When it comes to professional sports, I’m a shameless homer for my beloved Philadelphia sports teams particularly when it comes to the Phillies and Eagles. \u00a0And when our teams are on a roll, which the Phillies have been for the last five years and the Eagles for more than a decade, I will hardly miss a beat on \u00a0any of the news coming out of \u00a0pre-season training camps–battles for roster spots and \u00a0how \u00a0 veteran players are shaping up for the season are stories that \u00a0fascinate me.<\/p>\n
So I’ve been listening with great interest to the news coming out of Clearwater, Florida, the spring training home of the Phillies since the beginning of recorded history. \u00a0This year the Phillies have assembled a starting \u00a0pitching staff that \u00a0 is considered the best in major leagues by a wide margin, and perhaps one of the greatest starting pitching rotations in baseball history–not that I am biased (nor am I unaware of the ridicule I’ll face if the Phillies don’t make it deep into the post-season this year).<\/p>\n
Over the last couple of days I’ve been listening to interviews of some of the Phillies veteran players as they talked about \u00a0the philosophy behind their individual \u00a0training regimens and I found the parallels to \u00a0 the disciplines that any great trader needs to possess to be uncanny.<\/p>\n
Phillies slugger Ryan Howard, for example this morning, pointed out that \u00a0while it is good \u00a0for rookies to listen to the overabundance of \u00a0advice that they will get from coaches and teammates on how to correct flaws in their batting style, \u00a0at the end of the day \u00a0the player has got to find out the style that works best for \u00a0him <\/strong>and work to improve that everyday. \u00a0At SMB we teach that same lesson to all of our traders, in any trading practice.<\/p>\n Phillies star pitcher Cole Hamels the other day was recounting a spring training \u00a0outing in which he \u00a0 \u00a0struggled in the first three \u00a0innings \u00a0and began to defeat himself by focusing on the number of runs he had given up and a few pitching errors that the opposing team exploited. \u00a0Then in the fourth \u00a0inning he decided to simply \u00a0focus on “just making one good pitch at a time” and he settled down and pitched very well for the rest of \u00a0his stint. \u00a0At \u00a0SMB we preach the concept of following \u00a0“one good trade” with “one good trade” \u00a0repeatedly to our traders as the key focus in each trading day, tuning out the result of our most recent trade (whether positive or negative) \u00a0and working to simply make sure that\u00a0 this<\/strong> trade \u00a0 meets all of the characteristics that we define as a high quality, well executed and \u00a0well conceived trade.<\/p>\n A veteran pitcher and former number one draft pick \u00a0Matt Anderson, attempting to make the Phillies staff this spring, spoke this morning about his awe \u00a0in the \u00a0work \u00a0ethic of \u00a0Cy Young award winner \u00a0Roy Halladay. Apparently Halladay runs up and down the steps of the stands \u00a0each day as a workout regimen that he has personally \u00a0adopted. \u00a0Here’s a guy who could easily rest on his laurels as the best pitcher in baseball but instead he chooses to be the hardest working player on the team. I have no doubt that \u00a0he’ll have another great season. \u00a0And as readers of our blog know, there is no getting around the hard work and preparation \u00a0necessary to succeed at trading. Trading, while \u00a0a blast, is in fact very difficult to master. Without hard work and preparation, \u00a0we have found that no trader has a shot at being consistently profitable–just like great baseball players.<\/p>\n Here’s to a great season for the Phillies and a great trading day from the rest of us!<\/p>\n Seth Freudberg<\/p>\n Director, \u00a0SMB \u00a0Options \u00a0Training \u00a0Program<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"