By Jill Wolforth-
I’m days away from another birthday and I don’t know if it’s age that’s got me reflecting back or the fact that a new year is around the corner, but there’s something that’s been on my mind the past few weeks and thus the subject of this week’s blog article.
With the advancement in technology over the past couple years, we now have immediate access to media and people. As a result, there’s been a unique mentality evolve where people feel the need to come across as “the smartest guy in the room”. It absolutely amazes me to what extent people will go in order to be that guy. If it wasn’t so arrogant, it would be comical.
Here are the types of things I see and I’m sure you do as well. For starters, there’s the group that use technical or scientific words and phrases to describe something when it’s just not necessary. There are indeed times, occasionally, when things need to be a little technical but what drives me crazy is the online banter, typically on twitter, that has a group of people each trying to “one up” the others in the group to make sure everyone else who sees the thread (the outsiders) will think he is the smartest.
Then there’s the common practice of berating others so it appears the person doing the bad mouthing is smarter. It’s the “I’ll look good by making you look bad”. It truly reminds me of the actions of many junior high girls.
Then there are those who take a really good concept, first shared by someone else, and put it out into the public domain with no credit to origination. Why? Simple, it’s a really good idea and someone else can’t look smart, at least not smarter than me. And since it is a good idea, I’ve once again proven just how smart I am. Sheesh!
These are blatant things. However, what really bothers me in this whole scenario is the true incompetence of these “smart” people when it comes to knowing the history and evolution of pitcher training. Ask most of them to tell you about people like Bob Shaw, Jim Dixon, Bragg Stockton, Bill Thurston, Mike Marshall or Dick Mills and you’d be lucky if they knew one, let alone two or more.
I think most reasonable people would agree that no one has all the answers. At the Ranch we certainly don’t. We just continue to work to be better today than we were yesterday with a belief that all of us is better than any one of us.
This quote summarizes my thoughts perfectly:
“Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something.”
Here’s to hoping 2019 provides more wisdom. Happy New Year!
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ATTENTION Pitchers – If you haven’t been to the Ranch before, there is one more opportunity remaining to participate in an Elite Pitchers Bootcamp before the start of the 2019 season and it’s the last one until June. The date is Jan. 19-21 (Martin Luther King Holiday). This is the perfect way to get a jump start on the 2019 season and your competition! The camp is almost full. Don’t wait and miss out. To learn more or register go to: https://www.texasbaseballranch.com/events/epbc/
ATTENTION Ranch Alumni – If you haven’t made your plans to join us for our January Alumni Camp, now would be the time to do that. Our Alumni events are limited to half the number of players in the regular camps so that we can dive deeper into many of the concepts and add some next level training to help you take your performance up another notch. The dates are January 12 & 13th and you can learn more or register at: https://www.texasbaseballranch.com/events/alumni-pitchers-bootcamp/.
