The MVP Machine: How Baseball's New Nonconformists Are Using Data to Build Better Players

by Ben Lindbergh

The Cubs, who plan to conduct their own research with players in the instructional league, obtained data on Jha’s program that Baker says “shows a cognitive increase when people do it seven days a week and just a stabilization of cognitive function at something as small as three times a week, twelve minutes a day.” At the start of spring training, they present their players at all levels with a one-page summary of the scientific benefits of mindfulness practice, and they promote the regular use of free meditation apps. The resulting program is a mixture of hard science, Stoicism, and Eastern philosophy. “All the stuff that we do works great for the general population to bring them back to homeostasis,” Baker says. “But when you put those things onto the elite athlete, our vision is that it elevates them beyond what they are now.” The goal, Baker says, is to get players to reset and dismiss distractions before each pitch, allowing them to “play thought-free and allow all of the years of practice and training that is based on all of these scientific measures now to just express itself.” To do that, they have to “consciously and nonjudgmentally come back to this moment right now and go, ‘So, that happened. Now what am I going to do about it?’”