Latest / Dugout Dish Baseball Recruiting Podcast powered by EMD Baseball / Youth Baseball & Parenting — How to Support Your Son's Journey Without Making It Your Own | Ep. 185

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Youth Baseball & Parenting — How to Support Your Son's Journey Without Making It Your Own | Ep. 185 · Dugout Dish Baseball Recruiting Podcast powered by EMD Baseball

• 0:02
  Speaker A: Hey, parents and coaches, are your kids using the right glove? The most important skill for youth athletes to learn is how to play proper catch. The problem is most youth gloves are made with bad leather and are too big for small hands. They actually make it harder to play catch. That's why former Major League Baseball shortstop Kevin Smith created Cali Gloves. Cali gloves are crafted from 100% Japanese kip leather and are the perfect size for kids. All Cali gloves come with palm slits, finger loops and elastic wrist lacing that encourage proper hand placement. The right closing patterns and give kids more confidence to go make plays. Cali gloves even allow parents to break in the glove without stretching out the fit. It's the glove Kevin wishes he had growing up and the glove all his teammates want for their kids. Visit caligloves.com to learn more and help your kids play better catch. Cali Gloves K a l I gloves.com
• 1:11
  Speaker B: welcome to this week's edition of the Dugout Dish podcast. I'm Andy Kiri Kitties, joined by my Wonderful Co host, Mr. Keith Glasser. How are we doing, sir?
• 1:18
  Speaker A: Great. How are you?
• 1:20
  Speaker B: Good. Today we're going to talk a little bit about more like pre. I think there's a lot of lessons here. I think there's a lot that we're going to talk about that's going to apply to people who are in the recruiting process now. But me and you have both had some conversations recently with some with some parents. One of them on my end is a former teammate of ours whose son's a pretty darn talented ball player. But, but guys who are in that, like, seventh, eighth, maybe, maybe fresh, maybe starting their freshman year type of situation right now and just talking about kind of like what the landscape is and some of the things that we think that are really important for kids of that age, you know, whether it comes to setting goals or mindsets or, you know, the role of the parent. And, you know, how do you kind of lay that path to recruitment for a kid who's got aspirations as a, as an eighth grader, you know, or ninth grader that wants to go play in college? Like, how do you thread that needle and making sure that you're doing really good by them not getting in the way of anything, but also not making it kind of a, a boomer bust situation? And I, I think we'll, we'll, we'll be able to unpack what we mean there a little bit here soon. But I had an awesome conversation with a really good friend of ours and it was really refreshing to hear. And I guess I would have expected it from him, somebody who played in college at a high level and just a tough, hard nosed, really good human being, that he had a really refreshing take on what he was trying to provide for his son. And it was about making sure that he was in a situation that was constantly going to challenge him in terms of him competing with and playing with guys that are as good, if not better than him. Because his son does have some legitimate drive and aspiration to some of the things that he wants to work on, and it wants to go and compete, which we talk about all the time. But it was really refreshing for him. And one of the things he said is, I want to do everything I can by him to get him to where he wants to go, but I don't ever want to be the reason that he ends up doing anything. And I thought that was a pretty cool approach from a guy that me and you both know is wildly competitive. And I think that's a lesson for a lot of families and a lot of people can take. And we'll kind of see where this ultimately goes. Again, it's a touch tough for us to touch on here, but I know there you have some thoughts on this with regards to kind of the mindset of the parent and how they should kind of operate here. What do you think about that?
• 4:12
  Speaker A: Well, I think that that's probably one of the better ways I've heard it put right. You know, I think as parents, we all want the best for our kids. We want them to be the best at what they do, whatever it is, whether they want to play baseball or, you know, play the saxophone, whatever it is. But I would hate for it to be the reason, like, I'm the one driving it, right? Like, you want your son to be the one who genuinely has the interest and has the drive and wants to be able to do this and use baseball as a vehicle to be able to, you know, get to better places. You know, baseball has allowed me to see a lot of this country and travel and do a lot of cool things, you know, so. But I think as parents, sometimes it can be. It can come as at a cost, where you feel as though you're as invested in this process and you are from a monetary standpoint, right? Like, the kids aren't necessarily the ones that can afford to do all of this stuff, but it's got to be your son's journey, right? He needs to be the one that wants to be in the weight room. He has to be the one that wants to go hit or throw or get faster, eat better, sleep more, all of those things that will ultimately lead to his development. And I think that at an earlier and earlier age, you're seeing people that are way more interested in these wildly competitive programs that aren't necessarily based in the foundation of development and keeping kids in this game for as long as we possibly can. I think there's a fear factor in which they're trying to get parents to come to their programs, do things for either the recruitment process, which is three, four, five, six years down the road, the high school process, where you have a lot of programs that are run by some of the high school coaches that are like, hey, come play in my program. And if you don't, not that they say it, but it's implied, like, hey, if you don't play here, we'll see about high school, which I think is absurd, but there's a lot of those things going on out there in the world and it's driving the FOMO aspect of if we don't do this, we're missing out on something. When the reality is at 10, like anything less than 13, it's irrelevant. It does not matter. Very rarely is the best 8, 9, 10 year old the best 15, 16, 17 year old. That's just kids are developing at different ages. The maturation process is wildly different for everyone. So very rarely is that going to be true. And quite frankly, there's not really a lot of college coaches in the country that really care what you did at 10, 11, 12 years old, right? Like you're playing on a 40, what is it, 45, 60 foot basis, 45 foot mound. Like we don't play baseball on that field, right? Like what matters is when you can actually do something on a real live baseball field. When you're 15, 16, 17 years old, when you're in the recruiting process and you know you have a lot of other things, intangibles that are going to go with your game. But I think we focused on a lot of the wrong things, right? Like I had a conversation with my nephew yesterday and you know, today's the 14th, so the September 13th, him and I had a discussion. He was at baseball practice and he was like, oh yeah. His buddy was like, yeah. He's like, we just, it was boring. Practice was just boring. And I was like, well, what did you do? He was like, well, we learned how to run the bases and then we took some ground balls. And I was like, so you, like, you learned how to play the Game, like, yeah, man, it, it's, sometimes it's boring, but this is what it takes to be good at stuff, right? Like, you're not just going to roll it out there and be like, all right, let's hit for an hour and 40 minutes. Like there's more to this game than that, you know, So I think that, you know, from a parent perspective, you want to be able to make sure that whatever program or whatever you're doing to aid your son in this process is that you're focused on making sure that they still want to show up to the field every day and that it is something where they're going to develop in the program in which they're in to where hopefully in three, four years, they stick with it, they become a recruitable student athlete if this is what they want to do. And it's not going to be for everyone, right? Like, we talk about this a lot. It's 92, 93% of people aren't going to play college baseball. It's not for everyone. Not only from a, you know, a want perspective, but from a talent perspective. But, you know, if you, if you, they have a drive to do this. I think that, you know, you want to be more focused on the development side. You kind of, you know, not to say you're out of the way, but like, and these are what, these are the things that you need to do if you want to get to where you want to go, you know, So I just think that, you know, you want to pair yourself with programs and with people to surround yourself with that are going to give your son the best opportunity to be able to be successful in the long run. And quite frankly, if your son is 13, if your son is 14 and younger even, you know, close to 15 and under, like focus development, weight room, get bigger, faster, stronger, put on weight, sleep, do all of those things, you know, you don't need to go play, you don't need to go to every single tournament and showcase under the sun. You really don't. Because what matters is when you turn, you know that going into your junior year, like those two years are probably going to be the two at this point in time with the landscape. Those two summers are the ones that are your big, you know, this year, the summer after your sophomore year, the summer after your junior year, everything else just leads up to that and anything else that anyone wants to tell you is a bold faced lie, unless you're, you know, a first rounder. But at that point, this is all
• 10:32
  Speaker B: kind of move probably don't need our podcast if that's the case.
• 10:38
  Speaker A: No.
• 10:39
  Speaker B: Now, the fun, the, the kids showing up and enjoying it, I think is, is such a huge piece of it. And I think part of that, because you, you touched on this, I think part of it comes down to people, right? Like if you can find an organization or a team or an individual coach that your son or your daughter, if they're playing a, you know, softball or whatever, you know, lacrosse, whatever it is, if you can find them somebody that's not you that they really enjoy showing up to go and practice with, that's gold. If you can find a hidden guy that your kid is excited to go do hitting with, or you can find a coach from a travel organization, he doesn't even need to be the best baseball guy, right. I obviously be ideal if he could coach the game a little bit and you know, teach him some of the nuance and all that kind of stuff, which is obviously important. But if your son likes to show up and play with that guy in that team and he's got teammates that he enjoys being around, that's gold there too. Because they're going to play harder, they're going to show up, it's going to mean a little bit more to them, they're going to be a little bit more excited for the situation. And I think that it just doesn't need to be Boomer bus end all. Be all. I don't really think it needs to be that way ever. But you know, they're. The pressure of recruitment and the pressure of like the goal of college just shouldn't play a factor there. I think if you dumb it down to the simpler things of making sure that they're going to the right people, you know, that maybe you're not driving two hours to go to practice, right? That's, that's exhausting on both the parent and the kid. So making some of those decisions I think can be really, really, really beneficial to kind of lay in that path because the last thing you want is for them to get to 16 and they're in that window when they want to get recruited and they're just burn out from it because it hasn't been fun. You know, you, you didn't go on vacation because you had to play in the, you know, the Lone Star Classic in freaking El Paso in the beginning of August as a 13 year old, like that's not fun for anybody. So keeping it, keeping it light, keeping it fresh, making sure that they're around some people that they like being around, like I think that's a. I think that's a cheat code in this. And from a parent's perspective, I just keep coming back to what our. What our buddy said. Like, it can never mean more to you than it does to your kid. And I think that that is where most. I think that is where most families get it mixed up, is that the player doesn't want it. He doesn't want to be as college, a college baseball player as much as mom and dad want him to play college baseball. And if those two things, if the balance is off there, it can work, but at some point, it. The kid's gonna lose the enjoyment for it. And when things get hard, it's going to be easy to step away from it because it's not really what they want to do. I just. I keep going back to that all the time. And, like, I'm gonna let you kind of elaborate on this a little bit more, but the analogy of, like, what the car ride is like, like, I can't think of a better way to put it in terms of how you communicate with your kids and making sure that they're in an environment where they are comfortable.
• 14:26
  Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, I think that we've all seen it growing up. You still see it now, but you can't want it more than your kid. But when that game is over and you're driving home, that car ride can't be something that your son is dreading going home. Right. Like you're going to get in the car and do what? Yell at them? Come on, what are we doing?
• 14:52
  Speaker B: Can't believe you swung and missed that two one breaking ball on the third inning or your fourth game today. Right.
• 14:58
  Speaker A: Like, you know, it. It's. This is a game of failure, and it's really, really difficult. And the higher the levels you go, the harder and harder it gets. And getting in a car after a game where you probably, you know, where you didn't play fast, the last thing that you want to hear is, you know, your mother, your father getting into you about how bad you just were. Yeah, I know. I was there. I'm the one who just. I'm the one who was bad. I witnessed it with my own two eyes in my body, saw it all happened. I thought I sucked too, you know, but. And I think that it can lead to a myriad of other issues. Right? Like not just your, you know, not just the. The anxiety and the stress of. Of that experience after your game, but now you're trying to do way too much just so that you don't get yelled at in the car after. On the ride home or not to have that conversation instead of, you know, hey, tough shake today, huh? Like, a kid was pretty good. You know, whatever. You know, whatever it could be that, you know, it can't be something that your son is going to dread getting in that car and driving home. And I get it, right? Like, you're probably, you know, you're spending money on lessons and cages and, you know, going to said game and tournament. But I can promise you that he's probably not going out there and being like, you know what? I'm just going to go ahead and go over five today with four punches just so that I can really piss mom and dad off and get yelled at in the car. Like, I. I don't know if that's ever happened, right? Like, you know, I just think that we. We need to do a better job as, you know, and I'm saying we collectively. But, you know, the car ride can't be something that your son or daughter dreads when that game is over. It's got to be something where, you know, if you want to have those conversations, like, maybe wait, right? Like, you want to have conversation about what just happened in that game, like, maybe give it a day or maybe give it the entire ride home or whatever it is, so that both of you aren't necessarily as emotionally charged as you're probably going to be. Because like any high school kid, they're probably going to sit there and be like, what do you know, dad? What do you know, Mom? You know what I mean? Come on.
• 17:41
  Speaker B: What do you know?
• 17:42
  Speaker A: I know more than you, and it's just going to go in one ear and right out the other. You're better off having a conversation after things have kind of cooled down. And again, like, if they lost the game. Your son was terrible. He. He knows. He knows he was terrible. You think he wants to go sit in a car with his parents who are supposed to be the ones that are, you know, gonna support him and just get berated for sucking? Like, that's not fun either. You know, I. I just. I've. I've always thought, you know, it was a bizarre. Such a bizarre set of circumstances when with, you know, people that you knew and things you've heard, like, you know, it's not the end of the world. It's just a baseball game. Like, let's focus on. Let's focus on the things that we did, right? Let's focus on, like, hey, you were over. Like, even if you want to Give some semblance like hey, like I think it was bad. You thought it was like you run off field, you were high, motor all day, like tough game, like we'll get him tomorrow. You know, like what negativity are you bringing into that car that's going to actually get more out of him later that day, tomorrow, next week, whatever, right? Like I'm going to get in that car and be like, I don't even want to talk to you. If you are the parent of a high school baseball player with college aspirations, you already know the recruiting process can feel overwhelming. Endless showcases, non stop emails and big promises with very little clarity. That's why we recommend Diamond College Showcase Camps, the nation's premier academic baseball showcase. At Diamond College showcases, every college coach in attendance is there with a purpose to coach, instruct, evaluate and recruit. Every player is seen, every player is engaged and every family leaves with a clear understanding of where they truly stand. This is not a mass camp. College coaches run the drills, evaluate every athlete and provide honest professional feedback that you can trust. Diamond College Showcase Camps are built for serious student athletes who value both baseball and academics. If you're looking for transparency, clarity and a recruiting experience that respects your time and your players future, Diamond College Showcase is the place to be. To learn more, visit diamond collegeshowcase.com
• 20:07
  Speaker B: well the, the funny thing is is that looking back on having played and coached and been involved in this, I can't ever remember getting our asses chewed for playing bad, right? The difference in, is in, in what I mean by that is you get beat 15 to 3 and it's a little bit sloppy. Guys don't make pitches, make a couple errors, their bats aren't good, like okay, you're gonna get coached up on that. But I can't remember getting chewed out for getting beat. The only time I ever remember getting chewed out was we didn't play hard, right? Or like there was just a clear lack of focus. And to think that 18 to 22, 23 year old college baseball players with really high standards for what you would expect them to do on a day, in a day out basis, they don't get yelled at for making, for playing a really hard game, they get yelled at for not playing hard. But kids and I, you see this stuff on social media getting, you know, we were terrible doing this and terrible. Like you think that kid enjoys showing up? Like just coach him on it, be a coach and don't, you know, you don't need to, to, to berate a kid because they made a Base running mistake or make an example of a kid, a base running mistake. And you certainly don't need to do it as a parent either. And I just, I just put it in. It's kind of the same analogy of, you know, why would you, why would you treat a 13 year old a different way than you would treat an 18 year old? When you're talking about like the standard you hold, like for the execution of it. Like you think that 13 year old, to your point, you think that they're trying to be bad.
• 22:08
  Speaker A: I don't think anyone's ever trying to be bad.
• 22:11
  Speaker B: Exactly. You know, it's a hard game and I just think that it, you're better off getting coached than you are getting criticized. And I think there's a very, very thick line and I think that line often is defined by the timing of it, which I think is what you're driving at. That, you know, maybe right after the game isn't the best time to talk about the at bats. Maybe you let that one marinate for a couple days and go, hey bud, you wanna, you know, you wanna go to the cage today? Maybe we'll work on some of that stuff that gave you some issues in the game the other day. And I bet you that kid goes, oh yeah, cool, let's do it dad, let's talk about it. And then it's not emotional on either side of the, you know, on either side of the, the conversation there. No.
• 23:01
  Speaker A: And I think the, you know, I can remember the times that I've gotten, I got into my teams. But to your point, a lot of it is just more, it's effort based or focus based or something that is within our control. Right. Like stuff that we can control. If we continually don't control it, then yeah, probably going to lose my mind. But very like very rarely, if ever, if we just, if we played good baseball and we just got beat, they made more plays, they, you know, got more timely hits. Hey man, it happens. You're going to get beat. There's a reason no one's ever gone 162 and oh, it's really hard. Incredibly difficult. You know, it's, hey, the sun's, sun's going to come up tomorrow. And the beautiful thing about baseball is generally speaking, we get to play again tomorrow, we don't have to wait a whole week. Like, sun's gonna go down tonight, it's gonna come up tomorrow and we can get right back on this field and do it all over again. But if you dread doing that, the likelihood of you being excited to show up to the field and have a high motor and do all of those things that you want to do to get yourself better is gonna slowly diminish because everything it is that you're doing is just widely criticized in an already difficult game. In an already difficult. And I'm, you know, it's tough peeing, especially the recruiting process. It's already anxiety. Real. You're in high school, there's a lot of, there's a lot going on. You know, you don't need, you don't need to be criticized. 24 7, 365, let it sit, have a conversation day or two later. You know, hey, I think that we should, you know, let's go to the cages and work on this. Hey, you know, you want to go to the field and I'll flip you some balls or we'll, you know, I'll hit you some ground balls, whatever. Something that takes pressure off so you can actually, you know, try to get better at whatever it is that you're. You're struggling at and have the, the, the, the moxie and the, the. My brain's not working right now, but have the, the, the word I'm looking for here.
• 25:21
  Speaker B: Have some feel. Yeah. Feel.
• 25:24
  Speaker A: But like, you know, the, the excitement and the enthusiasm.
• 25:27
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 25:27
  Speaker A: To, to, to want to do it every day where it, it's just going to legitimately start to diminish if your car ride home is just miserable.
• 25:39
  Speaker B: Yeah. And it all comes back to making sure that your kids are enjoying showing up because that's what's going to lead them to put in the time and effort. Right. They're not going to work at something that isn't fun for them, that's not enjoyable for them. Right. It shouldn't be a job at 14 and 15 and 16 years old. And I've said this on the podcast before, as soon as it stopped being enjoyable for guys is when I watch guys careers slowly fade. Whether it was sophomore year of college and you could just tell that like the grind of it was too much for him and they just were going through the motions at that point. Or the guys who make it to pro ball and come back after their third season and go, yeah, I just, it's not fun anymore. Direct words from AAA player. It's just not fun anymore. So whenever the fun goes out is usually when things start to fade and the last thing you want to do is suck the fun out of it for your 14 year old son or daughter and you be the reason for it because you can't separate your emotions from just making sure that they really enjoy playing and trying to support them the best that you can. You know, if they're struggling, hidden. Maybe the answer isn't to, you know, talk through at bat strategies on the ride home. Maybe it's to go and have a nice, relaxed batting practice session with no consequences. I'm not there yet. As a father, I'm hoping that I can follow through on my advice effectively. I'm sure that I will have some friends, much like yourself, that will hold me accountable if I. If I get off the rails with that. But that's, that's the thing that's going to propel them to the next phase of this, which is the recruiting portion of it. And if they're willing to put in the time and the effort because it's fun and they enjoy being out there and they want to play baseball and they want to get the extra reps and they want to be around their teammates and they've got some coaches that they like showing up to play for. Maybe they got some cool gear that they like too. But they're excited every time it's time to go to the baseball field. If you can do that over and over and over again until they're 15 or 16 and they've got a little bit of talent, you're probably going to get an outcome that's pretty positive when it comes recruiting time. But if you, if you suck the life out of it before then, it's going to be an uphill battle, and you got to hope that that fire gets reignited somewhere along the line, which I. I think can be hard. Sometimes I think it can be hard. Kids get interested in other stuff, they lose interest in what they're doing, you know, and you can, you can kind of kill the dream before it gets there without even realizing that you're slowly kind of sucking the life out of the dream that your kid may have had at 13 or 14 when he turns on the College World Series and is like, I'd love to do that. And then by 16, it's just not. It's just not fun for him. And I think baseball is a sport where it's really easy to do that because you can't play pickup. It's really hard to just go and work on it solo, like truly solo, like basketball. You can go get working on your own and not have anybody there talking to you. You kind of need somebody there to help you, and you got to show up to specific facilities and things to do it. Like, I think it's one of those sports that it's easier to suck the life out of it one, because I think as a young kid it can be slow and dare I say, boring at times where basketball and soccer are fast paced and you always feel like you're in it. So I think it's even more important in a sport like baseball just to make sure that, you know, your son or daughter are legitimately engaged and excited to show up every day.
• 29:45
  Speaker A: But you can do other things too. Like you can go play wiffle ball.
• 29:47
  Speaker B: Yeah. Oh, yeah.
• 29:48
  Speaker A: Wiffle ball's great.
• 29:49
  Speaker B: You should play a hell of a lot. Wall ball. Big fan.
• 29:52
  Speaker A: Took the words out of my mouth.
• 29:54
  Speaker B: Butts up.
• 29:55
  Speaker A: Play wall ball.
• 29:57
  Speaker B: Politically correct.
• 29:58
  Speaker A: I don't know. What's that?
• 30:00
  Speaker B: Oh, that's right, wall ball. But if you bobble it. Oh, run to the wall. And if I peg you with it, you get a B. And then when you spell bot, you're, you're out of the game. That's what we played when we were kids.
• 30:15
  Speaker A: Wal ball's electric. I love wall ball.
• 30:18
  Speaker B: And when we got a little saucy when we got a little bit older and we wanted to play a shorter game, we would call it ass. Don't tell my mom.
• 30:26
  Speaker A: And then you had, you'd get an all out battles for whether or not like the ball beat the kid to the wall.
• 30:32
  Speaker B: Oh yeah, you have knock down, drag
• 30:36
  Speaker A: out fights like no, I touched the wall, then the ball hit it.
• 30:40
  Speaker B: Yeah. My, my, my, my elementary school, it wasn't like a, it wasn't like a corridor wall. It was a wall with an open side to the building. So the strategy if you did bauble is that you always ran to the open side because you could touch the wall and never have to break stride. Right. Otherwise, you know, like you're running full speed at the wall and you got to touch it. Like you got to pull up slow down.
• 31:04
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 31:04
  Speaker B: We have some kids, you know, that would run up the wall so they didn't have to stop. You develop some athleticism when getting pelted with a tennis ball in the back of the head is a consequence for, for trying to run through a ball
• 31:20
  Speaker A: and you bobble it some of the best. Well, we had wobble for hours.
• 31:26
  Speaker B: We had a thing that if you bobbled it and then you hit the ball after it. Because some kids would do that.
• 31:31
  Speaker A: Oh yeah, you B. Then they'd smack it away.
• 31:34
  Speaker B: Automatic, automatic letter. And then you had to stand on the wall with your facing the wall and one Person got to. To got a free shot at trying to pelt you with it. That was your punishment.
• 31:48
  Speaker A: It's fair.
• 31:48
  Speaker B: We were hardcore.
• 31:51
  Speaker A: No, like, there. There's ways that you can, I think, for younger kids to stay engaged and also do stuff like that where you just, like, you make up your own rules.
• 32:02
  Speaker B: Tape up your bat. Duct tape a ball at a home run derby. Good times.
• 32:08
  Speaker A: Go to the field and play opposite handed.
• 32:12
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 32:13
  Speaker A: Play with, like, four dudes and, like, you have ghost runners everywhere. And you get into arguments as to whether or not he scored on the. On the single or he scored a double. Like, you know, absolutely not. I was the ghost runner on first. I'm the fastest dude here. I'm definitely scoring on that 100%.
• 32:29
  Speaker B: You draft up your own teams. You know, back when we were kids, it would be like, all right, I got Ken Griffey. He's playing. He's going to play center. And then be like, all right, who's your pick? And be like, oh, I got Barry Bonds. And you had to hit with the hand. Yeah, that. To set up a chair strike zone. Yeah. I hope kids do that stuff. I don't know if they do. I don't know if they do, but
• 32:54
  Speaker A: I think that we had a wiffle ball league within our team in college.
• 32:59
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 32:59
  Speaker A: The great George Heath would go scout out stadiums around campus for us to play.
• 33:05
  Speaker B: I remember dragging a dresser out into the Upper West Cedar parking lot as a strike zone.
• 33:13
  Speaker A: We remember we played at Upper west because they had lights. George was like, guys, we got a night game.
• 33:20
  Speaker B: So funny. I talked to him the other day. But little stuff like that, like, I think it goes such a long way. I really. It keeps you.
• 33:30
  Speaker A: It kept me engaged. It keeps kids engaged. Like, it not only does it keep you engaged and keeps it fun, but it also. It makes you better. You have to figure out how to be athletic and have soft hands to field 17 hopper. Because when you're playing wall ball, you're trying to get the other people out so you're not trying to give them good feeds. So you're trying to figure out, like, you're figuring out ways to field balls in a way that, you know, isn't necessarily natural. And it. It promotes more athleticism and it's fun. Like, you're still competing. You know, you're playing with a tennis ball. Like, it doesn't hurt. Like you just let it rip. See what happens.
• 34:08
  Speaker B: Yeah. 100. And I hope. I hope there's kids out there doing it. I'm sure there's Got to be right. There's got to be whiff of the ball, I think. So if there isn't, we got to bring that back. I know there's like competitive wiffle ball now, but it's like adults, so I don't know. I don't know if little kids are rolling out there with the long yellow bat.
• 34:30
  Speaker A: I saw it on like espn, ate the ocho, like a big wiffle ball thing, tournament going on. They just roll out like a bucket of balls. Dude just lets it rip.
• 34:45
  Speaker B: Nasty stuff too.
• 34:47
  Speaker A: Oh, filthy.
• 34:48
  Speaker B: It's a pitchers game for sure. Pitchers game for sure.
• 34:53
  Speaker A: Gosh, you barrel a wiffle ball, that yellow bat. Oh, there's no better feeling.
• 34:59
  Speaker B: But no, I think I'm glad we talked about this and I know we've hit on it at times, but I do think it gets overlooked because a lot of, a lot of what we talk about and a lot of what happens when you start to get into that like 13 or 14 year old range is like, everything becomes about, well, how do I get recruited? And one, there's time for that, but two, you gotta lay the groundwork for it. And I think the fundamental piece of that is making sure that there's a certain level of enjoyment that your son or your daughter has when it comes to playing the sport that they're looking to play in college. And it just, I think it just starts there.
• 35:41
  Speaker A: Yeah, like they have to enjoy showing up.
• 35:45
  Speaker B: Yeah, you can't be dragging them to practice. Like, they need to have their stuff ready to get in the car. Like, hey, dad, let's go. Like, we need to be on time versus like dragging them out of the house because, hey, we got to go to softball practice or we got to go to, you know, basketball practice and they just don't enjoy it.
• 36:05
  Speaker A: Correct.
• 36:09
  Speaker B: Anything else you want to add on this particular topic, Coach?
• 36:12
  Speaker A: No, sir.
• 36:14
  Speaker B: All right, tune in next week, everybody. We will talk to you then. Thank you. Thank you for listening this week. If you're watching on YouTube, go ahead and hit that subscribe button and smash that like button for us, check us out on Apple Podcasts, Google podcasts as well as Spotify. You can follow us on Twitter and Instagram MD Baseball. If you want to find out what me and Keith do to help families and players navigate the recruiting process, go ahead and check us out on emdbaseball.com. take a few minutes to check out our new online academy. I promise you'll get some good information out of that. Thanks again for listening. Check in with you next week. Just watch.