In March 2018, some of you may have seen this article already, NBA player Kevin Love penned an honest and open piece in The Athletic regarding his personal struggles with anxiety and depression titled Everyone is Going Through Something. In this piece, Love essentially made the case that mental health impacts everyone and can even be intensified for those that play and work in professional sports. Perhaps unintentionally, this Love piece was a watershed moment for the focus on mental health in professional sports because it placed an emphasis on athlete mental health that was not previously there. It also triggered other athletes to start speaking out on their own experiences, whether it be online or in interviews, and highlighted the importance of providing resources and treatment for mental health concerns to ensure athletes remain healthy and safe and on the field of play without interruption. As Dr. Shikati previously mentioned, mental health is clearly linked to physical health and performance and should be included as a component of athlete health and wellness programs with appropriate attention and resources that I'll be discussing here today. In the past few weeks alone, we have seen a few high-profile events with a mental health component in both professional and amateur sports. They have ranged from struggles with the media, substance abuse issues, and even consideration of high-performing athletes walking away or talking about early retirement, even though they're physically healthy. Before turning to our summary of MLB's approach to mental health and our development of a best practices model, it is important. There's many team positions for Major League Baseball teams in the audience here, but for those that are not aware of the structure of professional baseball, I want to provide a very high-level and brief summary of the structure of our industry and the challenges that we face in developing a best practices model. The most high-profile aspect of our industry, the Major League Baseball section, we have 30 baseball teams based in the U.S. and Canada. There are 1,200 players, and they are represented by a very powerful union, the Major League Baseball Players Association. Anything related to player health and safety, the rules on the field, or the treatment and care that they receive, there is an obligation on the part of the league office, who I represent, to negotiate and reach agreement with the union on any aspect of the workplace that will affect the athletes. Our athletes also play 162 baseball games in 185 days. That includes a lot of travel, not a lot of rest, and a lot of days away from their family and on the road, which clearly can impact a player's mental wellness. There's also a much larger group of our industry that is the minor league baseball infrastructure. There are over 180 teams that are based in the U.S., Canada, and the Dominican Republic. That group includes over 7,500 players. They play variable season lengths, and probably the biggest challenge that we face with this group is that nearly a third of them are from Latin American countries and do not speak or at least English is not their first language. Finally, other affiliated groups and stakeholders that are critical to the essential functions of the industry of baseball are the umpires, the officials, the coaches, the team personnel that supports the athletes, the constant influx of new athletes coming into our system. Our draft is on Sunday, and there will be dozens of new players that are signing with teams and becoming professional baseball players for the first time, and also their families. As Love said, mental health is not just an athlete issue, and it is very, very important for us and for us to be successful to support all facets of baseball in this area. I like to think that MLB has been a leader on and prioritized the topic of mental health for nearly the past two decades. That's primarily through the efforts of Dr. Larry Westreich, who will be speaking in a minute, but the recent focus on mental health has presented an opportunity to evaluate our existing policies and refine the resources we currently have in place. Our objective, as laid out here on the slide, and all along, but certainly over the past three to five years, has been to create an inclusive environment throughout MLB and minor league baseball that promotes and makes available proper and accessible mental health resources for our athletes, our club employees, and their families. The goals of our mental health initiative are to further increase mental health awareness, to de-stigmatize the challenges that our athletes and our staff members may be facing. We want to make sure that we're providing proper and first-class, world-class services to our players and club personnel. We want to make care-seeking a normal process and someone that people don't have to be shy about or keep confidential, and most importantly, ensure that those in need receive proper, confidential care and assistance when it's needed. Now, I was originally hired by baseball back in 2006 to oversee and run our joint drug-testing programs, and our approach on the mental health front is actually based on the model that we have had in place for many years under these programs, where we essentially work hand-in-hand with our players' union, who, again, are the legal representatives of our athletes, and the athletes themselves, in creating confidential and effective evaluation and treatment resources for those in need. This same joint model has been employed for our league-wide domestic violence policy, our alcohol, marijuana, and off-field conduct policies, and this set the framework for the first time for mental health resources and treatment providers to be required under the terms of our collective bargaining agreement in 2016. We have also worked with the players' union to develop criteria for players to go on the injured list when they are struggling with certain mental health issues and require treatment. We have made sure to create an early intervention-style approach on awareness through such programs as our annual Rookie Career Development Program, and perhaps most importantly, we have established a web of credentialed and licensed mental health clinicians throughout all of our organizations to develop trust with the players and to provide assistance when needed. Moving forward, mental health will continue to be a major focus of our athletes and teams. We renegotiate our collective bargaining agreement every five years, we're actually engaged in that practice now, and we anticipate engaging in a collaborative review and update of our current policies and resources with our players and with the players' union. Our goal is to continue to improve on enhancing and promoting the resources and awareness on mental health throughout our industry. We look to further define the roles and responsibilities of the mental health professionals that are in place to assist our athletes. We are working currently right now on establishing minimum standards for the mental health services that are provided. Dr. Westreich, in a minute, will be speaking about our action plan and our approach to mental health emergencies, and perhaps most importantly for the time that we're engaging in right now, we are coming off of the COVID-19 pandemic. Things are obviously opening up, and we're all happy to see that, but that has created significant unprecedented mental health issues and concerns for our athletes, and we want to make sure that we take the learnings and the experience that we've engaged in over the last 18 months or so to see how we can improve our industry as a whole. If I were to make one recommendation for improvement in this area, it is critical to create guidelines on the roles and responsibilities of the mental health professionals in our industry or any industry. There are important distinctions between those licensed clinicians that can diagnose and treat mental health issues or psychological concerns, and those mental skills coaches or professionals who are in place to assist athletes with the mental aspects of the game or the sport that they play. It is also important that these professionals collaborate with one another, be aware of the areas that they are responsible for, and refer athletes to the proper individual should an issue arise. It is also critical to involve the athletes themselves, listen to them, and hear their perspective on what resources are important and how entities like Major League Baseball can support and assist them with the challenges that they perceive and face. Finally, we would not be successful in this area without the assistance of experts and treatment providers that have assisted the league and our athletes throughout the years. I've listed a few of them here in case that can be helpful to you, and if anyone is interested in seeing more detail, more granularity on the education and the resources that we make available to our major league and minor league athletes, the player resource center that's online is available for anyone, it's publicly available with no password protection. Thank you again for the opportunity. I hope you will reach out to me if we can be of assistance on this topic or provide further detail on what was discussed today.

MLB

mental health

professional sports

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athletes' wellness