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Yoni Rosenblatt: What's up guys? It's Yoni. Super excited to have you listen to my conversation with Nick Moore. I just wanted to give you some background and some color and some context around this conversation. I brought Nick onto the podcast because he is so well inform. He has an awesome knowledge and background in strength and conditioning, in rehabilitation and prehabilitation, but also because he lived in this elite level baseball world. He played professional baseball in the Red Sox organization as well as he is currently the starting long snapper for the Baltimore Ravens in the NFL. So he has an unbelievable background and he took an awesome path to get where he is today, but also because he has a very high level understanding of strength and rehab, it allows us to get into the weeds a little bit about what got him to where he is today physically. And so that's really the goal of the podcast, is to make you guys listening just better Sports PTs.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Nick is gonna help you do that, and those are the guests that you're gonna frequently hear from people around this rehab and physical therapy community that's gonna educate us and make us better at what we do. So understanding Nick's story is gonna help you provide better care to your athletes that are in front of you and hoping for your help on a daily basis. So without further ado, please enjoy the conversation with Nick Moore. True Sports Physical Therapy podcast thrilled to have Nick Moore join us. Nick Moore is the long snapper for the Baltimore Ravens, longtime friend for sure.
Nick Moore: Yes.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Of the practice.
Nick Moore: Yes.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And super excited to hear the Nick Moore origin story. Tell us all about you. Introduce yourself to sports physical therapists across the world.
Nick Moore: So my name is Nick Moore, as Yoni said. I'm going into my third year with the Baltimore Ravens. I am at 29, about to be 30, so getting up there in age. Graduated high school back in 2011. Got drafted to the Boston Red Sox in 30th, round in 2011. Spent about four and a half years or so with them, and got cut in my fourth spring training, right at the end. And by that time I was pretty much done with baseball. I was kind of burnt out, so I went a different route, went back to college, walked on at the University of Georgia, walked on to football as a linebacker, and, did that for about two weeks and moved to fullback and, played fullback for about two and a half years. And then, 2017 I moved to part-time, basically part-time fullback, part-time, long snapper. Played a couple games, at Long Snapper in 2017. And then 2018 my senior year, I moved to full-time long snapper and played out the whole year, in my senior year. Played all 14 games, did the Reese Senior role in, January of 2019, and then entered the draft in 2019 and eventually went on as undrafted free agent to the New Orleans Saints.
Nick Moore: Got cut in the... After the second preseason game in 2019 back when they... We had four games. So I played two games there, I got cut, dabbled around, did some workouts and stuff like that. After I got cut and then at three or four weeks into the regular season 2019, I was kinda like, there's no way I'm gonna get picked up at this point, I haven't played yet. So, I got a desk job. I worked as a financial accountant, for this company outside of Atlanta. And then, signed to the XFL in, December of 2019. I played that all the way through until Covid happened in March of 2020 when everything kind of shut down. So... And the XFL kind of suspended its season, and then two weeks after that I signed to the Baltimore Ravens March of 2020. And I've been here ever since.
Yoni Rosenblatt: That's a crazy story. And what's...
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And what's crazier is I've heard it before and you just lining it up like that and just saying it as if all those things are normal...
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Is even more shocking to me.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So just to to quickly summarize, you were both a professional baseball player at a really high level. You made it how far?
Nick Moore: I double two... 10 days in Double-As.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay.
Nick Moore: 10 days.
Yoni Rosenblatt: A cup of coffee, Double-A.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And now you're a professional football player?
Nick Moore: Yes.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So you are the most accomplished baseball player in the NFL?
Nick Moore: Yes. I'm the only one who has actually made... I think Hayden Hearst made it into A ball. And all the other guys didn't really play.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So it... You know, in my world, the stereotype is that I'm either gonna be a doctor or a lawyer, and if one of them doesn't work out, this happened to my college roommate. He said he wanted to be a doctor, it didn't work out, so he just became a lawyer. Is that the norm when you were growing up? You're like, Hey, I'm gonna be a pro athlete and if it ain't baseball, it'll be football?
Nick Moore: Yeah, I mean, I think I knew for me, I always wanted to be, I always wanted to be a baseball player, right? I never, dreamt of playing in the NFL. We never really watched the NFL growing up, being in Atlanta, you know, the Falcons, I guess when we had the Super Bowl in '99 or 2000, you know, we did the Super Bowl festivities, but growing up in the south, I mean, college football is everything. And my dad, we, you know, we grew up watching Georgia football games from the time I could, you know, see anything on tv. And so like, I just always watched... For me Saturday was football. Friday we play high school, Friday night lights, and then Saturday we watched college football, and then Sunday we just kind of hang out and do whatever. So NFL wasn't really on my radar. Baseball was always the dream for me. I gave it my best shot, it didn't quite work out for me, but, I definitely tried my hardest but yeah, so football, I honestly, like, I went to college with no aspirations of getting here. Like I was, I went to college to go to school.
Nick Moore: To get a degree and get a good job. And I used football as a way to meet people 'cause I was older going back to school. So I was in 22, 23 when I was a freshman. So I was five years older than some of my classmates. So football was a way to meet people and sports has a way of bringing people together and it kind of... Getting rid of the differences or what have you. So sports is a great way to do that and that's kind of why I did football and I wanted to use that as a way to make connections with... In the business world.
Yoni Rosenblatt: I love it.
Nick Moore: You know, outside of sports, when I got done with college, it would've been a great way to... A great, I guess a bit started to talk... Started to talk to somebody like, "Yeah, I played football at Georgia." And then... You know people love that. So it would've been a great way to kind of get my foot in the door in some of these business places around. And I just kind of fell into my role. Now, I...
Yoni Rosenblatt: I think you're right, like the way you try to use sports to network.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: To get your first gig. I think you could've done that with minor league baseball. I think that really takes you far too in a lot of places. I know for us, when we're looking to hire sports PTs, that's gold. I don't even care what level, I mean, it's awesome to put a division one athlete in front of another athlete to help them, but if you played anything, I think you're a better employee.
Nick Moore: Yeah. It's just easier to relate, I think.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yeah, no questions. So what I wanna dig into, 'cause that's... That story is fascinating and it speaks to your resilience just as a person and your preparation. But you struck me right away as soon as we started working together about your knowledge around the weight room, around fitness, around performance. It's something you're obviously passionate about.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So I wanna hear about what really is the difference between training, strengthening, conditioning, rehab, prehab in baseball, high levels versus football. What have you noticed?
Nick Moore: So for me, I mean the... I guess the stereotypical baseball style of weight training and strength conditioning is more about like endurance type of stuff. You're not really... Strength isn't as much of a factor 'cause you kind of have a base level of strength. Strength has always been a very strong point of mine. It's always been a strong suit I've had, so I've always focused on...
Yoni Rosenblatt: So you're a bigger dude just for those who aren't looking at you.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So... And you played what positions in Baseball?
Nick Moore: I got drafted as a third baseman and played first base as well.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay. So you're playing corner in field spots.
Nick Moore: Corner, yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: You are a bigger dude. Tell me what the lifting looked like then for a bigger dude, specifics, 'cause you're... Talking to an educated audience.
Nick Moore: Yeah, that's true. We have... So like when I was with the Red Sox at minor Leagues we... One of the things I really, really liked about our strength and conditioning was... Alright, the guy who ran the team was Mike Roose. He was a former special spec ops guy military. And so he had a different way to look at it than a lot of people, but he was... It was every... Everything was individualized. So we had like truly individualized. So everything we did, what I did was very specific to me, what my body was good at and what my body needed to work on as far as rotational stuff, a lot of core stability type stuff, a lot of single leg balance control, a lot of single leg squats, single leg RDLs, stuff like that. And then a lot of that rotational app like core, what I would consider the trunk as far as like the quads, the hamstrings, the glutes, the low back and the lower abdomen of the psoas area.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And that came out of assessments of where you needed to work?
Nick Moore: Yeah, we did FMS I believe.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Right. And the Red Sox were notorious for like, doing that throughout their entire org.
Nick Moore: Yeah, everybody, yeah, we all did it in spring training. That was like kind of the first thing we did. So we had... We had these baseline... I mean everyone calls them conditioning and strength tests I guess, but really we had our conditioning tests, which was 300 yard shuttles, which was rather tough, but...
Yoni Rosenblatt: For the corner and fielders?
Nick Moore: Yeah. Well, I mean... It's just tough in general. It's just... It's not a fun... It only lasts a couple minutes, but it's not... I mean we had... We did 55 seconds to run it. You had three minutes and five seconds in between. And so basically there's four groups running it. One group would run, then they would wait until the other three groups ran and then it was their turn to go again. And, that was kind of the baseline when you get into spring training. But we also had like, you had to do barbell split squats with a certain percentage of your body weight and you had to be, and you had to do inverted rows, I guess supine bar rows if you... It makes sense so.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Prone?
Nick Moore: You... Yeah. So you're laying...
Yoni Rosenblatt: On the stomach?
Nick Moore: No, so you're laying underneath like a bench.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Oh, got you. Okay.
Nick Moore: And you're holding onto the bar and you're basically doing an... Like a pull up, like an inverted pull up. So your body's kind of like this and you're pulling your chest to the bar and you're coming down, your feet are kind of elevated on the bench.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Australian pushup we call it.
Nick Moore: Okay. So it's like a literally a reverse pushup.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yeah.
Nick Moore: But we called them inverted rows and so you had to do... You had a certain number, I think the number was 15.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay.
Nick Moore: So to get 15 of those and you had to get like six of each leg on the barbell split squat, whatever your percentage of your weight was. But the strength stuff wasn't... It was more of just to kind of check in and make sure you were doing, you were working out in the off season. The conditioning test is what really was like, "This is the test... Like this is a true test." So we also did what we called... We had... Our fields are... You know they do the clover where there's four fields kind of in a circle and it was called the super lap. So it's essentially a mile and you'd have to do a super lap in seven minutes... Eight minutes, eight minutes, sorry.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay, so that was the Sox what year?
Nick Moore: This was 2011, actually 20... Mike got hired in 2012. So 2012 to 2015.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay. And had you... It has definitely changed now 'cause I know people in the Red Sox org.
Nick Moore: Oh yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: But I mean they were... At, at more of the cutting edge, just being systematic about it. Like using FMS and kinda coming back to it. But how did you feel about that? Like, how did you feel about their strength and conditioning? You feel like it prepped you to...
Nick Moore: I... Yeah, I thought we did a lot of stuff that, it definitely helped. Like... 'cause one of the biggest things in baseball is you deal with that... You play for so long your body starts breaking down. And I think one of the things that they did really well was kind of not necessarily eliminate that because it would happen just because of the grind of baseball, but they did a really good job of giving us that muscle endurance that would help us kind of push off. You know you... A lot of guys in baseball by middle of July you're like, "Dude, I am ready to be done." We've been playing since February. We go to spring training in February and by July you're like, "Dude... " The 4th of July hits, you're like, "Man, we still have two months of baseball." And so that is like one of the big things in baseball. You have to learn how to get past. And I think that Mike and the guys with the Red Sox did a really good job of kind...
Nick Moore: Help making that... That show up in the beginning of August. Giving us that a little extra juice, a little bit extra muscle endurance, that helped kind of push that off a little bit and kind of prolong our ability to play well. 'Cause at the end of the season you're just doing everything you can to put it together.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yeah.
Nick Moore: Baseball is a... Is a is a very different sport.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So... Absolutely. It's a marathon.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And it sounds like you were kind of training for that, so that's awesome. What'd it look like in the season?
Nick Moore: So in season was tough in the... For me, I was... I did extended spring training a couple times. So we were down in Florida in our main facility. So we have... I had access to all the normal stuff. So we are doing... We are on more of a regiment, like a regular routine 'cause we don't travel overnight. So we would basically travel... We played the same three teams. We played The Orioles Monday and Tuesday, we played The Rays Wednesday and Thursday and we played The Twins Friday and Saturday. So we'd drive there, come back the same day, you're working out during extended... I think we were working on like five days a week.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Five days a week in similar type of moves?
Nick Moore: Yeah. Very similar. It wasn't... Now some people were heavier, like I like to do heavier weights. So we did a lot of what I would consider 90/90 bench press with the dumbbells. Inclined dumbbell, flat bench or flat... Yeah, flat bench dumbbell and we would do a lot of the leg stuff trying to just continue to build... 'cause you're not really, extended is a different type of grind than the regular season. You're still playing ball, but the travel and the wear and tear of not sleeping and all that stuff and the bad dieting doesn't really affect you as much in extended spring training. So you're really still trying to build up that base for when short season hits in the middle of June. So we did the... For me there was no difference between extended and regular spring training. You just kept... It was literally the same exact routine, it's just two months extended. That's literally what it was.
Yoni Rosenblatt: It's brutal.
Nick Moore: So it was... A lot of it was the same. Now you get to the regular season. When you get to long season, it becomes more... A lot trickier because you're traveling into these small towns throughout America and... Like Batavia New York and Fish Kill New York and Lowell, Massachusetts, where we were at Mahoney Valley, Ohio, all these small towns. And you're driving through the night. I remember one trip we played in Staten Island at 7:00 AM or at 7:00 PM, sorry. And we had a extra in game playing 12 innings, and we had to drive all the way to Mahoney Valley, Ohio, it was an eight hour drive, and we had to play the next night. And it's like... So you do something like that, you can't work out for like three or four days 'cause you gotta play the game.
Nick Moore: That's the priority. So the workouts during the season, you really start off really good, but then as the season goes on, you're just... It's like you're almost checking the box, as bad as that sounds. And so it definitely became light, like less weight. Most of it was body resistance or band resistance, very lightweight stuff. Still trying to build up the... Have the reps high, like a high reps game. But it just... The weight went way down and it was more of body maintenance at that point just to push you through the end of the year so that you didn't completely fall apart in August, which happens to a lot of guys.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yeah. And then any rehab component at that point?
Nick Moore: For me, not... Other than your regular shoulder maintenance, making sure your shoulders and elbows are still really strong from throwing a lot. Playing third base, you're throwing a lot. And then just regular maintenance, like making sure your back is good, your knees and your feet and stuff like that. I didn't personally have any injuries in baseball, so I didn't do a whole lot of rehab stuff. But I know like in extended you have access to the... That's where the big leaguers rehab. So you have the access to the same trainers that they do when they come down. And like when I was there we had... Dice Kay was hurt a lot, Carl Crawford was hurt a lot, Ellsbury was hurt a lot. So we had a lot of big league talent that was down in Fort Myers. So we're getting access to guys that were using it, they're getting access to some of the best doctors we had to supply, because between Ellsbury and Crawford, that was 200 million for us, you know at the time. And that was when 200 million was a lot?
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yeah.
Nick Moore: A hundred million dollar... A hundred... I think Crawford signed a hundred million dollar deal and that was like 180, I think. And that was huge, and he didn't play it all.
Yoni Rosenblatt: They... He didn't play at all for the Sox.
Nick Moore: No. No.
Yoni Rosenblatt: When they came down there... Like if they come down to Double-A, Triple-A, they're covering the spread.
Nick Moore: Yeah, most of the time.
Yoni Rosenblatt: What are they doing for you down there?
Nick Moore: So we had... Crawford was with us for about three weeks. He played with us for about three weeks. He was down there for about three months. I remember it was 2012, was my rookie season. So I was in the short season or I was in the GCL, is what it was called. But it was like the first level of base professional baseball. And so him and Ellsbury, we had them both at the same time. And Ellsbury... Excuse me... Ellsbury was down there... I think he probably played like two weeks, like 10 games with us, and I think Crawford played closer to 20. And Ellsbury, I don't think he did anything for us.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Come on.
Nick Moore: Yeah. Well...
Yoni Rosenblatt: A hundred million.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: He's not taking you out for a Sandwich.
Nick Moore: No. Extended is... Being down in the rookie league like that, when you're at the facility, it's totally different. 'Cause he's in the other side. He's in the big league locker room.
Yoni Rosenblatt: You don't even see him.
Nick Moore: No. We only saw him at the game. He didn't practice with us. He didn't... We saw him... 'cause like for us, we had big league batting cages, big league fields and big league locker room. So it's totally separate.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Totally separate.
Nick Moore: Yeah. From us. We were in the lower levels.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Now, you're sharing docks.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Are... You're sharing weight rooms?
Nick Moore: Sharing weight... Yeah, we only had one weight... There's only... Or there was at the time, only one weight room.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So you're seeing what they're doing.
Nick Moore: Yeah. You're doing the same stuff. So it's like he was doing... I remember he did a lot of body weight stuff, a lot of slide board. He did... He loved the slide board. A lot of rotational... I don't know the exact terminology.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Do you think it was different than what you were doing though?
Nick Moore: It was definitely, definitely a little bit slightly different. Yeah. 'Cause he was dealing with... I can't remember if it was like an oblique thing he had at the time.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So, I like that it was individualized.
Nick Moore: Oh, everything was... It was honestly impressive 'cause there's a lot of dudes in the professional organization. Now, it wasn't as individualized during... Like if you're in Double-A, let's say. It was... 'cause you got one trainer, he's usually... And I, for one... For instance, when I was in the minors, all the guys we had that weren't... So our guys that were real Red Sox trainers, they were in the big leagues, then they were in charge of the Rookie league in Florida. Those were our two main guys. And then we had... We had threes, other guy's name was Edgar. But he was there cause he was bilingual and stuff like that. But he was also in Florida. And then the dudes that are spread out throughout the organization are kind of guys that... They're only there for a year, they're kind of... I don't wanna say interns, but essentially they're glorified interns.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And they're bouncing.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Nick Moore: And so they don't... And it's... So it's not as individualized. It's more of a, "Hey, let's get infielders over here or middle infielders here, catchers over... Pitchers over here," stuff like that, but.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay. So compare that.
Yoni Rosenblatt: To what you see in professional football. Now, what you... I assume it's different, but you tell me what you've seen in XFL...
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: For whatever that was. And now with the Ravens and the Saints in the NFL.
Nick Moore: Yeah, so the XFL was... It was something. We did kind of... We had a strength coach, I honestly can't remember his name, but he was with the Dolphins for a couple years. He worked with the Dolphins. But it was... We didn't have a whole lot, so we... Our facility was the Cincinnati Reds old baseball facility. And it was kind of run down, so they had converted the batting cage into an outdoor weight room, kind of.
Yoni Rosenblatt: How many swings did you take there?
Nick Moore: If there was actually a batting cage there, I would've taken a lot. [laughter] We practiced on the Old Spring training field, and I would... Dude, I'm telling you, I would imagine hitting home runs everyday. [laughter]
Yoni Rosenblatt: I'm sure you would, instead of snapping. Yeah.
Nick Moore: Yeah. But...
Yoni Rosenblatt: What was training?
Nick Moore: So it was... We had a pretty decent set-up, but we did your traditional football lifts, we did bench, power clean, and squat. And our trainer had stuff for us to do, but it was one of those things that it's kind of like a semi-pro league, so you kind of do whatever you want.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Position specific?
Nick Moore: For... No, not at that time, I wasn't doing anything position specific at that time. What I would do was, my roommate was our punter and he was a big workout guy, super jacked, kind of looks like the Liver King.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Oh.
Nick Moore: Not quite you.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay.
Nick Moore: Not that jacked.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yeah.
Nick Moore: But... So we did a version of the Westside Barbell...
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yep.
Nick Moore: Type style workouts. We would do heavy arms and then we would do heavy legs and we would do... I think he called it recovery arms, recovery legs, and then we would do kind of a fast twitch arms and legs. So him and I would go to... I can't remember the name of the gym, but it was essentially a Golds Gym or whatever. We were in Plant City, Florida. Yeah, in Polk County. And so we would go to the local gym and we would go everyday. We'd go six days a week at 6:00 AM, before practice, we started practice at nine. We had to be at the facility at nine. So we would go at six because we only had to workout twice with the team and they were not good workouts.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So you're lifting on your own.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Trying to stick around.
Nick Moore: Doing everything I can.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Trying to create some tape.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: You're doing Westside Barbell stuff that you and the punter decided.
Nick Moore: Yeah, he basically made up our workouts. His name was Jake Showman. He was super jacked and like...
Yoni Rosenblatt: You mentioned that.
Nick Moore: Very very shredded.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yeah.
Nick Moore: And I was like, "Man, this would be awesome if I could just get shredded."
Yoni Rosenblatt: Did it work?
Nick Moore: No.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Okay.
Nick Moore: I got huge though. I did get jacked... I did. I went from 250 to... That was when I got to the 260 range.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Did it make you a better snapper?
Nick Moore: I think it definitely... So I look at tape from 2020 when I was here in Baltimore, like in training camp. And that was like... I'm a really good snapper... I'm a different snapper now. But velocity and stuff, coming off those workouts... 'Cause we did that from basically December to March everyday.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So you felt like your velocity...
Nick Moore: Was way... Yeah, it was...
Yoni Rosenblatt: Accuracy? Did it affect it?
Nick Moore: Accuracy was... I mean, 2020, I feel that was one of the better times in my snapping era.
Yoni Rosenblatt: You credit Westside Barbell workouts for that?
Nick Moore: I don't necessarily know if I credit Westside Barbell, but what I was doing with Jake definitely helped. 'Cause that... When I was in the XFL, I was a good snapper, and even when I was with the Saints, I was a good snapper, but I wasn't quite... I wasn't anywhere near. And I think a lot of how I was in 2020 had to do with who I was working with, Morgan Cox. I think he kind of homed in on a lot of the raw skill that I had and definitely made me the snapper that I am right now.
Yoni Rosenblatt: What's up guys? It's Yoni from True Sports Physical Therapy. We are always looking for awesome sports PTs. Our practice is super unique. We are in network with insurance, but we spend one-on-one time for 45 minutes every single session with our athletes. We are housed in state-of-the-art facilities, high ceilings, big open turf spaces, racks, barbells, weights. It is a performance facility with the world's best sports physical therapists housed within them. And we want to add to our team and grow our team of awesome sports physical therapists. We offer awesome salaries, great benefits. More importantly, the ideal set-up to provide the highest levels of care to the highest levels of athletes. We have awesome continuing education benefits. We have career ladders. We designed this practice to suit both the patient and the athletic patient, as well as the sports PT. So if you're interested in joining an awesome growing company, reach out. You can send us an email at pod@truesportspt.com. You can find us on all social outlets at True Sports PT. We would love to hear from you. We want to hear how we can make your career even better.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So let me interject for a second, 'cause I'm gonna bring it back to sports PTs. Because what you... You just mentioned a few unbelievable themes. Number one, you went into your sports biography, which...
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Was insane. And as you pull that apart, I think it's crazy that you went from baseball to elite level college football, to now pro football, but it's starting to make a bunch of sense when you've listened to the work that you put in. This is not, "Hey, I'm a big boy from Georgia, I'm gonna do something physical for a living." This is, you attacked these things and got better at them.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And constantly looking as how to get better at them. And I think that goes a long way. I think that's so applicable to what we do. Really, anyone does.
Nick Moore: Anyone, yeah. I think that's...
Yoni Rosenblatt: Anyone does. Is if you wanna be great, you have to put in the work.
Nick Moore: Yeah, there's only one way to get there.
Yoni Rosenblatt: There's only one way to get there.
Nick Moore: There's no... I can't remember who the famous said it, but there's no shortcuts. You have to work and that's...
Yoni Rosenblatt: Where'd you learn that?
Nick Moore: I feel like, I mean, as a kid I was always a prima donna, my parents would say, but I always had a passion for sports. So, I would be, I was the kid who hated to cut the grass, but I would take 400 swings off the T in the net in the front yard by myself in the middle of the summer in Georgia during the daytime. And I would, I hated being outside, but if the kids wanna play wiffle ball or tennis baseball in the cul-de-sac and I was gonna play, or football or something like that. So I didn't like the manual labor per se, 'cause, my brothers, they did manual labor construction and stuff with my uncle and I hated doing that. But I loved lifting weights. I started, my dad started me lifting weights in fifth grade and I just, I don't know, there was something about it. I always loved doing that kind of stuff. Hitting in the cage was not, I would do that for hours. I'd go hit, I'd take four or 500 swings a day. And, some of that kind of hurt me in my baseball career 'cause you start to build bad habits. But I just, I've always really, really liked working towards a sporting goal. Sports has always been my priority. So I've never had an issue.
Yoni Rosenblatt: I feel, but having heard also that there's a lot of brains that comes with this brawn if you were still doing financial accounting, which is apparently a thing. I feel like you'd do that too, dude.
Nick Moore: Yeah, I think, yeah, I think for me, I think it's just like my mindset. I, when I, I don't, there's not a whole lot of stuff I like to do, but the things I do like to do, I just have this burning desire to be the best at it. Even if it's like video games or something, I hate losing, you know, I hate like being unsuccessful or, if somebody challenges me with a task, like when I was working as an accountant, I was way in over my head like I got the degrees to back it up. But dude, I was, I had no idea what was going on. But I think, having the mindset that I have and being around the people that are uber successful and, that also do that are also kind of hard workers like me, it just made me wanna do well for them. Like my boss at the time, I was like, nah, I just want to get this done because he gave me this task and I'm gonna do it to the best of my ability and I can't, One of my biggest pet peeves is people that do stuff halfway. I hate it. It really irks me when this people half ass stuff.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So like you said, that's applicable to fields, you know, of all types.
Nick Moore: Anywhere. Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: It's also the other thing that you just hit on, which I think is so important, is how you found a mentor. You came into to a roster with the league's best snapper on it.
Nick Moore: Yeah. There was a 0% chance I was gonna make this team here.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Because of Morgan Cocks?
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And, and so credit to Morgan...
Nick Moore: A hundred percent.
Yoni Rosenblatt: For, taking you under his wing and teaching you the finer things, but also credit to you to say, I'm gonna learn as much as possible as opposed to being so combative, super applicable in my world. Like we bring on sports PTs, we want them to learn from the clinic directors to learn from those around them and vice versa. We want those to teach those underneath them. So I think those are like really strong lessons, like you said, that that kind of apply to anything.
Nick Moore: Yeah, I think for me personally, I learned that through baseball. I remember I got, when I got drafted, there was a kid who got drafted a year before me. Gavin Cecchini. He made it to the big leagues. I think he got a cup of coffee in the big leagues, but he was like a third round third baseman and he was one year before me outta high school and I had a really, really tough time. He's a great guy and I had a really, really tough time being friends with him because I felt like, Oh this guy's my position, I can't be friends with him. No, that's the, that's just the silliest thing I've ever heard. Like you have a guy in your position, you're not competing, you are competing against him, but there's 31 other Ross or 29 other teams in baseball.
Nick Moore: You, why not get the best out of each other? You want that competition, but it's gotta be a friendly, it's gotta come from a good place. And I think Morgan, he definitely taught me that 'cause he, I mean, not a lot of...
Yoni Rosenblatt: He still do it.
Nick Moore: Yes. He still, he's my mentor. Every time I do something happens at practice or at the game and I'm like, "Dude, what'd you see?" Like, I send him film, almost every day. He's probably annoyed. I talk with him so much, but not a lot of guys in our position because it's, my position's very hard to get a job. It's very, very difficult to get into the NFL as a long snapper. And, it's honestly really hard to get to that third or fourth year.
Nick Moore: And then from there, as long as you continue to just, do what you always do, then it's easy to keep a job. Oh, I say easy. It's easier to keep a job, but one of the thing the, like coming into the league, it's very difficult to get in. So you don't get a lot of guys like Morgan that are willing to tell you the secrets. A lot of guys, they'll give you a little something, something here or there, but they're gonna hold back, some of the good stuff because their job's on the line, you know, and Mo just, he did that with a lot of guys. I mean, he's got six or seven guys that was under him, that came through the Ravens that are now in the NFL.
Yoni Rosenblatt: But you sought it out and I think that's an awesome lesson.
Nick Moore: I wanted to learn from the best, I mean that's why I chose, that's ultimately why I wanted to be here. Like it took me, my stay in New Orleans to realize that I didn't know everything, especially about how to play long snapper in this level. And there was only one way I was gonna find out. And that was by working with the guy who I thought or I think is the best guy at my job in the NFL. And you know, I don't know where I would be if I'd never came here. Who knows?
Yoni Rosenblatt: You're not the first specialist that I've heard that from in terms of coming to Baltimore. I think it's an awesome legacy. Morgan, Justin, Sam.
Nick Moore: Yeah. They, that trio was electric for a very long time. And when you get three guys like that, that worked together for nine years and that compete at that level that they performed at for so long, that's rare. You don't get that a lot in the NFL. A lot of these guys they play a long time, but they bounced around. They play four five years here and then they go somewhere else. And I mean, Sam played here 16 years. Morgan was here 11 and Justin's been here now in year 11. I mean, that's rare. And so being around those guys in 2020, the whole season, as much as I wanted to play, that was the best thing mentally for me and physically for me too.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And so, that's kind of, that's when I met you, you joined, a workout with Sam.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And we got pretty granular and specific where I would have, even though it was just you two, I gave you like, Hey, I think this is gonna work for your position. Let's try a couple of these drills. Sam, you try this.
Nick Moore: I think that was the first time I really dove into like position specific stuff.
Yoni Rosenblatt: So that bleeds into what I'm, tell me about is that, does that exist in the NFL from what you've seen? If not, why?
Nick Moore: I don't wanna say the wrong thing here.
Yoni Rosenblatt: I wouldn't say the wrong thing, I would say, and I don't need to know about specific organizations, you talk to everyone across the league, it's such a tight...
Nick Moore: I don't think for us, I think we kinda get lumped into a category, my position is like, Oh, you're like for me, they're like, Oh, you're a tight end or you're a linebacker, 'cause I'm a big guy.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Not that big, but.
Nick Moore: Some aspects of it. You're right, I need some of the stuff that they do, I need, but my job is very, very specific, and my body works in such a precise way in order for me to be successful on a daily basis that there's a lot of things that a linebacker needs that I don't need. I need a mobility, I need that shoulder mobility, I need that upper back mobility, I need hip mobility, I need core strength and I need very strong forearms and in hamstrings and I need a good base and stuff like that, but it's a very minute thing that I do, and it's very, very precise that sometimes I think that gets overlooked at my position. Now, kickers and punters is very specific. I think that, that's become such a mainstream idea that kickers, 'cause kickers put points on the board for the team, so they help win games, especially here Tuck is an unbelievable kicker, so he scores a lot of points for us from very, very far ranges. So that is kind of a not-so new idea, but I think the long snapper position, specific types of...
Nick Moore: I think a lot of people would laugh at the idea, honestly, and it's part of my position, it's a very overlooked position until it becomes an issue, it's like... It's one of those things you don't notice it, it's like when your check engine lights on in your car, it's not a big deal until your car stops working and then you're like, what the heck is going on? And that's kinda how a lot of people view. I think a lot, I don't know, but I think a lot of people around football in general, kind of think, it long sapping is just... It's okay. It's just a thing. It's nothing special, which it's not a huge deal, but it's a very, very difficult job.
Yoni Rosenblatt: It's really difficult and it's insanely exact and precise, and you're exactly right, you don't want the crowd to know your name, because if they do, you're probably doing something wrong, right? But you gotta figure out how to train so that you don't do something...
Nick Moore: My body knows right away when I go down to snap that first ball of the day, I know right away. Oh man, we did legs yesterday. I'm sore I can't get... My stance feels weird, I can't sink into my hips as much as I want to, or we do upper, I don't have as much range in my shoulders and my biceps are tied or something, and that... People are like, Oh, that's not a big deal. And I'm like, dude it's a huge deal. If I can't get my hands half an inch further than they need to go to start, that's the difference between me snapping the ball in the ground and me snapping the ball at the hip, it's like... Or me snapping at 6 o'clock, lace field goal snap or a 12 o'clock lace field goal snap. And until long snappers get the credit that we deserve, I feel like it's one of those things that may always be overlooked.
Yoni Rosenblatt: I think that's true. I think there's certainly value in hearing the way you've begun to attack it and that is, be precise about all things...
Nick Moore: Everything.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Nutrition, fitness, all things. It's your freaking livelihood, right?
Nick Moore: Yeah, there's... I've been doing it for about three years now, so I have a pretty good daily routine that I get into. And we start practice at 1:30. When 12:15 rolls around, I start my... I do sauna, ice bath and then shower, start getting dressed, and then I go into the weight room and I do shoulder dislocates, with PVC, I do a lot of shoulder mobility forearm stuff, core stability, like... Just to keep me activated. Ready to go for practice, and I do that practice and games. I do that basically, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Sunday.
Yoni Rosenblatt: That is something that I've noticed since working with you is how regimented you are, it's all so unbelievable. I don't know whether you're just lying to my face, but when I say to you, "Hey, are you still doing that exercise... " You're like, "Yeah, yeah, doing it."
Nick Moore: Yeah, no. If I put it in... If it's something that we put in, like the shoulder stuff or the forearms, the rotation stuff with the forearms, if we put something in that I think like, I do it a couple of times I'm like, man, this really helps.
Yoni Rosenblatt: It's in.
Nick Moore: And it just stays in. And it's one of those things that you might add... Some days I might do a shortcut 'cause I'm running late or something, but if it's Wednesday punt day or Friday punt day or Sunday, it's... I'm in there, it's an hour-long... Not an hour, but it's like 30-45 minutes long of getting my routine down, pre-game and then end of pre-game warm-ups and then after pre-game warm-ups before the game starts, there's that routine I just do every day, and I think it's unconscious at this point, I don't even...
Yoni Rosenblatt: I think that's awesome. I think we'll get a little bit more into that later, but it sounds like you know what kind of works for you, what I think is important to highlight there is these routines, the stuff that you realize works for you, again, it's the same thing in what we do for a living in that, when you understand how to relate to a athlete, when you understand how to perform a proper assessment, you can't get lazy when it's visit number, whatever of the day. When you find out something that works, you gotta own that, it's gotta be a piece of your routine. So I'll just leave it at that. I got one more for you, and that is, a guy like me, sports PTs that are working with a guy like you, a professional athlete, give us some advice as to how to provide you with the best session. Now, I'm talking in an individual session. When you walk into my practice, what is it that you hope that your provider is able to give to you, that you can leave and say, You know what, that was a hell of a session?
Nick Moore: So I think the first thing, working with you, I think the first thing we did was kind of deep dive into what my position is and what I need. Like, what do I think is important in my job and what parts of my body that I think I need to be able to be successful in my job. And so we talk through that, we dive through that. I think this is how I move and I go through, we go through slo-mo. Obviously, not everyone is as specific as me, but if I'm coming in, I want you to know exactly what I do and what I feel when I do it, like what my brain feels my body is doing when I'm actually snapping. So that way you have a good understanding of what's firing. Now, what you see and what I feel could be two different things.
Nick Moore: But most of the time, at this stage of the game, I feel like it, we're on the same page and that you know exactly what I... How I initiate my snap, what kind of things I'm working on as far as when we're working on trying to control my upper back more, not driving my shoulders down, keeping my head up and out of it. And so then we just... You come up with a plan to kind of attack, Hey, these are the things I think we should do to help you have better stability in your core, in your upper body, and strengthening your upper back and stuff that would help control, and working on that body control to where you can do your hand-arm movement freely. And then you're still able to control my core and my head and my neck and stuff like that.
Nick Moore: So, I think just having a good understanding of the player and what he feels... 'cause my biggest pet peeve when it comes to this stuff is like, at the end of the day, I'm the athlete. I'm the one who has to put... I'm putting my life on the line every time I go out there. And I'm the one who's risking my livelihood of me and my family to play. So as a strength coach or as a PT, I feel like the best thing you can do is not come in there and be like, "This is how I do it." No, it's not because I'm the player. You're the trainer. So I think if you're able to assist him. And maybe he's wrong in some ways, and maybe he's not. But as a player, we don't wanna be told like, "Hey, this is 100% not correct." And I think as a strength coach, one of the baseball... The guy we had in baseball, he was so awesome that he always would listen to the players. You get a guy like Mookie Betts coming in there and saying, "Hey Mike, my back's tight," or "My hands feel slow, and my legs feel heavy," Mike's not gonna tell a $400 million player that he has to do something. You know, "Hey, you have to squat, I know."
Nick Moore: And I think there's some things that we need to do that maybe I don't wanna do. For me, there's a couple of things I hate doing, but I know that they're good for me. And there's other things that I know that they're not gonna help me, and so I don't believe in them. So then it's really hard to get me to do it because it's... I feel it in my heart of hearts, that's not productive. And so I end up half-assing it or don't do it at all. And I think, from a trainer perspective, I think your best asset is being able to listen and understand the player and... 'cause you're the science guy. You know how the body works. You know muscles better than I do. I have a really good feel for how my body works. Like I always say, nobody knows my body better than me, right? I know when my body is tired. I know when it feels good. I know when it's moving fast. I know when it's moving slow, or when I get long and stuff like that with my snap.
Nick Moore: But you know the human body better than I do, right? So you know what muscles might be causing my hands to be slow or might be causing my neck to, or my upper back to, kinda dip through 'cause I'm trying to generate more force from other parts of my body that I don't need to. And so I think that's where you add in that stuff, or like, "Hey man, you're trying to generate power from the rest of your body when you don't need to. If you strengthen your shoulders, your upper back, and your core, then you can stabilize your body better, and your arms will be able to move better and more freely in your motion." That's kind of where the strength coach is able to really dive in and just make the athlete better overall.
Yoni Rosenblatt: That's... I mean you hit on something that's near and dear to my heart. Our number one job, I think, as sports PTs, strength coaches as well, is listen to the athlete.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: It's not about us.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: It's about you. I think you develop... You and I have been working long enough together that I know how intelligent you are about the way your body moves.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: I think an even bigger struggle is when athletes may be...
Nick Moore: They don't understand themselves.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Exactly. And when that happens, is how well can we teach? How well can we explain? How well can we become a team to say, "Here's, maybe, actually, what's happening." But the bottom line is, it's about the athlete. I think that's what you're talking about. Breaking down movement... You mentioned that it's not every athlete comes in can I Google my patient's name and find video of them, right? [chuckle]
Nick Moore: Yeah, exactly.
Yoni Rosenblatt: But... And I could do that with a guy like Nick Moore. But a guy comes in, even if it's a standard ACL and he's a high school football player, he's a receiver, let's say, I have to know what a receiver does.
Nick Moore: Yeah.
Yoni Rosenblatt: How do they breakdown? How do they accelerate? How do they change direction? How do we teach that? What are good principles to do that? And then sprinkle on top the pathology itself, how do we deal with an ACL? How do we deal with a meniscus? What does that mean for where we are in that overarching world? I think those are all important pieces. Just because the guy on your table is not Nick Moore, is not a professional athlete, doesn't mean that we don't have the ability to one, understand how that athlete needs to move, and two, meet that athlete where they are.
Nick Moore: Yeah. And it's... For me, I can reference it to kind of like batting stance. There's not one proper way to hit a baseball. There's nine million different batting stances in the world. And I think athletes, just because you have the same injury as somebody else doesn't necessarily mean that your body is gonna handle... Is gonna respond the exact same way as somebody else. I was in college with Nick Chubb and he had a gruesome knee injury in 2015. And...
Yoni Rosenblatt: I'm smiling not because Nick Chubb had an injury. I'm smiling because it's like [chuckle] the amount of elite level athletes that you have interacted with...
Nick Moore: I have a lot of...
Yoni Rosenblatt: It's nuts.
Nick Moore: I've been very fortunate. I met a lot of really, really awesome athletes.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Mookie Betts.
Nick Moore: Yeah. He's one of my nearest and dearest friends.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Nick Chubb.
Nick Moore: Chubb's an awesome guy. I was his tutor in math.
Nick Moore: Cedric Mullins.
Nick Moore: Cedi, he is my boy. We played Little League ball and high school ball together.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Yoni Rosenblatt.
Nick Moore: Yoni. That's my guy. That's my guy. [laughter]
Yoni Rosenblatt: Sam Cooke.
Nick Moore: Sam Cooke's one of my closest friend is right now. And he's just an awesome guy to be around.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Who am I missing?
Nick Moore: Justin Tucker is a legend obviously. He's a great player.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Who, this was...
Nick Moore: Morgan Cox.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Morgan Cox, yeah. We mentioned him already. Zack Wheeler.
Nick Moore: Zack Wheeler. Man, I'll never forget that dude. Holy crap. Sophomore year of high school, man, that guy's pumping a hundred. He's a senior. I'm a sophomore. He's pumping a hundred on the bump, dude. And we only had one hit, but it was your boy. [laughter] I had a bloop...
Yoni Rosenblatt: What was it?
Nick Moore: I had a bloop single up the middle.
Yoni Rosenblatt: What was the count?
Nick Moore: Honestly, I think it was 0-1 or maybe 1-1, I can't remember. But we were getting stomped, dude. They were just that dude. And we had some guy like my buddy Trey Martin, he was a draft of the Cubs. He didn't make to the big leagues, but he played like 10 years in minors.
Yoni Rosenblatt: What do you mean your buddy? Where was he? He was on your team?
Nick Moore: We were high school teammates. Yeah. Yeah. So Trey and then Ronnie Freeman was our catcher. He was a stud. He made it, I don't know if he ever made it to the big leagues, but he's a hitting coach now with the Giants.
Yoni Rosenblatt: The... You mentioned they were running back on the Ravens from today that...
Nick Moore: Oh, Kenyan Drake, yeah. Kenyan Drake. Him and I played high school ball against each other. He went to Hillgrove High School outside of Atlanta. And I went to Brookwood and he was a one year behind me. And he'll say this, if he ever watches this, he'll say this, I was a stud in high school football, okay?
Yoni Rosenblatt: And what position did you play?
Nick Moore: I played safety. I was about 6-3, 6-2 and a half. 6-3. About 2 0 5.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Nick. Okay. Nick. Anyway, the guys that you have [chuckle] interacted with...
Nick Moore: I've been very lucky.
Yoni Rosenblatt: The guys that you have competed with and against, it's a who's who. It's really unbelievable. What's the one thing you've noticed in common from what they have done or their personalities?
Nick Moore: I think two things. Number one is they're all... Their humility. They're all awesome people. They're all very, very nice, genuine people. No matter how big they got, no matter... I mean, Mookie Betts hit me up just a couple of weeks ago and said, Congrats on having a baby. You know, and he's Mr. $400 million guy. And I haven't seen him in person... I've seen him once in person since I got cut. Twice actually, twice. But I think humility and then work ethic. I think all these guys have unbelievable work ethic. I mean, you talk about... You know Sam well, and you know Morgan. Sam's probably one of the hardest workers I've ever met in my life. And not just football. That guy works at everything. At being a dad, at working on his yard, working on cars, stuff like... And in everything he does. He always wants to be great as he says. And Justin's the same way and Morgan's the same way. And Seti, I mean, dude, Seti was a backup on our high school baseball team and when I was there, he probably had five at bets. And now that guy is one of the premier center fielders in the game or...
Yoni Rosenblatt: Starting center fielder for the Orioles, and I think...
Nick Moore: And he's gonna be Team USA. And I mean, that guy, he had to overcome so much, I think. He only played one year of high school baseball. He went to North Carolina A and T, you know, very, very small baseball school. And I don't know if when he was drafted or if he was drafted, I don't know all of that stuff. But that guy had to overcome a lot of adversity to get to where he's at today. And that just shows how hard he worked and how awesome of a guy he is. And just remarkable what he's been able to accomplish at the major league level. And all those guys, I mean, dude, one of my best friends is starting pitcher, I guess now he's a... He moved to the bullpen. But he was a starting pitcher for the Royals for since 2018. And the same way that guy was going to Presbyterian College to play baseball, he was an eighth round draft pick to the Arizona Diamondbacks, kind of fluttered around in High-A and Double-A and then got rule 5 by the Royals. And he's been in the big leagues ever since, never looked back.
Yoni Rosenblatt: And so all these guys, humility and work ethic, obviously. So applicable to what we're trying to do here with this, With the podcast is just trying to educate sports PTs, how to be awesome. Talking to people like you who have made it at such high levels, that lesson I think is easy to apply and really resonates. I want to thank you for your time.
Nick Moore: Of course, and I love...
Yoni Rosenblatt: And joining us at the True Sports podcast.
Nick Moore: I love talking, man. I got a lot to say.
Yoni Rosenblatt: Well. You're good at it. You need your own podcast. Have you thought about that?
Nick Moore: I was talking to Morgan about that and he shut me down. So we'll see.
[laughter]
Nick Moore: We'll see what I...
Yoni Rosenblatt: Let's see if he'll listen to the sports...
Nick Moore: If he hears this one and hears how eloquent of a speaker I am, which I'm definitely not, but not, I've just, I've dealt with a lot, experienced a lot in my life and sports I've dealt with a lot of adversity. So it's always fun to talk about and the hope is that somebody listens and somebody can apply it to them, and somebody... It helps somebody. Get to, 'cause it wasn't easy to get here, you know? I took a very, very long road. It's still not easy. Every day is hard.
Yoni Rosenblatt: But you really like, you really mind the details and it's awesome to see. And it's been awesome to see your success, really becoming one of, like you and Morgan Cox, the absolute best long snappers in the game. So it's just been great to see that. Thank you for your time. Along those lines, we want to get better at what we're offering on the podcast. So hit us up at pod@truesportspt.com. We want to know about future guests that you want to have on here. We want to know any questions you have. We have a ton of questions coming in, just about how to be a better sports PT that we're gonna put together in Ask Me Anything episode where I'll be just dealing with those questions. So you better be listening.
Nick Moore: Oh, I'm in there. I listen all the time.
Yoni Rosenblatt: He's listening. Keep listening, share it. Love it. Appreciate you.
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