Now we go and check in with our mogul and training on the Friday free kick, find out what's going on in the life of Parky and what else is going on, because you know, he's having to juggle the Yegermeister Cup, like the actual cup, not like cups with Yegermeister in it. People. Come on, now, he's got a tournament. Although there might be benefits there, I don't know. We'll bring in Parky. What's up, dude? Morning?
What sorry to hear about your scarring from juice boxes at the.
Age at the age of thirteen when I was, when I was at the horse track. I mean, look, look when you go through all the juice boxes. Literally, it's like, okay, here's what I think. What do I know? How much do any of us know? Virtually nothing. So literally it's like, yeah, okay, this this, this sounds good, This looks good, this looks good. What does Nelson say? Nelson gives you numbers? I said
what I did? What Nelson said, you went the wrong direction, by the way Greeks from a hotel room in Millergeral, Georgia. But I'm not in office, HDS. You can tell there we go. Yes, no, it's it's that time of year where everything kind of blends together. Uh. And you know, and you know, when you're in a hotel, I'm gonna go ahead and lean lean to my right a little bit,
you know. So you know, when you're in a hotel, you always try if you've got if you're stuck with this in the background, you always try to make it look like you made your bed. You know, even if you're a slob like me, It's like, okay, let's just make it look like it made the bed and that way. So if something happens and I have to look this way, oh it's a clean hotel room. No, not when you are in with college kicking back in this as we
come screeching and I burned the transmission on this transition. Uh, college is kicking back in. High school's back in practice, and everything is ramping up when it comes to you and Greg and your men, tees, how where is the pacing right now? Is it ramping up? Did it literally just slam on the gas and everybody hops back in the door. Is there a transition here or is it just basically like a light switch on off, on, off, on off When a complimentary.
Well we do run a sale in August because we know seasons are starting back up and help with preparedness. But not crazy as far as light switch style, because some players want to or parents want their players to be prepared as the preseason starts and get in the right mind. But often history has told us that sometimes athletes wait until things aren't going perfect to seek us out, and so sometimes that needs to marinate a little bit
within the start of a season. So based off of that, it's not a light switch, which is nice for us.
Well, and does it you know, if you could and I don't know if if you could gently do it to where you're grabbing your mentees by the the lapels, you know, the floppy collar from like the eighties and nineties on the soccer jersey, and it's like, look, it's a twenty four to seven three sixty five thing. Pacing is okay. It doesn't have to be something where it's like, oh, ish, something's wrong. I need to go check in with mentees.
I mean, do you have to have these Reminders's like, look, it's okay to reach out to me in an off season. It's okay, it's cool. That's kind of what this development thing is all about. You have to remind them sometimes and sit there and go, yeah, it's cool to talk to me.
In the off season, for sure, we send out reminders to families and things because you know, ideally we'd love to and a big part of our mentoring is trying to give them the tools to handle the adversity when the adversity hits, so that they aren't hitting the ish. You know. They that's tough, right, It's tough for teenagers, which mostly we work with right to have that mindset right. They just want to think about the present and what's
going on right now. And I'm sure we were the same way when we were teenagers, so I get it. It's tough, but yeah, that's why we try and connect
with people a little bit in the off season. I get, yeah, you want to get away from soccer and everything, which is great, but you know, as the season kicks off, we try and have a session with everyone just to give them the tools again as a new season starts and expectations are there, and just figuring out their role, whether it's a new team or current team, or going
into high school or going into college. It's it's all a challenge so some of them do, some of them don't, and we take it from there.
So when you you know, when you have how many how many mentees? Are we talking eleven dy billion?
Just under eleven dy billion?
Yeah, that's the goal.
Gets to eleven dy billion.
And you've got you've got book on all of them, right, you have at least some kind of a whether it's a is it a word doc or is it written down like on legal pad? Or where do you keep your notes? Yeah? We do.
Weard docks that way we can share I know. I'm sorry Google Docs. We don't do work. We don't do Microsoft.
Yeah. Uh, So you keep running tally on all of your mentees when they circle back to you at the beginning of a season, when that first round of ish happens and they all of a sudden, it's like, oh, I got to talk about you know. Uh, you've got your notes there with you. Are you able to process progression in conversations and even how they carry themselves, whether it's a couple of months at a time, if they go away and they handle themselves, they're handling themselves differently
when they pop back in the door. Are you able to gauge that from the notes that you have and those initial conversations coming back or or is it one of those where I've got them intee, they're back in here. Okay, we're picking back up or we left off. I guess how much is how much is progression a part of it that you pick back up, and how much of it is like okay, literally is at the end of the last sentence when we last we're hanging out with each other.
Yeah, it's like sixty forty seventy thirty about progression. I think we all need reminders about things that we've learned in the past, right, It's it's tough for us to keep tally on everything. And so for sure, just especially where the athlete is, of going back and giving some reminders about certain things that maybe presented themselves multiple times in the past or whatever. Or we're big concerns earlier, right checking back in see how we're doing there, and
then we progress from there. And you know, progression might be the same topic, just viewing it a little bit differently and talking about confidence differently and what it means to them now. And yeah, that's so it's not all different topics, it's just different approaches and based off of who they are, where they are and things. But you know, we're still at a point where we're young and that and I don't even know if this will ever change. But the notes are good just to give us a
friendly reminder. But usually when you get back on a call, you remember the person and kind of okay, yes, I remember you and what you were going through, and you know whether they're easy to talk to or not, or who's going to run the conversation? How involved are parents? Like all those little.
Things, and you have all of these these issues, what do you think is the biggest issue that you continue to tackle over time? Is there one that's more constant than the others, or is it still the variety of things depending on the mentee, or is they're just one big thing that Yeah, this seems to be a common topic with mentees these days.
Confidence is always one yeah, But another big one is just understanding the journey is full of ups and downs, and you know, when you zoom out, you hopefully see it going up, but when you zoom in you see some ups and downs, and up and downs and ups and downs and understanding, hey, these downs are normal, and just understanding that they're going to hit and that's okay.
And so that's the age of social media right where it's like, hey, these people that are having success and these people that are out there having a great time, rights, that's just how they live life twenty four seven, and that's how I should we live in life twenty four seven.
And then when you're not and challenges hit and adversity hits, or a bad grade comes in, or a tough training session or whatever it might be where you get benched, right, well, everybody on Instagram's not doing that, so poor me type thing. So that's that's a big one for sure.
Well, and how much of when you and Greg are talking to your mentees about the ups and downs do you try to remember to have your mentee remember that it's about trying to stay in the middle as much as you can because we all know and I know that we're surrounded by young athletes and it is the extremes seem to rule more than the median, and success over time, I would imagine comes more from enjoying this and not locking into the bottom and remembering that that
median is always what you're what you're aiming for, and not getting wrapped up in the highs and lows as much. Yeah, I'm sure. I mean, it's just it seems like something that And like I said, I know that we were fifteen, sixteen, seventeen.
I mean I was back in the seventeen nineties. But you know, when you have these kinds of things, how difficult is it to remind them about being even keeled because of that that you ful exuberance and wanting to sit there and go, yeah, I'm doing great or no, or no I'm not and I've got to fix it. How difficult is it to remind them about the happy medium?
Sometimes it can be, for sure, and sometimes it's because players are constantly getting too high, more often because they're constantly being too hard on themselves. So it's all over the gambit. But regardless, Right, we talk about that median and that neutral line because it can serve so many benefits as far as just expectations if you're on the high side, but also it can serve as a goal if you're on the bottom side of it. Right, we don't have to get from negative ten to positive ten. Right,
there's that zero in the middle. That's pretty good for most of us. Right, you're living a decent life if you're living right on that line, or at least you can be if you're viewing it that way. So you know that that provides hope for people that are struggling with confidence. Right, I don't have to go from unconfident to super confident. I can go from unconfident to feeling neutral, and from neutral I can play better, have more success, and gradually gain my confidence.
How hard is that, though? I mean to remind him, you know, it's like we live in the extremes. Everything's cool or it's not. How difficult is to remind him that okay is okay? Because I mean it's like we live in this idea of everything's great. Everything stinks, everything's great, everything stinks. Just have a just have a good day is having a good day and then starting that winning streak of good days? Is that something that you literally have to pound in the folks. Sometimes it's like, look,
it's okay to have a zero. It's okay instead of being a minus ten or a positive ten, it's it's it's cool. Don't worry about it.
Mm hmm.
Yeah.
I have to tell myself that even today John out on the golf course, right, Hey, just have an okay day. Don't have a shocker here, you know, don't put up a snowman, just get a bogie. It's fine, right, But when you're in it, that's tough because you want to be good and you want to be the best, and you want to challenge yourself, you want to push yourself. So it's natural within all of us. But yes, when you take a step back and you say, hey, if my bad day was just okay and it wasn't brutal, right,
it makes it really easier to bounce back. And that's the biggest thing, because we're all going to have these off days and bad moments and bad things and whatever, right, but how quickly can we rebound? It is usually the differentiator between people. And if we make it easier for ourselves to bounce back, and we have some tools that are going to help us bounce back, then we can try and separate ourselves and then you know, some of those really good days come a little bit more often.
How hard are you and Greg on yourselves when it comes to wanting to do right by all of your mentees.
Yeah, it's definitely something we work on because of course it's only two of us and it's you know, it takes time, and nothing's you know, every session that we have is our time. It's nothing automatic here.
And so.
Yes, we want to be there for everyone and we want to do everything, but we also have to say no sometimes and we have to We can't partner with everyone and do everything, and we have to be strategic about things. And you know this this summer was a good example for me, Like I did not have a super productive summer in terms of work, but I had a super productive summer in terms of enjoyment and being around the kids and enjoying you know, one of the last few summers I have with them in the house
and everything. And so for me, that was the priority this summer and just understanding and having that knowledge of hey, I can catch up with this work and I can get back on it and you know, focus more time. But that's that's always tough because you feel like you're letting someone down and you hate to do that, especially especially as a mentor. Right you're supposed to be helping other people up. And so yeah, it's it's always a struggle, but we just do the best you can.
Our resident to m I t grab Michael Parkhurst hanging out with us.
Did you see that, John, you seem I T.
Did you get it? Yeah? Yeah, look, M I T. I saw it. That's why that's why I mentioned it.
I know, But do you did?
You?
Do you get it? M I T. It's not?
I no, then what is it? What is it? M I T? Mobile and training and training? Awesome? Okay, cool, you got me. I haven't had enough caffeine. That's awesome though, our resident I T. I like that when it comes to saying no. You mentioned that for for you and your own personal sanity and enjoyment and time frames and anything like that. I know that when your mentees are of that age, they want to please everybody. They want to be They want to be in the end Click,
They want to be in that group. They want to be that person that you know, the They want to make sure that. They want to make sure that Gretchen Wiener's is you know, a happy person I'm twenty four to seven three sixty five, and that you're in part of the end Click and that you're not, you know, outside of it. Do you tell your mentees it's okay to say no. Do you have those conversations? Do they even ask about that kind of stuff because we're in
that age group. We always want to be pleasing to folks and we want to sit there and be our best. Do you tell do you talk to them about that kind of thing? Rarely?
Actually, John, that you mention it, and maybe I should. Maybe it's something I should kind of institute a little bit here and there, especially for the more adolescent teenagers, right, the older ones here that are, you know, sophomore June and your seniors having choices of what they want to do sometimes after school and who they hang out with
and what friends are doing. I mean, for sure, we talk about saying no in terms of sacrifices and if you've got a game on a Saturday and all your buddies are doing something on Friday night and they're having a sleepover and you want to go right, and hey, there's sacrifices to be made in order to have success, and you can't have everything, so what's the priority. So there's there is that, but that's less of the pleasing
thing and more towards sacrificing and dedication type stuff. So but no, you know, that is probably something that we should look into and discuss a little bit more even with the younger generation of hey, people pleasing and that what goes into that and you know versus what do you want to do? And who are you? And does this make you happy? Type stuff?
And I mean, and that was literally just from the conversation that we had. That was why that popped up into my head. I was like, well, you know, we we think that we're bulletproof at that age. Legitimately, doesn't matter how many things we got going on. We think that we can go until two thirty three o'clock in the morning, go on four hours of sleep, roll out of the racket seven o'clock, go to dunkin Donuts and go to the go to the game, and everything's locked
in and everything's fine. I mean, it's patients, it's pacing, its understanding. Okay, you can't. You can't go one hundred miles an hour all the time if you want to be better at doing all these other things. It just to me, I know that I sit there and I'm looking at all these young athletes today and they all
look bulletproof. They really do. But I'm just I am in I'm in awe of what you and Greg do because of the level of patience that you guys piece together with all of these individuals and want to make sure that this next generation is approaching it the right way and that they're not you know, that nothing gets left out and that they continue to do things the
way that it's supposed to be done. And I mean, it's just it's just something that's come across from me that you guys wanted to take this on in the first place, to do this kind of stuff. Do you do you feel the impact that you guys are having, You get I know you may not necessarily get to see it all the time, but do you do you kind of gauge the impact that you guys are having with what you're doing there beyond goals?
Sometimes sometimes yeah, sometimes sometimes we get good feedback and we see somebody have success. We see somebody commit to a college, you know, be very happy with where they're at. You know, talking to a few pros lately that are in circumstances they want to change, and you know, when something comes out of that and you know they see things a little more clearly, that's success in my eyes. So, uh, yeah, you know, there's there's definitely some moments where we feel
good about what we're doing. To get back to what you were saying earlier, John, about you know, telling kids that you know it's okay to say no. Sometimes I can just foresee a parent of like a twelve or thirteen year old saying, well, my kids said no that I'm not going to do chores this week because that doesn't make me happy.
Yeah. Yeah, you've run that. You've already run that game, haven't.
You, bark You telling me I can say no and do things that make me happy and not feel pressured.
Yes, exactly. My mentor said this. Well, I'll show you this. It's like, okay, Mentor, you know, all right, Mente, you go over there and take out the garbage. I mean, but shoot, hey, hey, Mentor, go take out the garbage. Okay, Yeah, you get home after your weekend, it's like, hey, Mentor, Sunday night, go take out the garbage. Yes, ma'am, I
mean that literally. But that's that's how things are. Michael Parker's thanking out, whether it's beyond goals entering our resident in our mogul in training, I noticed you got a banner over your your left shoulder in the office. Now I noticed this.
Yes, yeah, yes, that's from the first inaugural game at the stadium.
How did that feel?
And this guy over here, I bring this out for all event the other day. I guess I can't hold it up because it kind of but that's what it is.
All all very nice, all of that.
Look at that good reminders.
Yeah, okay, so since you open that box, I'll go through that door. When you're in a when you're in a situation like you're seeing with your old club, and it's like you're seeing improvement, but it's almost like you know, Schlepprock's hanging out with you, and you hit hit a crossbar, you hit a post, it's like you're seeing improvement, but it's not coming into results. I guess that's something else
we could talk about with your mentees. What's it like to see the the current state of affairs with Atlanta United the way that it is right now, with only a handful of matches left at home this year.
It's tough. Not going to sugarcoat it.
It's tough. Thanks.
Uh yeah, obviously a far cry from where it was a few years ago. But you know, I'm a half glass full, and you know, I understand there's huge expectations every season, I think, particularly going into this season, based off of the off season last year and the finances and everything, and so I think that's what makes it more frustrating, because it's not a lack of effort from
the front office that things haven't gone well. And you know, it's easy to say, oh, it's because this guy got injured or this guy was missing, or oh we just don't have a good striker, Oh this that or the other thing. It's more frustrating when you can't exactly pinpoint it and say, hey, we've spent money, we've got a talented roster, we should be good enough to be at least a playoff team. Why isn't it clicking? Why can't we do it? Type thing? That's where the frustration really
lies for probably most people, and including the players. I've been there. My last year in Columbus was like that, why can't we win? I don't know why? And it's super frustrating, And yeah, there's nowhere to sugar go to it. There's no one that's from players to staff to fans that's enjoyed this season, and that's frustrating. But I do think that you know, given the league and Arthur's ambition and the club and where we're at that there's no reason why we can't be a top team next year.
When are you playing golf? When's your tea time?
I wish I was playing today, but I did play the other day, John, John, I've been playing really well lately.
Yeah.
Yeah, I've got my handicapped down to I think it's right at eleven. Who I shot at eighty five yesterday with an eight on the last hole.
Wow.
So that was frustrating finish, but I played well, and so for me, that's really good golf. The single digit handicap is within in sight.
Wow. See. I play better the longer the gap time between rounds, Like I play like back to back or like twice in a week. That's second round. I'm awful. If I haven't played in like six months and I go out cold Turkey, I'm crushing it nice. Yes, It's just it's stupid that way. I can't explain it. I'm probably in eighteen. I mean I'm probably, I mean I break ninety. But it's like I got an I've got a new set of clubs. The Boss was like, we got to get rid of your old metal shafts, and
I've had to dial everything back to zero. My yardages are just screwed up because I now have callaways with the graphite shafts or the composites, and I'm back to zero. It's like literally, it's like I'm sitting here and because of my swing speed and everything everything, you know, I'm two and three club club links ahead. It's like I'm hitting nine irons one fifty two with my old clubs.
With the nine iron. Now I'm back to one ten and I'm sitting there and I'm piddling around, and I'm going, okay, you know, when it goes one ten and it's dealing with new clubs, especially with new fangle technologies, stinks. Man, it's awful.
Well, I hope to have that problem someday. But I told myself, my my Nikes. Everyone, everyone's always amazing that I play with Nike clubs.
I got.
I got the whole thing, you know, driver woods, irons, the whole thing, except for a putter and put the putter John I got from played against Sports like three four weeks ago.
It's been a game changing for me. But that's the thing. It's like literally your club and and that's the thing. It's like your clubs are your clubs, They're they're what you wanted, They're what you like. It fits you. This is my thing, and you know, to heck with the rest of you. You know, this is this is this is what I'm doing, this is what I'm comfortable with. I'm not going to succumb to the peer pressure of gol clubs. This is not going to happen for me.
I'm going to play my nikes and to heck with you, and I'll get a snowman. And when was the last time you broke eighty? I never have? What? Oh? Okay, okay, So that's that. So in addition to getting from a double handicap to a single, you got to break eighty. Yep. See you were you were like you were you were. If you if you hadn't a snowman and you just bogied out, you'd beat an eighty three.
I know I've shot eighty two and eighty three a bunch of times, but yeah, nember eighty one, never eighty never below. Oh man, it's coming, it's coming.
All right. What's the latest with beyond goals mentoring? When are we announcing this third minte mentor.
Oh she's announced, John, it's out in the wild.
Okay. So Zara, uh.
Cheboshi, Okay, I want to you're the last name? Zara, Yes, defender for Orlando Pride. She went to Wake Forest.
H huh of course you did.
And uh yeah, she's awesome. The third intur Canadian American. So she's played with both national teams at the youth level and then has played I don't know if she's fully committed yet or not, but she's played with the full Canadian team, so we'll see.
Okay, So Canadian American and playing for the Purple team in the NWSOL as always my friend. It's great to catch up with you wherever the door opens and wherever it goes. I'm glad that we're back to see the next season of Beyond Goals Mannering and you guys are crushing it and then dealing with all the ish that folks have to deal with these days and correcting it to make sure that the path is what it always is. Where's Deacon.
On the floor? Not in her bed this time, but next.
But it's cooler. I understand that you're what you're talking about.
It what in the most recent book that I'm about to start. There it is Chief Joy Officer.
Okay, so Archie Enjoy Officer and MI I T. Michael Parkers as always my friend. Great to see you and have a great weekend. We'll catch up within a couple of weeks. Be well and we'll catch up soon.
You too, say a challenge, joh