It Is Not About How Good You Are, It Is About How Good You Are Going To Be: Baseball Journey by: Chico Lizarraga

I always had passion for the game of baseball, but I am going to be honest it never really hit me until about the end of my freshman year in college.  I had a tremendous support system, with parents who would go out of their way to help my brother and me succeed.  I can remember my dad hitting us thousands of ground balls and pop flies until the sun went down.  I can remember my mom gearing up in catcher's gear and catching us while we pitched (not too many moms do this, plus we threw hard).  I can remember traveling and playing against talented youth baseball teams with friends who I won't ever forget. 

Again, baseball was just something we did growing up.  It became a way of life and an obsession entering my sophomore year of college.  I was putting in extra work after practice, lifting weights, and doing all the right things, so I thought.  I saw results here and there, but not how I would have liked.  My junior year of college approached, and I had a down year.  My best asset of being able to catch, block, and throw declined and my ability to hit went backwards.

I had to reevaluate what I was doing and be honest with myself.  I was not that good.  I am the only one that could answer this question every day I got up and looked in the mirror, "Did you put in the work to chase what you could be?" My final year of playing baseball had arrived, my senior year.  I understood that I must be willing to fail, to be uncomfortable, to grow, to learn, and to be my own best coach.  I did exactly that.

My obsession to my craft did not have an excuse.  It did not give a shit if I didn't feel like it.  My will power and discipline had already formed my habits.  Consistency and owning my routine ruled my life.  People say that if you want to change your life, look for something you do in your daily routine, this is true.  I would have three to four different workouts throughout the day.  I would lift weights early in the day and pay out of pocket to have a trainer.  I would follow my Driveline program and hit before practice, then I would have a team practice.  Some days we would even bring in an outside source for Strength & Conditioning- I would then do this after practice, and then I would spend another hour or two hitting on my own.  I still felt like I wasn't doing enough.  Practice time was usually my easiest "practice" of the day and usually I felt like I was getting worse during this time, I am being serious, because I was so invested into what I was doing.

People, who aren't obsessed, won't get it and that is okay you don't need to.  I would lie on the floor of this dirty warehouse, taking notes, learning, watching video over and over again.  Studying the best hitters in the world, understanding that my swing was nowhere close to what they were doing.  I was not that good.  I lived in the batting cage, repeating my mechanics over and over again.  I would do this until I couldn't get it wrong.  I would strive to master it, and then I would make it more challenging by adding variability.  I hit more balls off a tee and picked up more buckets of balls than anyone who will ever step foot inside Mount Mercy University again.  This was all to be just an average baseball player by the way.

Everybody in the baseball community thinks that the baseball side is the essential part of performing.  I would highly disagree, along with striving to improve my swing, I transformed my body.  I began to eat the right things, sleep better, remove people who did not help me get to where I wanted to go, and used the power of boredom to my advantage.  As much time as I put working on my baseball skills, I put just as much, if not more time into increasing my athletic ability.  I knew I had to get stronger, move better, and move faster if I wanted to become the player I wanted to be.  I fell in love with strength and conditioning.   I wrote shit down, I watched videos, I studied, and I prepared. The power of boredom allowed me to research the good from the bad and to use the content I had learned to help increase my mental and physical states.  There is nothing in life that gives you more confidence than knowing that you put in the work.  Put in the work, even when no one was watching.

The Swing

My whole life I had been taught the verbal cues of "Swing Down," "Knob to the ball," "Stay short," and all of these can be good cues to some kids.  I was a small, scrawny kid that was taught to hit the ball the other way preferably on the ground or on a line.  Throughout my youth career I was a sub-par hitter, in high school I was a sub-par hitter, and most of college I was a sub-par hitter.

In 2012-13, I had a coach by the name of Desi Druschel.  I remember taking a round of BP and I had peppered the L screen on a line five times in a row.  After the round, he came up to me and discussed what I felt and what he saw.  I was ecstatic because I was a young buck amongst these grown men and I thought I put on a good round.  Coach Druschel said to me, "Chico, there is so much more in there.  You can be a doubles and home run hitter.  There is a lot more in there."

At the time I thought and the majority of my team members thought- "What?" "We are trying to hit home runs?" I had always grown up thinking that putting the ball in play, hitting low line drives, and not trying to do too much was the answer.  This was baffling to me; a coach telling me essentially to swing harder.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Coach Druschel, he was ahead of the game in many aspects.  I worked on things he thought I should work on, but my intent wasn't fully there.  I had seen some success my sophomore year at the plate because of this.  Coach Druschel had moved on and my junior year of college rolled around.  The results were not there. Going into that summer before my senior year, something ticked inside.

I finally became honest with myself and understood that if I wanted to take the next steps as player, I had to change.  My thought process that summer, fall, and winter going into my final senior spring season was that no one was going to be more prepared than I was.  I craved the result so intensely that the work became irrelevant. Leadership to me has always been about leading myself and by doing so others will follow.  That had always been my definition, and as the years have progressed I would say it has changed to creating more leaders rather than forging more followers.

I had a notebook I carried with me.  Within this notebook I had practice plans, my daily hitting routines, strength work, pulldown numbers, and tons of notes from guys I thought I could learn from.  I wrote down successful cues-"self-talk"- that would work for me in game (I still use them to this day).  Video was huge for me, I was my own coach.  I learned from guys on twitter who posted videos.  Coach Druschel still acted as a mentor to me as he would help out by videoing my swing and compare it side by side with other big leaguers.  We would discuss ideas for drills and what we thought I needed to improve on.

I learned from the best just like every other hitting coach: Bonds, Pujols, Miggy, Trout, etc.  I don't know if Coach Druschel meant to do this on purpose or if he had just enjoyed watching his swing like most people.  He would always show me video of Josh Donaldson.  I fell in love with the leg kick, the way his body flowed, the exaggerated barrel tip at the time and shoulder load.  The best thing I could've done for my career was to try to mimic the movement patterns of the professionals.

Yes, I know, you hear hitting coaches all over talk about how you should not try to swing like the pros. "Oh, but this kid doesn't have the same capabilities, he doesn't have the bat speed, or he is too small."  You know what I think? It is bullshit.  Why put a limit on yourself?  Why not strive to swing like the best in the world?  There is a ton of value in being able to develop movement patterns of that of the greats.  At the same time, I do understand that there are physical limitations that we must access and work through.

My focus became three things: my load, my barrel path, and the pitches I swung at.  At the time we didn't really use weighted bats (I learned about them more the following year when Pete Lauritson was at the U of I), we didn't have any technology, and we didn't use radar guns during our hitting.  With this I had to make the most with what I did have.  Time, energy, and effort.  I saw Baseball PDS swinging pipes on twitter and it was something I tried to copy.  I knew that if I had a "deep whoosh" I was doing something right.  My intent also changed by trying to swing as fast as I possibly could each swing and hit the ball as far as I possibly could.

My load became a leg kick, this definitely helped change my mindset as a hitter and freed up my body to move more athletically.  At the time I didn't really understand the hip coil, but the leg kick helped me naturally do this.  The purpose of my load was to help sync my body and to read the pitch.  My upper half I thought about "getting a running start with my hands" and loading into my shoulder (much like Donaldson).

In the past, I was "stiff" almost too stiff; I was tight, bunched up like a pretzel.  This loading process helped me to unlock my body and remove slack, enabling me to move better and quicker.  The pipe was huge for me, I got feedback from the noise created and I knew I had to get my barrel in the zone longer.  In the past, I had little margin for error because my barrel was in and out of the zone so quick.  My focus of getting on plane with the pitch for as long as possible helped dramatically.  Lastly, I hunted fastballs in the zone that I could drive.  Curveballs/sliders, yeah that is a good pitch.  But I knew my strengths; I would get a fastball and not miss it.  Pitch recognition and swinging at pitches in the zone more often is something I wish I had more time to work on.

Throughout my first three seasons as a collegiate catcher I was a career .260 avg. hitter.  My senior season I hit .330 avg. with 20+ extra base hits.  I played in 146 games during my career and threw out 63 base runners (thank you Driveline for helping me).  I had always been a pretty good defensive catcher but what I had accomplished offensively and what I had taught myself and learned about myself along the way, no one can ever take that away from me.

Fail often, fail more, fail better

If you are unwilling to fail, you are unwilling to succeed.  You must be comfortable being uncomfortable.  Part of this obsession and irrational thinking I had, it encouraged me to not be afraid to stand alone, I didn't want to blend in. Failure was a major part of the growing curve for me and I encourage you to get uncomfortable.

What would've happened in my playing career if I didn't risk adding a leg kick or changing my mindset to do damage?  I probably would've stayed the same and I probably wouldn't be coaching.  You don't know, unless you are willing to try new things.  To this day I try something new in the weight room every week, in order to challenge myself and in order for growth to occur.

Do not fear failure but rather fear not trying.  I can remember countless days; I am sitting in the cage alone, wondering to myself "What the hell am I doing?" Many days I didn't see any progress or I would go backwards, but I stuck with the process.  I would continue to beat on the craft relentlessly.  There was a series in Marion, IL about 1/3 of the way into my senior season.  It was a four game series against two different opponents, I think that weekend I struck out 10 times. Some of the coaches became weary of what I was doing at the plate.  I didn't, I took it as a learning experience, all I could do was learn from it.

The following week during practice, I hit so many balls off the machine; I had blisters playing in the upcoming weekend series.  All you have control over is how you will respond.  The only way for progress to occur and for us to move forward is by failing and learning from these experiences.  "Every strike out, brought me closer to my next home run."  I didn't succeed on purpose because of some extraordinary talent I had, I had success because I was willing to get back up one more time.

Leadership

In order to lead championship culture it starts with YOU. The small daily habits and actions created consistency. It was never based on how I felt, it drove my behavior, and the motto was to WIN THE DAY.  I believe that will power is a learned behavior that takes discipline and energy to sustain.  The mind is a beautiful thing, you don't need some drug or to travel somewhere or to have this or that-----the mind can do much more (David Goggins).

I was criticized yet again for not being vocal enough, for not going out of my way to help the other guys on the team.  I was an average player, with an obsession for greatness; it dwelled on me 24/7 to get better.  I knew I wanted my senior year to end on my terms, winning was the only option.  Daniel Coyle is noted for saying, "It takes 10,000 intense hours practicing your craft."  A leader is someone who is the vision of our future self; my goal was to embody this.

People often say, "Your best player has to be your hardest worker."  I wasn't our best player, but what I did have was an uncommon desire to improve.  I lead by example, people think leaders need to be some sort of cheerleader or a vocal guy and I am here to tell you that is bullshit.  People follow what you do, not what you say.  Everyday my job was to outwork every single guy on our team, set the tone, inspire them to be more than what they were, and give them hope and security.

How do you lead yourself?  You must constantly ask yourself this and make sure your friends, values, vision, finances, day to day decisions, and the value you bring to others are aligning with your life.  I want to use our 2016 Mount Mercy Baseball team as an example of what champion culture looks like and how leadership can help create this.

Going for Gold-"The People"

Our 2016 team had a clear and compelling vision for what we wanted to accomplish.  Every single guy had bought into the vision of our team, every single guy had a role and they understood their role.  The purpose behind driving the culture of the team, led to individuals being engaged and inspired to do more.  It was clear to everyone on that roster, that we knew what we wanted to achieve and why we wanted to achieve it.  Our core values and what we stood for, was shown every time we took the field.  People knew what to expect and that the game would be played the right way.

Our standards of behavior- our daily decisions, our expectations, and our accountability were aligned throughout our team.  We had committed and unified team members, this is the heart of culture (some call this chemistry).  To be honest, you could've rolled balls out there for us to practice and we would've got something accomplished.  The relationships built within the team were so genuine that we expected great things out of each other.

The trust developed between team members and our ability to communicate effectively with one another, led us to do great things.  The environment we had was fun, we knew when to work and when to play.  Simon Sinek speaks on this, "If you get the environment right, you can get people to do great things."  Our culture of excellence was embedded throughout every single player that season.  You may not be the most charismatic leader and that is okay, but if you can get people to believe in you and what you have to say and you invest time in your people, "gold" becomes a standard for those around you too.