
I learned a lot over the years doing this.
And at the very end, stick around.
I'm going to give you
some overall guidelines and things you just need to think about because, yes,
you need to get a lot of reps and that's what we're going to talk about in part.
And from these different these different aspects is getting ready.
But also there's a lot of bigger picture of what
the really thoughtful high level player does to get ready for the season.
So stick around to the end.
We're going to talk more in-depth about all that stuff. All right.
So the first thing is getting your arm in shape.
And look,
there has been conclusive evidence that when, you know, players
don't get ready as soon in the off season or when there was like a strike
or there was a shortened off
season and baseball players that maybe went all the way,
the World Series and Major League Baseball, when they have less of an off
season injury rates rise in the spring, you see more injuries.
You know, COVID was not good for injuries.
All these sorts of things.
When players are rushed and they've a shorter window
with their arms and specifically we're talking about pitchers, more
injuries happen and lots and lots of high school players especially.
They have really painful hurting arms in March and April
because they really did not ramp up well in the off season.
Ideally, you're starting in October, going really slow
the first four weeks of October, you know, then the next four weeks in November.
And you're just building up, you're smoothing out your mechanics,
you're fixing lots of stuff
when you're working on slow speed and not stressing velocity.
And then as you start to move towards full speed,
you start to try to increase in velocity.
You get your arm going as fast as it can go.
Hopefully it's, you know, moving a little faster now.
Then you transition to bullpens in January and February and those increase
in intensity and duration and complexity leading up to March 1st.
That's how it's done.
Now, if you're watching this
on January 1st and you have two months and you're starting from scratch,
that's not a good place to be in.
And you really need to think hard about
how important baseball is to you for next year.
And when you start your prep, two months is not enough to make meaningful changes
to your mechanics and and, you know, improve your slider and your curveball
and your changeup and all that stuff and also get ready.
It just isn't so.
But if you have eight weeks, you need to start throwing now.
You need to start with 3 to 4 days a week of catch,
start spinning your offspeed stuff at a low speed and then you need to slowly
ramp up in both intensity and duration.
So whether that's, you know,
going from 5 minutes of cash to 10 minutes of catch to 15 minutes
of catch to 20 minutes of catch or by throw count and by distance.
So you need to be thoughtful about it.
Think about where you need to be on March 1st
and then where you are today, and backtrack the stepping stones
to say, okay, I'm going to increase a moderate amount of volume each week.
I'm an increase only a moderate amount of intensity each week.
I'm not just going to jump right into it.
If you jump right into it, you're going to end up
paying for it later, a month later,
when you've got severe tendinitis, you've got problems,
you maybe get severely injured because you didn't ramp up.
So be cautious.
Write this down, stick to plan and find a warm indoor space.
If you're in a cold War, the country where you can get those reps
consistently and safely so you can build up slowly.
All right. Number two, arm care.
Arm care needs to be a significant part of your ramp up for the season.
And this is going to help you become more durable, help your arm be more resilient,
because as that throwing load really spikes in March and April
when practices become five days a week, six days a week and games start coming,
your arm is going to be heavily taxed.
Even if you did ramp up, arm care gives you extra armor, extra resilience
to let your arm be more durable and handle those increased loads.
You absolutely have to start arm care if you haven't already.
Now that it's the turn of the new year number three hitters,
you need to a good off the tee consistently a you don't want to be
blister McGhee in March and April which happens to a lot of players
who don't swing about much in the off season,
then they're suddenly hitting every day and their hands are torn to shreds.
It's not a good place to be. And number one.
Number two, you need to see some speed.
So whether it's getting against live pitching indoors
or against a good pitching machine indoors,
you need to help your eyes adjust to velocity.
That's one of the hardest things and one of the last things to come.
Every pitcher like myself, you feel like a god in spring training
because you're 89 when your arms are not full speed either.
You're 89.
It blows past hitters who haven't seen velocity all winter
because it's not there's not a great way to replicate.
You have to have a really good pitching machine
or guys that can throw your speed pitching to you, which is pretty rare.
But you need to do everything you possibly can to either stand in.
You know, if you you obviously have to know someone who's a pitcher
who's getting ready for the season, Go ask if you can stand in, put some armor up
like get your Barry Bonds armed guard,
but stand in there and help your eyes adjust to velocity.
It's a really important part of you being a better hitter.
Not going to get into all the mechanics of hitting and all that other stuff.
You need to be doing that all winter.
If you really want to improve your mechanics,
just like with your pitching mechanics.
But when it's crunch time in those final two months,
see some velocity, see if you can see some breaking balls.
Again, this is going to require somebody throwing them to you.
You're going have to ask around and be creative about how do you can get those.
You know,
maybe your dad has a filthy hammer and he wants to throw it to you.
Great. Right.
Or you've got a nasty slider wants want to throw some? Great.
But most of us don't live in that world.
So you're going to have to again ask around, stand in on some bullpens.
Outfielders, it's really challenging for you to get better
at tracking fly balls if you live in a cold weather climate.
Obviously, there's no way for people to really, like replicate the shape
and size of fly balls for you to get better at tracking them.
Unless you get outdoors, you have to be look willing
to throw on a coat, throw in a hoodie and get out there.
If it's 35 degrees and ask somebody to hit you
mammoth fly balls, you can track them down.
That's the only really real good way to get reps.
Obviously, you're going to get those reps
from high school season starts or when your travel team starts up.
But in a perfect world, you're continuing to get better
tracking fly balls and reading ground balls
from the outfield, making those long throws all winter long.
And that's just going to be
you having to suck it up and go out in the cold and take fly ball.
So see if you can find someone who and you ask around,
get your outfitter buddies, say, Hey, I know it's cold, it's going to suck.
Let's go out there. Do will bring a boom box will make it fun.
We'll all take turns hitting you know missiles at each other.
It's a really important thing to do.
Again, it's hard if it's cold outside. I get it.
But it's necessary because an indoor gym will never replicate
fly balls that are going to actually make you better.
You've got to get those really mammoth fly balls head up into the clouds
for you to actually get better at tracking them.
Infielders, You've got to get as many reps as you can
and you also need to see speed.
So, yes, go find a rebound wall, throw a tennis ball off it to yourself,
get a buddy, throw each other ground balls across the gym floor as much as you can,
get someone to hit you.
A million ground balls,
you know, field them all different ways, throw every different arm angle, work
on that hard stuff in the off season so you're ready for spring,
but also get out in on a cold dirt field, especially if, again,
if you live in a warm climate, hooray, you've won the lottery.
If you live in a cold climate again, you got to suck it up.
Go out there, hit ground balls into that cold dirt and take as many as you can.
Don't throw them across the infield if you want, right?
Just act like, Hey, I'm about to throw it and put in the buckets.
You can save your arm, get 150 ground balls a day.
That's the stuff that really makes a player the next level.
That next caliber is taking as many ground balls as they can
and not just like quantity just for quality sake, but quality.
Read those ground balls, you know, really work hard, make it a game simulation.
It's not just going through the motions as, say you got 4000 ground balls.
It's really putting yourself in there and imagining that runner running,
you know, blocking it down the line.
And you're going to make that tough throw again.
Find the balance of making throws.
You will work on your throws, too,
but also not throwing so much because you can't throw 200 a day.
You're going to wear your arm out.
So just find a balance of,
Hey, I'm going to make 75 throws today after I play catch and warm up.
And then after that we're going to do another 50 ground balls.
But I'm not going to throw I'm going to toss them in the bucket, whatever it is.
But again, you got to be creative.
You got to ask around and get those ground balls in catchers.
You absolutely have to volunteer yourself to catch bullpens.
Go to the local baseball academy, call them up,
call the local men's league, call the college down the street.
You know, there's colleges everywhere.
Ask if you can catch bullpens.
It's a gritty, crappy job, right?
No one likes catching bullpens.
But if you're a catcher and you don't like catching bullpens,
the New Year question why you're being a catcher.
Like, why are you a catcher if you don't like your actual job
of catching the best way for you to get better at catching
the next level slider, the catching that higher speed pitcher.
You know, if you're a JV player,
are you going to be capable of catching a high school varsity player
who can throw 85?
Not unless you start actually doing it.
So text people, make friends.
Ask the star pitcher in your high school,
Hey, do you need someone to help catch bullpens?
I'm here to help.
Even if they don't know you, who's going to turn you down like, No, no, no.
I don't want a free catcher
who is going to basically be at my disposal so that I can get better.
You're helping each other. So you need to take that mindset.
Put yourself out there, ask around, ask anyone, can I catch your bullpens?
I'm willing to do it.
That's the number one quality that's going to make you a better catcher.
All the hard work of blocking the receiving drills, those are great,
but you've got to see actual pitching, actual spin, read the slider, block
the actual curveball in the dirt catchers go catch.
And lastly, let's talk about strength conditioning. This is super important.
Obviously, you've got to get your sprints in again
if you live in a cold climate, sprinting outside in January and February, it sucks.
It sucks a lot.
We know that your cleats are going to barely dig into the cold dirt.
But look, if you want to be in game shape on March 1st and really run a great 60
and really be ready to go
and you have your not
your legs not just destroyed by the first three weeks of practice,
you actually have to go out and run sprints,
run some toes, some throw some forties and some sixties.
Right. A 60 is home to third.
It's a long sprint if you want to run a better 60 time
and you're not running sixties and you're not running
sprints consistently, then your actions don't match your words.
You don't actually want to run a better 60.
You just want to dream about running a better 60.
Sprinters sprint runners run.
If you want to be a faster sprinter
and run a faster 60 time,
you've got to get your butt out there and run more sixties,
run more forties, run more hundreds, get out there and sprint.
It's not complicated. You can make your own workout.
Just go out there, Sprint, walk back when you feel like you're fully rested,
then sprint again.
It doesn't have to be complicated. You can easily Google this.
You can search on YouTube, you'll find sprint workouts.
It's not that hard,
but you have to mentally get in the place where, Hey, I want to get better.
I want to get faster.
That means I have to suck it up, put on a hoodie, go out when it's 32
degrees and run sprints, and then there's strength training again.
You can't just jump on strength training January 1st
and expect to get much out of it.
You don't make that much progress in two months, the four or five, six
month mark when that rolls around, when you've been consistent,
that's when the magic really starts to happen.
So if you haven't hit it hard and it's January 1st
and thinking about getting the gym, just understand that
you kind of missed the boat this year and you should try to do better next year.
If you're really serious
about baseball, January 1st and March 1st is not going to cut it.
I know you could be saying, Oh, why can't I keep going after March?
String train just changes when it hits in-season.
You're playing so much baseball and you're practicing so often that in-season
lifting is not going to help you get bigger and stronger.
It's going to be more like maintenance
and helping you not lose the strength that you built in the off season.
So it's it's incredibly important that you really spend a solid part
of the offseason building strength, getting bigger, getting stronger,
so then you can maintain it with workouts during the spring and the summer
and then hit it back but hit it hard again next winter.
That's sort of how the cycle goes.
If you're just trying to absolutely get gigantic in the spring season,
it's going to affect your baseball performance
in a very negative way and maybe get you injured.
So you have to be really cautious.
In season.
Training for baseball was one of the most complicated types of workouts there are.
If you need help with that.
I do have a strength program called Early Work.
You can try it for free.
You'll find the description below.
But look, strength training is a big part of the modern baseball players journey.
It's why players are so big and so fast and so strong and hit
bombs and throw so much harder than they used to.
Strength training is here to stay, so you have to really be consistent with it.
And if you're starting just now on January 1st, okay, do the best you can.
We just know that next year he needs to do better.
All right.
So if you made it here to the end and I hope that you have, but I know
most of you on YouTube don't because I watch my own analytics.
I know probably only 20% of you are still here.
Here's the thing that you really need to know.
Being a better baseball player from one year to the next takes a lot
of thought and a lot of introspection and a self audit,
which means you have to really be honest and say, Look,
I know this stings, but I'm going to ask someone for help
and ask them, give me a, you know, good evaluation of like how good my slider
actually is, Why I don't throw as hard as I maybe want to, why I'm so darn slow.
What do I actually need to be to be a starting third baseman?
Sort of a backup third baseman, whatever it is.
You need to actually really want to know the answers of how can I get better?
And to hear, how can I get better.
It takes you hearing
and really listening and understanding where are my weaknesses.
We all have weaknesses. Just embrace them.
When you get a new weakness, when someone tells you
you're just not very fast and it's
because your hamstrings are weak and you're not in the gym enough,
that is a gift that allows you to then
go and say, okay, I've got what I need now.
All I need is a plan to get better.
And there are all sorts of people.
There's videos,
there are people like me on the web who are helping you find those ways.
So you need to be really introspective about what you struggled with last season
and what your goals are and what types of training
and what types of little nuance things are going to make you better.
So if you're a hitter and you're not very going
in, you're not very good at going the opposite way,
that you're really good at pulling the ball
and you're really good at hitting fastballs,
but you struggle with offspeed stuff
and you struggle, struggle hitting to the opposite way.
Well, how is that going to shape your hitting plan for the off season?
It should be a lot of teamwork going APO and then there should be
a lot of batting practice thrown to you with a focus on going up
while still being able to pull the ball and occasionally bring it in to you.
And also you need to find a way to see more breaking balls
because you struggle with that, see more changeups, cause you struggle with that.
It goes back to asking around to find someone to throw to you.
So the best players, they don't just go through the motions.
They don't just sign up for their hitting lessons.
They want to sign up for their hitting groups and their pitching groups.
They take a really hard look at themselves and they say, okay, yes,
I've got all this work to do, but I really need to work on my slider.
I really got to work on my changeup.
I really need to get better at burying my curveball and I'm ahead in the count.
I need to get better at throwing my change for first pitch strikes.
And when I throw bullpens,
I'm going to really focus on mentally, you know, breaking up into hitters
and I'm going to throw that first pitch
changeup over and over and over and over and over
because I want to get better at that pitch.
That's what I did every offseason as I got older and smarter,
and that's what all the best players do.
It's not just showing up and getting my swings and getting my ground balls.
It's I'm working on this specific type of ground ball that I struggled
with last season or I'm working on blocking sliders
and I want to
I want to catch as many pitchers who throw me sliders as I can as a catcher
so that I can get better at blocking sliders
because I really struggle with that last year.
Or maybe my throwing as a catcher needs to get a lot better.
So you really have to sit down. It's hard.
Look in the mirror, ask people around you, your coaches, your instructors,
your parents, whoever can give you an honest evaluation and say, Well, what?
How can I get better? Lay it on me?
Because when I get that information now, I'm free to make the changes
that I need to make to be the player that I one day hope to be.
All right. Thanks for watching.
If you made it here to the end, good job and I'll see you here in the next video.