KEY TAKEAWAYS Knowing the count" in investing means understanding when conditions favor you. When you have a plan, time on your side, and the right allocation in place. Most investors react to short-term noise. The disciplined ones learn to wait for the right pitch. Investing done right is unbelievably simple, but not easy. Own equities, let them compound, and stay invested through the noise. A financial advisor's primary job is behavioral coaching. Helping you avoid unnecessary swings that compound into long-term underperformance. Long-term wealth comes from behavior, not strategy. Time in the market matters more than timing the market. First of all. Is spring not the most ridiculous season for kids' activities? I don't know about you, but I feel like my head is spinning half the time. My son's got doubleheaders every weekend for the rest of the school year. This week alone, he's got three games at school. Another son is in flag football. My daughter's in field hockey and lacrosse. It is, without a doubt, a schedule that is whacked. That's the technical term. Anyway, I was at one of my son's games this weekend. One of four. And I'm watching a group of 13-year-old kids play baseball. It's such an interesting age. There is no such thing as a "typical" 13-year-old boy. Some are gangly and growing into their bodies. Others are still little kids. Some are shaving. It's all over the place. But what really stood out to me wasn't the physical differences. It was the decision-making. And that's not a knock on them. They're 13. They haven't played the game long enough yet. They haven't had the reps. One of the biggest areas this shows up is at the plate. A huge part of hitting, at any level, is understanding the count. How many balls. How many strikes. And what that situation means. If you're down 0-2, who does that favor? Not you. You're protecting. You're anxious. Anything close, you feel like you've got to swing. The pitcher has all the leverage. He can miss. He can expand the zone. There's no stress on him. Now flip it. 3-0. Who does that favor? You. You don't have to do a thing. One more ball and you walk. Swing and miss? No big deal. You still have room. You can sit back, relax, and wait for one pitch. Your pitch. Fastball, out over the plate. If it's not there, you don't swing. It's as close to stress-free as you get in baseball. And watching these kids, you could see it. Most of them understood the stress of 0-2. They felt it. They reacted to it. But what a lot of them didn't understand was 2-0 or 3-0. You'd see them swinging at bad pitches. Chasing. Not realizing they were in complete control of the situation. And I found it interesting. Not frustrating. Because I had to remind myself. I'm looking at this with a 47-year-old brain. My last frame of reference was playing at a pretty high level. What I know now versus what I knew at 13? Completely different. So instead of getting frustrated, I actually found it kind of beautiful. Because it shows you exactly where growth can happen. Once they understand the power of the count, everything changes. The 3-0 Fastball And what's amazing is I see the exact same thing happen with adults when it comes to investing. Maybe not as obvious. Maybe dressed up a little differently. But it's the exact same behavior. In the same way that a 13-year-old hitter can't quite bring himself to just let that 3-0 pitch go by and take the walk, most adults can't bring themselves to just sit back and let investing work. They feel like they've got to do something. They hear something. They read something. They see a headline. And it's like an automatic reaction. Swing. You get somebody talking about stagflation or some war or some massive correction that we've never seen before, and all of a sudden now you feel like you've got to react. You've got to protect. You've got to do something. And it's amazing. Because on the surface, you look at that person and you say, hey, successful person, corporate job, doing well, all the things. And then you hear how they think about investing, and it's like. You're just swinging at everything. Everything. You're in a 3-0 count and you're hacking at a pitch in the dirt. And the crazy part about all of this is investing, done right, is unbelievably simple. Not easy, but simple. If you have any level of optimism about the future at all, and I mean any, then the path is pretty clear. Invest in equities. Let them compound. Sit back and let time do its thing. That's it. You go back and look at any meaningful stretch of time. 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 years. And what did you have to do to achieve those types of returns? Practically nothing. You put your money in, and you left it alone. You didn't react. You didn't jump in and out. You didn't try to outthink it. You just let it work. "It's the 3-0 fastball. It's sitting there for you. Everything is in your favor. And all you have to do is not swing blindly." That's it. That's the whole game. And yet most people can't do it. Most people cannot not swing. That's the reality. And that's the whole reason why I exist as a financial advisor. Because left to our own devices, most of us are going to swing at that pitch we have no business swinging at. We're going to react when we shouldn't. We're going to feel like we're in an 0-2 count when we're actually sitting 3-0. Know the Count So what is the count in investing? I don't think it's one thing. I think it's a combination of things that put you in an advantageous position. It's having a plan. It's having the time for that plan to work. It's being allocated the right way, which, in my opinion, is being in equities. And it's the understanding, this is the big one, that once you've done those things, you don't need to react. You don't need to do anything. You've already put yourself in the best possible position. Now your job is simply to not mess it up. And if you keep swinging at bad pitches over time, your average is going to drop. It's just math. And what starts to happen is you feel like you're always behind. You feel like every time you make a move, it's wrong. Like every time you invest, the market goes down right after. And I think a lot of people feel that way. I hear it all the time. That feeling is real. But it's meaningless. It doesn't mean anything. Because it's not the market doing that to you. It's the accumulation of all the unnecessary swings. All the reactions. All the decisions that didn't need to be made. "I'm the coach in your ear. Relax. Sit back. It's 3-0. You're only looking for one pitch. If it's not there, let it go." And you've got to do that over and over and over again. For years. For decades. Because if you can just get that part right. If you can just stop swinging at the wrong pitches. You give yourself a massive advantage. Know the count. Ben Beck is Managing Partner & Chief Investment Officer at Beck Bode, a deliberately different wealth management firm with a unique view on investing, business and life. Frequently Asked Questions What does "know the count" mean in investing? In baseball, the count is the number of balls and strikes on a hitter. Knowing the count means understanding whether the situation favors you or the pitcher. In investing, knowing the count means understanding when you're in a position of strength (a written plan, time on your side, equity allocation) versus a position of weakness (no plan, reacting to headlines, frequent trading). The disciplined investor recognizes when the count is already in their favor and resists the urge to react. Why do most investors underperform the market? Most investors underperform the market because of behavior, not strategy. They react to news, sell during downturns, chase recent winners, and make decisions based on emotion rather than plan. The math of compounding works for anyone who can stay invested over decades, but staying invested requires the discipline to ignore short-term noise. As the saying goes, investing done right is simple. It is not easy. What is investment discipline? Investment discipline is the willingness to stick with a long-term plan despite short-term pressure. It means having clear criteria for when to act and when to wait. It means resisting the urge to chase headlines, react to volatility, or abandon a strategy when it temporarily stops working. The disciplined investor focuses on what they control: their savings rate, their allocation, their time horizon, and their behavior. How can I be a better long-term investor? The most important steps are: build a written plan, allocate appropriately for your time horizon, stop reacting to short-term news, and find a thought partner who will hold you accountable. Investing done right is unbelievably simple. The challenge is in the behavior, not the strategy. Most people benefit from working with a fiduciary advisor whose job is to help them stick with the plan when it gets hard.
