Heads-Up Baseball

Playing the Game One Pitch at a Time

By: Tom Hanson, Ken Ravizza

Narrated by: Lloyd James

Length: 4 hrs and 1 min

Publisher's summary

What does it mean to play heads-up baseball? A heads-up player has confidence in his ability, keeps control in pressure situations, and focuses on one pitch at a time. His mental skills enable him to play consistently at or near his best despite the adversity baseball presents each day.

"My ability to fully focus on what I had to do on a daily basis was what made me the successful player I was. Sure I had some natural ability, but that only gets you so far. I think I learned how to focus; it wasn't something that I was necessarily born with." (Hank Aaron)

"Developing and refining my mental game has played a critical role in my success in baseball. For years players have had to develop these skills on their own. This book provides practical strategies for developing the mental skills that will help speed you toward your full potential." (Dave Winfield)

©2006 Ken Ravizza and Tom Hanson (P)1995 McGraw Hill-Ascent Audio

Good book

Read this for my college softball team and I can say I will be taking many of these ideas onto the field with me.

Amazing ideas for both Players & Coaches

This book gives you exactly what you needed to hear! I love the breakdown and mental training drills. This book will help you become a better player or coach. I love how he talks about having a mission and how to be mindful of that mission, whether at bat, on base, pitching or playing defense. Practicing with the intent to get better is always our goal but if your not thinking of your what your exact goal is then you don’t really know what your trying to get better at then how do you know if your getting better? He talks about having a plan and visualizing it before hand. Breathing before each pitch when pitching and before each swing at bat. He briefly mentioned that you should journal your progress and I know for a fact that journaling your reps and how many you did right out of how many attempts, will help you to see what exactly you need to work on. Having that visual is important and it helps not being to hard on yourself. My son would do 3 sets of 10 grounders, 7/10, 8/10, 10/10 and usually all he could think of were the ones he missed, after he seen that he was getting better after each rep, it made him feel more confident and more eager to work harder to get his scores high. It also showed us what he needed to work on. Because he’s super young I think it’s harder to be mindful about having a mental mission on his own, so having him write in his daily reps made him think about what he needs to work on and now he’s only 9 yrs old playing travel ball and it has been amazing and fun to see his success. He’s not perfect but having a mission and learning how to execute your plan and visualize it, has helped him to grow and get better every season. I hope you can enjoy this book as much as I did!