Benefits of Tracking Performance with a Baseball Journal
Benefits of Tracking Performance with a Baseball Journal
Using a notebook or journal to track daily performance can have a significant positive impact on a baseball player’s development. Research in sports science and psychology, as well as real-world testimonials from athletes and coaches, all point to clear benefits of regular performance tracking and journaling. Below is a structured summary of key findings:
Sports Science Insights on Performance Tracking
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Monitoring Training & Performance: Sports science researchers note that keeping training diaries or self-report logs is a simple, cost-effective way for athletes to monitor their response to training and adjust for optimal performance. Regular logging allows coaches and players to evaluate what works and make data-informed adjustments in practice plans. In fact, consistently tracking workouts, recovery, and results provides quality data that can help prevent overtraining and injuries while optimizing performance outcomes.
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Identifying What Works: By reviewing a performance journal, athletes can spot patterns in their training that lead to success or setbacks. Reflecting on past entries helps identify which routines, drills, or habits produced the best results and which did not. This kind of individualized insight is invaluable, since training responses vary by person. Knowing what “makes you tick” through written records enables smarter, personalized training adjustments. Similarly, looking back at notes before a slump, illness, or injury can reveal warning signs and help avoid repeating mistakes.
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Goal Setting and Accountability: Performance tracking goes hand-in-hand with goal setting. Sports scientists have documented that athletes who set specific goals and log their progress outperform those with no goals or vague “do your best” approaches. For example, rowers who kept training logs and set personal goals showed improved attendance and performance compared to those without set goals. Writing down goals in a journal effectively becomes an “accountability partner,” making it harder to skip workouts and easier to stay disciplined since you can see a blank entry where a session was missed. Over time, this accountability translates into better consistency and performance.
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Data from Other Sports: Research in sports beyond baseball reinforces these points. A 2024 study in cycling found that a self-monitoring routine significantly improved training performance for competitive youth cyclists. Cyclists tracked their performance after each training session and the coach posted the results; the study showed improvements in volume, intensity, and consistency across all athletes who journaled, along with positive feedback about the process. This mirrors findings in other sports that when athletes actively log and review their practice data, they tend to train more precisely and effectively. In short, the principle of “you manage what you measure” holds true – tracking performance helps athletes in any sport reach higher levels.
Psychological Benefits of Journaling for Athletes
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Reducing Stress and Anxiety: Journaling provides a private outlet for stress, nerves, or frustrations that come with competition. Sports psychologists have found that expressive writing can alleviate performance anxiety. In one notable study, students who spent 10 minutes writing down their worries before a high-pressure exam improved their test scores by nearly a full grade. The act of “unloading” anxieties onto paper freed up mental resources needed to perform
. Similarly for athletes, writing out pre-game jitters or concerns can clear the mind. Emptying those worries onto a page means less mental chatter during the game and more focus for peak performance. Coach Logan James, a college lacrosse coach, notes that journaling is “a safe way to vent or express yourself without immediate feedback,” helping athletes let go of frustrations and find inner calm before competing. -
Boosting Confidence and Self-Awareness: Journaling has been shown to improve self-confidence and mental well-being. By routinely recording achievements, positive feedback, or even overcoming small challenges in practice, athletes remind themselves of progress made. This reinforces a growth mindset. For example, one coach observed that journaling allowed her to be honest with herself and build greater self-awareness; as a result, “the better I understood myself, the more I could navigate my next steps to improve my mental health and my play on the court”. Writing about daily wins (and losses) gives a balanced perspective, teaching athletes to see failures as opportunities to learn rather than reasons to lose confidence. Over time, a journal becomes a catalog of personal growth that an athlete can look back on to see how far they’ve come – a huge confidence booster during slumps.
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Goal Focus and Motivation: Writing down goals and tracking progress toward them in a journal keeps athletes goal-oriented and motivated. Psychologically, the journal acts as a commitment device – once you’ve written a goal, you’re more inclined to follow through. Coaches often have athletes jot down specific performance goals and action plans in their notebooks. As one college coach put it, “What good is a goal if we aren’t actively taking steps to reach it? With journaling, you can continuously go back and see where you had setbacks, overcame, saw success, and so on.”. By logging daily or weekly progress, athletes create a visual timeline of their journey. This not only motivates them (it’s satisfying to record a new personal best or a completed workout streak), but also sharpens focus — the goals stay top-of-mind. Sports psychology research consistently finds that specific, written goals lead to better outcomes than vague goals, and journaling is an excellent way to reinforce that process.
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Building Resilience and Growth Mindset: Journaling fosters resilience by encouraging reflection and learning from challenges. Writing about obstacles – a batting slump, a tough loss, an injury rehab – helps athletes process what happened and how they can adapt. Sports psychologists refer to this as reflective practice, and it’s been linked to greater mental toughness. Over time, a journal becomes concrete evidence of overcoming difficulties. “Journaling gives you an opportunity to look back on that time in your life and see how far you’ve come, both physically and mentally,” notes coach Jaylynn Stewart, adding that growth can be hard to notice if it’s not documented. By reading older entries, athletes realize they have conquered past challenges, which builds confidence to face new ones. This habit of self-reflection creates a growth mindset – athletes begin to view setbacks not as failures, but as steps in their development, each with lessons to apply. In essence, the journal becomes a training ground for mental resilience, strengthening an athlete’s ability to bounce back.
Testimonials from Professional Players and Coaches
Real-world examples from baseball and other sports underline how performance tracking and journaling can elevate an athlete’s game:
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Taj Bradley (Tampa Bay Rays prospect): Bradley, one of the Rays’ top pitching prospects, attributes part of his breakout 2021 season to keeping a daily journal. He diligently noted down pitching tips from coaches and his observations from each outing. Coaches were amazed when weeks later he could recall a detailed tip about his cutter because he had written it down in his notebook
. Throughout that season – in which he dominated minor league hitters – Bradley’s “attention to detail and enthusiasm for learning, evident in the pages of his notebook,” helped propel him from a mid-level prospect to a likely Top-100 prospect . His coach said those written notes led to advanced questions and adjustments, accelerating his development . Bradley’s takeaway: writing things down gave him an edge in understanding and retaining coaching, directly translating to better performance on the mound. -
Todd Stottlemyre (3× World Series Champion): Former MLB pitcher Todd Stottlemyre has spoken openly about how daily journaling and reflection made him a more resilient and focused player. After struggling with personal tragedy and confidence, Stottlemyre worked with a sports psychologist who encouraged him to invest in a journal for processing thoughts. Journaling made him more mindful of his well-being and also “helped [his] career development,” he told an interviewer
. By regularly writing about setbacks or negative emotions, he learned to reframe challenges: “If you’re going through a major setback, write down what it is and how it makes you feel. Once you’ve verbalized those emotions, jot down what it’s trying to teach you,” Stottlemyre advises . This practice of turning struggles into lessons, done on paper, kept him pushing forward. “Pretty soon you realize you’ve taken a hundred steps in progress,” he says, crediting journaling as a form of self-coaching that sustained his long career . -
Skip Bertman (Legendary LSU Baseball Coach): One of college baseball’s most successful coaches, Skip Bertman, was a huge believer in writing things down. When he took over as head coach at LSU, Bertman literally wrote out his vision for the program. During a long drive, he spoke his ideas into a recorder and later “transcribed his road ramblings onto a yellow legal pad,” listing every improvement, goal, and big idea he had for the team
. That handwritten page – later laminated and revered – became one of his most effective motivational tools . He would show his players that sheet of paper containing the blueprint of LSU’s future, many of which eventually came true (LSU went on to win five national championships under his tenure). This story illustrates how concretely writing down goals can set a clear roadmap. Bertman’s journaling of his vision didn’t by itself win games, but it focused everyone’s efforts and kept the program accountable to high standards. His former players recall how powerful it was to see that their coach had “written down everything he wanted to accomplish” and how it instilled a sense of purpose and belief in the team -
Taylor Burns (College Pitcher & Coach): Taylor Burns, now a strength coach, reflects on the best lesson from his high school baseball coach: “the greatest lesson I ever learned... was to keep a training journal.”
He started journaling at 15 and kept it up through his college pitching career. Years later, he cherishes those notebooks. Being able to go back and read exactly what workouts he did, how he felt, and even what life lessons or quotes he wrote down is one of his favorite activities.
Burns says seeing the progress (and even regress) over time in his training and mindset is “extremely valuable.” It shows him how far he’s come and reminds him of the challenges he overcame during tough seasons. He even rediscovered a long-lost freshman year journal, which vividly brought back how challenging that first year of college baseball was – and how much he grew from it. Now, as a coach, he uses that experience to communicate to young athletes about perseverance. His story is a testament to the long-term value of journaling: it not only helps in the moment, but creates a record that athletes can learn from for years to come. -
Additional Voices: Many other professional athletes and coaches advocate for journaling. Sports mental performance coaches (like Brian Cain, who works with baseball players) often incorporate daily journaling as part of training. They find that when athletes “journal and execute on intention and reflection,” it sharpens their mental game and consistency. Even beyond baseball, elite performers from Olympic weightlifters to tennis champions have used training logs or journals to reflect on each practice. The chorus is clear: maintaining a performance journal is a habit common to many high achievers.
Cross-Sport Evidence Supporting Performance Tracking
While our focus is baseball, it’s worth noting that the benefits of tracking performance extend to virtually every sport:
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Endurance Sports (Running/Cycling): Keeping a log is standard practice in sports like running, cycling, and swimming because it works. Coaches of marathon runners, for example, rely on training logs to gauge an athlete’s readiness and to tailor training loads. As mentioned earlier, research with competitive youth cyclists showed that a regimen of self-monitoring performance after each workout led to measurable improvements in how much they trained and how well they adhered to target intensities. The cyclists also found the process motivating (the study reported positive social feedback and “social validity” for the journaling routine). Similarly, in track and field, athletes who journal their workouts can more easily pinpoint when they hit personal records or when fatigue might be accumulating, allowing timely adjustments. The underlying principle is universal: when athletes track their training and reflect on it, they gain insights that translate into better performance.
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Team Sports (Football, Basketball, etc.): Athletes in team sports also see gains from journaling and self-reflection. In soccer academies, young players are often encouraged to keep notebooks on what they learned each week or how they felt in matches. This builds tactical understanding and self-awareness. In one case, an English Premier League youth coach had players write brief reflection diaries which led to more engaged and mentally prepared players (anecdotal club reports noted players came to team meetings with clearer questions and ideas after journaling their thoughts). While formal studies in these sports are still emerging, the practice is growing. Sports psychology programs across disciplines routinely include journaling as a tool for mental preparation and focus. Even in individual sports like tennis or golf, where the mental game is crucial, athletes use yardage books or journals to note conditions and thoughts during each round, then review them to improve strategy. It’s telling that across such a variety of sports – from endurance events to ballgames – tracking performance and reflecting in writing is widely recognized as a best practice for improvement.
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Injury Rehabilitation and Recovery: Another cross-sport benefit of performance journaling is seen in injury rehab. Athletes recovering from injuries in sports like football or hockey often keep rehab journals to track their progress and stay motivated. Research in sports medicine psychology shows that writing down rehab exercises completed, pain levels, and feelings each day can improve adherence to rehab programs and maintain a positive outlook. For instance, an injured athlete who journals can focus on controllable factors (like doing their physical therapy, getting good nutrition and sleep) rather than dwelling on being sidelined. This maintains a sense of purpose and momentum during recovery. Many athletic trainers encourage journaling during rehab as a way to celebrate small milestones and keep the athlete mentally engaged with their sport even if they can’t compete.
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Academic and Mental Performance: The crossover between academic performance and athletic performance is also noteworthy. The earlier example of writing before a test
parallels what some coaches have their athletes do before games – a quick journaling exercise to center themselves. It’s all about freeing the mind of clutter. In both domains, the evidence suggests that writing things down helps perform better when it counts. This is why you’ll hear of professional athletes writing notes to themselves in the locker room or keeping gratitude journals; these practices, though not about physical skill directly, contribute to a stronger, calmer mental state that clearly benefits performance.
Bottom Line: Keeping a baseball performance journal isn’t just an empty ritual – it’s a proven method to improve your game both physically and mentally. From the minor leagues to the World Series, and from the weight room to the psychology lab, the consensus is that tracking your progress leads to better progress. By writing down goals, recording daily work, and reflecting on both successes and struggles, you create a personal roadmap to improvement. You’ll train smarter, stay motivated, build mental toughness, and ultimately play better ball. So next time you pick up your baseball notebook, remember that each entry is a small investment in your future success – and science, psychology, and pro athletes all back that up.
At Always Grind, we're passionate about athletic performance. We created Baseball's first specific journal/notebook dedicated for players to track their goals, practice, and performance. Since 2019, the AG Notebooks have been seen in Big League Dugouts, used by entire MLB Organizations, and Hundreds of Colleges Nationwide.
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