Overseas Baseball Podcast

http://www.baseballjobsoverseas.com/e68 Daniel Catalan had a successful college career playing with Holy Name University where hit a very respectable .282 and a very nice OBP in his senior year of .410. He also led HNU in triples in both his seasons there and did not commit a single error in the outfield. Like many talented college graduates, professional teams did not come knocking on his door. So he gave overseas baseball a try and signed up for a profile at the International Baseball Community website. Weeks went by and crickets. Why? Why are overseas clubs also not interested? Daniel surely has a lot to bring to the table and could definitely do well in any league Europe has to offer. The number 1 reason why: he is an outfielder, the position in least demand overseas. In this interview Daniel explains how he earned a spot playing on a club from one of the most visiting cities in Europe, Barcelona and following that how he got to play in the South American Baseball Championship in Buenos Aires, Argentina

http://www.baseballjobsoverseas.com Overseas professional import Jimmy Jensen tells his story how he made his way up from cut from his high school baseball team travelling the world playing baseball.

Josh Wyant grew up playing baseball in North Carolina and was never the standout player but always had a passion for the game and worked hard at getting better. He was a three sport athlete between cross country, baseball and swimming and as college grew closer, he was told his best shot was at running. In his senior year of high school he moved to a new high school and was given the opportunity to improve himself to the level he needed through a coach who did more for him in that one season than any other coach in his life, Coach Pete Hardee. Between Josh's hard work and dedication and Coach Hardee's guidance, he was able to pursue a college baseball career with stops at Winston Salem State,Wilkes Community College and LeMoyne Owen College. Although these college baseball programs were within some of the lowest ranked conferences in NCAA baseball, Josh was able to put up some good numbers, even when playing some of the top schools in the nation during non conference games. "Never in my life was I a highly

In 1995 Ryan Schurman was a 10th round draft pick of the Atlanta Braves. Twenty years later he is married with a baby boy and living in Germany and coaches cricket. Ryan is another remarkable story of how playing baseball overseas can not only be a way of extending a playing career, but also a life changing experience.

In 2012, Tanner Leighton, the #4 ranked NAIA prospect in the country from The Masters College in California, was one of many players in the independent ball system who had been in contact with scouts during his college tenure, yet had no luck come June. After a season of Independent ball, playing with both the Washington Wild Things and London Rippers, Leighton went to play winter ball in Australia for the Melville Braves of Perth. Tanner then spent the 2013 summer season playing with the Solingen Alligators of the German Bundesliga before signing again to play a second season in Australia. However, Tanner was pulled aside by Australian customs officials upon his return and spent two days in a detention centre as he did not have the proper visa to return for a second year. The end result was a three year ban from Australia which left Tanner without an baseball option for the next three winters. Tanner returned to Germany for a second season with the Alligators, this time leading them to a German Championship

Will Thorp grew up playing baseball in British Columbia, Canada where he also started his college career at a local junior college. After a successful freshman year, he earned a chance to play at Lewis-Clark State College, one of the top NAIA baseball programs. In 2014, upon graduating from LC, Will decided to hang up his cleats. "I had finished up college on a rough note. My 4 years at LC taught me a ton about myself, how to handle situations, how to look at the game in a complete different view and be a warrior. Unfortunately I could never prove myself to the coaches offensively and had minimal ABs in my years there." Will did what many young western Canadians do, give in to the temptation to earn big bucks and went to work in the oil rigs up north. With not much to do other than work and sleep over the course of a few months, Will had plenty of time to dream about baseball. It is thus no surprise that without hesitation Will jumped on an opportunity presented to him by an old teammate to go play baseball

For the 2015-2016 winter season, there were a total of nine IBC members sign contracts in the Capital Territory State League based in Canberra, Australia. This is one of six state leagues in Australia that regularly import baseball players from abroad. This interview is with Graham Vickers, the president of the Ainslie Bears, a club who have utilized the website to import players over the past couple of seasons. Here is an earlier interview from 2015 with Andrew Medeiros, an IBC member and former Ainslie Bear from the 2014-2015 season. Between the two interviews you can get a good idea of what the life of a baseball import to Canberra may be like on and off the field.

Sam Siddall is a graduate from the Midland University (NAIA) where he spent three years as a relief pitcher with limited action. Post college, in 2013, he was playing in a mens league in Alberta, Canada when a friend presented him with an opportunity to coach youth in Australia after receiving the opportunity himself and having to decline. Sam had some coaching experience but no experience as a head coach at the time. He jumped on the opportunity and soon found himself in Adelaide, Australia with the Northern Districts Reds coaching the U17 and U15 teams while playing for their second division mens team.....

After finishing up the 2010 season with Almere and Hamburg and achieving his long term goal of pitching the Dutch Head Class, Boomer was undecided what to do about his baseball career and was leaning towards focusing on finishing law school and getting a job. After back-to-back years with no offseason and pitching 7-9 innings every start, his arm definitely needed a rest. However during the 2010 summer while on break from pitching in Holland, Boomer visited a girl living in Budapest (Hungary) whom he met while in Italy. While visiting her, he looked up baseball in Budapest online and found a local club of which he contacted by email with the help of his friend as a translator. They invited him out to practice and Boomer soon found himself practicing with grown men at a level he had never seen before, which was an interesting experience in itself and an eye opener. The Hungarians were immediately amazed as they had never seen anything close to a mid to upper 80's fastball and said to Boomer that they "would b

In IBC episode 58, Justin "Boomer" Prinstein walked us through the beginning of his international professional baseball story which was a wild one with lots of ups and downs with stops in Belgium and Israel. This was all in the span of one season as well. He returned home for only a month before committing to the Southern Districts Hawks of the South Australian Baseball League for second half of the 2007-2008 winterball season. He arrived at the beginning of December, well into their season, just in time to qualify for the playoffs. However he had to play one miserable inning after being on a journey for 45 hours just to make this qualifying game. Luckily for Boomer, he had the next month off as the league went on break for Christmas. This gave him time to adjust to the time zone and settle into Adelaide with his new family, the Crabbs, home to his Aussie teammate and roommate Adam from the Israel Baseball League. Boomer took full advantage of the month off and did a lot of travelling in South Australia, e

More stories at: http://www.baseballjobsoverseas.com Justin "Boomer" Prinstein has been involved in baseball overseas since he first came to Europe in 2006 as an import pitcher. The former George Washington University pitcher his junior and senior years in the shadows of some of his teammates. In fact, half of his team from his junior year were drafted. He was a bit undersized (5'11") and his high 80's fastball was figured to be maxed out as far as scouts were concerned. In 2006, upon graduation, the assistant coach at GW and former international player brought it to Boomer's attention that overseas would be a good option for him. Boomer's mind frame back then was to just "Keep playing somewhere and something good will happen", after witnessing players close to his level at pro tryouts get signed and work their way up to the AAA level. With the help of his former coach, Boomer sent his resume out to numerous clubs in Europe and received a number of offers. He decided to accept an offer from a Belgium club b

More international baseball stories at: http://www.baseballjobsoverseas.com The Euro League Baseball (ELB) is a new professional baseball league in Europe set to launch in 2016. There has been a lot of hype over the league during the offseason as players and imports anticipate something that has a lot of potential to be great. As the new year rings in and spring training is approaching fast, there are many rumours circulating about if the league will actually launch in 2016 and if so, how many of the 10 teams are actually going to move forward with it. CEO Wim van den Hurk has been searching high and low for a major sponsor to help subsidize the expenses that will be incurred by the teams involved. At this point, there is no major title sponsor. In a meeting in late November with the owners of the ELB and the managers of the clubs involved, it was discussed if they can proceed given the lack of a major sponsor. Estimated costs were outlined and strategies were discussed and all clubs were given time to meet

With all the violence that has taken place in France as of late, I can understand why someone may be hesitant to consider playing baseball there in 2016. However, when considering the alternative of staying and playing in the U.S. (for most of you), is France really any more dangerous? The U.S. by far dominates international headlines with regards to violent shootings, so why not take your career over to Europe? My ignorant impression from the outside as a Canadian living in Europe is that you are just as likely to come across senseless acts of violence or terrorism in the U.S. as you are in France. In the end, I guess the question we should ask ourselves is, "Should I allow the acts of terrorists to change my path in life or pass up on opportunities such as travelling the globe while playing baseball?" Only you can answer that for yourself but I know what my answer is and I am pretty sure what these guys would say.

Born in Montana, Kris Richards spent most of his life in North Carolina where he grew up playing baseball. After high school he remained in North Carolina as he signed on with the NCAA D1 University of North Carolina at Greensboro where he played ball from 2008 to 2012. In his senior year he hit .342 in what is regarded as one of the best college conferences in the country, the Southern Conference. Richards was drafted by the Orioles where he spent two years as a shortstop in A ball before being converted to a pitcher at the age of 23. This quickly led to a elbow injury and a year on the sidelines recovering from Tommy John surgery. Upon recovery, Richards decided to not continue to chasing a career as a player, and turned his focus to coaching. While coaching at an academy in North Carolina run by Mike Griffin, a former Czech National team coach, Richards was introduced to the possibility of jumpstarting a coaching career in the Czech Republic. "I had no idea where the Czech Republic was to be honest wit

Born in Annemasse, France, Owen Ozanich at a young age moved to the U.S. where he grew up in South Burlington, Vermont. Like many boys his age growing up in the U.S., he fell in love with the game of baseball. He found success early on as a little leaguer as the winning pitcher of the New England state championship game that was televised on ESPN2. In high school this trend continued as he led the South Burlington Rebels to a 20-0 record and the Vermont State Championship. In the fall of 2007 Ozanich made the University of Vermont Catamounts (NCAA D1) as walk-on and appeared in 35 games over two seasons. Upon graduating from college, he continued to play baseball in a men's league in Vermont before discovering that there is baseball in France and that he could use his dual citizen to jumpstart a career overseas. In 2011 he joined the top team in the French Elite League, the Rouen Huskies, and has been with them ever since as one of the league's top pitchers year-after-year. In 2011 McKenzie was a sophomore

Growing up in Wessington Springs, South Dakota, Sam at a young age was fascinated with woodwork and had a talent for making things out of wood. One of his high school hobbies was carving formula one cars from the quarter scale drawings featured in Road & Track. It is an annual pursuit he still follows today. He was also heavily involved in sports including football, basketball, track and field, and sporadically baseball. He had no idea it was the latter sport that he would eventually have a huge impact on. However first he spent 22 years as a stagehand for the National Arts Centre before finding his true calling of producing baseball's first maple bat.

Growing up in Southern California, Clayton Carson had the regular baseball dreams and aspirations that any young kid would have. Coming from a good baseball family and community, he had the opportunity to make the most out of the game of baseball. In college he jumped around from a few different colleges before settling in with San Diego State University under the helm of MLB great Tony Gwynn in 2005. Clayton played third base and shortstop for Gwynn and led the team in base hits and RBIs after 13 games before undergoing a career ending second back surgery. Clayton turned his focus to coaching and international baseball which has lead him on a path to remember.

Since I arrived on the baseball scene in Europe in 2004, there have been two American names that seem to keep popping up wherever I go, Ty Erikson and Justin (Boomer) Prinstein. I didn't know much about either but it was apparent these two were well connected within European baseball circles. I learned more about Ty in 2013 when his travel baseball team from the U.S. came to play at Finkstonball, our international tournament in Austria. They were called the International Game and they consisted of aspiring professional players who had paid their way to Europe to travel and play various European clubs over a two week period in hopes of getting picked up and at the very least develop some contacts for the future. It was at Prague Baseball Week that Ty told me about another project that him and Boomer are involved in, an annual college showcase in the U.S. for young European talent. A passion project of theirs which began in Florida in 2013 and then Washington DC in 2014, will now be held in Pheonix Arizona i

Andrew Medeiros was a standout in his NCAA III conference as a speedy catcher who hit for average with power for Westfield State College. After an all to familiar story of a talented player slipping through the pro baseball cracks in the U.S. Andrew decided to start looking for a 9-5 job. Before he really even got started looking, a friend told him about the International Baseball Community website and Andrew threw up a profile immediately and contacted me. Within two weeks he was on a plane to Canberra, Australia to play for the Ainslie Bears in the Capital Territory State League.

Alex Lee grew up just outside of Boston attended Wofford College (NCAA D1) in South Carolina where he played baseball for the Terriers and graduated with a business degree in 2011. An injury in his senior year left him with little options to continue his post college baseball career so Lee decided to pursue a coaching career once he realized that a regular 9-5 office job was not for him. After moving around the U.S. for various coaching jobs, Lee was presented with an opportunity to play and coach baseball in Austria in 2014 through a friend of his that had done the same the previous year. The Tulln Ravens hired Lee to coach all ages from the men's teams to all three youth teams. He also played on the Ravens top men's team which play in the Regional League East, which is Austrian third division baseball.