This phrase has been emphatically communicated inside dugouts, locker rooms, and on sidelines for decades upon decades. Coaches and players alike have encouraged each other to “FINISH STRONG” late in games when the team needs a little push, and during seasons when the odds seemed stacked against them. The team I […]
These two simple words encapsulated the 2023 baseball season in Billings, Montana- “Stay Level”. I was blessed with the opportunity to be the Manager of the Billings Mustangs in the Pioneer League this year and one thing our team focused on the entire season was keeping our emotions in check […]
I grew up a Detroit Lions fan, and my favorite player was Barry Sanders. During his Hall of Fame career, he scored over 100 touchdowns, and what impressed me as much as his speed and skill was the way he celebrated. He just handed the ball to the official. I […]
Baseball has been a part of my life since 1982 when I first put on a jersey for the Maroon team as an 8 year old in West Branch Little League. We didn’t have MLB teams as our mascots, and most of the kids wore tennis shoes and blue jeans […]
I have been a coach for over 20 years. The Major League team I worked for in 2001—the Arizona Diamondbacks—won the World Series that year. At the time, Bob Brenly was the Diamondbacks’ manager, and in one of his first meetings with the players, he wrote the team rules on […]
My dad was a good man, but he wasn’t around much. By the time I was 12 years old, my parents had separated, and eventually, they got divorced. My dad and I barely spent any time together, and he died when I was 26. His absence caused a lot of […]
Do you know how to heal a relationship after a fight? Last week, my wife and I had what some would call a “heated discussion,” but that’s just a nice way of saying we got into a fight. We are both former athletes, and we like to compete in everything […]
I was recently at a men’s bible study and some of the questions that were posed to us really hit home. The topic of comparisons came up and we were asked if we could trade lives with anyone else in the world, who would that be? As the men at […]
When I was a coach with the San Francisco Giants I had the pleasure of working with Thomas Neal. We were both hitting coaches in the minor leagues, and we spent countless hours talking about hitting and life. One thing he always preached to our hitters was to “Get connected […]
I was on the phone the other day with someone, and we started talking about my kids. I told the person their ages (14 and 12) and immediately they said how fun of an age that is. The funny thing is this guy doesn’t even have kids, so his perspective […]
