The Baseball Tryout

Having played baseball at a high level for over 15 years, I have attended many tryouts. Let me start by saying, tryouts do not tell the whole story. The inspiration behind this story comes from my recent attendance at some independent league and MLB post draft tryouts.

First we will start with the independent ball tryouts. I have attended two tryouts for two different teams. One team is in the Frontier League and the other team is in the American Association League. Both tryouts went extremely well except for the fact they lasted extremely long. At the tryout for the Frontier League there were about 80 players in attendance so I knew my day was going to be long. We first ran the 60 yard dash which is a staple for most baseball tryouts. A side note on the 60 yard dash: why run 60 yards in a straight line? I have never seen a baseball player run 60 yards in a straight line during a game. Anyways after the all the position players ran, the outfielders made throws from right field to second, third, and home. There were about 25 outfielders and each outfielder got 5 throws each. So meanwhile the infielders stand around waiting to take their 6 groundballs from shortstop. After all of the preliminary assessments were made, about 40 players were cut. After the cuts were made, a modified scrimmage game commenced. Each pitcher got to face 4 batters and each hitter would get about 3 at bats. I knew I was one of the better players at the tryout but my 60 yard dash is not a 6.2 and it is hard to show my fielding skills with just 6 ground balls. I am so grateful that they had a modified scrimmage game where I got to showcase my skills in a real game environment. At the plate I was able to show my approach and my bat to ball skills. Again, it is hard to show approach and bat to ball skills by just taking batting practice. In the field I was at shortstop and was able to show my range and arm strength on balls hit in the hole. If it were not for the scrimmage game, I would not have been noticed. The coach approached me after the tryout asking for my contact information and is interested in offering a contract for the 2017 season.

Now let’s talk about the team in the American Association. So this tryout is a little different than the other one attended because I was actually invited to this by their head coach. At the tryout it was just me and two other infielders. Again we ran a 60 yard dash and I somehow ran faster than I did at the other tryout. Then we went right into ground balls from shortstop. It was just rapid fire and one of the infielders had to take a break and he actually went to a knee because he felt like he was going to throw up. After that we took batting practice, which was awesome because we got multiple rounds to warm up before we faced live pitching. I was the first one to face the live pitcher who was about 6’3” and throwing 88–90. (Another side note: I had not seen live pitching since the Frontier League tryout which was about 50 days ago.) First two pitches were fastballs that I fouled off and on the third pitch, another fastball, I was able to barrel it up to right center. As I stated earlier, I am glad I was able to show my approach against live pitching. I know most tryouts at the youth levels do not have live pitching at the tryouts. So their coach invited me and the other infielders to take ground balls with the team before their game. We were taking live ground balls off of the hitters taking batting practice which was nice because it was as realistic as it gets. After it was over I went home and got a phone call from their coach asking me to come back the next day to do it again. I went back the next day and did the same stuff, except for the live pitching and the 60 yard dash. At the end of that tryout the coach also offered me a contract to play in the 2017 season but also said he may offer me a contract for the end of this season.

Lastly, the MLB post draft tryout. I went to a post draft tryout for an MLB team at a junior college in Iowa. I am going to start by saying this is one of the worst tryouts I have ever been to. We did the same preliminary tests as the other tryouts, in the exact same order. This was not the issue though. The problem was that I only made 4 throws from shortstop and got only 8 pitches of batting practice. The guy throwing BP had the worst arm I had ever seen. I have had probably close to 100 different people throw me BP in my lifetime and this guy definitely takes the cake as the worst. The tryout ends and I decided to go talk to the scout running the tryout. He says to me that I have everything to play at the next level except the ability to hit. I laughed at him and told him he is wrong. I tried to explain that whatever guy was throwing BP was the worst in the entire world. Honestly, I did not care what the scout thought of me, I know I can hit and the 8 swings he saw does not determine my ability to hit. So I left all pissed off but about 3 weeks later I received a text from my college coach saying that the MLB team that I tried out for had contacted him asking about me. I was shocked, for two reasons. One, I have never received a text from my college coach for the 4 years that I played for him. Two, the scout told me I could not hit but now they are interested in me?

So to conclude this long winded story about professional tryouts, I want people to know that their performance at a tryout does not define you as a player. If you have the worst tryout ever and you know you are better than what you showed, there is no reason to hang your head and think you are not good anymore. It also goes the other way though. If you have the best tryout ever and you did some things that you had not done before such as hit a home run or light up the radar gun, don’t get to high and think that you have made it. You need to understand that you did some special things in that tryout that you may not be able to repeat on a consistent basis. I will leave you with this, you have to be fearless. I was not drafted out of college but I know deep down that I should have been and that ever scout out there made a mistake not drafting me. I refuse to listen to what scouts say I can and can’t do. I do not fear others and their opinions. Be fearless.