I interviewed Quinn Betteridge, who was my assistant baseball coach last year. This year though, he moved on to be the assistant coach of the UBC bantam baseball team. Some of his responsibilities include videotaping his players and giving them feedback on how to improve, coaching first base and running a good number of drills during the practice.  

I chose to interview this individual because not is he a good coach and involved with my favourite sport, baseball, but he is very intelligent and has a very high IQ. For instance, he pays attention to the small things and takes notes of the small but could honestly be the most important part of the game. His strategies and gameplay of baseball are very similar to mine.  

I am currently serving as an assistant coach for the UBC bantam baseball club.  This is my first year in this role, as I was the assistant coach for the reds for the past 3 years. Besides being the assistant to my head coach Luke Yam, I do a variety of things. Some of these things include video-taping my players to help improve their fundamentals of the game, coaching first base (one of the most important responsibilities in the game and throwing batting practice for my players, both during practice and before the game. Besides being a baseball coach, I am also a program designer in north Vancouver.  

As I mentioned above, I am also a program designer in north Vancouver. It involved a lot of training and education for me to have that job. But it is something that I have wanted to do for a long time since I was a kid. Going back to baseball, I have always wanted to be a professional baseball player. Unfortunately, I wasn’t a very strong player, getting cut from a lot of the teams that I played for. I still wanted to pursue baseball, which is part of the reason why I applied to be one, first with the Richmond Chuckers.  

If I were to give someone advice about being a baseball coach, well there are a lot of them. The #1 piece of advice that I would give is patience. A lot of players that I have had the chance to coach are typically very skilled, but it is not on the outside. In other words, they have talent, but it is your job as a coach to bring that talent to the surface. If you’re just starting up as a coach whether it is at the kindergarten level or at the MLB level, make sure you are pat. Some other things include building relationships with your players, getting to know your other coaching staff well and making sure you are giving them the correct information, and not random things that are incorrect.  

I would say I am passionate about what I do, (as a coach, of course,) because of my love for the game. Ever since I was a little kid, being involved in baseball was always a big part of me, both mentally and physically. It was almost an escape from tough times and reality.  I wasn’t the best baseball player in my age group though, so I had to find other ways to get myself involved. If I wasn’t a player, it would have to be a coach, which I am doing now. Dating back to about 5 years ago, I have had my pros and cons of coaching. Despite coaching 7–10-year-olds at one point, which wasn’t my cup of tea, made me go into coaching 14-17 years old. Ever since I started this role, I have wanted to become a coach at a higher level, but for now, especially with my job, I am sticking with coaching minor baseball.  

Where do I see myself in 10 years? I see myself either as a higher-level coach (my dream) or even where I am right now. I am enjoying myself here at the UBC thunderbirds bantam team and have grown great relationships with the kids, despite being here for under 6 months. It also helps that most of the kids seem to like me and I like them, for the most part. Whether I am here, or with another pbl (bc baseball league) I have enjoyed coaching and hope to do it for at least another 10 years.