What Causes the Yips?

Why certain athletes, mostly men, get the yips is a mystery [source: Crace]. The condition generally comes on late in an athlete's career, although others, such as musicians, dentists (Ouch!) and surgeons (Oh, my!), can suffer, too. There are no warning signs, no symptoms. One day the yips appear, and in many cases, they never leave [source: Collins].

The yips are involuntary jerks, twitches or spasms that wreak havoc on a person's fine motor skills. Tasks that a person has performed hundreds, if not thousands of times, suddenly become chores. Although the problem manifests itself physically, most people suspect the yips have psychological underpinnings relating to stress and feelings of anxiety.

A few years ago, psychologists at the University of Texas looked at the free-throw percentage of NBA players in the final minutes of games when their teams were behind by a point. For three seasons, researchers charted the players' free throws during these high-stress situations. They found that when the pressure was on, the players shot worse than their career free-throw percentage [source: Beilock].

Some researchers say the yips might have a physical genesis, too, a form of dystonia, a neurological disorder that causes the involuntary contraction of muscles. Dystonia results in twisting and repetitive movements. The condition can affect just one muscle, a group of muscles or all of the body's muscles. Scientists have linked dystonia to the abnormal function of the basal ganglia, a part of the brain associated with involuntary movement. In fact, Aynsley Smith at the Mayo Sports Medicine Center in Rochester, Minn., concluded that one type of yip is a form of dystonia, while a second type occurs when a person thinks and worries too much about completing a task [source: Beilock].

On the other hand, Dr. Charles D. Adler, a Mayo Clinic neurologist, concluded in 2011 that the yips, at least in a small group of golfers he studied, were brought on by a movement disorder instead of stress or anxiety. Adler studied 25 golfers who claimed to be suffering from the yips, and compared them to 25 other golfers who were yip-free. Adler matched the golfers based on age, sex and golf handicap. Adler asked all the golfers to putt from varying lengths while he measured the electrical activity in their muscles with two specialized devices, including one called the CyberGlove II.

Adler found that 17 golfers — 15 of whom complained of the yips — exhibited signs of involuntary muscle contractions of their wrist, hands and fingers. He called the twitches and spasms "golfers' cramp" [source: Mayo Clinic]. Adler cautioned, however, that anxiety and stress might still play an important role in the yips [source: Smith].

For decades — perhaps centuries — athletes have had to battle through the yips. Some have been successful. Tommy Armour for example, won major tournaments despite the yips. Baseball's Steve Sax had a bad case of the yips in 1983 when he played for the Los Angeles Dodgers. He made 30 errors that season. He eventually settled down and became a decent defensive second baseman. Others, however, have not been as lucky. Steve Blass, a hard-throwing right-hander for the Pittsburgh Pirates lost his ability to find the strike zone in 1973, a year after he won 19 games. He left the majors in 1974 [source: Baseball-reference.com].

What can you do if you get a bad case of the yips? Scientists from the Technical University of Munich say squeezing a soft ball or making a fist with your left hand before you pitch or putt could help. Why is that? The German researchers say all of us perform some activities automatically with little thought. Such "muscle memory," along with the left side of our bodies, is controlled by the brain's right hemisphere [source: Collins].

If a golfer concentrates too much on his swing or a baseball player focuses too much on throwing, each stage of the movement becomes disjointed and erratic. That's because the athlete is no longer relying on his muscle memory to complete the task but instead is using the left side of his brain, which controls conscious movement. To strengthen the muscle memory, the Munich researchers theorized that making a fist or squeezing a ball with the left hand would increase the activity of the right side of the brain and allow the muscle memory to work its magic [source: Collins].

Apparently, they were right. Researchers tested their theory on a number of athletes including soccer and badminton players. When the pressure mounted, scientists asked half of the players to squeeze a small ball in their left hands, while other players did the same but with their right hands. Players that squeezed the ball in their right hands did not perform well in the pressure-filled situation, while those that squeezed the ball in their left hands did [source: Collins].

If squeezing a ball might work, what about a wristband? Neuroscientist Robert Goldberg has invented a high-tech band worn around the wrist that measures stress during a round of golf. The information is automatically relayed to an iPhone app, which allows a golfer, or his or her coach, to see how much stress the athlete is under. Goldberg hopes golfers will use the device to understand what triggers stress and devise ways to overcome the problem [source: Cacciola].

Despite such research, the yips remain a mystery, especially to those burdened by them. Cleveland Indian pitcher Chris Perez has seen his share of suffering. In the end, he said, the problem is mental. "They're telling themselves before [the ball is] hit, 'don't throw it in the dirt,'" Perez said in an interview with MLB.com. "And of course, they throw it right in the dirt."