Welcome to season two of the struggle bubble. I'm Chad Kutting Bonjour, my name is Craig Surgey. Last season it was Spanish, this season it's gonna be French? Oui oui We'll go with the French vibe. All right, everybody, we're back for another season. We're just going to wing this one a little bit to get us kicked off because Craig, you and I have been asked no short of a couple dozen times, hey, when season two, we missed the podcast. I think people are just being nice, but I don't know, we'll see. Yeah, I've had a few people like this is my drive time listening to you two idiots. So yeah, here we are. We're back. feel bad for whoever's still driving nowadays. The work from home life has been pretty nice. The commute lane is heavy on the podcasts is what I hear. That's awesome. everybody likes to listen nowadays instead of read. That's what I hear. So we're going to entertain the masses today with a little bit of an unscripted welcome back to season two of a little bit about what we've been up to. And then I think Craig, what everybody's really looking forward to is you solving all of their soccer problems. So in the back half of the episode, stay tuned. Craig will solve all of your issues. Yes, we are in season. are depending on your team one to three games in and... games in, is that what I'm hearing? 0-3 that's right that's what I said. Yes, what should we expect from a 7 and 8 year old? What should we be doing for our 7 and 8 year olds and when are they going to turn pro and go to D1? Yeah, I think some people still haven't listened to that episode, Craig, where we talked about the percentages of kids that are going to the pros and take it down a little bit. we've also got a transitional period. High school soccer's done and you're walking into high school baseball. Yeah, and high school baseball is half over. So we got, we got a lot to cover. the first thing's first, just, from scenery. And if you're listening to this and not watching it, I apologize, but I've moved locations because, I'm old and I was sitting way too far away from the monitor. So now I'm right up close and personal. So that's where you're seeing me in a little bit of different light. Now for you, you have a choice on studio A and studio B today you've chosen underneath the bunk bed. Studio C. I see what you did there. Is it just more comfortable in there? Absolutely, I got a couch. That's actually been bought twice because the dog took a piss on the first one. So, this is the second couch. And that's American piss, not European piss? Okay. All right, we're off to a great start. Let's go. I think going into a little bit of the sports is the right place because you were in the midst when we ended season one of going into the winter and picking up your first season of the high school soccer. How was that experience relative to the younger kids? Great, unbeaten in league, lost in the CCS quarterfinals. So it's a different vibe because you played to win. All right, pretty simple. There's some great questions actually came from the seven and eight year olds parents doing the evaluations on when do I see burnout in kids? Like, are we doing too much training? Is there too much structure? What does that, you know, what does that look like? So. I would say now having that experience, the burnout happens way earlier than I thought. I think that the high school kids come into this season relaxed and stressed all at the same time. Like clubs over, there's a break there, but they've got in the back of their heads, some of them are looking for D1, D2, D3, whatever. So they have that in the back of their heads mixed with this should be fun, because I've been told it's fun. And I'm playing with players that I may have played with when I was younger. Then we all switched teams and stuff, and now we're all back at the same place again. So it was a weird experience of trying to manage that, mixing with, we're really fortunate. We have some really good players. So the actual coaching part is more psychological and tactical than... coaching a seven, eight year old on the technical aspects of the game. So definite variance of skill sets needed to manage a lot of that. The other thing is you're running an 18 person bench and there's obviously an age difference between a freshman and all the way to a senior. So there's also management of that. I do it with sarcasm so it's generally fine. But, yep. the girls pick up on it right away with your sarcasm and your? Well, they can't understand a word I'm saying most of the time, so... And you're assisting, You're not the main or the head coach over there. So you're coming on and that's one of the things that I had to adjust to with the football last year is I'm used to being the main head coach. coach the kids in their rec seasons or in little league and you're the main voice and that you come with a practice plan and everybody's rallying around you. As an assistant, it's a little bit of an adjustment of you have the head coach that's giving more guidance, more structure. and then you try and fill the necessary void at practice or in games. How did you approach your role on the sideline or at the trainings? Yeah, it's pretty, it's definitely different. I feel there's less pressure on the assistant and the head, but you're all in it together. I would say I took the approach of, and everyone's different, but I sat on the bench with the girls and got to know them so I could try and read when somebody was in the right frame of mind, not in the right frame of mind, what they felt about the team. So I took it that approach where let me be more of a confident on, you know, what's gonna move on the field and what they're thinking and feeling. More than tactical, you know, and that came into it, obviously, like I see things a little different than the head coach and stuff. But I think, again, it's just a team. Like, it's better for me to be closer with the kids to understand where their personalities are at and... how they're perform on their feelings and different again with boys and girls, more than tactical awareness. And that's just my opinion at the same time. I think we probably trained the girls a little too hard, technically and tactically. I think if we'd gone a little more relaxed. I don't know though. mean, when you've gone unbeaten throughout the season, you can't really look back at it as a negative, but very disappointed to... Get out of CCS in the quarterfinals. I really like speaking of the CCS game. I sent you a message after I saw the final score and said, Hey, you know what happened? And in your very astute observation, I think you said, well, when the other team scores more goals than you, you lose. So it was, mean, just earth shattering advice that these girls are getting. Yeah, mean, it's, you know, don't score, you don't win. I mean, it's pretty, pretty, it's a pretty simple game when you break it down, right? And it was, it's just disappointing, honestly. You know, disappointing because I felt we had a decent preseason against the teams we were gonna go into, into the CCS round, which would be Midy and St. Frans, you know, the Catholic schools, which we don't see in league. think we would have had a great chance. You know, just give everybody the reality. They have 100 plus kids trying out, right? Like in any sport, baseball, football, soccer, whatever, the private schools can handpick basically to a certain point. So you know, you're up against a pretty tough opponent and yeah, it's just, again, I look at it two ways. It actually did me a lot of good going into, the seven and eights this year as well. And what I mean by that is when I did the evaluations, I wanted to get to know the kids better, not just the standard work on your left foot. And all the parents that are listening to this, if any of them are, they all heard the same thing. Hey, I can go and say, hey, juggle the ball more in the backyard, go kick it against the wall more with both feet, run around cones, get your technical movements better, blah, blah, blah, right? I'm not that interested in that because that should be the love of the game and I can teach that in training and that should roll over into, hey, I want to go in the backyard and juggle for 20 minutes, whatever that is. The one part I wanted to get with the kids this year was, what do you think I'm looking for? What do you think your parents are looking for and what are you looking for, psychologically? And then what do those words mean to you as well? You know, what does, and you've heard me say this before, What does technical mean to you? Well, that means I've got to do scissors and step. Hold on. That's a skill that is technical. But actually, I want you to work on your first touch and reading when the players attacking you where to move that ball into space. That's the technical aspect I want you to work on. So just taking that into the evaluations with the littles has really helped me and I think helped them that what I mean by technical and what they thought was technical are two different things. They are both technical, but I was actually talking about something else. So breaking that down, think that's going to roll over to high school this year as well. Of the psychological, like your coach may say it one way and it means one thing, but we're actually looking, you know, let's take it down another notch and really dive into what you're looking for. So I think both sides of the coin, think going into high school this year is going to be different. Getting the experience I got in that, you know, the fall of 24 was now beneficial to the 2016 girls that I coach today. Hey, talk about that translation layer. It's all child psychology. We've talked about this a bunch in the first season is how do you speak the same language? And then you might mean something and it comes out in a way that you fully understand, but when it hits their ears, they don't fully digest it. didn't fully get it. So think it's great advice to be able to say, was to break this down further and then let me hear it back from you. What are you hearing me say? What do you think that means? And then seeing the active development. And that's why I just think the Building that relationship and having the smaller group sessions, the one-on-ones, the one-on-threes are so valuable because they can do it and you can correct it or you can give feedback immediately. It's in the bigger groups and we deal with this in baseball all the time. If we have one dad, one coach out there trying to instruct 12 or 14 kids, it's really difficult. The more dads or moms we get out there, you're able to It's double-edged sword of having big. big teams, a lot of kids that are interested in soccer and baseball and all these other sports, but being able to distill the game down and slow it down for a brain that's trying to keep pace and maybe not fully processing what's happening in real time. Yeah, I mean, there's a whole... Yeah, it's difficult because some just people learn different ways, right? It's just, know, one of example I give you is I asked a lot of the team two players, do you think team one are mean? Right? And I'm like, yes, you know, be honest, right? Because I said mean can mean multiple things, right? So I said, I think they're mean, but what I really mean by that is they're uber competitive is they will stab their grandmother to win the ball like that's they want to win yeah that's aggressive they want to win so much that you may feel that they're being mean to you as a human but they're actually just competitive and want to win and that's all it is and it takes all kinds to make a team But just be aware, they're not being mean to you and they're not being cruel and they're not bullying and all those things. They just want to win so hard. And another coach said this to me this week, you know, he talks to the older kids. He said, it's a little bit like, you know, if you're in a fight and something's going on, am I going to be polite and ask you to stop and, you know, do something? No, I'm going to scream and I'm going to shout because the time and the sensitivity of it is intense. It's the same on the field. Right? You just got to be not numb to it, but you got to understand that this is a form of communication, but it may come out as mean, but it's actually just intense in that environment. So. there's a lot there too, because there's certain ways that we are as parents of letting kids win to build up confidence. And there's a time and place for that. But if you overextend too much into that to make everything fair and everything by the book, that's not how real life is. And we've been doing it in the house. mean, kids have heard me say a thousand times, know, life isn't fair. It's not meant to be fair. It's going to be unfair. How you react to it is what you can control. And I think there's a ton of learning and we're re-evaluating how we approach all of these different sports. It isn't about winning and losing. I think Alexa's team has won three games in three years. It's just a matter of the competition they're playing against and the team composition and it's difficult. So if you just put it on wins and losses, she's not going to have a great time. But how are you being gritty? How are you responding? How are you taking feedback and building out that foundation, which is It goes into a lot of what you're saying. think a lot of the advice and for everybody out there, my daughter's team plays Craig's team this weekend. And at first I told, you know, walk over, kick Craig right in the nuts to start the game off right way. And if you're not getting a yellow card, you're not playing hard enough. But the conversation you just had about, you know, being tough and pushing around. And I mean, a lot of that goes into the right mentality headed into the game. How can you represent yourself? and own your space, you can't control what the other six girls are doing on the field or the other 12 girls are doing on the field, but you can control your space and how you're moving around. Yeah, I mean, it's a process, number one. Number two, I talk about this all the time, is trust, right? You have to trust your teammate is gonna do the right thing. That takes time. Then, again, that competitiveness or meanness, and then style of play on top of that, right? And that was something I think we struggled with with the high school a little bit, was transitioning style of play. We could've done a better. job with. Yeah, there's a few things there that I think if you digest a little bit more and a little deeper just makes the whole process basically like gotta be competitive, gotta be mean, gotta have a start at play, gotta understand what my teammates gonna do. I have to be confident as well. If I get rocked, I have to get back up and figure it out. Right? And what does that look like? Does it take me a minute? Does it take me 10 seconds? Does it? And I always say this, people have heard me say this time and time again, some of the best players are goldfish brains, right? You miss, you get hit, you get up, you just carry on. Like you don't even respond that something just happened. You just move forwards. But it doesn't happen for every player. So trying to manage all of that is, it's difficult and you get to know your players, right? I was just talking to my team manager and like just trying to think about. what we're gonna play tomorrow and how we're gonna play it and what we're gonna do. I don't know what the best thing is to do because psychologically my kids will show up and be like, oh, we're playing Los Gatos 2015s. So it's like scrimmage. Yeah, it is, but it's not. Like it is a league game. There is a win and a loss to this. Are they gonna check in or are they gonna check out? If we go one-nil down, does it change the way that they play and style of play? If they get knocked on their ass, are they gonna complain? There's so many variables. You're trying to figure out if it's seven or eight, you're all but it's life lessons, right? At the end of the day, some point, you could be going for the same job as your best friend. Who knows? One of you is gonna get it, and you're happy for each other and everything else, but at the end of the day, at that intense moment, someone's gonna win and lose. We're going to play a one, two, one, two, composition tomorrow. We're going to really throw you off. So be, be ready for the Zig and the Zag. Craig on that point of checking in and checking out, it's actually very timely because last night we had a baseball game and you could tell from minute one, what type of night it was going to be. And it's, it's a lot. mean, these kids are nine and 10 years old and they show up, they had a full day of school. There's other things going on. there's illness. going around the entire school right now and you show up and they're not locked in. So as a coaching staff, I mean, you're in a different position from the competitive side, right? The league is intended to be competitive and to win while also teaching the love of the game and developing. On the little league side, is about community. You're playing with your buddies, you're playing with the town and it's about the baseball, it's not about the wins and losses. And I know there's people out there that don't like to hear that, of course you have to have a winner, have to have a loser. had no idea. Tell me, correct me on the numbers, but you play 10 games of pre-season? Is that right? we changed it a bit this year. So that's, that's correct. And we're not calling it pre-season, but in years past, you played games for the older division starting in February and every game meant something because you're being seated, right? The top team at the end of the season will play the bottom team at the end of the season to calibrate. And what that would do is create a bit of a pressure cooker throughout the entire season to win as much as possible. For us. and other leagues have done the same thing. We try to invert that. We want kids playing as many positions as possible. Learn them all because then you have a respect for the other positions. We'll talk about that in soccer for a second. But as a pitcher, if, if I don't know what it's like to play third base or the outfield and I see an error happen or a mistake, then I get on them. But if I know what it's like to pitch, to catch, to play the infield, to play the outfield, to hit in the leadoff spot, to hit in the bottom spot. It creates an empathy around the entire league. So we're trying to foster that a bit and by showing that the games literally mean absolutely nothing. You can call them preseason, can call them scrimmages. You're playing a legit game, but the outcome doesn't matter. So everybody gets the work in. There shouldn't be a coach out there to say, I'm not going to pitch Timmy because he might give up five runs. Put him in, let it happen at the end of the day. Now in the middle of the season or towards the 75 % mark, we'll start to play in a mini tournament. on just a sec, why did you change it? Why did you go to that model? Because parents are crazy and incentives are misaligned and it's our responsibility from a governing body perspective to make sure we live the values of the club, of the league. If we're saying this is about community baseball and having fun and we have an experience that is not fun or causing stress for the kids or causing a lack of playing time, then you come in over the top and say, all right, these are the rules that we're all going to play by. So it's really helped us redefine and live by those values that it's about the kids. It's not about us. And it's led to a lower stress environment. I can see it. I can feel it. It has a nice side effect of umpiring. If there's an umpire that's learning the game, makes a call that is incorrect or may cost a run or cost a game. Okay. We're all learning. So it's taking the temperature down. quite a bit across the league. Now we will ramp up to more competitive styles. We will have a champion, will have playoffs, but it's phased. So there's a true preseason, a mini playoff, and then a real playoff. Do you think because you pay less in baseball than you do in soccer, you're able to do that? Do you think in the soccer community because you pay per month for pro coach and all this other stuff, you feel that that is the outcome of the benefit of playing comp? I think the intention of playing competitive soccer is access to the coaching that you get because those coaches are paid and theoretically the best ones are getting paid. There's a system in place to get the right coaches out there to be determined how you got in that mix. And an expectation of development. But I'll say as a dad, The difference between comp and rec is stark. Rec seems like a free for all. You have coaches that don't know what they're doing. I was a coach and I know nothing about soccer. It's just a free for all, but there is still a love of the game. There still is fun and there still is development. From the first touch in fall practice to the last touch, the girls progressed. Now it might not be leaps and bounds the way it would be with a professional coach, but it was more of the organization and raising the talent bar that that our kids want to play in that situation. At the same time, speaking personally, the love of the game and the development hasn't happened at a tremendous rate on the comp side. There is a limiting factor and we can get into the field size, the access, the coach to player ratio, all of that, that you know really, really well. But when... my daughter walks off the field and goes, I'm terrible, I don't want to play this game anymore. Then we've lost the plot. We're not in it for the right reasons and we need to recalibrate, which is why I talk about her focusing on what she can control, which is a life lesson. And then setting goals that aren't, that are realistic but don't depend on somebody else. Making a team one or playing this starting position over this other person, you can't control that. That's the coach, that's the other player training, but what you can control is the level of effort and passion that you have for the game. And that's what we need to put in in our kids' hands. So you think having those baseball community organized little league, those 10 games. you can have those whoopsie do's with the umpires and a missed pitch or whatever and that pressure from the parents is so low because they understand it's a 10 game freebie or whatever like pre-season and then you're not paying for professional coaches you're paying for the field basically and the dads are being the coaches the environment is it sounds like a one-eater The temperature's changed. We have a great baseball community, so I'm not saying anything was bad in the past. It's graduating into the feelings. You want the kids to feel pressure because that helps them. How they respond to pressure, that's a life lesson. Controlling the nerves, controlling the energy, leaning on the training. But what we don't need is in February or March, when the kids have only been playing baseball for a month and a half, to have the pressure immediately. So how do we graduate into, mean you've probably seen this, but you'd be surprised that as soon as a jersey gets put on, it feels like a different game. You could practice for two weeks, a month, you're in your pickup clothes, you're loose. because I put this jersey on, everything changes. That's the same as golf, right? You can smash it off the practice tee as you get on the first hole and you shank it. it's all upstairs of how do you, how do you control that energy and then harness it? And we, we believe that there's a way to graduate. Now on the inverse of that, we've made some rule changes this year that actually are in a different direction. So historically or the last five, six years we've played like a, a kid version or a younger kid version of baseball earlier in the season. The specific example for us is stealing bases or advancing bases on errors. Last few seasons we've said, don't do that, just stay put. We're going to not take advantage of those. don't want to take advantage of those mistakes early on in the season. But what it does is becomes a crutch. they're not going to go anywhere on an overthrow. So who cares? I'm going to throw it into right field. And what we started to see is the game of baseball from a knowledge perspective. wasn't sinking in. So we're doing real baseball from the jump right now in our younger division. And I think it's going to be better, or the kids will be better off because now they know I can't overthrow that base. This kid could be stealing and they're playing real baseball faster. So yes, there will be mistakes and that's okay. But we're going to take advantage of those mistakes. And the games aren't going to mean anything from the first part of the season. And you're going to get there. go back on that on soccer IQ all the time, right? can see what the... Technically they can't actually do all of it yet, but they see what... I can see what they're trying to achieve, right? Which when they physically get bigger, they're gonna knock it out the park by the time they're 11 v 11. Right? Yeah. a game and a love for it and a respect for it. And it's funny, I go back to the high school and I'm looking at some of these players and I'm like, what the fuck? Like who, like who? And again, it's opinionated, but I'm just looking at some of the styles and their techniques and I'm like, you you were forced to learn to win way too young, right? And that changed how you developed and play the game. maybe a little bit too direct, maybe taking too many high risks, those kind of things. And it's like, God, if you just stayed on track with not worrying about winning or losing, understanding the game, get your technique down, get your tactical awareness and your soccer IQ high, you'll accelerate. As long as, I always go back to this, you actually wanna play. Right, there's nothing I, exactly, I can't force you. to go and I just again got off call with my team manager. I said, hey, she's really hitting that left footed shot. Like she's really striking the ball. And I go on this all the time, like, I will lose my mind if you just kick. It has to be directional. Like it has to be a pass. Even if it doesn't complete, it's to be directional, right? Yeah. And it just, and she's hitting the left foot. And I'm like, you know why? and it's because your best friend on the team is doing both feet as well. So now there's a competitive edge between the two of them. They're teammates, but now they're willing to go in the backyard and compete against each other, separate households, but knowing that when they meet at the field, they both want to be able to kick with both feet. That's just a habit we're trying to teach them to grow as humans as much as soccer players, right? And you hit on two big points there. You can't teach passion or love of the game, like actually teach it. You can foster it. You can create an environment where they thrive, but until it clicks, you can't force it. I love the game of baseball. Absolutely love it. Theo enjoys it. But the click hasn't happened yet. We're not in the backyard every single night, you know, hitting balls, but that could come. But are you creating that? then so that when it does click, you can identify it and feed it. Well, one thing I want to just get into on the baseball side, the community aspect, we had our opening day this past Saturday. And for all the complaining I do about being president of the little league, it's events and days like Saturday that make everything worth it. We brought in, we have 555 players this year. So this is the one day where they're all at the same facility. We do a parade of teams. So all 49 teams circle the field. We had Los Gatos high school baseball varsity baseball team showed up to do a player tunnel. So huge shout out to coach Minkle at Los Gatos high. and all the players coming out. We had Santa Clara University baseball come out to also do the tunnel and to see the little tee ballers looking up at these big guys who are playing baseball and loving it. It was just great to build that community aspect of it. So they go through the entire parade, 49 teams all the way from the youngest, which is four years old up to the oldest at 15 years old on the same field together. You recognize the board. And then we also have local dignitaries that come out. We had members of the Los Gatos Town Council, members of Los Gatos Lions Club. The local principals of each elementary school came out, which is just great to put faces to names because we use the facilities. We're an outside partner, outside vendor that are using the same fields that they are. So it's great for them to see all the kids that are taking part in the league. and being on those fields all in one place. And then we had members of the 1984 Los Gatos Little League All-Stars. So in 1984, they were 12 and they won the district tournament, section tournament, Northern California tournament, Western region tournament to go all the way to the World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, 47 years ago, 41 years ago. So great to have all of them come out in a great showing, almost the full team of everybody that, you know, still alive, which is crazy to think, right? They lost some members, some coaches, and had them throw out a first pitch, which is, you know, incredible just to see them come out on the same field they played on 40 years ago to throw a ball and to throw it to the next generation because we had members of the current teams out there. And then Lev Schistler, our VIP for the day. fighting pediatric cancer, comes out, throws a first pitch, not a dry eye in the stadium. But that's what it's all about. So you have an extension of 40 years ago to today, the entire community coming out and supporting one another. was just a huge shout out to everybody that made that possible across the town, across the Little League, and everybody that showed up. Really fun event. Yeah, that's super cool. Wow. Did any of them go and play pro or anything? No, and that's the thing that that's the point. That's the point that you try and make is that's not what it's about, but they have, they picked up where they left off, right? They know each other. They know the town and the conversations that were being had and the connections and the support system that they have. They had a common bond and it was community baseball. It was little league baseball that brought them together and you know, they still talk today. It's fantastic. So, yeah, yeah. was a great, great day. Well, one thing, Craig, that we have not talked about to do an abrupt pivot between all the sports between soccer and baseball is what we've been up to for the past few months in a new business venture. Hibernating? Getting fat. getting more gray hair. That's the thing, you log in and I was doing a little beard check and you know what? The kids have been absolute jerks about this too. Alexa will walk up to me and say, hey, you got some yogurt in your beard. I'm like, no, that's not yogurt, Lex. And you look back at pictures 10 years ago, Craig, no gray hair. Twins were born nine years ago, all gray hair. I think there's something in there. Well, speaking of kids and stress, it's been really exciting to build out a company. And basically what Craig and I have found is what we know really, really well, as you guys have heard, is on the sports side of it, right? What it takes to practice, to get to games, to coordinate. Craig's coaching a team where none of his kids are in the organization, right? You're running around doing five practices and a couple of games each week. You've got two kids at home that are doing competitive dance. and you know, Britton are high-fiving in the driveway saying, all right, you're going here, I'm going there. We're the same thing with our three kids. A couple of days ago, we had eight, no, let's check that. We had 10 pick up and drop off events that day where we were going from one place to another with all three kids with our own activities. yeah, effectively what, but Lauren and I. We wake up every morning, we look at each other and we're like, all right, we've got a lot of things going on. We got to be here, you got to be there, kids got to be here, kids got to be there. What's our game plan? How are we going to do this together and get this done? What's the game plan? And that's kind of where it was born of you want to create a company that lessens the stress and increases the transparency, the accountability, and just being there for each other and driving it through technology. The game plan of life. That's where we're at. How do we get that all organized? And go on, can pitch or I can pitch of a single family calendar and an Excel sheet does not work. Trial, tested, and burnt all at the same time. That's the biggest struggle. I'm gonna talk the struggle bubble. We wanna be everywhere. We wanna do what's right for our kids and we wanna be sane while we're doing it. And we're not able to do that. I mean, there's so many tools out there. I wanna reduce the gray, that is a great pitch. I don't know if we can legally say that, but prevent, preventative. Prevent the gray hairs, prevent the tension between your spouse or your kids. And that's, it is the overall pitch. So we see all the tension that happens with all of the activities that we have going on in life, all of the balls that we have in the air, the plates that are spinning. How can we lessen that burden? And the part that for me, tip me over the edge is, you know, we work in a corporate environment or have worked in a corporate environment for 15, 20 years. There are so many tools to keep teams and organizations aligned. The whole valley is built on a set of business tools that you can put tasks in there. You can put your calendars in there. You can put your project plans in there. You can put your one-on-one meetings in there. All of it's there. And then the minute you come home, you're trying to survive, right? You're unaware. of paper like, hey, have you got this? you do, like, it's ridiculous. I'm not gonna use Slack with my family. Like. using Trello One Thanksgiving for a Thanksgiving turkey, Thanksgiving meal and didn't work out the way that we wanted. that way. So, welcome to Gaimplan So we are in a beta right now and plan to release to the general public in the next couple of months and excited to get everybody's feedback. All right. Are you feeling that same stress? Have you found a system or a tool or a process that keeps it all organized and keeps your whole family in line? Or are you like us where you feel like every day is a survival. You can't wait to get your head on the pillow so that you're done running around and thinking about all of that. Because if we do this the right way, it's proactive. is a proactive family assistant that is able to just guide you through and make recommendations and do some activities for you. So you can just focus on what matters, actually being there for the kids. Well, the other thing as well is there's two sides that I want to bring out is one, we always neglect ourselves. We never, unless you are, you know, 5.30 AM get to the gym because literally the only time I have or, you know, 9 PM, whatever. Yeah, well, he just walks around with a headset on, but, you know, there's that side of it. Mix that with, you know, help. So like the grandparents, like, okay, I'm here to help. Where do you need me? When do you need me? What's the... And it always, again, goes to the default. Gotta make a phone call, gotta send a text message, gotta look at the family calendar to try and figure this out. Which just, again, it doesn't make any sense when we live in the middle of Silicon Valley and we have technology to help. Or not even Silicon Valley, but just technology to help. And we just talked about the entire community. That was one of the stats that surprised me the most is, you know, in the 1980s, 1990s, and well before that, it's community-based. You're raising your family with a set of families, and there are no fences. Everybody's playing, everybody's outside. And we've seen a giant trend where, especially since COVID, everybody is indoors or in their own environment. more limited access than history shows of working with everybody. So if we're on more of a same page or more well connected, how do we build those bridges and help each other out? It takes a village to raise the family. It takes a village to get to practices and carpools and everything that's going on. Is there a way that we can help lessen that burden and really power everybody's family? yeah, and I mean, you said it right. The name came from, hey, what we do and what's the game plan for today, right? Pretty simple. And then it goes to the minute I can see your calendar, Chad, and see that you can't do pick up or drop off at soccer, but I'm at the field and you request me to help. No problem. You can see I'm already there. I don't have anything extra. It's just a point of communication of, hey, can you bring Lex home or yeah, whatever. So I mean, it's simple. I think what we've developed, and I say developed and we in the same phrase, we definitely aren't coders. So we didn't develop, but it seems simple, but it's not. It's complex. Cause there's so many moving parts. There's so many angles of my calendar, your calendar, your Brit's calendar, Lauren's calendar. Like everybody's moving at such a pace that, you know, we have to figure it out. To your point, there's 10 drop-offs in one day. Well, that's chaotic. We need somebody can help just by asking again community approach right if we're all part the same soccer program or baseball program or school or whatever Somebody can take that burden and it takes one off me and I think one of the big things that I didn't realize was such an issue Was and you know, unfortunately we we have friends, you know that are divorced or going through a divorce and that communication point right they they literally now have two separate calendars in life and now have kids that are in one calendar But that point of communication and making sure nobody drops the ball is such a key part that, again, something I didn't think of when we were talking about this and talking about growing the business and developing it, but it's definitely a real thing. So I think... And that's the part of as parents and I mean, just in life, your aperture just gets laser focused at times because there's so much going on. And this happens at work on different projects too, right? There's a due date and you just laser focus, you have tunnel vision. And we get that tunnel vision as parents where you're sitting there like, all right, this is how I get through today. And you lose focus and you just do so many of those days in a row. Then you lose a month. you lose a month and before you know it, it's March 21st and you're a third of the way through the year. That's not good math, a fourth of the way through the year. Yeah. See, my math skills are there because I just immediately went to the, after this recording session, we need to be here, here, and here, and then tomorrow we need to do this. If you have a system that can be proactive and get ahead of that, that can identify trends and say, hey, you haven't had a date night in two months. Well, I was just about to go there, right? Again, you get so directionally positioned. Maybe we can save some divorces and date nights come back around. Who knows? I think it's even before that, Craig, of if you can show the transparency of what I'm worried about, and you as a friend could lessen that burden, or me as a friend. Back in Ohio, I use the airport analogy all the time. If you were going to a trip, call a family member, you call a friend, like, I'm going. You don't Uber to the airport. It's like a community thing. I'm gonna help get you there, I'm gonna help pick you up. we've become dependent on the Ubers and all that. Can we proactively get that reconnection? It's funny you say that, sidebar, I totally forgot that as well. Well, I'm like, in England growing up, it was always like, hey, can you take me to the airport? It was never a question of a yes or a no. was like, unless I'm actually doing something else, it was a yes. Or, can you look after the dog? No problem. Again, we definitely lost that, for sure. Because life's become too complex. it is, and you don't, we don't want to burden somebody because you don't know what they're going through. But at the same time, like my, my door is open. My car is open. If I'm going someplace and somebody needs a ride, I'm, I'm there. I can help out. if you called me tomorrow and said, Hey, I wasn't able to pick up milk at the grocery store, but I'm busy. Can you pick some up? Absolutely. But it's just enabling those touch points. How can we actually get that and be proactive about Rebuild the community brick by brick. So that's the aspiration, that's the goal. If you are interested, you need to spell that with an AI in the middle, G-A-I-M-P-L-A-N.AI. If you're like me, you'll have to do that a couple of times because spell check will want to correct it. But we're doing beta testing right now. We love insights, support, ideas, whatever you have on what we're building out, but we're pretty excited. to add it onto the list of things we're trying to accomplish between soccer, baseball, family, and otherwise. it's juggling. That's it, always juggling. Well, Craig, we have managed to speak for 45 minutes already in episode one. So I think we cut there. We have some guests lined up for the rest of season two. I, as always, appreciate everybody listening in. If you wanna follow us on social media, we're on Instagram, the Struggle Bubble Pod, and we're gonna try and post a little more regularly to YouTube. I'm not sure, but we do have two supporters that if we do not post on YouTube, They will let me know about it. But really going to continue to talk about the struggles of, of coaching, of sports leagues, of parenting and everything in between. And if you have any recommendations on what you'd like to hear next, please send them in. With that, I think we're out. We'll see you on the pitch. Yeah, by the time somebody's listening to this, you will already have played us and I'm not going to make any predictions, Craig, but I will say keep your eye out for Alexa. personally because I told her to throw some elbows. prediction is Lost Gatos will win. Los Gatos will win or draw. I don't All right, thanks everybody. Adios!