The Playbook with Colin Jonov
Formerly The Athletic Fortitude Show.... Colin Jonov’s Athletic Fortitude Show has rebranded to The Playbook with Colin Jonov, evolving from a sports-centric podcast to a universal guide for mastering life’s challenges. While retaining its foundation in mindset and performance excellence, the show now expands its scope to empower everyone—athletes, entrepreneurs, professionals, and beyond—to live life to its fullest potential
The Playbook with Colin Jonov
Tim Cortazzo- Why Young Athletes Need Failure More Than They Need Trophies
Tim Cortazzo and I dig into raising daughters and sons with different instincts, why toughness is really confidence, and how to coach kids without breaking their spirit. The weight room becomes a tool, not a religion, as we push for specificity, rest, and joy that keeps kids in sport.
• protect versus prepare as a parenting tension
• firm language with positive reinforcement
• problem solving over punishment in behavior and sport
• when to coach your own kid and when to step back
• toughness defined as confidence through experience
• hot stove theory for safe risk taking
• specificity over dogma in the weight room
• alternatives to painful lifts that still drive progress
• creating chaos in practice to close the game gap
• youth sports pitfalls: specialization, volume, burnout
• parents as volume managers and joy protectors
• keep kids enrolled by making it fun and meaningful
Subscribe to our YouTube channel, download the podcast. Five stars only, baby
Subscribe, Download, Rate 5 stars only baby! Follow @ColkyJonov10 on all social media platforms.
It's different with girls.
SPEAKER_01:I don't have a girl, so I don't know.
SPEAKER_02:Right. And so that's like it's it's different with girls. Like even like I'm big on like biology, right? So like how the sensation I get from like having a daughter and like then having the son and just like how I feel connected to them, totally different.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And like my daughter, I don't know how to describe it other than it's like my daughter's like it's like this innate feeling to like want to like protect them. Yeah. And like I'm responsible for like keeping them safe. Where my son, even though he's like three weeks old, is like the only thing I'm thinking of is I need to raise him to be a protector.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_02:And it's like that tension with the boy is like how like the language I use. How do I raise him to not be a baby? Yeah, to be soft. Like it's obviously my girls, I don't want them to be soft either, but it's a little bit different.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So that's where I'm at in like that tension.
SPEAKER_01:I think I see the difference, like how I talk to my boys and how my wife talks to them. Like, and I I know like how to allow them to, let's say they're they're fighting or they're wrestling or something like that. Like, I know the limit there. So I allow them to kind of push it, versus my wife is like, Tim, stop them. You know what I'm saying? Like, like, stop them. Like the second it starts, she kind of like gives me that look like, are you gonna do something? I'm like, no, I kind of want to see this play out. And then, you know, once it gets to that limit where I where I know, then it's like, all right, we gotta chill out, you know. But yeah, I mean, I don't have a daughter, so I it's you know, impossible for me to talk to that. Yeah, but for my boys, it's yeah, I think you said it perfectly. Like you're raising them to be the protectors. So there is some, like I feel like if I had a daughter, it would be very challenging for me to just not give her everything. Oh, yes. And and just spoon feed everything. Oh, yes, you know, because again, it's it's like the nurturing side of me. Yeah, you know, it's it's how I feel with my wife. Like I want to provide for her the best that I can in every single facet of our lives, you know, and that's how I was raised too. But with with the boys, it's like I want them to experience that resilience. Like they have to, they have to have some things that are very challenging in their life. Even at this young of an age, there has to be an accountability aspect, there has to be some sort of thing where you can build a more not build, I don't want to say build, but you can help them develop into a more robust person, you know, that can handle stressors in certain ways and are able to compartmentalize certain things. And I I know it's it's weird to to speak on because they're only six and four.
SPEAKER_02:Hey, this is when it starts. Like it the the younger they are, I believe the the more important. Like I really already try to speak in a certain way. Not like my college football coach used to say, no baby talk. I'm not ridiculous like that, but like I do speak to them differently in a way where I'm hoping to encourage as long as they can continue to hear the same language, the same phrases, as they get older, it begins to be you know a greater part of their identity because they've heard it forever and lived it forever. So it does resonate. Yeah, and so like the I think it's funny when people say, I know they're only four and six. Well, like I think it starts day one, maybe I'm the crazy one.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I mean, we've never baby talked our kids. Yeah, like it it has always been firm, yeah. And but everything's positive too. Yeah, you know, we're very, you know, positive reinforcement. I I don't love the negative side of things. Like when you when we obviously we yell at them for certain things, like, hey, do not do that. But I think explaining to them why to not do that, yes, I think is more important than anything else. You know, and then you can always kind of spin it back to positive things, like this is why we don't do this. Yep, here's what to do instead. That would probably get you a little farther along.
SPEAKER_02:It's like it's like the coaching, like you can tell someone not to do something, but you don't tell them why that's not helping them.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, receiver drops a ball and you're like, catch the ball. Like, okay, like that's what that's my goal. Like, I'm trying to do that. But why did I drop it? You know, and how can I correct it for next time so I don't drop it? You know, so I I think going through that problem solving, you know, start it should start at a young age. Like you the more problems you know how to solve and the more experiences you have with with solving those issues and solving those problems, the better you're gonna get at it, you know, and and it's it's very specific stuff. You know, I I I'm a seven you baseball coach right now for fallball. And I see it with them. I see it with the with the young kids. Like they strike out because they're strikeouts now, you know, it's six years old. Like some of these kids that you pitch to and they get three pitches and they swing at all of them and they're not even close. And like my heart is just breaking because I'm the pitcher. It's like I feel like Paul Skeen's out there, but and I just struck out this six-year-old kid and my heart breaks, and he just stands there looking at me because he doesn't know what a strikeout is yet. And I'm like, You're out, buddy. Like do you back to the building? I love coaching.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I struggle so hard. I was talking with Terry about this. I was like, I go back and forth on whether or not I want to coach. Yeah. Like little kids, right? Right. Like, do I want to be the coach? Because that sometimes I feel a responsibility, you know, having the knowledge of sport and having the knowledge of some of the other stuff that goes with sport. Do I have an obligation to go coach instead of letting someone who doesn't? Right. And so I go back and forth with that because I do think it's good for my kids to get another voice as well. Yeah. So I struggle with that tension.
SPEAKER_01:I think you could do both. Like, I do think there's a place where you have to pass along your information to your kids. Like, you played at a high level, you know a lot of things, you played a ton of different sports. You know, you were really good at all those sports. So I think your obligation is to try to pass that along to them because it can influence how you know how they play the sport and how good they are. Now they're gonna bash heads with you, you know. Like my like, God forbid I know anything about swinging a baseball bat. Like John Carlo wants to do his own thing, you know, and that's perfectly fine. Like, here, here's little tweaks that you know can help make you better. And when he uses it and he hits the ball harder or farther, he kind of has that, like, huh. Like dad knew what he was doing, so he implements that, right? Yeah, but I do think there is benefit in having other people coach them as well because they listen to them like everything. Yeah, like we have a third base coach. Um, this is the second time this has happened to Giancarlo. Like, his eyes go right to the third base coach when he's he's rounding second. And if he's waving home, like he's the kid in front of Carlo, he'll wave him home. But Carlo sees that arm going, and he's like, I'm gone too. Like, I'm going the third. It's like, no, no, no, stop, stop. But if that came from me, he'd probably stop there. He'd go like opposite of what I said, you know. Um, but he sees that third base coach waving his arm and he's like, Man, I'm gone. So I I do think there are things that you know you have to get, you have to have another voice. Like you have to learn. How many, I mean, think of how many coaches you've had in your life that you know you didn't know at all whenever you started with them that changed your life, yeah, you know, that that gave you so many tidbits of information that really changed how you view everything, you know. So I think having those outside voices are just as important. But I do think it's an obligation for me, just because of the experiences that I've had, trying to pass it on to them as well, you know, and and what they do with that information. Like, I don't want to mold the same, like I don't want to mold me. Yeah, like I don't need them to be me. I don't, I don't ever want that. I want them to be their own people, but at the same time, like here are all my experiences, take what you want with that, you know, employ certain things and and see what works best for you. And then, you know, that's what kind of creates your own identity there.
SPEAKER_02:That's like my daughter, my oldest daughter is like me to a T, like same personality. And I have to do a better job of like teaching her the land mines. Like, let's avoid the landmines. Yeah, everything else you're gonna have to experience on your own, and then getting the right people around her for the messages that she needs when she needs them.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:My second daughter, my wife to a T. So I have to learn how to communicate with her a little bit better because she's very much my wife's side of the family. The boy's to be determined, he's you know, three weeks old. He's the only good one in the house so far. So but uh so learning that aspect, like the communication style, is really hard with like young kids. And there was a tweet that you had a while ago. I don't know, even though if you remember it, but you were talking about how your kids run around the house, jump on the couch, like do things. And our natural reaction as parents is telling them, don't do that.
SPEAKER_00:Right.
SPEAKER_02:And you were saying we need to rethink that we need to let them do those things because it's good for athletic development, but it's also good to learn kind of results in like outcomes and like consequences for like actions that you take at a young age. I'd love to hear where that kind of came from and like where your realization there happened.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I I see it now because we're around kids a lot more now with birthday parties and and different hangouts, but I see so many parents like the second their kid climbs on the couch, like stands up on the couch, it's like immediate, get off, you know, get off immediately. And I'm big on like you, I think how I talked about a few minutes ago, like you have to experience certain things to understand like this is how you overcome that thing. So, worst case scenario, I mean, we've taken a couple emergency trips, right? But I call it it's like the hot stove there. You put your hand on a hot stove, you're gonna take it off, right? And you're probably not gonna do that again because you burned your hand. If you do it again, that's kind of where it's like, why would you do that? You know, like why would you do it again? I'm trying to, I can't figure out that mindset. But you do it once, you you take your hand off, you learn your lesson. Like that's a hot stove. So sometimes it takes like, hey, I jumped on the couch and I fell off to get them to understand, like, hey, maybe I shouldn't jump on the couch. Like maybe there's a better place for it. Maybe it's in a bounce house or a trampoline, you know. So I think allowing them to figure that out, I think is really, really important, you know, because again, you yell at them for everything. Well, now they're looking at you and they're questioning every single move that they make because you are the one who's directing their life, right? You're the one that, no, get off the couch. No, don't eat that candy, eat this, um, drink this. Uh, this is the sport we're playing. Like, so they're always looking to you to kind of figure out their problems when when in reality, like we should be trying to equip them with these problem-solving tools that that they need to learn on their own. I mean, I think that's the like I said, the the hot stove theory is it just makes so much sense to me, you know, makes way too much sense to me. Like, put your hand on the hot stove, you're gonna get burned. Take it off, you know, you do it again, like, hey, that was stupid. Let's not do that again, right? You learn your lesson. So, yeah, I think that's where that tweet comes. A lot of my tweets are just thoughts that I have immediately, and I'm like, hey, let me put it out there so I can get some content, get some, get some eyes towards you know, the training business I have and different stuff like that. I I deep down don't love social media, but I know that's kind of like the age of you know, some you have to do some of that stuff to market, you know. I think the knowledge that you have, like why you're doing this podcast and stuff, can can really help people out there. So whenever you tweet stuff like that, and someone like you that sees that and picks that up and has deep thought about it, I think that's that's a really important thing.
SPEAKER_02:And and that's why social media is great. It's like one of those necessary evils. I think most things in the world, there's like a good element and a bad element to it, and it's learning to utilize the good that comes with it. Yeah, and like that thing did actually hit me deeply because I ironically, I'm not sure I believe in coincidences, but it was right after I had been yelling at my daughters for jumping on the couch and like wrestling one of them fell off. Okay. So I was like, you know what? I was like, I actually needed to hear that because we're not gonna be able to prevent every boo-boo, we're not gonna be able to prevent trips to the ER. Like, these things are gonna happen. And my daughters do have crazy amounts of energy for girls, and that's a byproduct of genetics. So they have to learn things probably a little bit differently than us just telling them what to do because I don't want them to be dependent on me. I want them to be independent thinkers, I want them to question authority, and I have to remind my wife of that sometimes too. I'm like, like questioning authority, questioning us is a good thing. I don't want them to just do everything we say just because we say it. Right. There has to be rationale, there has to be reasoning, they have to understand, you know, cognitive thought. And that tweet just like hit me like a firesome. I was like, you know, this applies in the athletic realm as well. Like they have to be able to do free play things, they have to learn jumping on the couch, falling off the couch, getting back up, you know, getting bumps and bruises. Because then when they're out there in their sport and they fall down, they know how to get back up. Right. You know, they get a bruise, they get back up. You know, they get a cut, they're not, you know, they may come and cry to daddy, but they're willing to go back out there and learning those side of things. My wife wasn't as much into athletics. That's something she has to learn as well. Whereas from an athletic background, I'm just accustomed to all that stuff. And like understanding, I was in the ER a lot as a kid.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:It's like she has to understand that's coming. Yeah. Whether she likes it or not, whether it's the girls, whether it's the boys, like we're gonna have a lot of doctors' trips coming up.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. And it's like our number one goal is to keep them safe. So I think when we yell at them, the the reasoning is it's a safety aspect, but there's also an inconvenience aspect to it. You know, like jumping on the couch after we just got ready to go to dinner. It's like, I don't want to go to the emergency room. So I'm gonna yell at you to not do that so we don't have to go to the emergency room, so we could just go have a nice family dinner. Right. You know, so safety is always at the heart of it. But it's it's like you have to tiptoe that line of like, how how far can they push it before it turns into a dangerous thing? Right. So safety is obviously the number one most important thing, but but I do think you have to let them go a little just to it creates that toughness. It creates that that robustness that I talked about. And it's it's tough is a toughness is one of those weird things. I hear so many coaches talk about like toughness. And I always think, like, what is what is toughness? Like you get hit and you bounce back up, right? Is like is that true toughness? Or you can endure a a workout for a long period of time. Is that toughness? And I I always like to spin it as like toughness comes from confidence in doing something, right? So like if I'm if I'm a wide receiver and I run across the middle and I'm afraid of being hit, there's a lack of confidence there. And there's a lack of trust in my own ability to be able to handle that hit. I think when you experience those things, like when you get hit going across the middle and you realize like that wasn't that bad, and I caught the ball and I made a big third down catch for my team. Well, now your confidence goes crazy. So you don't mind going across the middle again because of that. You know, so I think building that toughness and it's more of like we're just building confidence for them. And if they could do a front flip on the couch and they they land it perfectly, there's some confidence that they're they're getting from that, you know. So again, I let let them experience that. If I'm telling them no, don't do that immediately, well, then like I said, they're gonna be looking at me for everything. Like, can I do this or can I not do this? And I I like having them develop that confidence in themselves that they're able to handle things on on their own.
SPEAKER_02:There's a key distinction between like physical toughness and mental toughness that I do that I do believe people don't define well. Yeah. I believe throughout my college career, I was very physically tough. I would argue I was very mentally weak in the sense that I played through a lot of injuries. Like I played with broken bones, torn ligaments. But psychologically, those impacted me at a deeper level where it affected my play because I lacked that trust. And something you talk about confidence, right? There's this unique relationship between confidence and belief. Confidence is proof of concept. Belief is the ability to believe that you can do something you've never done. And so as you get older, and this is where you know, navigating an adult versus navigating kids, like trying to gap those spaces as I'm, you know, a young parent, and then you know, working and speaking with athletes is the what bridges that gap is trust. So it's like, how do you build the trust that because you've done something in one domain, that you can have the belief that you can do it in another? And so, proof of concept, I got hit going to the middle wasn't that bad. Okay, well, then I have to have the belief that if I'm uh we'll we'll use football as an example. I have to block a linebacker now, never done it before, right? First time, I can do that because I've gotten hit before. So the ability to translate different events in different domains of life and connect them into others and create those parallels is really tough and threading the needle. And we were texting about this, like you it was one of the more profound things in just a normal text exchange, just like how you are raising your boys. Like on a podcast, because like it's something I think about a lot. And you just seem whether you obviously like executing it's really hard. I'm sure there's times where you fail, but like eloquently articulated, this is how I want to raise my boys, and that teaching them to fail part and to come back is such a critical critical component of building that trust to bridge confidence and belief. I think you do it or at least articulate it at such a high level.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. But failure is huge. I mean, that's the one thing that you can always learn from. You know, if you if you go along in your entire life and everything is successful, like there's gonna be a time where you experience something that's not gonna work out for you. Well, you have to have the tools to be able to handle that. And that's overcoming something rather than just shutting down completely. So, yeah, I mean, going back to the kids, again, I you can I can talk about it and I can have thoughts about it. It's not always executed perfect, you know, because because we're human beings. There's certain things that that I have to work on myself as a person and and as a parent that I think are really important, you know, such as like there, there are times where I'm frustrated from something else and I might take it out on the kids, you know, or there's times where the kids are going nuts and me and my wife take it out on each other, you know. So those are things that are I think are constant works in progress to where like maybe I had some sort of failure at work and now I bring that home with me. And, you know, that doesn't work. That will never mesh. You know, it it shouldn't work that way. I have to work on those things and get better at those things. And I have, I mean, six years of being a dad now, you you learned so many things, you know, throughout that time that I do completely different now than I did, you know, four years ago. So um, so yeah, I mean, going back to the the bridge from confidence to belief, I think I always look at uh, because I do believe in that. I mean, you you put that perfectly. Having, you know, believing something and being confident in something are kind of two separate things and bridging that gap are super important. I always look at um, we have this argument all the time. It's in every single locker room, it's at FSQ all the time. It's like who's better, LeBron or Michael Jordan, right? And my answer is it should be LeBron because Michael Jordan set this precedence in front of LeBron. So LeBron has this whole blueprint to learn from that can help make him better, right? So for my, and I'm sure Michael Jordan had that same someone in front of him. It could have, you know, it could have been anyone. But for to understand that, it's like um LeBron saw what could be done. So he believed that he could do that thing. Now, where does he get the confidence from? It's from proving that he could do that thing. So I think that's a a really good example of like um another one, skateboard tricks. You ever see some of those dudes doing like skateboarding tricks? And it's like Tony Hawk was like the first one to ever what was it, 900 or 1080? Whatever he did was ridiculous. And no one ever thought it could be done. Like no one, but he believed that he could do it. And now, like that's like nothing. You see every yeah, every single skateboarder can do that trick. So again, but why? Because they believe it could be done because they saw someone in front of them do it, and they have the confidence to to go try it, you know, because of that belief. And then once they complete it, then it's just a an everyday thing. So and skateboarding will keep getting pushed further along. And there's there's gonna be another guy who we're gonna have the same argument. Like, who was better? This guy or or LeBron? It could be Wemby. We don't watch Wembi, yeah. That first game.
SPEAKER_02:I mean he was doing things. I I was like seven, six or however tall he is. Yeah, I was like, that's not a good thing.
SPEAKER_01:He's like Yao Ming and Kevin Durant, like mixed together, you know. But but again, like Wemby got to learn he saw Michael Jordan. Now he has LeBron. So he has all these guys in front of him. Now he's doing things that that we've never seen. So it might be him, you know, and there's some little kid watching Wemby that's saying, I'm gonna do that same exact thing one day. But that's what pushes sports forward. That's what I mean, that's what pushes the world forward. That's how we keep evolving and keep getting better at things and keep making improvements to things.
SPEAKER_02:You obviously we we work together, we train together. You have a unique way of getting the best out of athletes. There were things that I never thought were possible until we started working together. Um what is it about your training philosophy where you carry basic principles but still continue to innovate? And how do you balance that?
SPEAKER_01:That's a tough one. I don't know. I I think I have a knack. I learned a lot from my dad and my grandfather. Like those are huge influences in my coaching life. Like, I saw my dad always get the best out of people. And I I still hear it to this day. Like some of the guys that he coached whenever he was coaching still like rave about the different things that like how my dad changed their lives. And that always, like I grew up with that, with my dad coaching me. He coached me in baseball, I mean, pretty much everything. Um, but I got to learn that that positive talk that he always had and and allowing me to believe in myself. So when I did mess up, I'll I'll hear parents now, like you strike out and I'll see the kid crying. Like, is he gonna get in trouble when he gets home because he struck out? Or it's like, what's the first thing that's gonna, what's the first conversation that's gonna happen in the car when that kid gets in the car? Like, see, is the dad gonna bring up how he struck out and this is what he should do differently? For me, regardless of the game I played, it was like, hey, let's go get some ice cream. You know what I mean? So in my mind, it's like, okay, I didn't disappoint my dad there. And so I'm cool, like, I'm good, that's fine. Striking out's not that bad. And I think that positive reinforcement helped me with that. And it it helped me believe in myself even more, and it gave me that confidence and belief that I could do different things. Um, so I think that has played a huge role in my life where I am trying to do the same thing with guys. And I've I've been coaching since 2012, I think. 2012. So what 14 years, almost 14 years of coaching.
SPEAKER_02:Crazy thing.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's yeah, that's crazy. 36, now it's crazy. Um, it doesn't feel that long, but but over the years, I'm I don't know if I've ever like cussed a kid out in a negative way. Like I've 100% raised my voice um to get a point across. But again, it goes back to like teaching and to giving them that belief that they can do it again. I remember I I fumbled in a practice, my freshman year in at Toledo in college, and uh the coach made me do up downs the rest of the practice, holding a holding a ball. So what's the like the next time I touch the ball, what's the first thing I thought about? Don't fumble because I don't want to do those up downs again. And I hate that coaching style. Like, do I think there's place for negative stuff like that? Like, yeah, I think kids, kids are resilient, kids can deal with different styles of coaching. And I mean, there's so many coaches that mother F you and you love those guys to death, you know? But I've I've been so I learned better from that positive side of things and and believing in myself as a as opposed to having those negative thoughts. So I've always thought that's the way that I should coach. I should positive reinforce as much as I possibly can without being negative, because I want that athlete to believe that they can do things. I want them to believe that they can run faster, jump higher, um, get stronger and feel like Superman whenever they they get out on the you know, the field or court or whatever sport they're playing. I want them to feel that way. They should feel great about it. And they should also have a great relationship with training because you have to train the rest of your life. And if you always looked at it as like punishment, like if you got your ass kicked in the weight room every single day, it gets really challenging to get back in the weight room. I mean, you dealt with it at you know, the high levels of football. Some of these strength coaches yelling in your face and and screaming at you and calling you names. And like that's not the that's not the best way to feel, you know. Then you're questioning stuff like, I don't know if I want to lift tomorrow, or what are we gonna do? Like, do we have sled pushes? Because that sucked last time. So there's that element, like you, it has to suck. Like it has to be challenging at some points in training. That's the only way you're gonna you're gonna adapt. It has to be challenging. But how you your relationship with that challenging has to be, in my opinion, a positive relationship because then you know, like, I'm gonna have a great relationship with it. And I this is something that I want to do the rest of my life. So I I think that's where a lot of my positivity comes from. Um in just being a normal person. Like we could have these conversations while we're training and you know, get you into some deep thoughts, and you're thinking, like, Tim really has my back, you know, like Tim understands me. Like, I think those things are just so important and in coach athlete relationships. So, so yeah, that's where a lot of that positivity and and energy comes from with that.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, there's a lot of different thought processes to how do you coach, what type of demeanor to use. I think an important piece of that is what is like unique to you, and that doesn't mean that you can't get better, that you can't improve on certain elements of the way that you coach, but I've always agreed with that mentality is like training shouldn't be a punishment. Like, if I if like you should want to train, like you should change your thoughts, and that doesn't mean that it can't be challenging, but focusing more on the reward that you get from training and like the inherent gifts that come from what you're supposed to be doing and why you're doing it, how you're getting better, and those different things. And then when you can kind of fall in love with the intricacies of the different training methods and why you train and why you have certain mindset and approaches to things, you're gonna get a longer benefit in like over time.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And I I I one thing we've we've talked about a number of times is just the screaming, hard ass coaches. It doesn't actually make someone mentally tougher. Yeah, it doesn't actually improve your performance by screaming and yelling all the time. Is there a time and place to yell and get on someone? Absolutely. But the athlete has to understand a couple of different things. They have to understand why you're yelling at them, right? What is the purpose of it? What are you trying to do in increase their performance in what capacity? And so they need to know that you care about them. They need to know you're not just an object to them to go somewhere that you care about them fundamentally as the person. And that is something that a lot of coaches, regardless of intentions, don't do a good job of articulating to their athletes. Is this the why, this is why I care, and I do care about you, and not just saying I care about you, but showing it, right? Having those conversations, like you were saying, hey, like we'll, you know, talk, shop, whatever. And not every coach is afforded that same opportunity, right? But that's why I would say the strength and conditioning coaches by far, to me, are the most important culture shapers in organizations. So who's your strength and conditioning coach? Who's in those rooms? How are they handling and conducting their workouts and transitioning with their athletes?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I I don't, like I said before, I don't mind the negativity and screaming. Like I don't mind it, but have substance to it. Like have it mean something. Like we talked about earlier. Yelling catch the ball at me doesn't do anything. Or making me do up downs when I fumble, like, that's not doing anything to me. Cuss me out because I fumbled and I caught and I cost the team a possession, that's fine. Teach me why I fumbled, and here's what you should do next time instead, you know, whatever that looks like, that's coaching. And how you how you raise your voice, however you do it, as long as you get your point across, that is a good coach, right? As long as you get your point across, and because I can yell things all the time. If the athlete's not changing, I'm not teaching. Right. So if they keep doing the same things over and over and over again, my message isn't being heard. So if I'm screaming, hold on to the ball, catch the ball, and I'm cussing kids out for doing that, and they go and drop another pass or they go and fumble. Like I didn't teach them anything. Right. So I have to have substance whenever I coach. And like I said, however you do. That. If that's a negative and maybe you know you're a little condescending or a little, you know, loud and mean. I think that comes from a place of passion for coaches. Like I think coaches care so much about it that that's just kind of what comes out. You know, they care, they want that kid to do well, and and they don't understand why they're not doing well in that situation. So they just want to yell and scream because they're trying to get that point across. But again, if you do that, as long as it has substance and it has some sort of change or some sort of effect on the athlete in a positive direction that's gonna make them better, then that's coaching. That's perfectly fine. I just choose to do it in a positive way. Is that a bad thing? I don't think so at all. Like it's not like I'm trying to be friends with everybody. You know, it's it's like outside of training, we could be cool. Like we could, like that's per, I'm not gonna go hang out with you. Like I'm not pulling up to the the next college party to hang out with you, right? But that relationship has to be, you have to feel comfortable coming up to me and being able to voice how you feel about certain things, because then that gives me some feedback on how I'm gonna coach you the next session or in the future. And and I think that is that's the most important part. Like as long as you have substance and there's some sort of change with that athlete, and and you have to be approachable too. Like the athlete has to feel comfortable coming up to you and saying, This is how I feel about this certain thing, this is why this happened. Because now, like I said, it gives me feedback and it allows me to coach you better. And that's what that's what makes me better as a coach. Like getting that feedback, understanding this is what worked and this is what didn't, just that makes me better.
SPEAKER_02:And that's one thing I always appreciated when we worked together is the number of times because I had a lot of injuries and I had a lot of like things that would nag me continuously, one of them being my back, I have you know, multiple knee surgeries, broken bones, whatever. Anytime you know, I came to you and was like, hey, like, you know, squat, back squatting is killing my back. Yeah, you know, hex bar deadlift through my back out, whatever it is. Hey, this is hurting my knee. There was always an alternative or a way to circumvent and not lose the production. And where does like that understanding come from for you? Like, what like how did you how do you program with your athletes to be able to have those different levers that you can pull?
SPEAKER_01:Training athletes is is very different than training, let's say, like a power lifter, training a bodybuilder, or just training someone to like be in better shape or you know, have better fitness, look better. Training athletes is unique because the weight room is simply a tool that helps them. It's not specific to the sport that they're playing. So take like a basketball player, for example. And I've how I've started to realize this, whenever I was younger coming up in coaching, I kind of thought the weight room solved everything. Like you get stronger and everything's gonna improve. But that's not necessarily the case. And and how I found this out over the years was I remember my experiences in college and both playing and coaching, some of the best kids on the team hated the weight room, absolutely hated the weight room. So we would have like, I would rep 15 reps on 225, right? And we had a kid that could do zero. And that kid went out as a freshman and put up like 12 catches in his first game against Purdue, scored a touchdown, had close to 200 yards. And it's like, I did 225 on bench press 15 times. Like, how's he doing that against Purdue? And I started to, as I got into coaching, I started to make those connections where the weight room is simply a tool. You don't have to squat, you don't have to deadlift as an athlete. You have to get stronger to help improve yourself. I mean, I I don't think if you took any athlete and you got them stronger, there would be some positive benefit to that, right? But the key is how do you work in the weight room around everything else that that athlete has to do? So you as a football player, you have to go out, you have to sprint, you have to change direction, you have to catch, you have to jump, you have to stop, um, you have to be able to handle four quarters of football, you have to be able to get hit and bounce back up. So you take all these things and you start to realize like, let's sit, let's just say, gun to my head, I had to pick a way of training. And it's weight room, it's go play football, and it's, I don't know, think of a different one, go run distance, right? If you're a football player, you have to like I would pick, go play football. Like, don't do the weight room, don't do the distance running, just go play football. Because that is that is your job. That's the most important thing. So in the weight room, if you're telling me squat doesn't feel good and hex bar deadlift doesn't feel good, it's hurting my back. Well, now I'm hindering your way of playing football, right? Because now if your back hurts, are you going to be effective on the field? No. So we'll find different ways to get strong. Like, can we hold dumbbells and do a you know, rear foot elevated split squat? Or can we do a step up? Can we do certain things that you could get similar benefits to squatting or deadlifting and still get stronger, but also feel really good whenever you're done and not have back issues. So, like I know whenever you were training, I still have have numbers on this. Your vertical and speed improved, and we didn't squat or deadlift at all. And you were like one of the first people where I'm like, huh. Like we didn't have to squat or deadlift. But we were sprinting a ton, we were jumping a ton, we were doing all these different things. We were out on the field practicing a ton. And then the, like I said, the weight room was a complimentary tool that that helped make you more resilient and helped, you know, you not experience injuries, you know, your last two years of football that you played, you know, injury free. Um, that was like the aha moment for me. And that really changed how I how I thought about training.
SPEAKER_02:And uh it's funny because that was the aha moment for me as an athlete.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like, and it goes back to that confidence to belief in that trust, like bridging that gap is obviously I didn't know this at the time. Yeah, it's something I learned later. But like when you recap and look at it, like when I came, and this was before we started training for my pro day, but we'd been training for a little bit. But I think I pre-tested 30 inches on my vertical pro day, you know, I jumped really well, but it was after we continued training for probably a year or two, the max we got my vert, I think was it was either so I jumped 38 and a half, was the highest I ever jumped. I think in the gym with you was 37.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:But that gap started where I was never like a high jumper, like could jump higher than most, but like relative to my sport, I was always fast, but couldn't relatively jump that high comparatively. But once I started seeing the progression, it was just that belief was like, okay, I can do it, I can keep going, I can keep chasing. And I didn't need the back squat. I wasn't being forced, like, you know, hey coach, my back's killing me when I back swat, it doesn't matter, put more weight on.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_02:Right. Literally, like those are some of the conversations I had. Not not a pit. Yeah, like those guys were good. I like those guys, but like certain conversations, I'd be like, yo, like this is like really like it's after working out, like I have to go sit in the trainer's room for an hour just to get my back feeling okay. Yeah. And there was never solutions or whatever. And I always, you know, thought, like, oh, you have to bench more, you have to squat more to be able to be faster and change direction. And like when we started training, I was like, I do feel better, I am more mobile, I'm more flexible. Like, I just trained for two hours, moved a lot of weight, and like I feel fresh.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And it was just like this trickle-down effect to where, like, okay, now I have the confidence I can do these things and I have the belief that I can do more, and then trusting the process that goes into that.
SPEAKER_00:Right.
SPEAKER_02:And like that was such like an aha moment for me. And I began to like talk to like other people, like, stop training the way that you're doing. Like, and starting talking to people in like, you know, professional organizations, and like, hey, like, you got to start like thinking about things like differently. There's not one way to like do this.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Specifically, I see this a ton in high school football. I and it's just the culture. It's it's whenever I was younger, when it got when it was winter time in Pittsburgh, Western PA, Whippy O football, you're in the weight room, and that's all you do. Like you just lift and you just get big and strong. Like, hey, get bigger. We're gonna gain some weight and get strong so you could play football, right? But that's not football, like, that's not football. So you're gonna go when it gets cold, let's say our offseason training starts January, and you're in the weight room until March. Like, that's three months that you just missed out on movement, sprinting, cutting, all these different things that you use on a football field, right? So for me, like I just I think it's so crazy. We're 2025 and I still see this exact thing in the offseason. They go and these teams, they just lift and lift and lift, and that's fine, but the lifting is one piece of the puzzle. There's so many other things that you have to do to become a good athlete because and and everything specific. If you want to get faster, the number one way to get faster is by sprinting. You have to sprint. Now, how you control the volume of sprinting matters, rest times matter in between your sprints. Um, you can't just go into the squat rack, squat, squat, squat for three months and then go test a 40 again and expect to run faster. It's it's not going to work that way. Like I said, everything's specific. You can't go and shoot free throws in basketball and expect to be a great three-point shooter because it's not specific. Shooting by yourself in the gym, let's just say I'm I'm just standing there and shooting from the, you know, wherever, there's changes when you add movement to it. And then there's changes when you add a defense to it. And then there's changes when it's instead of one-on-one with a defense, there's five on five. And then there's changes when it's fourth quarter and there's 10 seconds left in the game. So all of those things from standing there shooting by yourself, that won't always translate to 10 seconds left in the game. Now, there's a huge process in between there of all these different general things that can help piece that puzzle together. But at the end of the day, the specificity is the number one thing. It's it's the said principle. I talk about the said principle, SAID, it's specific adaptation to impose demands. You adapt to the stress that you are taking on. So if I want to get better at squat, best way to get better at squat is squatting. So if I have like a power lifter who is competing with squat bench deadlift, you have to do those things. I can't do rear foot elevated split squat the whole time and then go compete with squatting, right? But with football, if I go, I have to practice football to get better at it. You know, as a receiver, I have to do routes on my own. I have to do routes now catching a pass. And then you have to do routes one-on-one. You have to do routes against a defense, and practices are completely different than games, you know? And then on top of all of that, there's speed training, right? So getting faster, so now I can add more speed to my routes. And then there's the weight room aspect of it too. Again, big piece of that puzzle. But but just squatting all day, every day is not going to make me a better receiver. There has to be specificity involved.
SPEAKER_02:Where I guess like the thing is like, how do you add that like chaos element? Because if you're a young athlete or even at the college professional ranks and you want to continue to get better, and you're someone who's not getting as many reps in a game, how can you begin to kind of train? I call it the chaos element. Yeah. Where you're not just standing in a gym shooting by yourself, where you're adding different elements that are outside of your control that can impact the way that you train.
SPEAKER_01:I think you you, I mean, that's that's tough. Like that comes down to the resources that you have available, right? So if I'm one-on-one with a coach, let's say a really good basketball coach, right? And I'm one-on-one with him, and that's the only type of training I do, there has to be some sort of bridging the gap between that one-on-one training and going to play in a game. So, and I think you need both. Like you need, you need a great coach around you that's going to teach you how to do these certain things. But then you have to take those certain skills that you're learning and put them to use in some capacity. And that, again, we went back to the belief and confidence. Like doing things in with one-on-one with a coach gives you the belief that you can do them. But if you don't use it in a game, that tells me you're probably not confident to use that certain skill yet, right? Doing it in a game and it works, well, that's where you build that confidence. It could be like we try in practice first, you know, with your team, and it worked in practice. Let's try it in a game. It works in a game. Cool, we could keep using that thing. Now, there's different levels to it. Like there's you get away with things in high school that you can't get away with in college, right? So you have to adapt again. Um, and the same thing. Like, if I would go college to the NBA, there's a it's a completely different game, right? Guys are better, guys are faster, bigger. So you have to consistently keep adapting to that. Now, for a young kid, going out and saying, like, well, I don't have a defense to play against, so I'm not gonna shoot. That's not the way you should look at it, right? You should look at it, I'm gonna get shots up because it's better than it's better than anything else. Like, I have to get shots up every single day. Basketball is one of those sports, there's so much skill involved, so much of dribbling, handing the handling the basketball, shooting. That's not I want to say football is I don't want to take away from any football guys, but it's probably like the least skill you need. I always say, like, if you could, if you can't see the reality of it. Yeah, like if you're good at tag, you could probably be decent at football. You know what I mean? That's not the case with basketball. Like, give some really good football players a basketball who've never played it and watch them while they're wrestlers, yeah, like give them a basketball and watch them do it. Like, it it's not gonna work. It's not, you know, because there's so much skill involved. So I do think there, like there's a lot you could do one-on-one. You have to do a lot of stuff one-on-one because you're there's gonna be late nights where no one's gonna want to work out with you, or you're you're in the backyard just doing stuff on the hoop. That's better than not doing anything. I I think those things are so important. But but again, there has to be that time where I have to get into those chaotic situations. I have to find somebody to play against, or I have to find a team to practice with. And and uh, you know, in practice, that's so val practice is where the the development happens. Game is kind of where you validate all the practicing that you've done. So I've talked about this before, like take a shortstop in baseball. We're jumping sports here, but take a shortstop in baseball that might get four to five ground balls a game. And in practice, he could get four to five ground balls in 10 seconds, you know. So the practice, like some of these travel teams and stuff. I'm we're probably gonna get into the state of sports right now, but some of these travel teams, they go to these tournaments and they just play games the whole time, right? So you play six games, let's say a shortstop gets four ground balls a game. You got 24 ground balls in an entire weekend of work, versus let's say we play one game and we could practice for X amount of hours, right? I see a lot more value in that practicing. And then again, you you have to do it in a game to be able to keep adapting and keep evolving. But I could get a thousand ground balls in in a couple hours of practice versus 24 in those six games that weekend.
SPEAKER_02:And that's such an important point with the way that youth athletics in particular. I think baseball is a really easy one to highlight right now, is the amount of games on the AU circuit, and these kids are being asked. I think like particularly about like the arm usage, and these kids at young ages are asked to be throwing as hard as they can every single time that they're out there pitching without the adequate practice in training.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And we see so many injuries, particularly in the MLB now. And a lot of it is people blaming the MLB staffs. Some of it, I wonder, is that a trickle-down effect of improper training at a younger age and all this hard throwing without the adequate practice? And would really just like to kind of get your thoughts on it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Baseball is an interesting one, it's probably the most controversial one, in my opinion. And it's because of those arm injuries. Like, I've I've seen more young kids with arm injuries as a as like what I do for a living. I've seen more young kids with arm injuries than I've ever had in my life. The the female side of things with uh soccer, I see more young girls with knee injuries than I've ever seen. Like, I'm talking like young kids with major ACL, UCL surgeries. That to me is alarming. Like, that's something isn't right with that. The tough thing, we'll go back to baseball, but say I have a star picture and you're in the championship game, but he just pitched two days ago, right? You're probably trying to throw that star picture again because you want to win. What is what's the cost of that win? Like, so your mom and dad could post you on Facebook and shout out how great of a weekend you had. Like, and then you get to raise a troll. I mean, I always say like use sports is like whoever hits puberty first has a massive advantage. Like you go to a 12-year-old tournament, and I remember like Cooperstown. I don't know if you went to Cooperstown when you were younger. Some of those kids there were 12 and they're like seven feet tall. Like I've I saw kids like shaving in the bathroom, right? Friends like that. It's yeah, right. And they hit puberty, and those are gonna be the most dominant players there. Like they're they look like dads and they're just hitting bombs at 12 years old. So you have these underdeveloped kids who haven't hit puberty, they start to get a little bit negative thoughts, like, am I good enough to do this? And the problem is we we place so much emphasis on being a high-level athlete at such a young age that it weeds out the kids who might not be at that point yet. But let's say that kid, if he stayed on the trajectory, he kept playing the sport and kept developing and kept wanting to learn, that kid could develop. Once he hits, let's say he hits puberty in ninth or 10th grade, he could end up being the best one. Right. But we weeded him out at such a young age that he doesn't even play the sport anymore. And at the same time, as we weed those kids out, the most elite kids who hit puberty at a young age that are getting pulled in all these different directions, the star pitcher that has to pitch on one day rest at 12 years old because he's the stud, he gets burned out. So now we have two, we're pulling on two ends. We're taking out the underdeveloped kids because they don't have the confidence in their ability. And we're burning out the most elite kids at that age because, you know, we want them to throw on a day's rest to win a pointless tournament. Like that, I mean, to me, that's the biggest problem. That's that's the biggest issue right there. And not that's not to mention, like, there's socio, socioeconomic problems too. Like uh Tony Final, I think, is a great story with this. Like his dad set up a mattress in the garage and he would just hit golf balls into that mattress because they couldn't afford range time, they couldn't afford tea times and all this different stuff. And he painted circles on the mattress and he told Tony and his brother, just hit into these targets. Had his dad not had the savvy to do that, Tony Final may have never golfed because he didn't have access to it. Right. So the socioeconomic stuff mixed with the way we want these kids to be so elite at such a young age, and then both of those mixed with weeding out the the kids who aren't as developed yet, mix all that together, that's you sports in a nutshell. And that that's the biggest issue.
SPEAKER_02:And competitiveness is a good thing, like wanting to win is a good thing, but understanding at that age, winning means nothing. Like I I went to my parents the other day, and for the first time in honestly years, I went into my old room because I had my daughters. I was like, Do you guys want to see what room daddy grew up in? And like I had like a bunch of trophies, yeah, and like there was one where it was like again, 12U like championship. I don't even remember that. Right. Like I couldn't, I couldn't put a memory to that trophy. I didn't know what team it was for, I didn't know what role I had, like didn't remember any of it. And that's not to say like winning doesn't matter, but putting it in perspective, like these kids, like you're there to develop them, yeah, physically, mentally, emotionally. You're there to teach young men and or young or young boys and girls how to become young men and women, yeah, and the different things that go with that. And obviously, you know, we're both obviously very competitive people and played at high levels and had those aspirations. Those things will come along. And there's a genetic component that plays to that. There is a general desire for the sport, but you can influence that desire as a young coach.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_02:In coaching these athletes, where to the encouragement to keep playing, the encouragement on building the fundamentals, the focus on the resiliency aspect and keep working forward and focusing on process and understanding that outcomes are just a validation of the process. And then if the outcomes aren't where you want them, then you change the process.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And instead of having that, you know, this unique example we're talking about, having that same 12-year-old kid pitch two days later, develop one of your other guys. Right. Yeah. You know, help them learn those moments. Because guess what? Even if they fail, putting your arm around them and saying, hey, it didn't go the way you wanted, these things you did really, really well. Right. These are the other things that we can prove upon. These are some of the things that we can't control. That kid's shaving, right? Like you can't control it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Right. You know, you keep working, you keep developing, look where you could potentially be. Right. And like, there's, you know, I don't see enough of that. Yeah. You know, in particular with the close circles of the people I speak with, you know, in what you see on like a global scale. I so badly want the conversation to shift from everyone trying to be a professional athlete to hey, let's work on just developing being a human.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like let's be a better person, a harder working individual, and understanding all the benefits that sports gives you. Because I don't care what athlete you are, eventually sports are going to end and you're going to have to transition to do something else. Yeah. So it's what skill set, what you know, part of our identities, what you know, values, characteristics, disciplines can we build at younger ages that are just going to help them accelerate through life. Yeah. And that's what I really want the focus to be on in youth athletics. I just worry that this conversation falls on deaf ears.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. It's tough. I mean, it starts with the parents, though. Like the parents are the biggest thing because you manage your kids' schedule, right? You dictate signing them up for certain things. So if you have your kid, like we're in fallball right now, if they're going to football practice, then they got baseball practice, then they're they're also mixing in some uh soccer, and then you're bringing them to FSQ to train on top of that, and they're 10 years old. Like, would you want that schedule as an adult? Like, imagine your boss is like, hey, you're gonna work this job, and then we're gonna get you to this job, and then we're gonna get you this. You go home and you complain the whole time. Like you're miserable with that job. I think as parents, we just always think like, oh, they're kids, like they're having fun with all this stuff. There's other things that kids want to do that are fun. We're so many coaches and parents are preaching like anti-video. I grew up anti-video games. I grew up playing video games. I worked out perfectly fine. Like I would go train, I'd go to practice, I'd come home, and the first thing I want to do was play Madden or play NCAA. There was nothing wrong with that. That was my way of decompressing. I didn't know that at that age. Looking back, like that was my way of decompressing. It's no different than like parents these days that want to sit down and read a book at night and have a cup of tea or have a drink or watch a Netflix show. Like, that's your way of decompressing from from work. Kids need that same exact thing, right? So as a parent, it starts with you because you manage everything. You manage what where the kid's going. Kid's not getting the keys and driving himself to practice, right? You're the person that's doing that. So I think sometimes there's there's a there's a mix between they're trying to keep their kid up with everyone else. Like we don't want, I don't want my kid to fall behind. So there's that keeping up with the Joneses effect that's taking place. And there's also, I want my kid to be involved with stuff. So you take those two things together, and it's a and you're just signing them up for everything at that point. Now, there are benefits to some of that, right? You do want your kid to be around other sports. You want that movement variety, you want all those things that the kid's gonna benefit from. Plus, you want them with friends, you want them being able to socially interact and be coached. But at the same time, managing the volume of that has to be the most important thing. Like maybe instead of three sports this fall, maybe let's cut it to two, you know, and and let's play fallball on the side right now. Let's focus on football, right? That's the main thing. We'll do a little baseball too. We'll cut out soccer. And when it gets warm, then we can we can transition. You know, spring, we'll we'll do baseball as the main sport, and we'll do a little soccer on the side. You know, so I think being a parent, you have to understand how to manage that schedule most importantly, and know when that kid needs that decompressed time. Like take them to the playground, right? Go to birthday parties, go go do all these different things where kids just have so much fun and they don't have to worry about anything else happening in their lives. Because then you add in school, you add in the pressures from that. And now kids these days are dealing with the pressures of YouTube and social media and Instagram and stuff like that. So again, it's it's a lot different from when we grew up. You know, it's a lot different raising a kid now than you know, my the experience my parents had raising a kid. And it'll continue to be different, you know. So I think managing the volume, understanding like put in training time, like work to rest ratios, you need to, you need to pick up on that as parents, you know.
SPEAKER_02:I think it's important too, even at young ages, like ask your kids how they're feeling. It's something I've needed to do a better job of recently with like Mariana and just be like, you know, she colors something. Hey, how'd that make you feel? Yeah. And she's like, really good, really happy, right? How did going to soccer feel today? You know, I didn't like it, or uh, you know, it made me happy, right? Whatever it isn't like actually gauging, then obviously using the you know, maturity as parents to be able to decipher what's real and what isn't, but like get their gauge on it because they'll tell you. Like, my daughter right now loves gymnastics. Like, she comes home last night and she's showing me without me asking every single thing that they did. She's just doing it around the house. Yeah. And like, she doesn't have like any of her organized friends there. She's the one of the younger ones in the class, but she loves it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And so for me, like, that's great. Let's keep doing gymnastics. Let's do more of it. Yeah, let's do more of it. So, like, you know, this makes you happy, you love doing it, you talk about it. Like, that's great. Yeah. Right. And then the point about video games, I think, is a really important point because kids do need to rest. They do need some type of fun. It doesn't have to be video games, but it has to be something. Yeah. And obviously, anything over abundance is not healthy, but like in a perfect amount, like, yeah, I'm not saying let your kid go play 24 hours straight of Minecraft or whatever they play. Like, give your kids times and outlets to do free things that they want to do that allow them to just like escape for a moment.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, volume is everything. I think volume is so important. And my kids love sports, like they are naturally just drawn to everything sports. Giancarlo loves baseball. Marciano loves everything right now. I think, but Carlo changes with the seasons, right? Like he loves baseball now because he's playing fallball. He also loves football right now because football's on TV. Like we're watching football every weekend. So if I kept pushing him into those two things, like let's just say we did baseball and we did football and we did them year-round. There's gonna be a point where he loves it, and then there's gonna be a point where it gets a little bit too much for him, and he needs that rest. So understanding where to push and pull there, I think is is most important. And we have this is a great example. And I I wish every single I tell this to parents all the time. Right now, we're we train the number one wrestler at his weight class. This kid's a stud. Number one wrestler in the whole country. His dad, this started, he's been working with us maybe three years now, two to three years. His dad came to me in the summer when he first started training, and he said, I don't want I don't want my son to wrestle. We're not gonna wrestle right now. I solely want him to get stronger, faster, more athletic, springier, all these different things. And he didn't wrestle at all the entire summer. And he got back into wrestling, he couldn't wait to get back on the mat. Like he was so excited to get back and compete because now he wanted to use all of those the things that we just worked on, right? He did it again this this offseason. He didn't wrestle for eight months. He unfortunately broke his hand right before the state tournament last year. This kid would. He would have been a four-time state champ, no doubt in my mind. Breaks his hand, can't wrestle, right? What's the first thing we do? We get back to training. Eight months, doesn't wrestle at all. He goes to the Who's Number One tournament a couple weeks ago and dominates 13 to 4 or something like that. Beats the number two kid in the country. And he hasn't, he didn't come, he hasn't formally competed in all that time. He just focused on developing. Now he's practicing wrestling, like he's doing some of that stuff. But he just he could not wait. Like when you talked about like, hey, you're gonna compete this weekend, his eyes just lit up, man. Like he was, he could not wait to get back out on the mat and compete in front of people and have like a meaningful wrestling match. So much lesson to be learned there. Now, genetically, the kid's a little bit different, right? So I need to put that like that's a disclaimer.
SPEAKER_02:That's a point, too, that's really important, that's under-discussed. And it's not always fair, but it's the reality. Genetics are going to dictate a lot of this. Yeah. You know, and you know, you as parents don't have to be super athletic for your kid to be really athletic and have a really good career. But understanding that at some point, like professional athletes, because that's what everyone, you know, at least in this part of this conversation, are trying to get their kids to be, that is less than one percent of the population.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So in order to get there, your kid has to be 0.05, 0.01% of the world.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Okay. If not smaller odds. Right. So recognizing that and just take that out of the equation. Stop talking about being a professional athlete and just start like somewhere else and let the genetics play out.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like, and everything will go where it's meant to go. The key is the development and keeping your kids involved. Yeah. Um, I think it just came to you, your kids are freak athletes. That's it. I mean, like you at a young age, like you can tell you see it. Yeah. And I talk with my wife about it all the time. She's like, How do you know? I'm like, You just know. You just know. Yeah. Like you can see kids, their springiness at young ages, where like they're a really good athlete. Yeah. Their hand-eye coordination. I'm going up like with so Mariana, really naturally athletic, trying to figure out Charlotte a little bit more. Yeah. Hoping they don't see this in like 20 years. So I know what they're doing. But she's like, stop saying that. I'm like, it's important for me to understand and for you to understand because there's going to be different modes of coaching that's going to go along with both of them. Yeah. And we have to be willing to understand where they're where their baseline is at and how we can improve them however they want to improve. Right. And so she's like, You're like, you're always saying to me things about Sean. I'm like, listen, I love those girls more than anything in the world. But you have to have a realization with your kids so you can help them with where they want to go. Yeah. And that's like that's the message I try to get across to her uh in our parenting discussions about our kids. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And as much as like I want my kids to do sports, I I love sports. My I've made an entire career out of sports. That has been like I started at the five years old playing stuff, and I'm still involved. I went to football camp for like 20 plus years, you know, having my dad as a coach and then, you know, going with him at a young age and then actually playing, going to camp, and then coaching going to camp. Like I went to camp longer, like I have a whole lifetime of going to football camp, you know? So I am very attracted to the sports world. So I want my kids to be involved with sports because I saw how much that that has given me. The biggest issue is when I try to force them into the sports world, and that might not be where their interests lie. Like maybe they like building stuff, or maybe they like playing with monster trucks or whatever. My kids do that stuff all the time. I don't want to take them away from monster trucks and forcing them, like, hey, let's go hit baseballs. Because that's when they start to get that negative. Right. That resentment of my dad once is forcing me to do this. My dad never did that with me. He never once was like, hey, we have to work out today. I decided on my own I want to work out today. And my dad was there to coach me and help me. I think that's so important. Like understanding where your intro or where your kids' interests lie, and then trying to give them the resources to be able to explore that.
SPEAKER_02:Do you listen to Greg Olson talk at all? I know speaking of your kids here soon. A little bit. Yeah, I'm on pickup duty today. So we'll we'll wrap here. I love Greg Olson. He's my favorite media person, point blank, period, in so many different domains. I think he's the best commentator. I think he's super articulate in the analysis space as well. But he he is really involved in new sports. Yeah. And one thing he talks about with his kids is he's like, I don't care what you do. He's like, but whatever you pick to do, he's like, if you're picking baseball, like multiple sports, whatever it is, or you're picking the band, he's like, whatever you're doing, you're doing it and you're doing it all in. Yeah. Like you're going to like, we're going to learn the elements of like discipline and hard work and like intensity. And his kids are older now, obviously. But like, and that's how I feel. And like he articulates it out so eloquently, where it's like, I don't care what you do, you have to do something. You're not just gonna be a couch potato, do nothing. Obviously, I think about just like how you said everything sports have given me, both physically, mentally, emotionally, financially, like friendship-wise, like everything that comes with sports is amazing. So obviously, that's what I know, that's what I want my kids to do. Yeah. But like, if Mariana or Charlotte or Micah come to me and they're like, hey, like we love singing and they have some type of like talent level, like let's get after it.
SPEAKER_01:Let's be the best out. Let's be the best. Let's be really good at it.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, let's let's do it, let's do it the right way. Yeah, right. So it's it's less about what we're doing. Obviously, my influence will be sports, like, which is awesome. Like, both my daughters will sit on the couch and watch football, golf, basketball, soccer with me. Yeah, they will actually sit there and watch. Like, my daughter will come downstairs and say, Hey, can we watch golf this morning? Yeah, I'm like, Yeah, it's awesome. It's awesome. It's the best feeling, yeah. And obviously, you know, I've influenced that, but like, you know, if she didn't want to, there's plenty of things she to sorry, leaked on you. She plenty of things she tells me all the time she doesn't want to do. Yeah. So, like, but the premise of it is find something you want to do and let's go be great at it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And like I said, too, the seasons changed, right? Yeah. My kids are really into football right now because that's the season. You know, they're getting into hockey now. The penguins started playing penguin games are always on in my house. So they switched to hockey. We're now we're playing hockey in the basement. So, again, back to the youth sports problem with that, the early specialization and and over intensification of that specialization, I think it's a killer to kids because kids change all the time. Like, I'm I'm 36 and I still don't know what I want to do for a living. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'm glad that I've made a living in coaching, but there's so much other stuff that I really want to do, you know, that I want to do with my life that I haven't had the opportunity to do yet. Kids feel the same way. Like, they don't know if they're gonna be a baseball player when they grow up. They might think that. Like I ask Carlo all the time, what do you want to be when you grow up? It's just like, I mean, you ask kids that all the time. That's just a question I hear them doing in kindergarten. I hear them do it. Like he told me he wants to be a baseball player. Next time he tells me he wants to be a football player. Next time he wants to be a firefighter. You know, next time he wants to be in the military. Like it's it's just all these seasons are changing. So you can't, you can't try to just specialize and keep them in one thing. Give them access to creativity, give them access to this world that they don't even know exists, and you can introduce them to it. And they might fall in love with that, and that might dictate the rest of their life, similar to to me with sports. Like I fell in love with sports at such a young age, and that's all I did. I'd wear full like picture day. I want to say kindergarten picture day, full Buffalo Bills uniform, shoulder pads, helmet, cleats. I have cleats on in my picture. It's awesome. And I probably got made fun of, but that's all I wanted to do was sports. And now you see me now, I'm still involved in sports. I've made an entire career out of it. So so yeah, I think open as many different worlds as you can as a parent and see what they're really drawn to. Don't force them into certain things and and just guide them, handle their schedule, make it make sense. Like make it make it make sense to them. And uh yeah, I mean, that's as a coach and a parent, I think my number one job, especially as a coach, we have 12 kids on our on our U7 baseball team right now. If they all sign up for baseball again next year, I did a great job as a coach. That's the number one goal. Get them to sign up again. Because why? Because now they can experience the sport more. Maybe they'll develop more. Like maybe there's a a six-year-old who who didn't touch a ball this year and he wants to get better and he wants to come back because he had so much fun. And now next year he puts the ball in play. Like there's development. And because I he had a good experience with me as a coach, I just bought him another year of being able to develop. And that's keep them in the game. Keep every kid in the game. Let them fall in love with it, let them develop because you don't know who's gonna be good. You don't know who's gonna be good when you get older, you know? And don't burn out the the really good kids with it. I think as a parent and uh and a coach, that's the goal. That's the number one goal. That's awesome, man.
SPEAKER_02:What a place to wrap it. It was awesome getting on the mic with you again.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, man, it feels like old days. It does. Awesome.
SPEAKER_02:Hey, I know you're working on some things. Want to give you the opportunity to shout some of the things that you're you're working on out. And yeah, where can people find you? Um tell us what you're working on.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so obviously I own FSQ Sports Training, been doing that forever. Train athletes, that's our our main niche. Um, we're getting into this is something new, and I haven't gone public, I've been texting you about it, but uh, we started a nutrition company. Um, brand new. First time I'm talking about it publicly. It's probably been working on it for about a year now. Um just wanted to, like I said, I don't want to just coach the rest of my life. There's so many other things that I want to do. And this was one of them. I wanted to start another business that I was something I was really passionate about. So so yeah, we'll have more details on that in the future. Um, like I said, we've been working on it, we've been chipping away, we're doing branding stuff right now. We're doing uh, we're getting into supplements, we're getting into snacks and bars, different stuff like that. Um the main goal and what I'm really passionate about is I think now is social media. Again, we talked about how great social media is, but there's information overload now, and you don't know who the actual authority figures are in the fitness, health, nutrition space. So you have all these people that get in front of a camera and they could take their shirt off and they're jacked and they tell you something, right? Yeah, and there's young kids who eat up that information and they think that's the the way to go. So I want to make it more accessible and more straightforward. Like this is this is the stuff that's science backed the most. This is the stuff that you need the most. Like, how can I get that in front of people to create that type of platform? And to me, it's about just giving people better information. Like the people who don't understand how to eat well or how to train, how can I get them on the right path? And the people who are getting information overload, how can I simplify it for them? So I I think this is my my way of doing that. So yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Heck yeah, brother.
SPEAKER_01:I appreciate you, Tim. Appreciate you, man. This was great.
SPEAKER_02:Heck yeah, man. Uh, listeners, thank you for tuning in. Tune in next week. Subscribe to our YouTube channel, download the podcast. Five stars only, baby. See you guys next week. Appreciate you, Tim.
SPEAKER_01:Good, man.