Unpack the complexities of youth travel baseball with Ken Carpenter as we welcome Hall of Fame high school and current travel baseball coach Mike Yinger to the Athlete 1 Podcast. You'll get to the heart of what it takes to raise athletes in today's competitive landscape, from handling financial demands to encouraging multi-sport participation. This episode is not just another play-by-play; it's a candid and valuable playbook for anyone involved in youth sports.
Explore the fine line between fostering a competitive edge and ensuring player development with insights that go beyond the usual coach-speak. We tackle the often-overlooked topics, such as the effects of overzealous coaching on young pitchers and the evolving role of parents as their children mature in sports. Mike Yinger doesn't just share strategies; he shares stories that highlight the importance of integrity and skill in the game of baseball.
We touch on the dreams of young athletes aiming for college baseball and the guidance they require. Listen as we share powerful anecdotes that underscore the impact of thoughtful coaching and meaningful conversations. This episode isn't just about baseball; it's about the life lessons and lasting bonds formed when sportsmanship and genuine care are at the forefront of the game. Join us on the Athlete 1 Podcast for an episode that's a home run in revealing the true spirit of youth baseball.
Unpack the complexities of youth travel baseball with Ken Carpenter as we welcome Hall of Fame high school and current travel baseball coach Mike Yinger to the Athlete 1 Podcast. You'll get to the heart of what it takes to raise athletes in today's competitive landscape, from handling financial demands to encouraging multi-sport participation. This episode is not just another play-by-play; it's a candid and valuable playbook for anyone involved in youth sports.
Explore the fine line between fostering a competitive edge and ensuring player development with insights that go beyond the usual coach-speak. We tackle the often-overlooked topics, such as the effects of overzealous coaching on young pitchers and the evolving role of parents as their children mature in sports. Mike Yinger doesn't just share strategies; he shares stories that highlight the importance of integrity and skill in the game of baseball.
We touch on the dreams of young athletes aiming for college baseball and the guidance they require. Listen as we share powerful anecdotes that underscore the impact of thoughtful coaching and meaningful conversations. This episode isn't just about baseball; it's about the life lessons and lasting bonds formed when sportsmanship and genuine care are at the forefront of the game. Join us on the Athlete 1 Podcast for an episode that's a home run in revealing the true spirit of youth baseball.
He has a $6,000 budget. But he charges every kid $2,700 before uniforms and he has a $6,000 budget. So I'm like, wait what he goes. Yeah, the club brings in all the money and then gives you $6,000 to work with afterwards and I'm like, so where's all the money? And then gives you $6,000 to work with afterwards and I'm like, so where's all the money? Like what's the point?
Speaker 2:You're locked in to Athlete One, a podcast for athletes and coaches coming to you from Dublin, ohio, here to bring you expert advice, insightful conversations and powerful stories from guests who play or coach sports. Now veteran high school baseball coach and someone who has jumped out of perfectly good airplanes your host, ken Carpenter.
Speaker 3:Hello, hello, hello and welcome to Season 2 of the Athlete One Podcast. I'm Ken Carpenter and it's May, and high school teams are finishing up their baseball seasons and travel baseball is kicking into overdrive. What are the pros and cons of travel baseball? Today we address this and more with Hall of Fame high school baseball coach, mike Yanger, who has also been an athletic director and is currently an administrator at the high school level. He has two sons playing travel. Stay until the end, because you'll want to hear what ADs think when parents want the high school coach removed.
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Speaker 2:Be sure to follow us on all socials, at Athlete One Podcast, and hit up our website at athleteonenet. That's athlete the number one dot net. This is the Athlete One Podcast.
Speaker 3:Hello and welcome to season two of the Athlete One Podcast. I'm your host, ken Carpenter, and I'm excited today to start off Season 2 with a good friend who's been a coach, an athletic director, and he's an administrator and right now is a travel baseball coach. Mike Yinger, thanks for taking the time to be on the podcast.
Speaker 1:Appreciate you having me here. I think it's kind of funny that we're back together again After all these years. We used to coach against each other and then we got to coach with each other, and now we're back talking more baseball. So I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 3:Well it's roughly about nine o'clock at night and you know you're getting home from a travel game for your son and this is after you put in a full day of work as a high school administrator. You're sitting down with me to talk travel baseball, I imagine you know. Have you had a chance to have dinner yet?
Speaker 1:Uh, you know, know, it's funny. We got uh chick-fil-a if that can be a sponsor um on the way home and we grabbed it and we had a quick meal and we're sitting down to eat. My oldest son, who I didn't have a game for, is downstairs and I can hear him uh throwing ground balls against the cement ground right now of the wall, and then my youngest one is in playing switch mlb the show. So I'm not quite sure if this ever ends.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, talk about your sons. You know what age group are they in right now, positions they play and do they participate in more than one sport?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so one of the things my wife and I talked about so she was a Division I athlete as well. She played at Dayton. We talked about making sure our kids had the opportunity to play multiple sports. During the course of that we found out our older son really enjoys to play baseball. So he's kind of focused in on baseball and he likes basketball. But you know we're not pushing him any way right now. Like I said, he's downstairs right now taking ground balls on his own against the cement wall. So you know, I think it helps that we talk baseball so much, and you know there's little things that we do, but just the fact that we're more sport oriented and we don't look at doing one thing only has really helped.
Speaker 3:So they're one's in middle school and the other one is how old he's 10.
Speaker 1:Okay, so he's playing middle school. And the other one is how old? He's 10. Okay, so he's playing 10U. Now here's what I can tell you about the question of when should they play or where they should play.
Speaker 1:What I found was my older son left, after 10U, the local community team. It was a travel team, it was small, and he started playing on a little bit higher level, like they got more kids from different places Played more tournaments. But we found out that at 10U, 11u, 12u, even 13U. Now he's playing at a higher level Again, the fields aren't there and and the opportunity to indoor hitting or whatever off-season workouts really aren't there at that age group, unless you're willing to spend, you know, three thousand dollars, right, um? And to be honest with you, even at 13 you I'm not quite sure if you need to do that, because if a kid wants to play, he's going to find opportunities to play. But again, you got two parents that were really involved in athletics and sports and mainly you know baseball and softball. So we kind of have a different mindset of what we talk about on a daily basis and I think that makes a big difference.
Speaker 3:Well, for the listeners. Mike played college baseball at Ohio Dominican University. He's a Hall of Fame baseball coach in Ohio. And what has been your approach to developing your sons at a young age?
Speaker 1:Well, I will tell you, a lot of it has to do with learning the game. You know we talk about it all the time. My son is getting older. He's 13 now, he's in puberty, he's getting bigger, he's getting stronger and he's having a lot of success. And I can tell you my 10-year-old will be the same way. But they both learned the game, and from 8U to 11U, it was just about learning the game. It wasn't about playing against the best competition. It wasn't about winning necessarily.
Speaker 1:It was about learning how to be the best player you can be. So when it does hit, you're ready. And I think you know with my older son, major, he seems to be at that point where he's seeing some success because of all the stuff he's put into it. You know understanding the game and playing the game the right way. It's starting to pay off and we'll see how it goes. You know, like you said, he's only 13 and you know that jump from 13 to 16 to 18.
Speaker 1:You know strength and ability wise is huge but it's almost like that you kind of prepare yourself for the next step, so when the next step comes you're ready. Makes sense.
Speaker 3:Well, you've coached high school baseball and you've been very successful at that, and we had an opportunity to coach a, I believe, 17 and 18-year travel team. What would you tell parents who are signing their kid up for travel that are in that 13 and under age bracket?
Speaker 1:You know, one of the things is you have to remember when you're playing 11 or 12 of you and down and it's the 50 foot um pitching mound, 75 foot bases. You know, I, I tell people all the time this is huge, this is a huge comment. I always say I don't think people understand until they start getting older, to it's it's 80 foot bases, 90 foot bases, but you know you'll have kids that can play shortstop and then when you get to 90 foot bases, you have short stops and it's hard to understand that you might be able to play third base but you're probably not a third baseman. And you start developing that mindset and understanding the older you get. You know, I always tell people it's like fast pitch softball, it's that you know the smaller, smaller distances. Anybody can field a ball and throw it across a diamond.
Speaker 1:But, like when you start understanding how to hold runners on, you know, knowing what to do with balls that are in the outfield, where to tell people to go. It's the little things. It's like I said you prepare your your players for that.
Speaker 2:So when they're getting older and they mature they can be better off.
Speaker 1:So my suggestion is find someone that knows what they're doing in the community. Have them be on a community team. Learn the game. You know, whether you play basketball, soccer, football, whatever. Learn the game. So when you get bigger and stronger, you can apply that, and when you start applying it, you're head and shoulders above other kids. You know, and it's not necessarily you're just bigger and stronger. It's like you know what you're doing and it makes a big difference for everyone involved and then you get more opportunities because of that.
Speaker 3:I've noticed that when that happens you know being a high school coach when you get kids in that are freshmen, a lot of times they, you know, they, they might have some, some decent skills, but they don't understand the game itself. And that's kind of what you're talking about, right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is it, it happens. It happens when you're young and you're you don't don't know how strong you are, but once you, once you start getting bigger, you start realizing that if you know what's going on, you can apply that. You know, um, I, my, my one son, my 10 year old, he has size nine shoes. That's huge for 10. And my 13 year old has size 12s and you're like that's huge. But my point is, they're not the fastest, but they know how to run the bases. You know it's like you're not the quickest, but you know how to make a move when you're playing wide receiver. All those things kind of come into play knowing the game, whatever you're doing, and then once you hit that spot, then you can start applying it. Just knowing what's going on and being able to get bigger and stronger, that's huge.
Speaker 3:So when you coached the older travel group. If a parent is out there saying all right, my kid's done the community baseball and he's 14, now I'm going to put him into travel. What do you recommend there? Do you think that they should just get on just any travel team, or just go to as many tryouts as you can and see where you work out?
Speaker 1:Well, I will tell you like okay, my older son played on a. He guest played for a travel team this weekend. He hit number 11. He normally hits two, three. He normally plays short, something like that pitch. He played second.
Speaker 1:He played left, played a little short as long as your son or daughter are able to do those kind of things and then they kind of let it play out. They'll be all right. But if your thought is, I want him to come in and be the shortstop or the center fielder, I probably want to find a team where he can be the main person on the team. I want to go all out for the top level team.
Speaker 1:I'd also look and see a lot of times honestly, at this age and I try not to coach and I am and my son's playing short a lot. That happens a lot. You know most of the parents are coaches and most of the kids play short and they come in and pitch and they do all the things. And it's because you're sitting at home with your son and you're eating dinner and you trust them and so you're going to trust your son to make the play or you know to throw strikes. But hopefully they get older 14, 15 years old when they're playing 60, 90, they don't have parents coaching anymore and then you can kind of let them see okay, where do they, where's it fall?
Speaker 3:You know. Well, let me ask you this when you were coaching the 18U team that you coached, how did you approach the game itself? Because it seemed like, from my experience from being around you, you were teaching them the game there and they were playing it more like a game rather than just, hey, everybody just gets up there and everybody just keeps swinging and you know, like you were teaching the bunting and the little things, that got you guys a lot more wins.
Speaker 1:Well, not only that, it's crazy because a lot of schools will say colleges will say we will say we want to see this kid hit, we want to see this kid do this. But a lot of the scouting and that's kind of like my focus when I was coaching them was I want to put them in places where they can be, successful.
Speaker 1:Having a guy on second with no outs. He's either going to hit the ball the batter's going to hit the ball to the right side or he's going to bunt. He's going to move him over to third. That's going to enable my next batter to look good, because all he has to do is hit the ball and he gets his RBI. He's going to come out of his shoes and a guy at third is going to tag. He's going to score. People want to see they know the game. So, like those kind of things are a lot more important than people realize. What's crazy is how few of coaches know the game. It's funny that we talk about this because one of the major things I'm dealing with is at 10, 11, 12, 13 years old, is umpires know the game. That's the hardest thing for me to deal with, Because I'll talk about a balk. I'll talk about runner interference.
Speaker 1:I'll talk about. You know, leading too early Crazy things that I think that they should understand. You know, leaving too early Do crazy things that I think that they should understand. You know, because when I coached high school and college, I always said I'm here, I'm here to play the game. Our guys are here because they've worked hard. We expect you, the umpire, to give us everything you got too. And at first the umpires were like well, don't talk to me like that, right? But after a while they realized, oh man, he just loves the game. He's just passionate about the game and he knows his kids are working as hard as they possibly can too. Unfortunately, the age group travel baseball umpires. They aren't there, you know. They're there because they can't find umpires to do these games and they kind of just basically pick whoever they can.
Speaker 1:It's been hard for me. I still will tell you, I've never been thrown out of a game. This fall, believe it or not, 20-some years, this fall was the first time that I was actually ever told to go in the dugout. Really, wow, yeah, and and honestly it was because is because the um we had a kid get hit by a pitch and he knew the bat, he knew the pitcher and he smiled at him and he was, like you know, fake, like what's up, right? The umpire started yelling at him, telling him to go to first, and he didn't leave him alone. He just kept yelling, and yelling, and yelling and I said listen, I got him and he goes.
Speaker 1:No, I'm gonna take care I go. No, let me take care of the player. And then you know, you umpire the game I was like I'll take care of it.
Speaker 1:Well, he didn't like me saying that, so he goes, you can just go to dugout. So I was like, okay, you know, whatever, I wasn't causing any issues with it, but just part of the game. I mean, I, you can't say anything because they're so, they're so quick to make a trigger right, and then that's kind of it's the way the society is now. But it kind of hurts because you can't really teach the game, because a lot of times they'll say a wrong call and it's completely wrong, but you got to go with it and then you just got to pull the kids over afterwards and say that's not the right call. Let me tell you what should have happened, right, and that's kind of the way I've been. Like you said, I'm coaching a game.
Speaker 3:I'm not just coaching a win, I'm actually coaching the game, which is a big difference, right, and that's ultimately what's going to make the players better now in your, your travel experience. What are some things that you've seen so far that it just you shake your head and go, oh my, my goodness, I can't believe this. I mean, I'm sure there's all those nightmare stories of yeah, there there are unbelievable stories.
Speaker 1:Um, like I said, there's guys that coach the win, um, and they don't understand. You just play the game the right way and you'll win. You'll win. That's just the way it works, right? You just, you don't get too emotional, you don't get too up and down, you play the game.
Speaker 1:But there are some guys that literally play to win. There's guys that are on third base clapping their coaches, clapping their hands, yelling at the pitcher oh, I'm just talking to my batter, no, you're not, that's fine. And then you know, I have guys. I'll have guys that, um, they'll pitch a kid, or their, their kid, they'll pitch him, 126 pitches a game. And you're like dude, you're nine, what are you doing? Like it, like it's okay, just take them out. But it's when it all costs, you know, because you need a lot of those guys, need that lead. Uh, ring, you get at the end of the game or end of the tournament to show that you're worth something. I don't know, maybe they get money, but I don't get any money to coach. So maybe they're making money and I don't know about it, but but I don't know it, just it's crazy and I will tell you after 13,. You know it kind of falls off, you don't get as many parents.
Speaker 1:And maybe I think some of the parents say, all right, they've passed me and they let other people take over. So I think if I were 14 or so 14, you, I'd start to look for actual coaches that coach the game. Yeah, that's what I would say mostly.
Speaker 3:Now have you taught your sons to play more than one position?
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, oh yeah. My goal is always to be able to. If you teach them to play shortstop or second base, teach them to play center field so they know to throw through the shortstop to go to third and they know where the shortstop should be to receive the throw. So you're playing catcher, you know where third baseman should be, you should know all the positions.
Speaker 1:If you know all the positions you can run the game. I think it's so important. Like I said, you don't just play third base, you're the third base man, so you know what entails with the third base. You know First base.
Speaker 1:I always hear people tell me first base is overrated. I think that is the most underrated spot. You know because if you know how to play the game, you know when to come off the bag, you know when to stretch, when to go for the ball in the dirt. You know all kinds of things and you need to be able to know that if you play in our position. Because if I'm playing third and I throw it across the diamond, I know one time I might just have you know a backhanded play and just throw it willy-nilly as fast as I can across the diamond. And if I one-hop the first baseman, I know he's going to go for it Right. But then sometimes if I eat it, I know he would come off the bag anyways because it would be a bad throw.
Speaker 1:So just knowing the game, like I said, knowing the game is invaluable, knowing how to play the game, whatever it is. I mean I watch my kids play on on switch. They know all the different moves with all the different fingers and all the different stuff. You know I can't do that. I don't know when to hit X, I don't know in X, y or they, they have these like side views. I don't know any of that stuff. But how? Or they have these like side views, I don't know any of that stuff. But how great is that that they can do those kind of things and they know the game. You know what, if you did that when you played a sport, you know, if you knew how to play baseball that way, think about how far advanced you'd be. You know, then you get away with not being as athletic as the next guy.
Speaker 3:Then you get away with not being as athletic as the next guy. Yeah, and you know, I always liked the guys that played multiple positions, because when you get to high school, the high school coach might have a stud shortstop and you know he needs a guy in the outfield and you want to be the backup shortstop or a starter in the outfield. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I always tell people that I'm like, when you go to college, we'd bring in seven shortstops, guarantee they would not be playing shortstop. All of them would not be playing shortstop, but you're probably going to find a place for them to play, right, you know, because they're going to be your best players and that's kind of the way it goes, because they're going to be your best players, and that's kind of the way it goes. The guys that are on the travel teams always think that their son is going to play shortstop at this high school or that high school. Well, then they go to the high school and they find out, like you said, there's three other guys that are just as good, if not better, and sometimes they're a year older, two years older, and they have more experience and they're stronger. So you just need to find a place to get on the field.
Speaker 1:Go ahead. I just can't tell you enough how important it is just to learn Learn the sports, learn the game. We talk about school work at home and if our sons aren't successful in a class, we're like well, how much you prepare how much? How many times did you do that math example to understand what was going to happen when you took the test, and that's kind of like the way we approach athletics, you know, are you practicing Well? You're not practicing Well, then the heck, are you?
Speaker 2:doing.
Speaker 1:And then really, what's practice? You know, like my 10-year-old goes out and he hits three times a week. All right, okay, he could probably hit five times a week. All right, okay, yeah, you can probably hit five times a week if you ask me. But we'll let him get there. But you know, if he's not successful, I might look at him and be like, what'd you do when you hit? Were you actually working hard? Or, you know, were you messing around? And if he says I was working hard, I was doing what I can, then okay, we'll go from there.
Speaker 1:But you know, as a high school coach, how many times did you come across a parent that would be upset and you'd say, well, how much are they working? Well, they're practicing. Okay, what's practice look like? What are they doing outside of being here? Well, they don't do anything. They practice five times a week with you. No, that's not going to cut it, not if you want to be great, and that's kind of the way everyone else is doing that. So what are you going to do? Like I said, same thing with school.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, that kind of leads into my next question Talk about the impact travel baseball has on high school teams and their coaches the high school coaches, because it could be good and bad, because you know a dad might be coaching them all the way up until they get to high school and they were the, the starting short off, short stop and the lead off batter. And then all of a sudden they come to the, to you on the high school team, and it's a totally different picture.
Speaker 1:Well, I always, I always think about you, know when you think you're really good. We went to the state semifinals one year finals and, uh, after the game I got a great email from a parent and the parent said if we had any coaching, we would have won a state championship. And then he let me know how he was a semi-pro coach for a number of years and you know he would have been able to take this team to the state championship. And I I told him thank you, um and you know you do what you can.
Speaker 1:But at the same time, afterwards I kind of reflected on what you're saying. This guy's coached his kid all the way up. The kid played shortstop for him. He played right field sparingly for me.
Speaker 1:They played on kind of a decent travel team, but not the level of we're playing in. So you know, I think parents need to have that expectation of. If I think my son's that good, well then we need to go to that next level and see how it goes. Um, if he can't get there. You know, maybe we look at it a different way, but a lot of times parents tend to think that their kids are the best. Like this weekend, my son, like I said, hit 11 and played wherever.
Speaker 3:Are there too many teams playing too many tournaments and not focusing on development?
Speaker 1:So, if you ask it, that is a great question. So this weekend at a 10-year-old tournament we played some very poor teams. Poor. The kids had fun, they scored a lot of runs and at the end of the day they felt like they got better. The other team got a chance to play. They got a chance to play in a tournament they probably would never play in. So it's hard to say right, you have a bunch of kids that want to play, let them play. After a while you'll start seeing kids that want to play at a different level and they'll go to a different level.
Speaker 1:I talked to a parent last weekend of a 13-year-old. He said he wanted to play on a different team because his son was playing on a team that made seven errors in one game and he wanted to play for a team like ours, the one that we're playing on 13-0. I said you can try it, but you do realize he won't be the shortstop and hitting three and will be like you said. He'll be a guy, right, he'll be a part of the team and I don't think it's ever a bad thing. We had a nine-year-old last year. He wanted to play higher, competitive baseball. Fine, you know, go for it. But our 10-year-old team, for the most part, yeah, we'll win a lot of games. We'll learn the game. When they're 13, 14 years old they'll be ready to start branching off, play a little more and then, once you get to 60, 90, I think you see a lot of kids start stopping to go into the next level because you know you don't hit a home run over 200 foot fence. You know, like you do in 12 year. So you know those. Those are the fun times.
Speaker 1:So if you ask me, are there a lot of teams playing a lot of travel baseball? Sure, there's a lot of kids that want to play. You know, and you get older. Like you said, a 17, 18 year old team we played on or coached. They played good competition because they're a good team. You know, every once in a while you'd get a team in there that didn't belong in a tournament. They quickly learned they didn't belong in a tournament.
Speaker 1:So, ah, to play baseball, go ahead. You know, if you're really good on a team, go try to play on another team. But if you're just upset because your team's losing, you might want to look at yourself. You know. But you know, if a parent were to ask me. They're like I get parents say, well, what should I do? Um, I'd say stay a community as long as you can, because if you're not in a community and you're not playing 60, 90 and that basically is high school fields you're going to have a hard time finding fields. You're going to have a hard time finding fields. You're going to have a hard time finding places to practice. Communities mainly use their schools, their district schools, and when they have that they can do a lot more. You can have fall and winter practices. Then you play spring. You play 30, 40 games when you're 10U. That's fine. You don't need to play 85 games.
Speaker 1:I always laugh at the the eight, you, eight, you coach talks about winning 94 games. We had a coach, uh around here. He went 94 and six and they won all these tournaments. And afterwards I looked at him. I said so, who is the MVP? And he kept rattling off.
Speaker 1:All these names shook my head. I said, oh, he goes. What do you mean? I said you're the MVP, the pitcher is the MVP and ate you, like everyone, throw it to their bat and they hit it right. So you know, it's great that you win a lot, but it's also great that you develop, like you said, and when you get older you'll start playing on teams that have a little more more and you know more life and and what they want to do, and you know that's when you start seeing the difference. And you can really see a difference when you play some of these tournaments and you know your team is not even close to all the other teams. Well, it's either you need to find another team to play on, to be a part of, or you need to realize that this is where you are and you enjoy playing. There's nothing wrong with enjoying playing baseball Nothing all nothing.
Speaker 3:What is? What are your thoughts on the fees it costs to either what some of these crazy super elite teams charge, or the tournaments are just raking in cash and you know?
Speaker 1:yeah, I think I think the fees come from the tournaments. I hope I was talking to somebody this weekend and he has a $6,000 budget. But he charges every kid $2,700 before uniforms, right, and he has a $6,000 budget. So I'm like, wait what he goes. Yeah, the club brings in all the money and then gives you $6,000 to work with afterwards and I'm like, so where's all the money? Like what's the point?
Speaker 2:Stay with us. There's more of the Athlete One podcast coming up.
Speaker 3:Would you like to be a guest of the Athlete One podcast? If so, check out our website, athleteonenet, and sign up. Now back to our guest, Mike Yinger.
Speaker 1:And I know, you know, when I coached, when we coached together, you know, the fees were nothing and all we did was pay for the tournaments and shoot. We had one uniform, top and a hat and we were. I thought we were really good, you know, and it was. I think people realize it wasn't about the name, you know, the recognition, it was more about playing the game and we got recognition, but it was from playing the game the right way, right, I don't know. I think it's hard, because you got to, you got to worry about having the right person in charge. Because you got to worry about having the right person in charge, because if you don't have the right person, the right coach, you're going to be miserable for a long time. And you know, communication is a key as a coach, knowing that you might not know anything according to everyone, being able to handle those kind of conversations. Yeah, those are the kind of things you know I talk.
Speaker 1:I talked to somebody just the other day. We have a new kid on a 10 U team and he hurt his knee and I reached out to I'm just an assistant. I reached out to the parent and I said hey, how's his knee? He's new. The kid is super insecure about playing. You can tell the parents don't feel like they're part of the team. But the fact that the one of the coaches just reached out to say, how's your knee ken? I'm gonna be honest with you, the kid didn't hurt his knee like the kid maybe scraped his knee, but they felt like he, you know, wow, someone.
Speaker 1:Actually I told the coach, the parent coach, to hey, just want to let you know. I reached out and he said, well, I don't normally reach out on bumps and bruises. I'm like, eh, kind of want to just let them know you care, cause he's part of it. So, like I said, it's, it's hard, you know, because you don't get real thought-provoking coaches. You get a lot of times you get parents who are put in a role. You know they have day jobs. They're accountants, they're a different type, they're lawyers, they're different people throughout the course of the day. We're educators, so we know how to handle. We see things a lot differently. It's just one of those things you know it's you know we're lucky, but at the same time we're lucky because we get to coach every single thing.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because we know what's, we know the expectations aren't too high and they're realistic for every kid and every parent. So that's probably the biggest thing is, you know, find a place to play where you enjoy. You can learn the game, no matter what you're doing, and from there kind of develop a bond with a coach that you feel like you can trust. Well, take care of your son, you know, then move on. And when you're ready you can trust, well, take care of your son, then move on. And when you're ready to move on, move on.
Speaker 1:I'm not sure how many times you've talked about your son, but I can tell you, when I first saw him, I knew you wanted him to play college baseball and I was like, all right, let's find a way to get it done. And, jake, we'd switched them and put them down underneath and just got an opportunity. And then he went on to play to high Dominican, he he changed. But my point is he got an opportunity. But that happens because someone like me who's been around, that knows what someone will look at, you know, around that knows what someone will look at, you know, takes the opportunity to help them out. And you can find someone to coach and help your son like that, I think you're better off.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that leads into my next question. You know reality excuse me for baseball players and their parents when it comes to scholarships and exposure. You know what? What's the reality? You've had a chance. I left off at the beginning that you also coached college baseball. What's the reality that these parents need to face?
Speaker 1:uh, I think the reality is to have someone to be able to talk to him about it. I, if you tell me you want your son to play college baseball and you play for me, he's going to play. You know, I had a kid it was over COVID he didn't play at all. His junior year, senior year, they had COVID, he didn't play. He's on his fifth year at Bluffton as a starting right fielder. I had him going to Bluffton as a left-handed pitcher and from there he's their starting right fielder and, to be honest with you, bluffton has a good spot for him. Right, there's spots for everybody.
Speaker 1:You know to tell people they're Vanderbilt or they're Clemson material I got news for you. If they're Clemson and Vanderbilt material, or or Tennessee there's, they're going to be Louisville, they're going to be Ohio state, they're going to be Indiana, they're going to be all those different places you know are going to come knocking. So you gotta be realistic, meaning, go for it. You know, eighth grade freshman year, you want to go to LSU, go for it. Go down to the camp, see what prospect camp looks like. Don't be, you know, don't be surprised when you come back and say hey, dad, mom, everyone ran a six, seven. I'm running the seven, four. Okay, where can you go and run a seven, four? You know? I mean there are schools out there. There are schools out there that will take kids that work as hard as they possibly can and do the right things and contribute. There are schools out there, you know. Division three there's, there's a place for you. There is. It just depends on where it is. Might not even be in your home state.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, you know you've had a chance. You've coached. You were an athletic director. You're currently a school administrator now and it's becoming tougher than ever for high school coaches because parents have such high expectations. And you know, and I kind of there's a part of me that says I get it because you know they're not a starter or they're getting little playing time, and then it turns into where they go after the coach and the coach doesn't know anything, right? So what do you tell coaches? Because there's a lot of good coaches that are getting out of the game. And, more importantly, what do you tell the parents when you know they're they love their kid, but their kid just isn't good?
Speaker 1:enough. Yeah, you want to know what I would tell the coach. I'd say coach summer baseball or something. If you love baseball and you want to play, coach the game, I'd coach. You know, I honestly goodness I'd coach summer baseball or do something where you can almost pick your players and decide who you want on your team. You know, because when you're the high school coach, a lot of times you get whoever's there and, like you said, so-and-so played shortstop for my team for eight years and now he's not good enough to play for you. Well, my expectations are this.
Speaker 1:You know, unfortunately, as an administrator I see it all the time you know, athletic director, administrator, you don't have the backing as a coach, as you thought you did, because the supplemental and I say it all the time I think I said to you supplemental is so small as a coach it's under $10,000, and it's not a livelihood as an athletic director or assistant principal. It's like you know they're providing for their family with their salaries and you just have extra to go on vacation with. That's what they think the coach is doing, right. So they're like well, you know, the parents are upset, so we're just going to move on and it's kind of like you're stuck because you're doing what's right and you know what's right, but same time the administrators are like, well, if they come after me, they can take my whole livelihood, my family's livelihood, and they're just taking your summer vacation. And I know that's not the right way to think, but that's truly how it ends up going, yeah, and it hurts. It hurts me because I know how much people care about what goes on.
Speaker 1:I mean high school coach of baseball, basketball, football. You don't do it at all for any other reason to help the player be great, and it's very, very hard to actually realize that what you do isn't really that important to everybody as it is to you. So my suggestion is you coach a sport. You go to a summer team. I like coaching summer college teams. That was fun.
Speaker 1:I mean I got the coach kids that knew what they were doing, wanted to get better, you know, loved playing and had the same passion as I did, and it was fun. You know, I like I like being around those kind of guys and makes a huge difference and unfortunately, high you got some guys that just want to show up and play. You know, one of my good friends right now is learning that he was a division one baseball coach. Now he's learning that he's not starting a kid, thinking, nah, I'm not starting him, and the parent comes in going why isn't he starting? And he's like, well, cause he's not good enough. You know, and when he has that conversation, parent might not take that as he's not good enough, he's lucky to be here. You might say, well, he has a right. And that's where you kind of you have that hard, that hard conversation that a lot of the administrators don't want to have anymore.
Speaker 3:A lot of the administrators don't want to have anymore, or do you foresee a time when that's going to change, where the parents are not going to just if things don't go their way and they're just going to go to the top and try to get you removed and move onto the next person?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's going to be like that. I truly think it's going to be like that. I don't see. I mean, for the simple fact as being an administrator, I see teachers have the same issues. You know, right now they're not. That's their livelihood, so they have a union that's helping them. But I don't really see, especially in some of the affluent districts. I don't really see a change. You, some of the affluent districts, I don't really see a change. You know, I think we have a friend that won a state championship the year before and was fired the next year and he's a Hall of Fame coach and he has over 550 wins and it's like what are we doing here? Like what are we doing here? But a parent didn't like the fact that his son wasn't playing and made it about everything that it wasn't. It wasn't about the game, it was about everything that the person didn't bring. And you know, those kind of things they're going to get. I don't think they're ever going to get better. I don't think they're ever going to get better.
Speaker 3:I don't think they're ever going to get better. I don't think they're ever going to get better. It's a shame. But uh, cause a lot of the coaches out there, they, they're doing it for all the right reasons and you know, you know I think a lot of them realize, hey, it's not worth the headache that comes with it anymore, and no it's, it's it's disheartening for people like us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, boy, I would love to coach teams but at the same time, like I know, I couldn't survive some places. I know I couldn't, and it's not that it's not that I'm a tyrant, or I just know that I'd be honest and I'd tell somebody something they wouldn't want to hear and you know my expectations would be so high that some people wouldn't be able to handle it and they would try to find any way possible to make me look like I didn't care as much as I do. And it's, you know, like I I said, summer is actually pretty good because you get to know the kids, you get to know the parents. There's 11, 12 kids on your team. Honestly, you deal with, sometimes you deal with kids not hitting in the order, but try to work with them because you play these pool games, because everybody gets in the bracket. So you know it's kind of interesting the way that works.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of build-in to help the coaches yeah so, and if you want to coach, you want to teach the game, I I like a lot of things that didn't go in to the game, like mental, like what do you do? How are you planning? Are you doing the right things outside of the game? Are you being a good person? Those kind of things. I miss that kind of stuff more than anything. Is you know, being able to put my arm around a kid and talk to him about maybe making a different choice? You know? And then later on you get a phone call or a letter in the mail. It says how much they appreciate you. And you know, come to my wedding. Or my first kids named after you. It's those kinds of things. There's like whoa. You know the impact you had on people. It's, it's incredible. So those things I miss.
Speaker 3:Yeah, go ahead. So to finish up, I do a little quick rapid fire here with you. I know it's getting late.
Speaker 1:So, um, winning or hate losing? Oh, I hate losing. Why, oh I, I expect to win. Okay, you always expect to win it when you lose. Oh, I can tell you this when I was at DeSales that's a Catholic school in Columbus I can tell you this when I was at DeSales that's a Catholic school in Columbus when I was there, we would go on break Thursday, friday, saturday, sunday of Easter, and a couple of years we lost on Wednesday and I didn't talk to anybody. Thursday, friday, saturday, sunday. Until Monday we were able to play again, like my family would sit there and go. It was just a game. Yeah, I hate it. I hate losing. We win, I'll talk to you. We lose forget it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no doubt I'm with you on that. Rank these three things and what you are best at. Were you better at? Being a player, a coach or fishing, what's?
Speaker 1:one, what's two, what's three? I tell my kids I was the best player, so, and then I? I don't know. Here's what I say, and you probably know this. I only do three things. Well, right, I coach, I fish and I teach. That's all I got. And I tell people all the time I'm like if it's anything else I can't do it. I teach, coach, fish, it's all I got.
Speaker 1:So you come to me and want to talk talk accounting? I don't know what you're talking about. You want to talk talking counting? I don't know what you're talking about. You want to talk about cars? Don't know what you're talking about. You want to talk about what bait do you? Yeah, I got you. You want to talk about. You want to talk about something I teach? I got you right. But those three things I don't know. I don't know if I would rank those, because my kids always ask me would I rather be a professional baseball player or professional fishermen? I'm like I don't know. I mean, go out on the lake all day and just see what happens. Or you know, face Randy Johnson, I don't know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no. And the last question pretty seeks experience you had as a coach.
Speaker 1:Hmm, there are multiple Um one. One of my favorite experiences ever was I was playing a good friend in a district championship game and he sent me a picture of a kid crossing home plate touching the base while our kid is getting ready to tag them out and he said the run should have counted. Unfortunately, what the pick on this show was his kid? Uh, it ran out of the baseline about 35 steps before the tag was applied and the umpire I believe the guy's name was Kerry Fleming called him out of the baseline, called him out and the home plate umpire said that the run counted. Dan Steiner was his name.
Speaker 1:The run counted and I said Dan did the run count? And he goes, mike, the run counted just before he tagged him. So then I went and asked Kerry, when did you have the call? Oh, easily 30 steps before he tagged him. And then I talked to Dan and Kerry and we won that game, I believe, one to nothing, trying to remember who that team was. We played and won one to nothing and still hurt that guy. I know it hurt some, but yeah, that was a great episode.
Speaker 3:Unbelievable. I fell into that one. Yes, you did Well, hey, Mike, I appreciate you taking the time to sit down with me here, and you know it's almost 10 o'clock at night and you got to get back up again in the morning and do it again. So thanks again, uh, for starting me off for season two of the athlete one podcast great thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:It's a great time being here this episode of the athlete.
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