Many more athletes drafted and signed.
Countless college commitments, and tons of new members added to the team.
Let's dive into what made this year special and where we're headed in 2024.
1. We added another 14 members to the Tread team 👏
Last year we added 19 members to the Tread team. This year we added another 14, including 9 more coaches.
These include Leif Strom, Sean Fisher, John Lantigua, James Morisano, Nash Bryan, Aaron Bechtel, Tyler Germanowski, Victor Sanchez and Ryan Flippo.
We also have 10 new performance coaches starting this January (I know, crazy), as we plan to continue scaling our remote and in-house training to new heights.
Notably, while most private companies exclusively lose team members to pro organizations, Tread is actually seeing coaches leave pro baseball to start careers in the private sector.
John Lantigua (Pirates) and Pat Robles (Astros – starting 2024) both made the switch.
Both John and Pat are also fully bilingual, allowing us to more readily serve Latin players moving forward.
We also further increased compensation for Tread coaches, with an incentive structure added allowing our coaches' earning potential to exceed $100k+ in year 3 and beyond.
Other notable hires
Ross Seaton also joins us from Pro Ball, most recently holding an upper-level role as the Director of Pitching for the Arizona Diamondbacks.
In all, the team is now eclipsing 50 members – and we're excited about the extremely impressive level of talent relocating to Charlotte to start their Tread careers.
2. We're Still Hiring 📈
Piggybacking off of the last point, we're still looking for a number of new hires in 2024.
Currently, these include 5-10 more Performance Coaches and a Performance Analyst, although we will be announcing more openings on our social media pages throughout the year.
You can learn more about those positions on our Careers Page.
3. Tread Now Offers Rehabilitation ⚕️
As I alluded to above, we hired Dr. James Werner to serve as our Director of Rehab here at our headquarters in Charlotte, NC.
As such, Dr. Werner is tasked with supplying rehab to in-house athletes, serving as a point of contact for injured remote athletes, and helping revamp our return to throw & rehabilitation protocols.
We spent several months scouring the country to fill this position and received many top-flight candidates including current MLB Physical Therapists.
Ultimately, Dr. Werner's clinical skills are a massive addition to our operation, allowing Tread to be a destination not just for performance, but for rehab as well.
You can check out his bio on our careers page.
4. We Hired Fully Bilingual Coaches
This is a big deal, as we attempt to expand smart, accessible training for pitchers to a wider audience in pursuit of our shared mission:
Tread exists to help athletes re-write their stories.
5. We Launched Tread Merch
While we've supplied T-shirts internally for years to our in-house athletes, we haven't made merch available for sale for the first 8-years of our existence.
With the addition of a Marketing Department, we now have tons of merch being added to our site, including hats, sweatshirts, headbands and tees.
We also did limited edition merch drops for Veteran's Day and a Breast Cancer Awareness t-shirt fundraiser.
Keep following our social media accounts for future gear releases.
You can check out our full selection of merch here.
6. We had 13 pitchers drafted, 48 free agent signs, 5 MLB debuts, 2 All Stars and 5 World Series Champions
Here he is describing his story as well as a fun tweet on his call up by Jeff Passan.
In addition to these MLB Debuts, we also had 2 remote athletes selected as All-Stars – Josh Hader and Mitch Keller as well as 5 remote trainees on the World Series champion Texas Rangers: Jordan Montgomery, Josh Sborz, Chris Stratton, Dane Dunning & Will Smith (who has now won back-to-back-to-back World Series).
7. Many More Athlete Transformations
While there are too many to recount here, we try to post the best stories on social media throughout the year. Here are a few that stand out:
Cole Ragans went from 92-94 in 2022 to 96-101 mph as a starter and won August AL Pitcher of the Month:
16-year-old Joey Abbazia went from 86-88 mph to touching 93:
View this post on Instagram
Dalton Mall overcame chronic knee pain and jumped from low 90's to touching 100 mph and signing with the Tampa Bay Rays:
Danny Glenos went from 88-90 to averaging mid 90's in 5 weeks:
College RHP Cole Leaman went from 88-91 to 94-97 mph:
Remote athlete Dylan Matheson went from 86-88 to 94 mph in 4 months:
Matthew Driver went from 87-90 to touching 96.8 mph in a bullpen over 7 months:
Caleb Meeks went from mid-80s & “lost” to sitting mid-upper 90's. It's one of the crazier mechanical transformations I've seen in this short of a time:
Sidearm pitcher Brad Case started throwing Queso, going from 83-85 to 88-90 mph from a low slot:
Zach Mizrahi went from low 80's to low 90's in 1 year:
This list is just the tip of the iceberg, so make sure to follow our social media accounts for regular updates of many more athletes.
8. We have coached 1000+ pro pitchers since 2017.
We've been fortunate enough to continue branching out within the pro baseball world.
Since 2017, we have amassed a huge sample size of pro level players, which helps us to continue refining our approach to velocity development, pitch design, physical preparation & more.
While we pride ourselves on our ability to help these guys with the most complex problems, we place every bit as high of a priority on all of our high school and college players as well, with over 750+ college commitments at this point in our history.
9. We Released a Course: Mental Skills 101 🧠
One of my main personal projects over the course of 2023 was revamping Tread's approach to remote mental skills preparation and development. Members of our team and I spent the better part of 8 months designing the curriculum and training program for this course, and it launched to rave reviews this fall.
If you haven't checked it out, you can do so here.
10. Top Content from 2023
If you missed any of it, here are some of the most viewed posts and videos from 2023:
Top Around the Mounds / Podcasts:
- How To Train As A Submarine / Sidearm Pitcher
- How To Throw Hard As A Short Or Tall Pitcher
- Throw Harder By Using Back Leg Tension
- From 2 TJ Surgeries To 101 MPH 🤯 | Pete Fairbanks
- The Coach Who Fixed Aroldis Chapman | Hector Berrios
Top Breakdowns:
- How Does Yoshinobu Yamamoto (山本由伸) Throw 99 MPH?
- How Does Jhoan Duran Throw 105 MPH? | Pitching Mechanics Breakdown
- How Does Paul Skenes Throw 102? | Pitching Mechanics
- Aroldis Chapman's Resurgence Back To 104 MPH
- 104 MPH Freak Or Elite Mechanics? | Ryan Helsley Breakdown
- 103 MPH At 5'11? | Yordano Ventura Mechanics Breakdown
Top Product Review:
Top In House Highlights:
- Free Agent Throwing 100 MPH In A Pen
- The Knuckleballs Are Just Plain Filthy 🤮
- Lower Body Workout With A 100 MPH Pitcher
- Female Pitcher Sits Mid 80s In Bullpen | Genevieve Beacom (Unofficial World Record?)
- Intern Throws Nasty Pitches In Bullpen
11. We Built a Biomechanics Lab 🔎
After almost a year of research and deliberation into which system we would be installing, we installed a Qualisys Markerless Motion Capture System at Tread 2.0, creating one of just a handful of private baseball facilities in the world that have such an in-house system.
This software and series of cameras is able to accurately assess a pitcher's biomechanics without the need for dozens of markers to be placed on a pitcher's body. This is important because it allows the potential for hundreds of motion captures to be collected on a weekly basis.
This means athletes have the ability to throw on the mocap system weekly, with their biomechanics being objectively monitored every time they come in-house.
Our current lead biomechanist not only throws 98 mph and holds an advanced degree in Biomechanics, but we are adding a PhD level biomechanist starting in early 2024.
While we are still in the process of data collection and customizing the lab to our unique setup, this will continue to prove a major difference maker for our athletes in 2024 and beyond.
While the space is exclusive to remote athletes at this time, feel free to reach out to express your interest in joining our athlete community.
Where are we headed for 2024?
What do we have in store for 2024? While there are some projects we can't announce yet, here are a few goals we can discuss:
- We will be expanding our biomech team. As mentioned above, we'll be expanding our biomechanics team to further speed up research and development.
- We'll be ramping up short feature films. We have a formally trained cinematographer starting in early 2024, who will be tasked with bringing our athletes' stories to life. Our goal is to release these short films monthly, starting in Q2 of 2024.
- We have over 10 new coaches starting in January, and will be looking for 5-10 more. Apply on our careers page if interested. We're also seeking a Performance Analyst to round out our Data Team.
- Further ramp-up rehabilitation at Tread. We are looking to make Tread a rehab destination and will continue building these pipelines with agencies, college programs and pro organizations to bridge the gap for their athletes during the offseasons.
- Continue releasing educational content. We recently ran a poll on each platform asking people which type of content they wanted to see more of. Unsurprisingly, people seemed to want more mechanical breakdowns and sample drills/exercises to try. On top of continuing other types of educational content, these will be a big focus for us in 2024.
I also wanted to take the time to thank our team – and especially my partner and Tread's Co-Founder Coan McAlpine for believing in the vision and kicking ass in 2023. Now it's time to double down on that mission in 2024.
Closing Thoughts
Are there any products, content or offerings you would like to see us add in 2024?
Let us know by shooting an email to contact@treadathletics.com.
We take your feedback seriously and incorporate as much of it as possible into our planning.
Here's to reaching your potential,
Ben Brewster
