Welcome to the #RaisingAthletes podcast, we are excited to share with you our conversation with a passionate coach and leader who wants to help parents and their baseball athletes fall in love with the game as he did as a young boy.
Justin Sherman was born and raised in Westchester, NY, where he played high school and college baseball. It was while he captained the Purchase College Panthers that realized he had such a love for the game he wanted to get into coaching. He started as an assistant for the Panthers and then started working with athletes individually. This entrepreneur saw a need from parents for support and directions for their athletes and JustinTime Baseball was born.
Justin shares his passion and wisdom with us on this week’s episode. We know you’ll feel it as well and learn from him as he helps parents and kids grow the game.
Robert Icart is the Founder and Executive Director of BTI, a boy’s basketball club which has trained elite athletes including: Gilbert Arenas, Casey Jacobsen, D’Andre Bell and even one of Susie’s four sons, Luke Walton. Robert created BTI back in 1997 and strives to showcase Southern California’s top student athletes who are interested in pursuing playing basketball in college at any level. BTI has connections with schools at the DI, DII, DII and NAIA levels.
We had fun speaking with Robert about how things have shifted during COVID-19 and how recruiting is changing coming out the other side. Full disclosure, my older son, CJ, played for BTI and. my middle child, Parker, is also playing for them. I love recommending them to any who are passionate about the game and think their son may be interested in continuing on after school. Not only do they focus on the fundamentals of the game, they also stress the academic importance and the opportunities that can come from working hard not only on the court, but in the classroom and in the community.
Coach Ballgame has the unique ability to rally young players and draw them into the game. By combining the levity of props, jokes, and nicknames, he connects with the kids to help grow the sport of baseball.
If you’re a parent and especially if you’re a parent who coaches youth sports, this episode is filled with wonderful insights about what it means to help kids fall in love with something that they may be passionate about for a lifetime.
This week on the #RaisingAthletes Podcast, we are excited to have United States Navy SEAL veteran, Jason Booher on. While he is currently the leader of the management consulting firm, Northwest Harbor Solutions, Booher served 23 years as a commander in the SEALS, leading teams in everything from basic SEAL training, i.e., BUD/S to commanding hundreds of combat operations as well as driving integration of cross-functional intelligence teams. He currently serves as an advisor to the local Southern California public sector as well as at the most senior levels of U.S. Congress, professional teams including the LA Dodgers and at RedBull High Performance, as well as is a guest lecturer at Harvard and MIT on Leadership.
Jason's life experience as a leader in one of the US military's most exclusive and rigorous branches makes him the perfect person to talk to when we want to know more about raising resilient, gritty, hard-working kids. He shares some incredible insights which are completely transferrable to the coaching/playing world for how to build peak performance teams! (Hint: it starts with accountability from within.)
Wait, You Can Get Paid to Do That?!
Today's guest #RaisingAthletes is D'Wayne Edwards, the Founder of Pensole Footwear Design Company and the former Creative Director of Brand Jordan. When D'Wayne was a young boy growing up in inner city Los Angeles, he had a passion for two things: Hoops & Drawing. When the hoop dreams faded at 17, he was able to turn his passion for drawing into a lifelong career, first at one of the Sports Industry's premier brands, Brand Jordan/Nike and later creating his own footwear design school.
Parents, we want our kids to have passion for their sports because of all the lessons they will learn along the way, but ultimately, we want them to find a life path that will not only feed their passion but also fuel their dreams.
