Sideline Sessions

Ross Romano: [00:00:00] Welcome in everybody to Sideline Sessions on the Be Podcast Network. It is, as always, a pleasure to have you with us. Thanks for joining us. for this conversation. It's going to touch on a lot of topics. We'll talk [00:01:00] about the sport of baseball. We'll talk about scouting and coaching at the college level and a variety of other things that are relevant to coaches, to student athletes, to those of you who are involved in the world of athletics.

My guest today is Claudio Reilsono. Claudio is the general manager and a professional baseball scout with the Global Scouting Bureau, as well as the head baseball coach at Carnegie Mellon University. Carnegie Mellon has had its most successful seasons, including a couple of conference championships. With Claudio as the coach, he is now the all time leader in wins at the university.

And as a professional scout, Claudio has assisted in professional player signings all over the world. And he was named to that general manager role of the Global Scouting Bureau in 2002. Claudio, thanks for being here.

Claudio Reilsono: Thank you so much for having me, Ross. I appreciate it. Looking forward to this. Thank you.

Ross Romano: Yeah, there's so much to cover here. And we'll see how much of it we can get to. You've had a great career, but I wanted to start at the beginning You know, you went right into coaching at age [00:02:00] 18. How did that happen? You know, what was your playing experience? How did you determine you wanted to go into that?

Tell us about how that came together.

Claudio Reilsono: Well it all started August 19th, 1973. I was eight years old. Now, you got to remember, my mom and dad were from Italy. They were boxing fans and soccer fans, so I really wasn't introduced to baseball at all. But my uncle worked at Three River Stadium, which is where the Pirates and the Steelers used to play.

So on August 19th of 73, I was eight years old. He took me to my first pirate game. So I still remember to this day, driving up to that stadium. To me, it was just unbelievably beautiful stadium. And I still think it's a beautiful stadium. I still have little statuettes around my house and pictures all over the place.

Then we went inside and he took me to where he worked, which was called the Allegheny Club. He was a general manager of, it was a. Restaurant, fancy restaurant inside the stadium where you could watch a ballgame. [00:03:00] So he takes me downstairs in the locker room and I'm seeing a lot of pirate players in this bright white uniform and mustard pirate hat.

They're joking around, they're saying hello to me, and I didn't know who they were. And I remember going out onto the field, there's a ramp that would go in the field, and it was about 10 30 in the morning and all you saw was the ground crew and me and 58, 000 seats. empty stadium, right? So something was going on with me that I just really enjoyed where I was.

And this is before the game even started. Then watched the game and on my way home, I don't know, my dad asked me, did you have a good time? And I said, I did, but I know what I want to do with the rest of my life. And he said, what's that? I want to be in professional baseball. That's all I said. And he very simply said, okay, if that's what you want, I'll give you the opportunity to make your dreams come true.

And he gave me a hug, and my mom said, yeah, if that's what you want to do we'll be there for you. Whatever you need, we'll do for you. We'll [00:04:00] give you every opportunity. And she gave kiss. And I look back at that moment, Ross, since I was an eight year old kid, they could have said yeah, and kind of pushed me aside.

But they didn't. Right away, without any hesitation, they said, okay, what can we do to help you, right? And not to jump too far down the road, but I would not have the career or the life that I'm having if it wasn't for my parents. And there's an old Italian saying, if you ever see a turtle on top of a fence post he didn't get there alone. So let's get that out of the way for sure that my parents, but so I started to play and I, that was pretty good. You know, I had a blessed with a good arm. I could hit. Kind of a flashy fielder. Then I had obviously pro aspirations. I had two tryouts. I was a little hurt on both of them. The third one, I was completely healthy, worked incredibly hard.

My dad used to hit me fly balls. I used to go to my old elementary school and put rocks on the [00:05:00] asphalt and get a lacrosse ball, throw it against the wall, work on my glove hand transition. I'd go to the batting cages and hit, hit, hit, hit, hit. I go to a field and I get a 13 pound weight, throw it, pick it up, throw it.

Then I would run with ankle weights. I mean, I was ready. So I get to the pirate trip. It was a pirate tryout. And they, first thing they do is they time you in the 60 yard dash and they want seven Oh and under. And I always ran six, nine, eight at best seven Oh that ballpark. So they tell me to run, so I'm running and I can never forget about halfway through.

I'm going as fast as I can and I can see my fist bumping. I can literally see my fist bumping like a movie, slow motion, Chariots of Fire or whatever, going like this, right? And during this run, I'm saying to myself, is this an 80 or dash? So then I crossed the finish line. To this day, I don't even know what I got, but I [00:06:00] know it wasn't good.

So then I said, well they put me they want to test your arm next. So they put me in right field. Fine. Cause that's the furthest throw. So, as I said, I was blessed with a very good arm, good mechanics, accurate for the most part, but first ball they threw to me, I lined up perfectly, threw it as hard as I could, felt good, two bounces to third base, and I still remember, I went like this, right, just instinctively went like that, second throw, three bounces, I'm just saying what's going on here, I said this to myself, third throw, I think it's still rolling, and that was years ago.

So then I said, okay, I'll, I'm a really good hitter. I'll show them how well I can hit. Well, they never, I never got to that that that far. They announced everybody who was going to go to the next round and I wasn't one of them. So I was in the outfield with my sitting on the ground, my legs crossed and I was smiling and I have no idea [00:07:00] why I was smiling, but I knew my career, my playing career was done.

Now on top of that, I had some things on me. Number one, the, self imposed pressure of making my parents proud of me and happy. And this was our dream, right? But then the other side of it was, I had some people in my life, Ross, that were not very nice. They were not supportive. They wanted to see me fail.

And they told me so, flat out. It's we you're gonna fail, you're gonna be a failure, you're gonna be selling pencils, when you go to this your class reunion, people are gonna laugh at you, it's time to grow up, quit baseball, be a man, be realistic, it's a pipe dream, constant, constant, constant, constant, constant, and my parents used to fight for me and they'd get mad at these people and I never said anything back because for some reason I cared for these people, they were family, and I wanted to make them proud of me too.

[00:08:00] But then after a while, it became using your worst enemy to be your best ally. They motivated me. But this was constant, constant beating, constant beating. You know, and of course I had that I'll show you attitude. Well, here I was, I failed. Now I gotta go tell my parents that I'm done and have those other people laugh at me and say, we told you so.

Well, I had five years of being an assistant volunteer at my old high school. At Quaker Valley High School here in Pittsburgh, outside of Pittsburgh. And the head coach was a friend of mine, rich Wa, Nicki, and he said, why don't you just, stay with me as a coach? Well, no story short, he got into an accident, which he was okay, but he needed an operation.

So at age 23, I be, I became head coach, middle high school. I got that coaching, but, and I always liked coaching, but I wanted to play first. But I was done with that that was a little long in the tooth. So here I was 23 years old head coach, my old high school. And then from there I'm sure we'll get [00:09:00] to it, but went to onto some other schools and some championships and so on and so forth.

But that's how I get into coaching.

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Ross Romano: Yeah. You know, there's a lot there's a lot in that answer. One of the pieces I'll pull out for comment is yeah I just we're recording this like right after Father's Day weekend and I was just up in a game this weekend and Baltimore, and it was it was my Father's Day gift and my team lost.

But I went with a friend of mine and he said. I hope you still enjoyed it. And I said, Hey like it's a beautiful day at the ballpark. But what's the what's not to enjoy? And, so I can relate to that feeling of being happy, even when things haven't totally gone your way when you're around the game, right?

But also I'm curious how, and I'm sure this has evolved over the years because you got into coaching so young, you had 40 years of experience at this point, but those experiences you had I always kind of simplify it by [00:10:00] breaking it down with athletes. Like there's athletes whose primary motivation comes from either prove them wrong or prove them right.

Athletes who really the best way to motivate them is to question them and tell them what they can't do. And they want to show you what they can. And then others who. You know, you want to show them you believe in them and that's, that brings out their best but everybody's different. And that as a coach, I'm sure that requires you to kind of tap into different mindsets and different athletes and figure out what, what works best for them, but also that piece of, okay, it's easy for the critics. say, oh, well, you failed, right? But the fact is you had to put yourself out there in the first place. You had to be willing to go there and give it a shot and try. And that's another thing when it comes to motivating the athletes on your team and to try to, if you want to get as far as you can possibly go, [00:11:00] eventually.

You will fail. Everybody does. Even the greatest players of all time, at some point in their career, right, they get to the point where they can no longer perform, and everybody at every level, you have, if you want to keep growing, you eventually get to the level that's beyond your reach. Is it? Whether that's a factor of time, or talent or just circumstances, right?

It's just the day when you needed to perform your best, you weren't at your best, and then that but in order to even try or even to find out how far you can go, you have to be willing to put yourself out there and say, I'm giving it that effort. So I'm just wondering how those experiences that you had, you were fortunate to have early on, and then you were fortunate to get into coaching not long after, how That all has continued to maybe play a part in your coaching career and in the way you relate to the athletes on your teams.

Claudio Reilsono: That's a great question. [00:12:00] And when you said that about having a bad day, Hall of Fame boxer Sugar Ray Leonard, after a fight, he said, I picked a bad day to have a bad day. And that's what I did. But for two weeks I was like out of it. What am I going to do? What am I going to do? So then I slid over to the coaching and.

And then from there, obviously the scouting and coaching, but what I did was basically my whole coaching philosophy or style is, and I got this line from Dick Vermeule, the Super Bowl winning coach of the St. Louis Rams, he said, your players and your people won't care how much you know until they know how much you care.

Some of my players know that I care. I also know they're going to make mistakes. All I ask for is respect, consideration, loyalty, and give the program everything that you have. That's it. So, but I think all my life experiences, and I tell them at the beginning of the season I've been through it all.

And if I haven't been through it all, I know somebody who did go through it, that maybe I helped with that issue. So I'm there for you on the field and off the field. But [00:13:00] basically hopefully I'll answer your question that it was basically not giving up. Okay. Not, getting knocked down, getting up, fall down 6 times, get upset.

And going right back at it, because as you said, you're going to fail and some people. Like in the boxing world, I do some things in boxing. Sherry Ray Leonard, I mentioned him, he lost to Roberto Duran in the first fight. Six months later, he fought him again. He said, I want to fight him as soon as possible to beat him, and he did.

That was the famous no moss fight. Some fighters, after a loss, they disappear. They just disappear. They don't retire for two years and come back. Not necessarily retire, they just don't fight for two years. You know, I'm the type that, okay, the coaching didn't work out, gave myself two weeks. I mean, the playing didn't work out.

That went after it in, in coaching, but I also tell my players for the pro side, that was the goal all along. It took years to get, make that dream come [00:14:00] true. I had to be patient. I had to endure 130 some odd rejection letters, and maybe to answer your question a little bit more, I was asked to do a speech in January, and they said, can you.

put your entire career in a box. I said, wow. And it just hit me. The word top, t o p, top. I had to be tough. I had to overcome. I had to be persistent. I had to pray. And I did. I did those things. And there were certain things that happened in my life slash career that had to be tough, that I had to overcome.

I had to persevere. And obviously always pray. So, but that's what I did. So I tell my players, that it's not going to be easy. You know, it wasn't a steady climb. You know, there's a, there's an amusement park here in Pittsburgh called Kennywood. They should name a ride after me, a rollercoaster ride, because it's been up I was climbing the ladder, got to Division One college as an assistant, disappeared for two years, [00:15:00] went to Quigley Catholic High School as an assistant head coach, which was a very small school, but loved coaching there.

If I made 800 a year there, then I got my pro job, then I got the Carnegie Mellon job. So it's been up and down, but I tell my players, like, if we're down in a game, we got them where we want them. This is who we are. We like coming from behind. You know, let's do something that we can tell our grandkids about make a big comeback.

And that's kind of what I've done in my career. You know, I was written off many times. And it was scary. It was scary, but I kept at it, and you know, instead of being buried, I was planted. There's the old story about the guy who his donkey fell, or his horse or donkey, fell in the water well, and he couldn't get him out.

He tried to get him out, tried to get him out, couldn't do it. So he said, I'm going to bury him. So he started throwing dirt on there, and every shovel full of [00:16:00] dirt, the donkey shook it off. Shook it off, and the dirt piled up and he was able to get out of the well. And that's what I did.

And that's what I tried to tell my player in life, not just baseball. I used of expression, just like Sylvester Stallone used Rocky as a vehicle of expression. He just couldn't say, okay, everybody don't give up in life. See you later. No. He used Apollo Creed and Mr. T and the Russian. And, all the characters as problems in life and what you do with those problems and and there are times we all want to quit, including me, but I didn't.

And you just you have to have a reason for going after it. And I had a few reasons, my parents, and then the people who were against me. Now it's for my family. I'm married and I have a 23 year old daughter. So, I just kept at it. And there's, I always say there's nothing special about me. I just persevered and and I tell my team that during a game, I'll tell them things to not give up and and stories.

But one quick story our [00:17:00] championship team the following year, man, I thought we were going to really kill it because we had a bunch of seniors. We got off to a terrible start for like two and six, something like that. It was just a bad start. I remember telling my guys, I said, look, we have to win eight games in a row to make playoffs.

And one of my players kind of looked, geez, it's going to be tough. How are we going to do that? And I said, the old man, the young boy asked the old man, how do you achieve success in life? The old man said, well, by eating an elephant. And the young boy said, well, how do you eat an elephant? The old man said, one bite at a time.

So I told my team one bite at a time. Now that team, we didn't win eight. We went like six. But after every huddle, we would break the huddle. Some teams say wins, some teams say runs, or they say their team name. Our guys said elephants. That's when you know you got a special team. But so again, I try to, my experiences that I have in life, I transfer it, or even in the game, [00:18:00] transfer them over to my team for game situations, or life situations.

Because, finally, if I tell, if all I do for my players is tell them how to hit a fastball, throw a fastball, and catch one, I didn't do my job. And I told you about a young man who lives out your way that I coached, love him to death. He called me last year, and he was having some things going on at work, and he said, Coach, I thought about you and what you said.

I said, What's that? about the elephant, eat it one bite at a time. So hopefully what I say sticks with

Ross Romano: yeah, and then I'm curious also how the perspective that you're able to have as a coach and working with these players over a long period of time, right, and seeing through the ups and the downs If there's ways where you're able to, I'm sure that your coaching influences what you do with scouting and vice versa, right?

And part of it [00:19:00] being like in this scouting piece, you oftentimes only have a very limited window. And the more you do it, the more you know what to look for, right? And you're looking for things beyond the results of what happens that day. But even there's very good players who, sometimes look totally lost.

You might see him on a day and just, your conclusion is I don't know what to make of this. Or also from that coaching and from that playing perspective of of that that perseverance through that roller coaster that you mentioned of one of the things that I say to people when I'm doing, performance coaching just for their career and other areas is like, you reserve the right to make a different decision based on new information to change your mind in the future.

If you're. Doing one thing and you think that's what you're meant to do. And then at a certain point, you think something different or you have new information, you choose, it doesn't mean you failed at that thing. It means that you just kept getting smarter and that could [00:20:00] apply to this where, there's it's, Not the most common story, but there's plenty of stories, right, of players who were drafted by a team, or signed by a team, and they were released, and maybe they were released by another team, and maybe they spent a number of years bouncing around independently, and then all of a sudden they show up somewhere else, and they make a name for themselves.

And we say, well, how did everybody miss this? And often it's, well, they didn't necessarily miss it. This, the player that they saw was not the player that this guy got better and he improved. Sometimes it's okay. He had a bad month here and that team got but oftentimes it's okay.

This person believed in what they were doing, persevered and committed to improving and didn't just say, Everybody. Nobody's. Given me a shot, it said, okay, what do I need to do to get where I wanna be? But anyway, I just curious how you, in the different roles that you're in, right? You get totally [00:21:00] different ways of seeing individuals where the players on your team, you might.

Coach them for four years and know them really well and understand those ups and downs. Player you're scouting, you might see them one time. But yeah, it all contributes to your knowledge of the game, your knowledge of who can potentially be successful. And just curious your thoughts on how those different pieces influence one another.

Claudio Reilsono: it. But when you were saying all that, the person that came to mind was Kurt Warner, the St. Louis Rams Hall of Fame quarterback. He was cut by Green Bay, a couple other teams, and he hit it with the Rams. What did they miss that the Rams did? Well, maybe he matured, maybe he got a little bit better through all his hard work.

But as a scout it is hard. People, it's easy to see a stunt. and what he can do on the field. For example, there's some players out there that are, there's one particular player that's coming to [00:22:00] mind who's in the major leagues who is a stud and a half. He's got a cannon, he can run, he's big, he can hit for power, but he makes a lot of fundamental mistakes and he's not hitting anywhere near as well as he should.

So a local writer said that this guy is a great. tryout camp guy, like game time, not so much. And he's right, because like whenever we have camps, you'll see guys who can flat out, they do everything that a scout wants them to do. He can run the 60, and 6'6 6'7 He has a canner for an arm. He can hit. But come game time, eh, something happens.

Jim Leland, the new Hall of Fame manager formerly of the Pirates, Marlins, Rockies, and Tigers, once said, I want the players who are good after the national anthem, not before. Okay? So, as a scout, you have to say to yourself, okay. [00:23:00] And it is hard. Nowadays, it's different because they do the analytics. I don't deal with that.

I look at the physicality of a player. And really, to be honest with you, Russ, all the hitters and the fielders, all the pitchers I've seen all these years, It doesn't take me long if somebody is a pretender or a contender, as they say, and how far he can go. It's a guess, but I have a pretty good grasp on his ability, if he has the hand speed or the proper mechanics or the want how bad does he want it.

On a fly ball, they used to say Joe DiMaggio never made a great catch, because he always ran to the spot, okay? You can, like, you can tell, like, I have somebody in my mind for an outfield. Andy Van Slyke was the perfect outfielder. played I grade that player against him. Not that I expect him to be better than him, but at least you have something to compare it to. So it's my job to see, has this player hit a wall? Is he going to get [00:24:00] better? Or the numbers he has put up, is it against so so competition? Okay. So there's a myriad of things that you look at, but at the end of the day, it has to be with your eye and your gut, which I do think is not as It's not out there as much as it used to be.

Now everything is in analytics. He's got a 24 50 spin ratio, exit velocity of 110, and so on and so forth. Well, that's fine, but how many times is he going to get that exit velocity or that spin ratio? Or somebody's hitting 210, right? Why is he hitting 210? And can we fix him? Can he hit 280? You know, so there's all kind of things to play.

I did a really great project last August with a company that I'm involved with called Draft Nation. They wanted me to evaluate players through a scout's eyes and then go to the studio and evaluate them through a coach's eyes. Scout just dictates what he sees. If he's flying, if he's flying, if he's losing power, if [00:25:00] he's, if he doesn't have a whole lot of power, you have to dictate this is why he's not, he doesn't have any power.

He didn't say why he. What he can do to fix it, just that he's opening up. You can say that. Or as a pitcher he's throwing hard, doesn't have command of his pitches, and he's all over the place. So now you know he's wild. But as a coach, okay, why is he wild? Most likely, he's hitting when he's throwing.

He's throwing because he has to, not because he wants to. Why is Ross not hitting with power when he's 6'2 6'3 And he's, well, he's probably flying open, bat drops and drags, he pulls off the ball. That's why he doesn't have any power. Or maybe he's seeing the ball late. There's a bunch of things. So you do separate the scout, evaluates.

And that's it. a coach, you evaluate, and, can we fix him? And that's what, that's how we do it.

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Ross Romano: How does all that [00:26:00] relate to where you place your emphasis on recruiting versus development when you're and how does that, and at the level where you're coaching, how does all that play into obviously decisions you're making about the athletes you want in your program. And then there's considerations beyond talent when it comes to the culture and what you want your team to be comprised on.

And then also your, There's a certain amount of projection or your knowledge and belief in your staff of, okay, here's the things we know we can help players improve at, right? So how do balance those things when you're making those determinations and when you're considering how you're building your program?

Claudio Reilsono: First thing I get asked all the time, and again I'm separating the scout, the professional scouting, and Carnegie Mellon, but yet I'm joining them together. I get asked all the time, what kind of player do you want on your team? And it's the same answer as for the pro. I want somebody who can play, [00:27:00] who's not an idiot.

That's number one. I want good people. Period. End of story. I've seen some bad people who can play. I don't want nothing to do with number one. Number two, as far as CMU is concerned, it's a different ballgame there because, pardon the pun, because for me to go recruit, and it's only 13 percent acceptance rate, basically, I get what I get, make the best of it.

That's it. I get the best. I get whatever I get, and I try to make the best of it. I try to, fix them or develop them, as you said. That's it. Now on the scouting side, there are some people who are, there's one particular player who's in the Pirate Minor League system who's been getting a little attention.

He's good, but there are some things that they're going to need to do to fix him up. Will they? I don't know. I could fix them up in a quarter of a second. I know exactly what's wrong with him, but he's getting away with it now the minors, but is he going to get away with it when the pitch is 103 miles an hour or 101 miles an [00:28:00] hour?

You see what I'm saying? So, you can scout somebody, not recruit and pro it's scouting in college, it's recruiting, but you can recruit or scout somebody and you can say okay, he's plenty of room to improve and all he has to do is X, Y, and Z and he'll be a stud and a half. Okay, there's somebody on the pirates, O'Neal Cruz, I think he's 6'3 6'4 he has it all, but at times he struggles.

He could be fixed where he could be. A stud and a half. Will they fix them? I don't know. And it's a minor adjustment. Offensively, I'm talking about. Minor adjustment. I don't know if they'll do it or not. But so as a coach you're evaluating and at the same time you say to yourself, hopefully you're a good enough coach that you can fix them.

and make him better. Now, Hunter Pence, former San Francisco Giant, did everything wrong, but he's a really good player. So you know what you do? You leave him alone. You don't say a word to him. And I don't care what anybody does. Their hitting style, whatever, or pitching [00:29:00] style, doesn't matter. If it works, if it doesn't work, then I have to come in and try to fix it, and not do things my way.

But fix him to the point where he's good or better than he was. There is no my way. I mean, there's some things that I adhere to that all hitters have to adhere to, but I don't make them robots because they're not robots. So,

Ross Romano: right. Yeah. That one size fits all approach is a fast track to nowhere. What are there certain skills that. you have learned are with the right coaching that most players can improve them or develop them versus others that are harder to develop if it's not part of your natural profile.

Claudio Reilsono: Joe Namath is my favorite quarterback. One of my favorite athletes, if not my favorite athlete, but he said something that I didn't agree with. He said, great quarterbacks are made not born. I don't agree with that. You have to have X amount of ability. [00:30:00] You just have to. Joe Namath, for example, they talk about his quick release.

Yes, that was given to him, but he had a cannon for an arm. Dan Marino or Clemente or Dave Parker, they had, you're born with that arm. You can teach somebody all the mechanics you want. If you don't have that arm that you're born with, I don't care what you can lift all day long, doesn't matter.

You have to have, you have to be blessed and born with X amount of ability. Now when it comes to hitting, Okay, I feel that I'm very, very, very, very good when it comes to teaching hitting, seeing in a hole, seeing a hole in a hitter's swing and fixing it. But in my opinion, unfortunately, the way hitting is taught today is brutal.

You know, you see all this stepping and starting and put your foot down sooner, let the ball travel deep, hit the lower half of the ball to create backspin. Launch angle, uppercut, open up, [00:31:00] use your hips. Oh my God, it's terrible. Terrible. The pitching, people say, oh, the pitching is phenomenal. The pitching is okay, they're throwing it harder than, but are they pitching?

Eh. When I was growing up, there were pitchers. Guys who you talk about going to a Baltimore Oriole game, Jim Palmer was one of my favorites, the most beautiful pitcher ever he was a good looking guy, but his beautiful motion, oh my god, he was great he had, he was a pitcher, Tom Seaver threw hard too, but he was a pitcher, and listening to Tom Seaver talk about the art of pitching was just beautiful, nowadays, throw as hard as you can for five innings, makes it in a few wrinkled pitches, And let's get out of here and bring the bullpen in, but the hitters are making the pitchers that much better with the uppercutting or the hit, hit the lower half of the ball to create backspin or let the ball travel deep.

It's ridiculous. Hit baseball has been ruined by those thoughts [00:32:00] of teachings and philosophies, in my opinion. That's why you see more strikeouts than you see hits. And you look at a batting average of a first, second place team. 210, 215, 244, 213, 275, 210. What? When I was counted, I'll be 60 in October.

Half of those guys would have been gone. You know, batting 210, 215. So the game has changed, but I think you have to be born with X amount of ability. You have to be born with speed. Now you can have, like for example, when you steal a base, some people, I knew this one particular major leaguer was incredibly fast.

He's older now, but he was incredibly fast. When he would lead, he'd go like this. And sometimes he'd be on this leg too long and he'd take off. Or he'd have a hitch in his slide. But he was fast. Now you can fix those things. Or a hitter flying open, or pulling off the ball, or dragging his hands, or [00:33:00] whatever. You can fix those things. But you have to be born with X amount of ability. You have to be born with some speed. Has to be, he has to be born with that arm twitch and that arm or the hand eye coordination. That's just the way it is. And you have to be born with X amount of ability. Then you can have a coach hone those skills, help you hone those skills.

Ross Romano: Yeah. Do you have advice for, for high school athletes who maybe are interested in playing in college and are thinking about what are coaches looking for? I mean, I Clearly, I would say from your perspective, teachability is a big piece of it and wanting to improve and being able to listen to the coach and get better.

But are there other things that those athletes beyond their on field success and their talent can demonstrate to show a college coach that they're serious about wanting to be part of a program?

Claudio Reilsono: Well, when you talk to a coach, talk to him. Give him your give. [00:34:00] Paint a picture of who you are. Don't stumble and mumble around. Put your head down and or be cocky or arrogant or distant. Show him that you're a good person. Show him that you're going to work hard. This is off the field stuff, okay? Paint a picture of yourself.

Be respectful. On the field, get dirty. Work hard, play hard. An old scout. He's not old, but he's been around a long time. John Mercurio used to be with the Pirate Science Affiliate. One time he told me years ago, what can you hang your hat on a player? Does he have a big arm? Is he a power hitter? Is he hit for an average?

Can he run? So, develop some skill or two that a scout can hang his hat on. If I tell you Jim Palmer, well, beautiful athlete with a high fastball, strike a lot of people out. Reggie Jackson, Power, With an Arm, Who Could Run in His Day, Dave Parker, Five Tool Player, Power, Batting Average, Arm, Glove, [00:35:00] Speed. But some guys didn't have five tools.

Some have two. Own those two. Work on, just work on your game. And again, be a good person, but I would say when you're introducing yourself to a coach, be respectful. Be someone that he wants on his team, that he looks forward to seeing every day. I tell my players, I don't want you to look at your watch and say, Oh, man, I got practice.

I got to see Claudio. Nor do I want to say it about you. You know, give me all you have, work hard, and and coaches will appreciate that. And on the pro side, there are certain numbers that you have to hit as a right handed pitcher, lefty, so on and so forth. So that's obviously harder. But at the end of the day, Ross, it's just, you have to be born with X amount of ability.

Number two, you have to work hard and you have to be good at what you do. And third, you have to be a good person for me, anyway, and I will not sign an idiot, like I said, but that's pretty much what I look for as an outfielder, you look for somebody who has a good first jump and a good arm, [00:36:00] infielder, good first jump, soft hands, good arm, accurate arm, hitter, I look for someone who can hit for a high average, who doesn't have a lot of holes in his, that's what I look for, somebody who has Either a couple or no holes in his swing.

Hopefully no holes in the swing. And so that's what I look for. Well,

Ross Romano: Yeah. And I think you touched on something that I believe has come up a couple of times on this show, but it certainly has come up in other conversations that I talk about and other in all areas of performance, which is there's a lot of emphasis all the time put on us to strengthen our weaknesses.

And to a certain point, that's important, but also spend some time strengthening your strengths, know the things that you're good at, and continue to get better at those. And when you're talking about what are those skills you can hang your head on, right? Those things that you can be indisputably good at, which even in a lot [00:37:00] of sports goes all the way up to the pro levels, right?

When they talk about. Drafting a pro basketball player, it's, does this guy have one pro skill? Right? What, can they rebound? Can they play defense? Can they shoot a three pointer? What, if you can do one to two things at a high level, you can have a role. And yes, if you're one of those five tool players.

Sure, great. But but also almost every area, whether it's pitching, whether it's hitting it's not a, this, the skills are interrelated, right? Getting better at something might mean getting worse at another thing. You talked about the low batting averages, well that and a lot of that is the emphasis on a lot of players trying to hit for power, where some of them If you're not naturally a power hitter and you focused more on contact, you might, yeah, you're giving up something in one area, but it might improve your overall profile.

Pitchers, right? Velocity versus [00:38:00] control different pitches they throw, all those types of things, holding on base runners, fielding your position, right? The more you try to put more pressure on yourself to get better at something that might not necessarily be your strength. You might end up actually getting worse at the thing you're good at.

And so it's a balance, right? Because none of you don't want athletes who just are okay with their weaknesses or just. You know, do what they do and don't try to, but it's strategic to say, all right, what can I improve that is going to make me better overall versus saying, okay, well, there's this profile of what a player has to be and everybody cares about this skill, this skill, and this skill, and I need to do those.

And then it also becomes incumbent on the coaches, of course, to have the confidence to do that. To do things a little differently and say, look, we are, we're not [00:39:00] competing with, if it's we don't have the money that this other team has. If it's college, we're not recruiting from the same talent base.

We need to develop a team that wins differently because we, if we're just trying to do the same thing as everybody else, we're not going to match up, but we can go about it a different way. But that takes confidence and a little bit of guts to to say, look. We have to do it differently and some people might not agree because it's not in vogue it's not the current strategy, but that's how we are going to be successful.

Claudio Reilsono: that's the problem in my opinion with baseball for sure. It's a copycat league. Like years ago when the sixth inning for the starters started, it was Oakland A's. Tony La Russa had older pitchers, so he had them go five, six innings, and he had Gene Nelson and Honeycutt, Rick Honeycutt. as the setup, and he had a guy named Dennis Eckersley as the closer.

And the Yankees did it with Wetland and Mariano Rivera and just a bunch of [00:40:00] different players, and they were able to do it. But then other teams started doing it, but they didn't have the same horses that the Yankees and Oakland did it, and it bombed. If you have, if you don't have a good bullpen, but you have a very good starting pitching lineup, let the starter pitching go as far as possible.

But they don't do that, and that's that's not good in my opinion. But something else you said that I wanted to hit on and I forgot what it was, but you definitely can't put a blanket on everybody. Everybody's different, players are different teams are different. Oh, yeah, I know what I was going to say as a coach.

And I learned this from Bill Walsh, the Hall of Fame coach from the 49ers, he said, I try to put, he picked up an old running back. I forgot what it was. We put him in position to succeed. For example, if I have a kid who's 6'3 6'4 235 pounds, Heavy, but slow. He's a power hitter. I'm not going to steal him because I'm putting him in a position to fail. Okay, so I don't steal him. I'm only going to put him in a position to succeed. Probably face or [00:41:00] DH and have him do it. I want them to kill the ball. Swing like me or just don't mess up your mechanics. You know, I want line drives. No holes in your swing. Hit tall fields. I don't want the opposing coach when you come up to say we can pitch him inside, outside, low, high. I want you to be able to hit all pitches and that comes from practice.

But again, it all starts with you have to have X amount of God given ability to start it off with. then you can hone those skills and become better.

Ross Romano: Yeah. So as we're kind of, before we wrap up, wanted to touch on a couple other pieces. One is Just kind of, I mean, I think it's your leadership philosophy. You have a book, Lead from the Heart Up, Not the Neck Up. I'd love to hear where that comes from, what that means to you, and how that how that guides your leadership philosophy.

Claudio Reilsono: My mom used to say never speak from the neck up, speak from the heart up. In other words, be what you say, care about what you say, be passionate. And my players know that I'm there for them on the field and off. And I have been. They know they can come to [00:42:00] me for anything and I'll do whatever I can to help or give them the best advice I can possibly give them.

It's not, you're not just a player or a number. Okay, you mean something. When I wrote the book, I had several players. I said, write down whatever you want for the for the book or whatever. And I was blown away at the kind of things that they said about me and none of them really were baseball related.

They were life related. Which means a I got to them, right? So, basically Lee Lee from the heart out, not Nick. Again, my players, I'll get emotional. I'll get mad. Give him a hug or get mad, whatever the case is whatever the situation, that's what I am. And they know how I am. I've been blessed to have good players.

Not every single one of them likes me. Maybe I didn't like every single one either, but let's coexist and that didn't happen much just in the past couple of weeks. I've heard from players who just had babies. That means a lot to me. One of my best friends is somebody who I coached back in 1988. So I just try to.[00:43:00]

I'm not fake with them. I showed them that I do care and that's and I'll say this. What's the purpose of that? It was on my birthday. We're playing. This is a story in the book. We, if we win this game, we're going to have the most wins ever at CMU baseball. And I really wanted that for this team, but it was my birthday.

They wanted to win it for my birthday. So it was kind of back and forth. So we were losing 8 0. So I heard guys on the bench say, Man, we gotta win this game. We gotta win this game for Coach's birthday. We made a Fantastic comeback to tie it up, right? Last inning we tie it up. So I have something that a coach normally doesn't have time to do and that's think because they're making a pitching change.

So I remember I called the guy who got the game time double Brett said, Brett, come here. You're the game when you run, but you got me. If it's going to left field, I'm going to send you because he has no arm center fielder. There's water [00:44:00] out there. You're going to get a bad jump, not a good arm. I'm sending you. But if it goes to right field, Brett, Don't go home. Stay here. We have the meat of our order up.

Don't go. Stay here. Do you hear me? Yeah, coach. I got you. Brett, I'm not kidding you. The ball goes right field. Just stop here at third base. Don't move. I got it, coach. Okay. All right. So he goes back to second. I said, Brett, what'd I do? All right. All right. You know, well, the balls hit to right field. What do I do?

What do I do? I send them. I just told him four or five times not to go. And I sent him. He was thrown out by a mile. Well, why did I send him? I got caught up in emotion. I just did. And I'll never forget. He was thrown out by a mile. And I told my guys, Hey, yeah, get out of this. I saw the one kid, Jon Coons, pick up his glove and his hat.

These are our pitches. Don't worry, coach, we'll get you. Our center fielder, James Langhauser. Don't worry, we'll get him. Well, we didn't. We lost. We lost the game. [00:45:00] So, as is custom, we went down the left field line, and I wear sunglasses when I coach, and I had my hands on my knees, and my head down like this, and my sunglasses were catching my tears, told the guys, I'm sorry, you guys worked so hard to make this huge comeback, and I blew it, and I'm sorry, and I didn't even look at them, I'm looking at the ground.

And my pitcher said, Coach, if I wouldn't have given up so many runs, we'd have won the game. My catcher, Brian Tobias, said, Coach, if I'd have gotten a hit with the bases loaded, we'd have won the game. My center fielder said, if I'd have gotten to that ball, which there was no way he could have gotten to that ball, he was a great player.

They were blaming themselves. Now if I were not good with those guys, If when they made a mistake, I just browbeated them, or I was arrogant with them, or aloof with them, or mean to them, or disrespectful to them, or when they made a mistake, just like I said, browbeat them. When I made a [00:46:00] mistake, maybe they wouldn't have said anything, but they just said, look at him, good for him, let him suffer.

You see what I'm saying? So my players, I, and it all started for me in 93, I remember one time it was a back and forth game and we win the game and players were coming up to me and hugging me and congratulating me and it was just a regular season game and I'll never forget when I was in my locker, I said, why is it all these years and including this team, it was 93, why is it that they listen to me?

Why is it that they like me? Why is it that they play hard for me? And a couple of words came to my mind. I'm approachable. And I care. Now, does that mean that I let them lock 'em? Mean hell no. I'll snap on a player I have when needed. You know, if it's cold out, I'll wear a jacket. It's a hundred degrees out.

How stupid would I look if I wore a heavy coat, right? If it's sun, it's hot out, I'll wear shorts and a T-shirt. If it's cold, I wear a jacket. If a, if it calls to [00:47:00] be. Nice? I'm nice. If it calls to be a little stern, I'm stern. If it calls me to get mad, I'll get mad. If it calls for me to be more understanding, I'm more understanding.

So whatever that's how I am. I'm not going to, like you said, be a one size fits all. I'm not going to be mad all the time. You know, I'm demonstrative when I coach. I'm very passionate. But my players know that I care and that I'll do whatever I can to help them on the field and off. And it's worked.

Ross Romano: Well, Claudio you also do a bunch of other things, speaking, executive coaching, etc. Where can our listeners, if they're interested in learning more, I know you have your website, anything in particular you want to point out or folks can check out? Excellent.

Claudio Reilsono: Well, I wrote a book, as you said, Lead from the Heart Up, Not the Neck Up, How to Create a Positive Winning Culture on the Field in the office. I think it's a very good book for anyone in the leadership role, not just sports, anyone. I've had CEOs tell me that it's helped them, and that meant a lot to me. I do some speaking.

I'm going to be doing more to some schools, which I'm very excited about. Somebody who's very important to me, Jim Valveno, used to say [00:48:00] his favorite word in the English dictionary was the word impact. And so many people including him have had impact in my life. So I just did a speech the other day and apparently it went over pretty good and I want to impact people with my stories and my client and the good things, the hard things, the sad things that I went through and how I got through them.

So I do some speaking and I'm a boxing TV boxing show. We have a TV boxing show called the boxing authorities. With Luther Dupree Jr. and Smoker Jim Frazier, two wonderful guys, you can check that out. Best way, go on keepboxingfree. com you can watch it there, or Luther's YouTube channel, Steel City Luke, it's a great show.

I also co host of that, of a show called Steel City Sports World with Jim and Luther, but you can check it out on those stations as well. And then I host my own podcast, The Claudio Rossano Show, where I've interviewed Sports legends like Mario Andretti Rocky Blyer Ken Griffey Sr., Roman Gabriel, who [00:49:00] unfortunately passed.

I can go on and on. Sean Stellato this week. He's the agent that went viral over the winter. Great, great guy. Vinny Pazienza Jerry Cooney. I can go on and just a lot of great names. And then I also am a co host of a show called Italian Impact Weekly. Oh, my show, you can go to ClaudioRalsona.

com. And also you can get my book there and get me for speaking. And then the other show is Italian Impact Weekly with Steve Mancini and myself. We interview some names in the Italian world also successful businessmen and women. And so I enjoy doing the shows and the speaking and the coaching and the scouting and I enjoy doing all of it.

Ross Romano: Well, listeners, we'll put the link below to ClaudioRalstono. com. You can go there and learn about a lot of this. We'll also have more information in the bio. where you can see about these different shows if you're happen to be in the Pittsburgh area, maybe you already know about this. But for everybody else out there, you can check all of that out [00:50:00] online learn about the book or anything else that benefits you.

So check that out, please do. And also if you have not already, please do subscribe to Sideline Sessions. We'd love to have you joining us. weekly here as we bring you episodes, conversations with coaches from across the sporting landscape. And we'll continue to tap into a lot of different sports here, a lot of different coaching backgrounds.

If you have something you'd like to hear us talk about, send us a note. And we can certainly work on that for you, but bpodcast. network to learn about all of our shows. Claudio, thanks again for being here.

Claudio Reilsono: Thank you. And I'd love to have you on one of our shows if you are interested. We'd love to have you on.

Ross Romano: Would love to.

Claudio Reilsono: All right. Thank

Ross Romano: Thank you.