What is the real story? It is that he was contacted by the Yankee general manager at Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox. What was he doing there? He was thinking of doing his resurrection up there. Also, he was considering his most holy appearance in Houston. So, why did he choose the Bronx to perform this miracle? How does $28,000,000 sound as a very good explanation.

I’m certainly a respectful appreciator of the achievements of Roger Clemens. He has been a magnificent pitcher and deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. But, this latest stunt has cast a darker shadow on his image. He said his good byes and everyone wished him well. He already road into the sunset as a pitcher. Everyone cried their tears. Now he wants baseball fans to be so excited about his return.

As a child I wanted to trust my heroes. When they said something I listened. I looked to them for a moment of truth about how to conduct myself as a man. Say it ain’t so, Roger. When Mattingly said his good byes, he came back as a coach. This was a model for what life is about and how to deal with the existential realities of life. This helps children deal with the stages of development.

When Roger announced that he couldn’t resist rejoining his pals to save the team and give the fans another championship he is disingenuous. His ego could not be so large as his behavior indicates or could it be? Does he really see himself as a savior? He owes his ex-teammates and fans a more honest expression of motivation. What does this do to the morale of a team? What does it do to the kids who have been Roger Clemens fans? I am suggesting Roger is only serving Roger, not his team, his fans or baseball itself.

by Paul Schienberg, PhD

A “shrink” can expand your athletic performance.

By Paul Schienberg, PhD

Look what you’ve done, Yankee fans.

According to a report in the New York Daily News, New York Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriquez said he was undergoing therapy with multiple therapists to deal with his personal demons.

Rodriquez made the admission after he and his wife, Cynthia, donated $200,000 to a mental health program at the Children’s Aid Society in Washington Heights.

“I don’t know where I’d be (without therapy),” Rodriguez told the television show “Extra” in a segment to air Wednesday night at 7 E.T.

“I think it’s a different life that I’ve discovered and I thank Cynthia for that because therapy is an incredible thing and you might get to know someone you didn’t even know was in there.

“Why let the train wreck come before you fix it?”

Rodriguez did not specify the reasons for his ongoing therapy, but characterized his sessions as a “maintenance thing.”

The admission is a rarity in the world of professional sports.

After struggling during his first season in New York, Rodriguez has rebounded in his second go-around. His two homers during the Yankees’ 12-3 win over the Tigers Tuesday gave him a major league best 16 home runs and 46 RBI’s.

“It’s helped in baseball, for one, in terms of my approach to everything,” Rodriguez told the Daily News. “I think it would be great if kids out there realize that it can be a great benefit.”

Rodriquez has previously admitted to a rocky relationship with his father, Victor, who abandoned him when he was just nine years old. Victor resurfaced when the younger Rodriguez reached the major leagues, but the two remain estranged.

“I know where he came from and I know where he came from and I know his background and seeing how successful he is as a man, as a husband, as a friend, it really hits home with me,” Rodriguez’s wife Cynthia told the show. “It’s because of therapeutic intervention that he’s been able to discover and flourish as a person.”

Introduction: Background And History

Except for a few isolated cases, such as the preference of the lobster, crab and rat to use the right claw or paw, and the preference of cats to use their left paw, most animals are said to be ambidextrous and do not display lateral preference.

Preference for the right hand occurs in 90-95% of the population. Left hand preference is close to 10%. Ambidexterity occurs in approximately 5%. Left handedness is more common in males and in mentally retarded individuals (so if you are a male and retarded…..which to many women is redundant…..you figure it out.

Ocular or eye dominance is an entirely different situation. The first written description of ocular dominance is credited to Giovanni Battista della Porta in 1593. It was not until the late 20th century that serious attention was focused on this matter.

It might be expected that the eye that sees best is the dominant eye. This is not, in fact, the case. The dominant eye is usually considered to be the preferred eye for sighting. Eye dominance, preference or superiority is different from handedness or motor dominance.

Handedness is concerned primarily with motor aspects of motor organs. The eye is a sensory organ and has no conscious pro-prioception. And vision is for each eye represented bilaterally and equally in the brain in the occipital lobes, for most binocular animals. We have no consciousness of having a right and left eye as one is conscious of having a left and right hand. One does not see the world from a right or left eye, but from a single so called “cyclopean eye” which combines information from both.

When an athlete is asked to perform sighting tests, the cyclopean eye often seems to be located behind or close to one eye or the other. Eye dominance seems to be genetically predetermined. It is said that lateral dominance of a field of vision corresponding to the dominant eye, and it is easier for directional scanning to occur toward the field on the dominant eye and field. If persons are divided into only right or left eye dominance, then about 65% of the population is right eyed dominant and 35% are left eye dominant.

An individual who is right handed and right “eyed” or left handed and left “eyed” is said to have an uncrossed pattern of eye-hand dominance. Right handed and left “eyed” or vice versa is called crossed eye-hand dominance. There is no correlation between handedness and eye dominance.

A Study Of Baseball Performance

The study was conducted by a person (JMP) whose greatest frustration in childhood was that he didn’t become a good enough baseball player to make the major leagues. He could pitch but he could not hit a lick. He tired switch hitting and found much better success. He is right handed and has right eye dominant, uncrossed eye-hand dominant. He consulted his father’s history who was more successful in baseball. He found that his father was crossed eye-hand dominant, right handed with a dominant left eye, and had been a very successful batter, while uncrossed JMP had been a relatively successful pitcher. His father also had difficulty, in contrast, in pitching. The study looked a college varsity baseball team.

All twenty five, male, varsity athletes from the University of Florida baseball team were examined. Visual acuity, stereoscopic vision, ocular motility and eye sight dominance and handedness were established. All athletes batted the same “hand” as they threw except for one “switch hitter” who was right handed but who batter left handed.

Athletic performance was measured by data obtained from the prior year’s statistics. The pitchers were evaluated by their earned run average (ERA) and the hitters were rated by their by their batting average (BA).

Let me review some of the results of this study. College varsity level baseball players are twice as likely as the general population to have crossed dominance. The incidence of central eye dominance is considerably higher than the general population. The best hitters were centrally eye dominant or crossed eye-hand dominant. The poorest hitters were uncrossed eye-hand dominant. The top four pitchers were either uncrossed or centrally ocular dominant. Three of the top six pitchers were centrally ocular dominant.

What conclusion were the researchers able to draw from the results? There is strong support for the idea that the pattern of eye-hand dominance is significant and related to athletic success in baseball. There seems to be high probability that central ocular dominance helps athletes succeed in this form of athletic endeavor. The central ocular dominance players (batters and pitchers), whether right or left handed, were consistently and distinctly in the forefront. The central ocular dominant subgroup had both the best BA and the best ERA. The crossed eye-hand dominance pattern seems to be of benefit only to the batters – may even be a handicap to the pitchers. An uncrossed eye-hand dominance pattern is an advantage to the pitcher and a disadvantage to the hitter, and a crossed eye-hand dominance pattern is an advantage to the hitter and a disadvantage to the pitcher.

The situation for baseball hitting is very different from pitching in that the sighting action is to the side of the athlete. The explanation might be that there is increased ability of the eyes to sweep in the direction of the field of the side of the dominant eye. Certainly that is what the batter does. The pitcher is to his left and as he watches the pitcher he must make rapid sweeps of his eye from the plate in front of him to the pitcher on the mound, waiting for the pitch and watching the ball as it proceeds toward him. Even as the ball approaches him it is still primarily in his left gaze field, not the right gaze field, which it enters only when it crosses the plate and caught by the catcher. The batter must initiate his swing based on his vision of the ball’s course when it is perhaps only halfway or so from the pitcher to the plate, so it is irrelevant that the ball finally crosses into his right visual field as it crosses the plate. It is for these reasons why the crossed eye-hand dominant player is at some advantage in the batting situation over the uncrossed dominant player. The best combination for a baseball player would be a left handed centrally ocular dominant, or if not centrally ocular dominant, a left handed crossed eye dominant person. Many successful players do not follow this formula however.

Conclusions

Among those athletes that possess the other necessary qualities (speed, fast reactions times, coordination, competitiveness, etc.) for success, it may be that ocular dominance and the pattern of eye-hand dominance is another variable that is measurable and predictable.

Eye hand dominance could serve as a factor in scouting athletes, or guiding a young player on whether to hit left or right handed or to switch hit. It may be possible to determine what sport to concentrate on, as knowledge grows concerning the relations between ocular dominance and patterns of eye-hand dominance in other sports. Tennis is a natural next sport for examination.

Andy Fox plays shortstop and third base for the Florida Marlins. He was born and raised in Sacramento, California. He began his major league career with the New York Yankees. After two years with them, he was traded to the Arizona Diamondbacks where he had his most successful year in 1998. Andy played in 139 games, batted .277, scored 67 runs, and batted in 44 RBI’s. He moved on to the Florida Marlins in 2000 and again had a very successful year in 2002 where he started in 133 games, batted .251, scored 55 runs and drove in 41 runs.

Schienberg: We are interested in the mental aspects of playing baseball.

Fox: Fine. I think playing baseball is a day in and day out thing. You try to get into a routine … as far as physically and mentally. It is not so much how many ground balls or swings you take … it’s the quality of what you do … the more you play this game the more you understand that getting into a routine the more it is a reaction thing, not a thought … like here comes a groundball I got to do this … the more you concentrate on the physical things the more the mental things just come along.

Schienberg: The season is long…keeping that focus over a long time…does it take a pacing?

Fox: Not pacing. The more you do it the more you get used to the grind of it. You get used to the ups and downs of it. Through the work and preparation you try to eliminate the length of the rough spells…instead of going zero for twenty you go zero for ten…you try… staying on an even keel mentally…is probably the biggest thing in this game…it is probably what separates those guys that are in the big league vs. those who stay in the minors…they just can’t deal with the failure aspect of it. Once you understand that be able to deal with it, you get more successful.

Schienberg: I’m sure when you get into a slump a lot of people give you advice about what to do. Do you ignore that as much as possible?

Fox: I think when there is a slump there is a problem and you have to find something that works for you. It is good to work closely with the hitting coach. Sometimes there is a key phrase that you can use….like “stay back” or “are you seeing the ball?” The first thing is to understand the problem and the second is to do something that would eliminate and create a new muscle memory.

Schienberg: I know you are the starting short stop. So you are constantly out there.

Fox: No. I was the starting short stop last year. The kid I was playing for last year recovered from his injury.

Schienberg: When you play short stop…can you tell me about the chemistry between you and the second baseman?

Fox: It’s critical. You get used to a certain player. He knows what balls you can get to and you get to know his range as well. Last year I never played with Billy Castillo. It took a while for us to get used to each other. There is a chemistry you need to develop and there is an unspoken language that you develop with each other.

Schienberg: What is it like for you to be on the team? Last year you were a starter…

Fox: I’ve been a back up my whole career. So I’m sort of used to it.

Schienberg: You had a good year last year.

Fox: Thank you. Yes. I was happy with how I performed. You get used to your role on the team. You prepare to play every day, just in case you get an opportunity. You say to yourself, ok I’m backing up now and do some things to keep myself fresh…and prepare to play whether it is once a week or twice a week.

Schienberg: Jeff Torborg, the manager, nice guy.

Fox: Yes. Very nice guy. He is a great communicator. He checks with every player every day to see how you are doing. Cares about family. You don’t hesitate to go to him and say this is going on or that’s going on. It’s so important. He’s honest. I wish I had more time. But it’s time for me to do hitting.

Schienberg: Thanks for your time. Good luck this year.

Fox: Take care.

Jeffrey Torborg was born in Plainfield, New Jersey on November 26, 1941. He played as a catcher for 10 seasons in the major leagues for the Los Angeles Dodgers and the California Angels. Jeff caught several no-hitters, most notably Sandy Koufax’s perfect game on September 9, 1965 vs. the Chicago Cubs. He currently manages the Florida Marlins. In the past, he has managed for the Cleveland Indians, Chicago White Sox, New York Mets, and Montreal Expos. He met with Psyched at Fort Lauderdale Stadium during Spring Training, 2003.

Schienberg: How do you assess if a player is going to make the team?

Torborg:Don’t make an evaluation until you have to make a decision. You keep watching and watching.

Schienberg: Is there a team leader?

Torborg: There’s a bunch of guys.

Schienberg: Which guy stands out?

Torborg: The whole team … Mike Redmand, Lowell, the centerfielder, our new catcher. Leadership can come in all kinds of forms. You don’t have to be a talker to be a leader. You play with example and heart.

Schienberg: There’s a special relationship between a catcher and a pitcher. Are you looking for some chemistry between Pudge Gonzalez and the pitching staff?

Torborg: Chemistry is interactive on the whole club. Our catchers get very close. We meet every day. We have an offensive meeting with Bill Robinson. Right after that we have a meeting with the starting pitcher and the three catchers. Our three catchers are very close. We want their input constantly. It becomes an interaction between catchers’ too. Then the pitchers understand what we are trying to do. The catcher is an extension of what we are thinking in the dugout. Pudge brings a presence. The pitch selection can be over rated. But, if the pitcher believes it is the right pitch that’s the biggest part of the deal … whether it is the right call or not … if he believes it is right, he will deliver it … without being hesitant.

Schienberg: Are you still in touch with Sandy Koufax?

Torborg: Yeah, I had dinner with him the other night.

Schienberg: I will never forget that perfect game.

Torborg: Did you read the book about him?

Schienberg: Yeah, it’s a great book. What makes for a good day at spring training?

Torborg: Taking a solid crap.

Schienberg: Ah, the golden years.

Torborg: You got that straight.

Schienberg: What are you looking for when you brake camp? How do you know whether you got something really good going on with your team? Like this team … will you know whether you’re going to get off to a good start?

Torborg: We are really close to our lineup. Everyone seems like they are ready to roll. The only thing now is whether the pitching is where you want it to be. The bullpen looks good and starters are showing good stuff … AJ, Pav.

Schienberg: Do you like this team better than last year’s team?

Torborg: You know I liked that team last year … a lot. And I like this team even better than last year. We are going to miss guys that we really cared about. I like the end product and the way we play. The abilities with Pierre for example. He plays like Maury Wills. He brings speed. He makes things happen. We have as good a defensive team as there is in the league. I watched the Cardinals last year. You could see why they won. Their defense was superb even with all the tragedies they faced. They had four gold glovers and team speed. We led the league in stolen bases last year because we had to run. We don’t have to run as much as last year. We don’t strike out as much. We get productive outs. Last year we didn’t move runners up. Now guys are moving runners up. Little things like that make a difference. We take team speed and defense every day when we come to the park. The offense can be shut down that just happens … how healthy out pitching staff is (coincidentally, BJ Burnett , the best of the pitching staff, came up lame in the second inning of the game played immediately after the interview).

Schienberg: Should that rule be changed … where if the pitcher is attacked, he should be able to defend himself without fear of punishment?

Torborg: That’s a tough one. We had that happen once with the White Sox, when Jack McDowell stood on the top of the mound and met Whitten and hit him on the top of the head, and still got suspended. He took the shot. It’s a tough call. Got to go play a game now.

Schienberg: Thanks Jeff.