This life isn't for you Pt. 1

The title of the newsletter will make more sense over the next few weeks.

Sometimes I look back over the years and I wonder how we're still standing pushing through. Still chasing the vision. I don't think I know anyone that wouldn't have quit already.

I’ve been wanting to start showing absolutely everything… building everything completely 100% authentically and publicly.. showing all the ups, the downs, the good, and the bad - because unlike most social media accounts like to display… it isn’t all glamourus. It’s hard, its dirty, and you spend half of the time wondering if it’s even worth the pain and struggle.

But if we’re gonna start showing it all in the present.. it may make sense to start in the past to show exactly how we got to this point.

So Lets take it back to the beginning... like right to the beginning.

May 2003 I was having a normal dinner with my family at our house in North York when the phone rang. I picked up the phone to a thick french accent. It was the head Canadian scout for the Anaheim Angels (now the Los Angeles Angels) who asked to come sit down with the family and talk.

In my mind I feel like this should have been a massively exciting thing to happen in my life - but I don't remember being excited. This was the final year of high school and I've already signed with one of the top junior colleges in the country out of Texarkana, Texas so unless the scout had something crazy to say I was going to college to play, get better, and prepare for draft in the next couple years.

The way it works generally is if you're a top top prospect in the country you'll already know pretty far in advance that you're going in one of the top rounds and you'll have a general idea around how much money the team is going to be offering. I hadn't heard anything about anything at the time and I knew I needed some more development to become that top prospect status. Essentially the only way I would consider the draft is if I was going in the top 10 rounds. A good player in the top 10 rounds, with some development, will usually start playing in the MLB in a couple years - if you're top 3 rounds sometimes you get there right away.

We sat down with the scout for the Angels. The meeting wasn't very long. They wanted to take me in the 13th round and they we're offering a $70k signing bonus.

Now you think as an 17 year old kid about to leave high school would be over the top about this. Again, I wasn't. I knew what my abilities and potential were (so did others - reference image below - Perfect Game is the world's largest baseball scouting service) so I decided to turn the offer down and go to college, get better, and go after it again once I got the spot I knew I needed to be.

When draft day came around I didn't even pay attention to it as I knew what my plans were - but again we received a call. This time the New York Mets telling me I've been drafted in the 46th round.

I said no.

This is what I've been working for my entire life. Legitimately since I was like 5 years old. We're going to Texas. We're going to get better. And we're going to go in one of the top rounds next year.

You can pinpoint pivotal moments in your life. Moments that almost hard wire certain thoughts and behaviors into your character. Moments in life that are so vivid they are engrained into your memory forever. They are memories that would generally seem insignificant to anyone else.

For example my first introduction to both the gym and metal we're at the same time.

It's 1992 and I'm at our house in Stouffville, Ontario and my dads down in the basement and I was going downstairs to see him. As I walk down the thin walkway from the top of the stairs to the bottom I start hearing music. It gets louder and more audible the closer I get. I turn a quick left and then left again and start walking over to the TV area and to the left of the TV area is the gym my dad built, and that's where he is right now.

I still can't see him because he's tucked around a corner. There's music playing. Some rumbling noises and a quiet voice and I can't really make it out at first. The voice and lyrics start becoming more clear the closer I get and the voice starts increasing in volume and strength.

As I round the corner I see my dad in the gym hitting a set. At the same time the breakdown drops in the song "FUCK YOU I WON'T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME" (you know the song - and if you don’t, you suck, but here’s a link below)

1992 - I'm 7 years old - and I just had one of my biggest personality defining moments and I never even knew it. Since that day I've loved the weights and the gym.. Also since that day I never stopped listening to metal. Usually your music tastes growing up are influenced by your friends but I never once had a friend that listened to metal music, until college. Until Texas.

College.. Texas..

College in Texas is where a lot of the defining moments happened.

The years in Texas are what really started directing me towards the path I'm currently on.

If you've never experienced playing a college sport in the South then a lot of what I write about next week will probably shock you - because some of the shit is legitimately fucking crazy. Every time I tell some of the stories people look at me like what in the fuck - they almost don't believe it.

But yes. Next week.

Because it's time to hit the gym and blast some fuckin metal.