27: Ty Buttrey | He Got Cut From Travel Ball, Made MLB, Then Walked Away

Show Notes

Ty Buttrey got cut from a travel baseball team, was sent down to JV in high school, and still became a fourth-round draft pick who made it to the big leagues.

Then, in 2021, he walked away from baseball.

What surprised me most during our conversation was hearing Ty admit that he never really loved pitching, even though he loved playing baseball.

Ty spent years battling performance anxiety, struggling with his mechanics, and pushing himself to get better. He eventually reached the Major Leagues with the Los Angeles Angels, but getting there didn't make those struggles disappear.

In this episode of the Chasing Baseball Dreams Podcast, Ty and I talk about his journey from getting cut to pitching in the big leagues, what he learned about himself along the way, and what baseball parents can take from his experience.

In this episode we cover:

• How Ty went from getting cut and being sent down to JV to becoming a fourth-round draft pick
• Why the wrong training program caused him to lose velocity early in his professional career, according to Ty, and what he changed
• Why Ty believes the mental side of pitching accounts for as much as 70% of success
• What parents should look for when choosing a pitching instructor, hitting coach, or personal trainer
• Why being one of the best players at 12U or 13U doesn't tell you how good that player will be years later
• How the pressure to prove other people wrong contributed to Ty's performance anxiety
• Why Ty believes American youth baseball spends too much time playing tournaments and too little time developing skills
• What he wishes he'd done differently growing up, and his advice to parents about pushing their sons without belittling them
• Why parents of 12- and 13-year-olds should think carefully before chasing social media attention and NIL opportunities

One of the most interesting parts of our conversation came when Ty talked about how much he loved playing baseball but never really enjoyed the part of the game that became his profession.

He also shares what parents should pay attention to when their sons start putting too much pressure on themselves, and why he'd encourage parents to help their sons develop interests outside of baseball.

If you're a baseball parent with a son who's serious about playing at the next level, this is a conversation worth hearing. Especially if you're trying to figure out how hard to push him, what kind of training he needs, and whether he's still enjoying the game.

🎙️ Host: Bobby Minor

⚾ Guest: Ty Buttrey, Former MLB Pitcher | Los Angeles Angels

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Chasing Baseball Dreams is the only baseball parent podcast hosted by someone with no financial stake in where your money goes. I don't run a travel team. I don't sell lessons. I don't coach for an org. I have no reason to steer you in the wrong direction. I'm Bobby Minor... former Division 1 player, 35+ years coaching select baseball and high school, former travel organization director, over 1,000 college recruiting assessments, and a college baseball dad who almost lost 2 sons to this game for 2 very different reasons, with one currently playing college baseball.

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Ty Buttrey: You know, I I liked I loved spring training. I love the workouts. I loved being around the guys. I loved traveling, the food in the hotels, the actual thing of pitching, the art of pitching, just for my entire life, it never sat right with me.

Bobby Minor: Welcome back to Chasing Baseball Dreams. Today, my guest is former Major League pitcher Ty Buttry. He was cut from travel team, sent down to JV when he was in high school, and still became a fourth-round draft pick who pitched 115 games with the Los Angeles Angels. Then in 2021, made a decision to walk away from baseball. And I know you eventually returned before retiring again, but we're going to get into all that. So, Ty, welcome to Chasing Baseball Dreams Podcast.

Ty Buttrey: Thanks, Bobby. Appreciate you having me on, man. Yeah, it's baseball, it's been an up and down journey for me, no doubt. But you know, I was fortunate to play at the highest level, learned a lot. and you know, here I am in the next phase of my life.

Bobby Minor: Yeah. So what do you what do you have going on with like these days? What do you yeah, what's going on in Ty's world?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah. I think the biggest thing, you know, after stepping away, really burnt out in COVID, just didn't see myself being a, you know, obviously the profession is very lucrative and fun, but you know, I I I've always been someone that likes to do experience kind of everything. And you know, when that time happened, I just I got into really kind of helping my wife. her and I have been building businesses and just kind of initi community initiatives. and I found found a real liking to that. you know, she's right now in the middle of acquisition talks with her two companies, AthleteCon and then Sam Green University. And I've been helping her a lot out on the back end of that. you know, running a seven hundred person convention and the NIL with all the logistics and movie pieces. It's a hard it's a hard thing to do. And I like I like challenging

Bobby Minor: Mm.

Ty Buttrey: goals. as far as me, you know, she's kind of starting to really take off in her career. You know, I've had a couple of different odd jobs. I played I would try to go back for three years in the minor leagues and obviously just wasn't mentally and physically it just wasn't the same. So called it. Now I've been kind of just moving around. I'm I'm looking into getting I'm obviously doing a lot of coaching. a lot of coaching, but you know, ha have a big passion to jump into just learning about the business space, man. I think it's a pretty cool opportunity right now with AI and all these new technologies and stuff. So That's what I've been that's what I've been focused on.

Bobby Minor: That's awesome. So I think I read somewhere that when you when you retired, and I'm not quoting you, so if I'm wrong, correct me, but basically you said that you basically're stepping away because you fell out of love with the game.

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, I mean it's it was so frustrating for me my whole entire life. You know, I was always fighting my mechanics. it just never really came easy to me. I had to work extremely hard for what I had. just everything mechanics, pitching, training, you know, the anxiety, the mental side of it. It just was like, you know, at some point, you have to kind of call it for what it is. And yeah, it's a lucrative career, like I said earlier, and it's a really cool career, but I experienced it at all or I experienced all of it. I mean, I had a great nineteen year, I had a great eighteen year, had a very below average twenty COVID season. went to almost all the stadiums, met all the cool guys, you know, closed games. And I just kind of found myself once I accomplished that, it was I'm I'm a unique individual in that sense where like if my heart's not in something, I'm just not gonna do it, no matter how successful or good I am at it. And COVID kind of allowed me to see other opportunities in life. you know, I've been playing baseball since I was six years old. So I never really had a chance to step away and think about anything else besides baseball. And, you know, some people during the COVID season, they changed career paths. Mine just happened to be in the MLB, I guess.

Bobby Minor: Yeah. So

Ty Buttrey: Yeah.

Bobby Minor: man, yeah, I mean there's just so much there. So I know you've talked about, you know, getting cut from travel teams, being sent down from Vars to do J V, not even starting on J V your freshman year. Take me back to that time and like like how did you handle it and what kept you from giving up on baseball back then?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah. you know, it was it was a huge goal, right? Like it was a huge goal. you know, my goal from when I was young, you know, my dad played professional baseball at a low level. My sisters were successful at sports, my friends and my community, everyone played baseball and was successful at sports. and so that was just kind of my that that was my circle, that was my group. was just sports and baseball. And work ethic and focus and you know, I had a very intense high school coach that really brought out my ability. so that was just my surrounding. You know, I I don't know, I don't look at it back then as, you know, I there was at times I was burnt out, but as a kid, you don't really, you know, you're in school and you're in you you go home, you do your homework and you go to practice. And, you know, My wife my wife called me after I just said

Bobby Minor: It it it it ha it happened. It's inevitable. My wife yeah, it it it happens.

Ty Buttrey: Yeah. you want me to pick up where I was?

Bobby Minor: Yeah, yeah, pick up where you're where where you were. Or

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, so

Bobby Minor: just start yeah, go ahead.

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, so that it was kind of like that's that's where it was, right? Like it was I I didn't see anything else besides trying to become a baseball player. you know, there was nothing really on my mind. I obviously, you know, I I didn't do things at a young age that took me into business or, you know, I I've always loved like the creative, artistic side, you know, gaming, stuff like that. and I had those passions. But yeah, it was baseball. So I looked at it as That was my path, right? Just like I look at right now as my new path. I'm gonna figure out something to do, and not take no for an answer. And so ultimately when I had adversity, it was like, I can do this. You know, I just I I just always believed in my ability to accomplish goals. I've always been like that. I've been kind of sometimes delusional, like like a hopeful optimist with everything. And It bothered me, you know, it bothered me when I got cut from JV and my peers were better than me. It bot it I was a competitive person and I wanted to prove to myself. And unfortunately I wanted to prove to others, I think more so than I wanted to prove to myself. And that led to a little bit of the anxiety and why am I playing the game? Am I playing it for me or am I playing it for other people? Kind of thing.

Bobby Minor: Yeah. That's that man, that that's there's so much there is so much there and I think that's something that you know, a lot of parents and players have to kinda deal with because it I you know I tell everybody at some point if the player doesn't love it more and want it more than his parents love it and want it for him, i it's not gonna last and that that's kinda tough. So now here well so at what age so you got drafted I you obviously you pitched at in the major league level. At what year like when did you become a PO, a pitcher only?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, drafted out of high school, fourth round. I got pretty much like late first round money to the Red Sox. It was kind of a no brainer to go. I was gonna go to Arkansas University as a two way player. I was a I was a very good high school hitter. I could have probably hit at the D one level if I really focused on it, but you know, I was six five, six six, two hundred and five pounds, throwing ninety five, ninety seven. back in two thousand twelve with a really, really good curveball change up. So it just made sense to stick to pitching. And then went to the Red Sox and really, you know, really struggled for like three years. Lost all my VLO. Started working out the wrong way. it just became like a disaster. And then changed up my program, changed up my mindset a little bit and got myself there. But yeah, I was a PO pretty much after high school.

Bobby Minor: Okay. So 'cause obviously we talked about like, you know, getting sent down from Varsity to J V, all you know, all these things happening in high school, and then here you are a four a few years later, you're drafted by the Red Sox in the fourth round. So what changed in your development during those years? You know, when you were in high school? What turned you from being sent down to now you're a fourth round draft pick? And what do you think parents of like thirteen and fourteen year olds today can learn from your experience?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, so that's the honestly, Bobby, that's been the toughest thing that I've been trying to communicate through my content, through conversations, is it's like all the experience and the knowledge is right here in my head, right? And you talk to other former pros, high level s achievers, and they all kind of say the same thing, you know, like dedication, work ethic, resiliency, you know, find your wife, get your purpose, do the little things, you know, don't party. Don't do drugs, all those things that we hear 24-7, you know, good food, good sleep. And then, and then like that's what we hear all the time. But then there's like the secret sauce, the things that really change up a player from being okay to being like really, really good. And that's the hard part that I have a hard time communicating with parents and players, because to me, it's it's really you gotta be kind of crazy. Like you gotta be crazy to want success. Like you have to be so. Deliberately driven to one goal that no one's gonna stop you. And you do have to sacrifice a lot. You know, I never partied in high school. I never I didn't have a social life. I was, you know, I I'd get done training for two hours, go see a track and feel like I didn't train enough and go run two miles. And so I always had this thing of I'm never doing enough, I'm never doing enough, you know, hitting, throwing. I just always try to find a way to get better. Like That's to me how I looked at it is literally our job as sports players and in and anywhere is to just get better. Like that's if you're not getting better.

Bobby Minor: Mm-hmm.

Ty Buttrey: So a lot of this comes down to self-awareness and you have to have the understanding, like, okay, I'm throwing I talk to high school players all the time. It's like you've been throwing eighty five and college guys, it's like you've been throwing eighty six, dude, for four years. Something needs to change, right? Like you can change it, you know, and that's For me, that's what I did at a young age is I just I mean, I remember going on YouTube back in 2008 and typing in, how do I throw f a four seam fastball harder? I was a freshman, you know, and I I knew velocity was gonna take me far. And, you know, they're like, hey, put two fingers together. And now Ben Brewster and Tread is talking about, you know, it's just like things like that. That it it's it it's hard that that that 10%, that seek like that secret sauce that I'm talking about.

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: Because when you explain it to parents and you explain it to kids that maybe haven't played high-level baseball, it comes across as, whoa, this guy's really intense. Or this person's really wow, like, I well, you're kind of scaring me a little bit. I don't know if I want to take baseball that serious. and you I've lost clients and I've lost kids and parents because I'm a little bit too intense for them when I'm training them. And you know, but then you find like those You know, those one to two percent kids and parents that just like want it every single day, you know?

Bobby Minor: No, that's good and You know, I tell parents all the time, it's you know, like my my youngest son Julian, he's a red shirt junior this year. He's playing at a Division II school out in West Texas. He went the JUCO route his first three years. But like in high school, he went to three parties his senior prom, his prom after party, and his graduation party. He didn't, you know, it's Friday night, everybody else is going out and doing all that. We're at the cages, ten o'clock on a Friday night. And like it takes that level and and he's playing division two baseball. It takes that level. level of of almost obsession if you you know to play certainly beyond high school like it's not you know it's not for the you know for the weak of heart or the faint you know what I mean like it it there's a lot more to it than a lot of parents think it's not just being

Ty Buttrey: Right, right. yeah.

Bobby Minor: good being good at your sport there's a lot more to it so you

Ty Buttrey: Spot on.

Bobby Minor: you spent six years in the minor leagues before making your major league debut okay what was the toughest part about that journey five okay

Ty Buttrey: Yep. Think five. Five and a half. Yeah. Well

Bobby Minor: Okay. So I was rounding, I was rounding up. We can round down. We'll round down. So but

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, there we go.

Bobby Minor: what but what was the toughest part of that journey and what do you wish somebody had prepared you for before you signed your first pro contract?

Ty Buttrey: geez. how much the training how much the training affects your development and your process, man. I I mean it is crazy. Like if you don't have a good trainer telling you the right movements, the right body alignment, all these things. I mean, cause pitching is a very rotational, whippy, you know, explosive, high, high output delivery. And man, like I was a guy that I my joints get naturally tight. And so I started doing heavy squat, heavy deadlift, heavy bench, heavy row, long distance running. And all I was doing was just grinding all my joints down and making everything tighter. And I lost that whip. I lost that, you know, I went from throwing 93 to 97 in high school to the first three years of Pro Ball with the Red Sox, like 87, 91, touching 92, 93 here and there. And

Bobby Minor: Wow.

Ty Buttrey: some people, you know. Don't really touch weights. And some people, it's just like for me, I saw how how that had a direct negative impact on my career. And it wasn't until I literally changed my training that I went and got, you know, started throwing 98, 99, 101, 102. And it was a direct result of my training. I mean, it was completely that. And then obviously the secret sauce was me learning about process routines. not complaining about things, you know, everyone in the minor leagues complains. I learned that, you know, a complaining negative mindset just makes everything worse, you know. So endure the bus rides, endure the bad outings, that kind of stuff. I really dove heavy into the mental game, which helped a lot.

Bobby Minor: So it's funny you mention that I I actually recorded another episode earlier with with Corey Hart. Not not that Corey Hart, the other Corey Hart, who did play in the Brewers organization, but he was a minor league hitting instructor for almost eighteen years and now he's an assistant coach with the Syracuse softball team working on hitting. And we were talking about the mindset and approach and hitting. And I asked him how important does he think that is compared to the physical, you know, swing? And he was saying minimum fifty fifty, but he might even lean more to sixty forty mindset, the mental, you know. mental approach versus the mechanic the physical side. What do you what are your thoughts on you know when it comes to pitching? Like the percentage breakdown from the mechanics of pitching versus mindset, you know, mindset and approach.

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, that's such a it's such a good question. And it's I obviously for me, I was more of a physical guy. you know, I to me, physical was training, was food, was not putting bad things into my body. It was controllable stuff. So I really went heavy on the controllable stuff. almost to a fault where it it negatively impacted me. And I see a lot of guys where they do all the right things, all the right body work, all the right stuff, but then the You know, the mental side of it, it's like, can you be calm in front of 40,000 people? can you repeat your delivery? Do you have an efficient delivery? Are you flying open? Do you understand when you're flying open? Can you bow your neck when it's three, two, you know, bases loaded? You you know, you got no outs. So it's like, for me, I I think if you look at it like this, I would say it's 70% mental, you know, maybe even more than that. Because the mental side. That's the social awareness, the emotional awareness. And those you make decisions, you know, it it takes it a level of intelligence too, to know your body, to know what you want. and that's

Bobby Minor: Mm-hmm.

Ty Buttrey: all mental. That's all navigating, you know, what trainer, when to fire an agent, when to fire this trainer, when to move on, when to hire a new guy. Like you have to mentally not just you know, calm yourself down deep breath type of ment mindset, but it's a it's a process. You know, but then you take guys, right? You take guys that just keep

Bobby Minor: Hm.

Ty Buttrey: the game simple, that have always just the games kind of came easy to them, right? That they haven't, you know, they don't get anxiety, they don't really overthink things. They go out there and they just compete. You know, and that's where I think you find some of the really gifted athletes. you know, the Mike Trouts, the Acunas, the Otanis, you know, these guys that just they're just good, man. They're just good and their process is good. They don't overthink the game. They're ultra competitive. It's not, it's not just a one cut. It's not just like a one thing to make it to the big leagues. You know, I was way different than a lot of my peers and other guys are way different than me. But at the end of the day, I will say what was consistent was the work ethic and how much people really tried hard at that game.

Bobby Minor: Yeah, that's really, really good. So you mentioned choosing the right instructors, the right trainers, and things like that. And today more than ever, you know, you go on social media and you got one guy saying you should swing this way, and this guy's saying no, that guy's an idiot, you gotta swing this way. For the parent out there that doesn't know what they don't know, what do you what are some things they should look for? What are some questions they should ask in making sure whether it's a you know a personal trainer, a pitching instructor, a hitting coach, whatever, how what what can they look for, what can they ask to make sure that they are making the best decision for their son?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, you know, Bobby, it's I I've been on like a two-day or a two-week Twitter war going back and forth. One because I'm retired. And two, because, you know, I I'm retired and I have fun talking crap. People are talking crap to me, you know, old school versus new school. I and I I I kind of just go along with it. I I like I said, I need to get a hobby and get out there and do stuff. So I've been in the I've been in the you know, I've been getting strays left and right every time I log on. But, you know, to me it's like Right, you you have this, you know, the launch angle launch angle launch angle, you know, the swing man stuff. Then you have the old, you know, more traditional, you know, bat path, head down. you know, you have max heavy lifting and you know, kind of heavy plyo balls, and then you have more of just like a old school pitch, you know, let's just focus on mechanic. So you have these different philosophies going on all the time. And and here's my things to the parents. I I think you have to understand competency. When you're talking to like you have to know if someone's competent when they're speaking, right? Like, so if you if you're a parent and you're working with your son, or they're working with your son or your daughter, and the person seems like they're just going through the motions. they're not really passionate about teaching. And it's like, okay, that's gonna be another 150 bucks, or that's gonna be another 200 bucks, and everything's about a price and a dollar. to me, that's more of a red flag as opposed to. You know, because some trainers, it takes they may not connect with ten players, but the next two or three, they may connect. And those ten players may not connect with me or connect with somebody else. And so it's like, look like, does your son have confidence when they go there? For me, whenever I found a trainer or like a good I'm like, does this give me confidence, or do I feel like I'm not really does my gut tell me this isn't sh I'm I'm this is not right? And so It's so hard nowadays. And and I know I'm kind of beating around. There's I'm not really giving a clear answer because there's so many gurus now, man. There's so many marketing Instagram hooks and algorithms and four hundred dollar a month subscriptions and training programs. And it is crazy because MLB's done a good job of selling the baseball dream. You know, I think twenty five percent of parents think their kids gonna be an MLB player. We know the percentage is like point one percent.

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: So man, it's it's a tough question. To me, I think like the former pros always, well, I'm a former pro and I know what I'm talking about more than the non-former pros, right? And then you have the data guys that are, well, data's everything, and we gotta listen to the data. What's the data say? It goes against that. I think that's what I was trying to talk about. that I have a hard time relaying to parents and kids is that mental awareness to navigate, you know, what's r right, what isn't right. That's why I try to keep baseball. It's like, listen, keep it simple. You are a player and you're trying to rotate

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: and throw a ball. You want to be loose, you want to be explosive, you want to be whippy, you want to be able to repeat your delivery. So, like, look at other movements, look at things and copy. You know, I do a lot of power yoga with my guys. I do a lot of sprint work, I do a lot of long toss, a lot of mindset work, a ton of core, a ton of mobility. You know, these are things that I've spent probably two hundred and fifty thousand dollars on over thirteen years learning from the very best in the world, going all across the country for different trainers. so yeah, it's it's a tough question to answer because it's it's very hard to navigate nowadays.

Bobby Minor: No, and I I get it. I that's there's really and I know it's not one size fits all, and I think you really you kinda hit the nail on the head just because this player works well with this instructor and they've seen results doesn't mean that that's gonna be a good fit for this player with that instructor. And unfortunately I know parents they, you know, they suffer from from FOMO, from keeping up with the Joneses, and then now I'm thinking monkey see monkey do, you know. You know, they see this kid that went, you know, six for eight this weekend and their son went you know, went one for nine. Now they wanna know, well, who does this kid work with? Because we have to get in and, you know, that's the problem. And it's it's Yeah, it's it's to me we create we create a bunch of little robots that can't you know it's not like

Ty Buttrey: Yeah. Right.

Bobby Minor: you know back when I was younger like we would go out go to the you know the sand lot literally and we would play baseball for hours with no adults no coaching no dads and we learned how to play we learned how to figure things out now from you know six years old you have eight dads coaching a t-ball team you got all the rest of the parents along the fence every time a ball's put in play everybody's yelling what to do what not to do and they don't learn how

Ty Buttrey: Ugh.

Bobby Minor: to think themselves themselves. Yeah. So, okay,

Ty Buttrey: Right. Brutal. Brutal.

Bobby Minor: so in 2021, you walked away from the Angels and you talked publicly about just playing baseball for the wrong reasons, including trying to prove people wrong. When did you realize that? And what warning signs should parents be looking for in their own sons?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, I would say anxiety. if your son or daughter has anxiety at a young age, you really gotta monitor that because that can really take your career down a destructive path. you can start getting into, you know, addiction abuse stuff. You can start getting into things to numb it. You can start changing who you are as a human to try to balance it and fix it and stuff. I mean, I I had very bad anxiety. Ever since I kind of hit Pro Bowl and it became a serious job because I I take things very serious, right? I'm intense guys sometimes. And it turned into more performance anxiety. And that was a really tough thing for me to manage. You know, I and I would say that when when people why why'd you leave? You know, they don't understand what that means. being there at times and just, you know, why with this feeling that doesn't go away. And I I I wasn't a very patient kid growing up. I I always wanted to be doing something or I didn't, you know. Couldn't just sit there at the ball field, especially sit there as a starter. I think I should have been probably looking back. I should have been a position player. So I'm always in the game. I'm always playing, always doing something, diving, throwing, running bases, hitting, catching the ball. pitching was always weird for me growing up. It was always weird. I I never really loved it. I was good at it and

Bobby Minor: Mm-hmm.

Ty Buttrey: I was told I was gonna be great at it. I didn't love pitching. I I I really did like and and you know, I I made a statement when I left and a lot of people got upset because they thought I was attacking baseball. No, I'm being very transparent with how I felt about the game. I think it's necessary to be candid for an athlete so other people know when they're going through that. Because when you're going through it and you're in a hotel in double A and it's just you and you just gave up seven runs and you're not a bonus baby and you think your career is gonna be done, it is a lonely world. It is a very lonely world. And that's where guys, players start spending money, start getting into relationship trouble, start drinking, start smoking way too much. And so you really got to be careful with anxiety. nervousness is okay. Anxiety is something that to me, you have to move it around, you know, get to the field. you know, get there, shag BP, go work out, get it out, you know, get that nervous energy out. Don't let it kind of control you. I would say that's something for parents to kind of be a heads up on number two, try not to let when your kid's 13, 14, 15 years old, try not, and they're let's say they're the best. Man, I can't tell you how many big leaguers, you know, and players that I played with that were all stars at 12, 13, 14, and puberty comes around and these kids are getting bigger and stronger. And that kid that never really was good is now becoming, you know, he comes out of nowhere. It's like, dang, this kid's a big leaguer now? and so don't let that go to your head, right? Like don't don't let that stuff go to your head. and then I think the final thing I would say to just kind of be mindful of is not burning your kid out. That's a big, that's a big one. You know, yelling at your child for performance. You know, why'd you not swing at that ball? We've been working on this. I I think it's okay to talk to your child, but yelling and like being physically. and noticeably upset or down and out that your child didn't play well. That really affects their psyche and their mindset. and it can it can lead your kid to really not like the game and start taking it way too serious.

Bobby Minor: Man, there's there's so much gold there. Parents parents, I hope you're listening. and I it's funny because Like you say stuff to parents, even like Dustin Pedroya, I had Pedroya on my podcast. There's people in the comments pushing back on some of the things that he's saying. And I'm like, you know, just it it's just insane to me how everybody thinks, well, no, you know, my kid's different or our situation's different. But I mean the numbers are the numbers and that's why, you know, seventy five percent of players quit by the age of fourteen, you know, ninety percent will not go on to play beyond high school. Like that's not my opinion, you know, that's just the reality of the numbers. So let me ask you this if you If you loved pitching, if pitching were your passion, physically, how much longer do you think you could have kept playing at the Major League level?

Ty Buttrey: I think I could have been an I think I could have been an all star. I I I think I would have everything was there. everything was there. You know, I I liked I loved spring training. I love the workouts. I loved being around the guys. I loved traveling, the food in the hotels, the actual thing of pitching, the art of pitching, just for my entire life, it never sat right with me. I never really underst I I didn't I couldn't conceptualize it to really understand. I was a big

Bobby Minor: Mm-hmm.

Ty Buttrey: strong kid, I could throw hard. I I had a good breaking ball and and I and I just outworked I I outworked everyone to get there. and I threw really, really hard before everyone was now throwing a hundred miles an hour, you know? And that was by training. So I I I think I would still be playing baseball. I I'd still be, you know, a starter. but man, it just was tough. It was tough. I didn't know how much I loved the other side of baseball. You know, there's two sports. There's playing baseball and then there's pitching, right? Like pitching's a Completely, it's a completely different thing. So,

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: it's too bad. It's too bad. Because, you know, I spent all this time, all this money, effort, energy into baseball, and it just I I couldn't get myself to kind of calm it down inside my head. and it just was always, man, it was just a struggle from day one. and there was times when it was like really easy and man, it just I really beat myself up. And I don't. I didn't really do that with hitting too much. I would get frustrated if I lined out and I was over four, but it playing the game of baseball was was that that was pure excitement for me. But pitching was just tough. It was tough and I had a hard time navigating it.

Bobby Minor: Yeah. No, that makes a lot of sense. And I think just kind of thinking through it, especially at the major league level, if you're a pitcher, you know, if you're a starter and you have a bad outing, it's, you know, four or five days before you get another chance. If you're a reliever, you have a bad outing. I mean maybe you get back out there the next day, but maybe you don't. But like if you're a hitter and you have a bad game, most of the time, you know what I mean, you get to you're right back out there the next day and it's a lot easier I think to, you know, kind of put it behind you. So I know you've talked you've talked a lot about working with young players in the Virgin Islands and helped kinda and that helped kind of bring back your appreciation for the game. What was it about that experience that changed things for you?

Ty Buttrey: Well, it was the first time I did anything like that. it was always about me. it was always about me from the time I was young. And I say that confidently. That's not a that's not me trying to be arrogant. It's the truth. I was it was always about me in my career. And I'm going this I'm going traveling to this tournament, or going to this showcase, or I have to do this, or I can't hang out with this girl, or I can't hang out with my my buddy, or I can't do that. It was always about me in baseball. And so that's how that's how I grew up. And I would say any good athlete, it is kind of like that. You know, you have to surround yourself with just focus and staying on this lane about getting myself better, improving, eating. And when you live like that and you don't, I mean, I remember it was weird. Anytime I would have like a we would do like a charity day with one of the minor league teams, I had like the best performance later in that day. It was the it was the craziest thing. Like I would go, we'd do a charity event, my anxiety would go away, and I would just be kind of lax. I'd be like, wow, life's way more Life isn't this serious. You know, there's it's pitching is not this thing. You see other people and you're like, whoa, like you can be happy and feel fulfilled and successful by doing something other than pitching, you know? Like I got a lot of my fulfillment in life from wins and losses. You know, my I was like this kind of mentally and that was that was a tough thing. and so when I went to the Virgin Islands and I did that camp, it was one, it was business, which I love business. I love learning how to build, you know, build something from nothing kind of thing. But then two, you know, realizing that I had a lot of knowledge and I could help these kids and then they were getting better. And then three, it was in the Virgin Islands. It was fun. It was cool. It was like, you know, we're doing baseball on a Caribbean island. and at that point, I was still young enough to where I was like, okay, I think I I you know, I've kind of cooled off a little bit. I still it as much as it it brought me back to go play, it just that that scar Of just like being burnt out, man. It it never went away. It it never it never went away. but it was cool to go back and say, Okay, well, you know, this this camp was great. Looking back, I think I should have stuck with doing the camps. I think I would have had more fun, more fulfillment. you know, because once I left, once I went back to baseball, it was kind of hard to continue to do that. So yeah, that's kind of that's my honest answer.

Bobby Minor: No, that's I can totally relate. I I ran an event in the Dominican Republic for four years with an MLB Hall of Famer son and you know it's just it's just different. do you What so this is one 'cause like I you know, I see it in comments a lot on different posts where people are talking about as as a matter of fact, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal that came out yesterday about just the cost of you know of of youth baseball and I actually got interviewed for that article so I contributed to it. But you know, the comments everybody wants to compare how crazy it is here in the States with like the Dominican Republic and they want to reference, you know, players playing with no shoes and bottle caps and no gloves and everything, which I know that That does happen. But I've also seen it baseball in the Dominican Republic. It's first of all, it's totally different. Their mindset is different. That is like what that is life or death for a lot of those families. Versus here, I feel like most players, their first goal is to play baseball in college somewhere. If they play professionally after, it's kind of the icing on the cake, but they have other options. But baseball in the Dominican Republic is big business. You know, you have these private academy owners that that they don't train players out of the goodness of their heart, they train them banking on. that they're gonna sign when they're 16 and then they take 40%, which is a lot of money. What's it like in the what like what's it like in the Virgin Islands? And and how do like what you saw there with those players, how does that how does that how does that compare to like what you see with players here?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, well, first, two things. One, I I think America does a very poor job nowadays of developing players. I I I truly do. And I think that's kind of an objective fact at this point. I I've toned back my comments about how much, you know, the hate towards travel ball. And I I I I at times, I mean, I'm coaching a travel ball team. You know, there's just not really any other systems in America because it's become so much based around private equity that, you know. These tournaments are now what just people do and showcases where we know, and and anyone that played this game knows that you have to develop at the game, right? Like you have

Bobby Minor: Mm-hmm.

Ty Buttrey: to physically develop rep after rep after rep, you know, running and training. that's just how you get better at baseball. That's what pros do. That's what college players do. So if you go to a tournament and you have a practice twice a week, it's an hour and a half. You get a couple of reps there, you go to a tournament, you drive an hour away, you pay all this money. Johnny gets like seven at bats. He gets walked four times. He gets one hit and then he glinds out two times. It's like the kid got seven at bats versus in Puerto Rico and

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: Korea and Japan and even to the Dominican, like you said, it's you're right. It's not just guys are hitting bottle caps running around their bare feet. Like there are highly trained academies down there taking young kids and training them daily. And it's like that's actually not going on here. And you just again, that's just an objective, like. I I think travel ball has its perks and it teaches camaraderie, the kids have fun, it's great, you know, but man, we're really missing out on the skill gap there, which is important to get better, right? Like that's the goal. We have to get better. the other side of it, what I saw to your p to your point or question about the Caribbean, man, there's there's nothing there. there's like a, you know, there's a whoever wants to kind of Locally helped. There's some little leagues there. There's some, you know, there's some associations, dads, but St. Thomas, St. John's, and St. Croix. St. Thomas is the more touristy, kind of commercialized island right there. St. John's is like the kind of secret getaway honeymoon place. And then you have St. Croix, which is a bigger island, but it doesn't have as much of the tourist attraction and money coming in. So man, we had 120 I we had 120 kids and it was great. And you know, it was it got a little difficult to work with the government. You know, guys were doing stuff that was just it just was hard to it was hard. I would have had to live there and I would have had to buy in and really, really committed my life to doing that. And were my wife and I at the time, like it just wasn't these one-off camps. You know, we kinda got the price down to, you know, someone has to pay for it too, right? Like it costs money and

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: it's, you know, thirteen thousand dollars every time we were gonna run a camp. So you have to s fundraise and all this stuff. but yeah, it wasn't even on the scale as to close to Dominican or the PR

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: or to Puerto Rico, I mean.

Bobby Minor: Yeah. I want to go back to something because you you know we talked about and you mentioned it a couple of times like burnout and burnout being a factor of you walking away from the game. How much how much of how much of your feeling of burnout was like self imposed versus is there anything that you wish your parents would have done differently, you know, as you're going through this journey? And I'm not trying I'm not trying to throw your parents under the bus. I mean, you know what I mean, but like looking back, is there anything that you wish they would have done differently that somebody listening right Right now can say, Hey, you know what? I'm doing that I'm doing that myself to my son. Maybe I should do things differently.

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, I think my parents did a great job of instilling a work ethic in me. My mom was pretty neutral. You know, she didn't care too much about the wins and losses. She didn't really become like a travel ball mom at all. Like she was a she was a mom, right? Like that was her her job was to just love and be a mom. my dad was much more I wouldn't say he was intense, but he definitely wanted his kids to succeed. And, you know, it was always you know, training meals. It was, it was, it was intense, right? But like I didn't know any better. It wasn't he was never a yeller. He was never a screamer. you know, there was things like that that I I think just any dad in that area. I mean, I I I I heard horror stories of dads, you know, physically punching their kids and like

Bobby Minor: Wow.

Ty Buttrey: physically abusing their sons and and those kids made it. Those kids are playing played in the big leagues. It's like, you know, I mean, screaming at the coaches. My dad never did any of that stuff. I I think just the biggest thing for me was I wish I I wish I would have dove into a little bit more of my other hobbies when I was younger, right? Like I I I think that would have been better for me so I had balance. I mean, I really only play video games and I played baseball. And video games was like the counter opposite of if I wanted to become good at baseball, right? Like sitting down, bad posture, shutting your core off and playing a video game has zero impact besides maybe a little hand eye coordination with the shooting game. You know, they say that stuff,

Bobby Minor: Yeah.

Ty Buttrey: but like It's not like I was out there playing, I didn't really play basketball, I didn't really play football. I did at a younger age. I wasn't really an outdoorsy kid. I liked art, I liked drawing, I liked, you know, anime, I liked like really, you know, computer games like that. So like my who I was really didn't match like an elite level athlete. I was by no means your tip your stereotypical like jock. I was not like that at all. I just happened to be really good at baseball. So I think that was hard for my parents too to navigate. Like they didn't really know what way, you know, to go with me. I I would I would just say, you know, looking back on it, I think it's for parents, it's like, push your kid, right? Like push your son or daughter. It's okay. Like the gentle parenting thing has gone too far where we can't ever correct and get on our kid or push them. It's like, no, push them, man. Like that's what parents are for. You have, but like, don't belittle them, don't get all dis disappointed, don't yell. Don't scream. Like you can communicate with them in a cordial, you know, way that gets like that shows respect. so I I I would encourage parents to just like listen, you're the parent, right? Like you're the leader of the family. Like, leave your child. Your child doesn't know what it's doing without you pushing and guiding. I mean, we do that with school, you know, we do that with academics, and parents, you know, push their kids really hard in academics to go get a job. It's like, okay, well. You can do that in sports as well. You can do that in everything, right?

Bobby Minor: Yeah. No, that that's good. And I think there's I I think yeah, I think people parents go it's one extreme or the other a lot of times, you know. Either they're way too hard or they're way too soft and it's somewhere in the middle, you know, like you know, my son Julian is very, very self motivated, like every day wanted to do something baseball related. I there were times where I s you know, like, hey, you said you were gonna go you were gonna go hit later, you were gonna go lift or whatever, are you still gonna do it? I might ask the question, but it was always him, you know, driving the bus. So all right, let's this is where we'll we'll kind of wrap up our time. so like you're now involved in the NIL and kind of like athlete branding space. so let's say you got

Ty Buttrey: My wife more so. I I help her out. I help her out. Yeah. Yeah.

Bobby Minor: Okay. Okay. All right. So what would you let's say let's say you've got a dad who has a you know a twelve or thirteen year old son who's already thinking about social media, building a brand, future NIL opportunities. What would you tell that dad to focus on right now and what would you tell him to quit worrying about?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, so there's a couple things there. One, NIL has been around for years. It's nothing new. it's it's nothing new that we we just have to get to the point where what's the goal here, right? Like because you can get NIL and you can build your brand through just the skill and the notary notoriety of getting known, or you can actively build your brand. You know, my wife works with a lot of athletes that are like the ninety five percent that aren't making big time money with NIL, right? Like they're they're a track athlete or they're a rower or they're a, you know, maybe it's on softball or something and they have to, you know, they're trying to scrape by, they're not gonna go play pro and they have to have a business or a brand and monetize that with their audience they have in college. And so like that's where my wife's really came in to help and build a lot of trust with athletes that do that. And so it it's it's tough at 13, 14 years old. I think it's a little bit of a trap. I think you need to worry about it more 15, 16, 18 in high school because there's legitimate money in NIL. it's it's just it's gonna be a lot. It's gonna take a lot of extra effort. So, like you got to think about every time that you're gonna be training, you then have to go make content, post it, you know, build around it, and that can be challenging and that can be time consuming. Right now there's a little bit of a FOMO going on with parents and being like, well, I gotta, you know, we're gonna miss out on dollars. I look at it like this. I think it's smart to do because playing pro sports and making life changing money. I mean, even me. I mean, I made a good amount of money, but I did not make enough money to retire and sit on my butt for the rest of my life. I have to go out and earn. I have to go probably get a job and and get serious here, you know, like. There's things I have to do. I mean, it's not a $40 million contract, right? Like, and so, and then you got to live off that money as well. So, like, I would suggest making an authentic brand. So, because it's almost like a scouting report of who you are as a person. We know everything's moving towards the social media and IL. I mean, it's just how creative athlete creators, like, it's just getting bigger and bigger. You know, people, fans want to see it. Getting away from the old school mindset into this looser, kind of more free free thinking type of athlete nowadays, because it's great to fall back on. Like it is great to be, man, I got 60,000 followers. If I want to start some camps and clinics, if I want to be a coach, if I want to build a launch a t-shirt brand, or like, man, you you've grinded now for 15 years and you're like, okay, cool, I got this brand I can fall back on. And I think that's pretty interesting. but like I said, I'm not the expert. I would direct him to talk to my wife, Sam, because she could give you way better advice.

Bobby Minor: No, that's still a lot a lot of good stuff there. So, all right, Todd, before we wrap up, is there anything else, like anything else that you feel like parents out there, especially parents of, you know, eleven, twelve, thirteen year olds, anything that you think that they need to know?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, I mean, you know, it's it's hard. At the end of the day, Bobby, it's it's tough, man. You're going against, you know, millions of kids in the States, you're going against millions of kids outside in the world, you know, you're trying to make this goal of being one of those seven hundred and fifty players. I just look at it like this. If you s you don't have your your son doesn't have to play baseball, right? He doesn't have to play a sport. Identify what they're good at at a young age, see their strengths, see what comes easy to them, and really push them in that direction. Because it's at the end of the day, playing baseball is really cool. But you want your son or you want your daughter to love what they do in this one life that we have here on earth, you know, you want them to love it and like guiding them towards their what they really love. Man, you're gonna have all this success, you're gonna have all the money, you're gonna have all the anything you want, nurturing something that you want. And I think sometimes now with parents, is we kind of force or highly suggest that our kids have to play sports and travel ball. And I just don't think that that's the right way. I I don't think that's the right way to look at things. So I as much as I am right now in the baseball business, I want everyone to come and train with ties. Like, no, I I want your kid to be happy when he's fifty years old, right? Like I I see a lot of horror stories of retired pros that are shells and not even close to who they used to be because they've just they've given the game physically and mentally everything. There's not nothing really left in them, man. It's tough to see that. I mean, I have had a hard time, let me tell you, transitioning out of professional sports because you know, you're used to kind of I was a closer, man. Like I was coming in like a psycho, you know, trying to blow guys down at a hundred and one. You know, you gotta take this aggressive mindset and kind of contain it into like a professional business front. And it's it's just difficult, man. So definitely like try to identify what your son or daughter's good at and and sick highly push them towards what comes easy.

Bobby Minor: Man, I really appreciate it. So anybody that wants to keep up with you, Ty, on social media, where where can they follow you?

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, at Ty Buttery Instagram. And then if you want to join in on my Twitter war and just hear me talking crap to a bunch of random burner accounts, feel free to follow me at tie buttry underscore.

Bobby Minor: man. I appreciate you, Ty.

Ty Buttrey: Yeah, absolutely, Bobby. Thank you.