Joining us on the ABCA Podcast this week are the Walking Tall Movement founders Dr. Vanetta LaRosa, Todd Blyleven and Chris Maliszewski. The Walking Tall Movement was born out of tragic events with Todd being involved in the Las Vegas shooting and Chris being involved in the Highland Park shooting. Their mission statement is “To inspire humanity to Walk Tall for those suffering with their mental health until they can Walk Tall on their own”. LaRosa is the founder of Helping Hands Children Services and received her Doctorate from SIU in Educational Psychology and Applied Behavior Analysis. Blyleven is the founder of the Scout Hub and was on the podcast with me in the Summer of 22’. Maliszewski played for and coached with me at the University of Iowa and now runs the Highland Park park district. My hope with this episode is to make it okay for people to open up and be vulnerable about their struggles during life’s journey. This is an open and honest conversation with the four of us. I hope that it helps someone out there be okay with reaching out when you are struggling or need help. The ABCA Podcast is presented by Netting Pros. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time, specializing in the design, fabrication and installation of custom netting for backstops, batting cages, dugouts, bp screens and ball carts. They also design and install digital graphic wall padding windscreen, turf, turf protectors, dugout benches, dugout cubbies and more.

The Walking Tall Movement

The ABCA Podcast runs the gamut of baseball coaching topics, from pitching, to hitting, to the mental game, practice planning, recruiting and more. It's hosted by Ryan Brownlee, longtime coach and current Assistant Executive Director of the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA). The ABCA is the primary professional organization for baseball coaches, with more than 15,000 members representing all 50 U.S. states and 41 countries. Since 1945, Association membership has broadened to include: NCAA Division I, II and III, NAIA, Junior College, Pacific Association Division, High School, Youth and Travel Baseball. Each January, the ABCA hosts the largest baseball convention in the world. Over 8,000 coaches participate in the convention, which is held at various locations around the country. The ABCA's official website is http://www.ABCA.org.

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Next up on the ABCA Podcast is Corona High School head coach, Andy Wise. Wise has led Corona to a historic season winning the USA Baseball NHSI and going undefeated in league play for the first time in school history. Corona is ranked #1 in most high school polls. Wise started his playing career for ABCA Hall of Famer Don Sneddon at Santa Ana CC before heading to Long Beach State to play for another legend in Dave Snow. Wise pitched on the 1993 Long Beach State College World Series team. After a brief stint in professional baseball, Wise started his coaching career with another ABCA Hall of Famer Dave Demarest at La Quinta High School. Wise took over the Corona program in 2009 after starting the program at Segerstrom Fundamental in 2006. Wise has built Corona into a nationally known program from a team that was 3-11 in league play the year before Wise showed up on campus. The ABCA Podcast is presented by Netting Pros. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time, specializing in the design, fabrication and installation of custom netting for backstops, batting cages, dugouts, bp screens and ball carts. They also design and install digital graphic wall padding windscreen, turf, turf protectors, dugout benches, dugout cubbies and more. Coaches: Let's talk about your new assistant: Rapsodo. With Rapsodo's products you can track everything from how fast a pitcher throws to a batter's spin rate off the bat. Rapsodo's pro-level data gives you the power to look deeper into every athlete's skills, helping them take their game to the next level. Whether you want the basic dat

Andy Wise - Head Coach, Corona HS

Next up on the ABCA Podcast we welcome members of our Travel Committee for an open forum on travel baseball. This is a look behind the curtain of the conversations we have at the ABCA convention and the Youth Summit in November. Rob Hahne, Blake Hibler, Taylor McCollough, Jeff Petty and Jordan Baltimore give us some great insights on what is going on currently in travel baseball. The ABCA Podcast is presented by Netting Pros. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time, specializing in the design, fabrication and installation of custom netting for backstops, batting cages, dugouts, bp screens and ball carts. They also design and install digital graphic wall padding windscreen, turf, turf protectors, dugout benches, dugout cubbies and more. Coaches: Let's talk about your new assistant: Rapsodo. With Rapsodo's products you can track everything from how fast a pitcher throws to a batter's spin rate off the bat. Rapsodo's pro-level data gives you the power to look deeper into every athlete's skills, helping them take their game to the next level. Whether you want the basic data points or a more advanced look at a player, Coaches can customize their dashboard to help identify strengths and weaknesses that the naked eye can't see. Turn the cage into a simulated field to make competition and practice more engaging. Take the guesswork out of coaching. From youth baseball to Major League Baseball, Rapsodo is used by thousands of colleges, facilities, and high schools to help their athletes train. Visit Rapsodo.com/baseball to check out their lineup of game-changing technology and how you can implement them into your program. Play On.

Open Forum for Travel Baseball

This week on the ABCA Podcast is Missoula Mavericks head coach, Brent Hathaway. Hathaway is one of the winningest coaches at any level with over 1500 wins in 40 years of coaching. Hathaway played collegiately at Gonzaga and UTEP for college coaching legend, Jim Lawler. After college Hathaway went to work as a civil engineer before figuring out coaching and teaching was his passion. Hathaway spent 30 years teaching math at Hellgate Middle School and took over the Mavericks AA program in 1993. Hathaway is the longest tenured Legion coach in Montana. The ABCA Podcast is presented by Netting Pros. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time, specializing in the design, fabrication and installation of custom netting for backstops, batting cages, dugouts, bp screens and ball carts. They also design and install digital graphic wall padding windscreen, turf, turf protectors, dugout benches, dugout cubbies and more. Coaches: Let's talk about your new assistant: Rapsodo. With Rapsodo's products you can track everything from how fast a pitcher throws to a batter's spin rate off the bat. Rapsodo's pro-level data gives you the power to look deeper into every athlete's skills, helping them take their game to the next level. Whether you want the basic data points or a more advanced look at a player, Coaches can customize their dashboard to help identify strengths and weaknesses that the naked eye can't see. Turn the cage into a simulated field to make competition and practice more engaging. Take the guesswork out of coaching. From youth baseball to Major League Baseball, Rapsodo is used by thousands of colleges, facilities, and high schools to help their athletes train. Visit Rapsodo.com/baseball to check out their lineup of game-changing technology and how you can implement t

Brent Hathaway - Head Coach, Missoula Mavericks

Next up on the ABCA Podcast is Program 15 Sports President, Jeremy Booth. Booth started his collegiate playing career at Cypress and New Mexico State. Booth went on to play professionally until the age of 30. Booth was a long time scout for the Mariners, Brewers and Twins. Booth now is the President of Baseball Operations for The New Balance Future Stars Series as well as a Baseball Analyst for CBS TV KHOU 11 in Houston and the Co-Host of the Extra Bases Podcast. This episode is a great example of the many paths we have in the Game of Baseball. The ABCA Podcast is presented by Netting Pros. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time, specializing in the design, fabrication and installation of custom netting for backstops, batting cages, dugouts, bp screens and ball carts. They also design and install digital graphic wall padding windscreen, turf, turf protectors, dugout benches, dugout cubbies and more. Coaches: Let's talk about your new assistant: Rapsodo. With Rapsodo's products you can track everything from how fast a pitcher throws to a batter's spin rate off the bat. Rapsodo's pro-level data gives you the power to look deeper into every athlete's skills, helping them take their game to the next level. Whether you want the basic data points or a more advanced look at a player, Coaches can customize their dashboard to help identify strengths and weaknesses that the naked eye can't see. Turn the cage into a simulated field to make competition and practice more engaging. Take the guesswork out of coaching. From youth baseball to Major League Baseball, Rapsodo is used by thousands of colleges, facilities, and high schools to help their athletes train. Visit Rapsodo.com/baseball to check out their lineup of game-changing technology and how you can implement them in

Jeremy Booth - President, Program 15 Sports

This week on the ABCA Podcast we welcome members of our Youth Committee for an open forum on youth baseball. This is a look behind the curtain of the conversations we have at the ABCA convention and the Youth Summit in November. Deven Morgan, Dan Keller, Paul Gallo, Jimmy Fillingeri, Jeff Sopha, Shon Plack, Jimmy Onate and David Klein give us some great ideas to help youth baseball in this one. Shoutout to everyone that listens to the ABCA Podcast. This is episode 400!!!! The ABCA Podcast is presented by Netting Pros. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time, specializing in the design, fabrication and installation of custom netting for backstops, batting cages, dugouts, bp screens and ball carts. They also design and install digital graphic wall padding windscreen, turf, turf protectors, dugout benches, dugout cubbies and more. Coaches: Let's talk about your new assistant: Rapsodo. With Rapsodo's products you can track everything from how fast a pitcher throws to a batter's spin rate off the bat. Rapsodo's pro-level data gives you the power to look deeper into every athlete's skills, helping them take their game to the next level. Whether you want the basic data points or a more advanced look at a player, Coaches can customize their dashboard to help identify strengths and weaknesses that the naked eye can't see. Turn the cage into a simulated field to make competition and practice more engaging. Take the guesswork out of coaching. From youth baseball to Major League Baseball, Rapsodo is used by thousands of colleges, facilities, and high schools to help their athletes train. Visit Rapsodo.com/baseball to check out their lineup of game-changing technology and how you can implement them into your program. Play On.

The Walking Tall Movement

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