Transcript
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Today on the Athlete One podcast Jess Smith, russellville High School baseball head coach.
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Freshman year resulted in me being our starting catcher at Central Alabama Community College to losing my spot and us winning the National Championship and me being in the bullpen and so, man, that was like one of the best things that ever happened to me.
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Um, looking back on it, it was like I had it.
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I blew it but had we not won it and I got to learn how to be a teammate and fight through that struggle.
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It just it lit me on fire.
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Fight through that struggle, it just it lit me on fire.
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You're locked in to Athlete One, a podcast for athletes and coaches Coming to you from Dublin, ohio, here to bring you expert advice, insightful conversations and powerful stories from guests who play or coach sports.
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Now veteran high school baseball coach and someone who has jumped out of perfectly good airplanes your host, ken Carpenter.
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Hello and welcome to Athlete One, a podcast for coaches and athletes.
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I'm your host, ken Carpenter, and today's show takes us to northwest Alabama, where I sit down with a highly motivated young head coach, jess Smith.
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He's taken over a powerhouse program that has won back-to-back state titles.
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Coach Smith walks us through his approach to coaching today's high school baseball player, what he does to continue the winning tradition and his response to going from a starting catcher to bullpen catcher during a national championship season.
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That's Athlete the number one dot net.
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This is the Athlete One Podcast.
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Hello and welcome to the Athlete One Podcast.
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I'm your host, Ken Carpenter.
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I'm your host, Ken Carpenter, and joining me today is Jess Smith, head baseball coach at Russellville High School in Alabama.
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Coach, thanks for taking the time to join the Athlete One podcast.
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Yes, sir, thank you for having me.
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Well, if I'm correct, you're just coming off the golf course to join the show.
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And was it a good day?
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Yeah, top ten to join the show.
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And uh, was it a good day?
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Oh, yeah, uh, top 10.
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We didn't.
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We didn't take home the the big chick, but top 10 finished.
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So you can't complain whenever you're uh, spend your fridays at the golf course yeah, well, I I'm a terrible golfer and uh, I'm convinced if I could just use a fungo bat I'd be a lot better.
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So absolutely.
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Yeah, I was on.
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I was on on a team with two other really good golfers and I was just there for moral support.
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Yeah, there you go.
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Now.
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Is that your favorite thing to do besides coaching baseball?
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Oh man, it's summertime, it probably is All season.
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I spend a lot of time deer duck hunting.
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Man, I really just enjoy being outdoors, being active.
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My passion really when it comes to outdoors being an outdoorsman is probably turkey hunting.
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But you know that interferes with prime time baseball season.
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So I'll make sure on our Saturdays during turkey season we we have a one o'clock start instead of that 11 am start typically.
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That way I can spend some time in the woods Saturday morning ah, there you go.
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I like that well you're you're a fairly young head coach and you've been to back-to-back elite eights there in Alabama prior to you taking this job.
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Russellville, I believe, won back-to-back state championships.
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What do you point to as the team strength and the reason for you guys putting together a string of years where you guys are being very successful?
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Yeah, and I wish I could look you in the eye and tell you that I'm taking credit for it.
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But it wasn't me.
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It's kind of my job to just keep the standard going.
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Kind of, in Russell baseball history we reference our program as the gold standard.
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You know we're the Golden Tigers, so we reference the baseball program as the gold standard.
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And, man, I have to give all credit to the head coach before me and the associate head coach with me now, Coach Chris Heaps and Coach Jay Stanley.
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Man, the last decade, you know, here in Alabama they've won five state championships and that's included the COVID year and one runner-up, you know.
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So that's six of nine playing for it.
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And you know, and then the two that I've been the head coach, we've been eliminated in the quarterfinals and, man, it almost feels like a kind of like it was a failure in a sense.
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You know it's a bittersweet thing.
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You want to take pride in making it that far, because baseball is really really hard and playing on the biggest stage is really really hard.
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I think Tony Vantella was talking about that after winning the national championship it's just like this is really hard to get here.
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Championship just like this is, it's really hard to get here, um, and then I think that what has been the key to success over this last 10 years, you know, and what I'm trying to just continue is, you know, a culture of work ethic.
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You know, coach heaps, um, if you know him or have heard of him, and that is the, that's the hardest working dude in the business, you know, and one of my first days working for him he said you know, I believe luck is a four-letter word, spelled W-O-R-K, and I find the harder I work, the luckier I get.
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And man, that's just been kind of the staple of our program.
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And being uncommon, you know, that's the phrase that he kind of coined a decade ago at Russell, and man like I don't have enough pride to just eliminate it from our program.
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Man, we do, we want to be uncommon in everything that we do, and that goes from coaches all the way down to seventh graders and the parents within our program and it's a family-type feel.
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I mean, Russellville is a very, very tight-knit community and so part of that continued success comes from, you know, our younger athletes who are.
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Success comes from.
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You know our younger athletes who are, you know, third, fourth, fifth grade sitting in that stadium watching.
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You know the baseball team dogpile after, you know, winning the state championship and they want to continue that and they want to be a part of it.
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And it's like for such a small town, small community, it feels like, you know, that's the center of the universe from February to May and all hands are on deck.
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But yeah, I really believe.
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You know Coach Sheets, Coach Stanley, those two guys a decade ago came to Russell and you know those two things work and being uncommon in everything you do it starts in the classroom, you know, and then it's supposed to be when you enter the baseball stadium.
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You enter the facility every day at two o'clock.
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You're going to be uncommon.
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You know the common thing to do is go through your pre-throwing arm care routine just mediocre, you know that's what most high school programs are doing, but not us.
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You know we take an extreme level of pride in the smallest of details, you know, from pre-throwing to catch play, to not just taking ground balls but how we take those ground balls.
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You know like we preach that perfection, footwork, we're going to be on time, it's just.
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That was the precedent Coach Heaps established and, man, it's been able to continue because everyone's bought in.
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You know, like you can't sit there and say, well, one person is responsible for all of this.
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No, one person is responsible for getting total buy-in from an entire community.
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You know, and same with me, Like I've been very, very blessed to be around people like coach johnson, uh coach heaps and uh coach stanley, who, you know, inspired me to, in essence, be uncommon, um, and kind of want to follow in their footsteps and feel their shoes well in your what is the most important trait to have as a head coach in order to be successful.
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Is it the uncommon part, or is there something more that you looked at?
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Man, I feel like I look at it and it's not just one thing For me, it's two.
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You know it's, yes, that being uncommon.
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You know outworking everyone and and in baseball we all know that.
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You know we spend a lot of hours at the park.
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There's just no way around it.
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We do, but how intentional are those hours spent?
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You know, like I said, from the time that we exit the locker room and go into the arm care room prior to our throwing program, at what level are you executing?
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I know what type of day we're going to have when I can hear a pin drop.
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You know, while we're doing our free throwing, it's like they're locked in.
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You know time to go.
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Now we're going to take an extreme level of pride in our throwing program, defense, offense man, our scrimmages, um.
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So for me, yeah, that's, that's a huge piece of it.
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Um, I think for me, probably the foundation of being successful as a head coach and in my opinion and I'm young and it may change um, just humility, uh, man, being being humble, like being humble, being okay with admitting that you're wrong and maybe you don't do as good of a job at certain things as other people, but you empower those that do, or you, you listen to your assistant coaches ideas, you listen to your players conversations, um, and just don't let your ego get in the way.
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Um, and that's a.
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That's a really hard thing to do when you're sitting in the captain's chair and, uh, it boils down to winners or losses.
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Like you can, it's really easy to to get caught up in that world where I feel directly responsible for how successful we are.
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Yet if my ego gets in the way of that, then I could potentially prevent our team from reaching their fullest potential.
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You know like, for me, 30 years old, head coach at Russell High School is the greatest honor that you know.
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It makes me emotional saying those things to you.
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It is, it's an.
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I'm so blessed, but the thing that I think I'm so blessed with is being around those people.
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You know, like I referenced, coach Johnson, coach Heaps, coach Stanley, heck, all my heck, all the staff that I work alongside.
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Man, I've just been very, very fortunate and I think I had a vision of what I wanted this to be and I stepped out, you know, from an assistance role with Coach Heaps and Coach Stanley to go on my own as a 25 year old and man.
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You know, it was just like I got the blueprint.
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I know how, man, I know how to win championships.
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I've seen it done and boy did I come to a rude awakening.
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It's like, all right, sit down and evaluate.
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Success leaves clues and you've been around arguably the most successful people in your state, in your profession.
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So how can you blend the things that made them successful with what you bring to the table and how can you, you know, build off of feedback from those around you?
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So I would probably say that's to me, the two key components of being successful.
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Well, coaching today's athlete is different from what it was when I grew up.
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I'm an older guy.
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I grew up in the 80s.
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Talk about your coaching style and what advice.
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Since you're 30, I consider to be still a fairly young coach.
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Yes, sir.
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What would your advice be to a veteran coach who has that it's my way or the highway coaching style?
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Right, man, I think you know number one.
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I tell people all the time it is different now, no matter you know how much you want to argue and say it's not, it is.
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It's just an entirely different world that we live in.
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Even you know, when I was a senior in high school playing for Coach Johnson 12 years ago.
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It's completely different and he'll tell you I'm completely different from you know, as a player then in 2012, as the kind of kid he's coaching now.
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But again, I say this, like with today's athlete, and I think that's probably one of my strong suits and I fall short a lot, but one of my strong suits is just being able to connect with my players, and I think a lot of that has to do with the age.
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And so I tell it's not so much, you can't coach today's athlete hard, it's, you have to earn the right to coach them hard.
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Um, with that being said, like there's just so many avenues of information out there that like if you tell a kid one thing, hitting he's going to be like well, I saw on TikTok, you know teacher man talked about snapping the barrel and it's like why should I listen to you and not him?
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And it's all about that connection, that you're able to build that level of trust with today's athlete.
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And then you have to be really, really, really intentional.
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To do that.
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Um, and I think that's really hard with being a head coach is because you're responsible for so many things.
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You're responsible for the practice plan, you're responsible for knowing who's doing what, when and where and establishing that, the fundraising, the communicating with the parents, the bus rides, the scheduling, and the list goes.
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Being a janitor, the field head, field crew guy, like there's just so many things that go into it.
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And you have to be really, really intentional with your conversations with your players.
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You know you pre-practice, you know those times before we walk in the armchair room, am I going around talking to guys?
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You know, and I'm not just saying the kids today.
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They know the superficial, you know, versus authentic conversation.
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Like, do I show them that I genuinely care about them as a human?
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They have to know that, man, I have their best interest at heart and I think, if we were to just hash it out, the reality is the difference between old school and new school coaching is basically that statement where you know I play really, really bad and we'd get beat.
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And Coach Johnson, you know, have a colorful conversation after and I'll never forget, always like my parents asking me you know what Coach Johnson say.
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You know nothing.
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You know I would never, ever, ever dare to.
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And it's just different now.
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You know like the kids are going home and they're saying everything you're saying and we know you know, being in this world, you know you're going to make pretty much everybody upset at some point in time because baseball there's, you know, nine spots and we got 30 plus kids on roster and man, you're going to upset those people and it's just part of it because they love their child.
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But when your child goes home and talks about how much they love you whenever they're not playing, you know, then I think you've won.
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So for me it would just be really being really, really, really intentional with learning who your players are, showing a genuine care for them as a human first, you know, not just a baseball player, but as a student you know, in their relationships, their friendships, dealing with things with their parents, just showing that you genuinely care, building that bridge of trust so that when they get on TikTok later that night and see some hidden guru talk about drill work, they don't come back and, just you know, debunk you To me.
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That's how it translates.
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Right?
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Well, this kind of leads into my next question.
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You know, what would you tell yourself as a high school player based on your experience as a college player and a coach?
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Now that you know, if you look back at your 16- 17-year-old self, what would you go back and say to you know, know, if you look back at your 16 17 year old self, what would you go back and say to you know, make you probably a better player yeah, man, you're asking all the questions, giving me emotional.
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I got chills, you know, thinking about telling my my younger self um, man, I would say is just be good with that sacrifice, like, be good with being different, you know, and it makes me again, I get a little emotional thinking about it.
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It's just how much this game means to me, and it's not just being successful, it's just the process that baseball requires you know, like you have to put in the work and it still it may not reward you Like it still may not and it doesn't guarantee you success.
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And I saw a video, you know, years ago where a guy had said, you know, his pro ball career didn't go how he wanted to and he kind of crashed and burned and then he reset and basically said you know I'm going to do everything I can.
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And so if I could go back and tell myself that is like be okay with being different, you know, your friends in the summer, they're all you know, they're going to go to the lake and you know they're going to go whatever.
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But like, don't, don't let that fear of missing out Keep you away from your dreams.
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And also just the failure associated with baseball.
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Like, had a really good high school career, was a highly recruited college athlete and just and in my opinion, crashed and burned in my college career.
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Um, and a lot of it, was my response to failure.
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Um, that process changed for me, you know.
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I went from a really really hard worker that was, um, you know, sold out to that process.
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I was good with making that sacrifice.
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I was good.
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You know, my friends always used to say, like, oh, the streetlights are on, jess is going, you know he's going home you know, like, um and no, he's not going to be here this summer, he's going to be in who knows where across the earth.
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And I experienced a little bit more challenging times in college and then failed.
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And so if I could go tell myself that man, just like, do the work, keep sacrificing.
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You know, the most beautiful things come out of that struggle, like the thing that you can't do really well right now.
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You know, which, for me, was the offensive side of the game.
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You know I was.
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I could have some, I had some quality at bats.
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You know I was a good team player, but I wasn't going to hit for high average, I wasn't going to hit for power.
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Um, but man, I let that failure kind of deter me from conquering that.
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And so if I can go back and tell myself, you know, at a younger age is like that struggle you don't see it now, it's something that you know is really, really in your head.
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But if you just grind through it like, find somebody around you that you trust and will go to the ends of the earth for you, walk on to them and go to work, man, so yeah, that would be, that would be what I would say to 16, 17 year old Jess what I would say to 16, 17-year-old Jess.
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Well, is there anything specific where, maybe at the college level, where you're like you just wasn't getting it done and you were failing and you were like how can I turn this into a positive?
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Is there something that happened where you're like, okay, I'm not getting it done, but I changed this and it x happened.
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So I went in.
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I was always, um, I was a catcher and I was kind of your, your, your defensive guy.
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You know, we all know those it feels like with catchers you get one or the other.
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You know you got a hitter, that, whatever, and then you got a catcher, that, whatever offensively.
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But I think in high school, you know, I proved that I was kind of equal out, but I would say a little bit heavier on the catching ability side, you know.
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So then I went into college, my freshman year, and it was just like you know, first day of VP, I'm seeing guys, you know, 75% swings backside, 375, you know, just effortless, and I'm like dude that takes everything I got.
00:24:17.867 --> 00:24:19.412
Hey, you know, and I might not still do it.
00:24:19.412 --> 00:24:23.833
And so I started, you know, getting a little overwhelmed, thinking I wasn't.
00:24:23.833 --> 00:24:25.477
You know where I was.
00:24:25.477 --> 00:24:52.636
My confidence took a hit and ultimately, you know where I was, my confidence took a hit and ultimately, you know, my freshman year resulted in me being our starting catcher at Central Alabama Community College to losing my spot and us winning the National Championship and me being in the bullpen, and so, man, that was like one of the best things that ever happened to me, looking back on it, it was like I had it.
00:24:52.636 --> 00:24:56.532
I blew it but had we not won it?
00:24:56.532 --> 00:25:02.654
And I got to learn how to be a teammate and fight through that struggle.
00:25:02.654 --> 00:25:06.244
It just lit me on fire, you know.
00:25:06.244 --> 00:25:37.454
So I returned back my sophomore season and this was before the transfer portal was a thing, but there was still some embarrassment following my freshman year, as high level of a recruit as I was, and I thought I was going to go JUCO and then just play one year and go sign a professional contract to you know, catching bullpens in the national championship game and again going back to why that was.
00:25:37.454 --> 00:25:42.476
The best thing that ever happened to me was just it lit me on fire, you know.
00:25:43.366 --> 00:25:46.996
I came back home and I asked one of our assistant coaches, coach Hunter Vick.
00:25:46.996 --> 00:25:50.944
I came back home and I asked one of our assistant coaches, coach Hunter Vick.
00:25:50.944 --> 00:25:55.210
He's the head baseball coach at Chattahoochee Valley in Phoenix City, alabama.
00:25:55.210 --> 00:25:58.602
I asked him, you know, at the time, like, is there any league that you know I can go play in?
00:25:58.602 --> 00:26:01.865
And he said let me, you know, make some phone calls.
00:26:01.865 --> 00:26:06.449
And I ended up going to Outer Banks, north Carolina, and, man, I lived.
00:26:06.449 --> 00:26:07.252
It was awesome.
00:26:07.252 --> 00:26:12.796
I was so fortunate I was on a condo on the beach but I had, you know, 24-7 gym access.
00:26:12.796 --> 00:26:14.592
I had cage access.
00:26:14.592 --> 00:26:19.195
You know, outer Banks, there's a lot of dunes.
00:26:19.305 --> 00:26:24.471
So, with that being said, man, I just blocked out the world and I went to work.
00:26:24.471 --> 00:26:30.732
I said, you know, like we may not win another national championship, but I'm not going to blow it, I'm not going to do that again.
00:26:30.732 --> 00:26:40.569
I'm coming back, even though there was some temptation to transfer because of that embarrassment, you know, it was like, just, I was whatever.
00:26:40.569 --> 00:26:43.738
No, I'm coming back and I'm going to be the guy.
00:26:43.738 --> 00:27:02.719
And so, you know, just left the state of Alabama and drove, you know, twelve hundred miles away and Live in Outer Banks for that summer, and just went to work, you know, spent my early mornings running those sand dunes and then headed to the gym and then headed to the field until we played.
00:27:02.719 --> 00:27:04.000
You know the 7 pm start.
00:27:05.586 --> 00:27:12.476
And so then, you know, coming back my sophomore season, it was like, yeah, juco, you get a fall season in alabama.
00:27:12.476 --> 00:27:19.640
Man, I got that first offer from, uh, the university of north alabama and I was like I don't even need to know how much money, what.
00:27:19.640 --> 00:27:33.594
Yeah, I'm, I'm committed, you know, like I'm in um, because it's just that humility, man, man, you, just you learn to take baseball with a grain of salt and your ego can't get in the way.
00:27:33.594 --> 00:27:40.635
You know, I thought I was this player but I just, for whatever reason, I let some circumstances prevent me from being that.
00:27:40.635 --> 00:28:10.094
But, man, I think that was one of the things I'm most individually proud of was just that failure, that embarrassment, but then you know, fighting my tail off through it, where a lot of people didn't know the embarrassment I was experiencing, you know, individually, and getting that offer and opportunity to go play beyond junior college, for an opportunity to go play beyond junior college.
00:28:11.214 --> 00:28:15.538
Well, it just shows that hard work pays off, and you did that.
00:28:15.538 --> 00:28:17.800
Well, let me switch it up a little bit here.
00:28:17.800 --> 00:28:25.097
And the College World Series just happened.
00:28:25.097 --> 00:28:34.184
What's your take on Coach Schlossnagel leaving Texas a&m the next day after almost winning a national championship and it just absolutely blown up on the internet?
00:28:35.006 --> 00:28:36.048
yeah, man, it's, it's.
00:28:36.048 --> 00:28:43.548
It's sad, um one, I'm never gonna fault another coach for bettering him himself or his family.
00:28:43.548 --> 00:28:51.626
You know, um, but the, the myth, the method of execution in that transition was handled poorly in my opinion.
00:28:51.626 --> 00:29:07.689
Um and I, it's easy for us to sit here and and say that behind the computer screen, but we we haven't sat and lost the college world series and had a reporter right off the rip look you in the eye and say are you leaving?
00:29:07.689 --> 00:29:17.125
I couldn't imagine just that stress and how you would respond.
00:29:17.125 --> 00:29:18.046
So I feel for him in a way.
00:29:18.066 --> 00:29:33.017
But that doesn't change my mind on you know, hey, I'm all for people bettering themselves and their families, and sometimes in our profession you have to do those uncomfortable things, their families, and sometimes in our profession you have to do those uncomfortable things and it feels like you're not being loyal to people and it's it's a lot deeper than that.
00:29:33.017 --> 00:29:39.741
But you didn't, you didn't have to go so far as to say the things that you said.
00:29:39.741 --> 00:29:43.332
You could have just been a little more vague, man, you know what I mean.
00:29:43.332 --> 00:29:46.086
Just been a little more vague and you'd call it a little less heat.
00:29:46.086 --> 00:29:49.933
So well, travel baseball travel baseball.
00:29:50.414 --> 00:29:51.416
Is it big in Alabama?
00:29:52.038 --> 00:29:53.000
Yes, sir, absolutely.
00:29:53.852 --> 00:29:54.904
So it's like that everywhere.
00:29:54.904 --> 00:30:11.554
Let me ask you this what can be done to make it a more positive experience for players, coaches, parents, umpires and you know, and even making it more affordable?
00:30:11.554 --> 00:30:16.210
What would you do if you could step in and say, all right, this is how it's going to be run?
00:30:17.705 --> 00:30:21.876
The question is, the key ticket to me is the affordable piece.
00:30:21.876 --> 00:30:22.906
You know it's.
00:30:22.906 --> 00:30:26.095
There's a lot of powers that be that.
00:30:26.095 --> 00:30:26.717
You know.
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