Episode Description
In this episode of Surviving Youth Sports, Rhett Parker sits down with college baseball coach Justin Cunningham to talk about youth sports parenting, perspective, and what changes when you move from the dugout to the stands.
Justin has coached at multiple levels of college baseball and currently leads at Lyon College. This past year, he experienced the game differently as the father of Connor Cunningham, starting shortstop for Murray State during their College World Series run. Watching your child compete at a high level is exciting, but it also exposes something every sports parent feels. You have no control.
Rhett and Justin discuss the pressure youth sports parents place on the future, the reality that development is not linear, genetics versus growth, backyard reps versus travel hype, and how NIL and the transfer portal are reshaping college athletics. At the center of it all is a simple priority.
Whether your child becomes a Hall of Famer or chooses another path, youth sports should help them learn resilience, handle failure, and grow into strong teammates and good humans.
This episode is for youth sports parents, coaches, and athletes navigating competition, ambition, and the tension between long term dreams and enjoying the present moment.
Subscribe
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
YouTube
Key Takeaways
• The hardest part of youth sports parenting is letting go of control
• Development in baseball and other sports is not a straight line
• Environment and consistent reps matter more than early hype
• Not every athlete’s path should look the same, even within the same family
• The real goal is raising good humans, not just high level athletes
Soundbites
• “Whether he’s a Hall of Famer or he decides to do something else, I want him to chase what he loves.”
• “Youth sports are there to learn failure and how to overcome it.”
• “You have no control. And that’s hard when you’re competitive.”
• “The best years aren’t always the best records.”
• “Enjoy it. It goes fast.”
Final Reflection
The scoreboard fades. Rankings change. Scholarships come and go. What lasts are the long weekends, the backyard reps, the car rides, and the lessons learned through failure. Youth sports are not just about building athletes. They are about shaping character.
Call to Action
Subscribe and follow Surviving Youth Sports on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Share this episode with a parent, coach, or athlete who needs perspective.
If you have a story worth sharing, we would love to hear from you.
Devon Brown on Burnout, Rankings, and Letting Kids Own Their Journey
This week on Surviving Youth Sports, Rhett sits down with coach, parent, endurance athlete, and fitness business owner Devon Brown for an honest conversation about burnout, pressure, rankings, recruiting, and what happens when youth sports starts taking over family life. Devon shares what it’s like ...
Matt Dumouchelle on Why Winning Too Early Can Hurt Development
Matt Dumouchelle joins Surviving Youth Sports to talk about youth hockey, athlete development, parenting, and the pressure surrounding modern youth sports culture. Matt is a contributor for The Coaches Site, host of Coaching Crossover, and someone deeply involved in helping youth sports organization...
Alonzo & Logwone Mitz: Discipline, Legacy, and Letting Kids Find Their Own Path
Alonzo Mitz and Logwone Mitz join Surviving Youth Sports as the show’s first father-son duo, bringing two different generations of football, parenting, and perspective into one conversation. Alonzo shares his journey from Florida to the University of Florida and the Seattle Seahawks, while Logwone r...
Derek Bingham: The Hard Part of Coaching Other People’s Kids While Raising Your Own
Derek Bingham joins Surviving Youth Sports for a personal conversation about what it really looks like to coach, parent, and stay present in the middle of a busy sports life. As the longtime head baseball coach at Lake Washington High School, Derek has spent more than two decades helping other peopl...
Jason Collinsworth: When Youth Sports Stops Being Fun
Jason Collinsworth, host of the I Hate Soccer Podcast , joins the show to talk about a question more families are starting to ask but don’t always say out loud: When did youth sports stop being fun? After more than 20 years of coaching and working closely with players and parents, Jason has seen the...
Drew Reiners: We Paid for Perfection — The Reality Behind Youth Sports Tournaments
Drew Reiners, founder of West Coast Premier Tournaments, joins Rhett Parker to unpack a side of youth sports that rarely gets talked about. With nearly two decades of experience running large-scale baseball events, Drew shares what it actually takes to organize tournaments that thousands of families...
Brandon Harmon: The Youth Sports Blender
Brandon Harmon is a college baseball coach at Gonzaga, a dad of three, and right in the middle of what he calls the youth sports blender. Something every day. Practices. Games. Car rides. Repeat. In this conversation, he and Rhett Parker talk through what that actually looks like. The nonstop schedu...
Andrew Walling: Who Are You Without the Game?
At one point, Andrew Walling was at the top. Throwing mid-90s. Big opportunities. A path that looked like it was only going one way. Then it didn’t. Injuries, pressure, and the weight of expectations started to take over. Confidence slipped. The yips showed up. And for the first time, he questioned ...
Marc Wiese: The Game Ends, The Relationships Don’t
Rhett sits down with longtime coach and mentor Marc Wiese, whose career spans youth baseball, high school state championships, college programs, and USA Baseball. Having coached his own sons and thousands of players along the way, Marc brings a perspective shaped by both success and reflection. This...