Off Season Weight Room Workouts

Now that the all baseball seasons are done for a few months (except for the waste-of-time indoor winter leagues), I thought I should start talking about off season conditioning.

I will go into this in more detail in the future, so today let me just start off by telling you what not to do.

At the bottom of the page is a snapshot of a college workout, “designed” by a baseball coach with a background in physical fitness.  He must be very well read, because “his workout” looks just like every other “baseball specific” workout out there today.

Before you click on the thumbnail pic below, let me just say a few things:

1. This is not baseball specific, nor is it specific to any one sport.  It is a general workout with the occasional ridiculous exercise thrown in to look like a baseball-specific movement.  (Two that I saw at first glance: “cable cockback,” and “cable throw.”)
2. 20-30 minutes devoted strictly to a warm up is not a warm up.  It’s a workout.  I’m not saying athletes do not need to warm up, but if you can’t get yourself ready to go in five minutes or less, something’s wrong!
3. The “Smith Machine” is the biggest waste of equipment on the planet.  If you see this machine used in a workout, run away as fast as you can (unless you didn’t warm up for at least 20-30 minutes… he he!)
4. If you see a “Shoulder Circuit” listed on your workout, it was designed by someone that doesn’t understand what parts of the body should be throwing the baseball.  If you see it listed way at the end of the workout, it’s just busy work.  At best, these “circuits” can be a warm up, nothing more.
5. Plyometrics should always be done first (after a warm up).  If your workout has them anywhere else, move them up to the beginning.
6. If the exercises in your workout include a circuit of “core exercises,” your primary exercises aren’t the right ones.
7. Curls are for the girls… ’nuff said.
8. If your workout has more than 5-7 exercises included in your daily training (you are training daily, aren’t you?) then it is just a workout filled with busy work.
9. If you can’t tell what an exercise is based on it’s name, it’s not “baseball specific,” and probably a waste of time.
10. If your “rep ranges” are the run-of-the-mill 10-12, 15-20, and/or the ol’ 3 sets of ten junk, put down your copy of FLEX magazine, and remember that you are training to become a better baseball player and not the next Mr. Olympia.

Oh, if your workout looks like this one at all (or is this one), stop doing it!

Alright, here’s the thumbnail picture.  Click on it to see it in full size.  (Click on it again to zoom in.)

Please feel free to comment on it on the comment section below this post.  Like I said earlier, I’ll be getting more into this  as the off season rolls on, but some input from someone outside my brain is always a nice break…

Workout like a Ball Player, not a Body Builder,

Coach Bones