Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the DIY Goalie Podcast, where hosts and goalie coaches Nathan Park and Connor Munday share their insights on how to become a better goalie.
Speaker: Goalies, how are we doing today? Welcome back to another episode of the DIY Goalie podcast presented by True North Goaltending. It is just myself in the host chair today, but we do have a returning guest in Evan Carrillo, who is going to be joining us ah for, I think, the second time on on the pod. um so before we dive into that though just a couple things i wanted to mention we did have a goalie um pull out of our august 10th to 14th camp so now we do have one spot available if you guys missed the boat on that you guys can head to uh to our website at truenorthgoaltending.com there is a spot available there if you guys want
Speaker: and The other thing too is we do have the issues with our shop figured out. So that is back on the website as well. and So you guys can check that out. um And so we brought Evan back on today because I really wanted to dive into his podcast that he has. And we'll link that up in the show notes. But it's called the Cortex Athletic Review. um But Cortex is C-O-R-E-T-E-X.
Speaker: um so i know that probably kind of messes some things up on the search for you but uh but that's all good so thanks again for joining us today evan how are you doing and how's your off season going Off season's great. um It's been a little bit of time away from the arena, which is been nice. It's been welcome actually. I'm back on the ice next week or this coming week for helping a friend out with a camp. But, you know, I've been able to get a lot of stuff done around the house and some other like background
Speaker: um background stuff that's just kind of on the shelf behind the scenes during the season done. Yeah, yeah, that's good. Yeah, I kind of, I think I marked this past Monday as the official start of the season, looking at the schedule and everything that's coming up. So I kind of am now saying from here till March, it's it's basically go time. So yeah. It is nice to have that little window of ah of being away, but it it's crazy how quick it comes up and how how all of a sudden it's like, oh, the season's right around the corner again. but so But no, good to hear that you got a little bit of time away at least and and have a little bit more ahead too. um
Speaker: It's probably nice too getting the summers off from from the teaching job as well. kind of Everything lines down at once. say Uh, yeah, it is a bit of a sprint. Like there's a little bit of a gap once the main hockey season ends in March or April, and then there's some spring programming that happens there. But for like me at school, track and field season is actually,
Speaker: um It's just as busy as like gen or December almost. So yeah, it kind of comes to a stop at once and then you kind of forget about everything for a little while. And yeah, now all the emails are coming in already about training camps and stuff like that. So yeah, it's back into it almost.
Speaker: Yeah, for sure. So, yeah, the reason that I wanted to be on again was kind of to dive a little bit more into the podcast and kind of the stuff you're doing there. I know we kind of briefly touched on it the last time you were on, but I think at that point you're only like it was pretty new. I think you were only like two, maybe three episodes in at that point. And and now what you're at, 23, 24, something that, think when checked. 27 the latest. Oh, 27. Yeah, I'm a couple behind. But what I really like about what you're doing there is that you're really diving into actual research and kind of getting some science-based evidence kind woven into the discussions that you have. So what I kind of wanted to start with is, I guess, where do you kind of go and look like what sort of resources do you kind of sift through when you start looking for this stuff? And kind I guess, what sort of rabbit holes do you end up going down when you're when you're trying to find some of this stuff?
Speaker: ah I just use something that's available to pretty much everybody on Google Scholar is kind of my starting point for everything. And I've got, you can set alerts for keywords on Google Scholar. So right now I think I've got,
Speaker: um maybe 20 or so keywords going between like athlete development, goaltending. um What else do I have? IIHF, Canadian hockey, like just anything that if there was a peer reviewed study or sometimes they're not even peer reviewed, but it'll be something that's published in a journal or article somewhere.
Speaker: And if that makes its way onto the internet, then um I'll get an email notification saying that this keyword popped up in this new piece of publication. And I'll go through it and star it. And right now I'm currently, i have to probably take some out because 430 some emails behind here with the Google Scholar alerts. So um Yeah, that's sort of the starting point. And then um there's maybe 10 or 15 a day that'll pop up. So there's research that's ah coming out all the time. And it's just a matter of sifting through it. Like I found out NHL in the academic world is actually...
Speaker: More popular in the cancer um research is non-Hodgkin lymphoma. And so once in a while, there will be some NHL one. Like there's ah an article that just came out. It's behind a paywall as some of these are. So it'd be anywhere from $35 to $50 an article that you might have to buy if you don't have access to the journal.
Speaker: um just about the effectiveness of uh screens this last year in the nhl so somebody somewhere did a study on that and published it so um yeah the process is i get the email i kind of sift through it any interesting titles if there are then i start them and come back to it and make my choice uh maybe a day or two before recording and read the article, process it and try come up with the script. I'm not super great at just going off the cuff um and speaking freely yet. So I do have to be reading off of a script just to avoid stumbling over words and stuff. But um yeah, that's kind of the nuts and bolts of how that works.
Speaker: Yeah, I feel like I'm the complete opposite. I should probably try and follow more of a script and less off the cuff. But, you know, it is what it is. i find that at True North, we like to fly by the seat of our pants and go with the flow. um But no, that's. That's good. So from there, I guess, um like what sorts of things do you look for when you are looking through these um these articles and kind of, I guess, how do you navigate through them with a bit of an unbiased lens? And what sort of criteria do you kind of look for when you're you're actually finalizing like what you want to talk about when you um publish an episode?
Speaker: Uh, that's a good question. Once in a while, I'll just have to go back and look at the library and look at some titles. And I'm now I'm like, oh, I've got three of the last 10 are about sleep and athletic performance. So, um, I've always found that kind of interesting and I guess that's a bias that creeps in there, but, um,
Speaker: I try to expand the search a little bit. The thing is, like sometimes you know we've got our blind spots with our biases and um where that's going.
Speaker: um i'm I get a couple of emails that come in from... ah some listeners and um you know one guy was a professional golf instructor and he was asking about different um possibilities for things to do an article on and stuff like that's really good because I'm like yeah I've never would have thought about that on my own um so I guess the first few um ah My bias is probably more towards long term athlete development. And I've always just been really interested in say you have two pretty similar physical athletes, um like physically, stature wise, strength wise, stuff like that.
Speaker: ah one of them goes pro and has a lot of success and the other one doesn't. like What are the active ingredients in that? and um so I guess the long-term athlete development is kind of the bias that creeps into a lot of it.
Speaker: I'm just sort of looking because it's been a while now. Eye research has been um one that's fun. um There are a couple of goaltending specific articles that will come up. and I've always found it amazing that goalies aren't studied as much as they probably could be um given the nature of the sport um like all kinds of mental demands all kinds of ah physical and nervous system demands there um i think they'd just be ah you know really ripe ground for for a lot of scientific research um and it would be helpful as well so
Speaker: To answer your question, i am definitely biased towards, um I think, like some of the ah the active ingredients in long-term athlete development would be kind of the thing. So like um even development models between like what Norway's doing, what Finland is doing, are there elements of that, what Russia is doing? um There's one, twenty episode 21 was specifically Russian goaltender development.
Speaker: And think There's parts of that that I actually added into my own development model now. um So, yeah, I guess it's more to do with long-term athlete development. And I am trying to branch out. Like I do have some keywords that are like military-based, um some that are ecology-based, um and like economics-based. But you know i'm I don't know if I'm at that point yet where I want to start like connecting to really, really unconnected things, but I know for progression or evolution to happen, that's kind of what needs to happen is you need to steal from different domains. so all The plan is to get there, but I'm just sticking with the biases right now.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah, I know. um I don't think they're doing it anymore. But there was a and ah ah really good, really interesting podcast that I think it was Curtis McElhaney was one of the co-hosts and him and ah military air pilot.
Speaker: um They were kind of the two co-hosts. And They talked a lot about the different sides between the two, but how many similarities there are um in terms of like the mental demand and the approach and stuff. I mean, obviously one has a little more high stakes, um you know, when you're when you're a fighter pilot versus ah a goalie, there's a little bit more on the line. But it it was it was kind of cool to, you know, hear the perspective on both and just to kind of see a lot of the similarities. and
Speaker: I do agree with your, your take there on, uh, on just how interesting the position of goaltending is and just how unique it is. And, um,
Speaker: I think part of the reason why it's kind of been held back and and um we'll talk about trends and stuff in a little bit, but I do think it's trending in the right direction. But I think just because hockey as a whole has always been such a laggard and such a kind of traditionalist mindset, like you even look at You know, at the at the NHL level, how much they refuse to basically accept the effects of CTE on on athletes and stuff like that. Like they i don't know, it just seems like the mentality around the sport itself is kind of.
Speaker: anti-innovation almost and and, you know, forward thinking. um I don't know, like, are you starting to see a bit of a shift in terms of, like, a little bit more coming out nowadays with hockey research and, like, you know, I guess more specifically goaltending research or do you think it's still kind of, you know, a little lacking? Like, obviously, I guess it is still lacking, but do you see it trending in the right direction or staying about the same?
Speaker: That's tough to say. I think it's staying about the same. um Just looking elsewhere, i think um like coaching hires is probably an area that you could look at as well to evaluate that because I mean, in in the hockey world, if a professional sports team is going to hire a new coach, you've got, say, a young guy coming up like ah did you have Mike Gabinette at NAICS? No, I didn't. No.
Speaker: um like a young guy coming up like that that is like proven and worked their way up through multiple different levels, um proven that they can win ah really strong development models or you have somebody that for lack of a better word is kind of a dinosaur at this point but they would be the safe pick. In that industry you're just always going to get the safe pick it seems. yeah Somebody that's been there before, someone that's won cup years ago. so
Speaker: because when something, when it doesn't work out, then, you know, there's just less criticism and less, um, hands to the fire there. So I think in that way, there's a bit of a hesitancy to be more progressive. Um, in that sense, I think it is changing though. Like we're starting to see more female coaches that are entering the league in different roles. So I think we're kind of starting to see a shift there.
Speaker: Um, in terms of like what people are willing to try the higher levels so yeah i think in that sense there is evidence that things are coming around like that but uh yeah in the research world it's still still pretty sparse what's coming in for goalie specifically even hockey specifically there's um like there's been more recent articles on the sociological aspect of like what hockey canada has been doing um over the last couple of years than than any specific development models or anything so and i'm referring there to like the the scandals and the accusations and stuff like that so that's been way more popular than any kind of um
Speaker: you know, sports psychology or anything like that. That's been hockey related, unfortunately. Yeah. A little bit more clickbaity, I guess, or trendy or, you know. Yeah. um Yeah. It's funny you mentioned that because we're seeing that play out in real time here in the Edmonton area with the coaching, you know, fiasco that's going on. um What I do find funny though, is I have seen quite a few, like at least in,
Speaker: in you know the social media circles and stuff like that around Edmonton, talking about the Babcock hire um and mentioning why do we keep hiring these you know recycled coaches? And I'm like, well, to be fair, the last two coaches they've had, ah that's been their first NHL gigs, right? so um But I do agree, like in general, hockey and seems to be a little too stuck in its ways.
Speaker: um I also think too, like, although the game is growing, the barriers that the game offers, I think just makes it so that it doesn't gain as much traction or it doesn't gain the traction as easily as some of the other sports. I mean, you look at soccer, you can just grab a ball and you can be kicking it around anywhere. Right. And basketball, like you don't even really necessarily need a hoop. Like I know growing up, sometimes we would just put a laundry basket on a table or something like that. Right.
Speaker: um So how much do you think that kind of affects the, you know, the readiness that or the willingness, I guess, that people have to to kind of put funding into research for for a sport that's maybe a little harder to get get into?
Speaker: Yeah, that's a good point. um I'm sure there's a factor there. I believe the like the overall participation numbers have been decreasing over the last decade or so.
Speaker: And yeah, it's it's easy to see why, like especially if we're um You know, like Canada has been taking in a lot of people from different countries. And, um you know, if you're coming here, kind of immersing yourself in the culture and you have a choice to go with $15,000 a year sport or $500 year sport in in in basketball or soccer or something like that, like you're without knowing too much about it, you
Speaker: Yeah, I think that's a barrier for sure. And I don't know, i don't have any actual evidence on this, but it does seem to be getting a little bit worse and more and more expensive, more inaccessible, perhaps. um I know there's ways like people often cite, um you know, like to outfit a kid with hockey equipment, you need this.
Speaker: $300 stick and $1,000 skates and stuff like that. like It is possible to do it without going top of the line and everything um and to get in, but you know there's still the ice fees. There's still the travel. There's still like the basic gear.
Speaker: It's definitely an expensive sport. That's ah that's a barrier. I don't know. yeah I don't know. I would suspect that it probably plays into um the lack of ah the lack of interest or popularity in the research world, though.
Speaker: Yeah. um Were you diving into this stuff kind of like before you were doing the podcast? Like, was it kind of something you would do here and there? And then with the podcast, you're doing it more frequently or kind of how much were you were you diving into this stuff before that?
Speaker: Yeah, I was before. So I've had the the YouTube channel for a little while. um The big barrier with that is I'm not a ah graphics guy.
Speaker: So once you have the audio and you need to put a graphic to something or a video to something, that was ah a major, major roadblock. And that would like add 10 times the length and effort that went into a video. But so the podcast was just a little bit of a less friction in order to get some content out. And i yeah, I did.
Speaker: I have always enjoyed the research. So like graduating in 2015, my degree was pretty research heavy. So i was familiar with a lot of different articles. And I found like reading through a lot of them, ah you go through the references at the back and you're like, oh, there's an interesting title. That's an interesting title. I recognize those authors. They do some interesting stuff and it's very easy to get caught in a rabbit hole. And a lot of it is um you read it and you're like, this is interesting. This is useful stuff, but it's just not out there. Like most people, myself included, most of the time, if I wasn't doing this, are not likely to go and read through a peer reviewed article that you find on an academic database somewhere.
Speaker: um But yeah, like I as much as I can read that. um And just for myself knowing that I'm at least ah acutely aware of what's new with ah with some of the research out there was important and It's one of those things like if I'm keeping up with it and reading, I just feel sharper and I feel yeah you know no one article is going to be life-changing that you come across. The potency of those is actually quite small um from what you what you gain from each specific article. But accumulating over time, I think there's you know i think there's some value and I do actually enjoy it.
Speaker: Yeah. And for me specifically, just with everything I've got going on, like I find I just I don't have a lot of time to dive into stuff like this. And like resources like the Cortex Athletic Review are nice because it kind of.
Speaker: prevents or presents some of this stuff um in you know a ah somewhat easy to digest way that is also like for me specifically, like my commute to work is like 35 minutes one way. Right. So podcasts are kind of my go to way of getting information. The problem is, is i have like, i don't know, 15 or so podcasts that I like to cycle through and then I get behind and it's it's just a mad cycle. But um Are there any other kind of resources that you find out there that help to break some of this stuff down and make it a little easier to digest and a little quicker, like almost, I don't want to say like Cole's notes on them, but just something that like, you know, you follow that you get tidbits of good information here and there that maybe lead you to dive in a little deeper.
Speaker: um I do, there are a couple of channels on YouTube that I followed. So one was like an exercise scientist. um And I just, I like the way that he, ah he was probably like a kind of an inspiration for it just because he would look at specific exercises, whether it's a bicep curl or a big compound movement, like a deadlift or something like that. And he referenced different articles about which muscles were activating and stuff. So that was kind of the inspiration.
Speaker: um to build something that was similar in a way to bring research into just the the everyday um everyday world. And I do use AI to help break down specifically some stuff like with the ah the statistics and the results. like i'm I'll be honest, I'm not diving into those parts of the articles very much. I'm not i'm getting a little bit more...
Speaker: ah fluent with some of the terms and some of the statistical measures, but there's, yeah, i do have often a chat open where um ah I'll ask questions like, okay, explain this to me like I'm five. What does a R squared result actually mean? And then it'll present it in a way that I'm able to then ah relay that information a little bit a little bit easier because You know, most of the information, honestly, from the articles comes from the introduction and then the the discussion or the results at the back, the the stats and the
Speaker: ah the participants and stuff like that. I don't do a real deep dive in. There's, I'm sure, people out there that, ah you know, like number one, if it's ending up in an academic journal in the first place, there are people that are way smarter than me that have done those really deep combs through all the statistical analyses and stuff like that to make sure that it actually does make sense and it's it's accurate. So I don't spend a lot of time on that, but the odd time I do feel like um it is important. So yeah, I'll still, I'll get some help from our buddy chat oh from time to time just to help explain a few things to me.
Speaker: Yeah, I know there are a lot of people out there anti-AI, but I will say that with the right framework, um like even myself, like just getting it to build documents, if I just say this is what I want and you know all of that stuff, like um definitely when used right can can be a game changer for sure. um So as you've gone through ah this process, I guess, um are there any kind of trends that you've noticed develop over the year when it comes to just athletic development in general? Like, I mean, if you have specifics to goaltending or hockey, that would be great. But I know also that those two areas, there's not a lot out there. But I guess just in general, like, are you seeing any sort of shifts or trends that are kind of interesting in, you know, the general athletic development world?
Speaker: um Tough to say, just because like the stuff that I'm exposed to is with um my... keywords and key terms that come up.
Speaker: um I will say that like there's been stuff that I've tried to, like I'm pretty biased towards multi-sport ah youth athletes. And ah I'm aware of that bias too. So I will look for, is there evidence out there that suggests the opposite? like Am I just kind of um pumping my own tires here with, um you know, like, oh, look, see, this is the way to go. Here's another one that says multi-sport is good. Like what is actually out there saying the opposite?
Speaker: um And I've really have had a hard time finding anything um on those, on the opposite there. So saying that like, you know, it's kind of the Roger Federer and Tiger Woods model, um, where like Tiger started playing golf when he was two years old and kind of stuck to the one sport. And then Federer was all kinds of different, uh, sports growing up. It was, um, one of Malcolm Gladwell's books, actually, there's some good stories about it, but yeah, like that would be one trend specifically there.
Speaker: It's tough to find really anything that suggests the opposite for multi-sport. Um, it's a weird clash because like, as you and I were talking a little bit before, how things just seem to be trending earlier and earlier and earlier where, um, like commitment for kids to, um pick a position or pick a sport earlier. Like the pressure is a little bit higher, it seems. And I think it's more of just like uh,
Speaker: good marketing and a fear of missing out that's being played on. Um, and it's kind of funny because it just, it goes against what most of the research would say, um, in terms of multi-sport. So yeah, that would be one that I've, you know, I'll try and find kind of the opposite just to keep myself in check there. And, but I'm sure I do have some biases that, uh, I haven't been totally aware of yet that I'll, I'll try and check as well. So yeah, I don't know if that's a great answer for you, but, uh, yeah, that's what I've spotted so far. Yeah. I, I actually really liked that you touched on the marketing and kind of FOMO part of it because I, like I've had this discussion. um
Speaker: there, there's a guy I work with who's also a dad of one of the goalies that I've worked with for a handful of years. And, uh, And so we have talks all the time about stuff like this. And he's always asking me questions because as we know, the landscape, at least with hockey these days, is drastically different. Like I'm about.
Speaker: eight ish, nine ish years removed from when I stopped playing. So not even that long ago, but the difference between when stopped playing and now in terms of like the routes to go, the rules, like even NCAA rules at the higher levels, the minor hockey levels, like it's, it's ridiculous how much it's changed. and so he's asking me questions, trying to clarify this stuff and,
Speaker: you know We see on the unsanctioned side and the sanctioned side, you know there's AAA being thrown around. There's gold, major, you know minor, silver, AA, whatever. like um I'm surprised we haven't gotten to the point that we have quadruple A or something like that. because ah you know like The big thing that we talk about or or that I've mentioned to him is I'm like, it's marketing. like That's what it is. like If somebody can slap AAA even we've seen it with some of those rogue kind of tier two junior A leagues or whatever that slap on that they're a junior A league and because of that, you know they can it can get some players from Europe over and spending 20 grand a year or something like that. um So I think that is something that doesn't get talked about enough and needs to be touched on a little bit more in the hockey world is how much of this does come down to kind of the psychological aspect of marketing and trying to get people to, you know, think like they're missing out. And and I do think that is something that's, um,
Speaker: most people don't realize and just because you played it at a certain level and it wasn't major or triple a or gold or whatever they want to call it doesn't mean that you know we can't still have a solid career get through to the high ranks and um I know even this year there was that one senator's pick, I can't remember his name now, but he started playing hockey, I think, what, three years ago and was a first-round pick this year.
Speaker: um So I do think like sometimes that is overblown, the specialization and the I have to get to this level and all of that stuff. so I do think that's a good a good point to bring up. and I don't know if like what your thoughts are on that or if you've kind of seen anything related to that at all, but I'd kind of be curious to know what you think on that as somebody who is involved with the higher elite levels.
Speaker: Yeah, so full disclosure, like I do work in the the club side of things, as you know. So I honestly, I don't even have a problem so much with the non-sanctioned side. And I don't have a problem with um these leagues even existing for for the most part. But the biggest problem that I have with it is that the leagues don't talk to each other, the leagues. So like you could have...
Speaker: um a triple A team in one league and a triple A team in another league and a triple A in another. And those teams just never see each other, especially like CSSHL and AEHL in Alberta here will from time to time, maybe at a tournament.
Speaker: because they're both under the Hockey Canada insurance model, but like the non-sanctioned and sanctioned, I don't know, i don't think they ever actually play against each other.
Speaker: And so you're really leaving out a true assessment of if what you're product is, is actually AAA or not? Is it just um marketed as AAA, AAA tracksuit, cool pantshells, stuff like that.
Speaker: But the actual level, like if you were to cross over and play a top AAA team in the AEHL or CSSHL, is that score going to be 12 to 1?
Speaker: um So that's probably my biggest problem with it is just that And I thought I saw, I don't know if it's a fake Facebook page, but there's another ah another leak that I think popped up too somewhere, probably non-sanctioned. And like giving people choice, I think that's where... um these non-sanctioned leagues sort of originated from is just ah people have a, you know, if you're in your draw zone and you have a problem with a coach or a director or a board member or something like that, or the club, it's just not a good situation at the club. I do think that you should have some choice available to you. I don't want anybody to be stuck somewhere that is going to be bad for them.
Speaker: But the problem is when you go and play somewhere else that, know, you know, they can call themselves whatever they want, but the reality is they're just never checked. If you're just playing other teams that are also just calling themselves whatever they want, like you're really not getting a true assessment of what that hockey is. And likewise, how the recruiting works is ah teams will go and offer ah top player or top prospect um a really discounted rate or something to get on that team just to say that they're here and oh look ah you're going to all these scouts and they're going to get all this exposure because look who's on your team here so we need to fill up the roster and
Speaker: um you know, so that kind of a double edged sword there as well as it really thins out the talent pool. So you really don't like best on best is no longer a thing.
Speaker: And if we really want our top players from the province that we're representing to go up, then, um you know, you need to have best on best competition and that with all these different silos doesn't happen anymore either. So,
Speaker: um i've I've actually started tracking the number of Alberta players that have been selected for the World Junior roster over the last, I think it's, what's my thing go here, maybe 10 or 15 years now. And it's decreasing almost, like I think it was two roster spots ah from, like it's trending downwards for sure. And I i don't know if like that could be due to any number of things, but um And Alberta is not the only province doing this.
Speaker: But in my opinion, like we're if it continues to go this way where you know you can you can be a double-A player with triple-A money and you're going to be a triple-A player, you're not actually triple-A player. And I don't mean to take anything away from the kids. you know If you're happy and excited that you made a triple-A team, that's great. I don't mean to take anything away from that. But...
Speaker: the people behind the scenes that are causing this to happen. um You know, Alberta representation is going to be in trouble, I think. And, um mean you know, we're like I said, for all those reasons, best on best um and just really thinning everything out and really muddying your real assessment of the actual caliber of hockey that we're looking at here is going to be in trouble.
Speaker: Yeah, I think um the unsanctioned side, in my opinion, there are good things and there is a reason it exists. um And I've worked with goalies on the unsanctioned side um that at 10 years old, I'm like, man, you're better than I was at 16. But um the the one thing that kind of sucks, though, is that There is also a lot of, I guess, for lack of a better term, garbage on that side too, right? Like you you have a lot of people.
Speaker: the problem is is that with youth sports, it should be what is the best way to give this athlete the best opportunity? And I feel like there's too many people out there that have made it more about how can I profit off of this as opposed to how can we give these kids the best development to get to the highest level that they possibly can and to your point I think too that that's also led to a lot of kind of that thinning out and like back when I played you basically went to your minor hockey zone club and then if you were good enough you went to your um you know
Speaker: your elite level zone club, your double A, triple And then from there, you basically either went major, junior, you went junior A in college. And that was kind of, you know, i was a single track, nice and easy to go. Now it's like,
Speaker: You know, there's four different options on the unsanctioned side and then there's the sanctioned side. And once you get to the higher levels, to your point, there's the academies and then there's also the clubs. And it's just an absolute gong show. And I do feel for the players and the parents and stuff like that nowadays just because of of how.
Speaker: You know, confusing it is and how many options there are. and And it is hard to figure out like, oh, this club is saying they're AAA.
Speaker: Awesome. Let's go. And then you go and it's a five team league that, you know, you're spending 20 years. thousand dollars on and there's 30 kids on the roster or something like that right and and so i think there is a a point too that you have to really make sure that we're doing the research and and you know getting other people's accounts like that's that's a big one too is getting experiences from other people as to as to what they've experienced at their time and all that and also taking a look at
Speaker: the people behind the league and the teams. Cause that's another one too. Like some of these people, they'll run like a league for two years and it gets shut down and folded. And then what they do is they just start up another league. That's exactly the same with a different name. And and that's kind of a,
Speaker: another danger, I guess. So um now more than ever, I guess we got to do do a lot more research. But um I guess as we're kind of getting close to time here, what I do want to ask you is as you've gone down this journey and kind of done more research and all of that stuff um through some of these papers,
Speaker: Was there anything, I guess kind of a two part question. So was there anything that really surprised you? And then was there anything that really shifted your way of thinking on something like I guess that you had an opinion one way and then you found some research and said, wow, I was drastically wrong on that and have changed your opinion quite a bit.
Speaker: um oops yeah so the first part the the thing that was surprising i guess was funny enough how unsurprising most of the research was there um like the the titles they are a little bit clickbaity as well and some of the titles are um you can tell they're written by like just super academic people that are not uh don't really have a flair for any kind of marketing themselves. But um like you might get a really interesting title about um
Speaker: ah perceptual systems or something like that. And you're like, oh, this is interesting. Let's go through all this. And then you read the paper and you're like, oh, they're like, well, the effect size was um extremely, extremely small.
Speaker: And like you, you know, ah in general, like a lot of if pretty much all the research other than that I'll talk about here was just really Not underwhelming, underwhelming is not really the right word, but it was just a lot less potent than I thought it was going to be. Like I thought having this catalog of um of good research was going to you knowll shift the way and kind of steer my coaching and um development planning and stuff like that, but not really.
Speaker: um You might get a little tidbit from each paper and depending on what you're doing, you may never even use that tidbit ever again as a coach. so I guess that would be the surprising part was how how unsurprising a lot of the the findings are. But I think we're at a point right now to, um especially in athlete development, where we're you know it kind of parallels goalie development, where goalies or goaltending in the ninety s we We thought we were doing things right, but the position looks so different now just because I think we've kind of approached more of an optimal form and any progression um that we make now is going to take double, triple the time um to see because there's just so little left for us to improve on. We're just making adjustments as the game changes.
Speaker: I think I'd suspect that's a little bit of what's at play here too. Um, in terms of the, the thing that caught my attention, um it was an older article, but it was called the mundanity of excellence.
Speaker: And it sort of plays into my, my thoughts of like, you know, you don't need, um It's kind of like the anti-marketing thing where the the difference between ah an elite club or an elite association or organization is nothing that's going to be flashy or maybe even noticeable by a lot of people. But um it's just that they like the the quality of the reps is just not, it's unwavering, it's non-negotiable.
Speaker: ah it was It's episode three. um It's just called Excellence is Boring. And it really kind of is, too. I would i would argue that um it is pretty mundane. it's It takes a certain type of athlete, too.
Speaker: because like we're conditioned now for novelty. um That's why I think like shorts and reels and stuff like that are so popular is just because it's playing on that circuit of our brain that loves something new, something new, something refreshing, re-changing all the time. But um this excellence, it's more just about um the author's Daniel Chambliss and he was writing about a swimming club in California. And a lot of researchers went to go and ah see what these guys were doing because they're pumping out all these Olympic athletes every year but then they get there and watch and they're like this is this is actually quite boring like I'm seeing nothing really new here there's no new tools there's no new gadgets there's no new training or drills or anything like that but um the athletes are
Speaker: they're just aware of the the culture and they contribute to it. And every rep is, um you know, the coaches are holding them to that high standard as well. There's just really no wavering.
Speaker: And part of the thing in that one that got me thinking a little bit was like the difference between, say, double a and aaa It's not even so much a matter of skill, but more of a matter of culture.
Speaker: So if you're around AAA players in the summer, if there's any like aspiring AAA players in the summer that might be listening to this and you've been AA or a single A player for a long time.
Speaker: If you have, ah you know, you surround yourself in the AAA circles and you have people that are going to the gym every day and waking up early and watching what they eat and stuff like that, you might view that as like excessive.
Speaker: And, know, um It might be a bit of a shock because it's more of, it's a different cultural, ah you know, the AAA culture is just different. It's not just a matter of, you know, trying to lift heavier or run faster or stick handle faster or shoot harder or anything like that. It's just like the AAA and the elite culture is that much different. Those grinding things that a lot of people would see as difficult is just the normal thing to do there.
Speaker: Um, So that was probably, it's an old article. It's like 1989 article. So it's about, it's almost as old as I am now. um But it's one of those things that like,
Speaker: I think the half-life on that information doesn't really change that much. Like it's, it's pretty easy to spot that, especially with, you know, with us that work in that industry, you go and do ah a single a or a tier one practice, and then you go to a triple a practice and you're like, these cultures are vastly different.
Speaker: There's some kids maybe on tier one or double a that could hang skill wise at triple a, but the cultures are just so different. And, um, Yeah, that's the part that it really brought to brought to light there. So hope that answers the questions without too much rambling.
Speaker: yeah no i Yeah, I like that because we talk a lot about the consistency in habits. right and um like i as As somebody who's a little bit on the business side too and like a little bit more mathematical, I guess, um it's that whole compound interest thing. right like if you can get that you know i know it's cliche, but if you get that better each day, Well, that 1% of your new baseline is now higher. And then you you know increase that baseline and you get 1% better off of that baseline. And you know that's kind of that snowball effect. But it's the same thing. like
Speaker: There's been so many, i don't want to say studies, but kind of like um talks about some of these high-level athletes, like you know the the whole Kobe Bryant thing where he would, i don't know how many, a couple hundred shots a day or whatever he was taking throughout his career, even at the high levels. and you know To your point, the excellence is boring there.
Speaker: When you go watch you know a goalie session of an NHL team, it's it almost seems mundane, routine. like It's literally like two movements and a shot. right like It's a push out, a slide over, and a shot. it's nothing crazy. There's not 10 players and you know ramps and white pucks and lights and all of these stuff. right like it's it's It's simple.
Speaker: It's building on something specific and some sort of specific habit. and it it honestly and i know they're just basically refining and tweaking and there's not a drastic amount of development that they're doing, but that's that's kind of the point that you get to when you're at the high level is is you're making those small little refinements that don't look flashy they don't look like it almost looks like what are they even doing out there like think you know um so yeah i do agree with that and i i do think that's a point that gets overlooked and i also think that's why too like some coaches fail to gain traction because they're trying too hard to create their own
Speaker: next best thing or have some sort of proprietary edge or whatever the case is, when in reality, it's just how can you hold your athletes to a high quality on a consistent basis? Right.
Speaker: um So I do think I do think that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. um one Just to ah add on that ah quickly, um like a couple of years ago, i I actually took a lot of pride in, um like if I'm working with the team all year, that I didn't do the same practice plan with these kids twice. Because I think coming from the teaching world, if you do the same lesson twice, you're going to get 10 hands that go up right away being like, you taught us this already. You you already did this. You already did this. But yeah. It's completely different in the athletic world.
Speaker: um And that having, like you said, to get that compounding effect, you can't be doing something new every single time. Like you do need to have a pretty solid foundation to grow off of. So um that I think has shifted my mindset. And that article is probably one that helped to do that is like,
Speaker: I don't worry about an athlete saying, oh, we already did this drill. Well, we're doing it again because it's important. This time maybe we'll focus on this, that little thing that's different or something. And um yeah, like ah I've seen a couple of NHL practices as well and I've had a chance to talk to a couple of coaches too. And like it's, yeah, like you said, it's the same thing. It's like nothing nothing fancy. It's really,
Speaker: um You know, like they're not worried about their guys saying, oh, we've done this already. um yeah Like they do it because it's important, whether you've done it a thousand times or if it's the first time that's doing it. So yeah, completely agree that makes for bad radio, but I think we're completely agreeing on everything here.
Speaker: Yeah. Well, and the other thing I'll say, like my, well, I shouldn't say my biggest, but one of my biggest kind of shifts in in philosophy when it comes to coaching um is kind of that, like, I'm a lot more now progression based. And you know to me now like i'm not gonna push a goalie into working on post play if they can't track a puck whereas before it's kind of like okay we need to fit everything in and we need to try and touch on everything and and whatever and it it just doesn't make sense to try and get to that level of
Speaker: you know, skill if you don't even have the basic foundation to build off of, right? And so, um and for a lot of goalies, that is a lot of the not fun stuff. That's, you know, the edge work, the skating, you know, tracking and save execution. Like, you know, if we need to sit you in a butterfly and just literally work on shifting your body and meeting a puck in front of your body, And we do that for half an hour. Well, if that's the way that we need to progress, that's the way we need to progress, right? It's not fun necessarily. It's not flashy, anything like that, but that's what it takes to become a better goalie. And I think that's kind of where a lot of,
Speaker: the athletes and the coaches kind of fall short a little bit is because they're like, well, you know, shouldn't I be doing 10 different slides and, you know, ah all of this fancy stuff. Right. and And it just it's too much sometimes. Right. it's It's kind of that Khan Academy approach where you go at your own pace and you make sure you get you know, the one concept down before then we build off of that into that next step of of whatever that progression is, right? So um I do think any of the goalies and any of the coaches listening kind of need to understand that that's, I don't know, I guess just how it is. That's kind of the process you got to go through if you want to get to that high level. So
Speaker: yeah You might walk into an arena and see a boring drill. That does not mean that you need to go and change clubs to somebody who's using the flashing lights and white pucks and mesh bags and stuff.
Speaker: Yeah, because if you're if you want to get to those high levels, you'll see the exact same boring drill pretty much. so um I guess before we sign off, do you have anything else you wanted to add, Evan?
Speaker: ah No, it's always good to come on and talk Goldie. I think we're kind of getting our little our own islands here sometimes. so yeah yeah It's just ah cool to jump on and and check in with you and chat Goldie for a little while here.
Speaker: Yeah, for sure. No, I appreciate you coming on again. And i thought we had a really good discussion today. So I appreciate that. um Where, I guess, can people find you?
Speaker: um I'm not great on the social media. actually deleted the the Twitter and my life has improved significantly since that.
Speaker: Um, probably YouTube. Um, pretty, I think I've got all my contact information on the YouTube channel. I do have an Instagram, but, um, I honestly, i don't even think I have the app on my phone. Um, but, uh, yeah, all my, I'm probably more, uh, more present on YouTube. And I think all my, uh, contact information is there anyways, including my email.
Speaker: Perfect. And we will link that up. um I'm pretty sure it's just, yeah, Cortex Goalie Development on YouTube. um So we will link that into the show notes. and It's funny you mentioned that on social media. My personal Facebook account got suspended. Some AI flagged me for suspicious activity or something. I don't know why. And I'm kind of limbo on that and it's actually been nice not being able to look at it but the only thing that sucks is now I can't get on the business stuff so I got to try and figure that out but part of me is like I almost kind of want to leave it because it's a lot nicer not to have access to it but um yeah so
Speaker: thanks again evan for joining us thank you guys for tuning in if you like the show please uh like it share it subscribe depending on the platform you're on you can check us out at true north goaltending on facebook youtube and tick tock as well as yeg goalie coach on instagram assuming i can eventually get back in there we do still have posts going on because my social media person does still have access but i don't so we'll try and figure that out but as always you can head to truenorthgoaltending.com we've got our merch up there we've got camps we've got sessions drills all of that stuff um and we are uh gonna be i am hoping that this fall i am gonna have significantly more time to work on some of the content side of things so
Speaker: We'll keep doing in that. But so thank you guys for tuning in. As always, goalies make some saves Take care. We'll see you next time.
