Scott 'Crasher' Braasch: Reaching Young Minds Today

We’re excited to bring you something a little different—and incredibly impactful.

Coachable Players hosted a special livestream interview paired with a live music performance, featuring a former college football player who has built a powerful second act as a gym owner, cheer coach, and musician. Scott 'Crasher' Braasch brought the wisdom about reaching young minds today in coaching plus he sang some good tunes too!

This wasn't just a conversation—it was a deep dive into what it really takes to grow, adapt, and stay coachable in today’s world.

During this extended interview, we explored:

• The reality of transitioning from athletics to life beyond the game
• The mindset shifts young people need to succeed today
• Lessons learned from coaching and mentoring the next generation
• Honest reflections on failure, growth, and staying coachable
  
  

And throughout the experience, Crasher performed his own original music. This was a unique opportunity to hear from someone who is not only talking about growth—but living it, leading it, and expressing it through music.

Whether you’re an athlete, coach, parent, or young professional, this is a conversation worth your time.

We'd love to hear from you about this episode.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Podcast built on the belief that the most successful people in life are coachable. The athletes, business leaders, everyone around you share a trait. They're coachable. They're open to feedback. They grow under pressure. Leading with humility beyond sports. Here at the coachable podcast, we believe that coachability is not just a sports skill, it's a lifelong skill. Yes, sir. Yes. And today it's gonna be awesome. Today we have our first ever coachable players concert. Yes. The world famous Crasher. Scott Crasher Brash. World famous. Yes, I'll take it. My man. Thank you. So his topic today is reaching young minds. And he has reached thousands of young minds. Yeah. And for those, yes, absolutely. Yes. And for those few people that don't know Crasher, how about a little introduction so people know who you are? Sure, everybody.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

So uh I'm my name's Scott, but everybody calls me Crash. My last name's Brash. Has nothing to do with the way I drive or uh whether I've been invited to a wedding or not. Uh it's not it's not anything like that. It's uh it's definitely Crash Brash. And it was a name I received through football and through sports uh from my coaches in the past when I was in middle school. So it's stuck with me on my 56 now. So uh crasher has been pretty much my name for a very long time. Um and it's become my stage name too for music as well. But uh uh I got into uh yeah, I got into I was I was a football player, went off to college, played football at California University of Pennsylvania, and had two really major knee injuries that ended my football career very abruptly, actually. I uh back in 89, I was playing, I was a defensive tackle for Cal U. Um, and we were playing at Lockhaven and uh I blew my uh I blew my knee out there during a Hurricane Hugo had come up the coast, and they had a natural field and it and it wrecked my you know, it was tough to play on, but I was I was having a really good game. But my own player hit me in the knee and and uh blew out three ligaments and all the cartilage in my knee in one shot. And I had reconstructive knee surgery within 24 hours of that injury. And when I came out, I had a cast, you know, from my toe to my hip, and uh, and that ended my football career. Um uh they they said I shouldn't play football anymore. So um I was dating a cheerleader at the time at Cal U. And uh between um them and one of my fraternity brothers, uh, they dared me to come out and do cheerleading. And I thought, cheerleading, man, I don't know. I'm a Middletown guy. I'm from I'm kind of local to this area as well. I grew up in Middletown and cheerleading was always just kind of like the popular girls and stuff like that. It wasn't ever in my mind viewed as an athletic or a or or a uh a sport, but at least back then. Um, this was the mid to late 80s, so um, so you just it wasn't something that you kind of looked at in that in that way. And so I was like, I don't know if I want I'm not wanting to do cheerleading. Are you kidding me? And I remember calling my dad, hey dad, I think I'm gonna do cheerleading. And you know, he there was a big joke there. For those that don't know, also my dad is Dan Steele, who's a radio personality in the area uh for many years. And uh, I don't want to turn this into one of his things, but just for the record, he had a platform where he could make fun of me on the radio. Nice, and he did. So so I'll use it just for that purpose. But uh um, so and that it there was some that's a whole probably a whole nother podcast that joke that came out. But uh regardless, um I I called him and I said, uh yeah, I'm gonna be a chiller. And he said, That's it. Oh, okay, no big deal. All right, cool. Are you gonna do that? Whatever. So I I started throwing the girls around and I started to see how athletic and how um how I was how how much of a sport it felt like. I was like, oh, okay, I'm this is like lifting and balance and you know, tons of tons of aspects using muscle uh groupings and things like that that I've never had to really use before because it wasn't with baseball or or soccer or football or any of this, you know, any of the sports that I had done, wrestling, all that different stuff. So, you know, I uh I was I just got into it. I was like, I got really excited about it. I was like, this is actually pretty cool. This is this is athletic, it is a sport. And so I started to feel that way. And when I did, then I wanted to be, I always had kind of like the thought process that I want to be, I don't want to just do something to do something. I want to do something to be the best at something. And uh probably something that's been instilled in me from coaches before and from my parents as well, which is all part of this topic in the first place, is how do you become a coachable person? I felt like a coachable person, and I felt like that was something that all of a sudden I now wanted to be coached at. And uh, and I was learning off of videos because at Cal U, they didn't have a cheerleading coach. There was nobody there coaching us at the time. So we were literally coaching ourselves. We were trying to figure out how to do all of this. How do you do cheerleading? What is this? Show me a video. I'm talking to the girls, I'm like, I don't know how to do this stuff. So, you know, I'm I'm learning how to how to become a cheerleader. Um, and as I did, I continued to get, we went to camps, we did all that kind of stuff growing up. I mean, I, you know, I ended up being a cheerleader in college for three years. I was a collegiate all-American with NCA um at cheerleading. Um, and it all kind of came very, very quickly. It was like just happened. I just started, as I started to throw the girls in the air, that became an easy thing. Then I met my uh my wife, um uh Kim Lawson, now Kim Brash, who was a Penn State cheerleader through summer camps. And uh between the two of us, we had a vision that we wanted to bring this, you know, and and when I say bring this, I'm this the cheerleading gyms are are, I guess, relatively new in the sense that in the last 30 years um they've come around. It wasn't like there's hundreds of years of cheerleading gyms around, kind of like the sport, you know, cheerleading's been around for a very long time, but training girls or and boys um in a in an actual gym was not something that really existed back then. So we had this, uh, we were like, we should open up a cheerleading gym. And we were teaching summer camps, and we were teaching summer camps with people that were from Texas and Atlanta and Miami and all these places, and they would all, we would all come together under the brand of NCA back then, and we would teach a summer camp and we're all talking about it. Yeah, we're gonna go back and open up these gyms. Let's open up gyms. I'm well, we're gonna go back and open up a gym in uh Pennsylvania, central Pennsylvania. And uh they were like, we're going back and opening up a gym in Atlanta, we're gonna open up a gym in Miami and Dallas and all these places. And so all of a sudden, these these competitive All-Star gyms started popping up all over the place, and Cheer Time uh was our brand. Uh, we had started Central Penn All-Stars and we ran that for two years. Um what year are we talking? 90s or this would be, yeah. So uh that's a good question. Um 95, uh Central Penn All-Stars, 95, 96, maybe it was the very end of 95, um, 96, 97, 98. We incorporated as cheer time. We we didn't really, I mean, I was a I went to college to be a teacher and to play sports, and that was kind of in my mind. No, I think actually, you're right. It was actually flip-floped in the order. It wasn't until I blew my knee out that I realized I needed an education, but the rest of it before that was me, me finding out what college was all about. Um, but uh, but but regardless, I um yeah, so we we we opened up cheer time um off of off of central pen all-stars, which we ran for a few years. And it was my opportunity to take what, you know, my I had a teaching degree in my whole entire thought process in college was I was gonna I was gonna be a teacher and coach football. That's what I thought was gonna happen. Um, so you know, I I had been influenced by Coach Etsy, by Coach Boyland, um, by uh by Shatz, by uh uh by some really, really good coaches that I've had. Fortunately, I grew up in an era at Middletown where I was under some people that I felt like really did a great job of molding me as an athlete into wanting to even do that again um at as an adult. I was like, this is I want to coach kids. This is what I want to do, and I want to teach. And uh it was because of those people that came before me that instilled the the thought processes into my head as a coach themselves, by by their leadership, by their by the way they did their gym, uh did their not gym, but did their uh coaching their teams, uh me being a part of it, how they interacted with me, it just really kind of made me feel like, yeah, this is that's absolutely what I want to do in life. So I always thought I would be a football coach and a and a and a teacher. And here I did teaching for a while. I did, I did, I had my degree, I taught, taught, taught. Well, then when we opened up chair time full-time, I ended up moving from the teaching side of things um into owning the cheer gym and running the business. But I still feel like in the business set, I I am still a teacher. I still feel like I'm you know, in the gym, I'm like the superintendent, the school board, the principal, all those things. I um, you know, it all kind of ran through me. And the kids love to come to school and they didn't mind their homework and they enjoyed being part of it. So to me, it was like, yeah, this is I I love this. It's like running a little school, uh, a little school district in in cheer time. So cool. Yeah, I mean, that takes me up to present day, I guess. I mean, I suppose that's the journey I took. There you go.

SPEAKER_00 9:23

Yeah, so so we set the foundation. That's that's who he is. That's who we're talking with today, people. And it is a live studio audience. We we might have when I when I announced Craft Server is gonna be here, everyone was knocking down the door to get in here to hear him play. So so yeah, as I said, the the topic is reaching young minds, and I gotta thank you. You you reached uh Elena, my middle daughter's young mind, you reached her, and the Hanses are here, Maddie as well. You reached you reached them. And just just with Elena, the the confidence that she has and the leader that she's becoming, you know, I attribute to you, and you played a major role in that. So thank you. Oh, I appreciate that. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

Great, great kid, and uh great, great, great kid, great athlete, and great, uh easy to set very coachable. Yeah, very coachable. And so that's that's a props to parents as well, and parenting uh and the environment that you create in your household, because as we continue to talk today, I think you're gonna find that that has that plays that plays a big role in it as well.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Yeah. And and speaking of that, my my youngest daughter, she's had to date three different basketball coaches.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

She's gonna be a cheerleader before you.

SPEAKER_00 10:42

I'm telling her to stay upstairs. I don't know, stay away from crashes. Yeah, but the three coaches all said that it's your daughter is coachable. It's it's a pleasure to coach young people that are coachable, that listen to you, that take feedback. Yeah and and that was kind of where this came from, coaching the players. And and I thought, what better way to spend a nice Saturday afternoon than talking about coachable people with great minds like you? So absolutely. So we will, I know a lot of you are gonna listen for the music and we're we're gonna hear some great tunes today here, but let's let's start with with a little question here and then we'll play some music and then come back to the questions. Yeah. Um, so we're it's reaching young minds here. As a coach, what do you see young athletes struggling with the most today?

SPEAKER_01 11:25

Well, I think there's uh, yeah, uh, and there's a lot of that. Um distractions. Um, the kids are kids nowadays have so much. I think back to when I first opened up Cheer Time and I started coaching. And even when I was an athlete too, we you know, we didn't have cell phones, we didn't have technology at our fingertips the way we do right now. We didn't have instant gratification, we didn't have the need for gratification in the first place. The gratification we were searching and looking for wasn't necessarily online or anywhere, and now it is, and kids are really looking for that kind of stuff, and they feel like, you know, however many likes they have on a particular picture uh exemplifies who they are as a person when really that isn't the case at all. So um, so I think that's probably one of the biggest things I would say that I see with kids is the social media and the technology at their fingertips has really kind of created a distraction to them. Um, whereas, you know, the focus on the in the past, I don't think was ever there because it didn't really exist much, but it's expanded so much and it's I mean, it's it's only becoming it's only getting bigger. So it's not going away ever. It's learning how to, how do you, as a coach, work around that? Um, and for me, you know, I'm kind of at the tail end of my coaching through that. So I um I I'm I'm it's tricky. It's tricky. I guess I don't want to say I'm thankful because I I'm appreciative of my coaching, but I I know the struggles that it it creates for coaches uh to try to uh to try to deal with uh that. I mean, our kids, our kids can pull someone's stunt sequence up in three seconds on their phone and go, oh, this is this team's stunt sequence, this is what this team scored at this competition or that competition. They know quicker sometimes than the coaches do. And it's because information and technology is at their fingertips and they're so quick with it. In that aspect, it's good technology. Yeah, absolutely. In that aspect it is good, yeah. And and it and but it's also it can be, you know, that can also be a distraction for them because the focus needs to be on them and their enhancement of their of their uh their physical abilities, their what they are continue to how they grow as a teen, you know, and I and I speak a lot in cheerleading terms, uh not necessarily football or anything, because cheerleading is what I ended up, you know, doing full time for uh 30 years of my life. So I uh I'm gonna speak in those terms a lot. But you know, I I converted at a young at a young age in my mind, I because cheerleading is all, I mean, it's tricky. I don't want to get off topic, and I may, so help me if I go straying away. But you know, cheerleading is tricky because it's one of those sports that is subjective in in certain areas. You know, like football, you score, you you score a touchdown at six points, no matter if you're on a pee-wee team or if you're at a D1 college, you know, or in the pros. Yeah, it's still six points, period. And uh, and in cheerleading, you throw a full twist and it's worth, you know, eight points on this score sheet, eight point five on this score sheet, nine points on this score sheet. Just depends on who's looking at it, whether they thought it piped in the middle or broke form or whether it landed and squared off properly, all those different things, you know, all these different stuff is all interpretive by a judge. So it's trickier, you know, in our sport to try and justify certain scores and certain things. And uh, that's another aspect in cheerleading that we we struggle with with athletes is trying to get them to understand score sheets and what drivers, drivers are numbers that are taken away on our score sheet. Um, how how we how we have to counteract that and how we have to train our athletes to you know think differently and and focus on the littlest aspects and the most to make them the most important aspects so that our it enhances our score as a whole. But yeah, yeah. So I and I hope I don't want to ever get boring cheerleading community. But I'll tell you, one of the things I did right away is I started coaching my kids like they were football players. I I I uh and and I think uh, you know, I wanted them to understand how important cheerleading was and how hard they had to work um to be to be a part of it. And central Pennsylvania cheerleading was not where it needed to be. I remember taking our kids our very first year I took them down to uh Dallas, Texas to a competition, and we got our butts kicked bad. But you know, there were teams down there and programs down there. Chair athletics was a program that was going on down there. There were more full twists, and uh, for those that don't know, that's where a girl goes up in the air, does a twist in a layout position, and lands on her feet, which is a pretty tricky skill. Yeah, fulls and doubles. There were more full twists on the on the once uh chair athletics team than there were in the whole state of Pennsylvania, you know. And I was just like, This is where we got work to do, we got to get back to the gym and get the work. And these kids' eyes opened up like boom, wow, that's cheerleading. Yeah, and we took that back and we we use it as motivate motivation for us, and we pushed hard. And you know, over the years, we've certainly grown into a program that's been formidable at the national level, too.

SPEAKER_00 16:22

So because of it, but so six years ago, I was on the side of the non-cheerleading community. Yeah, Elena went through cheer time six years, and and I was of the mindset, like you said, like this is a sport, you know. I used to think like that, yeah. And then I would pick her up from practice, and she sweat more, was more tired. And I played football, and and football was like my primary sport. Sure. And I'd watch her practice cheer. I'm like, oh my gosh, they practice way harder than we practice. Yeah, exactly. You guys really put them through the ringer and they they improve because of it, you know.

SPEAKER_01 16:56

You know, it's and and it's very interesting because you know uh it wasn't even, I don't know, probably not even 50, 60 years ago that that cheerleaders were wearing saddle shoes and you know, non-athletic apparel. You know, now they're in sports brawls and and there's proper equipment and and our sneakers are light and they can, you know, tumble on and they're on spring floors just like a gymnast is in the at the Olympic level, you know. So I mean, it's everything is adapted to the athletic side of our sport, which has been such a pleasant thing to see happen because you know, you get people like myself and some of the other people, many of the other coaches across the country that are doing this. We're training our kids to be the best athletes that we can possibly train them to be. And now the stunts, I mean, you're literally watching organized chaos out there on the cheerleading mat. I mean, you don't know anything about cheerleading, and you go to a national championship for the first time, you're just like, what the heck is that? It's crazy at the first time. These kids are up in the air and they're flipping and twisting and doing all and these keep people are catching them, yeah, you know, and uh and it's it's like it's like circus lay. Um, you know, and uh uh and so yeah, you you have to train at a certain level in order to be there. I always tell my kids, I'm like, look, if you want to be at the highest level of this sport, think about like what the highest level of gymnasts trains. They're in the gym every single day for three hours. We're only in the gym two to three times a week for two hours of practice. You know, you're going in two, four, six, maybe seven or eight hours a week that you're putting into this. And there's people in in other sports that are training, you know, 20, 30 hours a week. You know, that's a huge difference in how we we train. We try to make it a family-friendly sport too, because clearly we have kids of all ages and all levels, um, just like in gymnastics. But it's not like you know, on a football team, you have like you don't have like level one football, level two football, level three football, level four football, and then here's the elite kids up here, yeah. You know, and and you just have a team, and you make it or you don't make it, or you, you know, you're you're on maybe the JV team. That's that would be the equivalent of being on the next team down. But uh, but in cheerleading, you know, you got a level one team, you got level one youth, level two youth, level three youth, you got a mini team, you got a junior team, jet level two, three, four, five. Like, you know, and as the higher the number goes up, the more advanced the teams and the athletes are at that level. So um, yeah, so it's uh it's it's very it's grown tremendously our sport, which has been great. And you know, it's also got growing pains too in our sport. And that's that's been there's been some difficulties in that uh across the country. But you know, yeah, we're uh I I I'm in I'm still enjoying it. We still got we're we're still going strong, man.

SPEAKER_00 19:41

And that young mind Elena that that you raised, she coached inspiration for you one year. Yeah, and then she for three years, I think she coached Pee Wee Football Cheer. So yeah, she did, yeah. And she said, when I graduate, I want to get a job where I can coach. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 19:55

Yeah, I love to hear that. And for those that don't know, inspiration, that's our uh special needs uh cheerleading team at Cheer Time. Inspiration's been around for a very long time, it's run by uh uh Bobby uh and uh and Jeannie, um, our two coaches that have been with us a long time. So, yeah, that's uh that's a great program for uh yeah for special needs. Awesome.

SPEAKER_00 20:17

So in 2020, the COVID year, yeah. I remember we had a conversation. You said I'm playing music more and more in my garage, not a lot going on, not not getting out in the community. I'm I'm getting pretty decent. Fast forward to today, you know, you're all over Central PA, you're playing all these bars, restaurants, you're playing tonight at Allegian. Yeah. I'm at I'm at Key West Florida a couple months ago, yeah, and you text me and said, I'm playing down here. Yeah, that was so we give the people what they want. Let's get a song in. Yeah, let's get a song in here. Fair enough. That's good. And then we'll talk about your music and we'll get back to reaching young minds. Yeah, absolutely. Sounds good.

SPEAKER_04 25:11

Beach Bal.

SPEAKER_03 25:13

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 25:14

That's my new song, Beach Bound, that's coming out April twenty fourth. So uh if you're out there and you're uh listening to music and you're into the trap rock style music, which is what I play a lot of trap rock, uh Americana and country, that's the type of singer, songwriter I am. Check out Crash Acoustic on wherever you stream or buy music. I have artist pages on all of those. And uh and like and follow. I'd appreciate it if you would do that. Like and follow my pages, and if you can put uh if you can put one of the songs that are on there onto a playlist or something, it helps bump algorithms, believe it or not. So yeah, it's tricky. Um I've I always thought the hardest part about the music making process, which hasn't been very long for me to be honest with you, but I always thought the music making the hardest part would be making the music, like writing the song, recording the song, yeah, doing all that kind of stuff. And honestly, it's been the funnest part. The hardest part is getting the music into people's ears, getting music into people's ears, like getting people to hear your songs. And it's like, wow, that was people are always like, that's a great song. I'm like, do me a favor and just send it to somebody, put it out there. It's crazy because you know, we it fortunately we do have the internet, and then and I can push out, but um, you know, then there's whatever you never know what Facebook allows people to see, um, you know, how the algorithms all work and whether people are seeing stuff or not. But you can bump things if you can get into playlists, if you can get into like continued rotations on people's listening to your songs, and yeah, so it's tricky, but it's uh it's always nice. The platforms like this are a great opportunity for me to get out, talk a little bit about what I do for a living and and being able to do some music too.

SPEAKER_00 26:51

So thank you, man. Appreciate you. Well, you do have the experience because uh, you know, as you mentioned, starting the the cheer gym, and that was kind of a new thing back in the 90s, mid 90s, and and so that kind of drive back then and that passion back then is is still with you. I see it today. So yeah, yeah, absolutely. You really put a lot into your your gigs when I see you out about thank you.

SPEAKER_01 27:10

I uh yes, I do enjoy. I play uh I play as a duo also. Tonight I have a duo gig. Uh Crash and Cross Acoustic is uh that that dot com. But uh yeah, Crash Acoustic Solo, Crash and Cross Acoustic Duo. And uh I appreciate that. Thank you, man.

SPEAKER_00 27:24

And I did get you some water if you guys I appreciate that. Wet my whistle. Yes. So back to reaching young minds. Let's reach some minds. Yes, let's reach some good minds. Yes. Uh so not every player is coachable, not every player is a delight to be around. There's there's some some young minds out there from time to time that that are tough to connect with. Yeah. Do you have do you have any advice reaching people that are uncoachable?

SPEAKER_01 27:53

Yeah, I have a lot of uh I have a lot of uh uh history in that actually. And uh, you know, I think um when we first opened up Cheer Time, I I've been I've been extremely flattered and humbled by where people travel to to be a part of our program. Um, you know, our program grew to a point where we had people driving in two hour radius of our, I had people come into our gym from West Virginia and from Maryland and from Poconos and um the outskirts of Philly. And and so, you know, they travel uh all these distances. Well, what you get when you get that is you get completely different demographic of people coming into your gym, all to be a part of the same exact team. So, you know, I have kids that'll walk in the gym and their parents can write a check for the whole entire year. And I have parents, I have people that come in the gym with one parent uh struggling to make ends meet from month to month to month. Um, and uh they make, you know, they have to do every fundraiser that we offer in order to afford it and make it work. And and I think understanding where people come from, we as a business had to understand where everybody was coming from in order to make it so that it was the family that everybody could be a part of. You know, the melting pot cheer time was that place where everybody could come from wherever they came, whatever their background and their their you know, their family life is. Um so trying to find the common ground is always the one of the first steps I would say in in trying to connect with any athlete. What's the common ground? Well, fortunately for me, I'm I mean, to most people, if you just looked at me, I'm just a big guy that does cheerleading. But if you love cheerleading, then I'm a big guy that has an opportunity for you to train in a facility that will take you places and push you to your extreme ability. So I got to get kids to understand that. Otherwise, I'm just a big guy that they don't want to hear. You know, they have enough dads or they have dads in their lives that they have other authoritative figures, I should say, um, or even, you know, because I could be mom too, but they have authoritative figures in their life, but they don't need one more authoritative figure in their life unless that authoritative figure has something to offer them. And so, you know, me trying to explain to young athletes that, you know, we have an opportunity here uh for you to train with people of all different types. This is life. Yep. I mean, this is basically what you're gonna have in life. You're gonna be in a job one day where you're gonna be working with people you don't like that you love, that you can't stand, and that you that you want to be around all the time. You're gonna have both of those levels in life. And so, what do you guys have in common? Well, you have in common at your job place, whatever that job is, whatever, whatever you're doing together, you all want to see that succeed. Well, in the competitive cheerleading world, we all want to get on the mat. We want to utilize our abilities to the best so that the team does the best it possibly can. That's our common ground. We have to find that common ground with every athlete. And that has to be sometimes you have to spell that out to kids. You know, what is my role on this team? Understanding your role on a team is is a tremendous uh motivator uh for an athlete. If I know what it is I'm to do, what my job is. My job is to throw girls up in the air, okay. Um I'm gonna throw girls on the into the air. That's my job. That's what I'm gonna do. If my job is to tumble across the front and do the jumps and and then I'm gonna do that. If my job is to to to to be the flyer at the top of the pyramid and stay as tight as I possibly can, all right. How do I become better at that? What do I got to do to become better at that? Once you have your uh once you have all that defined and uh in your in a position, and that can be any sport, you know. I mean, that's if I'm the quarterback, well then there's motions and there's there's proper technique involved in the releasing the football and and drop back steps and and fake, you know, different things. If I'm the if I'm a lineman, what's my first step? You know, I mean there's there's there's all kinds of aspects. It can be it's every single sport across the board. You gotta you gotta make sure that you start at those basic points and you find those find that basic point. And then that you get to the kid, uh you get to that kid and that athlete um by explaining to them their role and by explaining to them um how they help the team as a whole. And by and then then you then you can pull them together in that common ground. You know, we all love this sport, we're all coming from all over the place, you know, beat that stuff into the their brains. That's what I've always done anyway. It's helped me to to get kids on the same page by you know uh by doing that. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:18

Yeah, so you kind of touch on it with that answer with with finding the common ground, but but is there something beyond that? Is there some sort of mindset shift that could change a young person's life immediately?

SPEAKER_01 32:28

Yeah, I mean, I think just care, caring for somebody, and uh, you know, um, we're in such a judge a book by the cover. I mean, this is our world right now is so you're either on this side or that side, it's politicized, it's it's got you got this and that. And it is constant negativity in our in our world around us, let alone a sport that you belong in. Uh it's beat into our brains every single day to you're either on this team or you're on that team. Um, and so trying to fight that all the time is is as a coach, because when you're coaching a team, this is your this is the team. I need everybody's head and mind um focused on this right now. There's so you know, one of the things we try and focus on coming into cheer time, um, hang your issues at the door. You know, leave any issues you have on the outside at the door. This is your safe place. Come into this gym, train, focus on what you want to do to get better, forget all the stuff going on outside of the world. There's enough of it going on. We all have issues. Everybody, every single person in this team has an issue. But, you know, trying to get through to kids that believe the issue that they're dealing with outside of life is more than the person uh the next person's on their team's issues that they're dealing with out of life. That's tricky because everybody thinks that the issues that they're dealing with in life are bigger and and more complex than the person next to them's issues. And uh, and I'm like, no, they're not. Everybody has issues. I have issues, you know, I'm dealing with them. Everybody in this room deals with their own issues in some way or another, and uh, and out there that's viewing. They have everybody has has those problems, and it's okay to have problems. I mean, that's kind of how the world is. You know, it's how you how you adapt and you overcome uh those problems is what makes you the person that you are and what pushes you uh to the next step in life or to the next threshold that you're shooting for. Um, so I mean, it's the same thing you got to do as a as a mentor and as a coach, you have to find where that child, one, where that child, that athlete, where that that student that you have in your program is, and then you have to go to where they are and take them to where you want them to be and teach them how you want them to get there. Um, and I think transparency is so key. Um, being being a communicator, I'm a communicator. Um, and uh and I and I feel like that's helped me over the years, and I feel like that's it's such an important aspect that I, you know, I I never took for granted that I felt like a kid understood what I was saying. You know, I always felt like I explained it. Sometimes you get that mansplaining concept, are you mansplaining? Yeah, that you know, I'm no, I'm coach explaining you, and I'm and I'm and I'm making sure that we're uh yeah, I'm saying it to you because you do get athletes that are like, I know, I know they're the I know athletes, and uh that's a tricky athlete to deal with because they're basically that's a closed-minded do they truly know, you know, right? No, it's they don't necessarily, or I wouldn't have been talking to you in the first place. I wouldn't be teaching you something right now in this very particular moment if you already knew. I'd be already I'd be telling you great job at high-fiving, you know, which is another aspect of coaching that has to exist too. So is that uh gratification side? But uh yeah, so yeah. Um but did I answer?

SPEAKER_00 35:38

You did, you made it out of the ballpark, no problem. Yes, sweet. Yeah. So what what uh responsibility does a coach have beyond the sport? Do you feel like you have a responsibility when like Lane has been gone now two years, and I feel like she could pick up the phone and call you if you have a question?

SPEAKER_01 35:58

Yeah, I mean, um, yeah, I t I uh well, in terms of I think the responsibility that I have is um practice what I preach. Yeah. Um, I I think that's one of the biggest things that you know, it's easy to try and get kids to get a winner's mindset or try to, you know, believe that they can do something that they can't do. It's sometimes it's not quite as easy to always, as a coach, to always tell yourself that and to teach to coach yourself into that same mindset. So I meant I think for me, it's always try to I try to practice what I preach. If I if I'm telling my athletes they have to do they have to do this, that, or the other thing, um, then I want to make sure that you know I'm holding myself to a standard that is similar to that, you know, and uh um you know, and that can be whatever you think in your mind. I I just think for me it's been it's been a uh something that I've always tried to focus on is uh is is making sure that I'm holding myself to the to a standard that I think is one that I my students, my my athletes would be proud of as well. And uh and yeah, and that's whatever the way I talk, the way I communicate, I post online, whatever I put out there into the world, you know, what my my communication with them, happy birthday to them, just acknowledging them down the road two years later after they've already been out of my program. Hey, great job! Congratulations on getting married. I hear you're having a child, blah, blah, blah. You know, um, so different things like that, just keeping communication up and keeping relationship up over the years. And um, Facebook is good for that. I think there are there are good there, I mean, social media is a great tool, it can be such a distraction, but gosh, it's it's a great tool to keep up on people. The one trick about it is you don't always feel like you you feel like you know everything about a person and then you see them and you're like, I don't know anything about it. Yeah, I haven't seen you in person, like really communicated with you in forever, but I feel like I know everything going on in your life because you know you post it, you post it all over Facebook, and I see it. So uh, so that's a tricky thing because you you know, you don't always necessarily stay connected with people, but you stay connected with people. Yeah. Um, not truly connected, like in the in the past, you know, when when we were kids, and if you wanted to find out where everybody was, you had to ride your bike around the neighborhood to see where all the bikes were laying in the front yard. That's where everybody is, yeah. There's 17 bikes in the front yard, so they're all somewhere over there. You know, you had to go find people. Now you just send a text out. Where is everybody? Okay, you know, or you don't even go see them, you can talk to them on Zoom or whatever, or whatever they use anymore. Um, so the interaction aspect has uh has diminished, and I feel like that's a part that that's another tricky part, yeah, is that you don't necessarily these kids aren't very all the time face-to-face kids. They're more internet text to text snapchat hide behind hide behind keyboards kind of things and uh and stuff like that. And so I feel like you know that's a that's always a difficult spot uh spot to be in. Yeah. I like I like the I'm still old school in the sense that I like to I like to handshake. I like to hug. I like to how you been, good to see you. I like to have a conversation face to face. That's still that's still where I am as a person. And uh I just hope that our world never loses that. I hope that our world can continue to uh kids can can can continue to feel like that that's important, you know, interaction like that is important.

SPEAKER_00 39:26

I agree, I'm a hugger, I agree. When it comes to the social media side, probably once a year, I'll I got a great partner, just like you got a great partner, we'll talk about in a second. But Melanie will correct me probably once a year. And she's like, You came across as an ass, you know, like you're posting that stuff, and that's not who you are. You're just like, what are you doing? And and she'll correct me, you know, and and just like you have a great partner in Kim. And I wish she was here today. Melanie's like, is she coming to that?

SPEAKER_01 39:52

Well, they're at the they're at down at the regional summit right now. The coaching, her and my son went down the region. We had three teams make the regional summit, which is basically um, which is basically like the Super Bowl. Um, it's uh for the lower level teams. Okay, our lower level teams get an opportunity to compete regionally rather than having to spend an arm and a leg to go to Orlando every year, like some of our upper level teams, higher level teams will be going there uh at the end of the season. Um, this is their end of the season Super Bowl. So uh this is a big one for them. And we've won we've won this a bunch of times in the past, so I'm really rooting for our our uh the teams we have out there, and hopefully my wife and son come back with some wins. Yeah. I have a gig tonight, and this ended up working out. So here I am. Perfect.

SPEAKER_00 40:35

Perfect.

SPEAKER_01 40:35

I'm actually uh I think it's important to know I don't actually physically coach teams right now. Um I do coach some individuals in private lessons on tumbling because I do the higher level tumbling. So I work with a few kids in our gym on upper level tumbling, and then I I consult with all of our teams. And my, you know, my wife and my son, I do a lot of that now. So I wouldn't say I'm retired from cheerleading, um, but I am definitely moving more into the music. Yeah, I have stepped back a bit and I've done I'm I'm more on the business side of things um and uh and the consulting side of things. And I'm I'm I'm leaning more into the my real I do real estate also. Uh I'm leaning more into real estate uh with um with Caldwell Banker. Uh Scott, Scott Crasher Holmes. That's my tag. Scott Crasher Holmes, check me out. Um, and also uh um and then the music uh clearly is is my big my big thing.

SPEAKER_00 41:24

So yeah, but that's gotta be awesome, though the those decades of coaching with your wife, coaching with Kim. And and she's awesome at reaching minds too. I mean, she she could deliver just as good as interviews, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:36

Oh, she is very yep. She's guys are amazing. She was a uh she yeah, I got real luck. I married up, um, as many of us do. Thank goodness. Uh I yeah, I mean, I I am just uh a lucky guy. My wife's wonderful. Um she is uh she's such a caring and loving person, and she's the perfect person to be running at you know our gym. Um she deals with a lot with uh with and and you know it's crazy because we want to coach kids, but we always sometimes feel like we're coaching parents. Yeah. And parents are probably the biggest deterrent for coaches anymore. I mean, it's yes, yes, that is a yeah, that is definitely a word in the vocabulary. Um, I uh yeah, I mean it's it's it's a struggle because we're constantly, we're constantly dealing with kids are very adaptive, they overcome, they deal with it, they they cry to mom and dad um about whatever it is, but they're back the next day and they they deal with it and they move on and they push through. And um, you know, they're they're they're they're good like that. Um parent par parents hold things longer, they're upset. They're kidding, I'm upset. My child is upset. Tough, you know, honestly, that's tough. That's tough. That's coaching. Yeah, it is. I know you want to you want to put your kids in a big old cradled eggshell and hold on to them as tight as you possibly can. And anytime they're sad, you want to be upset at whoever made them that way. But part of coaching is putting kids in place and giving them discipline and teaching them discipline. And, you know, it's been a tough part. And I know my I'm talking about my wife right now, but I just went on a side thing because of it. But but I mean, that's a really tough aspect. And it's it's rough for, I know that's I just know it's rough for her, and she's dealing with a lot with that. She's always had me to lean on in the gym, and I'm not necessarily always there right now in that capacity. So now she's feeling it, and she's like, ugh, this is like this is rough. But um, she's an amazing person, was a Penn State cheerleader. Um, probably equally could be sitting right here in this chair doing this, doing this uh podcast with you and and minus the guitar. Minus the guitar, yeah. No, she won't sing. No, she won't claim no, she doesn't know no instrument. Yes, uh, she'll dance. She'll dancing, she'll be a dance. Of course, I'd need to drop a trap beat or some kind of house beat or something on it. A hip hop beat for her to do that. But um uh yeah, I play trap rock, but she'll dance around us in truck. She likes that. Um, yeah, I mean, I I I uh I'm I'm a very lucky guy to have her in my life. And my son too. Uh Tyler, I have two boys, uh Tyler and Brendan. Now, my youngest son, um, he's he's not into cheerleading at all. In fact, he hates it. Growing up, he was like, if I ever, if you ever gave me this gym, I would turn it into a uh he wanted to turn it into what was something Star Wars. Yeah, uh I'm trying to think of the laser gun. Laser tag.

SPEAKER_04 44:28

He was gonna turn it into a laser tag.

SPEAKER_01 44:30

He's like, I'm gonna turn it into a laser tag place. That's what he wanted it to be. Um, so uh yeah, but uh Tyler, Tyler was a highly uh highly decorated, highly competitive uh cheerleader coming out of the world. Uh yeah, he's he's he's won just about everything you can win in our sport um as an athlete. And now he's doing it again as a coach. So, you know, he's he's won worlds, he's won uh NCA college nationals uh a couple times, he's uh uh won Summit, he's won, he's won every he's won it all. I mean, he's he's just he's he's really a talented, uh, very, very talented, probably one of the most decorated, if not the most decorated athlete to come out of central Pennsylvania in the competitive cheerleading world, cheerleading University of Louisville and all that. So, I mean, and he's 25 and and he's into this. This is what he's at he's at a perfect age where he's like, I'm you know, that's kind of when I got into all this stuff. So now he's he's getting into it and he's doing a great job at the gym and and as a choreographer and uh very creative minded. Um yeah, he's got two very creative-minded parents, and it's it's definitely gone into him. He's he's doing a great job with it as well. And and coaching, uh, yeah, I think coaching side is is a little trickier for him. I don't know if he has quite the patience that his dad and mom had. And he's hopefully learn it. Yeah, I think he he's young. Yeah, so uh, you know, he's he's definitely learning and and uh and I hope that for him, but he he does enjoy it, so yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:54

So here's an idea. Just throw it out there, think about it. You could do cheer and laser tag at nighttime. So there you go. Brand, we'll get to throw it out there. Brand in the game. So, how about uh some music now? Do you want to talk about your songwriting process at all? Yeah, sure. I mean, a process at all and uh yeah, I can't just uh sure.

SPEAKER_01 46:18

I mean, yeah, I think I owe a lot of my creativity. Um, I mean, I've always been a creative person, creative-minded, um, in terms of, you know, yeah, a lot of cheerleading, especially, and artistically creative. Because I feel like when you're when you're doing choreography and cheerleading, you're painting a picture on the floor with athletes. You know, this there's symmetry, there's stunts in the air, there's levels to it, there's different things up at the top, there's stuff still happening down here, there's dance movement this way and that way. It's just a lot of creativity and choreography. And in my mind, doing that for 30 years, there's that is in there. And so when I start writing a song, whatever that topic might be, my mind starts going up here, down here. There's other aspects, there's levels. I need to create different things going on in the song that has a good hook, that has a creative um tag to it, that is uh that has, you know, it's just a fun song. So, you know, for me, um you uh I I think I started doing a lot of writing at COVID. Um, mainly because, well, I mean, we were one of those businesses at the time. My wife and I both derive our income through yeah uh through at the time at COVID. Cheer time. Yeah, it was through cheer time. Yeah, we both, we both, that's it was all cheerleading, competitive, uh, competitive cheerleading, choreography. I do, I do competitive cheer music as well, which is a whole other topic. But uh uh everything was cheerleading related. And at that particular time in our life, that was all ended and it stopped. So we had no income as a family, and we're just sitting there like, wow, that just yeah, how did that what do we do? I gotta we had so in my mind I started going, I we have to diversify this. I can't, we can't just both be deriving our income from uh competitive cheerleading, like something has to happen. So I started I got serious. I started getting serious about real estate. I got into the real estate world. I'm like, I need to diversify, we'll just do that. And I my neighbor across the street, he played guitar. And I remember at COVID, we I would always do like sing like in the shower or sing to my wife in her ear or sing in different situations that were never like me out there. I just I knew I had a voice, I knew I could, I could sing, but I I never I guess I just never saw myself as in that situation as an entertainer, you know. My dad was a radio personality, he's got a great radio voice. I think I have a uh that's very similar in that situation where I I can, you know, in my and it comes through in my vocals as well. So um, so I always felt like I could sing, but I just never thought I'd be an entertainer like that or be a singer like that. And I never grew up around instruments, yeah. As my dad being a DJ, I grew up around music. I grew up around all the genres of music. He's played, you know, he's a DJ 40 plus years in this area in the Harrisburg market and and DC and uh uh Texas as well. Um, you know, so uh it's it's been there, but it's never I never grew up with instruments. So um, but at the time we had it was COVID, I'll go back to that. And we had a little, we were trying to do socially distance as a cul-de-sac. I live in a cul-de-sac. And uh and so my neighbor over there had a little fire pit in the cul-de-sac, and then my neighbors over here had a fire pit in the cul-sac, and we had one over here, so we were all just uh three fire pits in the calls. It was fun. We were out there drinking, having a good time, and hanging out with each other. And my buddy brought his uh guitar out, and uh and he started playing songs, and I was singing. My other neighbor, he doesn't sing, so usually he he would do sing alongs in the backyard, and everybody sings along, everybody doesn't. So, yeah, and he was listening, he's like, I didn't realize you could sing. And I was like, Well, you know, I don't I don't really do that much. Most of the time when I sing, I was always singing with other people, and you don't really hear just the one person stand out. But he's like, What are you doing tomorrow? I'm like, same thing you're doing, nothing. Yeah, come on over. So we sat in the garage and we we knocked out like 50 different songs. That's cool, and uh just messing around, had a good time with it, and uh, and we started this little thing called Call-de-sac uh duo, uh, named it after our our our cul-de-sac there uh that we lived in. And yeah, and so we did some house like little house concerts in backyards, and I got I I got the itch. Okay. I it was like it was that I remember singing for the first time in front of people. We sang uh me and Julio down by the schoolyard, and I was like this. I'm like so panicking out, like staring at the words, and I can't even sound like uh you know, I was no projecting. It was no, it was like I was like, oh my god, oh my god, they're listening to me right now. And it was like uh such a scary, such a scary moment, but it was necessary moment. You know, I've been in front of crowds and talked in speeches and done different like I talking to people was but you put your so it's it's such a judgy, yeah. Music is very judgy, you know, and and uh people either hate you, love you, or kind of you know, there's like it's always that kind of a thing with a musician. So you never know where you're gonna hit and how you're gonna hit with people. So that song was we did that one. The next song I did was Tennessee Whiskey, which I'm way more comfortable with. And um, and so it hit me as I'm watching, and there's like probably 30, 40 people out in the crowd what I'm playing from, and I'm and I'm watching, and husbands and wives are hugging and leaning into each other on the song, and then all of a sudden I see couples are dancing in the back, and I'm like, what the heck? This is awesome! And and it just clicked in my brain like this is what I want to do. I want to be an entertainer in that regard. So I that's where it took off from. And then I started writing songs. I'm like, I'm gonna write some songs because at the time I I knew a bunch of musicians in the drop rock community, and I was that I had have a lot of respect for. Um, and I bought a lot of their CDs and listened to their music, and I've and I've always had like kind of a drop rock edge to me, uh, Jimmy Buffett edge to me. So I uh so I started listening and writing, and I was writing some songs down, and uh yeah, I uh so yeah, and and it just kind of took off. So I think um I I owe a lot of my creative-minded in the rhyming and the syncopation and the um you know that kind of stuff that happens in a song. I I owe a lot of that to my the cheerleading side of things because I feel like it's sort of helped bring out that artistic side of a little bit. And uh, you know, I do a lot of competitive cheer music where I do vocals. I've done that for like 25 years also. Um so if you've ever been listening to or watching, like on ESPN, watching cheerleading on ESPN, you'll hear the music that they're playing, uh they're doing the routine to. Um uh and that music that they're doing the routine, that two and a half minute routine, that's something it's a very niche kind of community of music producers, but I'm one of them. I just I'm one of those guys that mixes those for teams all over the country, you know, youth teams, rec teams, all-star high school, um, college. Um, yeah, so you yeah, I've just been I've been doing that, and that's kind of helped me on the production side too of music. So I've had that already. Now, live music is completely different, and uh you know, maybe I can talk about it after I do a little bit the live side of things. Yeah, you want me to do a song or you want me to what you can do?

SPEAKER_00 53:01

You but do we have a request from the crowd? A question, yes.

SPEAKER_03 53:05

So you were singing. When did you start playing the guitar? Did you start at a codestat?

SPEAKER_01 53:10

No, no. I uh no, actually, what ended up happening to me was uh my my neighbor was a guitar player and I was the singer. Yeah, um, so we did a couple things, and I got excited about being an entertainer. Well, my neighbor is older than me, and he's he's a great guy. I love him. Uh, been neighbors for a long time. Our kids all grew up together, but he's he's he's you know, he's a busy man, he's got owns a couple businesses, he has a couple houses, you know. He's got a house in down in New Smyrna, he's got a house in he's got a place in Gettysburg, he's got his house across the street, he's got kids are all growing up. He's like, dude, I don't want to gig. Yeah, I don't want to go gig places into like me. I'm ready to blow it up. I'm ready to go do like, I'm ready to go do like you know, 50 gigs. I'm like, and it has private parties, so I do, yeah, I do. I'm ready to start booking and booking and booking. And he was like, I want to play. He said, and I was like, oh man. So like I was like, oh my gosh, I ended up sitting idle with my uh I had a I had a voice that was ready to go for the for central Pennsylvania and wanted to sing songs and wanted to get out there and and and play covers. And and I was just like sitting there, like, oh my gosh, I can't believe I can't play because I don't have I don't know how to play the guitar. I didn't even know how to play it. And this this was in COVID, so I didn't even know how to play guitar. Um and uh yeah, because like I said, I didn't grow up around instruments, so like for me it was a learning process later in life, and uh and so I I sat for a year and a half wishing I I had a guitar player, didn't have one. Um, I decided I remember uh only because you can go back in Amazon, you can go back in Amazon and see when you bought things or you know, your history. So I look, I looked, I was like, I bought my guitar on Amazon in July of 2023. So I bought my first guitar in July of 23. And uh crazy. Yeah, I know. And I and I and I and I literally I clink, clank, clunked around on it, tried to learn some chords, you know. You they say you learn, you know, you learn learn a couple chords, C, G, D, I mean C G and D right there, those three chords, um, which are are pretty uh um pretty easy. Well, I mean I say that they're pretty they are in terms of a guitar, yeah, they're pretty easy uh guitar uh chords to play, you know, C, G, and D. And then A, and even E and even E minor. Like you play those five chords right there, you can probably play a million songs off of those five chords right there. And uh, so I was like, all right, well, I just need to learn how to play those songs, those chords. So I clink, clink, clunk. You know, I play it, yeah. It was more like that when I first started playing. I'm terrible. I have no touch, no feel. And I and I really kind of clink, clank, clunked around on the guitar for for probably three or four months. Three years, it's crazy. No, I uh no, that's not true. Uh, for about three, four months I clink clanked around. And then uh and then I I bought a cajone. I have a little uh cajone tab, you wear it like a guitar, just like this, but it's just this little box kind of like playing a guitar like this. You know, you play like a little drum. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You probably have seen me out. I play harmonica a little bit too. Um just kind of mess around with it. I can hold my own on certain songs. I you know, I know certain songs, I wouldn't say I'm a harmonica player, but I I definitely can accompany my guitar with a harmonica. But um uh so that was what I was doing. I would sing all the songs, I would play a little cajon, and I would play a little harmonica. And we started a new duo called Crash and Cross with a guy. And I've already so I sat for a year and a half after I had that guitar player, and uh and I was wishing I could play. I got a guitar, I'm gonna I'm gonna just teach myself because I want to do this, is what I want to do for retirement. I just wanted to play beach bars. I want to go out, I'm gonna play beach bars every day from 12 to 5. Nice somewhere in that time plot and then be done. That's it, you know, hang out with tourists and play. I just wanted to live that Jimmy Buffett life. That was really kind of it for me. So I'm like, I'm gonna learn how to play and I'm gonna just play all those songs. And so I couldn't figure it out for the life of me. I couldn't figure out how to play guitar. I was like, all right, man, it's just like I gotta find. I found a buddy in the area, Matt Jameson, who's a who's an awesome musician, uh, and and kind of like my mentor and a good friend. Uh, and he he helped connect me with people uh in the music industry in this area, central Pennsylvania. The community is amazing. Um, we have a lot of great talented musicians in the area, a lot of people that are putting music out now, too, which I'm real excited for them. Um, and uh and yeah, I mean, uh Matt was just an influential person, and and I ended up finding my first partner, uh Damien, on Craigslist, musician, musicians community page. He said uh acoustic guitar available. And I clicked on it, I thought, acoustic guitar available, that's what I need. Let me see. And it's like uh looking for somebody that can maybe play the cajone or play or or sit do the singing and maybe a little accompanying or something like that. And I'm like, this guy's talking to me. Yeah, I'm gonna send him an email. I sent an email out of the blue because I'm like, maybe this is the person I need to hook up. Well, he ended up coming over to the house, he knew all the songs I had. I sent him a set list that I had from when I played with Jeff, and he knew all the songs we played him like that day immediately. I was like, all right, let's do this, man. So we we got together, we did a couple open mics, um, and then all of a sudden gigs started kicking in and we started getting gigs. We did one gig, so I bought my guitar in July of 23. I did one gig in December of 23. I did one gig, my first gig was December of 23. I did my second gig January of 23, and then we did 92 gigs after that for the year of not 2024. Yeah, so we did we did 94 gigs in 2024. I was like thinking maybe we'd play one or I was like, we'll play one or two, maybe a month. That'd be cool. And then all of a sudden it just started, they started rolling in. They were doing two, three, four gigs a week. That's awesome. I'm like, holy cow, this is crazy. Well, June of that year, Damien, my my old guitar partner, who's a great, uh, great uh musician, great guitar player. He didn't sing, he didn't have he wasn't mic'd up or anything, he just played the guitar and I sang. But uh, but he he told me he was moving to Maine in June. Wow, I had like 50 gigs lined up, and all the clicked in my head at that point in time. Now I kept playing the guitar, I kept messing around, but I was playing mainly cajon and harmonica and singing. So I had not been serious about playing the guitar because I didn't need to. I found a guitar player. He told me in June that he was not, he was leaving and that he was moving to Maine. And I was like immediately, I thought, I am not going back to being that guy that can't play, can't play on my own. I need to learn how to play an instrument. So I got real, I got overly obsessed with the guitar. I was probably playing the guitar two to three hours a day, uh, every single day. I would get up in the morning. And fortunately, you know, being a real in real estate and being in um uh owning a cheer gym that doesn't really work. I didn't really work in the cheer gym times from 3:30 to 10 30 at night, you know, is you're you're working when the kids are out of school. So I had my mornings kind of open and I was able to, so I was able to play, and I just kept playing the guitar, playing the guitar.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:02

And uh, and you know, the first song I ever learned was uh the first song I sang, and it wasn't it was uh and I and I was like, Oh thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:00

And uh and I and I now I play that out, I play that out a lot, and um and and for when I'm playing with my partner, he just he's all down here like can't play the I can't play the total fretboard yet. I'm very uh I'm a rhythm guitar player and the singer, so I hold rhythm uh for us and and uh and uh and he plays, but I yeah, I was like, there's no way I'm gonna go another year and a half. And I had 50 gigs lined up, and he was telling me he wasn't able to do. So I ended up playing with like eight or nine different uh guitar players in central Pennsylvania. Fortunately, this time when I lost my partner, I knew people, and that that helped me uh because tremendously. I mean, I played with some really good guitar players in the area um that all stepped up and were amazing, great, great people. Yeah, and uh I love the name all, but I mean they're just uh the I appreciate them and they know who they are. Um, but uh I ended up finding my next guitar player who is with me now on Craigslist yet again. It was so funny because I was like, Craigslist isn't that bad place to find uh musicians. I mean, there's a lot of other sketchy stuff on there, but um, but I uh there is the musician community page is is pretty legit. And uh when you go on, you know, it'll say like seeking lead vocalist for death metal band or some crazy thing like that, or or uh you know, rock rock vocalist available, you know, that kind of stuff is on there. So I went on again and it said uh multi-instrumentalist. And in my mind, I was still with uh I was still with my first partner, Crash and Cross, at the time, and I thought, oh, this guy plays mandolin and keyboard and all that stuff. And then my I was thinking to myself, what if we expand this into a band? I should get to know, let's get to know some other people. So I just sent him an email and said, Hey man, um, I don't know if this is the right time or not, but I just want to say hi and and introduce myself. We have a duo, Crash and Cross. And uh, you know, in his thing, he said, I could, I, you know, I could potentially play as as early as today. Wouldn't you just let me know what you want? He'd been in the in the music scene in central Pennsylvania for 30 years, um, and was back and was it was uh looking to looking to play out. So his name's Dave Gary, that's my part current partner right now. He put put that in there and I sent him a thing. I said, Hey, I'll keep, I just want to keep you in my you know, in Rolodex, yeah, my phone basically. But uh, I want to keep him in my my list of of uh people I knew and and so he uh I ended up getting a gig that my partner canceled on. I called him up immediately. I sent him an email. I was like, dude, this is crazy. And you said you might be able to do it as as early as today. I have a gig tonight at six o'clock, and I could not play the guitar yet. And this was in, I don't know, 2024, you know. Um, I couldn't play my own gigs, and uh, and so I he came in and he showed up at 6.01 to a gig that started at six. I had everything set up. I'm sitting there going, boy, oh boy, please show up, please be here. He's okay. He said he's coming, he said he's coming. I have this gig. I'm sitting up on stage and kind of setting things around. We're supposed to start at, or he came at 559. I'm sorry, we started at 6.01. He showed up at 5.59, I had everything set up. He pulls his guitar out. Yeah, I look at him and he's like, I'm like, let's go. Wagon wheel? Goes right into wagon wheel. I'm like, so um, so you know, we and I sing wagon wheel, and I'm looking at I look at my wife, I'm like, that was pretty good, right? She goes, I was like, all right, cool. Uh, because I still only knew him as Dave. I didn't even know his last name. Three songs into the set, and we're playing at Grandpa's Love Shack up in uh uh in Perry County, um Sherman's uh Sherman'sdale area, and uh good people up there. I think they just sold uh so I think it's a new name, but regardless, um they uh we we he's sitting next to me to my left, and I look at him three songs in and I go, What's your last name? I don't even know how to introduce you. They want to be like, This is Dave. Everybody meet Dave. That was like I know. So so that was like such a last minute crazy thing, and I and so I got to, I mean, it happened so quick, and and then I I continued, I had a bunch of gigs set up with a bunch of different people, so uh multiple people uh had filtered in for the next three, four months of 2024, and all the while I kept playing the guitar and kept learning. So I was learning learning songs and different stuff like that, and uh, you know, I I uh I started learning.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:01

Lies from my home. Take the person of a whole just give me one. I go calm. Even his living just I'm rude and ruin.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:22

That was an angel from Montgomery by John. Trying to learn some John Prime music. I think I know. And uh Bonnie Raite made that uh made that famous song. And uh yeah, so I mean I just started learning a few songs on my own. I was like, all right, these are but I would play songs and try to play stuff, and I couldn't even hear the melody, like that it wasn't coming out, like I'm not playing the music like in the right way. I was playing the chords, but I couldn't figure out how to get the chords to sound like the song, and I never could get words to match everything. It just kept I kept grinding. I was like, there is no way um that I'm gonna ever figure out how to sing and play this guitar. That's how I felt in my mind in my body, but I never quit. I just kept I kept fighting, I kept pushing, and I kept thinking to myself, you know, it's funny because the metaphor here is that I kept thinking to myself, practice is what I need to do. I'm a coach, I gotta coach myself. And this, and I was trying to learn how to play guitar by myself, you know. I would watch a video or you know, you can do scroll through TikTok. Um, my whole algorithm, you should see my TikTok algorithm was literally people playing the guitar. Yeah, it was a guy, it was literally the whole entire thing was just one guy playing this song, next guy playing this song. I'm like, oh, there's a song I want to learn how to play that. I wanna play that one, you know, and uh and I was just watching their watching their fingers and what they were doing on the uh and trying to learn that trying to learn the chords. And I, you know, I got really I just got really obsessed by it and over the top uh wanted to wanted to be better, wanted to succeed, wanted to be able to provide uh the instrumentation for my vocals. And uh finally started clicking, and I and the words of the words were coming out. It was a matter of me getting this hand to match my mouth. Once this hand could match my mouth, then I felt like I felt like I could now sing the songs, you know, and I still have, I mean, I take I started taking lessons um in uh January of 25 from Chris Awes, who's a great, amazing guitar player, a good friend of mine. Um he started teaching uh in January of 2000. Again, he taught years ago, and then he quit for a while. Um, but he started coaching and and and teaching people uh uh guitar lessons. I started immediately with him. So all of Jan all of uh from June 24 until January or December, I should say, of 24. It was just me learning how to play guitar by myself. And I had picked up probably about three, four songs. So by the end of 2024, what would happen was uh we would do a gig and I wouldn't use my guitar, I would play the cajon and sing and do harmonica. And then he would take a break for three songs, and I would play solo three songs. So at my sets, I would play three songs and whatever they would be. Um, you know, I would those would be the ones I would do, and then he would come back and he would play three songs and I would take a break. So that music, live music was always going, and then we would come back together. So probably help with your confidence rather than yeah, and it was it was exactly what I needed. It was the perfect thing to do, and and I was three songs that I felt like I could perform to people and still feel like I should be getting paid to do it. You know what I mean? Like I wasn't like um because I've you know, as a paid musician in the area, you want to provide a lot, I want to provide uh legitimate, yeah, yeah, legitimate service to the to the customers of the place. I don't want to go up here and make it sound like it's open. Like me singing, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:41

So what if it's no, no, it's just my my claim to fame is uh I think we were dating in Southside and I sang karaoke, and people actually threw red solo cups at me. Pearl Jam. That's a joke, right? I probably were Pearl Jam. They were throwing cups at me. Boo, get them off the stage. Yes, we'll not be singing. So okay, all right.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:05

Fair enough. Fair enough. Um yeah, so I uh I I uh yeah, I just and and and I got to do three songs and it enhanced and built uh it built me up to feel like I could so then I started able to do like different all the while. Anytime I was not playing a gig, I was at an open mic. I went to open mic one right after the other. And open mic is is uh it's like that necessary evil. I've I've grown I've grown to like it more and more, but back then I I hated. It's not your equipment, it's not your microphone, it's not your setup, it's not your stuff. You show up, you don't really get any kind of warm-up songs, you get three songs, you do bam, bam, bam, you're done. Get off the stage, next person's going. I never felt like you could warm up into the music. And so it was always tricky, and it was always like, ah, but I have to do it because the one thing it did was challenge me uh as a solo artist. And and I didn't get enough challenging as a solo artist because I was always leaning on somebody else playing the guitar next to me, and I would do the singing, which I was good at. I was very I'm very good at that too. I could sit back and just sing songs and somebody else play the guitar, that'd be fine. But I I uh I wanted to be I wanted to be a solo musician also. And I told my friend that I had canceled one gig when I lost my guitar player, and I told her she was a friend of mine that I went to high school with who uh owns Reds um uh barbecue. They were running uh Appalachian uh Harley Davidson, they had the outdoor theater, and I was helping them book. And I told her, I said, I will never cancel another gig next year when you're doing this, I will never cancel another gig, I'll play solo. Um, I will learn the guitar to the point where I can play solo. And so uh to my to to to that, I will say that my I start got serious in June, July, I would say, of 25 uh four. My very first gig was March of 2025. So July, I mean it's gonna be August, September, October, November, December, January, February, March, eight months later. Eight months later, I played my first three-hour gig. And uh, and that was at Flinchy's uh on the train right now on a Wednesday night. So I mean, yeah, it was huge. Um, and I mean it took me basically six to eight months to to get to a point where I felt confident enough to play, play, play by myself. Now I do, now I'm able to play play all the time by myself now. Um but uh but I enjoy playing duo also. I like playing, I like playing rhythm and singing and letting my partner just rip on the guitar and go up and down. Plus, I think the customers and the people that are out there listening, they enjoy that. They like hearing a lead guitar that can go down here, you know, play all that cool stuff down there. I'm not down here yet. I'm trying to learn the fretboard a little bit more to to travel up and down. And you know, I I play some uh you know, I play some bar chords now.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:49

Different you got to feel in there from the sword energy with you.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:38

You know, I think of that song right there.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:56

I can't think of it.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:56

So yeah, moving up and down the fretboard has been a you know a challenge and different, but I'm I'm I'm learning, you know, I'm learning are you working that in any of your original stuff? Any um yeah, I have uh yeah, actually uh I do one. Um I'll do uh I'll do a song called Mr. Morgan.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:13

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:15

Mr. Morgan!

SPEAKER_00 1:15:16

Is he a captain by chance?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:17

Yes, believe it or not, he's my best friend and he is a captain. You've uh so I do a lot of songs. Um I do a lot of songs. I write a lot of songs about alcohol, uh, different alcohol songs. And my wife told me, said, She said, You write so many songs about alcohol. You should write, like I have a song called Tequila Sunrise, I have a bourbon broke, um, I have Mr. Morgan Liquor Cabinet, liquor cabinet. That's kind of where this one came from. She was like, You write so many songs about alcohol, you need to like what you should put them all in an album, and you should like where do you put all your alcohol? You put it in a liquor cabinet, you should put it in an album, and then your album liquor cabinet. That was her idea. And I was like, see, you're creative on it. Yeah, so uh it was a great idea, and that was a that was a great song that uh that I had written. But um, Mr. Morgan is uh yeah, it's a song basically about um if you want, I'll do this for you. Yeah, it'll be awesome. Yeah, uh this is like I said, this is a song about my best friend that's a captain and all the rum that we have drank together. So uh and I I remember back, and Todd you'll remember this too, because we were in college together. Um uh I remember back to my days at McMonagall's when I used to be a bouncer and a and a uh and I was a bartender there as well. And all of a sudden, this Captain Morgan showed up and uh we're like, what is this stuff? Spiced rum. This looks good, but it was a bottom shelf, you know, it was like nothing, not nothing. It was like what we never heard of it before. It was we just kind of came onto the scene. Uh we were doing we would do shots of it because when you're in college, you do shots of everything. Um this is coachable athletes. But uh it's not how to be a coachable athlete. Um treat your body like the athlete they want it to be. Um back in college, there's some those were that was some stuff that we uh we had done, but yeah, I would never do that anymore. That's that's uh my body doesn't do that anymore. But um uh but anyway, I think back to those days, and I I wrote some. This is this is uh this is called Mr. Morgan.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:24

We saw them from the lot in their own birthdays, sweet food things ever. I got a select friend named Jerry, he comes around from time to time from the world and it's not the right family, always makes you feel better, and sure. That part is better, that's me working downstream. Nice, yeah. I hear good stuff, brother. Just a cruise and hello. So he's still spices a combo crack and a power killing. She showed me her tattoo. Shout out to the doctors, yes, and we are gonna show you. You need the family desk. Always make you feel better than you.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:12

That's a fun song. I I uh I don't know if you caught all the references to all the different rums in there.

SPEAKER_05 1:20:17

I caught a few, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:18

Yeah, oh yeah. I was uh talking about uh Sailor Jerry, military yeah, Admiral Nelson's in there too. Uh Malibu cruising, gombu, uh pirate uh black heart, tattooed all that. Yeah. My creative going. Oh yeah, what do you got next? Um well, should I do liquor cabinet? Liquor cabinets, I think. Yeah, uh Mr. Morgan, I put Mr. Morgan out in February. Uh so it's out on wherever you stream or uh buy your music, wherever that is. Um and uh yeah, and that was out in February. Uh did Beach Bound already. That was that's coming out this month, April 24th. I'm putting one song out a month this year in 2026. I thought about doing an album, and I'm very album in my mind. I'm very alb it's very hard to get out of that mindset. But uh, we have some good friends, some mutual friends. Um, and I was talking to them, and as we were, you know, we were talking, they were like, just put a single out every, you know, every month, put a single out a month. Nice, or every five, six weeks, they were like, put a single out. I was like, I'm just gonna do it every month because I have a lot of material that I want to put out, and then at the end of the year, I'm gonna take all those singles, throw them into an album, and then release an album that way. So they'll be out as singles, but they'll come out as an album. That way, when I'm out, you know, playing gigs places, I can I can sell people all my singles on an album that way. Not a lot of people, I mean everybody streams for the most part, not a lot of people play CDs anymore. I don't even think they put CD players in cars anymore, but but uh but but a lot of people that like to support musicians still buy CDs, you know. So I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna do that. But um, this was I talked about it a little while ago. Uh this was a song that my wife gave me an idea for, um, liquor cabinet. Uh so this is my opportunity to put uh all my songs into one into one place. Um liquor cabinet.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:12

Song came out in January. My first single, eighty single I ever put out. Everybody has a face to put their something for them on the shelf, something never put them on bad. We ought to have to drink it, not a race. Not tonight, it's going down. Now I'm saying here's bottles. I'm just thinking I'm a pick up dance with a bath. Um just like my good stuff inside, so it's in just like all with it before. You think it's not a gym with some motherfuckers makes me go no slice of maybe your choose again decided, all the time. Sig in the second, it's all on me. It's like a cabinet, it's like a cat. Woo!

SPEAKER_01 1:25:06

So now that I'm putting all this music out, I'm like uh I my mind keeps changing on what I'm eventually going to ch name my uh name my album. Yeah, I keep I'm like I've have to put I feel like I have to put this song out, this album out called uh Liquor Cabinet, because I've I've one I've talked about it. My wife gave me this great idea to do that, and uh, and but then the other side of me is like I'm I'm working on trying to get into Trap Rock World. And I I just had that song. This song is right now playing on uh a bunch of places Gulf Coast Music Radio, it's playing on Radio SPF, it's playing on uh uh country cruising radio, it's playing um on um uh radio trap rock. Um yeah, I mean tons of stations, tons of stage uh streaming stations around the Gulf Coast. Where you know, where I like to play, I like to play down that way. And uh uh I did get an opportunity to play down in Key West, where we we talked about a little while ago early. Hog's head? Was it Hog something, right? Yeah, well uh my good friend, uh my good friend Heather Vidal played at the Hogs Breath, and she did she let me play uh a couple songs up there, which was cool. That was I've seen, I mean, I've watched between her and Tropical Soul, Dennis McCaughey and Heather. I've watched them probably I've I've been to been to Meeting of the Minds 10 times in the last 13 years, probably. So, I mean, I've seen them every year. They've they've been up on that stage playing. And to be able to go up and play on that stage this year was amazing. I think what probably my biggest achievement when I was down there, I played a couple places. I played Viva Argentina, I played Backyard uh Bar, I played uh uh Hank's Hair of the Dog, which was really cool. I played Surly Siren Saloon. But my biggest one, uh biggest two, I should say, I played the chart room. And for those that aren't familiar with the chart room, I don't really want to give it away because it's kind of like that nostalgic secret little hideaway bar, um dive bar. It's the first bar that Jimmy Buffett ever played in in uh in Key West. I played that unplugged, just like I'm playing right now, just sitting here in front of and and basically that if you've ever been in the chart room, it's about the size of this basement right here. It's a very small room, it's like a hotel room. Um, and uh and that they converted into a bar, I think many, many, many years ago when they opened up the hotel. And people are like, Where's your bar? And they're like, Oh, give us a minute. They turned a hotel room into a bar, uh chart room, but it's it's very nostalgic. Uh dive bar. They they give out um that they don't give it out, I shouldn't say, but they have it off of popcorn, peanuts, and uh they have they have a crock pot full of hot dogs. That's the kind of bar it is. So you just grab and now they get called that. I mean, the drinks are probably peanuts, but they play paper for all that stuff somehow. Um, but uh, but I played there and that was amazing. It was such a cool night. And then the next morning I got a I got a text message that they wanted me to play Margaritaville from one to three, and I got to play Margaritaville. So I I played where Jimmy got his start.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:58

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:58

Uh at the chart. Room, he played for Heineken Beer and Tips. That's what I that's what I told him I would play for. That's anything Jimmy played. And uh and they brought me in, so I was really stoked about that. And then and then to be able to play his bar the next day was awesome. It was like, yeah, it was such a it was very uh surreal uh for me. It was a great way. And I was leaving on Sunday, and that was also the the night they turned the clock back, so we gained an hour. So we I mean we we we're at the chart room until midnight. I started playing it. We played six hours, I played six hours, and and I just kept playing all night long. I didn't care. I must have played every Jimmy Buffett song I knew three times each, but um yeah, I just uh I kept playing, I kept playing there all night. And I had a bunch of musicians. We were passing the guitar around that other chop rock musicians that were there, it was awesome. And uh so yeah, that was a that was a really fun night. But we gained an hour, we went down the Duval Street and hung out until probably four in the morning, and then I got a text that I had to be at Margaretville the next day. I was like, I'm not missing it. I was supposed to fly out. I was like, I'll change my airline to do that games. But um, yeah, so uh yeah, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:02

Nice. Yeah. What's uh I've got you want to coach, you want to coach some more kids? Well, I do. I want to end this interview, but I want to hear you play some more. So let's let's end on a positive note here. Get the guitar ready here. So a parent comes to you, you have 30 seconds to have comments to a to a young athlete, a young person. And it's reaching young minds. So, you know, a parent says, I'm I'm struggling, I don't know what to do. Like, what would your message be to talk to that young mind?

SPEAKER_01 1:29:33

Um, are they are they in my program? Are they just okay? My one of my parents are I'm struggling with my child um behaviorally, yeah, behaviorally all right. Um, probably uh the first thing I'm gonna do is uh uh assess where that athlete is in my program and find out where they are in that in my program, but that'll happen really quickly. Um, I I think the key for me is how much do you love this sport? Do you love competitive cheer? Do you enjoy what you're doing? Because I love it. This is what I love doing. I love coaching you, I love coaching kids like you, I love coaching people like you and having people like you in my gym. So, my my thing that you have to understand as a as an athlete is this is one of those types of uh uh sports that your parents allow you to be in, but they're paying a lot of money for you to be a part of it. So it's an expendable sport. You need to have you need to have families need to have income. Yeah, and so you need to be appreciative of the fact that your parents are bringing you in here and paying a bill for you to be a part of this so that you can gain um that. That doesn't always happen with all sports, but in my case, I'm able to use that in one of those things. So, me, I'm not necessarily throwing numbers at them because I don't care about the money as much as I want them to understand what their parent what their parents are doing for them and for them to understand if you love this sport the way you say you're loving this sport, which usually they're always like, I love being here. I know this is what I want to do. Okay, well, then you need to fix the things that are on the outside that could end up taking this away because your parents will remove this from what you can do, and there's not much I can do other than support them through it. If your parents have to take this sport away from you because you're being unruly outside of it, then you're actually hurting your team, you're hurting yourself, and what you want to do in the future with this particular sport, and you're losing this opportunity because mom and dad have to pay for it. It's not a free sport, yeah. You know, you could go do rec cheerleading if they even allow you to do that. Uh, and then in that case, you're still gonna probably pay money, you're just not gonna necessarily pay quite as much as what competitive all-stars is. But regardless, I think that is uh that's probably my number one approach. And I like to try and get down to that level where I'm like, what is your goal? What are your goals? If your goals are, you know, what do you see yourself in in a year or two years? Do you want to be on this team again next year? Do you want to be on the next team up? And you know, in our sport, there that's that's a actually uh that's a that's a thing that works because most kids are aspiring to move up a level. Yep, you know, every year they're I'm if I'm working at this, I want to go from level one to level two, from level two to level three, level three to level four, and so on. Um, so each year I'm like, well, if you if you're you know, if you're not pushing yourself, you could end up on level one again or level two, and that's nobody to blame but yourself because you have everything you need right here. You have to push yourselves. You have to you have to work hard in order to gain the next level. And there's criteria that's not even set necessarily by us, it's set by this industry standard that we what we have to compete against. Well, if you're gonna go out there on a level two team and you're not gonna throw a handspring, then that's gonna be a problem because everybody that we're gonna compete against is gonna have kids on the team to throw handsprings. So you have to meet a standard in order to be on a level two team. If you want to be on a level five team, well, then you probably should throw a full, yeah, or you should probably have a standing tuck at that point, you know, or you should probably be able to throw a full up liberty, you know, uh uh or base it or back it or fly it. Uh, and you're gonna, if you're flying it, you're gonna need to be able to do flexible positions. So are you flexible? You know, so there's there's ways for me to um to utilize those aspects in order to to try and get on their page and understand where are you at as an athlete right now, where do you want to be as an athlete? And if you want to be at that next level, let's get you there. But you gotta the first thing you have to fix is what's going on at home. Yeah, you can't because what's going on at home affects everything you have here. Um, you know, it's one of those things that's really easy for a parent to say, I'm not paying for that anymore. You know, yeah, it's if you're not gonna, if you're not, I'll pay for it as long as you're one, you're happy, and two, you're following the rules of the household. Yeah, and every household has rules in it, and kids that are in those households need to understand that. Um, but I'm always a sub, I'm always supportive of parents and behavioral, and I'm happy to help in those areas. And I always tell parents, look, you know, if you're gonna pull a kid out of the program, you're you're not affecting just your kid. Yeah, you think you are, but in a team sport, you think you think you're solving the problem by saying, I'm gonna take this away from your child. If I take this away from my child, they're gonna fill the void with something. And and not always is it gonna be a good thing, they're gonna fill the they're gonna fill the void with probably negatives because there's a lot of negatives beaten on them every single day. Um, so if a child is is got it in a positive situation and in a positive setting and they're they're enjoying what they're doing, if to threaten that is is it can be very startling to an athlete or to a student or a child, but also um it can be motivating and it can be it can also have negative effects if it if you go through with it, if you follow through with it. And the the other thing a parent doesn't want to do is draw a line in the sand and then back up and then and then be forced to do it or back off of that line in the sand and make a new line back here somewhere, and then your kid keeps getting away with stuff. That's that's counterproductive, also. So I'm like, I'm always here to help and I'm happy to help. And I told parents that too in parent meetings. Yeah, you know, I'm happy to help. If you need discipline, I'm a discipliner, period. I mean, that's who I am as a coach. Um, I demand a certain uh quality from my athletes and I demand a certain uh level of respect from them, but I also give it to them. You know, kids know where they stand with me all the time because I'm a communicator and I feel like to be a good coach, be a coach, be coachable players, to be a coachable player, it's always easier when you feel like you know your role on a team. So to communicate that with them as a coach, what is your role? Understand it, know that you're what, and then be val evaluated on that role. How am I doing at it? Not just now I know my role, but how am I doing? I want to be better at this role. If I'm a back spot, I want to be the best back spot. You know, because a lot of times in a gym situation, they're gonna say, My top team in the gym, we have 20 kids on it. Well, okay, you're gonna put five stunts up in the air. I need five back spots, five flyers, and 10 bases. That's what I need on the team. So you could be the 11th best base in the whole gym, maybe the 15th best or 12th best athlete in the gym, but still you're the 11th best base on the team. What do I do with you? Yeah, you know, I can't put you on that team because so that's a tough conversation sometimes that you have to have with an athlete. And that happens all the time in all sports. You know, you could be the uh the sixth best lineman in uh on the offensive line. And the problem is you only play five. You could be the second best quarterback in the whole entire country, and the first, the best quarterback is in front of you, yeah, you know, in the whole country. That's a tough thing to have to deal with as an athlete, but if it's communicated and it's explained, um it can be the driver. It can be it can be something that pushes an athlete to be even stronger and better. Yeah, I mean, yeah, iron, iron sharpens iron, you know, in that situation. So it's like uh um, yeah, you're you you surround yourself with talent. Uh you then and that's another one of my things. I'm like, surround yourself with the people you want to be. Yeah, if you're hanging out with people that are causing issues and problems and all that kind of stuff, and negative people, you're probably gonna have those same exact problems fall back on you, guilty by association type of thing. Um, so surround yourself with people like you, like-minded people, people that want you want to be like. Um, and that'll help you to be a better person, also, you know. Um, so yeah, that's uh that's probably my conversation. But that starts that's me, that that conversation starts with parents. Like I want that, I I I set that tone with a parent before I've ever even seen a kid. Um, you know, kids try out in the beginning of the year. We have a parent meeting right before the season starts. I'm like, this is your commitment. This is you, you're getting to know us as gym owners, as business owners, as coaches, as what we're gonna do for your kids and how we how we lay out our entire program. Um, you're making a decision as to whether you want your child to be a part of that or not. And now you're putting them in this situation, you're there's gonna be some bumps in the road. There's gonna be things that you like, things you don't like, but I can tell you that we will have an answer for any question you have. We might not have the answer you want to hear, but we'll have the answer that this gym is happy with, and that we're that we're that we're we'll be proud of moving forward. So um, you know, I don't always tell parents what they want to hear, but I tell them what they sometimes. Yeah. Um, and I always had that conversation with parents because I feel like then it trickles into the household. Then it's a conversation where you can sit down at the dinner table, you're having dinner. Hey, how to go to practice today? Well, I know you know he's gonna he's gonna be tough on you, he's gonna push you, you know. Uh that that part that could that they're not they're only doing that because he wants to see you do this or get this or get that. I know, but then you know it's always tough when you're sitting at the dinner table and it's like, hey, he pushes me so hard. That's ridiculous. What is he pushing you like that for? You mean that can be that can set the tone for a whole different type of athlete when they come back into the gym. Yeah, my parents don't think I should be having to get yelled at, or blah, blah, blah. Or not yelled at, but what I, you know, I just say that in general, but you know, so I uh or or whatever. I don't know, I shouldn't have to do this 15 times, you know, or that kind of a thing. That's like uh that's the aspect that that I feel like the conversation with parents is the key because I I always tell my parents, I don't, yeah, I'm I'm in competitive cheerleading, so there's a fee at ours, and you know, not every sport is that way, not every athlete is being coached in the exact same manner as we are potentially coached, but you know, we're one of those types of sports where we do we have we have cost involved with our sport and keeping a gym open. We're much as as much of a business as we are a sport as well. So um, so in my situation, you know, I I always make sure the parents understand um where we stand right away so that they, you know, we don't we don't have those issues down the road. I always spell that out in the beginning. So uh I don't want them to, I don't want them to come back and be like, um, well, that's not what you said, or this or that, or you know, I get it. Yeah, if I get parents on the side, same team as us, I feel like that makes for a better coachable athlete as well. If I get them on the same side, because I'm like, we don't charge you enough money, parents, in order for me to coach you too.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:36

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:36

I'm not coaching parents, I'm coaching players. You know, coachable players is one thing. Coachable parents, that's a whole nother fee. Exactly. I'm coaching you too, that's a whole nother fee. I have to I have to charge you, but uh yeah, so man. Well, this was awesome. I thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:53

You're not gonna think it's reaching young minds. It was fun to it was fun. Thank you. It was fun to thank you guys. Thank you. We hope you play some a couple of yeah, absolutely. I'm happy to. Uh, my takeaway was uh meet people where they are, is what I heard, and then also heard um passion if they find their passion. Yeah, meet them where they are, and communication, passion, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:17

I mean, so uh I I think I think that's in young minds right there. Yeah, absolutely. You just gotta, yeah, you gotta go to where they are and bring them where you want them to be. Yeah, and you know where you want them to be because you're the you're the professional in the sport, you're the coach. Yeah, you've got to find out where they're not exactly. And uh yeah, and so I agree, man. This is uh this is awesome. It was nice to be able to incorporate music, yes, and into into coaching too. And uh one more question, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:48

What's your favorite cover that you play live? And then we'll hear it.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:51

And then we'll hear it. Yeah, are you gonna play it for us? Your favorite question. Man, what do I like?

SPEAKER_00 1:40:59

We have requests. I know that is crazy. Wow. Um I thought this would be an easy one. I thought this was the easy one. Well, I like so many songs. I'm so okay. What cover does the crowd love the most when you play? I don't come on. Sweden.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:17

No, no, no, no, no. Country Road?

unknown 1:41:20

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:21

Country Road, no? No, that's uh those are single. Those aren't typically in my set. Those are they go in my set if you mentioned one. What did you mention?

SPEAKER_00 1:41:28

You mentioned uh I don't know. What did I remember what song you mentioned? I do, yeah. Do you like Born Lightfoot? I think you said it was your first gig. You played something, you played this. Ain't no sunshine. Well, you played that one, but but you played it. You mentioned something.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:47

Yeah, I I don't know. I Chris Stableton?

SPEAKER_00 1:41:51

You try to see what's in the ski. That's it, yeah. That's right. Yeah. We came around to it.

SPEAKER_03 1:46:34

Thank you, guys. I appreciate you.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:37

Yeah, that was uh that that actually was a song that was the one that did it for me. That was the one that was like, that's I want to this is what I want to do. Awesome. I want to sing in front of people and uh yeah. You got the voice for it, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:50

Sounds awesome. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. Thank you. This was a blast, man. I appreciate you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for all that. All that you do for for the reaching the young minds. I appreciate that, man. I appreciate that. You are welcome. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks everyone for listening. Until next time, stay humble, stay hungry, and stay coachable. Boom. I like that. Woo!