From August 10-17, Appalachian State University baseball head coach Billy Jones spent a week at the USA Baseball Training Complex in Cary, N.C. to serve as a manager for the United States' 17-and-under National Team in a series against Chinese Taipei.
Below is Jones' first-hand account of his experience working with some of the nation's top young players and representing the United States of America in international competition.
It was late in the spring when I was contacted by the general manager of USA Baseball's national teams, Eric Campbell, who I've known for 14 years. He expressed interest in me getting involved with USA Baseball, specifically with the 17U national team development program.
It would be a lengthy process in order to work with USA Baseball but I agreed to do it, not only because of my relationship with Eric but because I wanted to be a part of a program that teaches kids life lessons they will never forget all while doing something I love. I was also drawn to USA Baseball because everything they do is first class — as coaches, we all know they do more than the baseball thing there.
Another reason I was so drawn to this position was the experience that my own son, Ryder (now a member of the San Francisco Giants organization), had with USA Baseball. I thought back to when we supported him through his own experience with the Tournament of Stars (TOS), the prerequisite to being invited to participate on the National Team in the 18U age group.
I still remember him telling me that of all of the things that he had ever experienced, being a part of USA Baseball was, by far, the most fun and competitive. He told me about a few of the managers and coaches they brought in for the tournament: Terry Francona (manager of the Cleveland Indians), Scott Brosius (an 11-year MLB veteran and three-time World Series champion) and many, many more. The list was impressive – big leaguer after big leaguer worked with the kids – with the end goal of being picked to represent your country.
So, before I made my decision to participate with USA Baseball, I asked him about his personal experience and he said, “You have to do that, Dad. You have to get involved with USA Baseball because it is real and it is legit.”
It was during the first meeting after I arrived in Cary that I realized how impressive the overall process and development of the USA Baseball program is. I was humbled when I was presented with the opportunity to be able to see some of the other people in the room. As I looked around I realized that, like my son had experienced, there was a more than a handful of former big leaguers in the room.
At first they didn't tell us what our responsibilities were. It was only after I was in Cary that I was offered the opportunity to manage one of the U17 national teams for an upcoming series against Chinese Taipei. I was shocked and honored. It became “real” at that moment – instead of just assisting, I was going to be in charge of a team representing the USA in international competition.
USA Baseball had every minute of the week planned for the kids and us. Every day, we were briefed on what our plans were for the kids that day. A typical itinerary began with a 7:15 a.m. wake-up call. We would all eat breakfast together so we could catch the bus at about 8:15 and conduct our field sessions from 9 a.m.-noon. After noon, we would go back to the hotel for lunch or stay at the complex to eat and have a second practice session.
As I said earlier, USA Baseball makes sure that the kids learn about a lot more than baseball when they are in Cary. In fact, the primary message of the week was that of being a part of USA Baseball means more than just playing baseball. We wanted the kids to understand and cherish their opportunity to be a part of such a great team and to represent their country. These values were reinforced in a few different ways.
We had several guest speakers. A lot were people involved in media or media relations and would discuss topics like appropriate conduct on social media, which was a learning experience for me as well. Kids usually know, or have at least heard, how they should represent themselves on social media but hearing it from a few different sources always helps.
One day, we were fortunate enough to visit the National Guard and hear stories from soldiers and members of the Special Forces, many who have been overseas to represent our country and even a few were injured during their tours. These people, who had experience representing the USA in the most meaningful way possible, had great motivational stories for the kids to hear. They were great examples of what it means to be a part of a team and how to represent your country.
We also got the chance to hear Ernie Young and Brad Wilkerson, both former big leaguers that won Olympic gold medals with Team USA in 2000, speak about their experiences. Those guys preached about what it means to be apart of Team USA and you could tell it hit home with those kids. Hearing Ernie and Brad let all of us know being a part of this program was more than another week of baseball – we were part of a much bigger picture.
Another way these values were reinforced was the actual experience of being able to play against the Chinese Taipei national team. The difference in cultures and the pressure on our players and staff to win for the USA was a big deal. The opportunity to wear a uniform with USA across the chest really encouraged all of us to remember what it meant to represent our country.
I'm proud to now be able to say firsthand that USA Baseball is about a lot more than baseball. The former players, coaches and all of the staff focused on teaching kids life skills as much as baseball – things like how to sit at a table when people are talking to you, how to take your hat off when you're eating indoors, how to dress and wear your clothes. Basically, how you should carry yourself while making sure you thank someone everyday for everything that they do.
For me personally, the knowledge that I was able to absorb from the staff that USA Baseball assembled for the week was humbling and invaluable. I always try to learn and one of the ways that I learn best is by watching guys I have admired. For some of us, we learn by teaching in a different way than we had received the lesson ourselves. The knowledge I gained by working with these kids and other staff members was one of the most enjoyable and beneficial parts of the whole experience.
All the people behind the scenes that make USA Baseball such a successful organization amazed me. The support staff – the people who would make sure the food and laundry was there for the kids, the people who made sure the schedules were made and that everyone knew what was going on – were really unbelievable. It was very important for us as coaches to remind the kids that it was all of those people who made the opportunity possible for them to participate and not worry about anything other than showing up to that field and giving all that they had everyday. The players didn't have to worry about anything else – it was a truly first-class and professional organization.
As coaches, we were also grateful for everything the USA Baseball staff did all week that allowed us to teach and be able to share what we knew to the kids.
On the field, it really became fun when we split the 45-50 guys into two teams and began playing games. I managed the “Stars” team and Coach Vanderhook managed the “Stripes” team. The first two games were against each other, which was great because we all got the chance to do what we love most – compete. However, playing against each other is a lot like intrasquad scrimmages at the college level – its fun and everyone's competitive nature comes out but it's not the same as playing against someone else.
However, the week ended with USA Baseball doing something that they never did before for the 17U national team development program – they brought in another country's 17U team for a series of games against the Stars and Stripes clubs.
Playing the team from Chinese Taipei team was a real eye opener for our kids, who were mostly rising juniors in high school. The discipline that Chinese Taipei played with and the way they addressed their managers and teammates was truly astounding. If you saw how they took the field, they weren't on the same talent level as us. But, as a group, they were a really good team. It was great for our guys to witness that kind of teamwork firsthand.
One of the members of the U.S. military that we were honored to hear speak earlier in the week gave us the mantra “be a good team, be a good teammate.” That became our team's theme that week. As representatives of the United States, we had a responsibility to others more than ourselves.
That responsibility really hit home for me prior to our first game against Chinese Taipei when I met their manager at home plate. We exchanged hats as gifts and he bowed to me, as is a traditional sign of respect in their culture. At that moment, I became very aware that I was part of such an impressive team and program – it was truly an honor.
The week was a grind, there's no question about that. We were at it every day at 7 a.m. until 10 p.m. on some nights. As a staff, we met every night and broke down every one of our players. But being in a room with 12 other terrific coaches and hearing their opinions and wisdom was really good because a lot of guys brought up points that maybe I wouldn't have thought of to better my players. It was also a great asset to have guys with experience at all levels of baseball assembled as one group because the professional, college and high school games are so different but we can all learn from each other and absorb things that will work when we return to our respective organizations.
Of course, it was my first time coaching in an international setting. One of my assistants, Mike Mack, specialized in coaching pitchers on our Stars team. Mike is from Plano, Texas, where he coached at a private high school for 20 years, was head coach at Tennessee Tech at one point and was even an assistant at Tennessee. Despite his vast experience at all levels of amateur baseball, he told me there is nothing like the international experience.
He said that in international competition, you start to find out who you are and what you're about. It's an “us against them” mentality and it's an unbelievable experience. Seeing as how his 18U team won a gold medal last year, rooming with him really helped me understand what international competition meant.
One day, we were talking about our players and he really enlightened to the purpose of the experience when he said, “Will this young man be able to handle that experience? It's either yes or no. It's different because it's not the relaxed atmosphere as we think baseball is. It's different.”
Perhaps most importantly, there is so much from the experience that I have been able to bring back with me to Appalachian State University.
Honestly, going into the program, I wasn't sure what to expect. I thought that I'd throw some BP, hit some fungos and kind of soak in the experience. I did not know I was going to be managing a team. I had to write reports on players, be responsible for my club and make sure that everyone got a fair share and equal amount of playing time while also trying to field a competitive team and win.
I always learn from kids. At the root of it, kids are all the same whether they are supposedly the best players in the country or not. I always feel like I learn as much from them as they learn from me.
But during my week in Cary, I also learned a lot from the other coaches and the USA Baseball staff about how to implement a successful program. I gathered a lot of ideas that I want to implement here at Appalachian State that will hopefully help us reach our championship aspirations.
For example, seeing how efficient USA Baseball's staff was and how that allowed me to just worry about coaching my players really hit home for me. My mentality has always been that I don't want to put extra work on people, so I wind up taking on a lot of stuff myself. However, that week helped me realize that I need to work on delegating a little bit better. I learned the value getting everyone involved, giving people certain responsibilities and letting them go with it.
I keep coming back to this but I learned a lot from the coaches there. Not necessarily new things, but maybe a different approach to things that I already knew. For example, I have always known how to position an infield. However, Coach Vanderhook showed me that he physically walks through infield positioning – like he'll actually walk a certain number of steps off third base and a certain number of steps back to teach his third baseman proper positioning. Brad Wilkerson was great at teaching the kids hitting strategies and Ernie Young showed our players certain ways to adjust their feet to get a different result from their swing without changing the swing itself. Those are the sorts of things that I learned and have brought back to Appalachian State – new ways to teach fundamental things.
I learned a lot about the value of being organized but not too organized. Guys need to learn how to fail and to understand and handle the failure that comes with baseball. One of the best comments I heard that week was, “There's so much failure in baseball. We all talk about failure in baseball but failure is feedback. How you deal with the feedback is how you get through the failure.”
Players don't usually think like that but when you look at it that way, it's so true. How do guys who play at the college or professional level deal with the failure? They can't get over that failure but what they need to do is learn from it, get the feedback and adjust. They need to understand it will get better if they stay the course.
The overall experience is something I won't ever forget. I won't forget it. When we played Chinese Taipei with USA on our jerseys, it was an amazing feeling. I know I had butterflies. I was like, “OK, we are representing our country, regardless if this is for a gold medal or not. We needed to represent our country in everything that we do.”
We had a great group of kids and I don't know if they understood it at the time but when it was done, they understood what it meant to represent their country. When they did the gift exchange and got to visit with the players from Chinese Taipei, they understood that they were kids just like them.
The whole experience of sharing stories and comparing the ways you do things with other people and coaches – people that have done a lot more in this game than I ever have – was truly a humbling experience.
As far as Appalachian State, I truly believe that the opportunity will allow me to become a better coach for our University. I feel very fortunate that I was offered the chance to participate in such a great program. I know I struggled for a while deciding what was best. I kept asking my assistants if it was the right time because to take a week away from our program right before school started is not ideal. However, I am so glad I did and I am glad that I am in that fraternity of guys who were able to represent our country.
There are a lot of guys who have done a lot more than I have in college baseball that have reached out to me because they wanted to see how it went. They say, “Was it awesome or what?”
And I respond, “Yes. It was everything I thought it would be.”
