40 | Conditioning, Competition, and Confidence: Coach Margo’s D1 Perspective

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_00]: That makes total sense. And that's cool that you got to double it, meaning they provided

[00:00:03] [SPEAKER_00]: a softball aspect and then they gave me the resources, whether you liked it or not, to

[00:00:08] [SPEAKER_00]: go to the speed of agility. I'll tell you, when I was training, basically the hardest

[00:00:14] [SPEAKER_00]: part of my training to get to college was softball junior year. We did speed of agility

[00:00:19] [SPEAKER_00]: training. It does work, but it doesn't happen overnight. That's where a lot of people

[00:00:24] [SPEAKER_00]: stop doing it because they're like, we're not paying all this money, let's

[00:00:26] [SPEAKER_00]: check in that much faster. But like, that compound interest that you're all that work

[00:00:31] [SPEAKER_00]: just accumulates into a second or half a step, which is usually the amount of measurement

[00:00:37] [SPEAKER_03]: that you're out of shape. Hello and welcome to Catching You, a dad and

[00:00:41] [SPEAKER_03]: daughter softball journey. I'm Rusty, a dad who's been in the dug up and on the

[00:00:46] [SPEAKER_01]: sidelines. And I'm Lacie, the daughter who's

[00:00:48] [SPEAKER_01]: journey through softball has been filled with incredible wins, tough losses, and

[00:00:52] [SPEAKER_01]: so many lessons both on and off the field. For the past 16 years, we've navigated the

[00:00:57] [SPEAKER_02]: highs and lows of softball together from the local fields to national tournaments

[00:01:01] [SPEAKER_01]: and everything in between. From the challenges of recruitment during COVID

[00:01:05] [SPEAKER_01]: to the mental and emotional roller coaster that comes with being a student

[00:01:08] [SPEAKER_01]: athlete, we'll be sharing the perspectives of both the parent and

[00:01:12] [SPEAKER_01]: athlete in firsthand experience of the impact of sports on mental health

[00:01:15] [SPEAKER_01]: and the importance of support from the sidelines. Welcome back everybody

[00:01:19] [SPEAKER_02]: to Catching You. We have the privilege of having coach Margo back on our podcast

[00:01:26] [SPEAKER_02]: again. This is actually on her live feed in TikTok, and so we recorded it and we

[00:01:33] [SPEAKER_02]: made it a podcast. So enjoy. Okay.

[00:01:37] [SPEAKER_00]: What you saw in high school, what would be like if you said college usage of your arm was 100%

[00:01:46] [SPEAKER_00]: how could you relate that to a high school athlete right now? Meaning like,

[00:01:51] [SPEAKER_00]: man, I would probably throw 50% less in high school than I did in college or whatever your

[00:01:55] [SPEAKER_01]: ratio would be. So my situation is a little different because so my freshman year,

[00:02:02] [SPEAKER_01]: it was basically me, we had two pitchers. It was me and then an older girl who's a senior

[00:02:10] [SPEAKER_01]: who was going to University of Minnesota. So she was pitching pretty much every single game.

[00:02:17] [SPEAKER_01]: I only pitched like maybe 50 innings that year. Is this your first year in high school or in

[00:02:24] [SPEAKER_01]: college? This is my freshman year in high school. Okay, we're talking high school here.

[00:02:28] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. So this is my first year in high school and then sophomore year,

[00:02:33] [SPEAKER_01]: she's graduated. So now I'm pretty much the only pitcher on my team. There were

[00:02:40] [SPEAKER_01]: you other girls, but I was pretty much the only competitive pitcher on my team.

[00:02:44] [SPEAKER_01]: So I practically pitched every single game. So I don't know what that would add up to,

[00:02:51] [SPEAKER_01]: probably more than I'm pitching in college right now that I pitched in high school and then

[00:02:56] [SPEAKER_01]: junior year it was COVID. So I didn't have a junior year and then senior year was the same

[00:03:01] [SPEAKER_01]: thing. I pitched pretty much every single game except another freshman came in and she was a very

[00:03:06] [SPEAKER_01]: competitive pitcher as well. So she got to get some innings as well. And then I think she's

[00:03:11] [SPEAKER_02]: in college as well now. So I can look up Game Changer and find out what your stats were.

[00:03:18] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you're talking about comparable to games. I'm talking about your overall experience

[00:03:24] [SPEAKER_00]: because you have way longer practices in college than you probably did in high school.

[00:03:27] [SPEAKER_00]: You are basically a full-time, like that is your job. So you have a fall

[00:03:32] [SPEAKER_00]: workouts, you've got individuals then you have and when I was in season I felt like my arm was

[00:03:38] [SPEAKER_00]: going to fall off some weeks. No, I'm just the underhand pitching because you had to throw

[00:03:41] [SPEAKER_00]: your bullpins and you had to throw the series whatever your rotation was. But just like the

[00:03:46] [SPEAKER_00]: overhand throwing the repetition, the two and a half hour practices on defense and then you

[00:03:50] [SPEAKER_00]: had to go hit. So did y'all have like pretty long practices in college compared to high school?

[00:03:59] [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, so our high school practices we just chose what we wanted to do. So my coach would be like,

[00:04:05] [SPEAKER_01]: oh, do you guys want to get BP like me to throw BP today? And we're like, yeah, and we'd BP for

[00:04:11] [SPEAKER_01]: 30 minutes and then we'd be out of there. So he was very chill in that sense. But now when

[00:04:17] [SPEAKER_01]: we get to college, it's very two and a half hours, two and a half or two and a half or every single day,

[00:04:23] [SPEAKER_01]: especially after an hour of waits in the morning from seven to eight. And then I practice from

[00:04:28] [SPEAKER_01]: nine to 12. And then I've classed the rest of the day. So that's when we get into 20 hour

[00:04:32] [SPEAKER_01]: weeks right now, we're going to start going into eight hour weeks, which are more like

[00:04:37] [SPEAKER_01]: individual practices. And I feel like I pitch a lot more during the individual weeks because

[00:04:43] [SPEAKER_01]: that's when we get our one on one time with our pitching coach. And then when we have our 20 hour

[00:04:49] [SPEAKER_01]: weeks, which is the three hour practices, then we're doing a lot of teamwork. So now the pitchers

[00:04:54] [SPEAKER_01]: are involved in field work and getting the team involved. And now we're doing live scrimmages.

[00:05:00] [SPEAKER_01]: I definitely pitch a lot more during bullpins with my one on ones with my coach. And then

[00:05:05] [SPEAKER_01]: once we get into 20 hour weeks, it's more teamwork. And then we start pitching live

[00:05:10] [SPEAKER_01]: and everything. And yeah, my body is dead in the fall. Once we get to spring ball when season

[00:05:17] [SPEAKER_01]: actually starts, they do let us cool down a little bit since we do have to pitch maybe two or three

[00:05:22] [SPEAKER_01]: games in the series, especially because in preseason we have double headers for our tournaments

[00:05:27] [SPEAKER_01]: and everything. So there are a lot more chill in that sense. But yeah, there were a few

[00:05:32] [SPEAKER_01]: full games that I did pitch these past three years that I've played and

[00:05:38] [SPEAKER_00]: my body's wreck for sure. Yeah. So maintaining because there's like a difference because when I

[00:05:45] [SPEAKER_00]: played, it was a lot of there were like a ton of breaks in high school ball select ball. We took

[00:05:52] [SPEAKER_00]: off like the whole month of August, we took off half of November, December. And you just really

[00:05:57] [SPEAKER_00]: don't see that a lot now that you see basically 12 months and depending on where you live,

[00:06:01] [SPEAKER_00]: but like in Texas, we can literally play 365 days out of the year and we wouldn't bat an eye.

[00:06:09] [SPEAKER_00]: Meaning like we have like fields that are able, weather's fine. But the issue is obviously

[00:06:14] [SPEAKER_00]: overuse with arm care. And you only this is my theory, you only get so many throws no matter

[00:06:20] [SPEAKER_00]: how great your arm care is, like you're born with just as much as God gave you.

[00:06:25] [SPEAKER_00]: And you can diminish that by not taking care of yourself. But do you see a difference

[00:06:29] [SPEAKER_00]: in freshman coming in and the three years you've been there, like showing them like,

[00:06:35] [SPEAKER_00]: hey, look like this is not a sprint. It's a marathon. So what do you see that kind of

[00:06:40] [SPEAKER_00]: like translation between high school ball and college athletes coming in and them not really

[00:06:45] [SPEAKER_00]: being like that throwing shape? It's hard because what they're transitioning from

[00:06:50] [SPEAKER_01]: a summer of five big tournaments, like they're coming straight from PGF a few weeks.

[00:06:56] [SPEAKER_01]: So they are pretty fresh, I would say like those girls are coming out of pitching

[00:07:02] [SPEAKER_01]: maybe two or three games in a day for their team at PGF or during pool play.

[00:07:07] [SPEAKER_01]: So I wouldn't say that like it's a very hard transition, but now we're,

[00:07:14] [SPEAKER_01]: it's definitely harder. Like in the fall you get a glimpse of it during fall ball,

[00:07:18] [SPEAKER_01]: but usually we just play junior colleges and maybe even we played Stanford and

[00:07:24] [SPEAKER_01]: Cal in our fall ball games. So they get a taste of that really quick.

[00:07:27] [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that's when it's the perspective changes. Okay, these girls are,

[00:07:33] [SPEAKER_01]: there's these are the type of girls I'm going to be playing throughout my college career.

[00:07:36] [SPEAKER_01]: So then you get into season. It, it, it's more of a mindset shift instead of a physical

[00:07:42] [SPEAKER_01]: shift, I would say. The type of competition that you're playing say in PGF or maybe your

[00:07:49] [SPEAKER_01]: team went to Alliance and played pretty competitive there as well.

[00:07:54] [SPEAKER_01]: And I think my transition from high school to college was more of a mindset because now

[00:07:59] [SPEAKER_01]: these girls are 22, 23 year olds that have been in college for four or five years.

[00:08:06] [SPEAKER_01]: And now I'm a little 18 year old trying to break them out. So it's definitely having to

[00:08:11] [SPEAKER_01]: switch your mindset and to be like, okay, we're on the same field, we're playing the same game.

[00:08:17] [SPEAKER_01]: Let me just play my game and do that. Physically, more of the challenges come in when we start

[00:08:23] [SPEAKER_01]: doing workouts like our weights and workouts and stuff because some girls aren't used to that

[00:08:29] [SPEAKER_01]: type of weightlifting and pushing weight that hard. Right? So when I came in my freshman year

[00:08:35] [SPEAKER_01]: and we were doing workouts in the morning, I like, I had to take an ice bath like five

[00:08:40] [SPEAKER_01]: times a week because my body wasn't so like drawn out. And it was definitely because of the type

[00:08:47] [SPEAKER_01]: of workouts we were doing, but some girls freshman year come in without any weight training

[00:08:53] [SPEAKER_01]: experience. Right? That's where I see a lot of the freshmen have troubles is they're like

[00:08:59] [SPEAKER_01]: way too sore or their form isn't correct. So they're getting hurt. So like pitching wise,

[00:09:05] [SPEAKER_01]: like as a pitcher, I don't see very many like they don't have much trouble getting into the group of

[00:09:11] [SPEAKER_01]: things, but it's like weight training and like getting into that schedule of a college athlete

[00:09:16] [SPEAKER_00]: that I see is like difficult for them. Yeah. What type of do y'all usually lift in the mornings

[00:09:22] [SPEAKER_00]: and then y'all switch it up with speed and agility or how do y'all work your schedule

[00:09:27] [SPEAKER_01]: when it comes out of the field workouts? So in the fall, we have Monday, Wednesday, Friday,

[00:09:34] [SPEAKER_01]: weights from seven to eight. And then usually we start practice at nine so that our break girls go

[00:09:41] [SPEAKER_01]: into get treatment on whatever they need treated on and then we go straight into practice. But yeah,

[00:09:47] [SPEAKER_01]: our weights have always been in the morning. And then during season, they're only Tuesdays

[00:09:51] [SPEAKER_01]: and Thursdays, but then they're at the same time in the morning. Bad time. Ours were like at

[00:09:56] [SPEAKER_00]: early like six AM. Like, yeah, I remember literally getting to the way room like six AM

[00:10:04] [SPEAKER_00]: or we would start the workouts. You had to be there like what five 45, right? You're like walking

[00:10:08] [SPEAKER_00]: there and then we'd work up an hour and a half. I would get done by about seven 30 and I wouldn't

[00:10:14] [SPEAKER_00]: have class till noon. So I would like shower and just go right back to bed. And then I'd

[00:10:18] [SPEAKER_00]: like because all my classes are why did I practice till noon? All my classes were at

[00:10:23] [SPEAKER_00]: night classes because that's the business school at my college didn't open up till one. So I couldn't

[00:10:27] [SPEAKER_00]: have any morning classes unless it was outside my degree. That grind started really early and

[00:10:32] [SPEAKER_00]: then that was my break. And then I hope to God, I had all enough time to get all my other stuff

[00:10:36] [SPEAKER_00]: done. You know, when it comes to you're saying like lack of form or maybe their sore or whatever,

[00:10:41] [SPEAKER_00]: did you feel like you were prepared to go to college like weight room wise? Or did you

[00:10:46] [SPEAKER_00]: all what kind of like stuff did y'all do as like dad and daughter or Russell? What type of

[00:10:52] [SPEAKER_00]: programs did you put Lacey in before she went to college? We had we started out with Suzy Parra.

[00:10:58] [SPEAKER_00]: You talking about pitching specifically? Weight training, speaking agility, something else.

[00:11:02] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. So she was part of that. She was part of the Bap Buster organization. We paid an

[00:11:08] [SPEAKER_02]: X amount of dollars to Bap Busters to go to a facility and she I think places is it two

[00:11:16] [SPEAKER_02]: or three days a week you were going down there. Yeah, working out and they would do

[00:11:20] [SPEAKER_02]: different, you know, agility movements, weight, weightlifting. She's hanging out with

[00:11:25] [SPEAKER_02]: Sierra Jennings, Melissa Brito. She's hanging out with these girls and working out with these girls

[00:11:31] [SPEAKER_02]: two days a week. So I didn't do anything. I just said, I just drove her there

[00:11:35] [SPEAKER_02]: and then drove her back and that was about an hour away. So we'd do that two days a week

[00:11:39] [SPEAKER_02]: and then she would have pitching lessons out there as well.

[00:11:44] [SPEAKER_02]: Let's take a quick break. If you want to leave us a message, use the link in the

[00:11:50] [SPEAKER_02]: show notes and if you want us to respond, leave your name and email address. Also,

[00:11:55] [SPEAKER_02]: please rate us in or leave a review as we're trying to grow the show every day. Finally,

[00:12:01] [SPEAKER_02]: Lacey and I both love coffee. We would greatly appreciate any contribution to the show.

[00:12:06] [SPEAKER_02]: That link is also in the show notes. Thank you. Take care.

[00:12:14] [SPEAKER_01]: I also, we also, I went with a few of my teammates, especially when I was like maybe

[00:12:18] [SPEAKER_01]: at TenU getting into travel ball, there was a coach that had worked outside of his garage

[00:12:27] [SPEAKER_01]: and me and a few of my teammates would go to him and he coaches like D1 football players,

[00:12:34] [SPEAKER_01]: D1 baseball players. And it's literally just like a little gym in his garage and we're just

[00:12:39] [SPEAKER_01]: throwing weight around, but he was really, he really emphasized form and pushing each other

[00:12:45] [SPEAKER_01]: and we would compete against each other. So that was like my first real taste of weightlifting

[00:12:51] [SPEAKER_01]: and that's where I got stronger. And then we had to go to SDC for workouts as a requirement for

[00:12:57] [SPEAKER_00]: backbusters. That makes total sense. And that's cool that you got to double dip, meaning they

[00:13:02] [SPEAKER_00]: provided like a softball aspect and then they gave you the resources whether you liked it or not

[00:13:07] [SPEAKER_00]: if you go to this vignagility. I'll tell you when I was training basically

[00:13:12] [SPEAKER_00]: the hardest part of my training to get to college was like softball junior year. We did

[00:13:17] [SPEAKER_00]: spina gelly training, it does work but it doesn't happen overnight. And that's where a lot of people

[00:13:23] [SPEAKER_00]: stop doing it because they're like we're not paying all this money, you should have gotten that much

[00:13:26] [SPEAKER_00]: faster. But like that compound interest that you're, all that work just accumulates into

[00:13:32] [SPEAKER_00]: a second or half a step, which is usually the amount of measurement that you're out or safe.

[00:13:37] [SPEAKER_00]: So do you all have like measurements at your school where they're like, hey, this is where you

[00:13:42] [SPEAKER_00]: want you to be? Or is it just, hey, we want you stronger, faster, better and it's like a general

[00:13:46] [SPEAKER_00]: consensus of what the athletes need. So my first two years, I mean, where you go to school, let's

[00:13:53] [SPEAKER_00]: start there. So if people that are online, they're like, I don't even care where this girl goes

[00:13:56] [SPEAKER_00]: to school. Obviously they're going to care when they hear where you go to school. But

[00:13:59] [SPEAKER_00]: yeah, when you go, what year you are. And then my question.

[00:14:04] [SPEAKER_01]: So I am a senior at San Jose State University in San Jose up in the Bay Area. And then so this is my

[00:14:12] [SPEAKER_01]: fourth year, I just started my fourth year. And so my first two years here we had, we had testing

[00:14:20] [SPEAKER_01]: beginning like when we got here in August, we had testing. And so that was basically like

[00:14:26] [SPEAKER_01]: grip strength, throwing speed, let's see 510-5 shuttle, 20 yard sprint, 50 yard sprint,

[00:14:35] [SPEAKER_01]: and we would get timed. We got tested then and we got tested at the end of the semester,

[00:14:40] [SPEAKER_01]: right when finals were in December, we'd get tested again to see how much we improved.

[00:14:44] [SPEAKER_01]: And then obviously we'd get harped on if they saw no improvement at all. But these past two

[00:14:51] [SPEAKER_01]: years, I think a lot of universities do this is like a run test. So last year, it was a mix of like

[00:14:59] [SPEAKER_01]: sprints and like you had to make this time. But now this as my final year, we're doing the beep test,

[00:15:05] [SPEAKER_01]: which is like the pacer test if you ever did that in like middle school or anything.

[00:15:08] [SPEAKER_01]: So we have to make it to a certain level. And if you don't then you fail. And then I think

[00:15:13] [SPEAKER_01]: there's consequences if you do. So yeah, that's where like our benchmark is at.

[00:15:18] [SPEAKER_01]: Really anything else like pitching wise or I know they want the slappers to have a certain 60 time,

[00:15:25] [SPEAKER_01]: like 60 feet under a certain amount of time. But other than that, the running test is basically

[00:15:32] [SPEAKER_00]: like our benchmark for like conditioning and stuff. What is like the craziest thing a coach has done

[00:15:40] [SPEAKER_00]: for conditioning for you? Like a high school, college, whatever. But what is something you're

[00:15:45] [SPEAKER_00]: like that was wild? I can't believe he or she made us do that. Seven innings code, lace.

[00:15:52] [SPEAKER_01]: Seven innings was pretty bad. That was like maybe 10 you 12 few. No, I was it was 10 you for sure.

[00:16:02] [SPEAKER_01]: Like in your second innings mean no. So basically we would sprint the equivalent of what seven innings

[00:16:09] [SPEAKER_01]: would feel like. And I define that like how do you quantify that? Honestly, I don't really remember.

[00:16:19] [SPEAKER_01]: I just remember my coach being saying all right get on the line seven innings and I remember

[00:16:23] [SPEAKER_01]: my heart just sinking to the bottom of my chest. I'm already throwing up.

[00:16:29] [SPEAKER_02]: Dad, do you remember what it was? Yeah, it's cone work. You'd have cones out there and you'd

[00:16:34] [SPEAKER_02]: have to run a certain distance. The first inning and then the second inning you're

[00:16:38] [SPEAKER_02]: going a little bit farther. So it was like horses or it was like shuttle runs. But as the innings got

[00:16:43] [SPEAKER_02]: on the longer that and then he would time them so that if he didn't make it in time,

[00:16:48] [SPEAKER_02]: it was almost like miracle again. If you didn't make it again doing it. And so when he okay,

[00:16:55] [SPEAKER_02]: they would if they screwed up right if he was pretty hardcore in the 10 years, like if you're

[00:17:01] [SPEAKER_02]: bunch of heirs, you weren't focusing, he would say okay seven innings and

[00:17:06] [SPEAKER_02]: the girls would just drop their heads because it was brutal. And these girls are 10 or 11 years old,

[00:17:12] [SPEAKER_01]: by the way. We had a hill in the back of the so that there is like the field and then in the

[00:17:20] [SPEAKER_01]: outfield was huge. But then there was a hill that would go up to the neighborhood.

[00:17:25] [SPEAKER_01]: And we called it like the diamond hill. And so he would be like all right at the end of practice,

[00:17:31] [SPEAKER_01]: he's like all right, go to the diamond and we're just like on the verge of years.

[00:17:36] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we would sprint up the hill up and down and we did not know when we were going to stop.

[00:17:41] [SPEAKER_01]: He never said any number of sprints. He's like, all right, go.

[00:17:45] [SPEAKER_01]: And we would not know when it would end. And that was probably the scariest part.

[00:17:49] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, definitely. I think we've all been tortured or had some type of trauma

[00:17:54] [SPEAKER_00]: when it comes to conditioning. And you have to think now that you're older, like they all

[00:17:58] [SPEAKER_00]: mean maybe it's like their delivery that could be a little bit better. But our coach one time,

[00:18:03] [SPEAKER_00]: he was his military, he took a gigantic phone poll and I don't know where he found this poll,

[00:18:10] [SPEAKER_00]: but he made us all run with the poll for four miles. Like we had to carry the poll.

[00:18:17] [SPEAKER_00]: So we got smarter where we're paid. We don't eat everyone on the poll. We just need the

[00:18:22] [SPEAKER_00]: like minimum amount. And then when we were like, okay, y'all are tired, like then we'd

[00:18:26] [SPEAKER_00]: switch so you could run a little bit without the poll. And we're not talking about like a flat

[00:18:31] [SPEAKER_00]: surface here. We're not like running around the track. We're on a trail. And this is at

[00:18:35] [SPEAKER_00]: like fall where in Corpus it's literally 150, like percentage of humidity and it was brutal.

[00:18:44] [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, that one was literally in one girl legit got a heat stroke and had to sit out for

[00:18:49] [SPEAKER_00]: four days. Again, he'd met to do a team building exercise ended up being like

[00:18:55] [SPEAKER_00]: half the people are throwing up one quid and one's in the train to afford it.

[00:19:00] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, insane. Yeah.

[00:19:03] [SPEAKER_00]: When is there anything that y'all say to the incoming freshmen that would prepare them better for

[00:19:09] [SPEAKER_00]: the years to come? Hey, this isn't high school anymore. Everyone's just as good as you are.

[00:19:14] [SPEAKER_00]: Like what's the narrative now? Because I know when I was like going into school, everyone

[00:19:19] [SPEAKER_00]: would try to stick or shock you in the fence of, hey, you're like, you're trash. We're

[00:19:23] [SPEAKER_00]: better than you. We're older or 22 and you're a little 18 year old. Is it still like a scare

[00:19:27] [SPEAKER_00]: tactic? Or is it like, we love you. Come on, please don't get the portal. What is it?

[00:19:32] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we are not a scare tactic team at all. We one of our main things too that we don't like

[00:19:40] [SPEAKER_01]: is like how other universities make the freshmen do like everything. So it's like you get the

[00:19:46] [SPEAKER_01]: gear, you clean up after practice. You do all this stuff like that didn't really resonate with

[00:19:54] [SPEAKER_01]: our team really because we do it all together. Every travel tip trip, everyone is assigned something.

[00:20:01] [SPEAKER_01]: I could get the ball bag. I could be assigned the ball bag one weekend while a freshman has

[00:20:06] [SPEAKER_01]: the bat bag and it really interchanges between classes. That's one of the things that sticks

[00:20:11] [SPEAKER_01]: out to me about my team is that we do everything together. We clean up together. We go to weights

[00:20:17] [SPEAKER_01]: together. It's not like the freshmen have to do all the rough stuff and treat everyone like or get

[00:20:23] [SPEAKER_01]: the seniors Starbucks every, I don't know. I've heard some crazy things that the freshmen

[00:20:27] [SPEAKER_01]: have to implement though. I don't think that'd be a bad one. No, I know, but we're definitely

[00:20:32] [SPEAKER_01]: a more like welcoming. Yeah, it will be, this is a great opportunity to get to know one

[00:20:37] [SPEAKER_01]: another, all of this stuff. Last year, this was a topic was like the freshmen, you could tell that

[00:20:44] [SPEAKER_01]: they were going like pretty light in weight. Like when we're doing weights and everything and being

[00:20:49] [SPEAKER_01]: like sluggish at practice and people saw that. And so we had a team meeting and we're like freshmen,

[00:20:55] [SPEAKER_01]: pick it up because that's not like that's unacceptable. Like seniors should not be

[00:20:59] [SPEAKER_01]: like pushing themselves harder than new freshmen. New freshmen still have to prove

[00:21:03] [SPEAKER_01]: yourself because your teammates have never seen you play. Maybe the coaches have seen you play

[00:21:09] [SPEAKER_01]: in another team, but now how are you going to integrate yourself into this new team?

[00:21:13] [SPEAKER_01]: And you need to push yourself and you need to stand out and you need to be vocal and all

[00:21:20] [SPEAKER_01]: this stuff like you need to work together as a team. If you're slacking, we can see it.

[00:21:24] [SPEAKER_01]: Totally. That was a whole ordeal last year where at the beginning of the year,

[00:21:32] [SPEAKER_00]: that was like, we're not going to be able to do that.

[00:21:53] [SPEAKER_00]: And so I went into the gyms and I was like, wow, I'm going to go in and out and out.

[00:21:54] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to go in and out and out.

[00:21:55] [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, wow, how are you going to get into this game if you're going to

[00:21:58] [SPEAKER_00]: first time ever getting out like on my own.

[00:22:00] [SPEAKER_00]: I was very like sheltered in high school.

[00:22:02] [SPEAKER_00]: I never got to do whatever I wanted basically.

[00:22:05] [SPEAKER_00]: And then I get this freedom and let's just say,

[00:22:08] [SPEAKER_00]: I made the most out of the freedom.

[00:22:10] [SPEAKER_00]: But when I became a senior,

[00:22:13] [SPEAKER_00]: I realized exactly what they were talking about

[00:22:16] [SPEAKER_00]: and like how I did not want to lose one more game

[00:22:19] [SPEAKER_00]: because I already had my freshman sophomore year.

[00:22:21] [SPEAKER_00]: We had a losing season.

[00:22:22] [SPEAKER_00]: Like we were under 500.

[00:22:23] [SPEAKER_00]: So I was like, we're not doing that again.

[00:22:25] [SPEAKER_00]: And I became this like alpha female.

[00:22:28] [SPEAKER_00]: Dude, if you're not here to win,

[00:22:30] [SPEAKER_00]: like you needed to go to home.

[00:22:31] [SPEAKER_00]: Like I had no grace for any slack.

[00:22:35] [SPEAKER_00]: And I look back and I had messaged one of the seniors

[00:22:37] [SPEAKER_00]: and I was like, dude, I get it.

[00:22:39] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm so sorry.

[00:22:40] [SPEAKER_00]: Like I was a jerk my freshman year.

[00:22:42] [SPEAKER_00]: Like I was immature.

[00:22:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Like I didn't know what y'all were fighting for.

[00:22:46] [SPEAKER_00]: I was more selfish than I should have been.

[00:22:47] [SPEAKER_00]: But it's all reflection and you definitely get better

[00:22:50] [SPEAKER_00]: as you progress over the years

[00:22:52] [SPEAKER_00]: that you are from 18 to 22.

[00:22:54] [SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully people do.

[00:22:55] [SPEAKER_00]: But do you see yourself having like the same conversation

[00:22:58] [SPEAKER_00]: with yourself or seeing maybe some of your teammates?

[00:23:01] [SPEAKER_00]: Wow, you've been sure it's so much since your freshman year.

[00:23:05] [SPEAKER_00]: It's a tricky question.

[00:23:07] [SPEAKER_00]: You don't have to say names either.

[00:23:09] [SPEAKER_00]: Don't call anyone out here.

[00:23:11] [SPEAKER_02]: I can speak with some of her frustrations

[00:23:14] [SPEAKER_02]: because she came from a very competitive travel ball.

[00:23:18] [SPEAKER_02]: Right. She played for Mike Stess.

[00:23:19] [SPEAKER_02]: She played for Mark Danwell.

[00:23:21] [SPEAKER_02]: She played for these high end coaches.

[00:23:23] [SPEAKER_02]: And these teams, the expectations on these teams

[00:23:27] [SPEAKER_02]: were pretty high.

[00:23:29] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, super high.

[00:23:31] [SPEAKER_00]: The high end is like one of the best out there.

[00:23:34] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[00:23:35] [SPEAKER_02]: So she's coming into college and some of these girls

[00:23:38] [SPEAKER_02]: may not have been on these very intense travel ball teams.

[00:23:42] [SPEAKER_02]: Maybe it was this more kind of kubayah type of thing.

[00:23:46] [SPEAKER_02]: And so I can tell Lacey because she's super competitive.

[00:23:50] [SPEAKER_02]: Sounds like you, Margot, that she was super competitive.

[00:23:53] [SPEAKER_02]: That she was like, what is going on here?

[00:23:55] [SPEAKER_02]: How come they're not like working their ass off?

[00:23:57] [SPEAKER_02]: And so she would work her ass off, but then she would get frustrated

[00:24:00] [SPEAKER_02]: because some of the other girls weren't.

[00:24:02] [SPEAKER_02]: No, it's not everybody, but it was just a couple of girls

[00:24:05] [SPEAKER_02]: who just were and I'm like, you're a division one softball.

[00:24:08] [SPEAKER_02]: How are you not working your butt out?

[00:24:10] [SPEAKER_02]: And so that was some of her frustrations,

[00:24:13] [SPEAKER_02]: especially sophomore and junior year for sure.

[00:24:16] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[00:24:17] [SPEAKER_00]: And I think too there.

[00:24:18] [SPEAKER_00]: I know I've defined this watching my generation go

[00:24:21] [SPEAKER_00]: and then seeing other generations coming through is sometimes

[00:24:24] [SPEAKER_00]: girls that are playing by school ball or travel ball,

[00:24:27] [SPEAKER_00]: their goal is only to get to a school.

[00:24:30] [SPEAKER_00]: And then that's it.

[00:24:31] [SPEAKER_00]: They've done the work.

[00:24:32] [SPEAKER_00]: They checked the box.

[00:24:33] [SPEAKER_00]: They said they got recruited and they got scholarships.

[00:24:35] [SPEAKER_00]: But that's like just the beginning.

[00:24:37] [SPEAKER_00]: And then there are some girls that get it

[00:24:39] [SPEAKER_00]: that have to put extra work in outside of because everybody's practicing.

[00:24:43] [SPEAKER_00]: But there are girls that were just content

[00:24:46] [SPEAKER_00]: with just getting on the team.

[00:24:49] [SPEAKER_01]: My my thought process in that is because I've known girls

[00:24:53] [SPEAKER_01]: that are like that as well, but we've heard I've heard this

[00:24:57] [SPEAKER_01]: since I was a girl and I bet younger athletes

[00:25:00] [SPEAKER_01]: all have heard it as well as if you're not putting in the work.

[00:25:04] [SPEAKER_01]: Someone's work like someone else is doing it better than you

[00:25:07] [SPEAKER_01]: or someone's working harder than you.

[00:25:09] [SPEAKER_01]: So I especially in high school, I knew there were other girls

[00:25:12] [SPEAKER_01]: out there that were trying to like.

[00:25:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Are in my same position, trying to get recruited.

[00:25:18] [SPEAKER_01]: What was I going to do about it?

[00:25:21] [SPEAKER_01]: Like how would I go about working towards what I want?

[00:25:25] [SPEAKER_01]: And trying to beat them.

[00:25:27] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know what they're doing.

[00:25:29] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know like how they're training or whatever.

[00:25:31] [SPEAKER_01]: I was going to do what I was going to do to work hard

[00:25:33] [SPEAKER_01]: to get to where I wanted to be.

[00:25:35] [SPEAKER_01]: But I knew some especially if I was like, oh, I don't want to go

[00:25:38] [SPEAKER_01]: to practice today or I don't want to throw both in today.

[00:25:41] [SPEAKER_01]: Someone out there is going to throw a bullpen today

[00:25:44] [SPEAKER_01]: and get better than me.

[00:25:45] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. And that's the last thing that I want.

[00:25:48] [SPEAKER_02]: It's like it's self induced FOMO, right?

[00:25:50] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[00:25:51] [SPEAKER_00]: Russell, what was like your one liner is to Lacey,

[00:25:56] [SPEAKER_00]: like when she needed a little extra motivation as a dad.

[00:26:00] [SPEAKER_02]: I was just, come on, Lace.

[00:26:03] [SPEAKER_00]: That's it. That's all she needed.

[00:26:04] [SPEAKER_02]: Come on, Lace.

[00:26:04] [SPEAKER_02]: I yeah, we've talked about it in other podcasts

[00:26:07] [SPEAKER_02]: where I put a lot of pressure on her, right?

[00:26:10] [SPEAKER_02]: She came to like her kitchen crying because I was

[00:26:14] [SPEAKER_02]: because my personality and I talk about this often

[00:26:18] [SPEAKER_02]: is I put so much pressure on her because of the organization

[00:26:21] [SPEAKER_02]: she was in.

[00:26:23] [SPEAKER_02]: And she did bad as a reflection of me as a father.

[00:26:27] [SPEAKER_02]: I'm not doing enough.

[00:26:28] [SPEAKER_02]: So I would push her.

[00:26:30] [SPEAKER_02]: My personality was if she did bad on bullpen,

[00:26:32] [SPEAKER_02]: I would ignore her.

[00:26:33] [SPEAKER_02]: I wouldn't talk to her.

[00:26:34] [SPEAKER_02]: She got emotional one time.

[00:26:36] [SPEAKER_02]: So I backed off at that point.

[00:26:39] [SPEAKER_02]: So as she did walk somebody, I would just say,

[00:26:41] [SPEAKER_02]: come on, Lace, we're alive.

[00:26:42] [SPEAKER_02]: Just come on.

[00:26:44] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I would say for him.

[00:26:47] [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know when I started doing this,

[00:26:49] [SPEAKER_01]: but I would like schedule out my week because he would catch me.

[00:26:52] [SPEAKER_01]: He would need to know when I wanted to pitch and everything.

[00:26:56] [SPEAKER_01]: And so I'd have something come up.

[00:26:59] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, oh, I'm going to do this.

[00:27:01] [SPEAKER_01]: He's, oh, I thought you were going to pitch today.

[00:27:03] [SPEAKER_01]: And then I was like, oh, yeah.

[00:27:05] [SPEAKER_01]: And then it was it's like a little guilt trip, but not.

[00:27:09] [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah.

[00:27:09] [SPEAKER_00]: I'd be like, I scheduled around you.

[00:27:11] [SPEAKER_00]: You're the one that scheduled, not me.

[00:27:13] [SPEAKER_00]: Or he's like, you had that type of maturity to make that

[00:27:16] [SPEAKER_00]: schedule and have that accountability.

[00:27:18] [SPEAKER_00]: And like all he is your accountability partner, right?

[00:27:21] [SPEAKER_00]: Like at the end of the day, he's not going to tie you up

[00:27:23] [SPEAKER_00]: and make you go pitch, right?

[00:27:25] [SPEAKER_00]: But you made that, you know, move to make the schedule

[00:27:29] [SPEAKER_00]: to commit to it because that's your goal, right?

[00:27:31] [SPEAKER_00]: And then he was like, are you sure?

[00:27:33] [SPEAKER_00]: And then you knew to backtrack and see, and that's really cool.

[00:27:37] [SPEAKER_00]: They all had that connection together.

[00:27:39] [SPEAKER_00]: A lot of people, one, don't have the maturity and two,

[00:27:42] [SPEAKER_00]: they don't have the debt.

[00:27:44] [SPEAKER_00]: Not physically, but they don't have someone be like

[00:27:46] [SPEAKER_00]: that actually will go catch somebody.

[00:27:48] [SPEAKER_00]: I think this is like where I hope you know and you know this,

[00:27:51] [SPEAKER_00]: but like a lot of these parents are outsourcing

[00:27:55] [SPEAKER_00]: exactly what your dad did for you.

[00:27:58] [SPEAKER_00]: And one, a lot of them don't even have the money to outsource it,

[00:28:01] [SPEAKER_00]: but they're doing it because they say they want to.

[00:28:02] [SPEAKER_00]: And two, it's like it doesn't take a rocket science

[00:28:05] [SPEAKER_00]: like to know that every time you throw a ball low inside

[00:28:09] [SPEAKER_00]: like your arms slow, you know what I mean?

[00:28:11] [SPEAKER_00]: You could be a creature of evolution.

[00:28:13] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, oh, wow, I can actually look at this and learn.

[00:28:15] [SPEAKER_00]: It's not like you're paying just for Lacey to hear the instruction.

[00:28:19] [SPEAKER_00]: You probably went to every first lesson was like like a sponge learning.

[00:28:22] [SPEAKER_00]: And then everyone's creatures of habit.

[00:28:25] [SPEAKER_00]: So like Lacey probably had the same bad habits

[00:28:27] [SPEAKER_00]: every time until you fix them.

[00:28:29] [SPEAKER_00]: And then when you were doing good, your dad was like, dang,

[00:28:31] [SPEAKER_00]: she's on because he knew you like he knows you.

[00:28:34] [SPEAKER_00]: But a lot of people aren't spending that time with their daughters or sons.

[00:28:38] [SPEAKER_00]: And then it's always somebody else's fault, right?

[00:28:42] [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, it's his pitching instructor.

[00:28:43] [SPEAKER_00]: He's not doing what he needs to do or she's going to sky.

[00:28:46] [SPEAKER_00]: But he doesn't know what he's talking about.

[00:28:48] [SPEAKER_00]: You don't either.

[00:28:49] [SPEAKER_00]: You're not even taking the time to learn and Russell,

[00:28:52] [SPEAKER_00]: that just says a lot about your personality.

[00:28:53] [SPEAKER_00]: One, you're a doer or two, you created a doer, right?

[00:28:56] [SPEAKER_00]: Lacey is a doer and you were a huge puzzle piece to her success.

[00:29:00] [SPEAKER_00]: And that says a lot about y'all as people,

[00:29:03] [SPEAKER_00]: but outsourcing it is not always the answer.

[00:29:07] [SPEAKER_00]: If she got stuck or something or like, dude,

[00:29:09] [SPEAKER_00]: I cannot figure out why her rise ball sucks.

[00:29:11] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm making something up.

[00:29:12] [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know about your rise ball, OK?

[00:29:14] [SPEAKER_00]: But like you could totally go get it that outsourced.

[00:29:17] [SPEAKER_00]: But then you have to go work exactly what you learned at those lessons.

[00:29:21] [SPEAKER_00]: Like how often do you think you pitched with your dad on a weekly basis?

[00:29:26] [SPEAKER_00]: In high school, like during high school season or not in high school season?

[00:29:28] [SPEAKER_00]: Like any time would you say give or take maybe twice a month outside of lessons?

[00:29:33] [SPEAKER_00]: Like just go get some throws in like how much quality time did y'all spend?

[00:29:38] [SPEAKER_00]: Not just to get better, but to spend time together.

[00:29:41] [SPEAKER_01]: So what our situation was is like our house layout.

[00:29:45] [SPEAKER_01]: We have an RV parking space.

[00:29:47] [SPEAKER_01]: So that was basically my bullpen.

[00:29:50] [SPEAKER_01]: And so.

[00:29:52] [SPEAKER_01]: He got a mat, a pitching mat.

[00:29:55] [SPEAKER_01]: And then I'd say probably four times a week.

[00:30:00] [SPEAKER_01]: He four or five times a week.

[00:30:02] [SPEAKER_01]: That's so much time.

[00:30:04] [SPEAKER_01]: You know that, right?

[00:30:05] [SPEAKER_02]: Like so we got a premise that one day would be like to spend.

[00:30:08] [SPEAKER_00]: So it wasn't like it doesn't matter.

[00:30:10] [SPEAKER_00]: We're talking about time here.

[00:30:12] [SPEAKER_00]: You know, anyway, we have to go out the workout.

[00:30:14] [SPEAKER_02]: But my job wasn't very hard, right?

[00:30:16] [SPEAKER_02]: I was a PE teacher.

[00:30:17] [SPEAKER_02]: I was getting home, you know, three or four.

[00:30:20] [SPEAKER_01]: He would take me home from school.

[00:30:22] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[00:30:22] [SPEAKER_01]: And then right after school, we'd go in the.

[00:30:25] [SPEAKER_02]: I had contraptions.

[00:30:27] [SPEAKER_02]: I had the same thing.

[00:30:28] [SPEAKER_00]: I had the same thing you bought.

[00:30:31] [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't buy it. No, I made it.

[00:30:32] [SPEAKER_00]: So I have them.

[00:30:33] [SPEAKER_00]: He built. Oh, so you're a plagiarizer.

[00:30:37] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[00:30:37] [SPEAKER_02]: So I built the PVC pipes with the strings, the strike zone strings.

[00:30:41] [SPEAKER_02]: That thing is awesome.

[00:30:43] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that was real cool.

[00:30:45] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think my dad probably this is back when you had to buy the tape.

[00:30:49] [SPEAKER_00]: But my dad bought probably every tape possible when it came to pitching.

[00:30:53] [SPEAKER_00]: And then do you remember the Jenny Finch circle machine?

[00:30:58] [SPEAKER_00]: Do you remember that way, way before Lacey's time?

[00:31:02] [SPEAKER_00]: But anyway, my mom would be so mad because I'd be doing it

[00:31:05] [SPEAKER_00]: like it helps your arm circle basically.

[00:31:07] [SPEAKER_00]: OK, and it's a resistance training.

[00:31:09] [SPEAKER_00]: So it makes you go fat.

[00:31:10] [SPEAKER_00]: You can tighten it and it would go.

[00:31:12] [SPEAKER_00]: Ringer, ringer, ringer.

[00:31:14] [SPEAKER_00]: And my mom would be so mad because she would be like taking a nap

[00:31:17] [SPEAKER_00]: or something like that.

[00:31:17] [SPEAKER_00]: And he'd be like on a Sunday and my dad's don't do it now.

[00:31:21] [SPEAKER_00]: It's cheese Louise is trying to get it in here.

[00:31:23] [SPEAKER_00]: You are yelling at me, but the things our dads do.

[00:31:26] [SPEAKER_01]: I used to be a dad.

[00:31:27] [SPEAKER_01]: We also had, I don't know where you got it, but the blue hitter.

[00:31:31] [SPEAKER_02]: The plastic.

[00:31:32] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah.

[00:31:33] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I was a PE teacher and I was the lead teacher.

[00:31:37] [SPEAKER_02]: So I was able to order things for the PE department.

[00:31:40] [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, I ordered that.

[00:31:42] [SPEAKER_02]: So I doubled it.

[00:31:43] [SPEAKER_02]: I ordered that through the PE department.

[00:31:45] [SPEAKER_02]: Hope I don't know what it requires.

[00:31:47] [SPEAKER_02]: No, they can't fire me for this.

[00:31:49] [SPEAKER_02]: So I ordered that and then I brought it home.

[00:31:51] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm still using your resources.

[00:31:53] [SPEAKER_00]: That's all I'm hearing right now.

[00:31:54] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, glad you didn't use your wife or that or anything taped

[00:31:57] [SPEAKER_00]: her to a pole and made her stand there.

[00:32:00] [SPEAKER_00]: That's nice of you.

[00:32:01] [SPEAKER_02]: We named it after a girl that we weren't a very fond of

[00:32:04] [SPEAKER_02]: an inner travel wall.

[00:32:05] [SPEAKER_00]: When I would hit her.

[00:32:06] [SPEAKER_02]: It was a screw on the hitter.

[00:32:08] [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, sorry.

[00:32:10] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, seriously.

[00:32:11] [SPEAKER_00]: I know there were my dad would always say seven says

[00:32:14] [SPEAKER_00]: probably pitching right now and move a look at me like,

[00:32:17] [SPEAKER_00]: yeah, that's and I'm like what I would tell my side.

[00:32:21] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'll go because you always have those rivals

[00:32:23] [SPEAKER_00]: like when it comes like high school ball and all kind of stuff.

[00:32:26] [SPEAKER_00]: So it definitely helped a little bit as I got a little

[00:32:29] [SPEAKER_00]: sometimes you just don't want to go because you're tired.

[00:32:31] [SPEAKER_00]: It's not the fact that you don't want to go pitch.

[00:32:33] [SPEAKER_00]: You're just don't want to do it right now.

[00:32:34] [SPEAKER_00]: And a lot of it for me was like the lifting part.

[00:32:36] [SPEAKER_00]: My dad maybe go every Sunday to the work to the weights

[00:32:40] [SPEAKER_00]: and lift and we were huge.

[00:32:41] [SPEAKER_00]: Like my dad was huge on lifting and being strong.

[00:32:45] [SPEAKER_00]: Like my sister was a power lifter like all the things.

[00:32:49] [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, I think I think if you don't have that support system,

[00:32:53] [SPEAKER_00]: it's really hard to like unless you're like a freak of nature

[00:32:56] [SPEAKER_00]: where you're just like anal about getting all your workouts in.

[00:32:59] [SPEAKER_00]: But I would say I wouldn't have been as good

[00:33:01] [SPEAKER_00]: if it wasn't for my dad because you say the same thing.

[00:33:04] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, because he was there for you.

[00:33:06] [SPEAKER_00]: Whether you liked it or not.

[00:33:10] [SPEAKER_01]: Now it was more it was a routine.

[00:33:13] [SPEAKER_01]: I feel like we were just all right, going from school.

[00:33:16] [SPEAKER_01]: What are you working on today? All right.

[00:33:19] [SPEAKER_01]: What do you mean?

[00:33:20] [SPEAKER_02]: After a while, my eyesight when it turned 50, my eyesight

[00:33:24] [SPEAKER_02]: was getting a little blurry.

[00:33:27] [SPEAKER_02]: I eventually got lacy.

[00:33:28] [SPEAKER_02]: But when it was really bad, I was like, Lace, can you find a catcher please?

[00:33:31] [SPEAKER_02]: Because I cannot see the ball coming at me.

[00:33:34] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, my dad, when I got from college, he was like,

[00:33:36] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not catching you anymore.

[00:33:37] [SPEAKER_00]: Like you're going to have to find somebody else to take you or do something.

[00:33:41] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, oh, and I'm just getting too old for this.

[00:33:43] [SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to do it.

[00:33:45] [SPEAKER_02]: Her last pitch, she dogged me right in the thigh.

[00:33:49] [SPEAKER_02]: Can they just fall in with it?

[00:33:51] [SPEAKER_01]: I can see what he does is that he tries to move out of the way.

[00:33:56] [SPEAKER_01]: But his leg happens to go where the pitch is going to go.

[00:33:59] [SPEAKER_01]: So he's I can see he's trying to move, but his leg just

[00:34:03] [SPEAKER_01]: he comes up and the pitch just hits him more.

[00:34:06] [SPEAKER_02]: Because I'm old.

[00:34:07] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[00:34:08] [SPEAKER_02]: That's part of the reason.

[00:34:09] [SPEAKER_00]: How hard do you throw right now?

[00:34:12] [SPEAKER_00]: Probably like 63, 64.

[00:34:15] [SPEAKER_00]: You think that's like an average speed for your

[00:34:16] [SPEAKER_00]: conference or like around that area?

[00:34:19] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, definitely.

[00:34:20] [SPEAKER_01]: I'd say it's pretty average.

[00:34:24] [SPEAKER_01]: Fastest pitchers in my conference, maybe 66.

[00:34:27] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[00:34:28] [SPEAKER_00]: And when you see those pitchers, because obviously like

[00:34:31] [SPEAKER_00]: pitching and kind of movement, all that stuff,

[00:34:34] [SPEAKER_00]: do you when I watch the World Series, I'm like, wow,

[00:34:36] [SPEAKER_00]: I know she's throwing a screwball because it's spinning that way.

[00:34:39] [SPEAKER_00]: But it's compared to 63 or 62 screwball where it's really cutting

[00:34:45] [SPEAKER_00]: because they just don't have the space.

[00:34:46] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[00:34:47] [SPEAKER_00]: Do you think those pitchers getting hit differently

[00:34:49] [SPEAKER_00]: than you would have if they made contact?

[00:34:51] [SPEAKER_00]: Or how are you seeing that kind of play out in your conference?

[00:34:55] [SPEAKER_00]: So you're talking about the pitchers in my conference

[00:34:57] [SPEAKER_01]: that I see getting hit differently?

[00:34:59] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[00:34:59] [SPEAKER_00]: So you're saying the average speed that you're around is like 63, 64.

[00:35:03] [SPEAKER_00]: And you when you see the faster pitchers like the 68s to the 60,

[00:35:08] [SPEAKER_00]: maybe 70s, what are you seeing as a pitcher that is,

[00:35:11] [SPEAKER_00]: are they getting hit differently?

[00:35:13] [SPEAKER_00]: Or is it just, it's just so fast.

[00:35:15] [SPEAKER_00]: It's so hard to hit.

[00:35:16] [SPEAKER_00]: I personally have not hit since I was 12 years old.

[00:35:19] [SPEAKER_00]: What are you, I'm sorry, let me rephrase that.

[00:35:21] [SPEAKER_00]: What are you seeing your teammates like six,

[00:35:23] [SPEAKER_00]: necessary between this types of different pitching?

[00:35:26] [SPEAKER_01]: I'd say my I'd say my teammates are pretty,

[00:35:29] [SPEAKER_01]: pretty confident with pretty at any speed,

[00:35:32] [SPEAKER_01]: especially with faster pitchers.

[00:35:35] [SPEAKER_01]: All you pretty much need to do is make contact

[00:35:37] [SPEAKER_01]: and it'll go farther than you expect.

[00:35:40] [SPEAKER_01]: It's the fast pitchers with a rise ball

[00:35:42] [SPEAKER_01]: that I think a lot of teams struggle with.

[00:35:46] [SPEAKER_01]: Because obviously it's rising and it's coming out you fast.

[00:35:50] [SPEAKER_01]: So you have barely any time to react.

[00:35:52] [SPEAKER_01]: But I don't, I mean they

[00:35:55] [SPEAKER_01]: if they have good spin, like if I have my teammates coming up

[00:35:58] [SPEAKER_01]: to me in the dugout and they're like, yeah, her spin's so wonky

[00:36:02] [SPEAKER_01]: or spin's so weird.

[00:36:03] [SPEAKER_01]: That's when I think the most trouble happens with our hitting

[00:36:07] [SPEAKER_01]: because they can't figure out what the spin is

[00:36:10] [SPEAKER_01]: or where that pitch is going to go,

[00:36:13] [SPEAKER_01]: especially because it's coming in so fast

[00:36:15] [SPEAKER_01]: and it's spinning really weird.

[00:36:17] [SPEAKER_01]: But there's also some pitchers where they're,

[00:36:19] [SPEAKER_01]: it looks like they're pitching fast

[00:36:20] [SPEAKER_01]: and then my teammates come in, they're like, that's like,

[00:36:23] [SPEAKER_01]: it's flat.

[00:36:24] [SPEAKER_01]: There's no spin on that.

[00:36:25] [SPEAKER_01]: It's coming in straight

[00:36:26] [SPEAKER_01]: and you just need to make contact basically.

[00:36:29] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, basically just swing a string.

[00:36:30] [SPEAKER_00]: I think too sometimes those pitchers that are so fast,

[00:36:33] [SPEAKER_00]: they like, they look like it's like the look of it is overwhelming.

[00:36:37] [SPEAKER_00]: So people just, they already make the commitment

[00:36:39] [SPEAKER_00]: they're going to swing before the pitch is even pitched.

[00:36:42] [SPEAKER_00]: But if you look at like the, if you're looking at from like behind the pitcher,

[00:36:45] [SPEAKER_00]: I know you all seen this probably a hundred times on TV,

[00:36:48] [SPEAKER_00]: but that ball isn't moving that much at all.

[00:36:50] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[00:36:50] [SPEAKER_00]: But they have this sick, nasty change up

[00:36:53] [SPEAKER_00]: and you're like, all right now I'm going to look like a real idiot.

[00:36:55] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[00:36:55] [SPEAKER_01]: They usually have really good change ups.

[00:36:57] [SPEAKER_01]: I know one of the pitchers on Stanford,

[00:37:00] [SPEAKER_01]: she was throwing like 68, 69, but she didn't have a change up.

[00:37:05] [SPEAKER_01]: And I think we started hitting her like first two innings

[00:37:08] [SPEAKER_01]: and they had to take her out because one time through the lineup

[00:37:12] [SPEAKER_01]: was enough for my team to catch up with whatever she was throwing.

[00:37:15] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:37:16] [SPEAKER_01]: And there was no change in speeds.

[00:37:18] [SPEAKER_00]: So that's like wild to not have a change up at that level.

[00:37:21] [SPEAKER_00]: I know that was it was weird.

[00:37:24] [SPEAKER_00]: Because you can only be the boss so much.

[00:37:26] [SPEAKER_02]: What I noticed is that teams, you know, her pitch staff is 60s, low 60s.

[00:37:32] [SPEAKER_02]: And when they play as a Stanford's and the UCLA's,

[00:37:34] [SPEAKER_02]: the first couple rounds, they're actually competing, right?

[00:37:37] [SPEAKER_02]: Like I guess UCLA was like, it was one to one going in the fifth inning.

[00:37:41] [SPEAKER_02]: This is UCLA's and then Stanford was a super close game

[00:37:45] [SPEAKER_02]: because these girls are so used to that those 68, 69, 70.

[00:37:50] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[00:37:50] [SPEAKER_02]: It's on 61, 62.

[00:37:53] [SPEAKER_02]: And then their change up is 57, 58.

[00:37:56] [SPEAKER_02]: They're they weren't used to it for the maybe the first couple of times

[00:37:59] [SPEAKER_02]: around the lineup and then the wheels come off usually after that.

[00:38:02] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:38:03] [SPEAKER_01]: You can be very serious.

[00:38:05] [SPEAKER_01]: After the third time through the lineup, they're coming up a fourth

[00:38:07] [SPEAKER_01]: time UCLA is like, all right.

[00:38:09] [SPEAKER_01]: All right.

[00:38:10] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.

[00:38:11] [SPEAKER_02]: That's great.

[00:38:11] [SPEAKER_02]: You can tell my brain, my brain did not have a good game against you

[00:38:15] [SPEAKER_02]: until the very end and that she whacked for you.

[00:38:19] [SPEAKER_00]: I know it's so funny.

[00:38:20] [SPEAKER_00]: You think about those games like day we're in it and then you're like, we were.

[00:38:25] [SPEAKER_00]: We were so likely to get sent in.

[00:38:26] [SPEAKER_00]: We would have won.

[00:38:27] [SPEAKER_01]: Think we would have won.

[00:38:28] [SPEAKER_01]: We would have won.

[00:38:30] [SPEAKER_01]: And the one run we did square was our second baseman hit a home run.

[00:38:35] [SPEAKER_01]: That was the only hit.

[00:38:37] [SPEAKER_01]: I feel like no, there were a few innings where we got first and second

[00:38:41] [SPEAKER_01]: or second and third.

[00:38:42] [SPEAKER_01]: We just couldn't.

[00:38:42] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:38:43] [SPEAKER_01]: It was a really good game.

[00:38:44] [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

[00:38:45] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

[00:38:46] [SPEAKER_00]: And there are some games that look back.

[00:38:47] [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, dang, we did all right.

[00:38:49] [SPEAKER_00]: I know we weren't going to win, but at least when he showed out and usually

[00:38:52] [SPEAKER_00]: hopefully you hope play your best because you're matched up.

[00:38:56] [SPEAKER_00]: You're thinking like we have nothing to lose if anyone's going to bet on them.

[00:38:59] [SPEAKER_00]: That's how we felt when we played Oklahoma my sophomore year.

[00:39:03] [SPEAKER_01]: We didn't score any, but it was only nine to zero.

[00:39:07] [SPEAKER_01]: And we're like, hey, teams in the big 12 are getting knocked around

[00:39:10] [SPEAKER_01]: like 15 to zero and we only lost nine to zero.

[00:39:12] [SPEAKER_00]: Four innings or something like something ridiculous, like a very short short game.

[00:39:16] [SPEAKER_00]: So in our heads, we won.

[00:39:18] [SPEAKER_00]: So totally.

[00:39:19] [SPEAKER_00]: And that's all you can do is compete, do your absolute best.

[00:39:22] [SPEAKER_00]: And some of those girls are just like freaks of nature.

[00:39:25] [SPEAKER_00]: Yes.