JT Maguire slumped into his worn-out mattress on the ground of a Wofford College dorm. He was 4 jobs faraway from commencement, bunking like a school child working as a volunteer assistant baseball coach, asking himself if he selected the correct path.
Is this life-style sustainable? Am I ever going to have the ability to retire at some point? Am I ever going to personal a home or get married?
He was in his 20s residing off ramen noodles and driving a run-down 2004 Volkswagen Jetta whereas his friends took fancy vehicles to comfortable jobs. Maguire even handed on dates as a result of baseball, regardless of giving him publicity, wasn’t paying sufficient — if something. He missed weddings, funerals, holidays and each household gathering in between.
Baseball took priority. He had a dream and refused to lose sight of it.
Maguire sat exterior Camden Yards’ visiting workforce clubhouse earlier than the center outing of a current three-game homecoming sequence for him, ruminating on a greater than decade-long sacrifice to get to this 12 months: his first as a significant league outfield coach for the Cleveland Guardians.
“I always reflect back on the harder times,” he mentioned. “Times where you kind of want to give up and get a job to make money and start a life. I didn’t have the time or the freedom or the money to go do things that my friends were doing. … It made me more absorbed into the game.”
Baseball entranced a younger Maguire rising up in Jarrettsville, first launched by his father, Jim Jr., and grandfather, Jim Sr. The household yard morphed into their ballpark, an area for JT and his youthful brothers, Tyler and Brady, to play wiffle ball till the solar went down. He was hooked.
JT later starred at North Harford High School beneath coach Tim Larrimore, who led the Hawks for 31 years earlier than stepping down after the 2021 season. He graduated in 2004 to play at Delaware Tech junior faculty then completed his bodily schooling diploma at St. Andrews Presbyterian College, a Division II program in North Carolina.
That’s the place he met Jim Blair, who first floated the concept of a profession in teaching. Blair warned Maguire of the sacrifices which may accompany his selection. But he additionally seen one thing that Maguire didn’t but see in himself.
“The way that he was as a coach — he was a player’s coach and a very calming person,” Maguire recalled. “He said, ‘Hey, I kind of see similarities in you and myself. I think that you have a good eye for the game. Maybe [coaching] is something that you should pursue.’”
‘Just a launching pad’
Thirteen years in the past, Maguire obtained his first teaching gig. George Cooper gave him a shot as an assistant for The Park School of Baltimore, much better recognized for teachers than athletics.
Now clad head to toe in Guardians gear, he smirked, “I can distinctly remember that first practice.”
They have been drilling routine fly balls. Maguir lofted one deep to proper discipline that plummeted down, lacking the child’s outstretched glove and smacking him squarely within the face. “We developed the crap out of them,” he mentioned, which might come to outline his teaching physique of labor.
Maguire’s first and solely season at Park was 2010, when it gained this system’s solely Maryland Interscholastic Athletic Association convention championship. Success adopted him to the subsequent cease, aiding Larrimore at North Harford in 2012. He helped a workforce that included his brother, Brady, make an look within the state closing.
“Once I knew that he was interested, it was a given to bring him on,” Larrimore mentioned. “He was very serious about the game and putting in the time to get better. … I knew right from the beginning that he was going to make us a much better team.”
Kevin Mooney can attest. He was a senior pitcher for the Hawks with a front-row seat to Maguire’s strategy. Mooney, who went on to pitch at Maryland, lauded the brand new coach’s power and experience. In hindsight, he might inform Maguire was destined for higher heights.
“That was always just a launching pad for him,” Mooney mentioned.
Maguire grew to become a training nomad of types. He left North Harford to educate at Harford Community College, Wofford and Lander University in two-year stints from 2013 to 2018. Those years, making little cash teaching tons of baseball, examined his resolve. His motive to maintain going: Seeing his gamers transfer up the ranks was a excessive he couldn’t attain anyplace else.
Ben Brewster was the primary participant to take action beneath his tutelage at Park. Brewster went on to play at Maryland earlier than getting drafted by the Chicago White Sox in 2014. Maguire continued to chase that feeling.
It fueled his development to the faculty ranks and meteoric rise throughout the Guardians group. JT debuted as a bench coach for the rookie membership in 2019. He then coached on the main league alternate coaching web site through the throws of the pandemic earlier than transferring as much as a bench function with Triple-A Columbus in 2021. Last 12 months he oversaw outfielders and baserunning all through the group.
Fruits of his labor
Maguire consistently appears to be like for tactics to higher his craft. He used to jot notes from American Baseball Coaches Association conferences, accumulating educating fodder to implement along with his faculty groups. He and a buddy, Kainoa Correa, who now coaches for San Francisco, started tweeting their very own catalog of expertise and drills. Correa took the infield, Maguire dealt with the outfield, which he termed a lesser-discussed house.
Then the ABCA requested JT to talk on its small stage. Nothing loopy for the then-Lander assistant. A 12 months later, he joined Cleveland’s group and was poached to attempt the principle stage in Nashville, Tennessee, on Outfield Play: The Development and Evolution of the Forgotten Position.
That meant 10,000 spectators.
Maguire is soft-spoken. Fairly reserved, too. If he’s not on a diamond, he’s removed from civilization, tenting or climbing alongside his girlfriend, Kat Murphy, and their canine, Cleat. JT can be methodical in explaining what he is aware of finest however by no means fast to disclose something not exhaustively thought out.
As a participant, Maguire confirmed up early to practices, having his dad whack balls off the fence so, like Hall of Fame basketball participant Dennis Rodman with rebounding angles, he might research patterns of the ball’s ricochet. Jim remembers when JT began with Cleveland. The two sat in entrance of the TV for hours at a time poring over a single swing. “He was explaining stuff I had never even thought of.”
Naturally, making ready for the ABCA consumed his summer season, JT was a nervous wreck. He neatly organized his slideshow, ready movies and rehearsed his speech alone within the basement.
“JT is not a public speaker at all,” Diane mentioned. “People always say, ‘Pretend that everybody in the audience is in their underwear.’ We didn’t do that. We just said, ‘Go talk about what you know.’”
What JT is aware of is baseball. And that lecture — advocating for what’s referred to as the pro-step strategy and outlining his tedious drill work — was a springboard for his recognition.
Guardians outfielder Steven Kwan prospered via JT’s teachings, progressing from short-season Mahoning Valley via the minors and ultimately to the massive league workforce. Kwan was drafted in 2018 out of Oregon State. He mentioned in faculty the place might be extra simplistic — as in, simply get to the ball. Maguire provided extra nuance.
“He restructured how I throw and my glove location on a ground ball,” Kwan mentioned, who final 12 months grew to become the second Cleveland rookie ever to win a Gold Glove. “He made me actually take into consideration all these issues and he had the proof to again it up.
“He’s not super aggressive with it. He sort of tries to lead you to the answer and asks you what you’re thinking and if nothing comes up, he’ll suggest something and see if you like it or not. Then he’ll present the evidence and show the videos and compare it to what we were saying.”
When Kyle Hudson left his put up because the Guardians outfield coach for a job with the Boston Red Sox, Maguire was a logical alternative. But the method nonetheless left him on pins and needles. Then the telephone rang. It was January and he was working a minor league camp in Arizona. The cathartic information of a promotion on the opposite finish nonetheless rings in his head.
Maguire slumped again in opposition to a four-wheel drive gator within the blazing southwestern warmth, reveling within the euphoric emotion of understanding, sure, he selected the correct path.
“He watched his friends get married and have kids and succeed in life and have jobs,” Murphy mentioned. “He told me about the times sitting on a mattress on the floor in a college dorm thinking, ‘What the heck am I doing? I’m missing out on life.’ … It’s a commitment level that I think a lot of people don’t have and don’t understand. Knowing where he came from to where he is now, he’s so grateful.”
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Source: www.bostonherald.com