Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] 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.
[00:01:12] Speaker B: Welcome to this week's edition of in the Clubhouse with EMD Baseball. I'm Andy Kirakidis, joined by my Wonderful co host, Mr. Keith Glasser. How we doing?
[00:01:21] Speaker C: Great. How are you?
[00:01:22] Speaker B: Good.
This is the time of year, you know, we're creeping up on Thanksgiving. You got plethora of holidays in the month of December, whether it's Hanukkah or Christmas or whatever holidays that you choose to celebrate.
I want to be inclusive here.
A lot of reasons to a lot of booby traps in the next five or six months if you will get you away from maybe your routine that you start to establish. And we've harped on how important the, you know, the next four or five months are for the vast majority of kids, whether you're a 27 year, 28 and 26 is for that matter.
But a lot of booby traps coming up. And I think that what I wanted to harp on and what we wanted. Excuse me, what we wanted to talk about was that consistency is king.
And when you get into the off season and you're in the weight room and you're getting your swings in or you're going through your throwing program.
[00:02:31] Speaker C: It'S.
[00:02:32] Speaker B: One thing to show up for a week and get after it, right? A lot of people can do that.
It's another thing to do for two weeks. A lot of people can do that.
But consistently being able to show up and get your work done week after week after week, making some sacrifices is a much harder thing to do.
And consistency is king when you're talking about development during this window. And don't let the holidays, don't Let, I'm not saying don't go to Christmas or Christmas dinner. I'm not saying that. But what I am saying is don't let some of these traps set in where it's like, oh, well, you know, I got this and that with so and so, and I got to go to grandma's house at, you know, 11am and we're going to open presents and, hey, get out of bed, get your work in before you go. Like, I, I truly think that this type of stuff really moves the needle for guys, because you can look up and next thing you know, you got Christmas Day, Christmas Eve, you got Christmas Day, you get the day after Christmas.
If you don't work out the day before Christmas Eve, all of a sudden it's like you took five days off.
And it doesn't seem like much when you zoom out. But when you're talking about the impact of consistency and you're talking the impact of the work that you put in and not missing days when you're supposed to be there, not taking the day off because you're a little bit tired or making a sacrifice because, you know, your buddies want to go out on a Friday night and being like, hey, I gotta, I gotta cut it short because I gotta get my work in tomorrow morning. Like, these are the decisions that are really impactful. And I think that making sure you maintain your consistency in the weight room, with your throne program, with your hitting routine, infield routine, whatever it is, you can really set yourself apart in these next six weeks if you're able to maintain your schedule and you're able to maintain your consistency and your commitment to, to what you're doing.
[00:04:40] Speaker C: Yeah, I think it's like anything that you want to do, right? Like, if this is what you want to do, and we've talked about this a handful of times on, on some of these podcasts recently, but they're, you know, takes what it takes and, and how bad do you want to do it? You know, I, I, I do think that in, in some regards, I, I, I smiled when you said that, you know, you don't have to skip Christmas dinner. Like, you know, we don't need the eyewash of, you know, grinding it out on Christmas Day and the cages, everyone's opening their presents, but I'm, I'm in the cage raking.
Okay.
There's value in, there's a lot of value in spending time with your family around the holidays, you know, But I do think that there's a lot of truth to, you know, being able to get your work in. And it's hard over the holidays of, know, not wanting to go to the gym. And if you live in the North, Northeast or the Midwest, you know, it's starting to get colder, it's going to snow. You know, you don't want to go outside and get in your car and warm it up and drive to the gym and work out and do it all over again.
But that's, that's what it takes if you want to get to the next level and being able to show up every day for yourself and ultimately for your teammates and to achieve the goal in which it is that you've set forth for yourself, you know, and if that's, you know, making it to a college roster and being able to play college baseball, or if you're in college baseball and you want to, you know, have more playing time or be an all conference guy or an all American or get drafted and play professionally, whatever it is that need to continually move forward is. Is going to pay dividends in the long run, you know, and it's not just, you know, it's the same thing in coaching. You know, it's not just about, you know, baseball. It's about life. You know, it's being able to show up and do that stuff every day because it is going to benefit you in the long run. Right? Like, we're older, we still work out, we still go to the gym, we still do this stuff. And it, you know, it's not, it's not all for, you know, I'm not trying to be a college athlete anymore. I'm trying to live longer and pick my kids up. But, you know, it's. It's worth it in the long run to be able to do these things because ultimately you're going to be able to achieve the goals in what it is you want to do. And if, you know, sometimes it might be, especially if you're an arm, it might be not throwing with high intent for two weeks, but doing, you know, band work and weighted balls and stretching and, you know, doing some light toss stuff like that for position guys, it might be, you know, hitting one day, working on defensive stuff the next day. And, you know, obviously you're a little limited in your. Your parts of the country and where you're from, but being able to get some semblance of that stuff done over the course of the week will set you further ahead of your peers when you get to that point.
Right. You know, like when we were growing up, it was always like someone else is always going to be working harder, you know, and there's truth in that, you know, so, like, you want to, you want to be able to say that you, you know, you at least got your work in and got yourself, you know, the, the old adage of 1% better every day. If you got 1% every day better every day, you'd be 100% better in a day or in a year or in 100 days.
[00:08:00] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:08:01] Speaker C: My.
[00:08:02] Speaker B: He's so good at math.
[00:08:03] Speaker C: My coaching, my coaching talk is off right now because in my mind, I was like, over a year, it'd be 365 days, you're 365% better, you know, but there's truth to it. So, you know, I think that the value and consistency and showing up for yourself and it goes, you know, I mentioned earlier, it goes to, you know, showing up for your teammates, things like that. Like, that's, that does a lot too, right? Especially when you get to college. You're in college, you know, being able to show up and, and hit with some of your teammates and, you know, they need it just as much as they do. And I think sometimes, especially with baseball, it's, you know, it's therapeutic to be able to just shut it down and go in the cage and just listen to balls ring off a barrel in a confined space and be uber loud, you know, so it's, it's showing up and being able to do those things because ultimately that's what's, that's what's going to get you to where you want to go. You know, you don't want to look in the mirror and, you know, another six, seven months and be like, why am I not getting recruited? Well, you know, what did you do in November? What did you do in December? Nothing. Sat and played video games all day long. Well, there's your answer. It's probably why it didn't happen, you know, And I'd argue that you probably didn't want it enough, right? Like, and we all meet those people later on, the guys who will tell you, you know, I could have played professionally, I could have played in college.
Okay, why didn't you? I didn't want to coach. Didn't like me enough. Like, no, you just, you didn't want it enough. That's what it comes down to. Like, you're not as competitive as you think you are. You didn't want it as much. And those are intrinsic questions that you have to ask yourself in, in this, this, this push to be more consistent in what it is you're Doing?
[00:09:45] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, it's, it's, it. We, we talk about this all the time, but, like, it's so darn competitive right now. It always has been, but I think it's even ramped up now with the changes that we've seen. And, you know, I'm not going to dive too deep into it because we've hit it so many times, but you got to find a way to separate yourself from the pack.
And for most guys, it's not pure natural talent. It's going to be figuring out a way to maximize your ability in the weight room is the lowest hanging fruit for every high school kid out there is get stronger and get more athletic.
And this is the time of year to do it. And the guys who are committed to that, they will have a leg up on the guys who are kind of committed to it versus and the guys who just aren't.
And those are decisions that young players have to make.
How hard do you want to work at it?
It's really that simple.
[00:10:47] Speaker C: Yeah.
It doesn't stop when you get to college. Right. Like, you're trying to set the, you're trying to set the tone so that when you get to college, you actually have a semblance of an idea of the amount of work that you have to put forth to, to get to where you gotta go to achieve the goals you get. You want when you get to.
To college.
[00:11:09] Speaker B: Yep. Yep. And you might as well start now. You gotta give yourself a chance to get to college. But I promise you, if you know how to work and you learn how to work and you know what it means to show up and be accountable to yourself, it's way easier when you get to school.
And that's kind of what you already know because we've all seen it.
Me and you coaches, we've had on this podcast, which is, you know, we're creeping up to like 60 coach interviews or something like that.
[00:11:36] Speaker C: We're over 60.
[00:11:38] Speaker B: They, they always talk about the guys who are able to get acclimated when they get to campus. It's usually the guys who've had to work for something or have put in the work to be there. It's not the supernaturally talented guys. Those guys eventually have to learn how to work.
They have to learn about the attention to detail. They have to learn about the commitment to doing the, the small things and the extra work and all that kind of stuff. And there's some guys who can get by by just showing up on practice day or game day and being really good because they're, they're more talented than others.
But we see it across all sports.
You know, you, you see a pop up in the NFL. You see a pop up in Major League Baseball, NBA basketball, like, whatever it is. Like, guys who, when they were 16, weren't the best players, and then you fast forward and like, oh, they're getting paid to play a sport. It's not by accident.
Most of those guys just, they didn't, they didn't stop working. They consistently continued to get after it. They saw a gross birth, they got stronger, whatever it might be.
And I think that's kind of what we're harping at here, is that, you know, the consistency over these months, you know, kind of the, the dog days of winter, if you will, being able to show up, get in a cold car, go to the gym, you know, get outside, put a sweatshirt on, put a hat on and go get your. Throwing in.
You know, whatever it takes is. Is kind of, you know, what you got to do. Like, it takes what it takes. I know that's kind of a, it's. I don't know if it's cliche, but it's something that popped up in a couple books that, that are. Have become increasingly popular. But, like, it takes what it takes, and it takes a lot of work in order to get there. And don't let these little, these little landmines trip you up.
You know, find a way to make sure you don't go consecutive days during the holiday without doing something that's going to help you get better, whether it's a lift or a run or whatever it might be.
But, you know, don't build in those excuses. Stay consistent with what you're doing. And if you're consistent for the next three or four months, you're going to get better.
There's no denying it. You will get better.
If you show up every day and you work at it, you're going to get better and just recognize how competitive it is and that you have to do that if you want to get ahead of your competition. It's really that simple.
Anything else you want to add, Coach?
[00:14:04] Speaker C: No, sir. All right.
[00:14:08] Speaker B: Well, thank you for listening, everybody.
Those young pups out there listening, go get after it and enjoy the holidays as well. Thanks for everybody for listening. We'll talk to you next week.
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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.
