We just got back from this which was fun (and it worked out so both girls could come):

https://www.mlb.com/news/jacks...ood-visit-petco-park

So far the adjustment is going well. He's very mature about the baseball part and still an 18 year old with everything else. Examples: 1. He asked us to buy him a pan for their residential hotel room (dude, you have your own money...go to Home Goods and drop $19 on a pan); 2. he met Blake Snell this weekend and talked to him for 20 minutes...75% of which was about whatever video game they both play; and 3. He "forgot" to tell us his hand x-rays came back clean for almost a day...but he did tell his sister who also didn't think it was worth mentioning. 

He's missed 5 games after taking two 95 mph fastballs (the one to the hand is the one that had him out). He came back for one game on Monday and aggravated it throwing someone out trying to leg a single into a double so he didn't play on Tuesday. So far, after 21 games, his BA is .318 with an OBPS of .825. He's playing all his innings at center which he loves. He wants to cut down on strike outs and increase multi-base hits but otherwise he's doing well. They have two more weeks and then they have a week off before fall instructs start.

Sweet! Holy God Paula, He is bigger than ken now.

And I do understand the 18 deal. Oblivious doesn't begin to describe it.

He should be buying u pans.

@Good Knight also made no attempt to grab the bill at dinner. LOL

Kenny, at 6'5", is definitely the little Dad now. James's base seems to be getting stronger too (I posted a link with pix below). I'm really interested to see what/how they work on him in instructs. He's also stolen 8 bases so it is going to be interesting to see if they work on strength to increase power or balance it with speed.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CTK93UZBsyw/

The rookie league is over and James is headed home for a few days before fall instructs. His final weekend: Turned 19. Hit another HR, grabbed a few more RBIs and got his OPS to 1.000. Not bad!

Impressive stuff.

@PTWood posted:

The rookie league is over and James is headed home for a few days before fall instructs. His final weekend is summarized . Turned 19. Hit another HR, grabbed a few more RBIs and got his OPS to 1.000. Not bad!

Nice, congrats. My guy is 1 day older, but a soph in college ;-).

This is a fantastic thread!  It is so nice to see good things happening to good people!

@nycdad posted:

Nice, congrats. My guy is 1 day older, but a soph in college ;-).

My guy is also 1 day older and a soph in college...... small world.  Sept 16th is the most common birthday in the US.

* oh and James numbers are sick

@Gunner Mack Jr. posted:

My guy is also 1 day older and a soph in college...... small world.  Sept 16th is the most common birthday in the US.

* oh and James numbers are sick

Is it? I know this changes, but for a while me and my ex-wife had the most and least common bdays.

Makes sense. He shares a birthday with my Mom. 😂

@Gunner Mack Jr. and @nycdad it’s crazy how each state has different age cut offs. For Maryland you have to be 5 by Sept 1 so the kid missed it by 16 days. We thought about petitioning him to start early but sitting still was not a thing in Sept of 2007! 😂

On September 26, I'll be ... older.  On September 27, my brother will ... be older.  One year and one day apart.  My parents were consistent.  LOL

Lots of holiday conceptions here. 

More conceiving holidays in the near future are certainly conceivable.

@smokeminside posted:

More conceiving holidays in the near future are certainly conceivable.

For some reason I am re-living this great movie in my head.

If he is home for a week, I hope you stocked the fridge. He is getting huge and still fast. Nice combo!

This just happened. Nice finish to the season. He got home yesterday. Went hitting with Dad today. Already destroyed his room. Also, love you guys but I have no desire to discuss conception in any way shape or form with you.

https://www.mlb.com/news/prosp...lb-pipeline-coverage

Here's the final Prospect Team of the Week

Wow! Just wow.

Thought I’d send a MiLB update. I just got back from picking the baby up at the airport. He was out in AZ for the first round of winter conditioning which was, in his words, surprisingly really good. They lifted/conditioned from 8-10 or 11 and then did baseball workouts (hitting, fielding,etc.). He said all of the international guys went home (except the Cubans who can’t go home) so it was Primarily US players as opposed to his Arizona League experience where at least half his teammates were native Spanish speakers. There were about 30 of them from all levels of the Padres minor league organization at the work outs.  There will most likely be another round in January. Over the three weeks out there, he put on 10 pounds, shaved off a body fat percentage and plans to get the percentage even lower now that he’s home with access to a full kitchen and can eat better. Not off to a good start as he ate all the leftovers in the fridge plus a smoothie when we got to the house from the airport (at 12:30am).

He asked to go to Dicks tomorrow to buy a football. His arm is one of his plus tools but they want him to throw a football to work on his release.

In talking to his friends with the Cubs, Angles and Mariners, each team does the winter very differently so his experience is not necessarily the standard as there is no standard.

Great to read this!

Football throwing seems to be the hot new training tool. Last spring the guys at Cressey were always outside throwing one.

Thanks for the update. Enjoy the holidays!

Tom House has encouraged throwing a football for decades. I was at the Padres spring training facility in the 80’s. House was the franchise, roving pitching instructor at the time. With all the footballs flying around I thought I was at a QB camp.

Tom House is a polarizing name in baseball, but I've got nothing but good things to say about him and his TPA organization. His stance and lectures on nutrition, arm care and rotational kinetics resinated with my son as a HS junior (probably because I wasn't involved) and I believe created a solid foundation for his current training methodologies.

@JucoDad posted:

Tom House is a polarizing name in baseball, but I've got nothing but good things to say about him and his TPA organization. His stance and lectures on nutrition, arm care and rotational kinetics resinated with my son as a HS junior (probably because I wasn't involved) and I believe created a solid foundation for his current training methodologies.

Im glad that House was able to help your son. However,  Im not a fan of his and he isnt held in high esteem in pitching circles in Texas. Personally, i think some of the things he promotes make sense and some don’t. But he is infamous for taking other peoples ideas and claiming them as his own and im never okay with that.

@adbono posted:

Im glad that House was able to help your son. However,  Im not a fan of his and he isnt held in high esteem in pitching circles in Texas. Personally, i think some of the things he promotes make sense and some don’t. But he is infamous for taking other peoples ideas and claiming them as his own and im never okay with that.

Hello Adbono, I’m not a coach or trainer, I’m a relatively informed parent who loves the game and is continuing to learn with a kid that is blessed to still be navigating the process.

In looking at your profile, I’m a Texas parent as well and given the length of your involvement in coaching kids we’ve likely met, or at least seen each other across the diamond (me being in the bleachers or behind my camera).

My son had a plus arm from the beginning, but as he got near 12U I felt that he was falling back toward the middle of his peer group in arm strength. I wasn’t worried, kids mature differently – young hard throwers don’t always end up as hard throwers post adolescence. At the end of his HS freshman season he started complaining about some minor discomfort in his forearm after throwing, he said more an annoyance than a big concern. However, like every other parent in this group I did the research and ultimately found someone to look at his mechanics. The coach was a former MLB pitcher and who also turned out to be a proponent of the Tom House methodologies – NPA (Had no clue about any of that at the time).  

This coach found some issues with Trev’s mechanics and kinetic chain, they adjusted and his velo picked up and any hint of discomfort was gone. That's all it took for my kid to buy in. He went to several House seminars (whenever he was in Houston), he never had another soft drink, cut most refined sugars out of his diet and started eating stuff I couldn’t bribe him to eat in the past. As a parent, I didn’t care where the motivation was coming from, I just loved the ownership.

He continued to work with this pitching coach through juco (never working on pitches, just kinetics and arm health) and the result of genetics, work and coaching culminated in a fb touching 97 and a scholarship at Arkansas. So, nothing but love for Tom House and his concepts coming from my experience.

This year Trev touched triple digits a few times and he now uses advanced kinetic baseline modeling to capture what’s right, so he can systemically adjust in the future, if required (not related to House or NPA). The processes and technologies move forward…  

@JucoDad posted:

Hello Adbono, I’m not a coach or trainer, I’m a relatively informed parent who loves the game and is continuing to learn with a kid that is blessed to still be navigating the process.

In looking at your profile, I’m a Texas parent as well and given the length of your involvement in coaching kids we’ve likely met, or at least seen each other across the diamond (me being in the bleachers or behind my camera).

My son had a plus arm from the beginning, but as he got near 12U I felt that he was falling back toward the middle of his peer group in arm strength. I wasn’t worried, kids mature differently – young hard throwers don’t always end up as hard throwers post adolescence. At the end of his HS freshman season he started complaining about some minor discomfort in his forearm after throwing, he said more an annoyance than a big concern. However, like every other parent in this group I did the research and ultimately found someone to look at his mechanics. The coach was a former MLB pitcher and who also turned out to be a proponent of the Tom House methodologies – NPA (Had no clue about any of that at the time).  

This coach found some issues with Trev’s mechanics and kinetic chain, they adjusted and his velo picked up and any hint of discomfort was gone. That's all it took for my kid to buy in. He went to several House seminars (whenever he was in Houston), he never had another soft drink, cut most refined sugars out of his diet and started eating stuff I couldn’t bribe him to eat in the past. As a parent, I didn’t care where the motivation was coming from, I just loved the ownership.

He continued to work with this pitching coach through juco (never working on pitches, just kinetics and arm health) and the result of genetics, work and coaching culminated in a fb touching 97 and a scholarship at Arkansas. So, nothing but love for Tom House and his concepts coming from my experience.

This year Trev touched triple digits a few times and he now uses advanced kinetic baseline modeling to capture what’s right, so he can systemically adjust in the future, if required (not related to House or NPA). The processes and technologies move forward…  

I think it’s unlikely that we have crossed paths before - based on the age of your sons & mine and based on me being in DFW and you in Houston. More than likely we have bern to many of the same places but at different times. But you never know. Baseball is a small world. Very cool story about your son and I appreciate your posts about that - and also your positive statements about Juco baseball.

New updates. He actually picked up a tab at a restaurant which was both sweet and unexpected. Then he ruined it by dunking on me. Literally. We all went to Chicago to support his sisters team playing Oregon WBB. Game cancelled because of COVID (10 cases, two symptomatic. Luckily Syd is clean) so we went to the practice gym to shoot around. I was under the basket rebounding and the SOB dunked on me. 😂

The indoor baseball facilities are adjacent to the basketball practice courts. I thought you guys would appreciate this video:

No dunk! Very disappointing.

@JCG the family knows better than that. Video would have meant the end of Christmas for all of them! Hahahaha

@PTWood they have a pretty nice facilities for baseball at NW. Son did a camp there pre-covid and its still his dream to play for them...Merry Christmas to you and your family!

@used2lurk good luck with NU! It has been a great experience for Syd although this year she’s been out with a back injury. Hope you guys had a Merry Christmas too.

1/18 James update. He was out in San Diego for a week hitting and lifting with 11 other prospects. Included one-on-one meeting with the GM where he was told the sample size was small but good start—keep getting stronger and faster. Left CA for AZ over the weekend for another 2 weeks of conditioning and then he comes home until spring training. They got to move into their new team-provided apartments and now he’s trying to figure out how to ship his bean bag. 🙄 The apartments are nice.

".....now he’s trying to figure out how to ship his bean bag. 🙄"

So much info in such a short phrase.  A thoughtful analysis could take days.

Smoke...we figured it out. They are on sale. He will be the lucky owner of an east coast bean bag and a west coast bean bag (this thing is huge and heavy...but super comfortable to sit in to play video games). If all goes well, maybe he'll pay on more than one team this year and we will have the saga of bean bag moves (from spring training to low A and beyond)...

https://ultimatesack.com/product/5000-bean-bag-chair/

Looks comfy, but I would need a hoist to get back out of it.

@smokeminside posted:

".....now he’s trying to figure out how to ship his bean bag. 🙄"

So much info in such a short phrase.  A thoughtful analysis could take days.

Smoke with a nasty double entendre on the inside corner for a called third strike!

@PTWood posted:

.....They got to move into their new team-provided apartments and now he’s trying to figure out how to ship his bean bag. 🙄 The apartments are nice.

I did not miss this point about the team provided apartments!  How cool and  convenient!   Trying to find housing is tough, especially in Snow Bird, college spring break filled,  Florida spring training.  Kid is paying $4800 a month for a 2BR sharing with another couple.  The Blue Jays are (supposedly) building their own hotel soon.

@PTWood posted:

Smoke...we figured it out. They are on sale. He will be the lucky owner of an east coast bean bag and a west coast bean bag (this thing is huge and heavy...but super comfortable to sit in to play video games). If all goes well, maybe he'll pay on more than one team this year and we will have the saga of bean bag moves (from spring training to low A and beyond)...

https://ultimatesack.com/product/5000-bean-bag-chair/

All sorts of baseball terms could apply here.  At this point, I recommend:

Bean Bag: The Double Play.

@keewart a game changer really. I’m so happy for the change.

And smoke and adbono I am trying very hard to ignore the two of you. 🙄😂

@PTWood posted:

@keewart a game changer really. I’m so happy for the change.

And smoke and adbono I am trying very hard to ignore the two of you. 🙄😂

Try as you will………….🤣