Process vs. Results

I overheard an 11 year old talking with one of our instructors the other day. He was disappointed in himself because he ONLY went 2 for 5 hitting in his last game.

"2 for 5?" the former college star yelled laughing. "I'd take 2 for 5 every day -- that's batting .400!" The kid shook his head. When asked what he would consider a good day at the plate, the player replied, "4 for 5."

There's nothing wrong with pushing yourself and working hard to be the best you can be. But all great athletes understand one thing. Results can vary based on many things, some within their control, some outside of it. And so the key is to concentrate on process, instead of results.

Did I swing at good pitches? Did I barrel up the ball and hit it hard? A hard line drive off the bat that ends up as an out is a positive if you're focused on process. If you're worried about results it's a negative.

After giving up 3 runs in the first inning of his May 9 start against the Pirates, Cubs pitcher Kyle Hendricks said, "Definitely frustrating, but you have to somehow not look at the results like that. I have to be immersed in the process right now, just focus on each pitch I’m making, making sure I’m making a good pitch and go from there. My focus was good today, attacking, pitching to contact. Just hopefully it will go my way next time.’’

On the other hand, kids are impatient and are most often results-oriented. Did their team win? How many hits did I get? How many batters did I strike out? But it doesn't help them when a parent reinforces a results focus. Instead, help your young ballplayer by talking to him or her about process. "You swung the bat well." "You hit a couple of balls hard." You've been working on laying off high pitches and you did a much better job of that today." "You threw a lot of strikes while you were pitching."

I'm not suggesting finding positives where there are none. Kids today are too smart for that. But whenever possible, be the voice of process instead of results. It's tougher to talk about process when your son or daughter had great results in a particular game. Yet, if you go with results only when there are good things to talk about, they'll soon see right through you.

Baseball and softball are games with a lot of failure built in. Failure is the greatest teacher there is, but if young players get down on themselves too much, their road to success will be that much more difficult and they run the risk of losing the joy of playing.

Teach them to work hard and that by "immersing themselves in the process" (Kyle Hendricks' words) the results will take care of themselves.