Matt Kata (@MattK8A) is a former Major League Baseball player and the Cleveland Guardians Manager of Youth Baseball Development & Initiatives. Kata graduated from St. Ignatius High School in Cleveland, Ohio. In this video from PCA-Cleveland’s August Breakfast with the Indians, Kata joined President of Baseball Operations Chris Antonetti (@IndiansGM) and Director of Player Development, Carter Hawkins to discuss the importance of simplifying messages for athletes.

In this video, Kata and Hawkins explain that simplicity is important at every level, whether at the youth level for 6 year olds or at the professional level for 36 year olds. As Manager of Youth Baseball Development & Initiatives, Kata is charged with simplifying professional development concepts like "GRIT" (growth mindet, routines, improving fundamentals, and teamwork) in ways that youth can understand. As Kata explains, simplifying so youth can understand these concepts is extremely important early on because those are concepts can be used for the rest of their lives, on and off the field.

Hawkins says that although simplicity is important at the youth level, keeping messages simple is also essential in the pro game. If coaches can simplify a larger idea into an easily understandable core concept that can be modeled, players tend to be much more successful in executing on those ideas.