Rangers' Matthew Robertson worked on mental skills to up his game

The wise old baseball philosopher, Yogi Berra, famously said, “Baseball is 90 percent mental. The other half is physical.’’

And while his math may have been a little off, the point he was making was clear: The mental side of pro sports is often just as important – and at times, even more – than physical ability.

That’s something Rangers defenseman Matthew Robertson realized a couple years into his professional hockey career. And once he did, paying attention to the mental side of his game helped him break through to reach the NHL after several years in the minor leagues.

It was after his second year playing for the Rangers’ American Hockey League affiliate in Hartford that Robertson knew he needed to do more if he was ever going to make it to the big leagues. He had been a second round draft pick by the Rangers in 2019, and he had all the tools – size (6-4, 210), skating ability, smarts, physicality – to be a solid NHL player. But his career didn’t seem to be progressing the way he envisioned.

“After that year, I'm like, ‘I’ve got to change something,’’’ Robertson told Newsday in an interview last week.

“I feel like I had the physical capabilities,’’ he said. “I think for me, it was just the mental part [that needed reinforcement]. When a mistake happened, if something didn't go my way – I feel like confidence, for me, was the biggest aspect to pull me back from making the NHL.’’

So Robertson asked his agent to put him in touch with a mental skills coach, who could help him figure out how handle adversity and overcome mistakes to become a better player. His agent put him in touch with Matthew Caldaroni, the co-founder and CEO of Molliteum Inc., a Toronto-based firm has worked with several well-known professional athletes, most notably former Jets defensive back D.J. Reed, NBA player Lauri Markkanen and Ottawa Senators star Dylan Cozens.

According to Caldaroni, he’s more than a mental skills coach.

“What we specialize in is actually resilience training,’’ Caldaroni said. “We built a brand around essentially helping athletes from the NBA, NHL, NFL, all over the place, basically build that within themselves.’’

It’s more than just offering breathing techniques to reduce stress, said Caldaroni, who co-founded the company with his brother, Chris. There’s planning, and strategizing about how to go about achieving one’s goals.

“It's clarity on what you actually need to do,’’ Caldaroni said. “What we've done with Matt, for example, was we took his identity -- an identity being beliefs about who you are and what you can do -- and we take that from, ‘I'm an AHLer, trying to grind it out,’ and we say, ‘Okay, let's raise the standard… What would a Top-4 NHL D man do?’’’

Working with Caldaroni didn’t get Robertson into the NHL right away, however. He spent two more seasons at Hartford (after his three-year entry level contract expired, the Rangers signed him to a one-year deal for 2024-25), and people wondered if he would ever make it. Some, no doubt, thought it might be time to give up on him as a prospect.

He would get called up by the Rangers every so often, but mostly just to serve as insurance because someone was nursing a minor injury. The guy would always play, and Robertson always ended up sitting in the press box as a healthy scratch.

He finally made his NHL debut at the end of last season because, with the Rangers eliminated from the playoffs, Braden Schneider decided to have surgery to repair a shoulder injury he’d played through for years. So Robertson got to play the final two games of the season.

The Rangers then re-signed him over the summer to a two-year deal, and he made the team out of training camp, as the seventh defenseman. Gradually, he worked his way into the top six, and now he’s a regular. And he’s had a good year: He’s averaging 17 minutes and 30 seconds of ice time per game, has scored five goals, with 12 assists (17 points), and 36 penalty minutes in 68 games. His 77 blocked shots are fourth-most on the team, behind Schneider (132), Vladislav Gavrikov (100) and Will Borgen (93).

“It's going pretty good,’’ said Robertson, who turned 25 March 9. “There's been some ups and some downs, but I think as the year's gone on, my confidence has gotten a little better, (and) I've kind of realized a little bit, more and more what I need to do to play every day in this league. And there's lots still to work on, but I think overall, it's been a good year and I've learned a lot.’’

He continues to work with Caldaroni, he said, because now that he’s finally made the NHL after all these years, he wants to stay.

“It's hard to make the NHL, but even harder to stay,’’ he said. “There's always someone trying to take your job. There's always guys who are gonna make the NHL, guys like me who are trying to do everything to make the NHL. Just staying here is the hard part. So I’m just working every day to get better, because I feel like there is still more to my game, more that I could contribute.’’

By Colin Stephenson

colin.stephenson@newsday.comColinSNewsday

Colin Stephenson covers the Rangers for Newsday. He has spent more than two decades covering the NHL and just about every sports team in the New York metropolitan area.