Willie Mays Mental Quote

As a hs player I do not think players work hard or atleast as hard as they could. There are very few people who can work only at one thing. In my opinion I don't think he was talking about hs or college players, mainly because there are so many others things they have to do in their lives. As a professional player your job is to be the best at that game, for hs and college you have other responsibilities.

For parents getting in the way of a player being able to take criticism, I think it happens more often than not. I've seen many people put stuff on this site venting about their kids coach being awful, and I will tell you from mine and my teammates experiences it gets in the way of a player being able to take criticism when everything you here about your coach is negative. It's just the way the game works and that's why more people fail at it than succeed.

I agree with the above, I don't think that comment was meant for non professionals.

Absolutely one has to be prepared to work hard to succeed in most anything, but being totally dedicated to one thing is really hard to do unless that is all you have to do all day. I didn't expect my HS player to be completely dedicated, baseball was just a small part of his HS life, the commitment becoming more pronounced in college and now it's a job, and he's completely dedicated to it, even more so after being on the DL.

Good stuff junior5, I enjoy your perspective as a player.

“In order to excel, you must be completely dedicated to your chosen sport. You must also be prepared to work hard and be willing to accept constructive criticism. Without a total 100 percent dedication, you won’t be able to do this.”

MY TRUE STORY
Many years ago, Willie was at my home in the SF area
for lunch. My mother asked Willie "why don't you go to Las Vegas, like the Dodger players".

Willie said "Lionel Hampton wanted Willie to join him on the road, however Willie said that my image with the kids is too important".

"Baseball teaches you life" at any age!

MY FOCUS AND DEDICATION IS AS STRONG TODAY AS IT WAS YESTERDAY.

Willie and the pro scouts [friends] have confirmed this daily.

Happy Birthday Willie.
Bob

Bob,
I don't think anyone who takes the time to post on this site will ever argue with the concept of baseball teaching life. I know in my case that I've learned a very large portion of what I think I know about life from the game of baseball and I will always be thankful for that.

I love this quote. I don't think that we can classify athletes in general because we don't know which athlete's specifically you are referring to (professional, high school, etc.) As for coaches, I would say that they are a huge factor that many kids don't take constructive criticism well on the baseball field. Many coaches have a tendency to yell a lot for mistakes. Some coaches make kids run laps or do pushups when they make a mistake. With my team that I coach I have a policy that if you make a physical mistake/error as long as you spend time on your own trying to improve that area of your game I am alright. I don't yell because EVERYONE makes mistakes especially physical mistakes. What am I supposed to yell anyway? "You should have gotten that!" would not be constructive criticism. All that makes the player think is "no sh*t! He knows he should have gotten it and all the coach is doing there is rubbing it in so next time he is more nervous and will likely make another mistake.

When was the last time you saw a player in the major leagues go a whole season without an error? If one of my players makes a mental error though, it is a completely different story. They get a one mental mistake "grace period." After that is used up then they start running. Mental mistakes are fixed by paying attention. Making them run will give them some time to think what they can do better next time.

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All the best!