Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 1225 | The Savannah Bananas Player Bringing Jesus to Baseball | RobertAnthony Cruz (Coach RAC)

Episode Date: August 1, 2025

Today, we’re joined by Savannah Bananas player RobertAnthony Cruz, known as Coach RAC, to share his journey to becoming a TikTok-viral baseball coach. RAC shares the details of signing with the Washington Nationals and how God redirected him after a sudden release. He shares his faith journey, from growing up in a Christian home to embracing the gospel’s depth as his own. He also shares the sweet story of meeting his wife in middle school and offers tips on coaching kids to find identity in Christ, not performance. We talk about the impact the Savannah Bananas have had and why they're so special, and we also discuss the impact of his faith-filled content and why he believes glorifying God through baseball outweighs any social media criticism. Coach RAC's socials: https://www.tiktok.com/@coach.rac?lang=en https://www.instagram.com/coach.rac/ Share the Arrows 2025 is on October 11 in Dallas, Texas! Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠sharethearrows.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ for tickets now! Sponsored by: ⁠Carly Jean Los Angeles⁠: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.carlyjeanlosangeles.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Good Ranchers⁠: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.goodranchers.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠EveryLife⁠: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.everylife.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Buy Allie's new book, "Toxic Empathy: How Progressives Exploit Christian Compassion": ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://a.co/d/4COtBxy⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ --- Timecodes: (02:40) Upbringing (09:50) Playing in high school/college (13:48) Playing professional (19:30) Social media (29:50) Savannah Bananas (40:18) Advice to young athletes --- Today's Sponsors: Good Ranchers — Go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠GoodRanchers.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and subscribe to any of their boxes (but preferably the Allie Beth Stuckey Box) to get free Waygu burgers, hot dogs, bacon, or chicken wings in every box for life. Plus, you’ll get $40 off when you use code ALLIE at checkout. Pre-Born — Will you help rescue babies' lives? Donate by calling #250 & say keyword 'BABY' or go to ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://⁠⁠Preborn.com/ALLIE. EveryLife — The only premium baby brand that is unapologetically pro-life. Visit ⁠⁠everylife.com⁠⁠ and use promo code ALLIE10 to get 10% off your first order. --- Buy Allie's book, You're Not Enough (& That's Okay): Escaping the Toxic Culture of Self-Love: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://alliebethstuckey.com/book⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Relatable merchandise – use promo code 'ALLIE10' for a discount: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://shop.blazemedia.com/collections/allie-stuckey

Co-track is an extremely popular TikToker who teaches kids the basics of baseball and how to love the game in a way that also glorifies God. He is a player for the very famous Savannah Bananas banana ball team. I'm sure if you don't know who Co-Track is your son does. This is a super fun and encouraging conversation that you are going to love. It's brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers. Go to Good Ranchers.com. Use code Alley at checkout. That's good ranchers.com, code Alley. Okay, y'all, before we get into that fun conversation with CoTrack, I want to remind you to please subscribe to my YouTube channel.

And I know those of you who have already subscribed, you're like, I already do that. Please don't ask me. But I have to ask because a lot of people who listen and watch don't realize that they don't subscribe. But you subscribing on these various platforms, Spotify, Blaze TV. Apple, YouTube. It's what allows us to bring you this free content on a daily basis. It's a great way to support our show. A lot of you ask me, how can we help? How can we support? That is how you can help. Just make sure that you are subscribing, especially on YouTube. Thank you so much. And now, without further ado, here's Coach Rack. Coch Rack, thanks so much for taking the time to join us.

Thanks for having me. Okay, Coach Rack, have you always been called Coch Rack? No. I I have not. Did you come up with that name? I actually did. You did? I didn't come up with the Rack part. It's my initials, kind of. My first name is Robert Anthony.

And then Cruz is my last name. When I was with the Nationals, one of my coaches started calling me Rack, and that kind of stuck. Yeah. And I started making coaching videos in 2022 after getting released from the Nationals. And so when I started making videos, I was like, okay, Robert Anthony Cruz, as my username is kind of like, kind of a mouthful. You know? I wanted it to be like, if someone could watch. one of my videos they can tell their friends, oh, you know, I watched this on a coach rack video.

So, yeah, I came up with the name coach rack and kind of just stuck. Mm-hmm. It is very catchy. Okay, I just wanted to talk about your story and hear about not just your baseball career, but obviously you're very strong in your Christian faith. So I want to hear your testimony and how you grew up. So we can go all the way back to the beginning. Sweet.

All right. Well, I don't know how far back should we go. You know, let's go all the way back. Okay, let's go all the way back. Before I was born. Okay. My parents were not believers when they met. They got married, wanted to have kids for five years, and couldn't.

And they together came to know the Lord and just a couple months later, we're pregnant with my sister. So both my sister and I were raised in a Christian home with new believers for parents. And so we were both homeschooled. I, yeah, my mom had a garden outside. we had chickens and um okay so y'all were crunchy before crunchy was cool yes because it's cool to be crunchy now but y'all were already homeschooling homesteading back in the day yeah yeah my mom's a trailblazer in that sense so yeah yeah very much we were very much uh granola so uh but yeah that that was kind of my my upbringing okay and you grew up playing baseball yes and you always wanted

to be a professional baseball player just about when i was five or four years old actually. I think the Olympics were on. I don't know which Olympics it was, but I was like watching people do gymnastics. And I was like, okay, I want to do that. So I did gymnastics for a couple years. My sister did it before me. So I did gymnastics from when I was like five until I was eight years old. And then it's just kind of hard to find a men's gymnastics program. So once I was eight, my dad was like, hey, we might need to find something else. So then I started playing baseball. And then from that point on, it was I want to be professional baseball player. Okay. And so tell me, about that. Tell me about playing baseball growing up. And at what moment you were like, okay,

I'm good at this. And I could actually try my hand at going beyond high school. Yeah. I think it was a plan all along for me to play professionally. Even when I started playing, I was obviously wasn't very good when I started starting playing ball at eight, nine years old. I mean, at that point in time, nowadays, kids have been playing for like four or five years already. Yeah. So I wasn't necessarily the greatest out the gate. I was pretty athletic though because of the gymnastics. But, but yeah, in my head, I was like, oh, yeah, like, I'll play. professional baseball and my parents totally were on the same page. They're like, oh, yeah, if you want to, like you can do it. Like, yeah. So there wasn't, uh, yeah, too much like realism, I guess,

from them. But they, uh, they were very supportive of that, that dream. But yeah, I wanted to be a pro baseball player pretty much after my first game that I ever played. So yeah. And when would you say, I'm kind of zigzagging a little bit, but when would you say for you, you really became a Christian? I know that you were raised in a Christian home, but was there a moment for you that you were like, okay, this faith is, is mine. It's real. Yeah. I don't think there. was a specific moment. And I think I've had this conversation with a lot of people. And whenever I share my testimony, I never have this one moment to point to. I have always known that I am a sinner. I've always known that I need grace. Yeah, there's never been a point in time where that hasn't been the

case. So that being said, I think that my life has been a lot of realizing the depth of the gospel and realizing that it's it is infinitely simple, but it's also infinitely complex. And, and I've realized that God is a personal God. And so, so I guess going throughout my life, yeah, that there's not really one moment. Yeah. And that's like such a beautiful testimony too, because all of us who are Christians, we want our kids to have that testimony. I think growing up, I remember like going to church camp and stuff because I was raised a Christian too, very grateful for that and people would go around and kind of share their testimonies and there was almost like this desire to have the craziest story or the most radical transformation, which of course is really

beautiful too. I love hearing those testimonies. But there is a lot of beauty and being able to say I never didn't know that I needed grace. It just was a growing understanding of the gospel. I think that's the desire of like every Christian parent to have that. No doubt. Okay, y'all, if you need encouragement, if you need friendship, if you need spiritual refreshment, then you've got to come to share the arrows October 11th, right outside of Dallas, Texas. It is going to be an amazing day of worship, of edification, of applicable teaching. We will be talking about apologetics and culture, but we will also be talking about the practical how-toes of biblical motherhood. how to steward your body in a very healthy, non-toxic way that is also relying on God's

providence and trusting in him. How do we navigate the craziness of this life, the chaos of this world with clarity and courage? That is what Share the Arrows is about. Last year was incredible, Holy Spirit filled by the grace of God. This year will be the same. Francesca Battistelli is a Grammy Award winning artist. She will be leading us in worship. And y'all, if you have never heard 4,000 women singing acapella, this is my father's world. It was unreal. It really was a taste of heaven. And I'm so excited for the same experience this year. It's time to go ahead and get your tickets. Make your plans. You can come by yourself. You can come with friends, with family. This is this is the most unique, I think, Christian women's conference out there.

Go to sharethe arrows.com. This year's Share the Arrows is brought to you by Good Ranchers. Go to sharetheeroes.com. And before we get back into that conversation, I want to tell you about good ranchers, if you are looking for a way to make your life easier and filled with more protein, if you are looking for a family-owned pro-America, pro-God company to, support, then you need to be getting your meat from good ranchers. We've been relying on good ranchers for gosh, over four years now, and it has made my life so much more convenient. I don't

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I was turning 17 years old and I still had never stepped foot in a classroom. I was homeschooled my whole life. And I was like, hey, mom, if I want to like keep playing. playing baseball, I probably should play like in high school or something. So I wound up taking a few classes at a local private Christian school and I played baseball there my junior year and then didn't really talk to any colleges till halfway through my senior year, but was playing really well and was in the right place at the right time. So it was like later on in my senior year when I was 18 that I started talking to colleges for the first time and wound up going to

UC Riverside, which was right up the street from my house. Okay. Yeah, you grew up in California. We kind of missed that, which I wonder if it was even more rare for your family to be how they were growing up in California, or is that typical for the area? You would think that it, I feel like California has this like stereotype about it. But I'll say like growing up, there were a lot of other homeschool families in the area. Yeah.

And a lot of those friends that I had growing up, I'm still really good friends with now, which is really special. That's, I guess another thing that's worth mentioning is I did a speech and debate, part of a homeschool speech and debate league. Yeah. And so a lot of my friends and that's where I met a lot of my friends that I have now. We still like go on trips together and we're, you know, groomsmen and each other's weddings. But there is very much a strong Christian homeschool community in California, even when I was growing up. Okay, speech and debate.

Is that something you still enjoy? Like, do you like public speaking? Do you like debate now? I do. Yeah. I don't like debate necessarily. I'm not opposed to it. I think it's very useful. I do like speaking for sure. And it's cool being with the bananas now and doing stuff like this. I think I get to exercise that skill a little bit. But I feel very comfortable speaking and I really do enjoy it. So especially with content too. So much of what I do on social media requires me to be able to write out what I want to say. And so, yeah, to be able to develop those skills in high school, I'm really thankful that I did it. It really is a skill to be able to write how you would say something and not just write how someone would read it. And so it's interesting. I'm sure you never foresaw that God would use the skills that you were learning in homeschool debate to make content and to coach people in baseball. So, okay, before we get to there, you went to UC Riverside, right? And then you transferred. And where did you

transferred to? I transferred to Biola University. Yes, I've been to Biola before. And that is where you kind of started to thrive as a baseball player, right? Yeah, I'd say so. Yeah, at Biola University, I had an okay first year, and then my next two years, on the baseball field, at least, I did well. Yeah. And then how was the transition going from playing in college to professional? What was that like? Yeah, that was a difficult transition. and something I didn't even really, I had my entire life just had this goal of playing professional baseball, but once I finally did get signed, I was like, oh, oh, I actually did it. I can't believe I made it this far. I didn't expect that.

And so going out to play professional baseball for the first time in Florida, big time imposter syndrome, like, okay, whoa, I'm now surrounded by a lot of guys that have been around the game for a really long time, a lot older than me, people who are really high. high draft picks. And so immediately upon getting there, it was like, oh, okay, I don't know if I'm actually, like, good enough to be here. I don't know how I, like, wheezzled my way into this. So there were definitely some of those feelings on the field, at least transitioning from college to pro ball. And I don't even know anything about that process of going to play professional. So can you, like, fill in those details for us? What does that look like to be chosen and recruited to

think they'll play across the country? Yes. To be signed to play professional baseball, there's different tiers in professional baseball. So there are certain independent leagues that are separate from Major League Baseball, where they'll pay you normally not very much at all, and you'll play in these kind of minor league stadiums normally in some rural place in America. So that's one form of professional baseball, and you'll find a lot of really good players there, oftentimes better than college. Then there's affiliated baseball, which is one of the Major League organizations has signed you. So that was my case. I was signed by the Washington Nationals. And when you're signed, it's normally about a four-year process, give or take, to get to the big leagues. So the big leagues are the MLB. That's what you see on TV. That's, you know, no one ever gets signed and goes straight to the big leagues. No one ever does it.

You could be the first round draft. You get paid $8 million. You're still going to probably spend quite a few years in the minor leagues. Okay. So I was signed by the Nationals in 2021 and then was just in their affiliates. system and hoping to work my way up. And after only a year, I was released from the organization. So, yeah. And they just released to you. They just say we don't want you anymore. Pretty much. Yeah. They're like. What was that like? Well, I didn't expect it to happen so quick. And normally they give you time in Major League. In baseball right now, everyone, everything's downsizing. And so when I got, when I got released, I got released with several other people who

they had also just signed. So it was, I was shocked. Normally they gave you like two or three years and then, um, but a lot of different organizations were downsizing. So I was part of that. And yeah, I'll never forget. I was just sitting there. Get the tap on the shoulder. And the guy's like, hey, you know, come this way. And you know, you kind of just know what that means. And, uh, so yeah, at the time I had just, uh, drove out across the country. My wife and I got married in the off season. And I had just drove across the country from California all the way to Florida in West Palm Beach and then got released two weeks later into spring training. And then I had just like unpacked my last thing into my hotel room that I was living out of. And then,

and then had to pack it all up. They were like, yeah, you got to be out of here by 11 a.m. tomorrow out of the hotel room. Oh my gosh. Whiplash. All right. So yeah. Yeah. Okay. Since you mentioned your wife, we'll go back a little bit. I want to hear about how you met your wife. Yes. We met in, I guess, middle school. age. Oh, okay. She was in eighth grade. I was, I guess, ninth grade, but I was homeschooled. So, yeah, it didn't really matter. It didn't really matter. I was just, yeah, I was like 15. And, yeah, I was 15. She was 14. We met. And she actually, we met through her cousin. Her cousin was homeschooled with my sister, long story. We ended up, we kind of started dating that year in 2014.

And, yeah, so then we, we, we, we, we, we, you. were together all through high school, college, and then got married right before I went to go play, or right, I guess after I went to go play pro ball. What was her reaction when you, I guess, came back to the hotel room and she was with you, right? And you were like, I just got released. Well, she was actually still at Cal Baptist University. Oh, okay. She was finishing up her last year's school. Gotcha. So she was going to come join me right when she finished up that spring semester. And so it was like kind of late March at the time. So she had like one month left of school. Yeah. So she was about to come move across the country with me. Yeah. And yeah, that was tough. I just, yeah, called her on the phone. I was like, hey, I'm on my way back. So we moved back in with her parents initially and then moved in with my parents. And we were there to kind of till the end of the year in 2022. It is such a blessing to have family that you can rely on. Yeah. Yeah. To be able to fall back on, it was such a blessing, especially this day and age. It's not exactly easy to support yourself right out of college.

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For the next couple months, I wanted to still play. And I had a couple opportunities in different countries. And so we're like, hey, do I want to go play in Mexico? Because I had some opportunities there. And basically every door that kept opening kept getting shut. And it was like six or seven different opportunities in a row. And I was like, all right, I'll take the hint.

And I did have a desire to share some stuff on social media. And I guess something that's, something that's worth noting, I guess. This is kind of a big detail. I kind of forgot. When I got signed in 2021, I didn't. For the nationals. With the nationals, yes. I didn't expect to get signed.

I was really hoping to get signed. But I hadn't spoken to a scout in months. I wasn't expecting it. I knew my dad was watching the draft tracker. I was watching the draft tracker too. But when I got. signed. I was like, okay, I want to tell my dad in a special way. My dad worked at Firestone, and he would always tell me batting practice after work. So he's an auto mechanic,

did that his whole life. So I wanted to surprise him, tell him that I got signed. So I went to his work and told my mom, hey, you should record this. I think this would be cool. Yeah. And so my mom, of course, this moment with my dad. And at this point, I had no desire to be on social media at all. Yeah. My social media was being used for my photography page because I did wedding photography. Oh, you did. And, but my mom records this video of me telling my dad that I got signed and I posted it to TikTok without thinking about it. And from that video alone, like that week, I was like ABC, World News, person of the week.

I was on NBC. Like this video just blew up like mega viral. Yeah. And so I got a couple hundred thousand followers on TikTok from this. And I had no idea what to do with it. I didn't know how to make videos. I didn't have anything to make really. So I'm just sitting on a couple hundred.

100,000 followers and didn't, a bunch of people who are keeping up with my career. And then I get released and I'm like, huh, okay, all these people followed me because they wanted to keep up with my professional baseball journey after this cool story with my dad. And now I'm just, you know, living with my parents, not playing anymore. Yeah. So for a couple like months there, I was like, okay, I don't like, I feel like I want to share some things on social media. I want the next generation of ballplayers to know that they don't have to have their identity wrapped up in how they perform on the field, but they should have their identity in something greater. It takes so much pressure off of you when you're playing. I felt like I had a lot of lessons

I wanted to share. But then I was like, okay, but it's uncomfortable for me to post on social media given like the last people have heard or like that I'm playing professional baseball still. So all that being said, after a couple months of trying different avenues of playing again. I decided to start making videos. So I made a video and was like, hey, this is what happened, guys. I got released. I'm done playing. In the meantime, I'm just going to, you know, see what's next.

And I started making coaching videos. I made two videos after that one. Just basic baseball coaching instruction stuff on like the mental game. And those videos were received really well. And again, my wife and I are living like at my parents' house at this point. And I'm like, okay, look, I told Gigi, I was like, I really feel like I got something here. That's your, that's your wife.

Yes, yes. I was like, I feel like I have something here. I feel like I really have a lot of things I want to share. And I feel like there's not that much information online about this. And so I was like, for the next three months, I'm going to make a video every single day. I'm going to post it to TikTok and post it Instagram, everything else. And we'll just see where it goes. If it doesn't go anywhere, like I'll figure something out.

Probably just book a bunch of weddings and go back to doing photography. Yeah. And so you're writing, filming, and editing these all by yourself. Did you have anyone who's helping you? No. And that takes some time. People don't realize it's not just like two minutes setting up your camera. You're really having to like plan it out.

Yeah, yeah, figuring out the microphones. I already had the camera equipment, which was nice. Oh, yeah. But then, yeah, figuring out how to use Adobe Premiere Pro and like watching tutorials. It was a big learning process. So made a video though every day that summer. And by the end of the summer, I had grown a few. hundred thousand followers across platforms. And I was like, okay, this seems to be like, seems to be

picking up traction and like still wasn't making any money from it. But definitely felt like it was what I was supposed to be doing. And I loved doing it. And it was mostly about the actual game and skills. Or were you weaving in your faith and the mental game and all of that? Yeah. I think the faith naturally shines through with a lot of the, A lot of the mental game stuff that I talk about, because so much of what I talk about is, is so much of my mission as far as baseball. I want to be the most impactful voice in youth sports. And I think youth sports is such a valuable tool for parents to connect with their kids.

So much of the time that parents spend with their kids is revolving around sports, especially these days. And so much of the time that parents will spend with their kids happens between the ages of when they're born until they're 18. After that, like, that's what, like, after they are 18 and they are out of the house, Like, you've already spent the majority of the time that you're going to spend with them. So those moments that you spend with your kids on the ball field or by the basketball court, like those moments are so tremendously valuable.

And I saw growing up so many people have very complicated, difficult, unhealthy relationships. Players had unhealthy relationships with sports and parents had unhealthy relationships with their kids. And so much of what my message is on social media is, to enjoy the sport for what it is and see it as an opportunity to grow and at the same time, don't have your whole identity wrapped up in how you perform on the field.

And if you're a parent, don't have your whole identity wrapped up in how your kids perform on the field. Don't try to live vicariously through them. Don't put unnecessary pressure on them. They want to win. They want to succeed. It's naturally built into all of us.

You don't have to harp on that too much. So I think so much of, when I say these things in videos, a lot of times, naturally, like, faith shines through that, right? Because if I'm saying have your identity and something greater, then I have to point to something. Like, if you believe that your creator made you for a purpose and then because you are made in the image of God, that is where you get your value from, then you don't have to find value in what other people say about you. You don't have to find your value and how good you are on the field.

And so that really shines through in a lot of my content. Initially, I didn't, there wasn't any prayer, scripture type, you know, churchy stuff. that would shine through in content. That's been, I think it made its way into my content a lot more recently. Yeah. And I think the only reason that is, it's not that I have some sort of agenda. It's, I feel like I have like been really experiencing the grace of God and his goodness in my life. And when that happens, a lot of times I can't help but share that with other people.

And it's so cool seeing what he's doing with my teammates and stuff now. So a lot of my content now is sharing about that kind of stuff that's happening. But I don't think that I have some sort of like Christian agenda with my page, though. I feel like I have experienced such a beautiful, good thing. And I wanted the people to experience that as well. Yeah. What has the response been as you've been more over and sharing your faith? Overwhelmingly positive.

I don't. Yeah. I mean, there's obviously going to be some people who rubs them the wrong way. and I really feel for those people because I think a lot of times that it stems from having been hurt by someone in the church or they latch these attributes onto God that are actually just attributes of sinful people. But yeah, the response has been overwhelmingly positive. It's really encouraging just a few weeks ago. We have these things called fans first chats with the Savannah Bananas where after a game we will just give shoutouts. to things that we saw happen that weekend.

And the owner, Emily Cole, kind of gave a shout-out that was really special. There was just a mom who had, her daughter was just in surgery. And I guess she found great kind of peace and comfort, I guess, in some of the, in one of my videos that was just a prayer. And the prayer itself was just a prayer over the stadium and a prayer for the game we were about to have, but she was able to draw some sort of peace and comfort from it. it's really encouraging seeing the impact that it's having and when kids come up to me and you know ask hey what's your favorite bible verse or what do you think about this or um it's it's cool seeing the

impact that's that's being had um yeah it's really encouraging yeah next sponsor is preborn preborn allows pregnancy centers to serve moms and dads who are in need and help them make a life affirming decision. Pre-born supplies ultrasound equipment to these pregnancy centers who then offer the free sonograms to the woman who get to see that that baby inside her womb, that Planned Parenthood is telling her is just a clump of cells, is a real human being, a part of her that she has a responsibility to care for seeing that baby. Hearing that baby's heartbeat can make all of the difference. and pre-born is the organization that helps make that happen. You can be a part of their life-saving mission when you donate to pre-born.

If you donate just $28, that covers the cost of a life-saving ultrasound. You are helping that woman not only make a life-affirming decision for her baby, but also get the resources she needs, both material and spiritual. So you are making an eternal investment when you donate to pre-born. Go to preborn.com slash alley. Donate $28 or whatever you can today. Go to preborn.com slash alley. Okay, so tell me about playing for the Savannah Bananas. How did that happen? I was two years out of playing and I had no desire to play again. I think part of it was like I had some, I always had the dream of playing in these big stadiums and like being a professional baseball player. And then a lot of that was, you know, ended up just not being God's will.

And so I think I was like done playing and I really didn't want to play. I had some, I think, emotions there that I was like, I don't want to like reopen this. I don't want to go back to playing. I don't want to go back to competing necessarily. And but at the end of 2023, a friend of mine was like, hey, this is a fan of banana's got to try out in your area. This is in Southern California. And I was like, I'm good. Like, appreciate it.

Like I really don't want to. And he was like, you know, they just released their schedule. They're going to be playing in like six major league states. stadiums next year. I really think you should at least like try out just see what happens. Yeah. Finally like initially I didn't want to and then I really thought about it for a while and talked with Jiji about it and prayed about it. And I was like, all right. Like I kind of, I'll go to the tryout and see what happens. So I did that and did really well at the tryout. And again, I mentioned earlier, I did gymnastics, you know, growing up. And so like I was able to

incorporate a lot of the acrobatic stuff that I did growing up. And, and, and, and, and, And then as far as social media goes, like the bananas are big on, you know, having a social media presence. And I already had that. And so in so many ways, it seemed like such a great fit. And so Gigi and I kind of packed up our stuff and moved out to Savannah, Georgia, right at the beginning of last year, 2024. Okay. Some people have no idea what we're even talking about Savannah bananas. So how would you describe, like, in a couple sentences, what it is?

Savannah bananas are a new adaptation of baseball, where at its core, it's still baseball. You still have a pitcher. You still have a hitter. It's the same four bases, all that. However, there are a lot of different rules that kind of speed up the game and tailor it to a newer audience. So we are still competing. We're trying to win. There are standings.

There are stats. But if a fan catches a foul ball, it's an out. If a pitcher walks a guy instead of a ball for just walk to first base, it's called a ball for sprint. Every single defender needs to touch the ball before they can tag the runner out. So it turns into a much more exciting play. There are, I want to say 10 different rules that have been added to the game of baseball to make it more exciting, speed up the game a little bit. We're on a time clock. It's a two-hour game.

So it's not like a three, four-hour baseball game that you'd be used to. So all the while, when we do score a run and we have pre-planned celebrations that we will do. So sometimes we don't score and we don't score. get to do any of these. But in case we do score, we'll have these pre-planned celebrations. We have hitter walk-ups. You know, normally in baseball, you have a hitter have a walk-up song that'll just play as they walk-up to home plate and then they go about their business. But like, we'll do a whole walk-up production, you know, where we're doing a whole choreographed dance to one direction or whatever. And so, yeah, Savannah Bananas. Have you ever been to a game?

I've never been to a game. No, I've only seen the videos online. It's so interactive for any of you watching. I couldn't recommend it highly enough. You could be sitting in the third deck in a stadium with 80,000 people in it, and you'll probably come into contact with either one of the players or one of the cast members, as they call it. Jesse Cole is brilliant, but I'm telling you, it is such a intimate experience as a fan. Yeah. And it takes a lot of work to put on this.

production. But yeah, I don't even know how to describe it. You just have to go to a game. Yes. I mean, at first, I remember seeing the videos and I was like, what is going on? Because it just looks so different. And obviously, like, the uniforms are different, a little more casual, sometimes goofy. And so, but my nephews who live in Georgia, they just like love it so much. And then I started to see a faith aspect, it seems like, in a lot of the content that's produced. Not that it's like an exclusively Christian team, but it seems like there are other teammates that, you know, are very public about their faith. And it seems to be kind of an unapologetic part about your games with like the pregame prayers and things like that. Is that the case?

Yeah, the organization is not a Christian organization. The players, many of them are. And that's been really cool to see. Last year at the beginning of the season, we, started. We committed to every single week. We're going to have a Bible study. We'll just, you know, because a lot of times on Sundays we're playing or we're on the road. And so we really just need a community. When I was with the Nationals, I really realized that too. Like, I really need a community. That's something that's been like a recurring theme for me is like, I need to be connected to the body. And so that being said, when I first got to the bananas, connected with a couple other players who were believers, and we're like, okay, let's meet every single week, at least once,

every week for the rest of the year. And we did that last year, which was really cool. And we got to see some fruit of that. This year, we were like, okay, let's do the same thing, but let's dedicate ourselves to praying a little bit more. I had just read a book. It's called Praying like monks, living like fools. And I felt really convicted after reading it because I realized that so many of the prayers

that I pray are, I'm like hedging for God in a lot of ways. I'm like, I don't want to pray for this person necessarily too much because I don't to be disappointed when I feel like God hasn't worked on their life or like it's, you know what I mean? So finally, I was like, no, like I'm experiencing such a beautiful thing in relationship with God. I feel like I have the craziest schedule and yet I have this like deep rooted peace and rest. And I wanted the people to have that. So regardless, like what I learned from this book is like I need to pray bold prayers and not like if I pray for someone for 20 years and they still don't know the name of Jesus

and still don't have a relationship with him, I'm going to keep praying for them nonetheless because I truly believe that that is like where the treasure of life is. And so we kind of committed to praying for teammates by name. Like, okay, we're going to write it down who we're praying for and we're going to pray for them by name. We're going to pray that we have a conversation with them at practice this week, specifically. And we started praying like very specific, targeted prayers.

And it feels like one by one, like God's just working on different people's hearts. and the organization. Yeah. And so we've gotten to see our little small Bible study grow tremendously. And just a couple weeks ago, we hosted our first, it was the first time we've done this, but we hosted our first public worship night. And so we, yeah, we're able to set up right outside the stadium and invited the public to come on out.

And we had our first worship night. That is awesome. Okay, we have a video clip of you. praying before the game. This is up for. Tonight the Savannah bananas will play on ESPN at Fenway Park. You guys know the drill. Let's pray. God, tonight my friends and I are going to be playing in front of a lot of people, not just here in person, but even on TV.

Lord, I pray that you would use tonight in some way to bring real value to the people that are watching, not just some escape at the ballpark for a night, not just something fun to watch on TV. But I pray that at the very least seeds would be planted. The people watching my friends and I would be able to see that our hope is in something greater. Something so much more meaningful than just being seen by a lot of people. My friends and I have experienced firsthand this year that true joy, true peace, true satisfaction doesn't come through accomplishment, doesn't come through success. It comes through relationship with you, relationship with each other, it's through love.

Lord, somehow, some way, use this game that we are playing, help us share that love that you've already shown to us. Pray that the people sitting in these seats would see our joy, see our peace, even performing on a big stage, and it would make them curious. Lord, I truly believe that we have found a good thing and I just want to share it. Thank you so much for this opportunity. This is always been a dream of mine. In Jesus name, amen. We'll see you guys tonight.

So I'm guessing the response from your teammates who might not identify as Christian. Like it seems like it's pretty positive. Like it's a Christian positive atmosphere. Absolutely. The fruits of the spirit are a beautiful thing. And regardless of what you believe to be in a clubhouse environment where we are all like serving each other and loving each other and having fun, like it's it's the best. Like we have so much fun. Yeah.

Our clubhouse dynamic is the best. I genuinely look forward to showing up to the field every day. Yeah. This camp we're about to do here in Dallas. Bringing a bunch of teammates with me. We've got like 30 guys and like I just can't wait to go hang out with them. Yeah. Okay.

Tell me about the camp. Okay. So my, at the end of 2022, this is when I'm doing content. And I'm like, okay, I'm not making any money doing this, but I'm like, but I kind of need to because Gigi and I are still living at my parents' house. I was like, okay, maybe like I could do baseball camps. Maybe I could do lessons. You know, I don't know. And so that's.

that's initially like kind of how it started and we ended up doing this this first camp called it not your average baseball camp and we were like you know what we're going to go above and beyond over the top of these kids like a lot of the at this point in time i'd already built a following on social media and i was like okay a lot of these kids are already going to know who we are me and some of my friends who also make videos and so we're like okay these kids are already going already going to know who we are what are some things that they would really enjoy oh they would probably love being in a video with us okay well right when they walk in let's interview them and like make videos for social

media that they might they could be part of like you know our pages so that's kind of what it started as was let's make the most like not average experience possible for these kids and then just just treat them like royalty and so we did that we did this first camp and we lost 10,000 dollars we were like and and but it was amazing it was the best experience and so many of the the coaches that we had we had them out from all over the country and we had just the time of our lives and the kids had the time of their lives and we're like, okay, we've got to keep doing this in some capacity. So fast forward, we've now had four of these camps. This will be our fifth one.

And, yeah, our first camp, we had like 60 kids and we had like 12 coaches. This camp coming up, we've got like 30 lead coaches and we've got about 70 helpers helping the 30 coaches and we're going to have about 1,000 kids over the next week. So it's going to be very fun. That is awesome. Is there a faith component to the camp or not really? You know, we've finished every camp with prayer. It's not specifically a Christian camp. It really does naturally shine through, though. It kind of can't help to do so. Yeah, that is awesome. Okay, you kind of already gave this message earlier when you were talking about the kind of content that you post on TikTok, but for parents of athletes out there and for kids who are athletes, or maybe young adults too, like what is the message that you have for them?

How do they balance being competitive, wanting to be excellent and the best at what they do, steward their gifts well while also ensuring that it doesn't become an idol and doesn't become their identity? You'll never experience more joy, fulfillment. You'll never experience more joy and fulfillment than you will when you have relationship with one who created you. And when you're in community with other believers. Like I truly believe that in so many moments. I guess my message would be to those athletes. Like really think through what it is that you want.

A lot of times you want to be in the spotlight. A lot of times you want to be successful. You want to have that big moment. And coming from someone who has met numerous people who have had those big moments, I myself now have had those big moments. I've hit home runs in stadiums with, you know, 70,000 people in them. Yeah. And the day after the big moment that you've been looking for,

forward to your entire life. You wake up and you feel totally normal again. That same emptiness that you have in you before you have it in you still. And then you go do dishes and life is still the same. And so much of our lives are spent chasing that big high, that next thing. And it's a lie that it's a lie that we believe that that's where true satisfaction. That's where true contentment comes from. It's the original sin, right? Like, no, like what God's given you isn't enough. You need this. Yeah. And so my encouragement would be this. What you, this romanticized vision of what it will be like if you make it, even if you do make it. Yeah. It's not going to be what you think it is. And maybe it does satisfy you for a little bit. Maybe you're the best player that ever lived and that satisfies you until you're 50, 60 years old and then you're done playing and then now what? One way or another, who you are. your identity, who you become in the process is what is so important because who you become in the process will determine what fruit you're left with at the end of it. And if you spend your time

only focused on me, even if you're becoming excellent at what you do, you're not going to have good fruit in your life at the end of your career. And when I say good fruit, I mean love, joy, peace, patience. Yeah. And so my encouragement to kids would be like, work hard and be excellent and be the best that you can be. To this day, I feel more motivated now to be the best that I can possibly be than ever before. And it's not because I feel like I have to earn anything. It's not because I feel like I'll be loved more if I am more superior. It's just like it's naturally like built in me, you know?

Like I want to be excellent. And sometimes sometimes I'm lazy and, you know, I have to like force it, you know. But like my encouragement to athletes would be like, be the best that you can be. Like, why wouldn't you? Like, your life is a gift. Like, every breath that you have is a gift. Like, be excellent. And then at the same time, realize that that deep satisfaction that you crave in your soul

cannot be met by anything that you achieve. So it's a balance. But where my head's at now is like, okay, anytime I have a tough day at the field, my mentality is like, okay, this is a character building day for me. I get to, I get to strengthen my patience. I get to serve other people and not make it about me. Oh, I went 0 for four, three strikeouts. Okay, but my teammate went two for three with a double.

He had a good day at the plate. I'm going to celebrate his wins and not be so focused on me. It's an opportunity to grow your character every single day. And so focus more about who you are becoming in the process. Don't focus so much on the future down the road. And don't miss those moments. Like I mentioned earlier that so much of the time that parents spend with their kids is on the ball field. Don't miss those moments.

If you are playing 12 U baseball right now, then in, Enjoy 12 view baseball and like look forward to that. Look forward to today. Don't worry about tomorrow. Look forward to today. So many times in my career, I was looking forward to the future. I can't wait to go play pro ball. I can't wait to go play college ball.

And then I look back in some of my favorite times playing were when I was 12 years old with my travel team. Yeah. So don't miss the moments in the present. Focus on who you're becoming in the process and realize that in the long term, the things that truly satisfy your soul, the only, the only, the only, only thing that I found is a relationship with one who's created me. That's so good. That's such a good word. Okay. If you want to follow you, how can they do that and find out about Savannah bananas and your camp, all that good stuff? Yeah. Coach rack. It's at coach.org on like TikTok, Instagram, on YouTube. It's just coach rack. I make longer videos on YouTube. Those are in more like 30, 40 minutes.

I have this whole like YouTube series going this year that's really fun that kind of showing off, stadium that we're going to and the experience and I'm miced up for at bats and so really good stuff so you want a deep dive go on youtube uh if you want the little like snippets then go ticot instagram but yeah coach rack is where you can find it and obviously savanna bananas they got like 10 million followers on ticot but you all have probably seen them but if not yeah yeah savanna banana at the savanna bananas i think on ticot and they can find like their schedule and everything there yeah yeah yeah if you just yeah look at them on google or whatever you use it'll come up it'll it'll show up yeah okay and if they're interested in

sending their kids to your camp, I guess, would they have to wait till next year to do that? Yeah, probably wait till next year. And this one filled up really quick. We had a total of a thousand spots and we were able to sell it out really quick. So we're kind of conflicted because we want to upscale, but then so much of the value that we had last time was having like this, this really good. Yeah. Yeah. Coach to player ratio. So we don't really know what to do with that. But yeah. It's a good problem to have though. No doubt. Yeah. I guess if you want to check out NYUBaseball.com, That's our website, and we have this community. We try to meet every Tuesday where we'll just hop on a Zoom call with kids and answer their questions about baseball and whatnot.

It's turned into more of like a once a month thing because both Angie and I who run NYABC, not your average baseball camp, like we're pretty busy. So we hop on when we can, but NYUAbaseball.com. Yeah. Okay. That's awesome. Well, CoTrack, thanks so much for taking the time to join us. I really appreciate it. Thank you.