The Royals Work On Their Minds

The sport of baseball can be a very frustrating one for those who play it. If you hit .300 on a season, you would consider it a pretty good year, yet you still "failed" 70% of the time you stepped to the plate. It doesn't just affect hitters, either, as teams can struggle through a season. Just think if you play for the Seattle Mariners.

It's May 31st, two months into the season, and you're 21-35 already 11.5 games behind the Angels. Your season is over, yet you still have to play 106 more games. That means you have to show up at the park everyday for the next four months, fail repeatedly, and do it all for naught. It's enough to drive a man crazy, which is why some teams are now employing the services of sports psychologists.

Like the Royals for instance. The Royals haven't seen the post-season since they won the 1985 World Series, and have finished over .500 only twice in the 14 year history of the AL Central division. In some way, you have to figure that the constant losing by the organization has to invade the psyche of those who play for the teams, whether consciously or subconsciously. Which is exactly where the psychologist gets involved.

The Royals were stumbling through another loss when the newest member of the organization walked into an empty room overlooking the field at Kauffman Stadium. A 53-year-old psychologist sat in a cushioned chair, glanced down at the diamond and began to explain.

"My job here," Andrew Jacobs said over the sound of fans, "is to be of assistance to the players and coaches to help them mentally deal with whatever it is they have to deal with, whether it's a personal issue or a professional issue.

"This is a game of failure and how you deal with it. It's a game of negativity. George Brett is in the Hall of Fame, his career batting average is just over .300, he failed nearly twice as many times as he succeeded. So failure is inevitable.

"How they deal with that, how they cope with that dictates the success you'll have in your career."

So what all this means is that once the Royals get over their issues with their mothers, they're going to be an unstoppable force.