153 | Matt Sayman's Journey from Baylor Basketball Scandal to Redemption

>> This is becoming undone.

“>> I just really wanted, I think, to go somewhere that I was wanted.”

And he told me that I was going to be one of the pillars of the Baylor Basketball program. I mean, what kid doesn't want to hear that from a coach. And so on the way home from that visit, I told my mom that I want to go there. And he tears just willing up in her eyes, because she wanted that too. And it was a Friday afternoon, I just come in from playing San volleyball out of Sterling.

And so every day was pretty much in the summer, a little bit of class waits in some basketball and then San volleyball. And it's just such a sweet time, living the dream. That's what I felt like I was doing.

And one of my professors called and said, "Hey, what's going on with your team?"

And I was like, "Oh, I don't know." Like, what? I played with a lot of knuckleheads, I think, as a nice way to put it over the years.

“And he said, "No, you need to turn on the TV."”

They're talking about that their Baylor Basketball player is missing. And a possible homicide in that Baylor Basketball player's might be involved. Like, I get why Baylor and our media guys wanted me to do it. Because I was the only one that was a four-year guy. And I think the only one that they trusted would say the right things.

Because they needed somebody at that moment to be pro-veller. Pro the basketball program. We excited about the future. But inside, I was the exact opposite. I wanted to get out of there.

Matt Samin here and I am undone. Hey, friend, I'm glad you're here. Welcome to yet another episode of Becoming Undone. The podcast for those who dare bravely, risk mildly, and grow relentlessly. Until we broke, the speaker out there professor and performance scientist.

I spent much the last two decades working as an athletic trainer and a strength coach in the professional, collegiate, and high school sport settings. Over the years, I've grown more and more fascinated with what sets high achievers apart. And how failures that can suck in the moment can end up being exactly the push we needed to propel us along our path to success.

Each week, I'll be coming undone on right new guests to examine how high achievers can transform from falling apart to falling into place. This episode is Baylor Focus, but I'd like to emphasize that this show is entirely separate from my role of Baylor University. But it's my attempt to apply what I've learned and what I'm learning

and to share with others about the mindsets of high achievers. You know, it is March Madness Time. And sadly, the Baylor Bayers didn't even make the tournament this year. Although as of this moment, right now, my Arizona Wildcats are still looking pretty strong. Their last final four was in 2001, and they won it all in 97.

The year before I got there, for grad school and for work as an athletic trainer.

For Baylor 2021, was the culmination of an incredible comeback story that you'll hear a bit more

about in a minute. But it all got me thinking, you know, we love stories about championships. We love that confetti, the nets getting cut down, the moments where everything comes together and makes sense. But what we don't see, what we rarely talk about, is what comes before all of that. The part where it doesn't look like it's working. The part where it feels like it doesn't matter at all.

“The part where you're not even sure anyone's ever going to remember anything you did.”

At all. Because long before Baylor basketball became a national champion, it was something else entirely. It was broken. And for a small group of players who lived through that season in 2003, 2004, there was no guarantee of what came next. No road map, no momentum, for a while, not even a coach, just a decision. Show up anyway, or walk away. Today's guest knows a thing or two about all of that. Today Matt Simon is the headboy's

basketball coach at Midway High in Waco. But in 2003, he was just mine in his own business and joined a summer of living the good life. Playing some basketball and lifting weights and playing beach volleyball, prepping for a senior year of Baylor where he and his teammates were heading into a season with high hopes. He had aspirations of a big 12 title and a March Manus run of their own. And then, the unthinkable happened. What's fascinating to me about this conversation with Matt is this.

At the time, he was going through that senior year. He thought that season didn't matter. He thought it was just a dark chapter that people would forget. But years later, but years later, watching Baylor win a national championship. He started to realize something different.

was falling apart. That was the foundation for that championship. Not highlight the foundation.

“And that's the tension we're going to explore in this episode. Because most of us don't get to choose”

whether we go through hard seasons, but we do get to choose who we become within them. And sometimes the seasons that feel the most insignificant, those are the ones that matter the most. I hope you'll enjoy my conversation with Matt Seaman in episode 153. Let's get into it. Greetings and welcome back. Becoming a known as the podcast for those who dare bravely risk mildly and grow relentlessly. Join me at Toby Brooks as I invite a new guest each week

as we examine how high achievers can transfer them from falling apart to falling into place.

This week, I'm stoked. I finally got a Baylor guest on here. Matt Seaman joined

me. He's the head basketball coach at Midway High School. And he's got a heck of a story also an author and a successful collegiate basketball player. So Matt, thank you so much for joining me. Yeah, thank you so much for having me. Yeah, my boss was no kind of put me on the trail. I wasn't aware of your book. And my wife and I were having this conversation last week.

“And we said, remember when I said, under no circumstances, would I go to Baylor?”

First there was a Patrick Denny's situation. Then there was the art-brile situation. And the Lord certainly likes to challenge me on the things I say I won't do. So here we are. But you were there for Scott Drew's first season and also all the things that transpired before that. So we'll get into that in just a minute. But I know you were successful high school and college basketball players still hold some Baylor records from not mistaken.

And so I always like to start at the beginning. What do you want to be growing up and why?

I love that when I was nine years old, I had a skills coach up in Pennsylvania where I was from. And one day sat me down and he said, Matt, I want what are your goals? And I had no clue what he was talking about as far as goals setting. And so I said, I'll look at the things that kids say and no order to them, no plan for executing them at all. And he said, let's look at this in a couple of years when you get the high school,

what would you like to see? Where would you like to be with basketball? And I said, okay, I like to make my freshman 18. And so I wrote that down nine or ten years old. And they said, okay, what's the next

“step after that? And I said, well, I think I'd like to make varsies a sophomore. And so I wrote that”

down. And then the last one was to play division one basketball and wrote that down. And he hit just helped me kind of a step by step approach to goal setting. Then I thought was really unique. Because over the years, I've talked to plenty of kids that say, I want to plan the NBA. Okay, great goal. How do you get there? I don't know. I have no idea. And so there's this that approach really helped me as I really got it. I played a lot of sports growing up,

but really loved basketball. That was kind of the thing that I always was doing. And that was my main

sport. But fell in love with skill work, pistol peat, marriage, video tapes that his homework basketball really got me loving the part of the game that is sometimes boring for players, which is you and a ball alone just doing drills. But I just created this work out over the years called Jamote that just stands for just a matter of doing it. And it just grew and grew. And then he's kind of fast forward a few years. I'm living in Pennsylvania, but I come down right before my freshman year

in high school to go to a basketball camp in Texas. And I met a guy named Tommy Thomas who's the head coach at the colony high school. I was about five, six, five, seven, very average in everything, but pretty skilled and very serious about the game. Told him my three goals and he said, Matt, that can happen for you down here in Texas. And so I flew back up to Pennsylvania. We're all of our families from told my parents on the way home from the airport that I need to move to Texas.

So I can be a college basketball player and ask my little sister. They ask my little sister. Is that something that you want to do? She said, let's do it. And we changed our lives. I'm going to force my way in here early. Hope I don't get a foul trouble along the way, but man, I absolutely love this story. From the age of nine, a young Matt loves basketball. And with help of a skills coach, he's able to plot his course to accomplish some pretty impressive

dreams. I like to say strategic and purpose relentless and pursuit better every day. And at nine,

he happens to head to a camp in Texas. Where coach takes an interest and convinces him,

“that if he wants to make those dreams come true, his path will be better served in Texas,”

rather than Pennsylvania. After talking it over with his family, and this is the remarkable part, they agree. Just like that, the family moves to Texas, so Matt can chase his dreams. Maybe you've got parents like that. Or maybe you didn't have parents at all. What I'm reminded of here is just how important it is to have our people. When you've got great big dreams to have people around you who don't only believe in you, but they're willing to help you

make your dreams a reality. Sure, where there's a will, there's a way. A strong will can get you moving, but the right people can make you sore. For Matt, it was his family. And time would tell that their sacrifices not only helped Matt turn his dreams into reality, they also helped shape the college he didn't up at. Not to mention the man he would be called. My dream, so my dream became my parents' dream. And there only reason I can imagine that they would do that is that

they saw how serious I was about it. It wasn't just a hobby, something that had picked up and put

“down. And so they got all behind that dream. And that's I think what makes what happened at”

Baylor even more difficult was, this wasn't just something that fell into our lap. Being a college basketball player is something that was really planned for and I will work really hard to get there.

Yeah, that's an incredible story. And certainly one that you had to be thankful to your parents

for making that dream happen, but you're putting in the work, you're investing the time and connecting with coaches. You don't just fall out of bed and become a division one basketball player. What led do you actually signing at Baylor and being that D1 player that you dreamed of back in nine ten years old? Yeah, the crazy thing about those goals that Coach Zella was his name asked me to put down was they happened in that order. When I got to the colony, it was I was from a small town

in Pennsylvania where actually football was king. So if I was trying to get somewhere where football wasn't big, then I came to the wrong state. But if football was really big where I was from at Burwick and coming down to the colony, it was a five-day high school, 600-plus kids in the class in each class. And I it was I just a very much a culture shock from where I had grown up and where I lived. But basketball, at least the skill part, I mean, that translated, you know, that it didn't matter

where what you're used to who you're used to live and where they're being around and in the type of place and and so I made my freshman 18 and but I was still small size 13 shoe and then my sophomore year, I grew five or six inches over the summer because my dad's 63 and my mom's tall. So everybody was thinking it's gonna happen but it was just I mean super late and but I hit my girl's spur was really skinny but still skills but I made varsies a sophomore. It got into the

weight room and really focused on that into my junior year and just exploded. The skill was there but then the athleticism hit and I and how high that was about 62 and then had a great junior in senior year. Halfway through well the summer going into my senior year I noticed some coaches that were starting to follow our select team but we had a really good select team 10-11 D1 guys on there. I didn't even start on that select team but I I had seen a bailer coaches name with Doug Ash had

a lot of our games but I actually thought he was looking at maybe one of my teammates instead but then sure enough they asked me to come down in my mom on a visit and coach Bliss met us along the highway at a gas station to leave our car and he was gonna escort us around and he had the Bible a Bible in his backseat and my mom still thinks to this day that it was on purpose because of who we were. I mean I was known for that my family we were known as believers and it was

“in very much well known of that's that's how we live and so he I think definitely wanted”

my mom and I did know that this was a place where I could live out my faith openly and but also he was the kind of coach that would guide me in that direction as well. May I loved the university

loved loved one thing he did really well is because I'd gone on another visit to SMU and I never saw

the head coach until the very end it was very rushed and I felt like I wasn't their choice

and I knew them and I was thinking okay they're better than me I got that and but coach Bliss made me feel like I was the only one and every time he introduced me to somebody he I felt super special like he could he was telling them if if Mac could be here this is gonna be incredible and and then in our last meeting he showed me some film it's funny he showed me some film of some

offense that we never used but he I don't know if he was trying to wow me or maybe it's something

that he wanted to do but we never used what he was showing but he sold me on that because I I went I'm not from Texas I didn't really understand universities down here who was big and who's not

“I knew big twelve was a good conference but I I just really wanted I think to go somewhere that”

I was wanted and he told me that I was going to be one of the pillars of the Baylor basketball program I mean what kid doesn't want to hear that from a coach and so on the way home from that visit I I told my mom that that's I want to go there I mean tears just willing up in her eyes because she she wanted that too and so it was really this kind of the the nine-year-old dream all coming together and it actually happening like what are the odds of that and especially when

your I was joke around that I think part of the reason for writing the book was to give people an inside look of what is it like to be a part of a college basketball program but not as a star it has a role player like so many that just survives

“for four years because Zion's one year at Duke and my four years I think are very different experiences”

and and how we were but yeah it was just it was really cool to see that happen from a guy that's not athletically special I'm six three which isn't that tall for that level and not that fast can't jump that high and so how do you actually do it and and it's pretty cool to see that I got allowed and helped all that those things to happen yeah kind of all research you all the record that I think

it's safe to say will never be broken in this in I L era school record for career games played at

one eighteen I'm stopping there I I appreciate you doing your homework and I did have that record for a few years but Baylor got so good that those guys back in the mid two thousand mid two tens were playing into postseason and playing for a long time and for four years so I don't know where I am on it now but I mean I have the ball that proves that at one point I did hold it right well I think it's safe to say that wherever you are on that list it's probably pretty firm at this

point a lot of one and done just yeah we see the you know the entire roster turned over last season there's talk that it might happen again but regardless that was a different era and you were obviously contributing early and often and and have to think that your dreams are coming true if we were to ask 19 year old Matt what's your identity how would you define yourself in that freshman that sophomore year what would you have said then before all the calamity started yeah that's a great

question I think I think I would have given you the answer that I'm supposed to say

which is I'm a Christ follower first I was pretty I was good at that I knew the right things to

say I think I knew all those answers and there was a part of me I mean it was how I was raised baptized when I was five I just all I can't remember a lifetime where we didn't go to church or part of my life and the Bible wasn't a part of my life and so I would have said that now the honest answer

“is basketball and the only way I know that now is because when that summer hit”

then in basketball is kind of ripped apart I realized I don't have an identity and the identity I thought I had or I told people I had I really have been walking away from that for quite some time I think if you rip open my chest I think there was a basketball there and then you know then the danger of that is for any athlete or really any professional it could even be a relationship that you hold really that's really dear to you that you're putting that person even on a pestle to

put your all your value and effort into a sport a job or a relationship what happens if it breaks

basketball your job your profession everything will let you down and hopefully God puts people in

“your life that won't but we're flawed and so I yeah I think that's the answer I would have given”

you've maybe seen those videos on Instagram or TikTok that say quote subtle foreshadowing in quote where the dudes like trying to open up a bottle or loosen up a drain plug or an oil pan and there's quick little brief clips inserted where he's covered with it right this is that Matt acknowledges that for that time in his life he was a college basketball player he's love bailer because it was a place where he could be vocal about his faith he could live it out he could

be authentically Christian however in the summer of 2003 the world would learn a lot

about bailer and Matt would learn a lot about himself there are moments in a career where everything you thought you were building suddenly gets stripped away and for that bailer program

“in the wake of the Baylor University basketball scandal it wasn't metaphor it was real”

if you're not familiar with that moment in college basketball history I'd say it's one of the darkest stories in the history of college sport a bailer player Patrick Denny he was tragically murdered by teammate called Natsun in the aftermath it was revealed that head coach Dave Bliss had instructed players specifically to lie in order to cover up NCAA violations including improper payments pinning the blame on the slain denny making him out to be a drug dealer who was the source

of the money that had actually been handed out against NCAA rules by Bliss. Let's start at first

as a tragedy quickly exposed something deeper a culture that had horribly lost its way and when it all came to light the program that had been on the rise and was expected to make a run at a big 12 title absolutely cratered scholarships were slash players transferred coaching staff gone the season was essentially forfeited bailer basketball became for a moment the example nobody wanted to be and it's been the subject of more than one documentary and to this day it's a stain on

the fabric of a school that has long heralded itself as an apologetically Christian and if you're mad same in that moment your career hangs in the balance because the thing you committed to the system you trusted suddenly isn't there anymore then enters Scott Drew young full of energy, unproven walking into what a lot of people called the worst job in college basketball at the time and he didn't walk in just promising wins he walked in promising a rebuild from the ground up

even mentioning championships and his initial press conference people across the country listened and maybe even laughed as this young guy out of nowhere took the helm of a program with an active murder investigation ongoing from last year's roster and he's talking about winning championships but that's where this becomes more than just a story about a scandal because from Matt this wasn't about bouncing back it was about deciding who he was going to be when everything else around him was

unstable under bliss whatever that program had become it had broken but under Drew with most of last year's talent either gone or incarcerated or murdered it didn't immediately get better under fact it got harder if your players fewer wins more uncertainty along road with no guarantee at the end of it and then that space Matt had a choice that every high performer eventually faces do I leave because this no longer serves me or do I stay and let this refine me

because staying meant buying into something you couldn't yet see no proof no payoff just belief and a willingness to endure we celebrate Baylor men's basketball now in 2021 Scott Drew made good on that promise people laughed at in 2003 as the bears defeated Gonzaga in the national championship but for Matt none of that was visible then but what was visible was chaos and what he chose to

“doing that chaos that's what actually shapes a career not one things are clear but when things are”

not that's where becoming undone actually happens but for Matt it would be more than one undoing yet to come yeah well I appreciate that transparency I think for a lot of folks we wear masks we we want to and I can say for myself there's lots of times when I might give an answer that I wish were more true when in fact if I really got honest and vulnerable and shared the truth in that

falling off and the unthinkable I mean we've got a murder on a college basketball team and the coaching

staff implodes the program is in disarray and you're one of the few the title of your book the leftovers in the subtitle there bailer betrayal and beyond stuff talking through that season and what it was like in wakeo and what it was like inside the basketball program maybe what Matt's thinking at this point do I transfer do I stick it out like what what are you thinking in that season

“I think just to rewind a little is what made it even charter was the direction we were heading”

and I team my freshman year and so already got a taste of postseason like this can happen at bailer with coach Bliss we were super young my sophomore year but competitive older and super competitive and right on the edge my junior year but everybody feeling and knowing like we're about to do this you got role players like me our T. Gwen Terrence Thomas that we're going to be seniors you got future pros like john Lucas and Lawrence Roberts and Kenny Taylor was our best shooter I mean it's really

coming together like kind of looked at that we could be in the top four in the big 12 which is top

25 usually which means March man is which I'm a Duke fan and always grew up at Duke fan

got went to Duke basketball camp and practice Christian late nurse shot out in the driveway falling into the snow and it's like all right now Matt I was a Kentucky fan growing up so that turned around jumper and stuff and I managed all of those great all those great March madness moments filling out brackets over the years and you know when you and I are talking right now it's it's coming up this weekend it's still a special it's the the most special sporting event to me you know that

we have but to to be a part of that was is the ultimate goal I feel like of every college basketball player and coach and so it was about to happen it was a Friday afternoon I just come in from playing sand volleyball out of sterling and and and so it was it was every day was pretty much in the summer a little bit of class weights and some basketball and then sand volleyball and it's just

“such a sweet time living the dream that's what I felt like I was doing and one of my professors”

called and said hey what's going on with your team and I was like I don't know like what I played with a lot of knuckleheads I think is a nice way to put it over the years and he said no you need to turn on the TV they're talking about that their bailer basketball players missing and a possible homicide and that bailer basketball players might be involved and I lived a pretty charmed life to that point I can't remember a significant death in my family parents were still

together this idea of I have this dream I have for basketball God in my mind was making it all happen the way that I wanted kind of my own theology of like a genie and this was the first time that that was derailed or there's a hiccup in it at all and over the course of that summer

“it was two months what if two months of new revelation after new revelation and learning”

right along with everybody else would have felt like yeah it was the world because fast forward to I'm after my senior year in bailer I'm playing in Iceland my first practice there

one of my teammates asked where did you play I said bailer thinking that they've never seen a

big 12 player before in in yard of Iceland and and I said puzzle look he goes don't they kill people there oh wow and and so like that that story followed me but yeah that's summer um I wanted to get out of wakeo wakeo to me I loved being on campus in fact at that time what's that movie van Wilder it's not a great movie but he wanted he was on campus for six or seven years and was like I love it here I'm gonna keep saying I that was my vision of grad school and just

saying I'm just gonna stay here I love and so but that that campus just started to close in on me and my teammates it was no longer about basketball it was what do you know what can you tell us I'm driving from Dallas back to wakeo and I get a call from New York Times that'd be really cool if they were wanting to know about our team and how great we were gonna be and what's

go to the student life center the slick and which I'd done thousand felt like thousands of times

and there were news crews waiting out there not I don't think they knew I was gonna show up but they saw me and then that was their chance to talk to an insider and another thing formed which was and I get it like I get why Baylor and our media guys wanted me to do it because I was

“the one that was a four year guy and I think the only one that they trusted would say the right”

things because they needed somebody at that moment to be pro-bailer pro the basketball program was excited about the future but inside I was the exact opposite wanted to get out of there didn't think that they would even be able to hire a coach and didn't know who that would be I did try I called to and I talk about this in the story I talk I called two colleges one that had used to that had been a crew to me before but that coach was no longer there and then I called because

a buddy of mine that we had gone to Baylor together yet a Logan calls Malski he had played for two years went to Davidson after sophomore year I begged him to stay I said Logan don't you get like we got something special here manless that he goes to Davis that has a great normal career I'm

“a part of the leftovers so maybe I now Logan didn't know but I called Logan I was like hey do you”

think coach McCillap would take me and he was like oh man I put you in touch I had a 10 minute phone call with coach he was super kind to me but I'm a six three average athleticism player that average four and a half point to game and I take charges and I dive on the floor and I'm a really good teammate and he just was kind and said you know we don't really take one of your guys which I totally understood at that time because transferring wasn't the same as it is today

he typically are doing it for good reasons and the guys that did come they would sit out a year and it would take them so long to get in the mix for one year some never did in fact I played over some of those guys and I don't think I should have but it just was hard and so again I just knew that was I was staying at Baylor the coaching staff that I played almost a hundred games for they are found out that they were doing a lot of things wrong and I didn't know about that

and there's some interactions with coach Bliss that were really tough over that summer that

I'd always believed in coaches might my parents taught me to trust them and it was the first time

I felt like I was really had been lied to by them and then on top of it the Patrick Denny he I mean I he was a red shirt my junior year so kind of in and out red shirts aren't always at practice aren't always around but we knew how good he was going to be and that he was going to really help us next year and he was always really kind I never had an issue with Patrick at all but for him to be gone and one of my teammates Carlton who I actually really liked and was the couple

lockers down from me and we would kind of our paths of playing time were sometimes along the same lines to where I felt like we kind of had each other's back and would encourage each other and

never saw that coming and I lost 10 teammates that summer and so you're just going into your

senior year as I'm a 21 year old that's really been living this kind of charm to life and now everything is crashing down and so to go back to your question earlier of identity I was just completely lost yeah that has to be tough and you know you've got expectations thinking that team's going to be kind of moving onward and upward on the threshold of doing some great things and all that comes crashing down not to mention a death and NCAA issues so you get this coach that no one had probably

ever heard of Scott Drew comes to town and you're part of a very few who stick around and you're

“the leftovers what do you remember about your first real interaction with coach Drew”

I was driving so I had tried to do my best to get out of wakeo as much as I could that summer especially the bubble it just it was different there's even there were new stories interviewing other students where they were frustrated because of what basketball players had done because it was another stain on our university and and even mentioned like being having to be careful about being around basketball players and I felt that I felt that walking around the campus and so

a new coach I'm thinking who would take that why would you take this like you can't be very good

“you have to be escaping something or like this is your eighth chance at something and they're like”

Scott Drew and I said never never heard of him I don't know who that is he's 32 years old when he

took over and I was 21 and so there and and there's only one other assistant that was another yet a couple of assistants that are a little older than him but the oldest assistant was 40 so it was a super young staff and we were meeting him for the first time right before right before his press conference I think around that time and he walked in but before he walked in I was just surveying our team and I used kind of quotes like for team because it was me and two other

seniors but Terrence had only been there for a year our team for two years this is my fourth we had a couple of freshmen that were sophomores now that didn't play much his freshman and then

a freshman that did decide to come because a lot of decided not to come anymore and some walk

“thoughts and I just remember thinking I know what we're about to go up against in a division one”

big 12 high level schedule that coach Bliss had made for a top 25 team and not a let alone the big 12 and all of the Hall of Fame coaches that were there and NBA players at that time and I was just down in the dumps about this is how did this happen and he comes in almost jogging I felt like so much energy and bouncing around hands out big smile thanking us for being there and then he kept saying this is that that we're building something

for the future and I didn't want to hear that I got a one that's not I don't want to be a part

of that I this is the future is now and everything he was saying was right and he was doing

all the right things he even met with us one on one and when he met with us it for me he was thanking me and asked me to be even a bigger leader and to go out and meet with the guys one on one and to really get them on board and the the tough thing is I've got I became used to being the guy that the coaches are all just happy with and don't have to ask me of anything or tell me anything I show up on a work really hard I give them my best I'm a leader when I'm there

but I don't hang out with guys outside of basketball and it kept me out of the police investigation only had to go once because I didn't really hang out with them that much and but that was just wasn't my thing I had other friends and how why are you asking me to do this like to spend more time with guys that for something now that deep down I don't think I care much about and so I was very guarded and and I've told of this so this isn't new and I apologize

over the years to him I wish I would have been more open I wish I would have given him more of a chance but I was there's such a sting from what the previous coach had said and done and then what to come out the newspapers and and all this things that I was just so guarded and the fact that we weren't even allowed to play in postseason play so it would be like you and I before we get out we get our new job and they say hey you're going to work hard you're going to do all these

things but we're not going to pay you where do you sign like that's I'm not doing that and so before we you know but then I had to be up in front of everybody talking in front of the media saying hey happy to be here you know glad glad that Coach Drew is here excited for this season we get to go to Hawaii that's fun but all in my head I'm thinking it none of it matters we don't even even if we were hypothetically had been good we couldn't play and as somebody that was just working like that

was to me the big care at that time I didn't want to play after college I was planning on going to grad school and staying on staff yeah just it was just wasn't the picture that I thought and even that this start that year it was just rough yeah well I got to wonder I mean Coach Drew is now famous for being a guy that builds culture and he comes here and is opening press conference you know and I was sitting in that and that and that jump because they show it at the

“Baylor you know every time for the play show them there I said I remember he could my wife and I”

went and watched Arizona them and Arizona a few weeks ago and they're showing that it was kind of like a crazy how is there but what a different mindset I had at that moment no I mean the flames are still

full of energy but still unproven largely and he's talking about winning championships and not

just conference championships national championships and it ends up being prophetic like it does happen but I have to wonder was that an i-roll moment for you or were you thinking almost almost a almost a laugh out loud in my mind like like are you coach like that's not happening man you know and it was just because we're so we were so talent-wise and even depth so far from that in fact the team that I thought like that was last year's team you know the team that we were supposed

“to have could possibly do that and another thing too is I think you mentioned culture I think”

Coach Drew was on the cutting edge of how a majority of people talk about being today or want to be today he was doing that at we had music in practice and we're walking like what are we doing here why are jock jams in practice this isn't serious you know they're they're beating drums before games tang is beating them a trash can and they're jumping up and down they're doing things are hugging their smile and and I'm like this that I was used to a bobby night type of environment

and practice because coach bliss was bobby night's first assistant coach and very much alike

in their discipline my first my first practice with coach bliss and coach Drew could not be more different or first interactions coach bliss literally looked at us and said I'm not your friend you have enough friends I'm here to coach you basketball and then he said bailer here you're here and he had this huge gap in between the two and it was like okay we get it the the assistance that and coach Drew the assistance were way more they were positive they were physical

with like hugging and touching and I mean I I don't know if I ever hug'd coach bliss like just I don't even know what I mean a couple handshakes it it was just such a different dynamic that now

“like that's what I try to do with my players like I want that and I think it's become way more”

popular but because of the results that it has of that type of positive culture where people

feel like they're cared for it's just not what I wanted which is silly because you should want that but when you're I mean three years on you know over a thousand days of hard-nosed fear-based leadership yeah you get used to that almost to point where like this is serious you're not a serious program if you're not doing that yeah and my research I mean teaching and coaching share lots and common and much of the work that I've done talks about the apprenticeship of observation

and how whether you're an athlete or a student you are on the receiving end of coaching and teaching and that has a way of kind of settling into our beliefs about what it means to be a coach and to be a teacher and if you've spent a lot of time under an authoritarian coach you kind of tend to become an authoritarian coach and a lot of judgment comes in when we experience someone that's that's different from our own so I have to think that that yeah coach Drew is known for building culture but for you

it was a culture shock and maybe not in a in a good way initially so you managed to make it through that season and basketball's over lots of times in this show we talk about that transition and you mentioned you played professionally so talk me through where you were psychologically when your collegiate playing days had ended and you're considering what's coming next we'll be back after this quick message you ever looked in the mirror and thought what in the hell just happened

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life on purpose your comeback is an accidental it's intentional start yours today at science of the comeback.com and if you don't mind just to kind of jump a year back from that moment when it was over because we talked a lot about identity earlier and when basketball was the thing that I was working

“towards and pursuing and then when that wasn't that important anymore I think athletes or competitors”

in general are always looking for an outlet for that of Michael Jordan you know you kind of for every

once a while an article will come up where he just talks about how empty he is because he has nowhere to place that competitiveness and it nothing feeds it not the golf not the gambling not owning teams not anything like playing did for him and so when that I'm I'm I'm not that level of competitor but a competitor and when it's not I don't find joy in that or any interest will you have to put that somewhere and I put it into the party scene and that would have never been a

part of my life up into that summer now I'm I had when I turned 21 I started to maybe it's kind of funny where you can kind of see where the sin creeps in in little ways it kind of been creeping

it but very subdued very not the same but then blew the doors wide open on that all season long

it was my idea of I'm just going to keep having fun off the floor do whatever I can to find some joy to laugh a little bit because we're losing this isn't fun this doesn't make any sense to me and even though in that season the love the leftovers book for anybody it's not depressing it's an underdog story because we end up halfway through that season my teammates parents Thomas he's the hero of the book of the story he and we we band together and we start to buy into

this coach drew idea of every night's our championship let's enjoy each other let's play hard for each other let's come together we do that and we end up being really competitive in a big 12

“that where we have no business being I mean there were I think at that time seven or eight”

Hall of Fame coaches you know in there in that league and we beat some teams we beat A&M twice we beat Iowa State we grew up 14 at Oklahoma with Kelvin Samson you know and we lost that game but so many great moments but after that season but the point the thing is even when basketball got good those habits didn't go anywhere that I was that I developed and so I just they kind of basketball and that those habits kept moving along well by the end of the season and after that

Oklahoma game on the back of the bus on the way home we're up 14 we end up losing because inevitably we just got tired like we did every game because we're playing six guys and we're role players and I was so done I wanted nothing to do with basketball and so about two months go by I don't touch a ball and then just happen to be up at the student life center slick and there's all there's basketball play a little pick up and just one game of pick up and I was like oh man

I'm not done I want to keep playing so went over to Iceland and coach Driscoll helped me get that one of the assistants helped me get that because I was a hard cell for pro basketball average

“eight and a half points a game my senior year but I was playing 38 minutes like you should”

average more than that if you're good and but I had some assists and I was a bigger sized point guard and so went over to Iceland and really threw myself into training three times a day

it was so much fun and Icelandic people were incredible and basketball it was there's a

big difference from big 12 play where those guys were all more athletic all of a sudden I was the athletic one and so I was playing really well and my off-court habits though followed me there and we had an apartment that they'd given me to live in and you know one night we had a really big party there and the owners of the club came to me and said Matt you can't do that again like that's not what this is of four and I was just so arrogant lost just thought it had been

so bull maybe and a couple nights later had even a bigger one and the next night they came next day they came and hand me a plane ticket and at that point the home and at that point I was averaging a triple double we had won the Icelandic cup I had offers to go to other European countries and play but I wanted to stay in Iceland where I was because I'm a loyal guy and they asked me to leave and I completely understand why they did when I came home from that I was about

for a year I kind of a baler degree I played basketball and I'm full of the jeans

“for Matt he manages to weather storms a baler both external and the campus community”

media in the wake of one of the largest scandals in college basketball history not to mention the internal turmoil where it feels like the love of the game has gone in a season that started as a disappointment before it even began with a depleted roster and NCAA sanctions making even an unlikely successful season ensure that postseason aspirations were impossible but one pick up game back at the campus wreck center and some help from an assistant coach and he finds himself on

the other side of the world as a pro basketball player and it's gone well for a while Matt's a star

in Iceland but his parting habits that had taken root during his senior year ultimately spelled the

end of his professional career it would mark the end of his dreams as an athlete and send him straight into the teeth of a purpose door with time and again with some help from someone who believed in him at this point perhaps more than he believed in himself he sets off in a new direction finding a new purpose along the way not to mention a divine appointment with a beautiful young lady but more and more than just a sec and on fold in jeans no fast to people in retail

it was just I I just didn't know what to do I tried nine different jobs in about three years

“and then luckily and I think it's a god thing but a guy my high school coach called me and said hey”

there's a guy that's opening a gym wants a director of basketball operations in Dallas and you should go meet with them and I did that met with them and then part of my task there was to go to create an eighth grade boy select team for his son and that group of boys coach them

it was my first time to ever do that I fell in love with it and so that was kind of my journey from

playing to being lost for about two to three years almost and then getting in two years and then getting into coaching at that point yeah what a story what a journey literally around the globe you're seeing kind of some consequences of saying that it creeped into your life at that point where were you spiritually and and how was your face helping or maybe pulling you in

“different directions yeah I was completely running away just just wanted”

when I say nothing to do with it there's a tremendous I felt tremendous guilt for how I was living but then the anger of why I was there it was misplaced it I took no responsibility it was all about how could you let that happen and then really trying to drown out that that that that Holy Spirit feeling of what you're doing won't still fill you it won't work you're trying to escape this but it's not it's not gonna go anywhere and and I knew I that's where it's kind of like

I'm so thankful to my parents for raising me the way that they did and giving me that foundation and for for for Christ coming into my life at a young age because even though I went

a poor direction it made some bad choices I always knew when I was doing was wrong

and that this wasn't the life that God had for me but there is that anger piece of like well then why do you let that stuff happen but that's not how that's that that's not how it works and that's that young person's ideal who God is or what it is to be a Christian and what I wish is I could go back to that time when that all happened and really figure out okay God what can I learn from this how can I be a light during this time how can I serve others how can I help others

that are struggling right now I didn't know that I became completely selfish and only focused on my happiness pleasure and joy and man that will take you down horrible roads really from that summer to my 30th birthday I was a high school coach at the time of our sister and I there's I wish I could apologize to some of those early on players because I was good at the basketball part but didn't horrible at the culture part I was way more like Coach Bliss early on

and just really angry and transactional not transformational which is I think what we want to be as

of why where I wasn't life and how this was happened and ended up I hadn't been to church in

“years and ended up the next Sunday going to a random church in Plano that I didn't attend I just”

drove by it and I knew it was there and sat in the back of the of the church and listened to a sermon that I felt like I had heard you know thousands of times and filled out a visitor card they

threw that card around I never filled out a card before that I never been a visitor a church before

I always just been an attendor and so I filled out that card I said I'm angry and I have questions and gave my information on there never thought I'd hear back from anybody and a little bit of time goes by but I got an email from a lady at the church saying I loved to connect you with our pastor come on in and we've set up a time she met me out she opened the door for me walk me in

“and we sat and talked for a little bit I was waiting for the pastor and then I basically shared”

the story like I kind of did with you right here and they said Matt like why do you think all of these things have already said no he's a man you you've got to give a control and I said no I did that already I'm already saved like I've done that I give me something else is like no no like when those bad things happen you took control of your life of your happiness of your identity of everything and and he said how's that going for you and and he basically he told me you got to

look and take accountability for the decisions that you've made which I never had done

up to that point and so a pretty cool life changing moment there but to me it felt more like coming back home it was familiar it wasn't like a oh I didn't know any of these things it was more as more like a really allowing God to live through me or move in my life and change some of those bad habits because it may be over times I bet I'm done I'm not doing that anymore and inevitably I would when I got upset or angry and then another cool thing that I wasn't looking

for when I walked into church that day was the lady that answer the email and open of the door

“we got married a year later and then now we were just celebrating I think 13 or 14 years”

put 13 married 14 knowing her but Jana I got put her there that day for a catalyst for change and I'm so thankful for that yeah wow I don't believe it would just say wow you're really lucky that you just happened upon that right but what a coincidence no yeah yeah well I love the redemption that's kind of baked into that and how there's kind of a soul circle moment there where the face that led you to bailer and may have wavered ultimately a strength and then and you

once again kind of understand and maybe you're living out that answer of when someone asked about your identity man it's it's so much better when we can actually be the thing we claim to be speaking of redemption arcs though that same bright-eyed brash happy coach with his arms why talking about national championships of bailer actually wins one talked to me about how you in the leftovers like do you claim some ownership in that process what what do you see yourself

in the bailer story and and specifically was Scott Drew you know do you think that that season ultimately helped lay the foundation for what was the comment baby okay sitting by my wife holding

her hand watching bailer win it in 2021 incredible tearing up the whole time when we realize okay

they're actually going to hold Gonzaga off because I thought the whole time Gonzaga was going to store back like there no way are we going to hold this 20 point lead for this long and but man we did and over the years I've had some people thank me thank some of my teammates I'm sure forced thing and what we did for years after that see that my senior year I thought nobody cared that it was just this horrible dark time that we don't want to think about or get past I was

even reluctant to come back to campus for a few years after which was silly that was all in my head and a few years after I think I maybe 2008 or 2009 I'm not sure about that day but I was going

in Pastor Wybel I saw him he was our chaplain my senior year and I saw him and he gave me this huge bear hug and he said Matt look out at the floor and at that time it was Perry Jones they had they had future NBA players already already it's probably 2010 or so but and he's a look out the floor and he said this wouldn't be possible if not for what you guys did that year and it's been cool to hear that it's humbling to hear that if funny thing is Terrence Terrence it really took

the situation that happened us back then and he made his life better from it he's stayed connected the program all the all the players in the last 20 years for the most part no Terrence because he's around and but he called me because a few years ago I don't know who did it but somebody did a story about the foundation and the foundation for them was Henry Duga Curtis Jarrals

“I think Mama do is probably in that you know there it was kind of that class or that group of”

guys calling them the foundation I I get it because they were the first team to win and it really take us from like obscurity or a team that's just hanging around and playing hard to were in March we're in the dance now they I mean they they made it to March minus five years after that's the testament to coach Drew and his staff how credible they are building teams getting guys to come in and building that culture that people want to be a part of after we've only had

six dudes and all that scandal five years it's incredible but Terrence called me is like

you believe that we're the foundation we are that's a Terrence like I appreciate that buddy like I think only you and I care about that you know but to be a small part of that championship

“is is humbling really cool especially when that year for almost the entire season I thought”

it didn't matter I didn't think what we did would ever mean anything to anybody I got a box out I got a wedge myself back in here one more time Matt says quote I didn't think that what we did would ever mean anything to anybody in the quote even the title of his book The Leftovers which we'll get to in a minute gives testimony to how Matt felt like

he'd worked his whole life being that gritty tough leadership first glue guy who might only get

you single digit points for 38 minutes of work but he'd also take three charges and two dives on loose balls and double digit assists he did all the little things only to have all of that goes so horribly wrong it's stolen away just weeks before it culminated with that senior season that had transformed almost overnight from promise and opportunity to tragedy and hopelessness the whole thing had stolen Matt's love for the game and he turned to a party scene to

dull the pain in that he created habits that would haunt him for years but looking back now through trials and experience and growth and grace he can now see the role he played in a bailer program that went from the ashes and the tragedy of a murdered teammate and unspeakable awfulness in its wake to a national championship less than two decades later and all started with those leftovers and with that smiling clapping and curting young coach by the name of

Scott Drew and over the years I've just found that to be so false and that people really do care that we showed up we played hard we were coachable we we believed in each other and we competed

“and I think I think Terence is right in the fact that I think we've gotten our just do like I”

think we're owed anything else but but no we were definitely a part of it and and then other bailer guys have just they just took it to all their levels with all of the winning even before

the championship our program had a 10 year run or so that was just incredible yeah and talking

on that same and he said boys basketball coach amid way high school here in Waco and also the author of the leftover spailer betrayal in beyond I had talked to me about how this idea to write the book came about and what was that process like for you and how do you feel like your life up to that point prepared you to be an author and I love that and I don't talk about this a lot so thank you for asking

basketball player I had no plan to be there was nothing after that when I when I was asked to take what major I just asked what Logan called my roommate what he was doing I had given me all of it's he I literally for two years had his same schedule I think he was so sick of me because I and then

“and then and then even when I said you have to choose a major I asked some of my some of the seniors”

on team what should I choose it said oh speed communications it's the easiest one so I chose that and

nothing besides basketball and never thought of putting a book together and then I was at

name and forest to use my first high school coaching teaching job and somehow I got some of you recommended a book called life at the end of the bench by Allen Williams and it was about his or his called the walk on life at the end of the bench and it's about his four years either at Wake Forest or Georgia Tech not sure which one but what four years in college and I'm reading this and it's like speaking right to me of this is your same story it's the same battle except

“he was a walk on household scholarship but my freshman year to sophomore year they recruited over me”

and got better and I had to find a new way my sophomore junior they recruited over me and got better and I had to find a new role and so I knew exactly what he was feeling going going through and then when I was thinking about his story and how his ended it got to his senior year and I then thought well mine takes a huge shift at that point and so I just started to research like what was you know kids you kind of you're in it but she don't it would want to probably

because of how I was living at the time but it was also very cloudy of of what it was really like

and I just I tried never to think about it and so I just started going back through and researching

“from day to day what was happening during that time and then I got to the point where okay it's”

we're we're now we're getting together and we're actually playing well against Purdue who was number 22 in the country had been Duke earlier where we lost by three or four points to them okay there's something to what we did that year I mean really going back through the story I would encourage everybody to kind of do that maybe not in a book form but look back over your story and I was able to really see a little bit more of the path of you know how I got into

where I was and so I wanted the book to be really three things one is for the kid that wants to be a college basketball player okay what's the blueprint and you're not Zion you're not 68 as an eighth grader your average can you do it and so what's the manual what what were my workouts like what was the time investment what did my family and I sacrifice to do that and then in all through high school and then what's it like to actually survive at that level and not be a stud and just make it but

be able to kind of create your own role in that role shift because my freshman year I scored a lot or not a lot but I scored sophomore junior year I barely shot I was a defensive player she kind of have to morph and move and then the leftovers part but the funny thing was is until Janah I really didn't have the end of the book because it would have read like this like how do you get to college okay how do you survive oh the this leftover story and then oh

but he's still miserable now okay he's still a still broken now and searching and then Janah and then that was the it was able to have an end to it of okay looking back I see how God's hand was still with me through all of those times still with our program with everybody involved and but I had ten it took me five years to write it because I can barely speak clearly as you can as you can tell and so hard to write it I wanted to get everything right and I had ten different

people and it and and and actually tried the Ghost Rider thing first and but I really wanted it

if anybody reads I wanted them to read it like this is a dude that knows basketball that really

it was just the that walked into the gym and he heard the swish of the net I was like nope nope

“not that's not me okay that doesn't that's not it so when I actually wrote it had a lot of”

people help with that my mom was one of the editors and she marked off all the things that she didn't like but had to make a choice to be transparent about the things I was struggling with because I either make it something not real and authentic or I go all in and not hold anything back

and I had never going to detail on things but just just to share the struggles and then when we

wanted in twenty one a Christian publisher Whitaker contacted me about republishing it so I self-published first and then they actually came out and going through that process was really cool because they made it they we took a 60 pages or so out and made it very like a lot more clean everything with that was it was just so cool to be a part of yeah that's awesome I know that reflection is a critical part of learning and just the process of going back through your story and maybe processing

those emotions that you know we're guys like we don't think about how we feel a whole lot and being forced to do that I can say for myself I've got a book I've been working on for a while and there are times when I'm just not feeling it like the emotional toll that it takes to

“remember what that season felt like I've often used the analogy if you've ever had an aquarium”

and it looks clean and you stir those rocks at the bottom and all that fish goop like gets up in the water it's like maybe I just need to leave those rocks alone like I don't want to stir that that mass it can be tough it can be a heavy load but there's wisdom and those lessons that wouldn't otherwise land on us sometimes without that reflection. I won't be conscious of every time I've got two left for you here one is one of ask of all my guests if we were to watch

a montage of your life what song would you pick to play in the background and why. I've never

had that question and I may steal that from my speed around with my gemoti gemoti podcast. Oh man I don't know why Jeremy Kamp I can't believe Jeremy Kamp take my life okay love it is a early 2000s Jeremy Kamp song when he was way more raw but there's so many it's like because there's a fierceness to that song and when I was a player of I was in Iceland they called me Mati Scrati which means Matt the Devil which don't like that part but

because I had a brand of playing that was fierce and intense and then with coaching I have to kind of be careful with that and not to let that guy out sometimes but in the right way but that's song Jeremy Kamp take my life a lot of great moments in that yeah give it all to you he says that repeatedly and like that yeah no that's a jam I have a playlist that I put together with all of my guests picks so you'll you'll get dropped into that mix and then I'll also drop the YouTube video

of that that's on into the yeah that's good that's really good. Last one I know you're fairly new in your role I've made way but the question I ask is of all my guests the kind of the other one is what from Matt is left undone you know I see years ago so I was at grapevine faith

Christian school for 12 years and got to that's my first head coaching job got to coach my son

through high school he just graduated last spring and they were doing some interviews they're about legacy and I was trying to be annoying to him and I'm not trying to be annoying to you either by answering your question this way but he asked about legacy what do you want your

“legacy to be and I think I just had finally gotten to the point with coaching with culture and things”

like that I told him I don't worry or care about that and he kind of went like this and I was like well no no I obviously when it's all said and done I'd like for it for to be a good one but my

that I can't control and and so it's kind of your your question is you asked say again what

“what's still left undone yeah so the idea behind the show is sometimes you feel like life is”

pulling us apart and we are unraveled and we feel like we've come apart more undone but then hi achiever is different from others they don't just sit in that wreckage they recognize that the Lord or if they're non-believer maybe they find something but they realize they have a purpose left yet unfulfilled and so that undone goes from being an negative to it's it's a purpose that

just driving you forward I love that and I actually will take that first part of it and I think I'm just

becoming I don't and I'm becoming the coach that God wants me to be I'm becoming the husband that he wants me to be and the only way that I know how to do that is just to try to be faithful each day so at midway in my first year I just tried to do my very very best to show up and give those guys my best that day to not leave any moment out and to leave each day thinking okay

“whether we want or lost successful or not I gave them everything I think if I keep doing that”

just day after day then then I'll keep becoming and I'm not trying to be deep here that's just how

I feel because yeah stay championship would be nice I don't see myself retiring I can't

what else am I going to do I love coaching I love basketball I really just want to spend as much time with my wife Jana as I can as my favorite thing to do and then I want to continue to grow my relationship with the Lord through daily Bible reading and from unreading other good books and staying in the word and memorizing more I want to memorize more verses and like so I don't know but but if I don't win a state championship I know that that doesn't make me a failure

if I could see it being a midway for a really long time it's a great school this is an awesome

place to live and we've got great parents and great kids a great students so it's kind of a unique

place I'm 44 yeah 44 and I don't really have anything because what my childhood dream I did it you know and not many people there's a great little this aside no but great little video by Randy Pausch called the last lecture and in that last lecture he talks about he has six months left to live and he knows that he's a professor six months left to live and he has does this last lecture about no regrets what brick walls are really in our lives for is to let us know how

badly we want something and he goes to all this childhood dreams and how he was over his lifetime achieving them even he wanted to be he wanted to be an astronaut so he went on that plane that takes you up and you're you know floating for like 10 seconds and then comes back down but all of those things I kind of feel like I did that like I did achieve I didn't expect right to book our all those things but those childhood dreams so now I yeah I just want to be

faithful each day and work really hard that led me to midway because if you would have told me in March of last year that I would that would be down here I would have probably said I don't think so so just being open and faithful to whatever he had wants me to do get my very very best to whoever he has me leading at the time and then man enjoy all the time I have with Jana I'm sorry if

“that's a boring answer oh I love it I think sometimes we can we can over program that answer and”

we can be so driven by the assignment that just like you said about co-street like win the day every game is your champion I mean those yeah those things can add a lot of moments of joy so that doesn't feel like drudgery it doesn't feel like something I have to do it feels like something I get to do and it's pulling me instead of feeling like something is just kind of pushing me as I dig my heels in so I love that you mentioned your you've got podcasts I know your books available

on Amazon so give me some socials where it work and my listeners go to follow your work and and stay connected with what you're doing it's a good question I am active and let's see

and then the podcast yeah the gemody podcast I've been doing it for five years I put out one episode

“a week and it's just about leadership and culture but I interview coaches and leaders and”

most the time that are basketball coaches but it's just been talk about becoming every time I listen or have one of those talks I feel like alley I'm so far from you know where you where you can't be or where coach some coaches are which is okay not not comparing because that's the thiefable joy but just knowing that there's more that we can learn and do but that's been such a fun hobby that has ended up really being important yeah tremendous math same in here and I am undone

you know there's something that Matt said in this conversation that I just keep coming back to

for most of that season he thought it didn't matter that it was just this dark chapter that people would want to forget and yet years later he's sitting there watching bailer win a national championship and realizing that what they did mattered more than he ever understood in the moment not because of the wins but because they stayed they showed up they competed they believed in

“something that didn't yet exist and I think that's part of this story that resonates for me the most”

because most of us have seasons like that I know I have seasons where it feels like nothing we're doing is even moving the need on seasons where it feels like we're just grinding away in isolation in an obscurity where we start to wonder if any of it is even worth it battle and what this conversation reminds us is this those might be the very seasons that are laying the foundation for everything that comes next even if you can't see it yet even nobody's clapping even if it feels like it doesn't matter

it does so wherever you are right now if you find yourself in one of those seasons stay keep showing up keep doing the work because you might not be in the highlight real right now but you might be building the foundation I'm thankful to Matt for dropping in and I hope you enjoyed our conversation for more info in today's episode be sure to check it out on the web so if you go to unden podcast.com

backslashep153 to see the notes links and images related to today's guest Matt sameman some quick updates about the show dropped a ton since the last episode but we've bounced back kind of after consistently being at number four in both education and self improvement categories tied for the best standing in show history we drop down to age before rebounding and as of this morning I'm happy to say that we're back at number four at the same time sadly across all categories

we dropped out of apples top 200 for the time being but a little setback or adversity has never

been a reason to complain around these parts just means there's an opportunity ahead so I'm

“hoping to get back in there between now and the next time we meet if you want to follow along”

it's your progress for yourself you can now go to unden podcast.com backslashep153 and cheer me on in the last month we've had more than 14,000 downloads and we aren't done yet if you'd be so kind of to share the show with a friend or leave a comment or a review that would be so sincerely appreciated. Last episode I introduced something new that I plan to be doing each episode it's kind of weird but I call it the teal of the week if you listen to my multi-part Larry Johnson series you heard

me talk about how my deep love for teal started back in high school with LJ in the Hornet it's not just a 90 staple to me it's a trademark it's my signature color and if you're watching on video you'll notice that although the new studio is brimming full of color for this episode I was just wearing black t-shirt but now as I record this commentary for this episode I am wearing my current absolute favorite shirt that lives in my closet it's a long sleeve Jordan brand

Charlotte Hornet shooting shirt and I love how it feels and love how it fits I'm a performance scientist and I like to let my data do my deciding so over the years and the data backs me up on this I've learned that the environments that we create right down to how we decorate our space what we choose to wear all those things can influence how we show up so for me teal has become

it's a small but consistent way to signal to myself it's time to be present it's time to be

“intentional it's time to do this and do it well so each week I'll be wearing a different teal shirt”

we usually tied to a team or a program just as a way to keep that rhythm in that consistency

so this week it's one of my first teal teams the Hornets back in the day I had an original Hornet

starter jacket a Charlotte winbreaker one of the super cool magic Johnson all over print Hornets T's I've been looking for one of those on eBay for a minute but they are rare and when I find them

“they're like 150 pucks for a 30 year old t-shirt I just can't force myself to do it”

I actually have a senior picture in my cheap knockoff Larry Johnson Hornets replica jersey but all that to say the Hornets and I go way back so when I slip on this particular shirt whether I'm headed to the office to knock out some work headed to the gym to live to her headed to the court to play I just feel better and as prime time maybe said it best

“years ago I have a famous court that you read last is that look good you're good play good play good”

you pay good see you thought that court was all about sports snap I call this about you and it's about life because if you look good you feel good if you feel good you perform good and you perform good

work up next they pay me so never underestimate that look that presents that ginise a glove

and it's trying to betray me because you got it don't give up on you but it all starts with you they got to look good coming up on the show I've got former division one strength coach turn pastor Chris McCormick I've also got a couple of other guests that I'm super excited about but I'm not going to jinx myself till I get those interviews recorded keep in them to myself so let's just say there's more

incredible conversations headed your way on becoming undone becoming undone as an I try to

create a production written and produce by me Toby Brooks tell a friend about the show and follow along at Facebook Instagram and LinkedIn at becoming undone pod and follow me at Toby Brooks PhD on Facebook Instagram and LinkedIn check out my link tree at link TR.e backslash Toby Brooks PhD listen subscribe and leave me a review on apple podcasts Spotify I heart radio or wherever you get your podcasts till next time keep getting better

you