Ex-Yankee coach brought out the best
TROY, N.Y. >> Dana Cavalea helped the Yankees perform at their absolute best, and he has the World Series ring to prove it.
He spent 12 years with the organization as a strength, conditioning and performance coach, working with all-time greats such as Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera and Alex Rodriguez.
But some of the most valuable insights he ever learned came from trainers that handle another type of world-class athlete, the thoroughbreds at Saratoga Race Course.
“I’m one of the few people that come to Saratoga and never bet,” Cavalea said. “But I love getting to the track early in the morning, going to the backstretch and talking to trainers about how they develop power, strength endurance and winning within the horses.”
On Saturday, Cavalea visited Market Street Books to discuss his new book, “Habits of a Champion: Nobody Becomes A Champion By Accident.”
His wife Lauren’s father, John Caglione Jr., lives in Troy.
“I’ve been fortunate enough to work with some
of the greatest players, managers and leaders both in sports and business,” Cavalea said. “I spent so much time reading other books about leadership and how it’s supposed to be done. I found them to be very theory and textbook based.
“This is a real practical solution I want to create for people based on my real life experiences with some of the top athletes, team owners and CEOs in the world. I kind of distill it into 15 lessons plus one bonus by Reggie Jackson and a forward written by Joe Girardi.”
Originally from Long Island, Cavalea went to the University of South Florida where he became a strength and conditioning intern for the school’s football team.
Two weeks before spring training one year, the strength coach he worked for told him the Yankees were looking for an intern, too. So he drove to Legends Field in Tampa, where he’d spent the previous day as an awestruck fan, not knowing quite what to expect.
“I was a nervous wreck,” Cavalea said smiling. “I parked my car, walked into the front office and they said, ‘Are you Dana Cavalea? Come with us’.”
“They put a lanyard around my neck, put me in Yankee gear and the next thing you know I was in the middle of the field during team stretch with guys I’d been taking pictures of the day before, like Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte. It was amazing!”
After three years working for free as an intern, he became an assistant and then the head man, still just 23 years old. By the time he left, Cavalea had become director of strength and conditioning/performance enhancement, leading all the staff that work in each of these areas.
“Really my job was to oversee $300 million-plus in human capital and make sure those assets were protected for the Steinbrenner family in terms of their performance, both physical and mental,” Cavalea said. “When you’re working with a guy, if he gets injured, you’re also working on his mindset.
“We did have a training staff, a mental conditioning coach and rehab specialists. We all worked in a very integrated way. My job was to deploy insights from everyone and get guys back and ready to play.”
In 2009, when the Yankees won their last World Championship, Cavalea won the Nolan Ryan Award, an honor given annually by Professional Baseball Strength and Conditioning Society to an individual whose accomplishments reflect an exemplary dedication to the field.
But after a dozen years, he and the Yankees parted ways amicably in 2014.
Today, Cavalea runs his own business, doing much of what he did previously, but with players from many different teams, plus top corporate executives as well.
“It’s based on agent recommendations,” said Cavalea, of Stamford, Ct. “When a visiting team comes to town, an agent might call and say, ‘I have shortstop Jose Iglesias. I need you to work on him. It’s 100 percent customized. That’s one part of my business.”
“The other part is CEO and executive coaching where I put together health and lifestyle plans and strategies,” he said. “I also do corporate speaking, going into companies and motivating their workforce, almost treating them as if they’re one of my players.”
Of course, having met and worked with so many great Yankees, he can’t help missing the organization, especially on Old-Timer’s Day when the likes of Whitey Ford and Yogi Berra would show up.
“For years I used to take care of Yogi, put him on the treadmill and take care of his workout,” Cavalea said. “All of those players, Ron Guidry, Willie Randolph, it’s a big family.
“What’s so interesting is that you don’t see them very often, but whenever you do, it picks up right where you left off. It’s like a big fraternity. It was great.”