ASK THE DOCTOR
Tee's Weekly Sports Psychology Advice Column
With Dr. Rachel Enakmas
Dr. Enakmas,
In your professional opinion, what is the right amount of time per week for a male to spend thinking, watching, reading, talking, or writing about sports? I'm not even counting travel time to and from a live sporting event or actually playing a sport. Inquiring minds want to know.
Thanks,
One of the 10 most powerful women in Washington
Washington, D.C.
Dear One of the 10 most powerful women in Washington,
When you say “right” amount of time, I assume you mean ideal psychological focus target measured by minutes per week. And come on, you have to count travel and playing time — how is that not sports-related? Interestingly enough, my published study on ontogeny considered time related to sports among its primary observations. We found that males under the age of 13 and over the age of 50 would be best served spending between 6,100 and 6,400 waking minutes per week dedicated to sports.
As is standard APA practice, we assumed seven hours of slow-wave sleep. Wilmington, Delaware, native James King once logged 9,781 minutes of sports-related activity in a week – the most the study ever recorded. It’s worth noting that 9,776 of those minutes were dedicated to the Philadelphia Eagles. Please keep in mind that these numbers are just targets and it may require a lot of focus and energy to reach these optimum levels.
Dr. Enakmas
Dear Dr. Enakmas,
We have a really terrible player on our soccer team. The coach is getting mad at us for making fun of him. Coach said we are hurting our team’s overall mental health and that a team is only as strong as its weakest link. Is that true?
Justin Caine
Brooklyn, NY
Dear Justin,
No, it is not true. A team is only as strong as its weakest starter. I’ve played on plenty of teams that included the worst player in the league. Most of the time that player’s dad was paying our league entry fee. However, as long as he stays on the bench where he belongs, his lack of ability and mental toughness doesn’t stop the team from winning. Alternatively, you can always seriously injure the weakest link during practice, which would be the psychological method we refer to as “addition by subtraction”. Tell your coach to reach out to me for further clarification.
Dr. Enakmas
Dear Dr. Enakmas,
I am a loyal reader of your column. While watching the NFC championship game with my husband, I noticed the Packers did something called “freezing the kicker” in regulation but decided not to freeze the kicker in overtime. When I asked my husband what that meant, he said, “They are trying to get inside his head. Now get me another Guinness.” So, if freezing the kicker is about getting in his head, I figured you would be one to ask what this is all about.
S. Sperry
Newtown, MD
Dear S.
Freezing the kicker is when the opposing team calls a timeout after the kicker has lined up but before the play starts. This forces the kicker time to think about the kick for a little while longer before he attempts it. It is also possible to freeze the shooter in a basketball game by calling a timeout before an important free throw. It can be an effective technique because the longer you think about an act the more likely you are to have negative thoughts. Research going back to Sir Charles Sherrington has shown beyond a shadow of a doubt that negative thoughts manifest as negative results.
Where I veer from Sherrington is in his notion of a motor plan and its application towards a pre-shot routine. If someone interrupts your pre-shot routine in football, basketball, golf, billards, horseshoes, bowling, tennis, soccer (penalty kick), or any other sport that allows for a routine, you should immediately stop and start again at the beginning of your motor program. As long as you focus on sticking to your pre-shot routine you will not consider how your career, marriage, or credit report would be affected by choking during a big shot. I hope this answers your question, Sperry.
And in the future you should have your husband’s next Guinness ready before he has to ask for it. Are you really a loyal reader? C’mon Sperry, you’re better than that. Use your head.
Dr. Enakmas
Dear Dr. Enakmas,
The famous competitive-eating Render brothers were evicted from an all-you-can-eat buffet for eating too much. Please help them with their self-esteem.
Captain Ern
Hampden-Sidney, Virginia
Dear Captain,
Assuming their ejection was part of a training exercise for an upcoming event like the Fruitland fried oyster championship, the Crisfield crab-picking finals, or Hunan Palace’s buffet (competitions daily), I would think the famous Slender and Meat Render would take this expulsion as a badge of honor. Are we sure this was a blow to their self-esteem?
They say in the sales profession that you know you are doing your job when someone asks you to leave the building. I would think the same is true for competitive eaters. I’m just glad to hear the Renders are training together again after the infamous incident in the Horse Bridge Golf Course grill room. Professionally speaking, I feel like Meat gained the psychological edge on his older brother after he beat him in last year’s Fourth of July hot-dog eating contest while voluntarily adding Cheez Whiz to all 73 of his Eskay Ball Park franks. It was truly one of the great mental psych-outs in recent memory.
Dr. Enakmas
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If you would like to have Dr. Rachel Enakmas answer your sports psychology question, please feel free to write to teesweekly@teesweekly.com