Periodically, and hopefully as much as once a week, there will be some useful information to pass onto to you and your baseball throwing child.

December 2008

This month’s newsletter comes from 36,000 foot elevation on my way back to Los Angeles from Houston, TX. My bi-annual trip to the best pitching coach convention I have been to at Ron Wolforth’s Texas Baseball Ranch is more than a business trip and learning environment for pitching coaches across the nation. It is a tremendous time and opportunity to share new information, training techniques and cutting edge protocols that I get to share and utilize with my students and clients. However, the best part is being to share stories of the successes that your children have encountered over the past year with the type of training we have utilized to help improve their performances.

And believe it or not, as one of only a handful of coaches from California, those around the country want to hear me tell those stories because they have a tremendous amount of respect for our state that continually produces great ballplayers. The people in Texas and Florida want to know what is going on in California and as this is my 5th year attending this coaching clinic they figure if I keep coming back then we all must be doing something right out here to keep me showing up year after year. This is a testament to the tremendous job your children are doing in their games and practices!!

There are a few quick items that I won’t go into much detail about because you can do your own research on it but here are several items:

• The success of our first annual Elite Pitcher’s Bootcamp in November was a big topic of discussion among a dozen coaches. They heard that it was a first class clinic and that our speakers were thrilled with the results. You can see some of the pictures of the event and the number of participants. As a result, Ron Wolforth and Brent Strom will absolutely be there for next year’s clinic. If you were not able to attend last month, it would be an understatement to say that you missed out on something special and that it would be of great benefit to be part of it next year around the beginning of November.
• There was a speaker at the clinic... Joe Fletcher... out of Michigan who blew the coaches out of the water with the nutritional side of what pitching and working out does to the body and for ways to help with recovery after a game/workout. Also, what to fuel the body with before and after a game. His topic included a nutrition guide to helping baseball pitchers with by simply changing a few dietary foods that can actually help gain velocity on your son’s fastball... let’s put it this way, one of the WORST things you can do for your child during a game is going to get them a Gatorade to drink in the dugout... horrible, horrible, horrible. For more information, go to www.extremepitching.com. It will be an immediate change for my own son.
• I am going to recommend a video on You Tube that was shared with me and it was so inspirational that I want everyone to see it. It has to do with being able to accomplish a goal and never quitting. Please share it with your children…. The link is www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSM1mvMypWU. It is worth the 7 minutes!
• Lastly, whether we want to believe or accept it, baseball / athletic training is a year-round process that has so many benefits that get lost in wanting our kids to just be kids and living ‘normal’ lives. Our Generation X kids are living their lives so much differently than we and our parents and their parents lived our lives. Our children are becoming great at X-Box, Wii, text messaging, high-definition television, computers…..do I need to go on……and not so great at playing outside in front of the house with the neighbor kids, riding their bikes to the ball field to play a game of football or baseball, or hide-n-seek (you remember all the games we played……let us all curse the game of Pong that started all of this technology!!)

Training your kids is one of the many ways that are out there in our community where I can help them become more athletic and strong in the sport of baseball.

Because baseball season is right around the corner it is important during the holiday and vacation season that they begin to get athletic, strong and durable so they don’t breakdown during the baseball season.

It is amazing to hear coaches talk about how hard their athlete trained during the fall time, then go back to school after vacations without any conditioning going on and hurt themselves in the first week of practice……..all because they did nothing for 4 weeks and expected that since they worked so hard prior to vacation that they would be fine when they came back……..wrong decision on the athlete’s part and wrong decision on the parent’s part for not encouraging them to go the gym…..make time to hit or throw…..go jogging around the neighborhood!!

These are just some of my thoughts and hopefully something you can have some insight into what I think about flying over New Mexico.

The information is out there for you... hopefully through your own research you can make decisions that are best for you and your baseball playing son.

I wish each and every one of you a very Merry Christmas and holiday season and great wishes for a wonderful New Years. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Until next time,

Jim

p.s. lessons are filling up fast and few spots are available for baseball season. Contact me sooner than later and make life easier for both of us in scheduling a time that works for you!