Baseball Update

There have been a few changes to J's fall baseball plans, so I figured I'd update.  Sadly,  Coach C is not going to be able to do a fall session with TP due to his college schedule.  He's assured me he plans to be back next summer though, and I am holding him to that promise!  We also found out that J's high school will not be having a fall team due to having no coaches at the moment.  So he's playing fall ball with a local Little League.  To say this team is different from TP may well be the understatement of the year.   It is a mixed junior/senior level team, which means ages from 13-16.  J is not only the oldest player on the team, he's also the biggest.  Our biggest concern is that he keep playing to the best of his abilities and not get lazy with the slower pace of this league compared to tournament ball.  On the other hand, it is an opportunity for him to step into a leadership role, which he did at tonight's practice by helping some of the younger players when they struggled with things. 

In the meantime, Coach C has set up an extensive training program for J to help him bulk up, get stronger, and improve his game.  Starting Monday, he'll be following a pretty intense eating program designed to help him gain lean muscle.  Three days a week he'll be doing a lifting program.  Two days a week he'll be doing a core program. He'll be doing a running program two days a week as well.  He is also currently in the swim season for his high school team, and swims five days a week.  Most importantly, he is working hard in his school classes, maintaining a fairly high GPA.  I'll be sending Coach C weekly progress reports and he'll tweak the program as needed as J goes along. It's going to be a brutal schedule that is going to require a lot of pre-planning to make it work.     

Why is he doing all of this you might wonder?  As I've mentioned before, baseball is J's dream and this is just part of the hard work that he will have to endure to make that dream a reality.  For him, the pay off at the end will be worth every minute of hard work that he puts in.