Claudio Reilsono
Episode 271
8 APR 2024
He has had a long career in baseball, including being the all-time leader in wins as coach of the Carnegie Mellon University baseball team, which he guided to consecutive conference championships in 2015 and 2016. As a professional scout, he has assisted in professional player signings all over the world and in 2002 was named General Manager of the Global Scouting Bureau. He is also a professional hitting instructor, conducting his own hitting camps in several states and serving as a hired instructor at many baseball camps. He was voted into the “Steel City Sports” Hall of Fame in 2014, and is the author of a book called, “Lead from the Heart Up, Not the Neck Up.”
Notable guest quotes:
“My mom is the one who taught me things, talked to me about God, about prayers, Italian prayers and the importance of having it in your life and faith.”
“I remember going by our church and I didn’t realize I did it so audibly, so loud, that I used to pray, ‘Please don’t let my daddy go blind. Please don’t let my daddy go blind.’ … My dad never went blind… Three or four doctors told him that he had glaucoma, and he was going to go blind… He would tell you, ‘It was little Claud’s prayers that got me through’.”
“My uncle used to work over at Three Rivers Stadium, where the Pirates and Steelers used to play.”
“My dad had a landscape business. I learned how to switch hit (by) hitting apples and rocks. So, I was constantly hitting and swinging and throwing and my mom used to say if there was a baseball in the air you could be sure Claudio is underneath it.”
“I got a job at Quigley Catholic High School for a whopping 800 dollars a year, but I enjoyed those two years, and we were playing in a tournament one time, and I remember my dad told me, he said, “I’m very proud of you.’ He said, ‘You treated this Quigley Catholic baseball team as if it were the Yankees. You bloomed where you were planted’.”
“I’ve had a lot of negatives, banana peels, I’ll call them, that I had to avoid. I learned a lot. I learned that through faith, that’ll help you get through.”
“That day, I always say, the good Lord presented me, said, ‘Here, Claudio, this is your gift,’ you know, ‘This is it, this is going to be your day’.”
“Without the good Lord’s presence and my parents, (I) guarantee you all those accolades or jobs or whatever opportunities I’ve had would not have occurred.”
“The good Lord would have said, ‘Hey, have faith, in a couple years you’re going to be at that ballpark. You’re going to sign that guy on TV. You’re going to sign that guy’s nephew.’ Things can happen in life.”
“How did they happen? I always say, Very simply; through faith, through hard work, perseverance, or, I condense it into the word T-O-P-P – I had to be tough, I had to overcome, I had to be persistent, and I had to pray.”
“Everything I do is from a Christian foundation. That’s how I was raised.”
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