Blue Collar Approach To Baseball Success - Ryan Alexander

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Behind the scenes with athletes and coaches. This is Athlete One Podcast with Ken Carpenter.

SPEAKER_03 0:16

On today's show, I'm going to sit down with Ryan Alexander, the head baseball coach at Grove City High School here in the great state of Ohio. We'll discuss his Ohio Valley upbringing and how it has led him to be one of the premier baseball coaches in Ohio. Ryan played baseball and basketball at St. John's High School for Tom Sleva and the next four years at Muskingham University as a center fielder. He has been the head baseball coach since 2009. Has collected 200 career wins. He's been the OCC champion 2010, 2012, 14, 15, and 17. Made it to the state final four in 2011 and 2012. Has had three players get drafted. 27 players currently are playing college baseball. And since 2009, he has had 60 players that have gone on to play college baseball. Ryan, welcome to the Athlete One podcast. I gotta start right off with what does it mean to be from the Ohio Valley?

SPEAKER_02 1:24

Um to me, it was an absolutely awesome place to grow up in. And each each group of those kids are a little bit different in each way, but they kind of helped um mold who I am today. Um it definitely is a it's a it's an area of a gang of blue-collar workers, and they're gonna work hard, they're gonna go after it. And if you want it, you know, we've always been told we can get it if you if you want it bad enough.

SPEAKER_03 2:02

Right. I mean uh, you know, when I think about the valley, it uh it taught taught me more than anything. I think it taught me how to compete. You played at Bel Air St. John's, correct? Yes. Okay, and uh from there you went to Muskingham University. What were the sports that you played when you were in high school?

SPEAKER_02 2:22

Um, I played baseball and basketball. Um, I played baseball at Bel Air St. John for Coach Tom Sleva. Um, Sleva is now at uh St. Clairsville High School. We're still uh great friends, and uh either St. Clairsville usually comes up here to scrimmage every year or we go to St. Clairsville and Scrimmage just because um the relationship we have together. Um absolutely love competing with that guy every day. Um and then I played basketball at Bel Air St. John's for uh Coach Dan Angelich.

SPEAKER_03 2:54

Okay. What position did you play baseball in? And basketball, what were your both sports? What did you play?

SPEAKER_02 3:00

Um baseball, I was a center fielder. Um occasionally Coach Sleva made me pitch, but I didn't really want to do that that much. Um and then basketball, I was a uh point guard since my sophomore year. So I always tell people when I was a freshman, I was literally like 5'1, 5'2. My sophomore year, I was our starting point guard on varsity, and I think I was 5'4, and I would dribble down, break the press, and then just go hide in the corner and wait for it to kick out to me. And then uh by the time I was a senior, I was six foot. So I literally grew one foot in high school.

SPEAKER_03 3:36

Wow, amazing! And that that's probably all the difference, too. I bet that you you could really uh you're a different player when you got a little bit more height.

SPEAKER_02 3:45

We just had we had that talk with our guys uh um on a Zoom meet last week, you know, changing bodies. And you know, if there's if there was anything that any college guy that we have comes back and says, it's I wish I'd have hit the weight room more when I was in high school. So, you know, like everybody says it, but it's finding a way to go out and do it when you're when you're at that age.

SPEAKER_03 4:09

Yeah, no doubt you are um you're one of those guys that you know I I follow on social media, and you know, when I get a chance to see you at either clinics or at a game, different things like that. Um I've always been impressed with how uh your players are and how they uh go about playing the game, and and and I really think that that comes from you because one of the uh things that stick out in my mind, it's not all the championships you've won and all the college guys you put in, you put in college, but it's the uh I watched you, I believe it was in the the district, or maybe it was a regional, and the way you took infield and the way you hit that round of infield, I mean, it seemed like you were out there forever, and when you came off, you were just dripping with sweat, and I was like, man, this guy's getting after it.

SPEAKER_02 5:08

Um yeah, that's always something we've always done at Grove City. Like we just literally try to preach that same mentality um all the time of you know, we we want to be hard-nosed, we want to we call ourselves dirt bags. Um, now that we uh switched over to turf, everybody's asking me if we're going turf bags. But uh we really just want to try to bring that mindset to start the game. And uh, like I I remember playing basketball growing up, or you know, you're playing a really good baseball team and they take a great infield or they warm up and they look really intense on it. You're like, man, do we really want to do this today? So, you know, that's kind of always the uh attitude we have when we take that field, we want to do it the right way. Um we always have a gang of guys in our dugout. So to me, you know, when we take infield, that's another chance for you to shine and get your uh spotlight, even if you're not a player for us that day.

SPEAKER_03 6:11

Uh you've been at Grove City since 2004, and you became the head coach in 2009. And from what I've been able to find, researched out, you uh average 20 wins per season, and you play in a very difficult OCC. And talk about the for people that maybe are living in the south or out west that might happen to stumble upon the podcast here, the difficulties it is with trying to coach baseball in Midwest in the springtime.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Yeah, and and that's the number one issue why we decided to really make a push to raise the money to get the turf infield. Just it's it's so hard to prepare for games when you can't get outside and work. Um in the north, you know, I remember even when we were in high school, it was every single day in the gym, cages in the gym, ground balls in the gym, your bull pens were in the gym, and then you'd play that first game and it might be live. So, you know, that was that was a big piece in making sure we got that turf project done for our guys. Um but like we we always try to do a spring trip. This year's a little bit different. We've already, I think every every team in central Ohio has been their spring trips have been canceled. Um since I've taken the job in 2009, we've always gone somewhere to compete. Um we've competed against some of the best teams in the United States. Uh, I think we played Farragut, um, Tennessee when they were number one in the nation. We played Oxford, Mississippi. They were top five in the nation when we played them. Um we played Oxford, Miss or Oxford, Alabama. Um, and they had two guys, I think, in the top ten um players in the in their classes in the U.S. So we've been everywhere to try to play as many great teams as we can. Um, just for also for our guys to see the competition that's out there. Um do you think you're the best? You know, and we want to line up and say, hey, you know, I still remember we played that 2011. That was the first year we went to the Final Four, and we went down to Farragut and played Tennessee when they were number one. I think they had six guys that played in the league at some point. Um, so our guys still talk about this day, like, man, I can't believe how far Nicky Delmonico hit that ball up that tree. And uh they were they were pulling guys off the bench and hit two back-to-back bombs on guys off the bench. It was it was wild. Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_03 8:51

But I think that you know, when you go out and challenge yourself like that, you it definitely helps coming back to here to Columbus and having to jump back into your league, and you're like, well, we we hung with those guys. We ought to be okay in a league.

SPEAKER_02 9:07

Yeah, I I've always said that um our league, and and it'll be a new league this year. It was gonna be a new league last year before the COVID ended the season, but um our league for the last 10 years has produced so many great players. Uh I think Pick North won a state championship when they finished fourth in our league. So they finished fourth in the OCC Ohio and you know won a state championship that year. Um, the first year we went to the Final Four in 2011, we finished third in the conference, and that was uh in 2011. 2012, we had another great team that made a Final Four run. Um, 14, 17. We've had some some great teams that uh our guys in the winner, they always like to come back and and uh talk trash to each other about which which team was the best.

SPEAKER_03 10:02

Well, that that's good to have though when the guys come back and get together like that.

SPEAKER_02 10:06

Yeah, I mean it it has it's been an absolutely awesome thing for our group. We have so many kids that play in college, but this year's been really challenging for that because you know, we haven't been allowed to work out as a team since Thanksgiving. So um our guys haven't been together. Usually that time from Thanksgiving to Christmas, we have high school guys, college guys all working out, talking, and it's some of the best stuff that you know that I've ever seen as a coach, just seeing our guys interact with each other and young guys asking the old guys, and you know, we stike Myers is still always back, and Chase Annell, um Mike's with the Angels, Chase is with the Phillies now. Um so just being able to pick those kind of brains has been amazing for our for our coaches to even see.

SPEAKER_03 10:56

In 2011 and 12, you talked about how you made it to the Final Four. What in your mind was the difference compared to the other successful teams you had?

SPEAKER_02 11:06

Um we we talk about that all the time, and one of our coaches, he was actually on that team. Um in 2011, 2012, Tyler Kent, the coach is with us, so he's on our staff. Um he played he was our center fielder for both of those years. Uh, was an all-American at Otterbine, um, drafted by the Phillies out of college as well. Um, but you know, we talk about that all the time that some those two teams are probably our best players, you know, went to Autobine and went to Muskingham and went to D3 schools that, you know, maybe we didn't have a couple of those big time players like we had later on, but they were just so scrappy and willing to do anything for their teammates. Um, you know, there's still guys that talk to me all the time about our shortstop we had back then. It was a guy named Jimmy Gravette. Um he's about 5'9, 140 when he was in high school. He was our shortstop. He had to, he had always told him he had to crow hop to get it from shortstop to first, but he always got the guy by a foot. But he, you know, everyone talks about the kind of energy and passion that that guy played with every single day. Um he later took that to the Marines, and uh, I think in his boot camp training, he finished in the top 5% of all the Marines. Um, so it was just the kind of competitor he was. And when you got leaders like those guys, you know, it's it's real quick and easy for everybody else to follow suit. Um, there's just been numerous other great, great leaders we've had along the way. You know, Mike was a great leader in 2010. Um, Joey Ford played at right state, Chase Annell um with in 14, and Robbie Jobs on our staff now, he was on that team. Um just a lot of a lot of great players. Tyler Cows played at Iowa State, was all big ten. And then it in uh 2017, we had another great team. We had Hayden Cart play, he's a um all-conference guy down at Charleston, and Dan Rutan, he's a captain at Oakland now. Um Blake Griffith plays at Oakland, Colton Bauer uh plays at Ohio State, Nick Irwin plays at high state. Um, so just a gang of great dudes. Um, and then following those guys, Tyler Angard, uh McCloskey, Burston at Otterbine. So I mean, it's a it's a great pack of kids that continue to want to feed off of each other, and um almost a competition for them on you know who's gonna who's gonna be the guy to get it done that day.

SPEAKER_03 13:52

Um you have if I'm correct, you have 27 right players playing currently in college baseball right now and 60 in the last 10 years, and you know, there's some really great baseball in Ohio, but there's probably not too many coaches that have that many players in a 10-year span.

SPEAKER_02 14:13

Um I I think it uh yeah, and I like to even think about all the guys that finished college playing baseball. You know, like I remember going to Muskingham, and we started with 26 of us came in as a freshman class, and two of us finished. So um it was a it was myself and another kid from Pickerington, I remember that were in our senior class that year. But it is it is you know, it is a grind. I I honestly feel horrendous for the kids right now, and I we've actually lost a couple that decided not to play, and I think it it mainly had to do with this whole COVID situation. And it's a shame that you know, I think three of our guys that were going to play somewhere next year, their programs were cut, so we had to scramble and find them new homes to go play in in the middle of the summer. Um and it's just I I hate it for those kids. You know, we have kids at Ohio Wesleyan at Otter Bine and Umskingham, and there's a there's a gang of them that aren't even allowed to do workouts as teams right now, and I think it's just it's really eaten at these kids so much because they've they've loved this for so long and they've lived it. And you know, when you play for us, you know, these guys are doing it four or five days a week, six days a week, you know, for the last four years of their lives, and now you kind of strip that from them and it's it's tough for 'em.

SPEAKER_01 15:42

Are you looking to start your own business or work from home? Here's your opportunity. Click the link in the episode description or on the Athlete One Podcast Twitter page. Now back to the interview with Grove City head baseball coach Ryan Alexander on the Athlete One Podcast.

SPEAKER_03 15:58

Now, how do you help players when they're trying to figure out where they're going to play? You know, whether it's D1, D2, D3, Juke Juco.

SPEAKER_02 16:06

Um, you know, we kind of we kind of sit down with all of them and find out, you know, who's talking to them. You know, it nowadays, and and I feel bad for I feel bad for the college coaches on how early some of those Division I coaches have to try to recruit kids. And, you know, I know that they don't think they're getting the best kids sometimes because they have to pick try to pick them so early and who's gonna develop and how they're physically gonna develop. Um, so those kids, a lot of those guys that know they're gonna go to that big time route, you know, that's they're finding this out as sophomores and juniors and or freshmen even, um, that these coaches are already on them. So um at that point, if you know none of those schools have contacted me about them by their junior year, then we start looking the other route. You know, a lot of our kids have gone JUCO, and unfortunately, I don't even know if that route's going to be available here soon for a lot of these kids. Um, Sinclair, um Coach Deniman, he always called it Grove City South because uh he took so many of our guys, and you know, so so many of his uh great ones that he talks about, um, you know, went to Grove City, went to Sinclair, then they went on from there. We have uh, I think we had uh Joey Ford started he went to Sinclair, played for Coach Dent, went to Wright State, and then Tyler Cows came, Ben Myers came, Ben went to Fairmont State, and Cows went to High State. Uh AJ Peter went there, ended up at Western Kentucky now. Um so it's just it's a it's a shame that they're not gonna have that opportunity to uh play at some places like that and you know then be able to move on. I know that Tri-C already canceled their program as well. So two great JUCO programs just in Ohio have been canceled since COVID started. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 18:07

Now you've had three players get drafted. Uh if you could just share a little bit about the the three players.

SPEAKER_02 18:14

Yeah, um Mike Myers, he was our first guy. He was a 2010 grad, and then he went to Ole Miss out of high school. Um I remember he asked me to go on his uh recruiting trip, his his final recruiting trip to Ole Miss, and they were playing Alabama in a football game there. He goes, Coach, I really want you to go on this official and tell me what you think before I decide to commit to the school. I said, dude, you know I'm in. So we go, we go to Ole Miss, and I've been on about 50 other baseball trips with his dad, um, who's a huge supporter for our program. Um, but we go to Ole Miss and and uh he goes, What do you think, coach? And I told him after that Saturday night, I said, if you don't go here and I get to come back here for the next three or four years, I'm gonna kill you. So uh he went to Ole Miss, had a great um career at Ole Miss, and then he got drafted by the Cardinals out of height or out of college. Um, was with the Cardinals for uh four or five years. Now he's with the Angels. Um, just got reliever of the month at the end of the month uh in August, I believe, with the Angels. Had a great year this year, so the whole town just rallies around him. He's a great kid, um, always gives back to our community and just a real face of our community. Um Tyler Kent was our next one. Again, I told you he went to Otterbine. He he was a homebody kid, so there was no way he was going any further than Otterbine. Um and he was draft all-American at Otterbine. I think he hit about 50 bombs for Coach Powell up there. Coach Powell loved him. Um, and he he was the first guy that really went to Otterbine and got it done for Coach Powell. So since him, Coach Powell's always he always tells me any guy that you tell me we need to recruit is coming to Otterbine. And uh he's held true with that because I think he's got about half of his roster right now as Grove City guys, I swear. Um, but we've had a great relationship with them. Our kids have gone there and absolutely love that program and love what it's about. And then the the third guy was uh Chase Annell, and Chase went to Bowling Green out of uh caught out of high school and struggled with command sometimes, struggled with finding it, but he was always a guy that was continually pushing himself to find a better way for for himself. Um went to Coastal Carolina, kind of really figured it out down there, became their closer at Coastal, um hit 99 miles an hour a few times as a senior, and got drafted by the Phillies this year. So he's our he's our third guy.

SPEAKER_03 20:57

You gotta, to me, you know, that says a lot about you because you're the one heading up the program. And you know, when coaches are, you know, you got Beals at Ohio State, you got Audubon, you got all these coaches that are like, send me your guys, they know what they they're getting because they know that they've come through your program for four years.

SPEAKER_02 21:20

That's that's the plan. So sometimes it always doesn't work out that way. But I at least try to I try to warn the coach when I feel when I feel there might be trouble on their rising. But uh our guys, for the most part, um they know how to buckle down, they know what work is, and we kind of preach that to them um at our place all the time. Like if you're going, if you're gonna want to succeed at this, at the next level, you have to learn to love to work. And um I think that's that's a big thing that our guys hone in on. Um they work in the weight room, they work in the cages. I mean, they they hit. The time they the guys that want to do it they get after it all the time, and and we're and I'm a guy that really promotes all the sports. So like I want our guys to play football, I want our guys to play basketball. Some my best guys ever have always been two sport, three sport guys. Um, you know, it's it's a rare guy that only played one sport that really succeeds for us. I just feel like that guy has to do so much more to find ways to be athletic and learn to compete. And you know, when you get in that box, you know, I want that guy that has been at the line shooting shooting big free throws or trying to get in the lane or or trying to run between tackles and hit somebody, or a lot of a lot of our great players have been big-time linebackers at our school. So um, you know, we we promote that.

SPEAKER_03 22:53

How would you say that your players past and present would if would describe you?

SPEAKER_02 23:01

Uh it it is funny because a couple of the kids' parents have told me these things um, you know, later on after we coached them, because they're always like, man, Coach A is so nice, he's so happy. And and and most of the time I am, you know, I try to be a very positive person and upbeat. And, you know, I I don't ever want to preach things that I don't believe. And I believe in, you know, being happy all the time. And if it's not fun, don't do it. And I tell our guys all the time, like, if they don't like working out and they don't like coming to the gym and they don't like getting in the cages to hit, like, you better not do it because this is the wrong sport for it. Um but some of our uh some of our guys are always like coach A is an amazing person off the field always. In games, he's absolutely insane. Um, some of them have noted in practice in practices, they usually like me because I try to keep it upbeat. I know that uh baseball can be a slow sport, so every practice we try to make it look as much like football and basketball as we possibly can. So um practices are always fun and competing and trying to find winners and losers and who can deal with those situations. Um but in games, yeah, like my wife always says, like, I honestly don't like bringing our kids to games sometimes because they see a face that they've never seen before. So uh sometimes it gets like that, but uh for the most part, you know, our guys just know that you know we love to win, we love to get after it, and I think if you if you do those things, the the good things are gonna fall into place.

SPEAKER_03 24:55

Talk about how you develop the skills of players beyond the game.

SPEAKER_02 25:00

Um you know, I think it is it is daily talks. Um myself, I grew up in a in a situation where you know, by the time I was uh 12, 14 years old, you know, my dad wasn't my dad really wasn't in the picture for me. So my a lot of my coaches were my dad's. Um and I I couldn't thank them enough for that um to this day. You know, little league coaches, you know, my parents were never really my coaches um growing up. So my mom would drop me off the field, and for the next two, three hours, a lot of those guys were always my dad. Um my high school coaches were amazing like that. Um so I always I told myself since I was a sophomore in high school that I knew whenever uh someone finally told me you're not good enough to play anymore, that I wanted to teach and coach and be able to help kids in that same regard. Um it's just daily life lessons. You know, our guys know I got an open door policy. My old players, they'll call two, three in the morning. Um, if they need something, they know I'm all I've got their back for life. Um, so I think it's just just knowing that that knowledge of um knowing that I deeply care about them more as a person than ever as a baseball player, and we reiterate that all the time. Like, grades are way more important than baseball. Um, if you can't, if you don't have good grades anymore, like it's hard to find a place to play baseball. So, you know, that that's a big piece we talk about all the time. In the weight room, we try to do a daily lesson or things to talk about that is gonna, you know, drive more, drive, drive home things that are gonna be way more important than baseball in life. Um, like I said, we've we've had three guys get drafted, and we've only had one guy continue to play this sport, but we've got a lot of guys that are um got a guy that's about to be a doctor. I'm about as more proud of him as as I am any of those guys that got drafted. Um Drew R Trip, one of my first classes, he he actually started as a freshman, first kid that I've ever played as a freshman. Um he's finishing med school right now. And like to me, just hearing that it makes me almost want to cry a little bit, thinking about how hard and how much he sacrificed in the classroom to be successful. Um, we had him come back and talk about it at camp. Um he's he's getting ready to go do his uh, you know, his uh intern. He's gonna be like interned, go to his different hospitals and everything. Um right now he's finishing up at Penn State Medical School. Um, so just guys like that that are really would drive you to be a coach and love kids way past baseball. Um, some of the kids that come around our program still to this day didn't play 10, 15 innings for us. But they knew that our program is way more important than just playing. Um so those guys were always coming out in the fall, hitting fungos or talking to guys, or and and they didn't play 10 or 15 innings, but they knew that they knew we loved them way more than them playing baseball. They just also knew that they weren't one of the best nine or ten guys that needed to be playing that day. Right. And and that's all that's a it's a tough thing for for kids to swallow, probably a tougher thing for parents to swallow.

SPEAKER_03 28:46

No doubt there. Now, um just to finish up to wrap things up, how good is it gonna feel to go out there and hit that first round of in chill before the first game?

SPEAKER_02 28:58

Oh, I can't even wait. I'm I'm so excited for our kids. Um you know it just I'm I'm I'm hoping at some point we make sure that this season's gonna happen. Um, basketball's been real shaky for us. Um I feel horrendous for those kids. I know a lot of those kids played baseball for us. Now they're playing basketball seniors, and I think we went on a 10-day COVID break right during Christmas, came off of it, played a game yesterday, and a kid got COVID again today, so we're out another 10 days. So I couldn't imagine being a high school basketball player and having to sit for 20, 21 days, and I've only played three days in a row. You know, I can't, I couldn't imagine that that sport is so challenging for your body, and just the the physicalness of it, the the endurance part. I you know, I'm praying those kids get to come back and play a season at all. And I mean they're gonna be on an NBA schedule here when we come back. It's gonna be like TNT game every other night.

SPEAKER_03 30:06

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 30:07

Um then it becomes like baseball season in Ohio, Carpenter. I know you know that. Where uh you don't you play one game one week and then the next week you got 10 games.

SPEAKER_03 30:17

You when I first started this podcast idea up, I thought you were one of the guys I wanted to get on here. And you know, you are not only just a great person, but what you've done for the city of Grove for Grove City and all the players that you've brought through your program is has been huge. And you know, you to me you seem like a young guy, and he's got a ton of energy, so I'm sure you're gonna be around for a long time, and and there's gonna be a lot of frustrated coaches having to play you two, three times every year.

SPEAKER_02 30:47

So it is the plan to keep coaching to stay young, that's for sure. Turn 40 this year, so it's catching me.

SPEAKER_03 30:53

There you go. All right, well, I really appreciate you joining the podcast and take care. Thanks, Carp. Thanks very much. I would like to thank all of our listeners who have subscribed to the Athlete One Podcast. Remember to tune in each Wednesday for a new episode. So don't forget to subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Google and leave a review. If you want to join the Athlete One podcast, follow us on Facebook and on Twitter at Athlete One Podcast. Thanks and take care of it.