May 21, 2010--Throwing the ball back to the pitching mound may be the simplest part of a catcher's job, but it's got former Texas Rangers catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia stumped. Physically, he can make the toss, but something in his psyche just won’t let him make the throw, says Dr. Michael Lardon, who is a psychological consultant for Major League Baseball.
"When you first start off playing a sport, it's physical -- but at the higher level it becomes disproportionally mental," he said. A mechanical glitch like this can become a persistent unconscious response.
In addition to working with sports psychologists, Saltalamacchia has changed his grip on the baseball and is using a tap-tap-throw rhythm for his tosses to the mound, tapping the ball twice against his glove before the throw, according to the Associated Press. So far, so good. The catcher made it through an entire game with only one inaccurate throw on Monday.
Tap, tap, Arch.