Pirates’ relief pitcher Octavio Dotel knows a thing or two about staying composed in crunch-time. Dotel was sent in to keep a 3-3 tie with the L.A. Dodgers Wednesday night. The tie seemed to be slipping away when Dodgers’ Jamey Carroll hit a double. To make matters worse, Carroll ran to third on Dotel’s wild pitch. With a runner on third base and no outs, Dotel kept his composure.

He responded with three outs: a comebacker by Rafael Furcal, striking out Matt Kemp and a ground out to Manny Rameriez.

The Pittsburg Pirates went on to win the game 4-3. Pirates’ Ronny Cedeno sealed the win a single line-drive in the 10th inning.

“You can’t start thinking about it, like ‘Oh, my, they’ve got a guy on third, it’s the ninth inning. You’ve got to keep yourself relaxed as much as you can and go pitch by pitch, and that’s what I did,” said Octavio Dotel.

Many ball players can get rattled when things don’t go as planned. You might throw a wild pitch, walk a batter, or strike out. When things don’t go as planned, many players become frustrated, dwell on errors and then speed up their routine.

Playing angry or frustrated baseball can cause more errors, poor decisions and mental mistakes. You’ll want to maintain your focus on the task at hand. Focus on what you have to do to throw a good pitch or to make a successful hit. You can focus on seeing the ball well at-bat or focus on the catcher’s mitt if you’re a pitcher.

Another strategy: stay calm.

“If you watched that inning closely, he never panicked. He knows the game is on the line. He knows a runner is on third base. He knows he’s facing a great lineup. But you still make your pitches. That’s what a veteran guy does. He’s figured it out. He knows how to control himself. That was impressive,” said teammate Evan Meek of Dotel.

Your baseball psychology tip for today is to refocus the moment you find yourself losing composure or dwelling on the past. Remember that no one can make you feel frustrated but yourself.

Coping with failure

Mariano Rivera, relief pitcher for the Yankees says, “the secret is not so much confidence as focus.”

Focus and the ability to concentrate in the now is important to develop a strong mental game. To be able to perform, you have to be able to focus on performance cues. You can’t throw a good pitch or get a hit without focusing your mind on execution. The good news is that every ball player has the ability to focus. But sometimes your focus can get displaced.

Ball players can lose focus by letting negative emotions, such as frustration or anger, get the best of them. Mistakes can cause you to feel frustrated, such as missing a fly ball or walking a batter. When players become frustrated or angry, they spend too much energy and attention on mistakes. You’re essentially focused on the past, which hinders your ability to focus on the current pitch or play.

Mariano Rivera is a good example of keeping his emotions in check and staying focused one pitch at a time.

“Nothing derails him, Chad Gaudin says. “No emotions get in the way. Ever. He is able to take all that energy of the moment and channel it into everything he has to do. Why doesn’t everybody do that? Not everybody has the power or self-discipline.”

Even though there will be times when you’re frustrated with your performance, the key is to catch yourself before your performance spins out of control. You’ll want to think of the times where you are most likely to become frustrated. Do you become frustrated when you’re down in the count? Or maybe you get frustrated when you’re not performing up to your expectations. The first step is to be aware of mistakes that can trigger frustration so you can develop a plan to bounce back from them quicker.

Failure is a part of sports, especially in baseball. The key is to not demand perfection and to be more accepting of your mistakes. You certainly don’t want to dwell on your mistakes or beat yourself up. Save your analysis of errors for after the game. Use mistakes as a way to improve your game. Think of your mistakes as learning opportunity to better your game in the future.

How you react to those lows can influence your performance. Do you get frustrated and upset with your performance? Or, are you able to bounce back from your mistakes?

Anger and frustration can impact your performance in a negative way. You might dwell too much on your mistakes causing you to lose focus on the current task. You might tighten up and try too hard.

Matt Garza, starting pitcher for the Tampa Bay Rays, worked on controlling his emotions on the field. Garza’s hard work paid off, which contributed to a 6-1 win over the Marlins in 2008. Garza was on a roll, giving up just one hit, a home run, to Hanley Ramirez in the seventh inning.

“I’ve made huge strides mentally. I think before I would have lost it after giving up that slider to Hanley (Ramírez). I would have gotten ticked off, threw a couple angry pitches, a couple more knocks might have came and we’d be talking about a different story here. I might have been out in the bottom of the seventh. But I was able to regroup,” said Garza.

Garza’s ability to regroup was critical to his performance. When you’re angry or frustrated, you’ll have to find ways to regroup and refocus on the task. You might take a deep breath before approaching the plate or mound. You might use positive self-talk to tell yourself to refocus. You might tighten up your glove or readjust your hat, for example. No matter what you do, you’ll want to put the mistake behind you to get ready for the next pitch or hit.

If you can control your emotions, you’ll be in a better position to improve your performance. Rays manager, Joe Maddon sees a relationship between emotional control and performance.

“In this game, I know for a fact, when you can correct the mental mechanics a lot of times your performance increases. You do deliver the ball better, you have a better arm stroke, you have better mechanics, etc., because you have control of yourself. You have control of your emotions, you’re able to breathe,” Joe Maddon said.

Your baseball psychology tip is to find ways to control your emotions on the field. When you find what works for you, use that mental game strategy consistently, which will help you bounce back from mistakes quickly.

You can lose their composure for several reasons. You might lose your composure after making stupid errors, not meeting your expectations or feeling angry or frustrated with your performance. Milton Bradley of the Chicago Cubs shows his anger by throwing temper tantrums on the field.

Recently, Bradley threw his helmet and a water cooler in the dugout after a fly out in the sixth inning against the White Sox. Bradley struck out two innings prior to the incident. Manager Lou Pinella was tired of Bradley’s behavior and removed him from the game.

A loss of composure can also result in more mistakes. Rick Porcello, Detroit Tigers pitcher, lost his composure after the Minnesota Twins got a few hits recently. The Twins hit two runs, a single and home run, rattling the rookie pitcher. Porcello then gave up a combination of hits and walks to send eight batters to first base.

These are just a few examples of what can happen when players lose composure. Even professional baseball players get frustrated and angry sometimes. Frustration can happen at any time during the game. When players are angry, they can forget about the rules of the game.

No one can feel frustrated but yourself. Composed baseball players don’t let strike outs or other mistakes ruin their mindset for the rest of the game. Composed baseball players approach can let go of their mistakes because they know that frustration can harm their performance.

First, you must be able to identify what situations cause you to feel frustrated. Do you feel frustrated after you’re down in the count? Do you get upset when your teammate makes a scoring error? You’ll want to know which situations cause you to become frustrated so that you can respond more effectively.

Then, you’ll want to use positive self-talk to help you manage your emotions. For example, after a strike, you might take an extra check swing and tell yourself to focus on the ball.

Your baseball psychology tip is to respond more effectively to your mistakes. Mistakes are part of sports. You’ll want to keep your cool by using positive self-talk or taking an extra few seconds to regroup.

Here is my conclusion after working with 1000’s of athletes: Strict or high expectations can undermine and suck the life out of confidence!

Expectations can be tricky. You might think that setting high expectations is good for your performance. But, in reality, expectations can put unnecessary pressure on yourself. You set your expectations so high, they are almost impossible to reach. If you’re not performing up to your expectations, you become frustrated and lose confidence in your game.

I’ve worked with baseball players who expect to throw a no hitter. Only a handful of professional athletes have thrown a no-hitter in their career. In 2008, only two professional baseball players have thrown a no-hitter, Carlos Zambrano and Jon Lester. Think about how many games these teams play a year and only two players, in two different games have thrown a no-hitter. Therefore, no matter how good you are, pitching a no-hitter is not likely.

Doubts can also hurt your confidence. Doubt is the opposite of baseball confidence. When you doubt yourself, you question your ability. You might wonder if you can beat the opposing team. You might wonder if you can hit a ball to left field. Most baseball players doubt themselves after making a mistake or performing poorly.

You’ll want to turn those doubts into statements of confidence. To do that, you want to take a positive outlook on the situation. If you doubt your ability to get a hit, you might tell yourself that you’ve hit millions of pitches before and today is no different.

Besides, doubts are just about your perception of the situation. According to Carlos Pena, of the Tampa Bay Rays, you don’t think about the doubts and just play baseball.

“We’re not intimidated at all (of the Boston Red Sox),” Carlos Pena said. “Remember this: intimidation, worry, fear, doubt is all a product of perception. It depends on how you perceive things. Our point of view is, we’ve got a ball game to play, OK? That’s it. Let’s play baseball, period.”

Your baseball mental game tip for today is to let go of expectations and doubts, which undermine your baseball confidence. Take positive stance about the areas of your game and your ability to perform well. Think about what you need to do in the moment, instead of setting high expectations, such as making solid contact with the ball.

He had a rational side that knew you can’t get a hit every time and he didn’t let a ground out or pop out effect his hitting confidence or other parts of his game. Good hitting helped him relax, which improved the rest of the game. He hit great and didn’t worry about mistakes because he knew that mistakes were only temporary. In the end, Soft Hands won games.

I also knew a hitter called Death Grip. Death Grip was not a great hitter like Soft Hands. When Death Grip strikes out early in the game, he talked himself into hitting poorly all day. His grip got even tighter. He became more anxious and hit worse. He lost his confidence, touch, and had negative momentum on his side. Death Grip, unlike Soft Hands, had an irrational side to him. When he popped out early he would say to himself: “Here we go again, hitting poorly again”.

He would reinforce this thinking by maintaining irrational thoughts like: “It’s so awful that I can’t hit well all the time, I’ll never be a great hitter.” Death Grip’s frustration with hitting made him make poor decisions, get tense the whole day, and not enjoy baseball. His frustration filtered into the rest of his game and made him make errors on defense, which further eroded confidence. He was angry at baseball. In the end Death Grip’s hitting caused him to burnout, be depressed, and not enjoy the game he loved to play.

The ironic part of the story is that Soft Hands and Death Grip were the same person living in conflict together, and battling for supremacy. The moral of the story is that humans have two sides to their personality. To be successful and be happy in life, the rational side must prevail.

Why do some athletes get down on themselves and play worse when the wheels fall off? They can’t let go of mistakes and forget about what happened at the last at-bat. Expectations are not being met for how the game “should be” played and negative emotions get the best of them. Frustration and anger lingers to the next at bat or inning, which causes more errors. This in turn causes more frustration and a poor focus. It is a vicious cycle. In this article, I present a few techniques for controlling your emotions and helping get back on track when the wheels fall off.

Don’t Dwell on Mistakes
The frustration you carry with you to the next at-bat comes from dwelling on your last strike out. This is unhealthy for your self-confidence and doesn’t let you enjoy yourself. When you dwell on errors, you sends a message to yourself that you should continue to be upset and beat yourself up. You make the choice to focus on the mistake or focus on what you need to do to get a hit right now. Interrupt the negative pattern by changing your focus to the present pitch.

Give Yourself Permission to Make Mistakes
Some players expect that anything less than a flawless performance is a failure. You have to accept that you are human and you will make mistakes just like everyone else. Sometimes it helps to give yourself permission to make mistakes. You’re not perfect and even the best players in the world make mistakes.

Slow Down and Breath Deeply
Frustration or tension causes you to rush your behavior and become sloppy with your preparation. You may walk faster up to the plate, rush your routine, and swing faster. When you are upset, make an effort to slow down your behavior. Take your time walking up to the plate. Slow down your at-bat routine and be more deliberate without overanalyzing the situation. Take a few deep breaths through your abdominal region. You can breathe when you’re walking up to bat.

Give Yourself a Pep Talk
Negative emotions worsen when a player’s self-talk is negative and self-defeating. A player with negative self-talk says: “I’m the worst batter, I can’t play this game”, which increases your anger and decreases self-confidence. Notice when your self-talk becomes negative, and second, learn to be more positive with yourself and give yourself a pep talk: “I’m a good batter, I’ll do great this time around.” No one can be positive for you but yourself. You have to be your own best coach and give yourself some words of encouragement.