The Fearless Warrior Podcast

080: Why Finding the Right Fit Matters More Than Division with Maleah Andrews

• Amanda Schaefer

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We are airing our Mentorship Call from last week with Maleah Andrews! She is a college softball standout who shares her journey from multi-sport high school athlete to record-breaking infielder and batter at Western Washington University.

Episode Highlights:

• Playing multiple sports develops skills that transfer between games
• Communication matters when you get into a slump
• Her decision to go to a DII school rather than a D1 school
• Maintain identity beyond softball to preserve the love for the game
• Parent-coaches must establish clear boundaries and open communication



Connect with Maleah:

Instagram: @maleah_andrews_

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the fearless warrior podcast, a place for athletes, coaches and parents who know the value of a strong mindset. I'm your host, coach AB, a mental performance coach on a mission, former softball coach, wife and mom of three. Each episode, we will dive deep into all things mental performance, mindset tools and how to rewire the brain for success. So if your goal is to gain the mental edge and learn the secrets of mental performance, mindset tools and how to rewire the brain for success, so if your goal is to gain the mental edge and learn the secrets of mental performance, you're in the right place. Let's tune in to today's episode. All right.

Speaker 2:

Welcome tonight, ladies, to our Fearless Mentorship call. We are super, super excited we get to welcome Malia Andrews here with us tonight. Malia is currently a sophomore at Western Washington University up in the Northwest. She's an infielder and when I was looking up some for SAT she last year just absolutely crushed it as a freshman. So it's really exciting to have her here. But last year as a freshman she started all 64 of her games with her team as a freshman, which is amazing. And then she also, as a freshman, led the team in batting average on base percentage and OPS, so like really crushing it. Especially in the stats, um set a bunch of single season program records like in hits, runs, total bases is what I saw um and that's super awesome.

Speaker 2:

And the really cool thing, for me at least, is that Malia actually went to my high school, graduated from my high school and is the daughter of my softball and volleyball coach. And so I met Malia and held her as a baby when she was first born. I can't remember what year, what year, malia, were you born? Was it right after high school? I was saying it was the year after I graduated, in 04. So it was the year after I graduated. I remember holding her as a baby, so it's like full circle moment here that I get to have you on here and uh, holding you at a volleyball game to now talking with you about how you're doing amazing at at softball. And, um, while she was at my high school, she was both a volleyball state champ and a softball fourth place. Is that what you said? Fourth place in state, which is incredible for that high school. So she represented my school well and super proud to have her here. So, malia, welcome, introduce yourself.

Speaker 3:

Girls hear from you. So my name is Malia. I go to Western Washington. As was said, I'm a third baseman, but I'm pretty sure I have played every single position at some point in my life. I played volleyball and softball all throughout high school softball all throughout high school. I made the decision to stick with softball. Yeah, my team last year made it to second in the nation, so I've gotten to experience the ups and downs of being the underdog and all these things getting to the national championship. Yeah, I'm really excited to talk to you guys. I feel like I have a lot to say from different perspectives. I know a lot of people when they talk to college athletes, they get like the D1 perspective and all these big schools, and I think that my voice just is a little different because it's a different route and at a lower level school like D2 or D3, I think you have other options for things and I think just having that kind of mindset kind of opens up some doors for you. Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Let's tell me about that recruiting process, because you were good enough, I'm sure you had some D1 offers, what? What was that process like for you to choosing? Is it D2, is it D2 school? So what was that process like and why? Why'd you make that choice?

Speaker 3:

Well, initially, obviously, like when you start the recruiting process, you kind of just have to put yourself out there. You send off a bazillion emails. You probably won't get a response because of the guidelines, ncaa rules whatever. But then, as I kind of got through the recruiting process, like end of 16U into 18s, I was like you know, I kind of don't want to do the whole big school thing. I wanted to try to find a school that would actually let me play both softball and volleyball. So that was like the initial like okay, I need to look at lower level schools because that's never going to happen at a D1.

Speaker 2:

You're a little short right. Is that the issue with volleyball? You're a little short right Is that the issue with volleyball.

Speaker 3:

That too, that did not help. So, looking at schools, it was kind of like, okay, I'm going to look at these D2 schools, maybe some D3s. But then you look at it and you're like, hey, d3 doesn't do athletic scholarships and I'm like that's probably going to be a little more helpful for me if I do have that. So I looked at a lot of D2 schools, had to check out both their softball and volleyball programs, kind of narrowed down a list with sending emails, and even at this time I still had some offers from some D1 schools that I was talking to them through and everything. And I was able to narrow it down based on like distance, academic, like where I wanted, what I wanted to major in, and then my like senior year.

Speaker 3:

I narrowed it down to like two schools, one D1 and one was Western, and I like didn't know what to do. I was like what Hilah's like I don't know how to make this determining like factor for me. And I went to a hitting lesson with my hitting coach and I was like hey, you talked to a lot of softball girls, like what is your like? What are you thinking for me? And he's like he kept it simple, kept it straight Go to whoever wants you Like, go to whatever school truly is invested in you as a player and as a person, and that kind of swayed my choice and I chose Western from there. So yeah, it was a long process, not my favorite thing in the world, lots of ups and downs, but definitely an experience that you can't really forget.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, that's, that's such good advice. Like, go where you're valued. I think that's great advice. And I think you're totally right that a lot of girls have it in their mind like it's D or bust, oh yeah. Or even, or even, it's a big d1 school or bust, right. They're like I can't play for Oklahoma, like you know. I mean, yeah, what's the point? Right? And and yeah, I think you make a great point that there's there's so many schools out there and they're so varied and you got to find the right fit. You got to find the one that values you and you value them. Yeah, it's a, it's a long-term relationship you're trying to settle into.

Speaker 3:

So definitely, especially when you're looking ahead, that's, that's where it comes in, where it's like hey, where do I want to spend the next four to five years of my life, like you're right?

Speaker 2:

right, yeah, and schooling matters too, for sure. Oh yeah, um. So you mentioned you're a multiple sport athlete, which is awesome. So, like, how do you feel like that helped you in softball? Like, how do you feel like playing multiple sports helped you get to where you are now?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I mean, even if, like, we have camps and everything that we do and a lot of girls questions is like to the coaches and it's always like, hey, what do you look for in an athlete? And she's like, be an athlete, like there are so many other things, like I could be thrown into a totally different position that I've never played before. But like, how well can I adapt, how well can I figure it out and just kind of be athletic. You know, playing multiple sports, growing up and keeping myself versatile like really opened some doors for me. Like I've had conversations with my coach because I was playing shortstop and in the beginning of the year she kept putting me over there every once in a while and I was like I am not a fan of shortstop. She goes good, I don't think you should play shortstop. And I'm like why am I over here? But like we talk about me being a third baseman Like I, she talks about how I have probably the most variety of arm angles that you have probably ever seen out of a lot of infielders.

Speaker 3:

Like I don't think I ever throw a ball over my head, like the ball does never come above my head Like it would if I was an outfielder or anything, and I think that, like having that versatile to be able to throw from all the angles around my shoulder, like came from partially being able to do volleyball, like having to set a ball over my right shoulder or having to serve a ball to a location coming across my body different ways. I think that there's so many different things you can pick up from other sports that you don't realize will be helpful in the sport that you are playing until, like it kind of just shows up out of nowhere you know. So I think growing up, making sure that I also had body awareness, kind of knowing like orientation, hand-eye coordination, foot coordination or even just in the vicinity with a ball, I think was really helpful yeah, that, that's awesome.

Speaker 2:

You have to have all those arm angles at third base because you know those pitchers aren't getting out of the way.

Speaker 1:

No.

Speaker 2:

Try to throw across the diamond. They're not getting out of the way. Even now, we still struggle sometimes.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, just to interject. Hi, ladies, I'm Marlee Davis. I'm Malia's mom. I also coach her all the way up to U16. And then I also coached her in volleyball. Well, kind of because when she got to varsity I had to go back down to JV because she and I were like it's not a good time.

Speaker 4:

But more so as that follow up to that question as someone who's coached a lot of girls over the years I've more than 30 years of coaching under my belt in multiple sports the more you can compete, no matter what it is whether it's you know, in Uno, whatever right you just your competitive nature, learning how to compete in different sports.

Speaker 4:

That that's's transitional, more so than like the actual physicality, like what it takes to shoot a jumper, like in a basketball, is very different skill set and versus a softball throw, but it's a competing and so the more sports you can play, it also works between your ears to allow you to not make a really big issue out of a competitive moment and instead you just compete and you trust your training and you go about your way.

Speaker 4:

And so it is hard for ladies your age because eventually you're going to have to kind of start whittling it down, like Malia did, like she played basketball as well. She didn't mention that, but we played basketball all the way up until high school and finally there was a narrowing of the window. So to challenge yourself, to compete at all, you always learn something. You learn something from competing in volleyball that you can take to softball. You learn something from competing in volleyball that you can take to softball. You learn something from competing in soccer that you can take, and the more experiences you have and competing in pressure situations, the smaller those pressure situations end up being in the moment.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, just the idea of like being an athlete, I think, is something that that is helpful and and like they were saying, like you don't have to like play on a travel ball team in every sport or something like that, like you can play rec leagues, you can play for fun, but just play like, just get out there and develop those skills, like I think that's super, super helpful. So what was your so coach? D was my coach in high school, so I know she taught us visualization. We did lots of goal setting as a high school student, which I was super, super valuable, so you probably got exposed to a little bit in high school. But, like, what has your exposure been to mental skills, um, in your life and especially in college? Now, like what, what do they do for you?

Speaker 3:

yeah, um, obviously, throughout high school having my mom there and the program that they had set up for us like we did do a lot of visualizing. Before every game we had team goals, individual goals, like we were writing these things down and then, as we got into college, I think that things kind of shift a little bit, not necessarily as like okay, like like we still set goals for the year, we still set goals for ourselves individually. But we also have to look at more of the mental health side of things because, like, this does become a full-time job. Like you are on the field every single day, you're in the weight room two to three times a week on top of practice, you still have to do school, you have to do well in school, and so that becomes a thing of like being able to manage still being a person as well as like doing your full time job of softball. So, like at the beginning of the year we get these notebooks, we get these journals and almost every week I think, we go through like, whether it's like leadership questions or mindset questions, and sometimes we share with teammates and sometimes it's a little more personal so we don't have to, and then we kind of talk about it as a team, so that kind of we can get to know each other and how we process things mentally, like when you are in a slump, like do you want somebody to be there to support you or do you need your space to recap and then come back into it. So we use that in multiple different ways to get to know each other, to build a team and so that our coaches know how to best respond with us.

Speaker 3:

But then we also take into consideration the leadership roles. Because you're a college team, now everybody on your team's here for a reason. You all are good. It's not just some ragtag team. You pull together like whoever's down the street from you, and so you're usually a lot of. You were leaders on your teams before that and so now you're not like the top dog you know anymore and you're in a different kind of space and you have to figure out how to navigate that without pushing in too many different directions. So we kind of help figure out, like what you want your role to be as a teammate and what you want your role to be as a leader, like we're all going to be leaders, but it's how you're going to lead, versus just taking on that role.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's awesome. That's so much different when you're like sitting down as a team and every year the team's different and every year you got to kind of find your place, you got to find your voice and yeah. So that's that's awesome. Well, girls, we're going to go ahead and open it up to you guys. What questions do you guys have for Malia? You can either unmute yourself or you can put it in the chat and we'll read it, but what questions do you have for her?

Speaker 3:

It can be softball related or not School related, literally anything.

Speaker 2:

We usually get food questions. Oh, we get food questions like what's a really popular one is what's your pregame meal. So let's start with that one. What's your pregame favorite pregame snack?

Speaker 3:

OK, pregame, ok. So for us, because we have to be at the field super early, and sometimes even earlier, to like untarp, because we are Washington school, it rains all the time. Me and my roommate at least, we both go to this little coffee stand called Cool Beans, we get ourselves a little drink called the Lotus, and then we also get bagel, breakfast sandwiches with sausage, egg cheese and you, since we play double headers, so every game every Friday, saturday, we play two games back to back. We pack snack bags, and those for me are usually whatever I can find in my fridge during that week. If I go to the grocery store, great. If not, oh well yeah.

Speaker 2:

Awesome. So a couple in the chat here. One, where are you from? Maybe they want more specifics or maybe they missed that at the beginning.

Speaker 3:

Either way. So I grew up in Shoreline, washington and I went to high school Bothell High School in Washington, so mostly northern Washington State, washington State yes, not Washington. I forget that sometimes I know yeah, no, we are Washington state, yeah, and I'm still in Washington. So Western Washington, bellingham.

Speaker 2:

But what I'll say about Bellingham. I couldn't remember where, what city it was Bellingham, so it's North of Seattle, all right. What's your favorite mental skill? What's your?

Speaker 3:

favorite mental skill.

Speaker 3:

Let's see, I think one thing that I've really liked that my team does, we do note cards before every game and what that is is your intention or like mindset for that game or that day, and I like to use them personally as a way to kind of set mini goals for that game.

Speaker 3:

So I write an offensive thing and a defensive thing and, just like in our last games, my offensive one was to stay through the ball and my defensive one was we love slap D, and I think that is one of my favorite things because it narrows things down for that game and you don't have to look at like the big, big picture of like, oh, I have to be perfect, I have to do this, I have to get on base, I have to hit the ball. It just is finding little successes throughout the game that you're like looking towards boards. I did like visualizing a lot when I was in high school, more so for volleyball than I did for softball, but I think the note cards for softball have become one of my favorite things that we do. That's awesome.

Speaker 2:

All right, we got it. We'll pause the chat for a second. We got a couple people with hands up. Andy, I saw your hands up hand up first. Do you want to unmute? Unmute, ask your question.

Speaker 4:

How do you handle hitting slumps?

Speaker 3:

That's actually a good question. So I actually I wouldn't say it was a full slump. I was in a partial slump about two weeks ago. We weren't playing any games at the time and I was just in practice. We were doing front toss, we were doing semi-live and I could not score up a ball, couldn't do it for the life of me. I thought I was losing my mind, like I was like I don't know why nothing's working. Like I've tried every adjustment possible.

Speaker 3:

Um, and when I get into situations like that, I really try to use my team and my coaches as a resource. Like me and one of my teammates, we have similar adjustments to make when we're hitting. And so I'll talk to her and I'll be like, ok, I'm going to go up here, I'm going to do this and I'm going to make this adjustment and I want you to tell me if you see anything else. Or I'll just go to my coach and I'll be like, hey, something's not right. Like I like to talk through what's going on in my head, because if I keep it to myself, I tend to scramble it up even more.

Speaker 3:

But in other situations I like to just take a step back and I will go to hitting practice sometimes, and usually a coach would be like okay, you get like five to six good swings If I feel good with three, I'm out of the cage, like I don't want to keep going if I feel good about it. You know. So, if, like, you're in sort of a slump, but then you're kind of making your way back, like once you feel good, leave it alone. Because if you keep swinging and then you have two more bad swings and then it gets worse and you're like, oh, I need to do more, I need to do more, then you kind of just are building things up when in reality, if you're good, leave it alone, don't change it, leave it where it is, that's awesome, Sophia.

Speaker 2:

what's your question?

Speaker 4:

So you talked about how your mom was your coach, and so like my dad coaches me.

Speaker 2:

So how would you, how do you, how did you separate like parent from coach? That is an awesome question, sophia, great question.

Speaker 3:

Very good question. Me and my mom, I would say, are very, very close. I think that I was able to, early on, utilize my mom as my coach but then also be able to step back and go home and have her be my mom. It was more so of like a hey at the door, like you're done being my coach, you're done being a player. Now we're mother and daughter Because, like, sometimes we would talk things through in the car rides or like after games, which is fine because you're still kind of in that mindset and that setting.

Speaker 3:

But it was like when we got home, like it's like no, I need you to be my mom now. Like, or I'd be like hey, can you be my mom for a minute? And like I would just rant and I would just talk about what I'm feeling and how things are going, and then she would give me my mom perspective and then she could also be like hey, like as a coach, I would say this. So kind of building that relationship. I think that me and my mom did that very early on Mom, you can add to this too if you want. But like we kind of figured it out as we were going. But we were really close, no matter what. So what I did say as her daughter and what I said as a player, she could kind of interpret in two different ways, if that helps. Yeah, coach D.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, to elaborate on that. It's a delicate dance, right, and I knew as a parent we all know what triggers your child, right? So I tried really hard to in our conversations to not trigger, because I wanted her to be very thoughtful about the conversation we were having. And, um, I remember one time, like so I love my husband, malia's dad, but he, he cannot separate the two, he can't be dad and coach, he just. And so we actually had to sit down one time.

Speaker 4:

I had to sit down, and so I encourage you, ladies, like at some point it's hard, find your supports and we sat down with dad, drew and and, and we just said you can't do this anymore, right, yelling on the field at her because your parents you know, ladies, the only voice you hear sometime is only your parents, right, and so trying to block that out, you know that's not that easy, because that's your parent, that's your person you love, that's a person who cares for you, and to be able to draw that line it takes a team Malia and I together as a team to make sure that that happens. And so having just really honest conversations with your parents is really important to establish where that line needs to be so that you can be the best you can. Right, and Malia and I, there were times where, yeah, we fought it out in the car, but as she, as you get older, it'll get better. Because, hopefully, because your parents, like now, I would say so, so tell me about this. And so, instead of saying you should have done this, I would just say so, tell me about this so you can tell your parents, hey, can you just ask me about it so I can give you my opinion, because they're they're not on the field, they're not in that nanosecond where you're making this decision and the key thing is for it to get you to a place where you can learn from it.

Speaker 4:

But even now, like the other day, molly was telling me, mom, I can't square up on a ball. And I said, well, here's what I see. And I gave her. Just, I did make it a dissertation. I just said, here I try this, this and this. And then I don't know if that helped or not, but you know your parents know your skillset probably pretty well as a coach. Um and uh to ask them for just give me one thing, don't give me 20. Give me one thing to work on and see where that takes you, and if that's not the adjustment you need to make, then give me one other thing. So, arna, did we answer your question, sophia?

Speaker 2:

Conversation. Communication is always big, always important. Talk your way through it, for sure. All right, we can jump back to some other questions in the chat. So this person has been on these calls before. Because this is the question that I usually ask at the very end, so we'll ask it right here in the towards the end. But so if you could go back in time and ask or tell your younger self when you just started playing softball, what would you say to your younger self? You could talk to that, to that little girl, little Malia.

Speaker 3:

Wow, wow, I actually don't know. I think I would have told myself probably to have more confidence, especially at a younger age, because I think as I got older, like in my little little league in my neighborhood, I was really good. It was like you were probably, I was probably one of the top people in my area, no matter what. And then I got into select and it was like you're a nobody here, like you're just another number and you have to make a name for yourself. And I think I would have told myself to have some more confidence because I really did fight some battles of quitting, non-quitting.

Speaker 3:

Everybody's going to go through it. It's the roller coaster that comes with being an athlete. But for me at that time, I think that I hadn't built even just the mental confidence to be like, no, I can do this, like I can make it through this, do this Like I can make it through this. So there would be so many days where you come home from practice and you're like I'm just, I'm done, like I don't want to fight this fight anymore. And I think if I had told myself like future me now, look at where I'm at I never would have thought I would have been here Like never would have thought this is how far I would have come. So to tell myself like, early on, mental and physical confidence, have some more of it, learn it sooner, grow it, build off of it. All those things, awesome, all right, we're running short on time, oh sorry.

Speaker 4:

I was just going to say how many of you are pitchers. Any of you pitchers?

Speaker 2:

Lots of pitchers. We have lots of pitchers, yeah.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Figure out how to give yourself grace You're going to. It's a game of errors, right you?

Speaker 2:

want to make the least? Yeah, all right. All right, some fast ones. Favorite ice cream.

Speaker 3:

Oh mint chocolate chip. Solid Favorite position, third base I'm glad I'm staying I'm staying in my corner yeah, all right, the hot corner.

Speaker 2:

Uh, this one's not really a short one, but how do you, how do you stay motivated so, especially when it's like a full-time job now, at this point, personally, I found things outside of softball that keeps me to love the game of softball.

Speaker 3:

Like I still go play volleyball. Um, I still go hang out with people outside of sports like they're not my teammates, they're not anything related to softball. Um, I have my step aways, like I have my way to separate softball and my own personal life so that I can still love to go back to softball. I think when softball consumes your entire life, you lose sight of the love for the game or it over, like it just takes over everything that you think of. And so, like I found ways personally to step back like have my time with my friends, have my time with my family, still be able to do school and then be, like, excited to go to practice because I get to go do something that I still love to do.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, now we talk about that all the time. Right, girls, this identity, that your identity needs to be more than just softball. That's part of your identity, but it absolutely there's. There's so much more to life than softball, and softball is great Lots of joy, lots of great experiences but it's just one part of who you are, so I think that's awesome. Well, maybe one last question. I saw a couple of people with their hands up. Do you want to go one more question? I feel you had another one. I'm going to ask it for our last, final question. Who is a person that, when you're younger or maybe you still do that you look up to as a person?

Speaker 3:

wow. Um, I think I was a little a bit of an anomaly when it came to this kind of a question. I did not keep up with college softball growing up. I barely knew who anybody was playing. I didn't have somebody that I was like yeah, I want to be like them, like I want to play in this stage, I want to be like them when I grow up. Like I never really had that, but I think I would probably like, if I was going to answer, I would have to say my mom, simply because of how much like I related to her.

Speaker 3:

I think, and I think I had that connection with my mom so early on that she was the person that I was like she works so hard, like she does all this on a regular basis. She's my mom, she's my coach, she's everybody else's coach and I just kind of saw myself in her. And I think it was really hard for me to connect to other college athletes Because it's like, yeah, they're doing well, but like I don't know them, you know, I don't know their life story, I don't know, like where they came from, how they got to where they are, and I think that was something that, like you could ask a lot of other people in the like, oh yeah, cisbates or Sammy Reynolds, like all these people that, like I barely know anybody's names of. I'm going to be completely honest. So I think that finding ways to connect to people is a better way than just having this idolized picture of somebody.

Speaker 2:

That's awesome. Your mom's up for me too. I still got. I still got your voice on my head coach D. I still hear her every time. Every time I mess up, I hear, I hear your voice. So all right, well, thank you so so much, malia. This has been awesome. Thank you for coming. Thank you for sharing all of your experiences and your stories. Thank you, ladies, for all being here tonight.

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