Transcript of How Skip Bertman Built a Dynasty for LSU: Winning, Leadership, and Building Champions New

You don't have to make the big leagues to succeed. You can be successful in your business, touch other people's lives, and do things that you've learned to do. And as Ryan said, put it into the business. You can't run your business if you don't know how to be a good team. You have to come up with the concept that you're part of an organization and you have to do your part, and you have to root for the other guys to do their part as well.

In 1983, Louisiana State University put an ad in the paper for a new head baseball coach. This man with me today responded to the ad. Louisiana State University had zero championships. No one believed, but this man to my right, Skip Burtman, came along and instilled culture. After everything that you've been through, everything you accomplished in your life, what does true determination mean to you? In 1983, Louisiana State University put an ad in the paper for a new head baseball coach, and this man with me today responded to the ad. And the Louisiana State University had zero championships, 200 people in the stands, all there just to wait until the football season. They didn't even understand what baseball was here in Louisiana. The loudspeaker was busted. No one believed. But this man to my right, Skip Burtman, came along and instilled culture and belief not only into the institution of LSU, but into the community of Baton Rouge and the state of Louisiana and the world of college baseball. He has built many men of leaders like myself, Blair Barbier to my right, Ryan Theriot to my left. And so many other thousands of men have benefited from being in this man's presence.

I cannot tell you how special today's episode is. 18 years at LSU, 5 national championships, 7 SEC titles, 11 College World Series appearances, and he's built men. But the most important thing other than the baseball is what he's done in the community, what he's done for everybody's life. So without further ado, Skip Burtman, my mentor, my baseball coach, our baseball coach. Welcome to the Determined Society.

Thank you. Thank you. That's very nice of you.

I mean, the whole time I'm trying not to cry here, man. It's like, I, you know, I'm sitting here, guys, and I'm going over everything and, you know, just being back here in Louisiana is just so emotional for me. I brought my son and just thinking about being on camera with you made me so emotional because without you, I'm not where I'm at.

Oh, that's nice to hear. I'm glad. You know, you're so talented, you're going to be where you want to be.

Thank you, Coach. You know, it was early on though, right, guys? You, you know, you get into this program of LSU and you think you're just going for baseball, you know, but this man teaches you so much more about being a teammate, being a human being, and more so about leadership. But before we get there, take me back to the young boy, Skip Burtman, you know, living in Miami and sitting there with your coach at 15 years old. What was his name? Sapper.

Max Sapper.

Max Sapper. And he taught you more about baseball than most coaches ever learned. Right. What made him so different?

He was a former professional ballplayer. Who studied the game quite a bit. He lived very close to Flamingo Park where, where we played. So he was always there and a chance for us to talk to him. He taught me a lot of things that I use for Ryan and Blair and things that I'm using today. So I had a great start. I was— geez, this— hope this doesn't sound right. I was lucky enough to be prepared to be a coach. And then at the University of Miami, I had a good opportunity with a good head coach, Ron Frazier. And so when I came to LSU, I really, you know, was trained a lot. And of course, you got to recruit the right guys. You got to have good players. You can't win. And people like these two, uh, were great players. And I was at an affair last night at Jeremy Moore's house, and there were 10 guys, and, uh, good character people. That's, that's how it was done. If you don't get the good character kids, it's tough to win.

You know, it's interesting because we, we talk about the leadership style of Skip Bertman. Right. So I want to hear from you, Blair, and you, Ryan. What was the thing that stuck out most to you guys of his leadership that made everybody just understand that the first step is believing in yourself and creating such amazing experiences while you both were here?

Yeah. Honestly, I feel like today, like I won the lottery hitting the plate for this guy.

Right.

I mean, it's that good when you look back at all the things. And I go back to, like you said, it's way more than just a baseball coach. Like we went in there and we're talking about success and we've got the Sunday Successful Speaker Series and we're hearing from CEOs of massive companies and he's calling in favors to get them to come talk to us. Never about baseball. And in talking with him, I know that he was grinding to make us better people. Better, you know, a better person. That way he could trust us more. We could trust each other more. And he taught us all these little nuances in life that can help you to be successful. And that has nothing to do with baseball. Yeah, see, we talked about hitting and we did some things. We did. But it was really about that. That was the motivation, the leadership that he had. And again, it's really why I feel like I won the lottery to learn a lot of these things that started with Mack Sapper and through Ron Frazier, and it kept going. And he was nice enough, loved us enough to share that stuff with us, you know.

And, um, amazing.

I love that, man.

Right now, yeah, I mean, you know, I'm sitting here listening to Blair. I, no offense, I'm trying to think of one, like, baseball point that I remember from the greatest college baseball coach of all time. I'm trying to, but what comes to my brain is, is everything that Blair just said. And it was from day one, you know. I You know, Coach said something that I think is just so important and not only in sports, but also in life and in business. And he said the word culture and character, you know, and getting into the living rooms of folks and understanding what makes somebody tick. I mean, that's a hard thing to do. Like, to learn about the players is hard. Lazy coaches or leaders have a set way that they do things. You know, lazy. And they may not be lazy people, but they're just lazy in that aspect of leading men. One thing that Coach Burtman did was would understand the person, what made them tick, like what they liked. I was this kid from Broadmoor that didn't have a whole lot. Well, he let me wear his Rolex one night. I don't know if he remembers that, but he did.

I wore his Rolex out to the bar one night. I sure did. Yeah.

Coach.

But he just knew kind of, you know, he would take time to get to know everybody and what made them go. And, you know, that's really what sticks out most right now. I was listening to Blair. I'm like, yeah, you know what? Like, did he give me like a tip to help me hit? No, not really. You know, but man, that's so much more.

It's so funny because every time I talk about what I've built and when my wife asks me, you know, tell me about Skip and tell me about your mindset. See, back in the '80s, when someone told you to lay down on the ground in the locker room of the College World Series and visualize being there, people thought I was a little cuckoo. But now today it's called sports psychology, right? And it's something that has built me. It's something that I have sat there when I was recording the show in my car. Thinking about what's next and feeling it and visualizing it in the quote that he always said, right? And I feel so deeply that the quote, you know, I want one of you guys, maybe even Skip, man, you want to say the quote so the audience can hear it? Yeah.

Let me do it just before. Ryan mentioned something about how it began. So did you do. You too. In 1984, when it first began and there were 300, 400, 500 people at the bollard, and I hear things like, hey, Slip, Slip Birchman. Yeah, Slip, we need one more point, you see.

Yeah.

And one by one, as their runs, you know, not points. And you get a lot of this, hey referee, you stink. You know, it was all football. You know, at LSU. And people like this are so strong, like Ryan and Blair, they're such strong people with great family, mom and dad, great. And they were able to do things besides football. Play great baseball, as both of them did. And of course, some went to the big leagues like Ryno, and others are super successful, you know, business guy, you know, like Blair. And they did things like Blair played second base in his first time out. What year was that?

'97?

Yeah, it was '87.

Long time ago. That's what it was.

We're all getting gray except Brian Terry. I got some in there.

I think he's dyeing his hair.

No, we don't.

I know.

Hey, listen, I mean, I don't know.

I got some grace.

Okay.

Okay. I just keep it real short.

Okay.

No, the guys, they're great. And I can remember Blair played second base. Yeah. When he was a freshman. I go to him and I said, Blair, we need you third base. I can put this other guy at second. But he can't play third player. They move right over. Ryno, of course, played as a freshman. I mean, he, you know, he was so good. But he— but both of them were fun. Both of them were excellent players, but both of them had fun and delivered fun to the clubhouse. The other people.

I know. I've been in the clubhouse with this guy before. I know it. I know what goes on. I know what goes on. Never got the chance to be with you in the clubhouse.

Nah, I wish we could have.

That would have been fun, man.

No doubt about it.

I came the year after you won the natty and you were gone.

Yeah.

You know.

Yeah. But that's the thing. Again, you know, Coach, there was so much fun, but there was so much work. But because of what you created through your leadership, we all loved every minute of it. We loved each other and we loved being with each other. And that's something that I don't think any— I don't want to say any other college coach on the planet because that would be unfair, but very few have been able to do.

Yeah. The first thing that was on my mind after coaching the team that was here with Jack Lemay and I had them all— Lemay had them the year before and then I had them. Uh, we did okay, but, uh, hmm, uh, one of the things that I really look for in order to win is high-character kids. And of course they have to play, but high-character kids. And, uh, these two are perfect examples, you know, of kids that can team, be part of a team that can reach out to someone who needs help to be better on the team, not to mention their skill level, to reach out to help others without, you know, sounding bossy. They were, they were two of the greatest. These happen to be two of the greatest that played for me, and it was a lot of fun. I mean Rhino was a lot of fun. Blair, it's a lot of fun. And I'll tell you, Blair, your dad, well, I mean, what a great guy. I mean, the parents were very nice. I enjoyed talking to them. And, uh, it was, uh, it was fun for me to get going, you know, on this thing.

He created the best atmosphere for our family, for us. I don't ever really remember, Ryan, you remember rules? You remember curfew checks?

Absolutely not.

No, we did what we were supposed to do sort of thing. He trusted us to do that. We had some guiding principles, right? Hey, this is what is expected of you, but let's have some fun. Let's let it rip. And that was my favorite part. We could have fun and he would talk to us about letting it rip. Like we didn't come to Omaha to hold them up at third. And that works for us in business. We didn't come here to sort of just play, you know, and it was some of my— we got to have fun and we got to let it fly.

But to your point, though, like, like that does not work if you don't have the right folks in the room. You know, the whole— if it ever escalated up to his office, like, we were done. You know, that team doesn't win. Right. And, and, you know, it's funny, Blair sitting right there like, like, there was always a guiding presence in the clubhouse, in the locker room, that you don't need a curfew because if you don't take care of your business, that'll be handled in the clubhouse.

Mm-hmm.

Right. And it would never get to his office. And, and there was a hierarchy there. And, you know, I'm not going to sit here and get on my soapbox about college sports now and how that's a hard thing to create. But I will say that You know, once you start that cycle in recruiting those types of kids, the clubhouse and/or the boardroom polices itself.

Absolutely.

Yeah. And, you know, if it ever escalates up, it's—

there might have been one time it got to his office, maybe Doug Thompson, Trey McClure, myself involved in a— okay, in a food fight.

In a food fight?

In the union? In the club, you know, probably shouldn't have happened.

Was it in the clubhouse or was it in the union?

No, it was in the clubhouse. It was in the clubhouse.

Like a real food fight?

Yeah.

People do that?

Maybe Momoa grow— yeah, I mean, it got, it got, it got, it got intense.

Movies, were you just having fun or were you like pissed?

Like, we were having fun, probably went a little, little, little past the guiding principle thing, you know. Um, you know, so we had, we had to pay for that one. Okay. But, uh, you know, so when, you know Every now and then, it made it out.

You know, I got a funny story, and it was the year that I was with you in 2001. I think what happened is I think Southern beat us.

Oh yeah, I remember that.

And remember they ran to center field and they slid on their knees and they went like this to our flags?

Yeah, yeah.

And then Skip goes, oof, see you at 6:30 tomorrow morning. And I'm like, I don't know who I was talking to. But I was like, what's that mean? And they're like, don't eat. Yeah, don't eat.

Look.

And then they asked us and then we gave them, we gave them our bats. I don't know if you remember that. Like, they were like, yeah, like they came, they beat, they needed bats, I guess, to finish the year out.

Some balls.

Yeah. And coach is like, all right, boys, go get your bats and give it to them. Like, wait, what?

I don't remember that.

Oh, yes, sir.

Okay.

I don't remember that. I remember the next morning, though, was the worst morning of my life. Yeah, it was bad.

Some bear crawls and some—

oh, yeah, you know, some, some rolls.

Oh, my goodness.

And some— all that.

All that.

Yeah, it was. Yeah.

That was treacherous.

Well, that only happened once in her career.

That's enough.

That was definitely enough. You know, it's, uh, it's one of those things that we— so many stories because of this man, you know, Doug Thompson. And, and thank you, Doug, and, and Coach Daly for setting this up. And, you know, he told me a story yesterday about the 2000 comeback, right, in that game against Stanford. You came in the dugout and you're like, nobody believes we're going to win this game.

Yeah.

So grind it out, buck up, and we're going to effing win this thing. And someone's like, yo, yo, Blair, Blair, Blair, you got to go hit. Because I wasn't in the dugout. I was sitting in my friend's living room at that time, you know, watching it, just like sweating and wanting this to happen. And you sprint up to the plate. This man has a 13-pitch at-bat and then blows the ball out of the yard.

Good memory.

Good memory. Long time ago. Yeah.

Unbelievable.

It goes back to that quote that you were referencing. If you— Anything you could vividly imagine, ardently desire, sincerely believe, enthusiastically act upon, must, absolutely must come to pass. That's the foundation. And that's—

I mean, hair on end, man.

No doubt. And that's the inspiration for that. That's why. Yeah, hey man, taught me this. Look, we're in dire straits right now.

Yeah.

You know, and— Wasn't that the 8th inning? Yeah, I think it was the 8th inning.

Yeah.

And it was a gloomy day and, you know, Stan, you know, they had the momentum and the pitcher was cutting us up and it was Wayne on the mound at that point. It was Wayne on the mound at that point. Jason Young.

If they would have left the other guy in, we wouldn't be talking about this.

Jason Young, that job was—

But both shoving. Yes. We never saw two guys.

No.

In the first round. Come on. Crazy. The kids are so— at the time, you know, that that happened, the kids were so tough mentally. I don't mean I did that. I mean their parents did that.

No, you did that.

And they did that. They watched other kids. And their toughness. And pretty soon, people like Blair and Ryno were the leaders, and they— other kids picked up on that. So I didn't have to talk to every single kid one-on-one, you know. They did it because of who they were. And I'm very, very proud, not just because Ryno slid in with the winning run, you know, or Blair got a Gave that speech that really made a difference against Stanford. All the time, they were great kids. They did well in school. There was never a problem of any kind with the kids, which is important to me. You know, I didn't want to hear about a bad— some teacher sent me a note about a bad kid. I just didn't like that. Very rarely happened. And, uh, I always said, I'm gonna want high-character kids to smoke, you know, the coach that helped recruit at the time. Give me high-character kids. And we— the high-character kids won for us. And if we didn't have that, we struggled.

Yeah, some more. Don't you love his humility?

Yeah.

I mean, are we really?

Are we really?

Yeah. Coach, I mean that with all respect. It's, you know, say like, you know, you did this for us.

That's the truth.

Well, I mean, and it was just, it's still so apparent. I use this every day with my companies, the folks I interact with, my family. You know, number one, there's, and there's a few principles that I learned directly. From him that, that have allowed me to continue to have success after baseball. Right. Which is a hard transition.

Oh, dude.

You know, when you've tried to hit a curveball your entire life and all of a sudden you're not trying to hit a curveball anymore, then what? Now what? You know, we all deal with that. Right. And so, so number one, and I learned this directly from, from Coach was, The game itself can't define you. Like, that can't be at the core of who you are. It has to be something greater and bigger than that. And, you know, baseball is so hard to where if you take your eye off the ball— and truthfully, I wasn't good enough to take my eye off the ball. But if you do that, somebody's going to take your job, especially in pro ball. I mean, the second you let your foot off the gas pedal, Here comes another guy. And so if that's your identity, you're going to be disappointed every time.

Yeah.

Every single time. And then one day the game forgets you.

Oh yeah.

And then that's who you are and then you're miserable. Right? So the guiding principle, and I think it equates into winning, whatever that may be that you determine in your life as winning is Blair kind of touched on it. And Coach danced around it, but it's— and I tell my people this all the time— you have to want your teammate or your locker mate or your, your officemate to succeed more than you want yourself to succeed. You have to love them more than you love yourself in moments. I have to want Blair to get the big hit more than I want the big hit. I can't tell you how many times I stood on top of the dugout or even in pro ball with Fontenot when we were playing together and I wanted him to have that moment more than I wanted myself to because I knew he needed it, you know, or I wanted him. I just wanted him to have it because I loved him.

Yeah.

And you take that and he would talk about that a lot. You know, you have to really love those guys. I mean, genuinely love them. Do you want to win? Do you want to have success? But those principles, the, the loving your teammates so much, and then also not having that one pitch or that one game define you as a human. You take that and transition it into the business world, which I'm working on every day.

Mm-hmm.

Not great at it yet, but I'm trying.

I hear you on that one.

Yeah, I tell you, it's a thought.

Yeah.

You're unstoppable.

Yeah.

Yeah, you're, you're— I mean, it is because now I don't have to rely on a general manager. To say if I'm good or not. Now it's on my shoulders.

It's— everybody looks for a cheat code, the silver bullet code.

Yeah.

And what people don't realize is he gave it to us a long time ago. It's do the dang work.

That's right.

Love your teammate. Love your coworker. Love your family. Love, love the people in your life and focus on that. The results come, but don't focus on them.

And don't let them define you.

The recruiters, whether— well, you don't need any names. I told all the people who recruited— that was a lot of different people— is the kid high-level character? And I, I don't know, I just saw him play center field. Well, you got to find out, you know. Is he president of some club in school? What's his grades? What does he do after school? Mom and dad watch him at the park, or does he stay in? Because those are the guys that win.

Yeah, but that's what's special because, because Larry, and you, and you know this, most recruiters and head coaches aren't thinking of that. What's he run the 60 in?

Right.

What's, what's the exit velo? Right, right. What, what's the, um, the launch angle now? And what, You know, what's all this stuff? Those potentially can be big moments in games, but they don't win championships.

Fortunately, we didn't have those things.

Yeah, thank goodness.

Yeah, thank goodness. Yeah, really.

I didn't.

I didn't have it.

Yeah.

I've been to LSU recently and Jay Johnson, magnificent coach.

Yep.

And I'm watching in the clubhouse and of course television sets set on the wall. The guy pitches a ball, tells you how much it rotated. Yeah.

Oh, the spin rate.

And the spin rate, you know, how fast, of course, it was and what location it had. And I thought to myself, well, I don't think that's going to do it for us. And besides, I thought I could see that, you know, with the kids and When you match that with the character of the kids, and like Ryan said, everybody wanted everybody else— like Blair said, everybody wants everybody else to be successful. They don't talk about themselves. It was a super team effort every year, but it took time. Yeah, for it to happen. When I started boys in 1984. I saw me— God, I heard a guy yell, hey, Bertram, you know, we're one point down. Let's go.

Yeah, all the time.

Football. Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, it's funny because you look back at that and I want to touch on a very important point of you being the visionary that you are. You had the big yellow pad, right? And you had every goal. Every improvement, every vision, every championship mapped out, and you sat with your coaches on the mound. What were their reaction to that list at that time?

It was, uh, at the beginning, uh, it was hard for them. They, you know, you can't do this, and they can't do it in their businesses, you know, with 2, 3 ball games, uh, you know, when you go to the mound You know, it has to be a long period of time, you know, for the baseball season. And while there might be mistakes made, say by me, regarding— they accept that. I accept their mistakes. And we all want the same thing. It isn't just to win. I've been fortunate. All the teams I've ever had have won. But I've had great kids, high-character people like these two. Fathers involved, you know, in the program. See, I enjoyed parents, you know, coming by. Most coaches don't. It was a wonderful thing at LSU. Ryan and Fontenot. It's amazing to watch them play. And then one day you pick up and they're playing. I go actually, go into the ballgame.

Yeah.

And together in the big leagues. I don't think— I don't know how many people have done that, but I was super. And we went out for steak and it was wonderful. So Coach, maybe when they succeed, rightfully so, it's wonderful when they succeed. But you don't have to make the big leagues to succeed.

That's right.

You can be successful in your business, touch other people's lives, and do things that you've learned to do. And as Ryan said, put it into the business.

What— you know, you talked about that yellow pad.

Yeah.

And you talked about that coaches hit culture 4 or 5 times, like from '84. Like, what year did you go— did you ever go, okay, it's rolling now? You know what I mean?

Like, well, in '86, yeah, uh, we went to the World Series, first time ever for LSU. So that wasn't it, but we went back in '87, and while we didn't win, as you know, it takes time, uh, they got to learn that. And, uh, we went back in '87, that helped us. It also showed the fans that if you're really good, you go to Omaha for the national championship. And then of course, all of a sudden our fans were so terrific. We had the most people in the stands, you know, for fans.

You know, I, I feel like we're at that point, you know, you go back to '86, you go back to '87. He certainly talks about it in the book. It's when this, this hold the rope, dude, thing starts to take hold. By the time we got there, we were getting crystal balls.

Yeah.

And, and if the ball broke and our trust broke, but it was all about trust. And, and that, that yellow sheet in my mind started to create— Coach would talk about our synergy all the time. His best 9, not the 9 best. And that to me was the The cornerstone, the cornerstone was the synergy that started to be built. Our 2 2 equaled way more than 4. Certainly not 4 and certainly not less than 4.

No.

Way more than 4. And it started in my mind with that page. Lil Boi, this is where we're gonna start.

Yeah.

We're gonna put one foot in front the next and to kind of come be part of this thing. There's a trust factor that you have to bring to the table. Otherwise we'll police it. He can police it, whatever it is. But you gotta be into the, you gotta be within the ball of trust by the time we got there. Or when he threw the rope over and said, who would you have hold it? Right?

Yeah.

And then you realize like being part of this team, this community, this family is different because it comes with some, You're gonna have to bring some stuff to the table. It's gonna come with a little bit of responsibility, a little bit of pressure to be part of it.

Did you know it was gonna work like that?

Say that.

Did you know that it was gonna work like that? Like, like, you know, was there ever a— you ever go, man, I sure, I sure hope I'm right?

Let me say this, uh, be careful. Uh, in high school Team won in junior college. Yeah, of course, the University of Miami and at LSU was tough in '83, '84, '85. You know, they didn't know how. Some of them were recruits before I got there, and it was tough for me because they weren't the kind of kids that I would recruit. And then it got a little bit better in '80, so '80 '84 and first year in '86, which is fast, we—

it's really—

went to Omaha. Uh, that was first time anybody from Baton Rouge ever went to Omaha. And then by the end, thousands of people went to Omaha, and thousands of people appreciated the character and the play of say these two guys. They, but they could sense the teamsmanship, people in the stands. They could sense the quality of their personality, what mom and dad did. You know, everybody looks around and can sense that. So if Rhino goes to speak somewhere or Blair, you know, everybody thinks they're, originally they think they're gonna get a football player. See, but baseball players are— mom and dad set them up. They were playing since they were, what, 8 years old? Earlier. Earlier.

Yeah, it starts so early. But, you know, the thing about it is, you know, we keep going back to the list. That's the essence of everything we have all created because of him, because of his vision. See, he visualized and saw the grandstands. Yeah. He saw the people down left field line. He saw people down the right field line. He saw the national championships. And so when I started my business and when y'all started your businesses, I'm pretty damn sure you guys wrote this stuff down and said, this is exactly where I'm going to be in 5, 10 years.

That's right.

And only the people that believe in this, only the people that can subscribe to this vision can be here. Because if not, you can't win with you.

I love what you, I so love that. The only thing I would add to that is that he told us too that there are going to be dream busters along the way.

Oh yeah.

Dream busters. There are going to be people that are going to tell you you can't.

Oh dude.

And they're going to come out of the woodwork.

Every turn, bro.

Every turn.

Every turn.

And you got to be tough enough. You got to be courageous enough to believe that you can, to believe that we can. Because it doesn't matter whether we were playing baseball at LSU, we're working, you're— we're all working every day. Somebody's going to tell you that what you want to do and what you think you can do, you can't do that for some reason. And it's just not true. He allowed us to bust through those mental barriers. Tell us about Roger Banister. Oh, first guy under 4 minutes in a mile on a balmy day in England. I can Remember the story. So it's so good. And it just, it lets you know that it's up to you.

Yeah.

It's up to you.

You know, it's funny because if I had a dollar for every time someone laughed at me for starting this and doing this, I'd have a lot of freaking dollars. I probably wouldn't have to do anything anymore.

How much money?

You could give us some.

I'm sure.

We mean it.

If I remember it, I was at Alec Bach.

It was one of my favorite interviews, dude, because I got to sit there with somebody that I respect as a friend of mine and have a conversation. And now we're doing it in person again, you know, for this time. But, but man, of course I remember.

From then until now, this is awesome, dude.

It's been nuts.

Amazing.

It's been nuts. But you've always supported me. We don't talk all the time, but you know, you'll pop in every now and again and go, you're stud, I love you. I'm like, dang, man, there's my guy. But again, again, I want to stress this. It's because of him.

Amen.

It's because of him. Because Doug Thompson and I were talking yesterday at his office. He goes, some of my best friends are LSU players from 5 to 10 years younger than me or 5 to 10 years older than me. And the thing of the matter is like, I never played with you, right? I played with him for a year, but I was hurt.

Mm-hmm.

Doug Thompson yesterday, first time conversation in person. My son thought we knew each other for 20 years.

That's good.

Because it's the brotherhood.

It's a family.

It's different. It is. And those skills, and I want the audience to really check in on this, whether you're running a business, running a family, doing something, I don't care what is your salesperson, these principles of leadership apply. You can build this in your own life. That's why this book, you know, Everything in Baseball Matters, is much more than baseball.

Absolutely.

Skip Burtman is more than baseball.

What?

I mean, that book is sitting— that book is sitting on my— it's sitting on my coffee table in my office. I've got, I've got one book sitting right there. And when people come and meet at my office, I don't sit behind the desk because I think that's cheesy. We could do the couch and we do the chair thing.

Yeah, come on.

And so That question's asked all the time.

What is that?

What does that mean? Like, everything matters? Like, what is— I'm like, and I look, I'm like, everything matters.

Everything.

Like, literally everything matters, you know? And you take that book right there and you can apply that to any aspect of your life.

Yeah.

And I promise you're going to sit there and go, oh, you may not be able to hit a curveball or know how to go for to go first to third, but dude, it's good.

All I know is if you run a team, whether you're a coach, an athletic director, or you're like me and own a business, you better buy that book for your people.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So every one of my people in my company are getting that book. My son is getting that book. My production team is getting that book. Everybody who supports this show is getting that book. On my dime. Because here's why. If you're going to be involved in this, then you need to understand where it came from.

That's right.

You have to.

Hear, hear. It all applies.

Yeah.

It all goes back to what we were talking about earlier. I mean, this whole— all of the success at LSU had very little to do with him saying, this is how you hold a curveball, or this is how you do this.

Well said.

It just didn't. It had more to do with things that he talks about. And that's why I say I got to listen to him narrate that book in essence for 4 years. Yeah. I mean, when you talk about day in, day out, elevated on game days with the motivation, I mean, but it always came back down to these things that mattered in life and not about if we were going to beat, you know, Georgia on Friday night at 7 o'clock.

You know, one of my favorite moments with him, and I don't even know if you remember this, but I remember going into his office and saying, Coach, I'm done. You know, I got to have surgery. You know, it hurt to even shift gears in my car. Yeah, we had manual transmissions back then. We were dating ourselves a little bit. It hurt so bad. And he goes, are you sure? You're going to play this year. It's your first year here. You and Matt Heath are going to split time. I'm like, Coach, I can't even throw the ball back to the pitcher at this point. What he doesn't remember is probably that conversation, but a week before he asked me on the loudspeaker, ooh, what happened? Did you get in a car accident? Yeah, I know. And I'm like, ooh, I made it.

Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

I made it.

Oh yeah.

This shit's running deep. But I remember that conversation and I think The biggest pain in life is the pain of regret. And I hold regret in that moment because I should have said, you know what, screw it, screw it. It's going to hurt like hell. Maybe I, maybe I sit next year out, but at least I'm on the field for this man's last year. But for some reason, there was something in my mind that was just telling me that I couldn't.

I couldn't.

And so I say I should have said that. But if I didn't handle that moment like I did then, I don't think I'm where I'm at now because that drives me. Do you remember that? You remember that? Yeah. In your office at the athletic building.

By the way, I don't mean to jump in here. Last night, it's at Jeremy Moore's house. You know, one of our— another one of our great people. Today at 4:30, we have a reunion, and the '96 team, 30 years, can be honored and walk in the field. But we hope that everybody come at 4:30, whether you played '96 or not, and see if we can get all the people together. I wished to God there was some kind of test. That all the people could take to see how successful they are, how wonderful their family is, you know, how the baseball— I don't mean me— the baseball participation at that high level. And you handled it. They handled it. Uh, and now as businessmen, they handle that too. And I'm not saying that certainly it was me, it's the idea they played, uh, national championship type baseball, whether we won or not. And, uh, they knew how to be a good team. And you can't run your business if you don't know how to be a good team.

Yeah, but that's the thing that we keep talking about and going back to is what you built is much more than baseball. And you taught us how to be good husbands.

Yes.

Amazing fathers.

Important to me.

You know, that's what I get emotional about.

Friends.

Yeah.

All that stuff. That's, yeah.

Like I can think of many people that played in big college baseball programs. They don't have what we have. And I'm not talking about the 8 national titles. I'm talking about the family, the brotherhood. You know, it's just this connection within this community wasn't there before this man stepped in this area.

That's right. And the tentacles go much further too.

Sure.

I mean, you know, we talk about the greatest college football coach of all time is who? Is who? Nick Saban.

Football, right?

Yeah.

And where do you think Saban sat and talked and listened and learned? And, you know, that there's so much of that we talk, you know, that the people I don't think really think about a lot.

That's an amazing point, right? Because what most people don't understand is when he retired from baseball, he went to athletic director.

That's right.

And then he was Nick Saban's mentor. And all of a sudden, right, Nicky leaves, he goes and coaches pro, and then he goes to Alabama and he becomes the greatest football coach of all time. And everybody credits it to Nick Saban created this culture that even one blade of grass out of, out of whack has to matter to everybody. Even the janitor, even the person in the press box. Where did that come from? Yeah.

You know why he's awesome? He did that for even the smaller sports. He brought those coaches in.

DeeDee Brooks.

All of these programs. DD shot through the roof because they got to spend time with him. He didn't just go football. He didn't just go basketball. He spent time with the women's sports, the other men's sports, and brought the entire athletic department along for the journey. And I, again, Ryan touched on it earlier. You know, he knew how to talk to each individual differently. He talked to me different than Ryan, different than this one or different than that one. He did that in the athletic department too. And that's why you saw that spike. And we've been on a run since, I would argue.

It's intentional leadership. It's leading with intent. It's understanding the folks around you, what makes them tick. But it's, you know, we're talking leadership, but there's good leaders and then there's intentional leaders that really take the time to dive into those people. It's not just sports either.

No.

Yeah.

Like this is— Transitions.

No, it's personal. I'm, you know, it's a very personal thing. And I'm going to bring up something right now that might make us all a little bit, you know, emotional. In 1984, Skip, you gave your College World Series lapel pin to a young boy. 15 years later, you recruited him and he won a national championship. Wally Ponniff Jr. And our brother passed away at 22. And asleep, and you gave the eulogy. How do you hold that?

You know, I've said this, high-character young men that play baseball, come, those are the ones I want. Not so much uh, how fast or how deep they can hit. All right, that worked for me, but it also worked for you. And I mean on your own with your parents. I don't mean I did it, and that's how you got by. So learn. It can be learned on your own. It can be watching others, you know, picking the best points from each person. Then you become leaders with businesses like you three. And I'm not saying it couldn't be done without sports, but sports help.

It parallels life and business so much. And that was just, you know, the thing, you know, about, you know, our boy Wally was, you know, it was just indicative of your leadership and what you created. There's no mistakes in this world. That impact on that 4-year-old boy at that moment.

Yeah.

It said, I'm going to LSU. It was in his blood. He's from Metairie. Yeah. He wanted to come here.

No doubt.

Hey, when he was in the womb, he was probably already, you know, chanting the fight song. Right. But the thing is, the thing is, most services don't have their college coach give the eulogy. That is speaking so highly of what you created here. You know, and I didn't want to have this conversation without touching on that because I want the audience to understand and the people that are going to see everything on the social media clips and whatever of what this man truly created.

You want to talk, you were talking about like it's a family and Coach has talked about high character. You want to talk about a unbelievable family. Still talk to Mr. Wally and Nick and all of that. And, you know, tragic, you know, and there are others, Johnny Thibodeau and others. And, you know, it hurts, still hurts. You know, like you said, it'll drag the tears out. But it shows what this man means to us, obviously. To the parents that he touched, to the whole thing, to have him, you know, give that eulogy, you know, and he shows up all the time. This isn't talk.

No.

You know, this man still shows up. He's not— this isn't, you know, cheap talk.

It's not lip service.

It's not lip service. It's what an example. I'll say that.

Thank you.

Truly, man. So I took my son to the old site, Alex Box Stadium, and I was getting on the internet looking at the photos, like, where was the Intimidator in relation to the athletic administration building? So obviously not hard to find on the internet, right? So I go to the spot where I felt like home plate was. I'm like, why isn't home plate still here? First and foremost, like, what the hell, man? Like, leave something.

I'm with you.

Leave something.

I'm with you.

I know it's, you know, you needed the buildings, the grocery mart, and like some things are worth more than money.

I'm with you.

But something interesting happened to me when I was there showing my son around and he was running around on the grass and I was still having a hard time kind of figuring out where I was. And this is going to sound really woo-woo, but I was walking at a certain point and then I just literally stopped and I felt cold in a really good way. And the goosebumps, you know, the energy came from the ground and floated all the way through my whole body. And it was to a point where I've never felt these types of goosebumps. And I'm telling you, it was our boy Wally. I'm telling you, I'm telling you. Or the mystique of the box. Yeah, something. But something—

all of it.

So all of it. Something hit me so hard, you know, hard to drive by that spot.

I mean, and just knowing all of the things that happened there, right? The magic that was there. We— when that ball got rolling downhill in that stadium, it was over with. It really was. It was just the crowd was on top of you. The smoke was coming across from the barbecue pit.

Yeah.

And I mean, it was, it was a lot. You were done. It was over. You were done. Over.

I remember in '03 when we, when Baylor was, was here in the, in the regional final, they beat us, you know, Friday night and you guys were long gone. But, you know, they beat us Friday.

We were in Tennessee.

Yeah, we were.

And, you know, we won Saturday 6-5. And then we just— but, but before we won 6-5, they had this lefty. I think his last name was Durden or something, or something like that. And he hit this ball to center field, and I'm like, this is a problem because they're about to go up. There's no wind blowing. When that ball was hit, that wind started blowing in hard from center field, and that ball was caught right by the 31. Yeah, right by the 31.

He's a, you know, when Wally got here his freshman year, he was— knew he was supposed to be here. You know, it's uncomfortable being a freshman walking into that locker room.

It's uncomfortable being a Juco transfer.

Okay. So I said very similar.

Yeah.

Because of the tradition and what's happened and, you know, so it's— it is a little unnerving. He was comfortable from day one. He knew in his brain that that's where he belonged on that field and fit right in. And I told him something that you told me, like, we can't win without you. You know, Blair told me that my freshman year, and I told Wally that, and it was true. You know, we can't win without you. We got to have you. You got to be great. And you are great. You know, the comforting part for me, though, is I know exactly where he is.

No doubt.

I know exactly where he is. And so he was— and that's in heaven because he was an unbeliever— is so special to everybody. You go back to a lot of that World Series too.

Yeah.

So for me, that's comforting. If there was a question, I would—

Yeah.

But for me, that is comforting. I love hearing the chills story. Yeah. Um, God, he, he was, he was supposed to be there. And, and there's many others. This guy was supposed to be at LSU, you know. You just always knew. I was, you know, and Skip, Skip will tell you, saw me when I was like 10 or 11 playing Little League. First time they saw me, he was recruiting Trey and Todd McClure and Gil and all those guys at Episcopal.

Yeah.

And, and my Papa went over and grabbed him, said, hey, come look at this kid over here.

And he's like, oh, Papa.

Yeah, you know. And so, and so You know, there's just certain guys are just supposed to be there. And I think, um, that's right. You know, you've got, you've got 4 or 5 right now here. And, and man, if, if, if every school would adopt that too, they'd have success. Or every business would adopt that too. They don't have to be superstars.

No, no, no.

They just, they need to be that core, you know, that core group.

Yeah. I remember, you know, being in the locker room with Wally. My, my locker was right next to his and I was struggling, right, with the injury. You know, and all that kind of good stuff. He just looked at me, he's like, you're, you're fine, man. Just go have fun. Be yourself. You're supposed to be here. Yeah, you're good enough to be here or you wouldn't be here. And, you know, he also gave the whole locker room pink eye. Remember that?

That might be the worst thing he ever did.

The worst thing he ever did. Probably is the worst thing that Wally Potts ever did.

Such a good Oh my God, I miss him, I love him. And, uh, well, that's the— that's— that is the kid you'd want your daughter to marry, 100%. Like, that— they say that, and that might get overused some.

Mhm.

That's him.

Yeah, like, that wouldn't upset me.

No, no, no, no.

I'm like, dang, girl, you lucked out.

This is worth it.

You want to do it now?

Keep him.

Yes, do it right now.

I agree.

But no, again, it's just you— you— it just always goes back to the character you're talking about. You you know, that coach keeps talking about with who he recruited. And, you know, just this— it's special here, you know, it's just different. And I got to bring my son, he has to bring my son to this beautiful place to meet you guys and to meet, to meet you, coach. And I remember telling him like, hey, I'm going to Baton Rouge, I'm gonna go interview Skip. He's like, oh, that's great. I go, you're coming with me. He's like, I get to meet Skip? I think that, that's a He's been waiting for this moment, you know, and, you know, he's 12, you know, and doesn't really fully understand, but because of what you built through your leadership and creating amazing men, he's hell-bent to come here. Like, there's no other place he wants to be other than LSU.

Nice.

That's awesome.

That's pretty dang cool.

That is awesome.

Yeah.

You know, like, I mean, you have a kid here. Here running track, right?

I got 2 here and I'll have 3 here next year.

Dude, you have—

I wish you were still the AD, Coach, get some scholarship dollars.

Well, that's true. He's done everything from helping soccer, yeah, as well as other sports. He's done the same, and that's really urgent. Now, we never had that when you guys played, except for Wally. We never had that, and we needed that for you. We need that for the other boys. It's, uh, coaches are looking at how fast the pitch is, of course. They're looking how far the guy can hit the ball, and those guys don't necessarily win for you. You know, you got a guy that hits it less, but his character and his ability and teamsmanship and his desire to be number one is better than that. So we watched a lot of other teams that had great players.

Absolutely.

And beat them.

And beat them.

Yeah, they were better than us.

I mean, yeah, if you, if you did, they had the pros and the guys that were going on, but they didn't have the quality of the team unit and the high character, uh, you know, of our kids, especially these two, because they were leaders here. He played, uh, second base when he was a freshman, and he was really good, of course.

All-American, right?

Next year I say to him, we need you to play third. There's no problem. If that's what's best for the team, I'm moving over to third.

No ego involved.

Yeah. And of course he did, and he played great. And in the College World Series, you made that great play at third base. Oh, and got the guy out at first.

Yep.

You know, by a little bit.

That was down the line, right?

It was down the line.

I remember where I was watching that on TV.

This guy is so nice and he always gives it to us. He always, even back in the day, but he is who molded all of that. He took, you know, when we are, everybody like anywhere else, when we show up at LSU, you think you're it, right?

You can say it. You can say it. I mean, you want to say something.

I'm saying just say it. I'm giving it everything.

Just say Ryan did this.

No, but we all did. We all did. But he molds us, he takes us, he strips it down and tells us what is real in life and how to get what you want.

Yeah.

Right?

Yep.

It's the little things too.

It is.

It's to help enough other people, then you can have what you want sort of thing. I need him to be really good. I want him to.

I love him.

Like Ryan was saying earlier, he molds that. He takes a bunch of cocky kids and people that think they're going to play shortstop for the Yankees.

Yeah.

And makes him love LSU and love his teammate and gives you something that lasts for life. Well, you know, that's him.

Yeah, exactly. But, you know, so most coaches, you know, in the pregame for getting ready for a national championship game would start talking about, you know, watch out for the offspeed, do this, do that, do this, do that. You know, if we get this guy here, we're going to do this. If that— if he gets you in this count, look for this. No, I remember sitting in my living room. They always had him mic'd up. Yeah. Remember, today you represent your family and your maker. Go play like champions.

Let's go.

That's it.

That's it.

You deserve it.

You know, he told us.

Yeah, you deserve this.

You're champions today.

You deserve that a lot. Right at the end of every story.

Yeah. I mean, this guy turned all of our delusions into reality.

It was subliminal stuff, too. I mean, it was always videos of success and watching guys before you do things that were grade. It was— and I'll know that was all intentional for him too, but for us, we didn't know that it was. But like, everything that we looked at and talked about had something to do with winning in Omaha. And it was— and so when you got there, it wasn't new. Like, we may have— I may have never had an at-bat in Omaha before, but in my brain, I'd seen Blair and all these guys before me, and there's thousands of times guys having success in Omaha, you know.

So like, why'd you throw that helmet? Exactly. He's seen that.

It just happened. I didn't think about it, you know.

But you—

but you—

here would say, why did you throw the helmet like you did?

I saw it because that's what Armando did.

No doubt.

Or the other guys. You saw it on the video. And even though you never thought about it, you threw— well, other things are like that.

Yeah.

Uh, not just going to your right at shortstop. Or going to your left at second base or third. You know, and it's not as if you have to do it every single day. You have to come up with the concept that you're part of an organization and you have to do your part and you have to root for the other guys to do their part as well. And not only that, but we had a lot of fun.

No doubt.

As well. I mean, I want to sound like it was all a lot of fun.

No, it was awesome. You know, you're talking about seeing it. You know, you get in the squad room and you pull out that cart with the TV on it.

Yes.

VHS. Push it in. I mean, we're dating ourselves here.

No, no. It wasn't real.

Hey, bro.

There was no DVDs. There was no YouTube. You know, mirror face.

This was VHS.

VHS.

And we watched.

These highlights, and, and we'd watch them over and over and over again until they were fully ingrained into our brain, in our every fabric of our body. It's— and, and it's because of those things, it's like you're watching it and it's like, yep, that's us, that's what we're supposed to do, that is what is expected, that is the expectation. And every now and again we get a highlight clip of us from the weekend before and watching our guys do the same thing.

Mixed in. Mixed in.

It's like, oh, this dude, master, master, the magician.

Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed.

You guys have a funny Skip story you want to tell? I got a lot of funny Skip stories. What's your funniest one? Well, can I tell mine then?

Please.

You remember you got me suspended, right?

We catch what?

You got me suspended.

From— from—

from— for a week in the fall.

Okay.

He's like, I need you to come to my batting cage and work with the boys. And someone gave me $50. And the next week he comes up to me, he goes, oh, you got to go up to compliance. They want to talk to you about the cages.

Follow the sword.

Just, just be honest. You got paid $50. I said, all right, coach, I got it. Go up there. Yeah, I made $50. Like, all right, you're gonna have to sit out a week.

Are you serious?

They didn't tell you about all the other stuff that was floating around?

I was like, what's going on here? Yeah, I was just doing what I was told. The legend here told me to come.

And there was a lot of things that all of you did that other people don't do that play baseball at real good schools, you know, but they don't have the quality in my mind. They don't have the quality of all 30 guys. See, I'll tell you what, today, boys, there are 30 full scholarships. Yes, that's on my baseball player. We had 11.7. So that meant that nobody had a full, and they, they did. That didn't bother them. You know, we just wanted to do the important things and represent LSU, our parents, and other people in the best way we could. And they did. And it was enjoy— listen, it was enjoyable for me to go up and watch you play with the Cubs, right? And Fontenot to be at second base. So, and Spider Jorgensen, yeah, was playing for the other team.

Cincinnati, sure was.

So when that was happening, I went up there and I saw everybody, of course, and that was nice. Uh, and not everybody makes the big leagues, but he did. In his business, the quality of his family. You say, that's more urgent, you know, than those who made the big leagues. There's so few of those. Did we have great ones? Sure, we had Ben McDonald, we had Doug Thompson, we had people who were super. So I'm not saying we didn't have great talent. I'm saying that It wasn't the only thing that we had.

Mm-hmm.

And the character of the players and their desire to have other people be successful on their team and not necessarily have for them to have the highest batting average, but for somebody to have it on our team, that means everything. Now, of course, they're good in business now. And boy, both of these guys And I'm not saying that baseball did it, of course. I'm saying that baseball was part of their growth and what their parents taught them, what the community and school taught them. Baseball was a strong part of that.

Is it fair to say that you were really into it? Coach, is it fair to say that you, you're more interested in creating Major League men, human beings, than Major League baseball players?

Yeah. But that's the thing that was always been so apparent about Coach is he was more proud of the man you became.

That's right.

The husband, the father you became. That's what mattered.

Which goes back to the identity piece because at the end of the day, it's, it, nobody cares. Like, like in 100 years, who's going to care? Like the game's going to forget you. Baseball forgets everybody.

I mean, it does.

It sure does. Baseball will forget you. And so, and so You know, and that's my message a lot of times to, to the guys now that I'm, I'm helping is like, yeah, I get it. Like, this is important, but like, what's really important? Like, Paul Skeens is the greatest pitcher on planet Earth. Literally.

No doubt.

Right. And so that platform is special. That's a— he'll never have it again.

No.

Right. And that's my message to him. Like, listen, yeah, you're great. I get it. Trust me, I don't want to hit off of you.

No, right?

Well, the game will forget you.

Yeah, thanks. Let me say this about the— baseball can be— it's a wonderful game, it's the greatest, but it can be cruel and hard to play at certain times. And you hit a shot and the shortstop dives and catches the ball. And the other team hits a little dribbler that gets a guy to first— it's baseball! These guys handled both of those, you know? Whether they hit the ball like that or whether they fielded a ball that was a dribbler couldn't get the guy at first base, and they overcame all of that. Wonderful for me but more important is look them now on the success. You know, Rhino and his then-girlfriend, okay, my granddaughter is— she was a cheerleader, Rhino's wife. And my daughter, my granddaughter, who's a teacher now, is— we've brought her up. And, and his wife was so nice, and he came by This was in the basketball arena.

Mm-hmm.

This guy's father did so much. I mean, it was who could cook the jumbo white better.

Let's go.

Yeah.

Trey McClure, pork chops and all.

Yeah.

And that was the best of times.

Well, well, anyway, that means a lot to me having nothing to do with the pork chops. The, the effort to get our team to be, enjoy themselves. We had that.

Yes.

And, uh, Dad was great. But, you know, it goes back to what you were saying, you know, in the beginning. You go out to play and you're not always sure that you can make it. You know, there's obviously times. Now, these two guys were so Well, neither would you. Weren't— no one was drafted out of high school, okay? So they weren't superstars, but they had that high character. They had all the moves you needed. Those are the guys that I want. I want them to pitch, I wanted to hit, I wanted to play D. Those are the guys who do that, and I don't understand why other coaches can't pick that up. I really don't.

I just—

the game has changed.

I've, you know, lazy recruiting. I mean, they don't take the time that you took though. That's the thing. Yeah, it's, it's easy to read numbers now. Analytics are great.

Oh yeah.

But it's easy to go, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, I'll take him. It's hard to sit down and talk to the parents and look the kid in the eye. Like, that takes time.

Yeah, yeah, it takes time.

People don't do that now because they have exit velos.

Well, and they have you know, a team full of mercenaries, one-year mercenaries and one-year, you know, and that's going to change.

We could be here for hours talking about—

I talked to Monty Lee about that this morning. We were, you know, in the hotel. We were just sitting there talking about, you know, kind of how hard it is now and how different it is. So, you know, and I think that's going to change because next year it goes into effect. You got 5 years to play 5. You can only transfer once. That's great.

Oh, that's happening.

That's how that's written. I'm already signed that bill, dude.

Wonderful.

Done.

Oh, that's great.

That's done.

That's good news.

Well, there's 30 full scholarships, which I like.

Yeah, I like that.

But there's also the NIL money.

Here we go.

Which I don't like.

I don't like it at all.

And I think that— not, um, this is not a little shoe, but I think there are schools, baseball teams at schools, where they're a little bit— they don't talk a lot about it, but they're really upset that this guy gets this amount of money And I get this, yes, it's going on. And just like this, you know, nor human nature, it happens in the big leagues, happens in college. And I'm sad about that, you know. I, I don't want NIL money, you know. I like full scholarships, of course. And these guys played with it— tuition, scholarships, tuition, books. Yeah, I mean, Dad And right now too, tuition's gone. Dads had to pay the difference. Yeah, but it— but they really— with 11.7 scholarships, they realized that other people had to have tuition too, and that we have to contribute. And they all handled that so well. Nobody came in— no father came in and said, why doesn't my guy have more? Or, can't you do more for my kid? The kids explained it and everybody understood it was the way to go.

But that's the pro— that's the culture difference now in college baseball because you have someone coming in, right? And, and the, the returners are expected to be the leaders setting an example. But then when the guys come in that have more money than them, they're like, that, that causes dissension in culture. That's hard.

Look, Blair and I lived it. We, we Baseball is great until I started getting paid.

It must be— it's such a good one. It must be so much less fun.

Yes.

Worrying about the draft, worrying about the end, worrying about like— I don't— we never thought about it.

Look, I loved the game. The second I started getting paid the 1st and the 15th, it became a job and it was not fun. Yeah, the fun was gone.

It was gone.

It was gone. And now you're, you know, you introduce the variable of money to an 18-year-old who can't process, um, the way they should talk or act or sound in a clubhouse. I mean, Blair and I did it. We, you know, we— there is angst, of course, because I'm hitting.330, making league minimum. Coach K. Fukadome is making $15 million and he's hitting.120. Yeah, I'm feeling some type of way about that. Now I'm 27 years old. I have the maturity.

Yeah.

To be quiet about it and just say, okay, it's all good.

Yeah.

Now you're asking an 8— yeah, 18-year-old Ryan from Broadmoor or the West Bank Tank over here to keep their mouth shut. Like, I know what I would have said. Hey, whoa, timeout. Yeah, I'm 18 because I— but I don't have that maturity. So what you're saying is true. Like, yeah, they're gonna act like kids because they're kids. What we didn't think about with NIL was that variable mentally, what money does to the human. And are they old enough to take it? They're not. They just can't.

Yeah, I don't think so. They can't.

Yeah, it's, you know, hell, when I was 25, it was hard.

I bet, I bet.

You know, today, in addition to 30 scholarships full, you know, per team, which, you know, took away a lot from superstars like you guys, we couldn't get full. Now they have the 30 full. But amazingly enough, NIL, you guys says, well, what can you do for me now, coach, after I have a full scholarship? And some of them, well, many of them, you know, get paid. I mean, they don't have to work for it.

Real money.

Real money. I mean, $100,000. Yeah, sometimes huge amounts of money.

Yeah, it's different. Yeah.

I didn't have that. And I'm so glad, you know, I said if that ever comes, I have to get out. But I never did when I was coaching. And you know, I can remember Ryan as a freshman. I remember I had a microphone and, you know, we teased him and he was just, you know, beginning and it was wonderful. Blair was a superstar at second base. I remember the line drive that you caught when you were off the ground that high and moved over to third. Because that's where we needed a guy. They treated— they were different. Uh, you know, I'm not saying different in any way except they believed me when I said that I'm making sure we can win, but we can still win if you're a good guy and make good grades and you're a good teammate. We could still win. Winning just was one thing of many that we wanted for the kids.

Yeah, I think again, we always talked about what you've built, but that's the byproduct.

It is.

Yeah.

It's the day-to-day that we're trying to talk about, but being in it, we're so fortunate to know how impactful that really was. Yeah. His delivery, the story, the timing. Of it all. It always felt like, oh my God, he's bringing the— he just had the timing of what we needed as a team. And when you can put those tried and true principles and deliver them at the right time like he did, it's just so impactful.

And then Steve— and then we win.

And we win.

Like, that's, you know, and we're still winning.

Yeah.

You know, because of what the man gave us and taught us. Along with our parents and, and others. But, um, just really, really fortunate.

You know, it's a good point because we talk about that top of the mountain goal. You know, in '84, this man puts the College World Series on the regular season schedule.

Yeah.

Really? Like, they've never done it.

Never been there.

Never been. But you did that. And what it created is like, here's the standard. Now everything here, that's the gift, that's the process. So we're going to do all the things that we need to do over and over and over and over again, because that's where you're built. That's where the individual is built. That's where the team is built. That's where the culture is built. That's where the winning is built. And then all of a sudden you execute that over and over again, and now you're here without even thinking about it, right? Of course, we always had Omaha In the back of our mind, we knew what the assignment was. Hell, even in the weight room now, it says Road to Omaha starts here on the weight room. Sure. It's like it's in our face constantly. Yeah, but we're almost numb to it as well.

Yeah.

I mean, if you don't, if you don't visualize it and understand it and see it and feel it. I mean, there was two very familiar with these teams, but '07-'08 in Chicago, we were number one offense in baseball, number one pitching staff in baseball, best defense in baseball. And we got swept in the playoffs. We never talked about the World Series. Flip side of that, you go play for a manager like Tony La Russa in St. Louis or Bruce Bochy in San Francisco. They had both won championships. It was recent and it was all they talked about. Yeah, all they talked about was the World Series. All they talked about was October. I'm like, this is familiar. I know. Yes. And the teams weren't nearly as good as the Chicago '07-'08 teams with Greg Maddux and Kerry Wood and—

Sure.

Alfonso Soriano. I mean, the list goes on. There's Hall of Famers all over the place. I'm looking around like, I don't belong here.

Right.

And, but we didn't win. But it was such a familiar feeling for me when I got in those clubhouses and around those men. And I go, okay, this is what it looks like. I mean, let's rewind for a second. It started with Skip. And it went Lupinella, Dusty Baker, Joe Torre, Tony La Russa, Bruce Bochy.

Wow.

All going to be— all going to be in the Hall of Fame.

Yes.

And the greatest one of all of those is sitting right here. Oh, undoubtedly.

Oh, 100%.

Listen, it's not— I'm serious. It's not even a question. And I'm going to tell you why. Because his skill set would transcend any— it works in— he said it earlier without even saying it— high school, junior college, Little League, high school, junior college, Miami, LSU. It would have worked in New York with the Yankees. It would have worked at Google had he wanted to be the CEO of Google. It would have worked. It would have—

it would work at a daycare.

It would work anywhere. That's why we enjoy that. And Blair made a great point, man, like He's like, I'm almost jealous. Like, we got to experience that. I mean, like, everybody else gets to read it and see it, read that book and digest it and go, man, this is pretty awesome. Like, we actually— so we read it, we heard it, and then we saw it work. You know, we saw it all the way to the end.

You know, it's— you asked me earlier, you know, like, I don't know if you remember, but I was on your show a few years ago.

Of course you're big time now, bro. Hey, man, I'm finally in the business.

And you're jacked. Well, you know, I mean, This is my big leagues. I finally made it.

Yeah, true.

You know, like, it took me years. I finally made it. Cool. You know, I sucked for a long time. I didn't become what I thought I was going to be in this game of baseball, but, but now I'm doing what I was meant to do. My, my purpose, what God created me for, was to have great conversations and bring amazing men like this to the audience, right? But here's the thing, the one thing you said about those World Series championships, you said The difference was, is everybody in the clubhouse loved each other.

Oh yeah.

That's an exact quote from that show.

Really?

Yes. Well, you can go back and you can look at— it's exactly what you said.

True.

And it's true, man. You know, so here's what I want to do. You know, we're, we're, we're going to, we're going to start downshifting here and have one more question for all you guys. Well, I'm going to start with Skip and it's the most, one of the most important questions because it's the heartbeat of the show, right? This show is called the Determined Society because One day I was so fed up and agitated that people were always making excuses in their life, including myself, most importantly myself. So I wanted to wake up in a determined society where people chase their dreams no matter how they felt emotionally at that time. After everything that you've been through, everything you accomplished in your life, what does true determination mean to you?

Um, hmm, determination, of course. It was very important both then as players, whether you're in the big leagues, you know, or your college, and then when you go into business. Yeah, determination is really important, but there are many other things, you know. How do you— how you behave with other people, what you can learn from certain people that are older or in a different part of the business. Uh, what you can learn about finances, that it's not the most important thing, you know. And other things that you can learn and become a better businessman, or you can go to the big leagues. You know, there's, there's, you know, I never thought about the big leagues with Ryan, you know, although I knew that he would be drafted and he could play. But I didn't think of that. I never said to him, boy, you're going to be great, you're going to play in the big leagues. I never said that. What I wanted for Ryan, who had a lot of talent, was to max out his talent and then let some scout, you know, make the determination and let Ryan, you know, deal with it.

Uh, when this guy graduated, you went into some coaching.

I did, for a couple years.

And I like that. And he was excellent, but then he went out in business— didn't pay much— and then he went out into business.

That's true. Well, that's the reality of it.

Yes, he could have been a great coach. Because the pros told you that.

Absolutely.

And people said to you, you know, you should do this. Uh, but he, he went the other way, and I like it, you know, what happened to him. Uh, and a Rhino, of course, uh, you know, was gifted and maxed out his gifts. You know, you, uh, played. There are certain other things that you can get out of baseball, which is, you know, can be a cruel game. And balls that bounce in the wrong way and dribblers and line drives and pop singles. You have to learn to live with that. Same as what you're doing now. There are times when people don't show. There are times where they don't do well. On the microphone. You know, you have to live with it and you have to handle it. And these guys handled that.

Yeah.

And this guy got up at the 8th inning in Omaha and just burst it out into a speech, you know, not rehearsed or anything, not supposed to. I mean, I didn't do it, he did it himself. And it was so real, you know, that the other guys picked up. Boy. And I think it made a difference in the winning and losing.

1,000%. I mean, without it, you don't wake the team up. I mean, you had to follow it up with the home run, you know, you had in a 13th pitch at bat. What, what for you, how do you define determination?

You know, I look at it, in a couple ways. And it's in, in, in, in some ways it's, it's things that I'm determined to do sort of daily. Mm-hmm. I'm, I'm a Catholic and I'm faithful and I'm determined for the, that union to, to grow and grow and grow. I'm determined to make sure that I'm in the right spot with my family, with my friends. And then because of things I've learned from my family, from my friends, from my mentors, I'm really determined and I, and, and Coach just said it. I'm determined to know that things are gonna happen today and that tomorrow I just need to get back up and get back to work and take it just like that. That to me, the determination thing to me, I like to drag it really down and make it simple and not make it complicated and not make it to where I got to figure all these things out to what I'm just, it's not. What I'm determined about is being tough enough to get back up.

That's it.

That's that.

That's it. I love it. Ryan?

I'm going to use that one because I need that. Being tough enough to get back up.

He's thinking about his golf clubs that he put away after that horseshit outing with that.

Um, ask the question again.

What does determination mean to you?

Yeah. Um, you know, I think first you have to, you have to be able to lock in on what, you know, what kind of moves you and drives you. Um, and that changes as people grow and get older. And yeah, I touched on a little bit earlier, you know, not having the game define you and identify you as a person. Human being. Um, I love what Blair said. I mean, it's, it's 100% true. Uh, you know, being— I mean, just locked step, determined to have that relationship with God. Um, because it— the pressures and stresses of life that we go through to be great, to be successful, to be somebody that can get back up. Man, it wears on you, bro.

Yes, it does.

And then you don't know that it's wearing on you until it jumps up on you, until it bites you and it's on you. Right. And so I struggle with that. I mean, I do. And it's dumb because it's all made up probably. But the being determined every day to be the best version of me. And I think, you know, as the older I've gotten, the more I've realized, like, you know, it really— the things that we thought were important really aren't that important.

You know, that's really good.

That's true. That's true.

That's really good.

I want to be— I'm determined to be the best father I can be. Right. And husband and friend. I mean, I think those things are just really, really, really important to me. And there was a time where I had my perceived success where I don't think I was. I really don't, you know, because I was so locked in on myself and the game and baseball. I'm like, okay, this is so stupid.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No, I mean, listen, you know, for me, it's all, it's everything that you guys are saying. It's, you guys are talking about a relentless pursuit. That's all you're talking about, right? It's the ability to get up and put on your shoes one day when you don't want to. It's that quietness that nobody sees, that dark work where you're, you know, you're feeling poorly. You know, I'm going to go out there and I'm going to build my business again tomorrow. I'm going to take those 25 hacks, work in opposite field or middle, middle, or whatever it is I'm struggling with, no matter how I feel about it. It's the ability to get back up and keep on, keep on ticking. It's very unsexy. It's very quiet, but it's what happens behind the scenes. So I just want to thank you guys so much, Ryan, Blair, and ultimately Coach.

Thank you.

This has been the most meaningful episode, and I cannot wait to share it with everybody. I get to be here with my boys and my coach, my mentor, and our coach and mentor, for crying out loud, along with other thousands of men that get to listen to this and remember and live all of this again of what they've created through through Skip and the culture here at LSU that he built. And for the audience, what I really want you to do— I don't ask you to buy anything, but now I'm going to for the first time in a very long time. Yeah, the ads that are played on the, on the, the deal, whatever, do whatever you need to. But this book right here, Everything Matters in Baseball, it's not just about baseball. It's about life. It's about business. It's about being a wife. It's about being a good husband, a great human being, teacher, child, whatever it is, skipBurtman.com or even skipBurtman.net. When you go to checkout, make sure you hit the promo code on the bottom and type in TDS for your discount. Go there right now, and until next time, stay determined.