The Last Three Outs When closers choke By Russell Westerholm Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the Requirements of a degree in Writing Professional Writing, Journalism option 1 May 2012 Thesis Advisor: Prof. Briggs 1 Abstract This thesis is a long-form journalistic piece about why baseball closers choke. Pitchers in baseball have always had the reputation of being neurotic and closers are more so because their job is the most stressful in the game. Experts say there are two ways a closer can focus; one is good and one is bad. Focus, confidence and execution are the most important tools for a closer, and without all three, he is destined for trouble. This project looks in depth into how brain processes affect focus, confidence and execution and what actually happens in a closer’s mind in the ninth inning. 2 Table of Contents Terminology and basic rules of baseball – 4 Focus, confidence, execution – 7 The Great Rivera – 11 Preparation – 16 Team Chokes – 19 Brain Processes – 25 The Postseason – 29 What can be done – 32 Works Cited – 35 3 Terminology and basic rules of baseball • Blown save: when the reliever surrenders the lead in a save situation. • Choking: in sports, choking is when an athlete fails in a situation where success means winning the game and failure means losing. • Clutch: a term used for athletes who are very good and consistent under pressure. • Double play: when two outs are recorded on one defensive play. • ERA: stand for Earned Run Average. It averages how many earned runs a pitcher gives up per nine innings. o ERA is one of the main ways in which fans and analysts measure a pitcher’s success. • Extra innings: If the game is tied after the third out of the ninth is recorded, extra innings ensue. Extra innings continue until one team takes a lead and holds it through the bottom half of the inning. • “Game 162:” refers to the last game of the season, as there are 162 games in a season. • Inning: consists of two halves – top and bottom – the away team hits in the top half and the home team hits in the bottom half; both halves consist of three outs. Each baseball game is made up of nine innings. 4 • Leagues and Divisions: Major League Baseball (MLB) has two leagues and six divisions. o American League (AL): East, Central and West o National League (NL): East, Central and West o The main difference between the two leagues is the designated hitter rule. In the AL, a designated hitter hits in place of the pitcher. In the NL, there is no designated hitter, pitchers have to hit. • Long reliever (long-man): a relief pitcher whose job is to pitch more than three innings at a time. Long-men are typically only used when a starting pitcher has a short outing. • Middle reliever: a relief pitcher who pitches one inning a game, sometimes two, in the middle innings of a game (4th-7th). • Pitching rhythm: a sequence of events in which a pitcher throws a pitch, gets the ball thrown back to him by the catcher, gets the sign for the next pitch from the catcher, then throws the next pitch. o Many things out of the pitcher’s control can interrupt a pitcher’s rhythm such as hits, home runs and foul balls. Pitchers can also ruin their own rhythm by taking extra time between pitches and walking around and kicking dirt around on the mound. • Save: a save occurs when a reliever ends the game after entering the game with the tying run due up. 5 • Scouting report: detailed report on any given hitter or pitcher listing strengths, weaknesses and tendencies. o For hitters: Report used by pitchers that lists details such as pitches the hitter hits well (or poorly), what areas of the strike zone they hit well (or poorly), if the hitter is patient or aggressive and any other tendencies. o For pitchers: Report used by hitters that lists details such as strongest and weakest pitch, how often they throw each pitch and in what kinds of situations and any other tendencies. • Starting pitcher (starters): a pitcher who starts the game. Starters are usually expected to last six to seven innings. o Fun fact: relievers are a fairly new position, before relievers, starters had to pitch the entire game no matter what. o Quality start: when a starter pitches at least six innings and gives up three or less runs. • Triple play: when three outs are recorded on one defensive play. These are extremely rare. • Walk-off: when the home team scores the go-ahead run in the bottom of the ninth or later. It is called a “walk-off” because the teams walk off the field after the run scores because the game is over. 6 Focus, confidence, execution In Yankee stadium, Metallica’s “Enter Sandman” begins to blare over the loud speakers and every fan in attendance knows that marks the entrance of Mariano Rivera. In Boston’s Fenway Park, during his time spent as a Red Sox, once Dropkick Murphys’ “Shipping Up to Boston” filled the stadium, everything else stopped. All in attendance stopped to watch Jonathon Papelbon run onto the field. In San Francisco, during the 2010 World Series, Brian Wilson was finishing his warm up tosses when countless “Fear the Beard” signs began to go up. Soon after, the crowd was roaring as the thickly-bearded closer ran onto the field. The closer entering the ninth inning in a save situation is the climax of any baseball game. There are many things that heighten the stakes in the ninth inning of a close game. The crowd noise grows, the adrenaline pumps through the fans in the stadium, the closer and the hitters. The outcome of a close game rides on the closer’s performance and there is no point in a game where the crowd is louder than in the last inning of a close game. A closer needs to master three elements to be successful: focus, confidence and execution. In such close situations, with immense crowd noise, closers need focus on the catcher’s target. Closers also need unshakeable confidence; they need to believe that they are good enough to get any hitter out. Lastly, closers need to execute their best pitches in precise locations because one mistake could lead to a blown save. 7 Closing pitchers have perhaps the most stressful job in baseball and one of the most stressful jobs in all of sports. Their job is to get the most important three outs of the game: the last three. The last three outs are the most difficult and most important because they are what stand in between a closer’s team, and a win. In the other dugout is an entire lineup that will do everything they can to beat the closer. Doubt is a closer’s worst nightmare. When doubt creeps into his mind, a closer cannot help but visualize giving up the big, game-changing home run. In the ninth inning, every mistake is magnified; hitters have heightened senses and reactions due to the high amount of adrenaline. If a closer cannot match that level of focus, adrenaline and confidence, doubt takes place. When doubt takes place in a closer’s mind, he chokes. Choking is a term more commonly used for athletes. It is used to describe when he fails in a situation where success is imperative. Taking a step away from baseball for a moment, choking exists in all types of professions and everyone experiences pressure at some point in their lives. The mouth gets dry, palms start to sweat, the mind races and all it can focus on is not choking. Paradoxically, the desperate need to not choke, is exactly what causes people to choke. “When the worries begin, [people] try to control their performance and force an optimal outcome,” Sian Beilock, author of “Choke: what the secrets of the brain reveal about getting it right when you have to,” wrote. 8 Choking usually occurs when a person is highly skilled at something, usually a professional, and it follows a certain procedure. First, when people become nervous, they become self-conscious, when a person is self-conscious, they try to avoid failure, when they try to avoid failure, the brain tries to micro-manage basic motor skills of the body. For closing pitchers, choking occurs when they think about their throwing motion or the point where they release the ball. When the pressure is high, the brain focuses all its attention on making sure these automatic motor skills are done perfectly instead of focusing on the task at hand, inducing paralysis by over-analysis. “I have this vision of what I think choking is. I think most fans do. Athletes have a slightly different perspective because they know the pressure that they’re dealing with all the time,” Dr. Shane Murphy, professor of sports psychology at Western Connecticut State University (WCSU) said. “It’s a pretty thin line between success and failure.” Murphy is the former psychologist for the Colorado Sky Sox, a triple-A affiliate of the Chicago White Sox and before that, he was the first full-time psychologist for the U.S Olympic committee. Murphy said that sports psychologists tend to define choking differently than fans do. He said they have a different perspective because they try to define it operationally. The two definitions Murphy gave were anxiety-based and brain- process-based. 9 Anxiety-based is what common sense tells us. Common sense says that an athlete chokes because he let his anxiety get the best of him.