Ben Pensky

Walking home from the gym a few months ago, I was thinking: there’s gotta be an accessible way to help players work on the mental side of their game. I wanted to create a platform that gives athletes the tools to track their mindset and reflect on what helps them perform their best. It’s about more than just sports psychology; it’s about giving athletes a personal journal to understand how they feel and what works for them. The Mental Pitch can also be a great tool to use hand in hand with a sports psychologist or therapist. Discussing the journal with a professional could be incredibly beneficial, as most people need support with introspection. The Mental Pitch also gives players an opportunity to walk into meetings with a written account of the thoughts and feelings they want to talk about. I want players to be able to look back and see what they were doing when they were at their best, so they can get back to that mental space when they feel “off”. It’s about learning how to take control of your mind, and setting yourself up for long-term success - on and off the field. I hope you use The Mental Pitch to learn more about your game and life.

I’ve loved soccer for as long as I can remember, and I have a decent memory. I remember my third grade “shoe box project” being solely about Messi. I walked into class with my Messi jersey on, and a full shoe box: inside the box was a mini trophy (representing his ballon d'ors and champions leagues), a syringe (representing the growth hormones he had to take), a picture of the Barcelona badge, a mini “copa” soccer cleat, and whatever I had to write about him. 

Soccer has always been a big part of my life, but it hasn’t always been the best part of my life. I’ve faced many mental challenges, and they have helped me realize how important it is to focus on the mental side of the game.

When I was in high school, I dealt with some pretty serious depression. A part of it stemmed from soccer. My coach would yell things like “Wake up!” or “What are we doing?” when we weren’t playing well, and it didn’t feel like the kind of support that would help us grow. The yelling was usually about actions that we weren’t doing on purpose, like a mis-hit pass. And then, there were the three times he singled me out in front of the whole team, yelling at me, bringing up my dad and other factors that were not in my mind until he put them there. As time went on, I got a new coach, but the pressure I was putting on myself wouldn’t go away. I was focused on getting college offers, and I was stressed most of the time I was on the field, with my club team. I committed to play soccer at Tufts University, but decommitted 4 weeks later because of pressure I put on myself and a building confusion about what makes me happy. When I decommitted, I also decided to quit my club team. It was a big “deal.”

After quitting soccer, I walked into my school’s head football coach’s office, and I asked if I could join the team. It was already two weeks into the season, but he said yes. I had fun, but after a few weeks, I started going to the soccer field most days after playing D-Line at football practice. I still loved soccer. There was a lot of therapy and self reflection while juggling a soccer, or tennis, ball on my high school’s soccer field. I realized that soccer wasn’t the problem. I reached out to my now college coach, about possibly recommitting to Tufts. He couldn’t have been more supportive, and he said I could be on the team that fall. 

I ended up tearing my ACL and both menisci in a football game the following Friday night. I had to face the reality of being injured, and I was back at rock bottom. That injury was horrible, and it helped me understand what it’s like to be sidelined physically and mentally. Not wanting to do school work, loving to lay in bed, and not “getting” to do a hard workout was my reality for weeks.

As my rehab progressed, my mental state seemed to progress with it. The summer before my freshman year of college, after a lot of work on my physical and mental health, I finally felt like I was getting back on track. Unfortunately, my freshmen year wasn’t fun either. A week before flying to Boston for my freshmen year, I started having knee pain again. Neither menisci had healed properly. I was out for the season, had another surgery, and was back in rehab. This time the mental battle felt even tougher. 

I wasn’t consistently doing the things I needed to do to heal, and some weeks, I even ignored my rehab schedule. I didn’t fully recognize I was skipping rehab, I was just focused on the fact that I was showing up to watch practice every day, and traveling to most games. My hope for the rehab journal aspect of The Mental Pitch is to allow players to be self-aware, especially when their depressed, anxious mind is tricking them into not holding themself accountable. I wasn’t holding myself accountable, and I didn’t even realize it. Everyone has different levels of self-awareness. When I’m anxious and depressed, I become much less self-aware in some ways and more self-aware in others. The Mental Pitch can help healthy and injured players become more self-aware, and they can recognize certain thoughts, actions, or habits they wouldn’t have acknowledged without a consistent, easy-to-use journal. 

The first week back from winter break my freshmen year, I met with my coach. I told him that I wanted to work my a** off to play next year, as well as build a better, closer relationship with him. It felt like I had turned a page. This is also when I decided what I want to do with my life: help athletes become the best version of themselves.

When my sophomore season rolled around, I was playing, and most importantly, enjoying the game again. For the first time in a long time, I was in control of my emotions while playing. My sophomore spring went well too, and that was when I was having the most fun I’ve ever had playing soccer.

Just when I thought everything was finally going well, I got injured again during the summer before my junior year. I lost that flow I’d worked so hard to find, and my confidence plummeted. My mental game flipped upside down. Instead of focusing on improving, I started worrying about what other players thought of me - like whether or not my teammates trusted me enough to give me the ball or not. I didn’t want the ball anymore. 

My thoughts were beginning to negatively impact my performance, but in the moment, I thought it was my performance impacting my thoughts. Using a journal to track where my mind was going during games and training sessions would have helped me recognize the root of my poor performance, negative self-talk, earlier.

When my mental game switched, I felt like a different version of myself off the field. A lot of days it was hard to get out of bed. When I was the most injured I was all season, I’d wake up at 8am, have class at 10:30, and I’d sit in bed and think until 10:20. Then I would decide if I was going to go or not. I knew I was depressed, but I wasn’t holding myself accountable in all aspects of my life. I thought I was giving my all for my teammates and coaches every day. I thought because I was hurt and pushing through it, that was enough. The truth is, I was getting treatment before practice every day and working as hard as I could during practice, but I could have been doing more work in the gym and doing more cardio that didn’t involve running.

The point of me explaining this is to allow The Mental Pitch’s users to understand how and why I came up with this idea. Being self-aware is difficult, especially when your thoughts and feelings aren’t how they typically are. I didn’t realize that I could’ve been doing more, for my team and in the classroom, until I reflected on this past fall. The Mental Pitch allows athletes to realize negative changes in their standards in real time, instead of when they start feeling better months later.

When I was not in the best spot this past fall, it felt like my school work consumed me, and every day of practice felt like pain. I didn’t even have the energy to ask for help, talk to a therapist, or consult a sports psychologist. The idea of The Mental Pitch stems from someone understanding how it feels to be in a bad spot because of injury, negative thoughts, and depression. Thank you for reading more about why I created The Mental Pitch; to give athletes an even more accessible way to put their mental state first.