Order of Man

00:00:00.000 It's a fact that most men thrive on competition.

00:00:02.620 Competitive sports are as old as time.

00:00:04.440 They test our skills, our abilities, our strengths, and so much more.

00:00:07.740 But more than that, sports are a metaphor for life.

00:00:10.460 I can't think of another opportunity where you can learn how to win,

00:00:12.820 how to lose, teamwork, discipline, commitment, and every other trait

00:00:15.740 that will help you thrive as a man.

00:00:17.400 This week I talk with Travis Chalk, co-founder of Baseballism,

00:00:20.560 about America's pastime, lessons learned from the baseball diamond,

00:00:23.980 and how to turn a passion for the game into a thriving business.

00:00:27.420 You're a man of action.

00:00:28.620 You live life to the fullest, embrace your fears, and boldly chart your own path.

00:00:33.400 When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time.

00:00:37.840 You are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong.

00:00:42.900 This is your life. This is who you are.

00:00:45.420 This is who you will become.

00:00:47.100 At the end of the day, and after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.

00:00:52.800 Men, welcome back to the Order of Man podcast.

00:00:54.720 My name is Ryan Michler, and I am the founder of Order of Man.

00:00:58.180 We're glad that you're back here with us this week.

00:01:00.220 I've got a great one, again, lined up for you today with the founder of Baseballism,

00:01:03.360 and we're going to have a great conversation about learning life lessons from baseball

00:01:07.500 and every other sport, for that matter.

00:01:09.500 Now, this is a timely conversation, as I just completed a Spartan beast over the weekend

00:01:13.400 to cap off my first Spartan trifecta.

00:01:16.040 I'm pretty stoked about completing it, and I can tell you that there are some serious lessons

00:01:20.080 to be learned from pushing yourself.

00:01:22.080 So I'll get into that in a bit, but let me give first a huge shout-out to those of you

00:01:26.680 who left reviews last week.

00:01:28.040 I realize that you do not need to do that, but I appreciate it when you do.

00:01:31.640 It means a ton to me, and if you haven't left your review yet, you can do it at orderofman.com

00:01:35.920 slash iTunes.

00:01:37.260 Now, we've talked a ton about the Facebook group that we've got going on, and I want to

00:01:42.100 do it again today.

00:01:42.780 Men, if you're looking for a place to have some real conversations about real manly topics,

00:01:46.860 you need, look no further than our Facebook group.

00:01:49.260 We're now over 600 strong, and you can find us at facebook.com slash groups slash order

00:01:54.800 of man and request access, or you can just search for order of man in the search bar

00:01:58.840 on Facebook.

00:01:59.820 You know this already, but the show notes, the links, the best quotes, all of that can

00:02:03.300 be found at orderofman.com slash 028.

00:02:05.760 I also added the video that Travis and I talk about during our discussion, so you'll want

00:02:09.220 to be sure to go back and check that out.

00:02:11.220 I do want to ask for your forgiveness for this show today, just a bit, as the audio isn't

00:02:15.880 great.

00:02:16.340 I contemplated not airing it at all, but there is too much great information here on this

00:02:21.020 show, and I know that you'll get a ton of value from our conversation, so you'll have

00:02:24.500 to bear with me on the audio a bit, but again, I know that you'll enjoy this show.

00:02:28.020 Now, let me introduce you to my guest, Travis Chalk.

00:02:30.420 Travis is the co-founder of Baseballism, a clothing and accessories brand that focuses

00:02:33.900 on turning a love for the game of baseball into a lifestyle filled with passion, commitment,

00:02:38.020 and discipline.

00:02:39.140 Started in 2006 as a youth baseball camp, Baseballism has quickly grown into a recognizable

00:02:44.040 brand that serves professional baseball players all the way down to their core audience of

00:02:48.460 youth and high school athletes.

00:02:50.320 Travis has a degree in educational studies and is a former college athlete himself, but

00:02:54.180 has since turned his love for the game into a full-time career with locations around the

00:02:58.300 country and many stores opening soon.

00:03:01.040 Baseballism has 372,000 Facebook fans, 52,000 Twitter followers, and 121,000 Instagram followers,

00:03:08.120 attesting to the fact that Travis knows how to create a huge and loyal following.

00:03:12.860 Travis, excited to have you on the show.

00:03:14.260 Thanks for joining us today.

00:03:15.260 Appreciate it, Ryan.

00:03:15.980 Good to be here.

00:03:16.860 So, I fell in love with your brand.

00:03:18.560 I followed you guys on Instagram a little bit, and I like what you guys are doing.

00:03:21.280 I like a little bit about your backstory, and as I learn more about what the company is

00:03:24.540 all about, I become more excited about what you guys are doing.

00:03:27.580 So, we reached out, wanted to have you on the show, but I'd like you to tell us a little

00:03:31.140 bit about Baseballism and the story behind why you guys started what you're doing now.

00:03:36.020 Okay, so going way back, I graduated from the University of Oregon in 06, and I'd played

00:03:41.820 four years of college baseball there, played club ball for the University of Oregon, and

00:03:46.040 after I graduated, I had an educational studies degree, and I didn't really know what to do

00:03:51.240 with it.

00:03:52.000 I wasn't really ready.

00:03:52.940 I went to college just to have fun and play baseball, and it's because it's something

00:03:56.080 that my parents expected me to do.

00:03:58.620 And so, I graduated not knowing what I wanted to do, so I ended up going back to baseball,

00:04:02.840 which is what I'm familiar with, and I wanted to teach private lessons, and I was looking

00:04:06.940 online for a website domain to name my private lessons business, and I looked up Baseballism,

00:04:13.160 and I could not believe the domain wasn't taken.

00:04:15.080 So, not knowing really what I was going to do with it, I just bought the domain immediately.

00:04:19.320 Yeah.

00:04:19.600 And I got together, three of my good friends that I all played baseball with, and we started

00:04:24.740 a youth camp, and it ran from 06 to 08, and we were successful doing it, just 10 to 13

00:04:31.340 year old, well, 8 to 13 year old kids.

00:04:34.240 And every camp you go to, or every team you play for has like a team t-shirt or a camp t-shirt,

00:04:41.520 and we really wanted to kind of take a step up above the original, you know, 100% cotton,

00:04:48.480 Hanes heavy t-shirt that shrinks about three inches after you wash it once, and then you put

00:04:53.060 it in your closet, and it stays there for about a year and a half, you use it for a workout

00:04:56.880 clothes, and you throw it away.

00:04:58.260 So, we really put some focus into designing a nice logo for our t-shirt, and we did that,

00:05:04.300 and parents loved it, kids loved it.

00:05:06.200 The t-shirt became just as big a hit as the youth camp was.

00:05:09.580 In 08, we decided to, you know, disband the camp because we had to get real-life jobs,

00:05:13.360 and you can't make a living doing, you know, youth summer camps your whole life.

00:05:17.180 Right.

00:05:17.360 Well, sometimes you can, but most of the time you can't.

00:05:20.760 It's tough, right?

00:05:21.580 It's tough.

00:05:22.060 It's really tough.

00:05:23.660 And so, I went and taught at community college.

00:05:27.720 My three other buddies, one became a financial manager at a health and science university.

00:05:32.520 Another one was a sports marketing and sales guy for a local sports company.

00:05:37.080 Another one joined the military, and he was a JAG lawyer for the last seven years.

00:05:41.360 And so, we got back together in 2012.

00:05:44.100 I worked part-time at a baseball academy teaching private lessons for baseball.

00:05:49.540 And I made a small run of shirts, brought back baseballism,

00:05:52.260 and the shirts sold out just with our original logo that just says baseballism with a bat instead of an eye.

00:05:59.080 Oh, right.

00:05:59.460 And the shirts sold out in a week, and I made 450 of them, and it sold out in that baseball academy.

00:06:05.860 Oh, my goodness.

00:06:06.520 And so, I called my buddies back that originally started the camp, and we got back together,

00:06:10.320 and we said, hey, you know, I think we got something here.

00:06:12.380 The idea is we do an off-the-field brand, high-end.

00:06:16.000 We try to do a mainstream sport and an off-the-field brand,

00:06:18.660 which is really kind of something that's never really been done before at a high-end.

00:06:23.240 And we put it together.

00:06:24.440 We did a Kickstarter campaign, and the rest is really history.

00:06:28.040 We started up in 2013 with our online website, and it's been about two and a half years,

00:06:32.800 and we've been taking off since then.

00:06:34.540 What brought you guys back together?

00:06:36.220 Is it just something that was calling to you, or is it just, hey, let's throw these shirts out there,

00:06:40.320 and see how they do?

00:06:41.220 Or what was the reason for you guys getting back together after several years of a hiatus?

00:06:45.180 Well, what would happen is we'd wear our original camp shirt around town, you know,

00:06:49.120 just to bars, to shopping, just, you know, to social events.

00:06:53.080 And people would say, where'd you get that shirt?

00:06:55.460 Not even knowing we were a baseball camp before, where'd you get that shirt?

00:06:58.900 And we talked to each other about it after I'd sold those shirts at the baseball academy I worked for.

00:07:04.580 And they were like, I'm getting the same thing.

00:07:07.680 Like, wherever I wear that shirt, people are asking me, where did I get that shirt?

00:07:11.020 And so we're like, we got to do something about this.

00:07:13.060 And I had a credit card, didn't have much money.

00:07:16.300 So we just hired a video team to shoot a Kickstarter video for us.

00:07:22.320 And we just kind of took a gamble on it and it worked out.

00:07:26.080 Why do you think people are connecting so well with your brand?

00:07:28.700 Because I know as businesses start, not everybody has the same level of, in fact,

00:07:33.560 very few have the same level of success you guys have in two different areas.

00:07:37.780 Why are people resonating with your brand over some of these other brands out there?

00:07:41.020 I think for all of us, baseball is a passion here at Baseballism.

00:07:44.840 So we are really familiar with baseball.

00:07:46.640 We're doing something we've done since we were five years old, except in a different aspect.

00:07:50.720 We're doing it off the field in clothing instead of on the field and actually playing the game.

00:07:54.700 It really makes us genuine, I want to say.

00:07:58.260 Everyone knows when they wear our stuff and when they look at our Facebook posts,

00:08:01.940 they look at our social media, that we are first and foremost baseball players.

00:08:06.100 I want to say that I'm a better third baseman than I am a graphic designer.

00:08:09.820 You know, our sales guy was a better pitcher than he is a sales guy.

00:08:14.220 And our financial guy was a better catcher than he is a financial guy.

00:08:17.820 We are from baseball.

00:08:19.840 Our brand is the way we played.

00:08:22.280 I think everyone who starts a brand kind of makes that brand in the image of themselves in a way.

00:08:27.400 Right.

00:08:27.740 And we believe in pure baseball.

00:08:30.300 We try to do things the right way.

00:08:32.640 When we coached, between the four of us, we have about 30 years of coaching experience between us

00:08:37.220 because that's what we did in between college and starting this business on the side from our full-time jobs.

00:08:44.360 When we say things on social media, people believe it.

00:08:47.120 And the reason is because it's the truth.

00:08:49.440 It's who we are.

00:08:50.640 It's what we did.

00:08:51.160 It's how we played.

00:08:51.880 We played head down baseball.

00:08:53.980 Do it the right way.

00:08:55.640 Respect the game.

00:08:56.740 Humility.

00:08:57.540 Treat people with respect.

00:08:59.440 And that's how we present the brand to people.

00:09:01.260 And I think people really appreciate something like that nowadays.

00:09:04.800 Well, and I think you can even tell in some of your clothing.

00:09:06.780 Like, I look at some of your shirts.

00:09:08.020 The one I like is the 6-4-3, how it equals 2.

00:09:11.220 Yeah.

00:09:11.320 And then I think the other one is it's not okay with the backwards K. 1.00

00:09:14.560 Uh-huh, uh-huh.

00:09:15.040 And I think unless you're into the game, you don't really understand what those things mean, right?

00:09:20.160 Oh, absolutely.

00:09:20.840 I mean, our shirts are a way to connect people that may not know each other, that have a love for the game.

00:09:25.660 That 6-4-3-2 shirt is just a friend-maker conversation starter.

00:09:30.140 Whether you know baseball or not, if you wear it, the person that doesn't know it is like,

00:09:33.800 hey, what does that mean?

00:09:35.300 And then you start a conversation there.

00:09:37.500 Or if someone does know it and they recognize the shirt, then you got a friend for life right there.

00:09:42.860 Because they know exactly what you're talking about.

00:09:44.720 And it's not okay.

00:09:45.620 It's kind of like a life lesson thing for us.

00:09:47.580 As a coach, the last thing you want your players to do is to go down swinging.

00:09:51.120 You want them to give themselves a chance to be successful.

00:09:55.500 And I think that's what brings the off-the-field aspect to it is in life in baseball,

00:09:59.960 you want to go down swinging.

00:10:01.520 You don't want to have an idea, not ever put anything into it to see if it works.

00:10:05.260 You want to give it a chance.

00:10:06.200 And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work.

00:10:07.360 But at least you give it a shot.

00:10:08.880 So you talk a lot about passion, obviously, in the business that you're running now.

00:10:12.380 But why has baseball been such a passion and a pastime for not only you, but really,

00:10:17.360 I think the tagline is America's brand.

00:10:19.580 Why is baseball that way for boys and men in America in general?

00:10:24.820 Well, to start off with me, I'm originally from Honolulu, Hawaii.

00:10:31.080 And I went to school at University of Oregon.

00:10:32.860 And for people that are from Hawaii, leaving the island is a pretty big thing.

00:10:36.860 You're going 2,000 miles at least in any direction.

00:10:40.380 And I got to college.

00:10:41.360 I didn't really have any friends.

00:10:43.040 I didn't know a lot of people.

00:10:44.380 And I tried hanging out with certain groups of people.

00:10:47.280 I tried to hang out with people that were from Hawaii.

00:10:49.560 Didn't really get along with them.

00:10:52.080 I'm Asian.

00:10:53.400 And so I tried hanging out with the Asian people.

00:10:55.900 I didn't really get along with them.

00:10:57.440 And I played club baseball.

00:10:59.180 And those are the people I related to the most.

00:11:01.120 So I guess the term baseballism comes from being from baseball,

00:11:05.100 believing in what the game has to offer and the good in baseball.

00:11:08.380 And that baseball is just really where I'm from.

00:11:10.960 Yeah, that makes sense.

00:11:11.920 What about in America in general?

00:11:14.400 I mean, why do we follow it so closely?

00:11:15.940 Why do we have such a love for the game in general?

00:11:17.740 Yeah, well, I think as opposed to other great sports like basketball, football,

00:11:21.960 there are some sports I watch them all the time.

00:11:24.280 But they lack the history that baseball has with the United States.

00:11:29.500 I mean, this country grew up with baseball.

00:11:33.440 I post things on social media all the time.

00:11:35.280 Like, before the first – I mean, when the first baseball game was played,

00:11:40.560 there were only like 26 states in the United States.

00:11:43.600 And so things like that make you realize how long baseball has been with us.

00:11:46.940 It took us through two world wars, the Great Depression.

00:11:49.480 And it's been there for the United States longer than any of the sports have.

00:11:53.020 So all the terms like, you know, three strikes, you're out.

00:11:56.240 You know, the term on the first date, you reach first base.

00:11:59.700 Yeah, right.

00:12:00.600 Second base.

00:12:01.040 Those terms are embedded in our language.

00:12:04.060 And so baseball is just a part of the American culture.

00:12:08.480 Let's talk about some of the lessons that you've learned.

00:12:10.480 Because I always talk about sports as good as they are.

00:12:13.320 They're really a metaphor for life and they're preparing you for life.

00:12:15.880 Like you said with that shirt, it's not okay.

00:12:17.880 That's a lesson for life, not just baseball.

00:12:20.460 Exactly.

00:12:20.980 What are some of the lessons that you've learned in your playing time and then also you as a coach?

00:12:26.020 And what do you see us being able to learn from sports in general, not just baseball?

00:12:29.400 I think one of the most important things I learned was to be consistent.

00:12:32.920 A lot of guys can go out there and they go four for four one day and they just kind of quit.

00:12:39.060 They're satisfied with four for four.

00:12:41.640 The great players, I like to say Derek Jeter a lot because he's probably my favorite infield player.

00:12:47.560 And he just brought it every day.

00:12:50.420 He wasn't, you know, didn't hit 30 home runs a year.

00:12:53.300 He didn't bat for 370 or he was a 315 guy that you just knew what you were going to get every single year.

00:13:01.360 Just solid, right?

00:13:02.240 Just solid.

00:13:02.740 And so that's what we try to bring to the business side as well.

00:13:06.520 We try to bring it every day.

00:13:08.140 We post something on Facebook every day and we first started this brand and we're like, what's going to separate us?

00:13:12.460 Being consistent is going to separate us because anyone can be great one day, but not everyone can do it every day.

00:13:18.080 And so when you do it every day, then people start taking notice.

00:13:21.000 Oh, this is something special.

00:13:22.520 And then you gain that credibility with everyone.

00:13:25.480 And that's really helped our brand a lot is being consistent.

00:13:29.200 People know that when they go onto our Facebook page and they look at our posts, it's going to be something genuine.

00:13:34.840 It's going to be something good and it's going to be something baseball.

00:13:37.980 Yeah, that's so valuable.

00:13:39.100 Like you said, such a valuable life lesson.

00:13:41.380 It's really hard to do it consistently over time because it's not the glorious part of the game, right?

00:13:46.380 Or life in general.

00:13:47.160 Yeah, when we first started this, I just kind of thought to myself, I was like, what's one Facebook post for the rest of my life to start something that I can be proud of?

00:13:56.820 It looks like a lot.

00:13:57.700 It looks like a lot of work, but it's just one Facebook post a day.

00:14:00.220 It's one tweet a day.

00:14:02.100 And when you look at it that way and you look at the reward that's at the end of the tunnel, it's definitely worth it.

00:14:06.940 Let's talk about some of the downside of baseball or even just the black eyes that not only baseball gets but professional sports in general with steroids and all of that stuff.

00:14:17.720 Tell me a little bit about what you see from your perspective and then how that impacts our belief in the athletes that we used to look up to and the game in general.

00:14:28.220 Definitely.

00:14:29.180 That's the stuff we honestly run.

00:14:30.880 We try to stay away from that stuff on social media because it's so controversial and we don't want to make.

00:14:35.540 As a brand, our thing is we want to be baseball for everybody.

00:14:40.200 And then when we start arguing steroids, who's going to make the Hall of Fame, who's not, it's just really a fine line for us because we don't want to start that war and take a side.

00:14:49.680 We just want to be everything baseball.

00:14:52.120 And so, yeah, that kind of stuff, it's a good conversation, but we try to stay away from it because it really makes people take sides and we don't want that.

00:14:58.520 So we want – if you play baseball, whether you did something or not, we want – we like the passion side of it.

00:15:06.280 We try not to stay – we try to stay away from that kind of stuff.

00:15:08.740 That's cool.

00:15:09.120 Yeah, and you can see that.

00:15:10.020 You can totally see that passion and that positive side that you're putting into things.

00:15:13.020 So I like that.

00:15:14.080 One of the videos that I watched just a couple of days ago or last week, I think I shot you a text about it, was the Game Within the Game, I think is what it's called.

00:15:21.320 It's called Within a Game.

00:15:22.840 Within a Game.

00:15:23.420 That's right.

00:15:23.740 Tell me a little bit about that because that video, I mean, it gives me chills and almost tears to my eyes.

00:15:28.060 I love that video.

00:15:28.860 So tell me a little bit about that.

00:15:30.420 Well, I kind of – when I was growing up, I always had a decent knack for poetry.

00:15:37.500 And I guess Facebook and social media kind of – trying to look for different things to post, it kind of gave me a way to use that talent, I guess I have.

00:15:45.920 And so I wrote that poem kind of picturing myself and my dad growing up.

00:15:50.200 And it kind of just – it's just the circle of life of baseball, I like to call it.

00:15:53.980 It's just you grow up, but your dad teaches you, you teach your kid, and then repeat.

00:15:59.940 I wrote that – I wrote that just trying to connect, you know, the meaning of baseball and, you know, how much it means besides the major leagues.

00:16:08.700 And I think that's not really captured as the youth side, the high school side, the college side.

00:16:13.720 Because everyone sees the big leaguers.

00:16:15.740 They know the big leaguers.

00:16:16.660 But going on behind the scenes, you've got hundreds of thousands of youth baseball tournaments being played every summer.

00:16:22.160 And that's really the core of baseball.

00:16:23.740 That's our audience because if we just sold to Major League Baseball players, we'd only be selling to, you know, a thousand guys a year.

00:16:31.080 Right, right.

00:16:31.780 Just a handful of guys.

00:16:33.100 What about all the people that love the game that don't make it and they make it to baseball games and they watch the game and they appreciate it?

00:16:40.600 That's our core audience.

00:16:42.040 You know, we love giving stuff to big leaguers, but we are just about people that love the game behind the scenes.

00:16:48.060 Yeah, that video is so great.

00:16:49.340 It reminds me a lot of the best times that I have with my kids.

00:16:52.600 I've got three kids, one seven who I can play catch with, and he's in baseball right now.

00:16:57.600 The other is getting started in t-ball.

00:16:59.200 He's four years old.

00:17:00.020 And so it really reminds me of, you know, looking at it as from a father, like how you can connect with your kids, which is so important, and how you can teach them something and teach them about life and teach them to work hard.

00:17:13.480 So it's been really valuable.

00:17:14.820 So I think that's why that video resonated so well with me.

00:17:17.000 And it's fun, too.

00:17:17.820 I mean, I coach a lot of youth baseball, obviously doing the baseball camp, too.

00:17:22.060 And you see something different every single game.

00:17:25.400 You see something you never thought you'd see every single game.

00:17:27.560 And it's just hilarious, it's fun, and it's genuine.

00:17:30.700 And that's the thing about youth baseball is it takes the steroids conversation out of the question.

00:17:36.280 You watch a ten-year play, don't worry about it.

00:17:38.300 You're just watching baseball in its purest form.

00:17:41.060 So tell me about with youth sports and with kids in general, like how do they differ in their approach to the game than a college athlete or somebody who's made it to the pros?

00:17:52.280 Well, I want to say that it's more of a business as you get to college than the pros.

00:17:57.120 It's not really an option.

00:17:59.200 It's something you have to do.

00:18:00.780 What we love about the youth game and the high school game is that it's something that kids are choosing to do, really.

00:18:06.960 I mean, of course, you get parents that pressure their kids into things.

00:18:09.420 But for the most part, kids are just really having fun out there.

00:18:12.260 It's hard.

00:18:12.760 I don't think I can say when I watch Major League game that 100% of the guys out there are having fun.

00:18:18.060 It's a career.

00:18:19.320 It's a job choice, right?

00:18:20.020 It is.

00:18:20.440 I mean, there are a lot of players that do have a lot of fun out there and do have that passion for the game.

00:18:24.620 But 100% is a big number.

00:18:26.740 And I think when you walk out into a 12-, 13-year-old field or even a high school game, you've got guys.

00:18:32.020 They're not saving anything.

00:18:33.780 They're giving everything they've got.

00:18:35.840 You watch them big league games.

00:18:36.840 You've got 162 games.

00:18:37.940 And understandably, you can't go 100% every day.

00:18:41.960 You've got to pace yourself.

00:18:42.720 I mean, even your 100% is 85% because your body is just not all the way there.

00:18:48.600 But you go on to a youth field in a high school game.

00:18:50.680 Every kid's giving everything they've got, every single play, every single pitch.

00:18:55.020 And that's where thinking comes first.

00:18:56.700 Yeah, that makes total sense.

00:18:57.820 How does the – from your experience with coaching and working with these youth sports, 0.98

00:19:02.240 how does a parent who pushes their kids or – we all know the jerk on the sideline, right? 0.97

00:19:08.720 Who's yelling at their kid or way too hard on their kids. 0.98

00:19:11.040 I coach my son's teams, and I see that even at seven and four years old.

00:19:14.800 What is your perspective on how that either shapes a boy or impacts his play or his life?

00:19:22.120 My opinion, I don't have a kid.

00:19:24.560 But if I did have a kid, I don't think I'd force him into baseball.

00:19:28.060 He would obviously grow up around baseball because of what I do.

00:19:30.680 And I think that would make him want to play.

00:19:34.500 Seeing something that I do, he would probably want to do it or she would want to do it.

00:19:39.440 And so I think that's how I would approach it, getting my kid to love the game.

00:19:43.900 I wouldn't force him to do it.

00:19:45.680 But also, we come from a coach's perspective a lot because we have all this coaching experience.

00:19:50.540 We see a lot of parents yelling on the sidelines and stuff.

00:19:53.040 But a lot of it is just letting your kids grow up and letting the coaches do their job.

00:19:58.560 Sometimes, like I remember back when I used to coach 12-year-olds, we'd have a dad saying,

00:20:04.360 Come on, throw it hard. 1.00

00:20:05.840 Throw it as hard as you can.

00:20:06.520 What happens if I'm calling a change-up?

00:20:08.120 Right, yeah, it doesn't make sense right there.

00:20:09.240 You're undermining the coach when you yell stuff like that.

00:20:12.020 And so I think parents kind of sometimes got to take it.

00:20:15.020 I understand it's their kid and it's the most important thing in their life.

00:20:19.020 But you got to let the game do its job.

00:20:21.880 The game will teach lessons itself.

00:20:24.060 I mean, your kid's got to go through the process of doing it out there on itself.

00:20:27.800 His or her own.

00:20:29.200 Baseball will teach you a lot.

00:20:30.840 One of the quotes I have out there is,

00:20:32.860 Striking out is important.

00:20:34.420 It's not because it teaches you how to fail.

00:20:36.720 It's because it teaches you how to fail alone.

00:20:39.380 And I think that's really important for our kids.

00:20:41.980 I think parents need to take that kind of perspective and say,

00:20:46.060 He's going to do it out there and he's going to do it alone.

00:20:48.520 And I'm going to cheer for him.

00:20:49.800 But everything he does out there, I can't hold the bat for him.

00:20:52.980 I can't feel the ball for him.

00:20:54.400 And just kind of let it organically happen.

00:20:56.600 That's really cool.

00:20:57.300 I like that.

00:20:58.120 And that's one of the few, you know,

00:20:59.320 you always hear that hitters have the hardest job in all of sports, right?

00:21:04.520 Yeah.

00:21:04.960 I mean, the best hitters are hitting 30% of the time is all.

00:21:08.600 And yeah, so I see my boys,

00:21:11.060 when they're out there and they fail or they make a bad play or have a bad game,

00:21:14.680 I want to immediately jump in to help.

00:21:16.660 But I notice that they actually are processing what's happening,

00:21:20.820 not just physically,

00:21:21.680 but they're processing it in their mind too.

00:21:23.400 And they're learning from those experiences.

00:21:24.940 And we as fathers need to let them do that so that they can be more successful down the road,

00:21:29.240 not just in sports, but in all of life.

00:21:31.620 Yeah, exactly.

00:21:32.680 I totally agree with that.

00:21:34.460 You see, your kids struggling out there is something hard not to talk about,

00:21:38.920 but you just got to let it happen.

00:21:40.360 That's part of the game.

00:21:41.560 I mean, you talk about it after the game and you say that this is what happened.

00:21:44.300 This is how you should have reacted.

00:21:45.400 And hopefully you got a good coach out there that can do that for you.

00:21:49.440 Let's shift the conversation a little bit because we've talked a lot about the passion for the game

00:21:53.840 and the game itself,

00:21:54.760 but we have a lot of men who are listening to this who are aspiring entrepreneurs

00:21:58.540 or they've started a business.

00:22:00.500 When you guys started Baseballism, was it on the side?

00:22:03.420 I mean, it sounds like you were playing sports and you were going to college when you started.

00:22:07.000 So how was that balance between what you were doing and then also having this passion project?

00:22:11.720 When we first started the baseball camp,

00:22:13.240 it was just kind of like a part-time job we had.

00:22:15.660 At the time, I was moving furniture.

00:22:17.640 A couple of my other buddies were still going to school and playing.

00:22:20.080 And we just did it during the summers.

00:22:21.540 When we originally started the t-shirt apparel side of it,

00:22:24.100 we're not just t-shirts.

00:22:24.860 We just do everything.

00:22:25.820 We do bracelets, hats, and hoodies and stuff.

00:22:27.500 So we're a brand.

00:22:29.060 When we started in the brand side of it, it was a brand.

00:22:31.240 We all had full-time jobs.

00:22:32.880 I was a community college and I told you what my other buddies did.

00:22:37.440 And we would stay in my garage until 4 in the morning after work.

00:22:41.900 We'd get back from work at like 7 o'clock.

00:22:44.040 We'd stay in my garage packing orders until 4 in the morning.

00:22:46.600 And it was a grind.

00:22:47.940 You've got to be willing to put in the work.

00:22:49.740 It's just my advice.

00:22:50.640 You have to be willing to grind.

00:22:53.860 You have to treat it like a job.

00:22:55.360 Because when you start something new, it's kind of your option to do it or not.

00:22:58.960 But if you don't treat it like a job and it's something that you have to do,

00:23:02.480 then it's not going to work out.

00:23:03.820 What was the point when you guys knew that you could not only take this full-time,

00:23:08.720 but make a successful business out of it and then be able to quit and come back?

00:23:13.340 And are all four of you 100% involved in the business now?

00:23:17.360 Three of us are full-time.

00:23:19.100 One of them still kept his job because he has a really good job.

00:23:21.460 He does our finances.

00:23:22.360 Our finance guy just does it part-time.

00:23:24.840 Okay, right, yeah.

00:23:26.040 But yeah, three of us do it full-time.

00:23:28.700 Three of the owners do it full-time.

00:23:29.920 And we also have a bunch of other full-time employees.

00:23:31.820 I guess when we first started realizing it was when my garage was overflowing.

00:23:37.140 When the first forklift came to my garage with a pallet full of 2,000 pounds worth of clothes,

00:23:43.380 we were just like, okay, it is time to rethink things and move into a store.

00:23:51.260 And so we moved into a store and we just said, we're making enough now.

00:23:55.840 This will pay us better than our full-time jobs.

00:23:57.960 And so that's kind of when we realized when that first pallet came is when we had to shift gears.

00:24:04.220 And so you made that leap.

00:24:05.460 Did you all jump at the same time or one at a time and just gradually get into it?

00:24:08.260 It was one at a time.

00:24:09.320 Actually, one of our owners got laid off.

00:24:11.640 And so that kind of really motivated us to step up our game a little bit.

00:24:16.000 We were like, hey, this guy, he just got married.

00:24:18.780 He's got a kid on the way.

00:24:20.180 Let's make something happen here.

00:24:21.220 How do you guys deal with not only differences in opinion, although I want to talk about that,

00:24:25.880 but then also different stages of life?

00:24:28.380 Like sometimes, Travis, you'll be able to put in 100% and sometimes you can't put in 100% because of where you are in life.

00:24:33.720 How do you deal with that with four partners?

00:24:36.160 Well, I think the great thing about the four of us is we all do something different.

00:24:41.920 And I think that's what makes it so good is that we each have something different to do.

00:24:46.980 And it never really overlaps.

00:24:49.400 And so if I can't do something, then I can't do it and nobody else can.

00:24:53.440 But at the same time, if I can do something, no one else really has an opinion about it because I'm the only person that can do that.

00:25:00.640 Right.

00:25:01.080 Yeah, that's cool.

00:25:01.960 That makes sense.

00:25:02.340 We never have the too many chefs in the kitchen kind of thing.

00:25:05.960 And we all trust each other 100%.

00:25:08.300 You know, if our law guy, his name's Kalen, if Kalen has something legal that we have to discuss and he says, this is the way we should do it, 99% of the time we're going to say, all right, Kalen, you do what you do.

00:25:21.660 Because I don't know any better.

00:25:24.100 And the same thing with our sales guy.

00:25:26.300 And if he has, you say, hey, I think we should open a pop-up store here.

00:25:29.420 I think we should wholesale to this company.

00:25:33.120 We're going to say, all right, well, we believe you that they're good enough to wholesale our stuff, to vend our stuff.

00:25:37.760 So we're going to just go with it.

00:25:39.820 And so there's not a lot of guess and checks, which makes it a really good work environment.

00:25:43.280 It's a very, it's not very frustrating because I can put on social media whatever I want and he can sell to whoever he wants.

00:25:50.720 And our finance guy can tell us whatever budget he wants and we just trust each other.

00:25:54.080 Cool.

00:25:54.220 Yeah, that makes total sense.

00:25:55.380 And that's good that you each have specific things that you're good at and you found each other to help each other and carry each other in certain areas.

00:26:01.600 So, Travis, what's next for you guys?

00:26:03.240 I mean, you guys have come a long way since the youth camps and now you're doing a lot of clothing mostly, right?

00:26:09.380 Yeah.

00:26:09.760 So what's next?

00:26:10.960 I mean, is this going to continue to develop and evolve or what do you see being in the future for you guys?

00:26:15.440 Well, I mean, we want to keep giving back to youth camps and baseball.

00:26:19.880 Youth baseball, that's where we started.

00:26:21.400 We don't so much do anything on the field anymore.

00:26:25.380 We did coach a little league team this past year after work just for fun, just trying to give back to our community around us.

00:26:31.740 But we want to be the polo Ralph Lauren of baseball.

00:26:38.640 We want to make people make a decision when they walk into a Nordstrom and they see a polo Ralph Lauren logo and they see a Burberry logo and they see a Lacoste logo.

00:26:46.800 And then they see the flag man, which is our baseballism logo.

00:26:50.600 We want them to say, which polo do I relate to the most?

00:26:55.860 Right.

00:26:56.020 And I think 90% of the time in the United States, you're going to have a guy that relates to baseball more than tennis.

00:27:01.560 And so that's where we want to be.

00:27:03.160 We make high-end stuff.

00:27:04.240 We make soft shirts.

00:27:05.100 Everything's hand-picked and everything's measured by us.

00:27:08.480 I mean, I'm starting to get into the design game now, which I never thought I'd get into, being an education major.

00:27:13.700 But I'm starting to design our polos from scratch and pick out our material.

00:27:18.400 And we make good stuff.

00:27:20.480 And so we want people to make that decision that they can choose baseball over other high-end things.

00:27:25.840 I like that you have a vision.

00:27:27.040 You have a big vision for the future that's going to make it really successful for you guys.

00:27:31.040 So a couple other questions as we wind things down.

00:27:33.840 The first, and I didn't prepare you for this question I should have, so I'm going to throw you on the spot here.

00:27:37.860 But I think it's an important question.

00:27:39.720 It's one that I ask every guest that I have on.

00:27:42.560 And that is, what do you think it means to be a man?

00:27:45.700 For us, it's discipline.

00:27:48.380 It's having restraint, I think, is the big thing for us, and especially coming from baseball.

00:27:53.360 It's being able to have the mental toughness to not cry after you make an error.

00:28:00.480 To be able to not get your way and be okay with it.

00:28:04.520 And I think that's something important that we need to teach our youth is you're not always going to get your way.

00:28:09.280 And you're not always going to do the things that you want to do,

00:28:12.420 but you just got to be able to do the best with what you've got.

00:28:16.420 And I think that's what baseball teaches, and I think that's really what makes you a man.

00:28:19.660 To have a girl scream at you and try to punch you and not be able to hit her back, that's discipline. 0.67

00:28:24.960 That's mental toughness.

00:28:26.660 And I think that's what makes him that.

00:28:28.740 Awesome.

00:28:29.160 Travis, thanks for joining us on the show today.

00:28:30.940 Tell me how we connect with you guys.

00:28:32.780 How do we follow what you're doing on social media?

00:28:35.340 Where's your store?

00:28:36.200 Where can we learn more about what you guys are doing with baseball?

00:28:38.380 So brick-and-mortar-wise, if you love baseball, go to Cooperstown, New York.

00:28:43.940 Go see the Hall of Fame and then come see us.

00:28:45.920 So we have a store two blocks away from the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.

00:28:49.860 That's a great experience.

00:28:51.860 We have a pop-up shop in Emerson, Georgia, about 30 minutes outside of Atlanta.

00:28:57.920 We're looking to be in Arizona next year, so heads up for that.

00:29:02.100 That's nice.

00:29:02.580 That's closest to me, so I'll be there for sure.

00:29:04.420 Yeah, we have a store in Portland, obviously.

00:29:06.860 In the next couple months, we do a strong push to raise funds for breast cancer research

00:29:10.860 and childhood cancer awareness.

00:29:13.360 So be on the lookout for that on social media.

00:29:15.520 We are facebook.com backslash baseballism on Facebook.

00:29:19.600 We are at baseballism on Twitter and Instagram, and we're also on Pinterest, which is something

00:29:25.240 we just kind of started up now.

00:29:27.080 So you can find us on all those platforms, and our website's www.baseballism.com, and come

00:29:32.300 check us out.

00:29:32.860 Travis, thanks for joining us.

00:29:34.280 Enjoyed having you on the show today, man.

00:29:35.540 All right, appreciate it, Ryan.

00:29:37.020 There you go, guys, Mr. Travis Chalk.

00:29:38.580 I hope that the audio wasn't too bad for you and you got as much out of the conversation

00:29:42.280 as I did.

00:29:43.160 If you're not competing in sports in some way or your children are not involved in athletics,

00:29:48.240 I hope that this episode may have changed your mind and that you guys will get involved.

00:29:52.380 Now, again, if you enjoyed this show, if you learned something new, or if you're feeling

00:29:55.400 generous, or if you just want to say thank you to me, head over to orderofman.com

00:29:59.340 slash iTunes, where you can leave us your rating and review.

00:30:02.460 And again, a quick reminder to join our exclusive group at facebook.com slash groups slash order

00:30:07.300 of man.

00:30:07.900 Join in the conversation we're having about manliness and masculinity.

00:30:11.100 We want to have you there and as many guys as possible.

00:30:13.640 Now, next week, I'm going to be having a conversation with a man who will teach us a ton about using

00:30:18.440 our resources to survive and why learning to hunt is such a valuable skill that we all

00:30:23.060 need to develop.

00:30:24.080 We'll talk about how to start, what equipment you need, and how you can become more self-reliant.

00:30:28.960 Guys, I look forward to talking with you next week, but until then, take action and become

00:30:32.860 the man you were meant to be.

00:30:34.860 Thank you for listening to the Order of Man podcast.

00:30:37.820 You're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be?

00:30:41.480 We invite you to join the order at orderofman.com.

OoM 028： Life Lessons Learned from America's Pastime with Travis Chock

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