BRUCE BOLT BLOG

My favorite Chinese proverb is: "The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now." This blog is about being better. To be better at anything, all you have to do is start now. The offseason is a great time to start training mental skills! Stay in the know The Off-Season Challenge This off season I want you to become aware of your self-talk. It is one of the fundamental pillars of sport and performance psychology. Self-talk is a collection of statements, phrases, and cue words that direct our actions and provide a running commentary...

“It’s funny how this game works,” Anthony Herrera likes to say. Oh, baseball can be funny, all right. For instance, Anthony, a five-year veteran of professional independent ball, got to smile plenty the last two seasons at the theatrics of his Toros de Tijuana teammate Fernando Rodney, the former big-league All-Star who still performs his bow-and-arrow routine upon notching a save. “La Flecha. The Arrow,” Anthony noted with a grin of the beloved Rodney. “He calls himself that.” Stay in the know But then there’s the sport’s “funny” nature that can throw you for a loop like a well-executed knuckleball....

An elite athlete and his parents came to see me because the athlete doesn’t “hustle.” The dad played pro ball, and hustle was his thing, so it’s creating heat around baseball. Dad said his son is killing it in practice, but in the game, he comes up short. He offered examples while the mom nodded along. The kid slumped in his seat and listened quietly. I asked the player if what his parents said sounded about right. He shrugged. I asked what he thought. He said his performance suffered because he was playing safe, pulling back, and tightening up. He...

 You can also watch/listen to this interview on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.   *****  Stay in the know Our Founder, Bear Mayer, recently caught up with BRUCE BOLT athlete Tyler Naquin of the New York Mets just before the MLB Playoffs. They talked about baseball life, bowhunting, what it's like playing in a winning clubhouse where half the team wears BRUCE BOLT. "I was on deck the other day and some guy behind me in Milwaukee was like, 'Naquin, those are some sweet batting gloves.' I was like, "Thanks, man. Look 'em up!" - Tyler Naquin Enjoy this exclusive conversation before the Mets kickoff...

The goal of this article is to provide you with drills to increase your power off the mound. For the sake of conversation, I want to define power to make sure we're on the same page.  Power is the highest amount of force you can produce at the highest rate of speed.   Simply put: strength + speed = power.   Stay in the know Three Drills Athletes in various sports consider themselves baseball, football, or hockey players, etc. And then within those categories they segregate further by saying "I’m a pitcher" or quarterback or defenseman.   They lose sight that...

***** Stay in the know Former pro baseball player (now famous TikToker) Robert Cruz put together a mini-masterclass on respecting your equipment and taking care of your BRUCE BOLT Batting Gloves. We call it Glove Care 101. 1. Dry Your Gloves After Each Use Our glove bag is meant to keep your gloves flat when they are in your equipment bag, but it’s very important to air your gloves out (out of the bag) after games, practices, and BP especially. 2. Moisturize Your Gloves with Leather Conditioning Balm Our gloves are made from 100% real Cabretta leather unlike other batting gloves. So just...