29 -Jim Chester Gardner-Webb University "Program building & Practice"

Bio

 

• Current head coach at Gardner Webb University
• Former Head Coach at Barton College
• 2019 Carolinas Conference Coach of the year after leading Barton to the biggest turnaround in D2 baseball
• Former Head Coach Lock Haven University where he lead the program to another turnaround from 13-28 to 32-18
• He left the Penn State Greater Allegany as the winningest each in their programs history and led them to 6 World Series appearances
• Prior to PSGA he was the HC of Mercyhurst Northeast college for 2 seasons (his first HC gig), and was the assistant at Seton Hill University for 2 seasons.
• Man of faith serving heavily in the FCA
• Always willing to share and help grow the game

 

 

Show notes

• Program turnaround/success is NOT about me!
• Its about our players and coaches
• Passion about everything outside of the boxscore
• Being selfless, relentless, and blue collar as a leader of the program
• Selfless - community service
• Relentless - we are about 110% and figure out a way to make it happen, no bad body language
• Blue Collar - hard work, get yourself dirty and make it work
• Delegate by mapping out responsibilities of each person on staff. Have the coaches tell me “I got it.”
• More concerned with AB and approach (charting QAB, barrels, AB)
• Love flow and function (a lot of people on the field working together)
• Practice plan
  • Team prayer
  • Warm up band routine
  • Dynamic warm up
  • Speed segment
  • Everydays - position drills
  • Throwing program - position specific
  • 3 man PFP and lead into pickoffs
  • Bunt D or 1st/3rd defense
  • BP, extended I/O, 
• Repetition is huge!
• Ron Polk's playbook!! 
• We created a playbook of everything we like to do at practice
• Skeleton of the week (use the prior weeks plans to plan out)
  • Everyday meeting detail/refine each day
  • Go against the checklist and see what we need to do 
  • Map out to the minute and groups organized
• Culture and makeup trump so much!
• Don’t give up on a kid, be passionate about them, and know they will make mistakes, be there at their best and their worst.
• Hold kids accountable, tell them what they need to know, and they may not like it, but they need to hear it.
• Don’t give up on the kid, and show them you are invested.
• Practice is about the coaches preparing the players. The game is about the players performing, and going out as a cohesive unit doing something they have never done before.
• If a player messes up a coach needs a mirror
• 3 inning games - play the 7th, 8th, and 9th 
• Play at least 2 and most 4 - that is where the game is lost/won
• Ed Chief article - 
• Competitive BP - points per rounds, live 
• Bunt game
• Consider myself a great thief and taylor it to myself
• Email - jchester1@gardner-webb.edu
• Twitter - @coachjchester