Orioles working to create a "Mental Skills Curriculum" as part of their player development

[scOtt]

13 hours ago, Luke-OH said:

Check out this job posting.

https://www.teamworkonline.com/baseball-jobs/orioles-jobs/baltimore-orioles-jobs/player-operations/sport-psychologist-counselor-1961053

"This position is a consortium experience between the Baltimore Orioles Minor league affiliate teams, the US Naval Academy and the University of Maryland. The primary role of this position is to develop and implement a mental skills curriculum for two Baltimore Orioles Minor League Baseball (MiLB) affiliate teams. In addition, clinical psychology and sport performance services will be provided for student-athletes and military academy members at the University of Maryland and US Naval Academy. Under the supervision of two licensed providers/Certified Mental Performance Coach, this position will be first point of contact for players and staff seeking assistance and/or information related to performance, mental health, and wellness."

 

Reports To: Assistant General Manger

 

Who would be Sig?

[Luke-OH]

4 hours ago, scOtt said:

Reports To: Assistant General Manger

 

Who would be Sig?

I feel like they may add another assistant GM this offseason, but as of now it can only mean Sig.

[Going Underground]

18 hours ago, Darkhawk said:

I'm curious if this position is more of a mental health professional to help young players cope and adapt to the rigors of a professional baseball season, as well as adjust to their first extended stay away from home, as opposed to developing baseball acumen.

However, I would be shocked if this hire was someone who did not believe in the growth mindset. Astroball made a big deal of the growth mindset, as opposed to fixed mindset, and I wonder if this hire will be helping to assess/develop players to that mentality. 

MLB has to have at least access to one. Nationals have one who they can talk to in the dugout.

 

But these days, mental coaches are the norm in baseball. The collective bargaining agreement negotiated between the league and the Major League Baseball Players’ Union requires all teams provide access to one. And more players are realizing what Adams recognized at the beginning of his first spring training with the Nationals.

 

“Time to go get right,” he would say, and the big, burly, tattooed man would lumber out of the room and into the dugout, where Mark Campbell, the team’s director of mental conditioning, awaited him. Then came a chat on the top of the bench, or a slow walk around the warning track, a private conversation as important to Adams’s day as the ones he had with hitting coach Kevin Long or working in the unfamiliar outfield with coach Bobby Henley.

 

Dave Martinez remembers that day in an office in Chicago, when he was Joe Maddon’s bench coach with the Cubs and having a bad day. He couldn’t stop staring at the floor, the safest place to look in times of hardship. Ceilings only serve as a reminder of the heights not yet reached.

 

 

Ken Ravizza, the Cubs’ longtime mental coach, dropped onto the floor to intercept Martinez’s gaze. He looked up at him, receiving reluctant eye contact from a man determined not to give it. At that point, Martinez had to talk. So he did.

"I really believed he's a big part of why I'm managing today,” Martinez said then. “He's helped me throughout many different obstacles, as a player, as a young player, as a coach. He's helped me understand players. He was an unbelievable person and a greater friend.”

Ravizza died during the 2018 season. Martinez found a permanent marker and wrote his initials on his cap in tribute. “Kenny,” as Martinez called him, was a pioneer in the mental coaching field along with Rick Ankiel’s confidant Harvey Dorfman and a few others.

 

Lester is one of several high-profile stars that make mental coaching a part of their routines. When the All-Star Game was at Nationals Park this summer, several all-stars on both sides lauded the effect mental coaching can have on their performance and work-life balance. Now-Houston Astros outfielder Michael Brantley said he utilized the Cleveland Indians’ mental coach regularly during his all-star season. Now-St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Paul Goldschmidt, who owns the eighth-highest OPS in baseball over the last three seasons, said he began using a mental coach regularly four years ago, too.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2018/12/26/baseball-mental-coaches-were-once-seen-weak-minded-now-theyre-essential/

 

 

[Br10n]

NFL QBs are doing “brain games”. The games are designed to improve quick decision skills.  It is supposed to help them make better and quicker decisions  when under pressure in the pocket.  Tom Brady and Kirk Cousins are big into these.   This goes well beyond the wonderlic   

 

 

[sportsfan8703]

https://wonderlictestsample.com/nfl-wonderlic-scores/

NFL wonderlic test results of famous players. 

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, sportsfan8703 said:

https://wonderlictestsample.com/nfl-wonderlic-scores/

NFL wonderlic test results of famous players. 

I took an "online version" once.  I'm assuming it was BS because it was very easy.

[sportsfan8703]

2 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

I took an "online version" once.  I'm assuming it was BS because it was very easy.

Man, idk. Did you see the “Hard Knocks” that followed the rams a few years back?  They were in a helicopter and asked Jared Goff which direction the sun set. He said the sky. 

Edited October 2, 2019 by sportsfan8703

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, sportsfan8703 said:

Man, idk. Did you see the “Hard Knocks” that followed the rams a few years back?  They were in a helicopter and asked Jared Goff which direction the sun set. He said the sky. 

When I was in Norfolk I had a young Seaman ask me if South Carolina was in the same time zone.

 

[waroriole]

Hahahaha. I can’t believe you can say that on tv.......Norfolk

[Ohfan67]

2 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

When I was in Norfolk I had a young Seaman ask me if South Carolina was in the same time zone.

 

Holy crap. That went right past funny to depressing and scary. 

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, Ohfan67 said:

Holy crap. That went right past funny to depressing and scary. 

She was very fond of Marines.

[Obando]

On 10/1/2019 at 5:30 AM, Luke-OH said:

I feel like they may add another assistant GM this offseason, but as of now it can only mean Sig.

I was thinking the same thing, mainly because when Sig was hired, the title he was given was Assistant GM - Analytics.  If it was simply Assistant GM, with no specific designation, I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but it’s the emphasis on analytics that tells me Elias likely plans to hire an additional Assistant GM to oversee scouting &/or player development.  Since Matt Blood has already been hired as Player Development Director, that makes hiring someone above  him a little less likely, however.  On the other hand, there currently isn’t a true scouting director in place, with Brad Ciolek given the title of Domestic Scouting Supervisor.  If Ciolek was truly a scouting director, his title would likely include “Director” in it.  That tells me that Elias likely has designs on hiring either an Assistant GM in charge of scouting (as Sig is to Analytics), or an actual scouting director.  Names to keep an eye on for an Assistant GM-Scouting job are Jaron Madison, current director of PD with the Cubs (worked with Elias in St. Louis) and Kris Gross, current scouting director with the Astros (worked with Elias in both St. Louis & Houston), but that’s obviously pure speculation on my part.

[MDtransplant757]

7 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

When I was in Norfolk I had a young Seaman ask me if South Carolina was in the same time zone.

 

Sounds about right. 

[TAMC]

16 hours ago, Ohfan67 said:

Holy crap. That went right past funny to depressing and scary. 

When the Olympics were in Atlanta, a ticket buyer from New Mexico was directed to foreign sales.

[7Mo]

Russell Wilson is using a mental conditioning coach.

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/27754778/mental-conditioning-driving-force-russell-wilson-success