the variability of the timing in different phases of a baseball swing, a characteristic of novice batting performance. This has also been shown in golf, as pressure can cause golfers to revert to a novice control strategy for adjusting the stroke for different putts of varying distances ( Gray, Allsop
Search Results
Ironic and Reinvestment Effects in Baseball Pitching: How Information About an Opponent Can Influence Performance Under Pressure
Rob Gray, Anders Orn, and Tim Woodman
SportPsych Consultation Issues in Professional Baseball
Kenneth Ravizza
This article discusses the development of mental skills training for professional baseball players and coaches. The basic educational model involves providing information, skills practice, and support for the athlete who wants to improve his mental game. The basic philosophy employed is an experiential process that facilitates the athlete’s understanding of mental skills training. Over time, skills are refined and adapted to meet the athlete’s unique needs. The practicing sportpsych consultant must follow a number of operating standards to ensure the trust and respect of both players and management. The most difficult step is getting the commitment from a professional team. This article discusses an approach to making contact, guidelines followed for developing a mental training program for a professional baseball team, and some technical aspects to consider in developing a mental training program. It focuses on the range of services provided to players and coaches in group formats and on an individual basis, both at the major league and minor league levels. Finally, there is a discussion of problems inherent in working with players, coaches, and management and how to cope with them.
Patterns of Specialization in Professional Baseball Players
Richard D. Ginsburg, Steven R. Smith, Nicole Danforth, T. Atilla Ceranoglu, Stephen A. Durant, Hayley Kamin, Rebecca Babcock, Lucy Robin, and Bruce Masek
Two developmental pathways to sport excellence have been described: early specialization and early sampling (Côté, Lidor, & Hackfort, 2009). Despite a common assumption that early specialization (defined as playing one sport exclusively and intensely before age 12) is a necessary precursor to success at the collegiate or professional levels, research to support this assumption remains unclear. To add to this literature, the current study was a survey of 708 minor league professional baseball players on the ages at which they began to specialize in their sport. Results indicated that most players sampled a diversity of sports up through late adolescence. Only 25% of players specialized before the age of 12 and the mean age of specialization was 15 years. Furthermore, those who specialized later were more likely to receive college scholarships. Finally, we examined patterns of specialization as a function of athletes’ home climate and culture. At least in this sample of professional minor league baseball players, an early sampling pathway seems to have fortified success at both the collegiate and professional levels.
A Moid of Performance Measures in Baseball
Kerry S. Courneya and Packianatian Cheiadurai
The study was concerned with empirically confirming the proposed classification of the performance measures in baseball into tertiary, secondary, and primary measures based on their proximity to skill execution and task performance and with the extent to which these measures were contaminated by external factors. The data consisted of various performance measures derived from the box scores of games played by 10 teams from the National Collegiate Athletic Association during the 1988 season (N=381 games). For confirmatory purposes» the total sample was subdivided into home and away samples (N=762 observations). The results of correlational and regression analyses supported the proposition that the secondary measures would be more closely related to the tertiary measures than would the primary measures. Further» ran differential was the superior tertiary measure relative to win/loss and ratio of final score in reflecting skill execution and task performance. Practical applications of the model and directions for future research are then discussed.
Major League Baseball Managers: Do They Matter?
Dennis Smart, Jason Winfree, and Richard Wolfe
Smart and Wolfe (2003) assessed the concurrent contribution of leadership and human resources to Major League Baseball (MLB) team performance. They found that player resources (defense/pitching and offence/batting) explained 67% of the variance in winning percentage, whereas leadership explained very little (slightly more than 1%) of the variance. In discussing the minimal contribution of leadership to their results, the authors suggested that future studies expand their operationalization of leadership. That is what is done in this study. Finding that the expanded operationalization has limited effect in explaining the contribution of leadership, we take an alternative tack in attempting to understand leadership in MLB. In addition, we estimate a production frontier (based on offensive and defensive resources), determine the efficiency of MLB managers relative to that frontier, and investigate the extent to which manager efficiency can be explained by manager characteristics. Finally, manager characteristics are related to manager compensation.
Using an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Approach to Overcome Distractive Overthinking With a High School Baseball Player
Samuel Wood and Martin J. Turner
-old development-level (high school varsity team) competitive baseball player. The first author adopted a client-led approach to develop the athlete’s self-awareness and “navigate” through challenging experiences and situations. The first author assumed an interpretivist and constructivist approach to the
Radioulnar Range of Motion Normative Values for Elite Baseball Players
Kevin Laudner, Robert Lynall, Jeffrey Williams, Regan Wong, Takashi Onuki, and Keith Meister
Context:
Numerous studies have documented reduced glenohumeral joint range of motion (ROM) of the dominant extremity among baseball players, which may be caused by throwing-related factors that also affect the radioulnar joint.
Objective:
To measure pronation and supination ROM in competitive baseball pitchers and position players.
Participants:
Asymptomatic professional and collegiate baseball pitchers (N = 59) and position players (N = 43).
Outcome Measures:
Bilateral radioulnar pronation and supination ROM.
Results:
Pitchers demonstrated significantly less pronation and total ROM in the throwing arm than the nondominant arm. The position players demonstrated significantly less total ROM in the throwing arm than the nondominant arm.
Conclusions:
The reported normative values may provide useful standards for interpretation of radioulnar ROM measured in both asymptomatic and symptomatic baseball players.
Three-Dimensional Analysis of Scapular Kinematics During Arm Elevation in Baseball Players With Scapular Dyskinesis: Comparison of Dominant and Nondominant Arms
Jin-Young Park, Junhyun Kim, Beom Ho Seo, Ho Dong Yu, Ju Hyun Sim, Jae Hyung Lee, Kyung Soo Oh, and Seok Won Chung
Throwing-related shoulder and elbow pains are well-recognized phenomena in approximately 70% of the competitive overhead athletes 1 – 9 and may result in dysfunction. The shoulder and elbow are easy to injure in overhead athletes such as baseball players because repetitive throwing activities and
Salary Discrimination in Major League Baseball: The Effect of Race
Kevin J. Christiano
Using data on the salaries of 212 nonpitchers appearing in team lineups on major league baseball’s 1977 Opening Day, this article explores how rewards to veteran professionals are influenced by race. Multiple regression analyses and separate comparisons of regression coefficients for returns to performances by blacks and by whites reveal a single indication of salary discrimination against blacks. White infielders are apparently paid more for each home run they hit than are their black counterparts.
Variable Ticket Pricing in Major League Baseball
Daniel A. Rascher, Chad D. McEvoy, Mark S. Nagel, and Matthew T. Brown
Sport teams historically have been reluctant to change ticket prices during the season. Recently, however, numerous sport organizations have implemented variable ticket pricing in an effort to maximize revenues. In Major League Baseball variable pricing results in ticket price increases or decreases depending on factors such as quality of the opponent, day of the week, month of the year, and for special events such as opening day, Memorial Day, and Independence Day. Using censored regression and elasticity analysis, this article demonstrates that variable pricing would have yielded approximately $590,000 per year in additional ticket revenue for each major league team in 1996, ceteris paribus. Accounting for capacity constraints, this amounts to only about a 2.8% increase above what occurs when prices are not varied. For the 1996 season, the largest revenue gain would have been the Cleveland Indians, who would have generated an extra $1.4 million in revenue. The largest percentage revenue gain would have been the San Francisco Giants. The Giants would have seen an estimated 6.7% increase in revenue had they used optimal variable pricing.
