In today's episode, Coach Kara and our Warriors interviewed Skylar Wallace, a professional softball player for the AUSL's Chicago Bandits and the Japan Diamond Softball League, as well as a three-time All-American, NFCA National Player of the Year, and three-time All-SEC First Team selection at the University of Florida. She opens up about self-talk, the transfer decision that changed everything, and why the six inches between your ears matters more than anything else on the field.

Episode Highlights:

• The importance of embracing pressure as a privilege
• The ANTs framework — how to identify and squish automatic negative thoughts 
• Why surrounding yourself with the right five people is one of the most important decisions you will ever make as an athlete
• Why being terrible at basketball made her a better softball player
• Why self-talk is not something you master once

Connect with Skylar:

IG: @skylar.wallace

Ready to join Fearless Warriors and train the mental game?
See details below or message us the word WARRIOR on our social channels.

https://www.skool.com/fearlesswarriors/about

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

We are so excited to share this mentorship call with Jocelyn Erickson, a University of Florida alum, two-time Rawlings Gold Glove Award winner, 2024 NFCA National Player of the Year, SEC Player of the Year, and now a professional player for the Chicago Bandits She sat down with Coach Kara and our Warriors for a raw, honest conversation about visualization, identity, team culture, and what it really means to get over yourself and play for something bigger.

Episode Highlights:

• Getting hyper-specific in visualization practice is exactly what prepares you for big game moments
• Why thinking about your teammates instead of yourself actually makes you perform better
• The ACL and double meniscus injury that sidelined her for almost a full year, and why she says she is grateful it happened
• How surrounding yourself with the right people is the fastest way through the hardest seasons of your career
• The one thing she would tell her younger self about time, presence, and never taking a practice for granted

Connect with Jocelyn:

IG: @joceyerickson

Ready to join Fearless Warriors and train the mental game?
See details below or message us the word WARRIOR on our social channels.

https://www.skool.com/fearlesswarriors/about

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

Welcome back to our Cool Careers in Sports series! Susan Forbes is a recruiting advisor, life coaching certified consultant, and host of the number one volleyball recruiting podcast, the NXTVB Podcast. With over a decade of experience, she has built a career around one powerful idea: athletes should be in the driver's seat of their recruiting journey, and the right program wants who they actually are and not who they think they need to be.

Episode Highlights:

• Why trying to be who you think coaches want you to be is one of the fastest ways to end up at the wrong program
• The "world's best peach" analogy that will completely change how your athlete thinks about rejection in recruiting
• How optimal performance states connect directly to recruiting 
• Why NIL is not just about money and how athletes are already building bridges to life after sport 
• Her one piece of advice: your success is inevitable as long as you do not give up

Connect with Susan:

IG: @hey.susank

Podcast: NXTVB Podcast

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

Welcome back to our Cool Careers in Sports series! In this week's episode, I interviewed Matt Woods, who is part of the Motor Preferences Experts team, the first and only performance company in the US specializing in a science-backed system based on an athlete's unique, natural movement patterns. If you have seen the colored tape on catchers' chest protectors at college games, or spotted those side-by-side mechanical case studies on social media, that is Motor Preferences in action.

Episode Highlights:

• The aerial vs. terrestrial framework and how two completely different pitchers can produce elite results with the same pitching coach
• Why the mental flow state and physical Motor Preferences are more connected than most coaches and parents realize
• How finding your natural movement profile gives athletes their battery back and frees up mental energy for what actually matters
• Why the best cue is the one the athlete comes up with themselves and what that means for coaches and parents
• Why separating your identity as an athlete from your identity as a person was the mindset shift that changed everything for Matt

Connect with Matt and Motor Preferences Experts:

Website: motorpreferencesexperts.com

IG: @motorpreferencesexperts

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

Welcome back to our Cool Careers in Sports series! Hana DeGuzman served Team Fearless from 2021-2025 and is now serving as a Certified Mental Performance Consultant at Premier Sport with the Minnesota Twins. In this episode, Hana unveils what it actually takes to build a career in sports psychology, the difference between mental health and mental performance, and why open-mindedness is the superpower that changed the entire direction of her life.

Episode Highlights:

• The real difference between mental health counseling and mental performance coaching 
• Why athletes do not have to wait until something is wrong to seek out either
• Why motivational self-talk alone is not enough, and what instructional self-talk actually sounds like in the moment
• How she discovered sports psychology as a junior in college by simply Googling how to be a better softball player
• The leadership lesson she learned her senior year that she still thinks about as a coach and practitioner today

Connect with Hana:

IG: hana_deguzman

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hanadeguzman/

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

Welcome back to our Cool Careers in Sports series! This week, I interviewed Kaylee Dellert, the Softball Marketing Manager at Rawlings Sporting Goods, where she manages marketing for both Rawlings Softball and Easton Fastpitch. She gives us the inside scoop on what it really takes to build a brand voice that an entire community loves, how she noticed a gap as an intern and ran with it, and why the hardest season of her career was also the most important one.

Episode Highlights:

• What a week in the life actually looks like when the World Series, AUSL season, and major bat launches all hit at the same time
• The story behind building distinct brand personas for Rawlings and Easton 
• What it is like designing signature gear with pros like Jocelyn Alo and Kenzie Hansen and bringing their personal brands to life
• Why her toughest year in college, with no teammates and no road map, was the direct reason she landed her dream job
• Her real advice on connections, never burning bridges, and why the softball world is smaller than you think

Connect with Kaylee:

IG: @kaylee_dellert

You can also follow the brands she leads:

Rawlings Softball: @rawlingssb

Easton Fastpitch: @eastonfastpitch

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

We are diving into another episode of our Cool Careers in Sports series! This week, Savanna Collins, Senior Reporter for the AUSL, pulls back the curtain on what it really takes to build a career in sports media. She shares why failing and putting yourself out there with smaller opportunities is exactly what prepares you to shine on the biggest stage.

Episode Highlights:

• How being a coach's kid and a weather girl in fourth grade put her on a path she never had to second-guess
• Why she said yes to the smaller and unpaid opportunities
• The mindset shift of not taking yourself too seriously 
• What pro softball looks like in five to ten years and why expansion is priority number one
• Her best advice for any young person who wants to start right now without waiting for permission

Connect with Savanna:

IG: @savvyco

Website: https://www.savannacollins.com/

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

This episode features one of the most decorated and dynamic voices in softball today, Nicole Mendes. A two-time national champion and three-time WCWS All-Tournament Team selection at Oklahoma, Olympic athlete with Team Mexico at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, and now a softball analyst for ESPN, Nicole is proof that the mental tools you build on the field will follow you everywhere you go in life.


Episode Highlights:

• What being homeschooled and practicing alone taught her about self-motivation and discipline
• The moment Patty Gasso told her to relax, and why it still took years for that lesson to actually sink in
• How the Olympics impacted her mental game
• The mental technique she uses to stay neutral after mistakes 
• How one phone call to Amanda Scarbrough launched her ESPN career

Connect with Nicole:

IG: @nicole_mendes__

Ready to join Fearless Warriors and train the mental game?
See details below or message us the word WARRIOR on our social channels.

https://www.skool.com/fearlesswarriors/about

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

In this week’s episode, we break it down with Jade Hewitt, Director of Photography for Athletes Unlimited and the AUSL. Jade works exclusively in women's sports and made history as the first official photographer for a Topps trading card deck featuring all professional female athletes.

In this episode, Jade unveils what it takes to build a career behind the lens in professional softball, why the mental game of photography mirrors everything we teach our athletes, and why she believes it is cool to care deeply about something and just go for it.

Episode Highlights:

• A full day in the life of the AUSL Director of Photography 
• How playing the game made her a better photographer and why anticipating the play is everything
• The mental battle of imposter syndrome and comparison
• The physical cheat sheet she keeps in her camera bag to reset her mindset
• How to find your passion first and then adapt it to a career in sports

Connect with Jade:

IG: @jadehewittmedia

Website: https://www.jadehewittmedia.com

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching
  
  
  

Welcome to our brand new series on Cool Careers in Sports! Karis Hudgins is a student sports broadcast director at UNC Greensboro, where she directs live ESPN+ productions for Spartan Sports Network, and recently went viral for giving the world a behind the scenes look at what it actually takes to call a live college softball game. In this episode, Karis pulls back the curtain on the mental load, the fast decisions, and the relentless live pressure that goes into every broadcast — and how she landed a gig with the Savannah Bananas straight from an Instagram DM.

Episode Highlights:

• What a sports broadcast director actually does and why the mental load is way bigger than it looks
• How Karis went from taking photos at a soccer game to directing live ESPN+ productions as a student
• What it was like to work a Savannah Bananas game with 12 cameras and two directors in her ear at the same time
• Why the failure reset routine she uses in live broadcast is exactly what we teach our athletes on the field
• The reality of being a young female in a male-dominated field and how she is changing that
• How she landed a Savannah Bananas contract straight from an Instagram reel
• Her best advice for any young person curious about a career in sports media

Viral Reel behind the scenes: https://www.instagram.com/p/DW7sYtYgN6z/  

Connect with Karis:

IG: @veggies.and.books

More ways to work with Fearless Warrior

• Learn about our proven Mental Skills Program, The Fearless Warrior Program
• Book a One on One Session for your Athlete
• Book a Mental Skills Workshop for your Team or Organization

Follow us on Social Media

• Facebook @fearlesswarriors.org
• Instagram @fearlesswarrior
• Instagram @fearless.coach.ab
• X @CoachAB_
• YouTube @fearlesswarriorcoaching