4 generations from extinction

Do you know the first names of your great grandparents? Be honest. I’m not sure where I read it, but it made an impact. The author stated that most of us are simply 4 generations away from extinction. Kind of puts things into perspective doesn’t it?

I’m as guilty as anyone when it comes to letting my passions rule the day. Nothing is as important as what’s on my mind RIGHT NOW. Thankfully, I have some really good people in my life to keep me grounded. They are certainly not “Yes” men. Thank you. And, you know who you are.

Let’s forget baseball for today and teach our kids about their great grandparents. It might be more valuable that you can possibly imagine.

Hiram Jeremiah Aumiller
Ellen Susan Aumiller
John Jacob Beaver
Verna Treaster Beaver
Clemme May Wagner
Theodore Roosevelt Wagner
Maude Elizabeth “Mamie” Orndorff
Elwood Foster Orndorff

Full Reps!

Bret Wagner

Soft BP and why it’s bad

I wrote a blog a few months back about feedforward postural control.

Blog Here

It basically states that your body will put itself into position to perform the act at hand. To demonstrate the point, imagine trying to catch a pebble dropped at 10 ft compared to catching a 50 lb rock dropped at the same height. You would change your body position (probably get lower and put your legs in position to handle the load) to perform the task at hand.

Throwing the ball slow in batting practice is the equivalent to giving your kid a 4 oz pebble to catch. Remember, the ball has momentum. Momentum is defined as the product of the mass and velocity of an object (p=mv). In other words, less velocity = less momentum.

Throwing the ball harder in batting practice produces more momentum and requires the hitter to provide a greater force to overcome that momentum. Guess what they do? Prepare to hit using their legs and hips. Feedforward postural control.

I’m not suggesting you blow your hitters away. I’m suggesting you find a velocity that gets your hitter’s attention. So that they instinctively prepare to use their legs and hips.

Full Reps!

Bret Wagner

A Good Source of Calcium

Animal Crackers. A good source of calcium! Really? Does anyone actually eat animal crackers because they are a good source of calcium?

I’m thinking the majority of people who eat animal crackers could care less about calcium, magnesium, iron, much less even know what it does for them. Obviously, Keebler is trying to appeal to the moms and dads who purchase these snacks for their kids. Confronted with different choices, why not go for the lesser of two evils. “At least they are a good source of calcium.”

One of our members and his father were working out in the cage the other night and I noticed they were doing a drill that I haven’t seen in quite some time. The father was behind homeplate flipping balls out in front of homeplate. The boy was trying to hit these balls back up the middle. This drill is a dinosaur. I remember doing it when I was in high school. No one ever told me what the purpose was. I don’t like it at all. Maybe it’s supposed to help you keep your hands back on off speed pitches. Maybe. But, if you want a drill to practice keeping your hands back on off speed pitches, I can recommend plenty that are significantly better than that one. When do you ever track a ball coming from behind you? Seriously?

But….It’s better than the alternative. A couch potato.

Behind home plate flips. A Good Source of Calcium!

Bret Wagner

Cynicism – GoWags style

It’s said that a cynic knows the cost of everything, but the value of nothing.

That’s an extremely important point. There’s cost. And then there’s value. While both have a monetary component, cost doesn’t take into account what you get out of it.

I’d like to share a message I received from a happy GoWags member last night regarding a brand new “Members only” sign we placed at our facility outside the weight room. He will remain anonymous.

[SON'S NAME] told me, "You can't come past here dad, you're not a member."

I laughed at his 8 year old processing. Ridiculous.

But…

When we looked at joining a competitive gym, there was no
consideration that it was a 2 for 1 deal; dad is free or vice
versa...nope, n/a.

You can't hit there, can't play catch with your son. And, anything
else they offer is available just past the signage at our dojo.

GoWags…what a steal!

To the individual who submitted this email. Thanks for giving me today’s blog idea. Good stuff. On a side note, I’d love to see more dads (or moms) take advantage of our workout area while their son is working out.

Bret Wagner

What’s up with Pinterest?

Can anyone give me an idea as to how GoWags might be able to use Pinterest?

I see a lot of activity on Facebook, but most activity is from women. Is this something that may benefit GoWags?

Thanks,
Bret Wagner

 

The ideological query

As an Information Technology professional, I deal with database queries all day long. You take a standard data set and filter out that which doesn’t meet your criteria. Voila! That’s the information I’m looking for. Let me use that for my analysis. Rarely does the initial data set meet my needs. I need to filter out the “junk”. It’s not that the “junk” doesn’t exist and isn’t real. It’s just that for this particular analysis, it isn’t relevant.

Why is it, that in life,  people have a hard time  filtering out the “junk”?  Your either “all-in” or you’re either “all-out”.

Take my blog yesterday, for example.

Blog here

I was amazed how many positive responses I got. I was amazed how many negative responses I got.

Look. I understand not everyone can afford to train. I understand that. This wasn’t about the poor.  Filter them out.

This was about those individuals, who are perfectly capable, but have an incentive to not train.  In my language:

SELECT firstName + ‘ ‘ + lastName AS  Lazy FROM tblAllBaseballPlayers WHERE financialcondition <> ‘Poor’ and motivated = ‘FALSE’

Sincerely,

Bret Wagner

GoWags to implement Excellence Tax

Below is the 2012 income tax brackets and rates. The more you make. The more you pay. Nothing new here. I didn’t say nothing wrong here. I said nothing new here. It’s called a progressive tax. Progressive taxes attempt to reduce the tax incidence of people with a lower ability-to-pay, as they shift the incidence increasingly to those with a higher ability-to-pay.

Year 2012 income brackets and tax rates

Marginal Tax Rate	Single	Married Filing Jointly or Qualified Widow(er)	Married Filing Separately	Head of Household
10%	$0 – $8,700	$0 – $17,400	$0 – $8,700	$0 – $12,400
15%	$8,701 – $35,350	$17,401 – $70,700	$8,701 – $35,350	$12,401 – $47,350
25%	$35,351 – $85,650	$70,701 – $142,700	$35,351 – $71,350	$47,351 – $122,300
28%	$85,651 – $178,650	$142,701 – $217,450	$71,351 – $108,725	$122,301 – $198,050
33%	$178,651 – $388,350	$217,451 – $388,350	$108,726 – $194,175	$198,051 – $388,350
35%	$388,351+	$388,351+	$194,176+	$388,351+

After looking at this table, GoWags has decided to implement an Excellence Tax on all parents whose kids hit over .300 and have an ERA of under 3.00

Look. We know that your child has shown an interest in baseball and you’ve decided to encourage it. That’s awesome. We also recognize that you are willing to make a financial commitment in your son’s development. Deliberate practice doesn’t just happen, right? Your son is becoming a better player this winter. And, the fruits of his labor will be evident as he takes the field this spring. Higher batting averages, faster pitching velocity, more power, more awareness, better body language. He’s a GoWags sponge and it’s going to show.

But, we’ve decided to tax you if your child does too well. It’s not fair to those kids who aren’t willing to make the commitment your child has. Hope you understand.

Those players not committed and thus hitting less than .300 or an ERA over 3.00 will receive a direct payout from GoWags for 96 weeks as a safety net that they don’t feel too badly about their performance.  After all, its not their fault that they are not committed.

Sincerely,

Bret Wagner

For those readers sarcastically challenged, that’s a joke.

The 50 Yr Old Basketball Genius

You’ve got to see this!

Video Here

OK. So Bob Fisher is a basketball genius. Here’s my question. What do you think basketball coaches think of his learning style?

It’s so easy to watch that video and think he’s a “genius”. But, that’s only because he’s already got the plaques and awards on the wall.

Be honest. What would you have thought about him if he didn’t have the hardware? I thought so.

Daniel Coyle describes it best

There are lots of useful takeaways here, but what I like best is Fisher’s mindset. He’s active. He doesn’t rely on any one source of wisdom; instead, he reads everything he can get his hands on, tests it ruthlessly, keeps what works. His mindset is not one you typically find in an athlete or musician (who often have passive, obedient, “whatever you say, coach” attitudes).

Fisher’s mindset is like one you’d find in a hacker: searching, resourceful, always willing to invent and re-invent. He’s living proof that talent isn’t about obedience to authority — it’s about being entrepreneurial, about taking charge, seeking out good information, and hacking until you get where you want to go. As Fisher so beautifully puts it, “Anybody could do what I do, if they know what I know.”

C.S. Lewis to the rescue

It never fails. Every time I’m struggling to articulate how I’m feeling, C.S. Lewis seems to capture it perfectly. We had our 9 yr. old travel team practice last night and I wasn’t particularly happy with the “effort” given.  I rarely get upset with results. But effort.. now that’s a different story.  Isn’t it funny how results usually follow effort?

Back to Lewis.  Here’s a gem from his book Mere Christianity.

“People need to be reminded more often than they need to be instructed. The real job of every great moral teacher is to keep on bringing us back, time after time, to the old simple principles which we are all so anxious not to see;  like  bringing a horse  back and back to a fence it has refused to jump or  bringing a child back and back to the bit in its lesson that it wants to shirk..”

I don’t think Lewis would mind me substituting the word baseball for moral in the quote above.

Sometimes our players don’t need new stuff. They simply need to be reminded of the importance of doing the same stuff correctly.  Focus and do it right. Focus and do it right.  Focus and do it right. Maybe that’s my new mantra.

Or….maybe I need to remind everyone what Full Reps really means!

Bret Wagner

Are you an early adopter?

Are you familiar with the innovation adoption lifecycle or technology adoption lifecycle? Simply put, it states that no matter how good an idea or a certain technology is, it will go through a bell curve life cycle similar to the one below.  The innovators and early adopters jump on board first followed by the early majority. The late majority and the laggards are the last to adopt the technology. Think about Facebook and where you fall on this bell curve.

Anyway…GoWags is using a brand new service that allows customers to pay for sevices or get discounts on services by allowing their customers to post favorable messages to Facebook. It’s called Pay Me With A Post. You can visit our page here http://www.paymewithapost.com/GoWags

Are you an innovator or an early adopter? If so, you may want to check it out for yourself. It’s pretty interesting.

www.PayMeWithaPost.com

Innovation Adoption Lifecycle

Bret Wagner