Interview with baseball player Zak Taylor
Zak Taylor played baseball at Oregon State. He graduated in 2019 with his degree in Psychology. After graduation, he continued to play professionally. He is from Sherwood, Oregon. He is a big golfer, and he loves to go fishing in the summer. He is a Mental Performance Trainer for ROKKE Performance Therapy and does content creation the Baseball Bat Bros. In this interview we talked a lot about the power of your mind in sport.
Below I have written most of what we talked about but you can listen to the full podcast HERE.
Q: When did you start playing sports?
A: I think I started playing sports as young as when I could start walking. I always had a ball or a bat in my hand as a child.
Q: When did you start playing competitive?
A: When I was probably 13 or 14 I started traveling more and getting more serious about it. My 8th grade year is when I started to play at a high level.
Q: How many / what sports did you play competitively?
A: I also played football and basketball. It kept me in shape and I played with my best friends. I knew early on that baseball was my best sport and favorite sport.
Q: How did growing up in Sherwood affect your sport?
A: It’s a small suburb in the Portland area that started to get big when I graduated. Football was my favorite sport to play in high school because of the small town vibe and the atmosphere with everyone showing up to games.
Q: Have you ever faced any injuries or setbacks?
A: I partially herniated a disk in my lower back that took me a few weeks to recover. It was right before season so it hindered my ability to train fully in the off season.
Q: How was professional baseball different than college?
A: I was fortunate to play on arguably the best team the history Oregon State Baseball had. Everyone had the goal of getting to Omaha to win the national title. It was amazing to play with great teammates who were first round picks in the MLB. It’s unbelievable to be able to say that I played on that team and to be successful in the role that I had. Pro ball is eye opening in a sense because it’s more of a business. You’re getting paid to play and it’s based off performance. It was great to get into pro ball but then you realize it can be challenging with the individual goals players have to get to an affiliate.
Q: What was the transition out of playing competitive sports like for you? What did you do in your newfound free time?
A: It was hard and it was something that was in the back of my head for months. I was still planning about 6 months ago to continue playing. It was the first time in my life where practicing and training felt like work. I realized that I didn’t want to do this and it wasn’t fun for me anymore. I am not defined by baseball and I’m 25, I have the rest of my life. If I don’t want to do something, there’s no point in doing it. I couldn’t go into a season not going 100% in. Our days were so structured and scheduled out in college and now you’re on your own. There’s not many professional baseball players in my area so it’s tough to coordinate and get the training in as much as possible.
In my new free time I picked up golf. I always wanted to do it but never had the time. Now I have the time and it feels like it is a bit harder than baseball because it’s me against me and I have that internal competitiveness. I can work on the game by myself and I don’t need other people there. That’s different than baseball because it requires having someone else there to play catch with and do baseball drills with. I love to be outside; I enjoy it because it’s a way for me to decompress.
Q: Do you feel like you would have done a different degree if you weren’t a student-athlete?
A: Honestly, I think I would have. I probably would have gone into exercise science. I probably would have pursued being in the fitness industry in some way. I felt like I could do a lot with that degree. I went into college with that degree, it was titled kinesiology but it was the same degree path as exercise science since that is what Oregon State offered. I found out quickly that I had no interest in some of those classes. I might have done marketing as a business major since I was super interested in that. I had an experience my sophomore year in college. I didn’t play much yet that year as I was still learning and growing. I had some performance anxiety. I met a guy named Alan Jager, who invented the J bands and is a big mental skills advocate, and he’s done a lot of mindfulness training. We (the team) were going to meet up with him and I was so excited. We were doing some breath work and I originally thought it was stupid. His demeanor being calm and collected and the way he addressed the team was someone I wanted to be around. I decided to take the experience serious and I was open to it. How I felt coming out of it I felt calm and my anxiety was diminished. I wanted to talk to him one on one so I talked to him. I decided that I needed to get myself right from a mental standpoint to be able to compete at a high level. The conversation with him was great and changed my life. We worked on internal dialogue and how I talked to myself, which was a game changer.
Q: Did you consider being a full time / team coach?
A: I did, I actually have a still a lot of people that tell me I should be a coach. I have been offered coaching jobs. I did turn them down. The time commitment and the schedule it takes with being at the field all the time and working with people behind the scenes all the time is a lot. I’m never gong to say that I won’t be a coach but I like where I’m at right now so maybe later down the road it could be a possibility.
Q: How did playing competitive baseball shape who you are today?
A: I was really able to learn a lot of hard life lessons. You start to learn that no matter how well you prepare for something, it doesn’t owe you anything. If you’re on a good stretch, if you’re on a bad stretch, you still have to go in and work every single day and it’s like a bigger metaphor for life. Baseball instilled in me that hard work ethic and learn how to prepare for something.
Q: What was one of your favorite moments while competing?
A: Junior year we’re in Omaha in the championship series against Arkansas. We lost the first game in the 3 game set. In game 2 we were down by 1 run going into the 9th inning and I led off that inning. I had close to a 10 pitch at bat and I walked to get on base. For me, it was more than the at bat, it was all of my mental training leading up to that moment. For me to be in that moment and be able to walk in that situation was huge. I was so bought in and committed to what I was trying to do and that was all I was worried about, I am going to win this at bat and this is going to go my way, I truly believed. If you’re looking at paper, this guy was a better player than I was but I went into it confident and bought in and proved to myself that I could be really successful in the situation, and I was. If you can truly believe in yourself and know that you put the work in, you’re able to enjoy the moment and embrace the moment.
Q: What advice would you give to someone who is recently done playing a sport?
A: Don’t get caught up in looking too far ahead. You go from all of this structure from being an athlete and that’s all you’ve ever done and all you’ve ever wanted to do. It’s hard no matter how you end your sport. Slow down and don’t think you need to have everything figured out because the reality is that you don’t. Taking it day by day and being in the moment is important and don’t feel like you have to have your entire life figured out.
Q: What advice would you give to someone who is currently playing a sport?
A: Enjoy that day to day grind. You will have so many stressors and just being able to take a step back and realize how far you’ve come. I know I’m dealing with a lot right now but at the end of the day I am grateful for where I am at. Gratitude is super important. Taking a second and having a positive mindset that things are going to work out. Shifting your perspective is so powerful.
Q: Do you have anything else to add?
A: Being a good person is important because you never know what someone else is going through. Self compassion and having empathy for other people and being a good teammate and person and someone that other people want to be around goes a long way. Baseball is awesome and it is my vehicle but it is my way to impact people. I ask myself how can I help other people along the journey because that’s what makes me feel really good at the end of the day.
If you have any more questions for Zak, please leave comments below or contact me. If you or someone you know is struggling, please call the Suicide Hotline. It’s toll free and available 24/7 at 800-273-8255.
Once An Athlete’s mission is to provide resources and support for current and former athletes. Please support our mission by making a donation.
Are you or someone you know currently struggling with what happens in life after sports? Or did you already go through that transition to life after retiring competitive sports and wish you had more resources and support? Have you ever wondered, “what do athletes do after they are done playing sports? What’s next after sports?” Do you feel like you dedicated so much to your sport and you don’t know what to do now that you’re done competing? You’re not alone. Check out the site and join us in the journey. Once an athlete, always an athlete.
More blog posts with baseball players: