The Beginner Photography Podcast

What Baseball Taught Me About Photography

Raymond Hatfield

#588 In this episode of the podcast, I dig into what baseball has taught me about becoming a better photographer. At first glance, these two worlds might seem unrelated, but I quickly realized that the secret to growth in both comes down to the quiet, persistent practice—those thousands of unseen reps that prepare us for our “big game” moments. I share stories from the baseball world, like Dodgers legends Freddie Freeman and Cody Bellinger, as well as insights from head photographer Jon Soohoo, drawing parallels to our photographic journey.

KEY TOPICS COVERED 

  1. The Importance of Consistent Practice (Reps) - Drawing inspiration from baseball, Raymond explains that greatness comes not from isolated performances, but from thousands of unseen, intentional repetitions. Photographers should practice regularly—not just at special events—to develop instinct and technical fluency.
  2. Learning From Failure and Tracking the Right Stats - Baseball legends, who "fail" most of their at-bats, exemplify that success includes and even requires frequent failure. Similarly, not every photo will be a winner, and that's normal. Raymond recommends tracking progress by the number of photos taken or personal growth, not likes or follows.
  3. Growth Through Community and Feedback - Community is vital, just as team dynamics support baseball players. Photography communities (like the podcast’s Facebook group) offer constructive feedback and support, accelerating learning compared to going solo. Having a mentor or a coach provides targeted insight for growth.

IMPORTANT DEFINITIONS & CONCEPTS

  • Reps (Repetitions): Intentional practice sessions, drills, or photographic exercises done consistently. In the context of photography, "reps" mean repeatedly shooting in diverse scenarios to build technical competence, instinct, and creative resilience.
  • Utility Player: In baseball, a player proficient in multiple positions; used here to describe photographers experimenting with various genres to build versatility and discover their niche.

DISCUSSION & REFLECTION QUESTIONS

  1. How can you integrate intentional photography "reps" into your everyday routine?
  2. In what areas do you find yourself waiting for the "perfect" moment rather than practicing in less exciting conditions?
  3. What “stats” matter most to your personal growth as a photographer? How might you measure improvement beyond social media engagement?
  4. How could participating in a community or seeking coached feedback support your progress?

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Thanks for listening & keep shooting!

Raymond Hatfield:

Baseball is about the thousands, thousands of quiet unseen reps that go into making greatness possible. And I think that we as photographers should start to think that way too. We shouldn wait for the quote unquote perfect photo op. We shouldn't wait for a scenic location or vacation or a styled shoot before we even start practicing. We should be ready to go when we get to these places, We should be practicing in the boring moments because that's where things like instinct as a photographer are built. Hey, welcome to the Beginner Photography Podcast, brought to you by Cloud Spot. The number one way to deliver and sell your photos for photographers. I am your host, Raymond Hadfield, and today we're gonna dig into something a little bit different. on the surface it may seem like it has less to do with photography, but I promise you, it has everything to do with your growth as a photographer. So let me throw a quick stat out there for you. Did you know that in baseball, a player who can consistently get a hit just three out of every 10 at bats is considered elite, like Hall of fame level. Amazing. That means that they fail 70% of the time and they're still going to make history. So here's what I've been thinking. Maybe we've been looking at photography all wrong. As photographers, whether you're a hobbyist or even a professional, we look at going out and shooting, as our game, right? We have to be fantastic during our performance. We have to, nail every shot. We have to get focused every time, every moment. Every pose has to be stellar. We're aiming for perfection, that's a normal thing to want to do, to strive towards, but maybe what we actually need here is just simply some more swings, some more at bats. So in today's episode, that is what we're gonna talk about. We're gonna talk about how we can relate baseball to photography and what baseball can teach us about photography, getting up to the plate, taking your swings, learning from the misses, and of course celebrating our wins. You know, sports are nowhere near as fun if we're not celebrating our wins. and I'm not talking about. Simply the amount of likes that you get on your photos. So today we're talking baseball. We're talking photography, and if you like the two things, I really hope that you enjoy this episode. If you like photography, but maybe you're not into baseball, that's fine. I'm not gonna get into all the crazy stats, that. baseball is known for, I'm gonna try to share some stories that I know about baseball that are gonna help, you honestly to grow your skills as a photographer and start to change your mindset around how, you approach photography and how you shoot. Now when we think of baseball, we usually think of a baseball game, right? that's typically how, if you're an adult, that's how you're going to see baseball being played is during a game. But there is a lot more to baseball than just the game. A few years ago I interviewed Dodgers head photographer, John Sue, who here on the podcast, and he said that for a 6:00 PM game, he will show up to the stadium around noon. That seems crazy, right? like why would you show up that early? Truth is the players do as well, and that's why they have batting practice. The players who you see on tv, right? The professional baseball players, they're spending hours in the cages or doing fielding drills before they step into a real game. they don't just show up and hope that the crowd or the lights are gonna, get them pumped up and ready to go. They're gonna show up early, they're going to swing. They're gonna adjust. And then they're gonna swing again before every single game. That's how it works. That's how you prepare for these big moments. In fact, let me share a story with you about Dodgers first baseman, Freddie Freeman. Okay. maybe you've heard of Freddie Freeman. Maybe you haven't. Freddie Freeman has been a professional baseball player for more than 14 years. He's a golden glove first baseman. That means he's the best. He's played more than two thousand games. This guy, Freddie Freeman, he knows how to catch a ball, right? he's probably one of the best people in the world at catching a baseball yet before every single game. Do you know what he does? He practices. He practices his fielding drills. He practices catching balls, and he's not doing it because he's trying to learn how to catch anymore, like he knows. What he's doing is preparing for the moment. He's preparing for when the ball comes his way, he'll be able to catch it because baseball is not just about, showing up in the postseason and then hoping for greatness. That's what people become known for because the stakes are so high, but that's not what baseball is about. Baseball players play 162 games in a season. That's not even including the postseason. They play a lot. Baseball is about the thousands, thousands of quiet unseen reps that go into making greatness possible. And I think that we as photographers should start to think that way too. We shouldn. wait for the quote unquote perfect photo op. We shouldn't wait for a scenic location or vacation or a styled shoot before we even start practicing. We should be ready to go. When we get to these places, what we should be doing is. Practicing in our yard. We should be practicing in our living room. We should be practicing on our lunch break. We should be practicing in the boring moments because that's where things like instinct as a photographer are built. So if you're feeling stuck, I don't want you to wait for inspiration. I don't want you to wait for an upcoming trip before you get out your camera. I want you to get in your reps now. So that when that time comes, you are ready to go. But I get it right. it's kind of hard to start thinking that way again because all we see from baseball players is the game that they're playing. Right? and when we think about photography, think we buy a camera hoping that we're gonna take photos of beautiful scenes. We're gonna take photos of beautiful moments. But we don't really think of our camera as a tool that we need consistent practice with. My wife and I play on an adult, softball league together. And, before you get too excited, last season we went oh, for eight. So like, don't be impressed, thinking that I'm like super athletic or anything. Oh, for eight is not, we do it for the fun, right? But we do play against teams who are not there just for fun. They're there to play. and they take themselves very seriously. some teams are, graduated post-collegiate baseball players. They're intimidating. and. The last thing that you want to do is walk up to the plate and just totally embarrass yourself. swing, huge swing and just completely miss it. or do something dumb. there are different rules, in softball as well, so you gotta know those. But anyway, point is sometimes you do stand at the plate and you feel, the doubt starts to creep in. Maybe I'll miss it. maybe I'll look dumb. And honestly, after eight consecutive losses, you start to think, maybe I'm just bad at this. that's a perfectly normal thought to have in your head. And that's not uncommon for professional baseball players too. They go through slumps. We go through slumps. People go through slumps. We all go through slumps in everything that we do, even the pros. In baseball, a slump might be, you just can't connect with the ball. Or every time a ball is fielded towards you, it just gets passed, right? There's a hole in your glove or something. But in photography it can look similar. you feel like. everything you take is just garbage. In fact, it was either 2016 or 2017. I don't remember exactly what year, but I felt like every single photo I took was trash. I mean, I did not like the photos I took during those years, and that sucks when you know that couples are paying you. And you want to deliver greatness, right? Not only do you want to make this couple happy with their wedding photos, which, is kind of a, a big event in somebody's life and something that they don't do often. For many people, this could be the only time they get wedding photos taken. You want to deliver something great, but on top of that, you also want to create something great. Very few people get into photography for the business side of it, like just to make money. Most people get into photography because they want to create something amazing. And I felt like I wasn't able to do that. And again, it sucks. But having been through it and making it out on the other side, I can tell you that going through that slump doesn't mean that you're broken. It means that you're learning if you're the kind of like picture perfect parent trying to capture, life with your kids and they refuse to smile, like that's okay. That's okay. Maybe they didn't smile on that shot, but you took it with an intentional composition that looked nice. Maybe you're diving into photography after retirement and you can't remember where the ISO button is. That's fine. You're not behind. That is something that you can. I mean, it's easier to learn today than ever before. with things like YouTube and just being able to search the internet, maybe you're trying to balance a a day job with a family, and you have creative dreams to start a business yourself. Every image you take still counts, whether it's your kids, whether it's a a family session. Whether it's just your personal life, every photo you take still counts. And here's the thing, you don't have to love every swing. It doesn't have to connect, but you do have to take it. A baseball player who goes up to the plate and swings and strikes out every time has a better chance of not being traded then a player who just goes up to the plate and watches every pitch go by them. You have to try, even if you don't like it. and on top of that, I'm gonna add something else. You have to practice how you play. Again, if a baseball player went up there and just kind of super weakly, just kind of, swung the bat around just, yeah, whatever. Here you go. I'm just going through the motions. That's not going to work. You have to practice how you play. Meaning you have to do it with intention. Yes, every shot you take counts. If you're paying attention to things like light, you're looking for moment. You're trying to frame up a great composition. If the moment is garbage, if the light didn't work the way that you were hoping, if the composition has too much headroom, well guess what? You still tried and that counts. But that doesn't mean that every photo is going to be a winner. Just like in baseball, not every hit is gonna get you on the sports center. In photography, not every image is gonna go viral or even, get six likes. That's not promised and that's not the point of a photo anyway. a photo that you love might gets scrolled past. You could take this great moment, great composition, beautiful light. Doesn't really connect with a lot of people. And then you're probably gonna find photos. In fact, I can guarantee that you'll find photos on Instagram that everybody else loves, but you don't get it. It doesn't mean anything to you. So what stats, like the amount of likes that you get on a photo, don't define your growth. You are not guaranteed more likes because you have more experience. The algorithm doesn't know how far you've come. It doesn't mean anything. Your best photo might be the one that only you understand, and that's still a win. In fact, I have another Dodger story for you here. Past Dodger Center fielder, Cody Bellinger had one of the weirdest batting stances I've ever seen. It looks like he just doesn't care that he's there to be in the batter's box. I mean, he looks like he's standing like stiff as a board, tall, straight up, straight back, and yet when the ball would come to him. He would hit it, not only often, but he would hit it hard. Lemme paint another picture for you. It's the 2020 World Series against the Tampa Bay Rays. This is game seven, right? It's a Tide series. So winner takes all here, and at this point. It's a tie game. Cody Bellinger comes up to bat. No one on base. He swings, he connects and he gets a home run. So now the Dodgers have taken the lead. This is a huge moment, right? After crossing home plate on his way back to the dugout, he does one of those like jump and bump into each other's celebrations that, you just do with another teammate when you hit a home run in the World Series, making your team take the lead. And when he does that, the way that he hits the other player, he dislocates his shoulder now. You don't have to be a professional baseball player to know that the shoulder is actually a pretty important part to the mechanics of swinging a bat, which is his livelihood. Unfortunately, the Dodgers let him go after a very non-productive, 2021 season because he couldn't get his shoulder to work for his style of swing. Now, does that suck? Yes. Do I love Cody Bellinger? Of course. Belly's the best. Did I hate to see him go to another team like the Cubs? Of course I did, But he showed up every single day after that injury to get better and better and better. It took him three years before he finally started to look like he was getting his swing back. Now the stats on paper say that Cody Bellinger is not doing well, but he and the coaches could see the progress that he was making, right? So while he's not hitting the bombs that he once was, he was celebrating different types of wins. And for those first few games back, maybe just lasting an entire game is a win, even if he didn't get any hits. So sometimes the stats that you're tracking are simply the wrong stats for where you're at. Maybe the stats that you track should be the number of shots that you've taken each month, rather than the number of likes that you get on each post. For me personally, I keep all of my photos within Lightroom and I organize them all of my, my personal work, I organize them by month and year so I can see how many photos each month I am, keeping. I can see the number of keepers that I'm capturing. Each month, and typically, I'm not gonna lie, it'll correlate to the number of things that we're doing that month, right? If we have a busy month with lots of interesting things that we're doing, yeah. I'm gonna take a lot of photos. Typically, in the wintertime, that number starts to dip. Should a dip? No, but it does. I'm human. You're human. I hope you're human. I hope that you're not just ai, just reading a transcript. Trying to copy me and my personality to take over this podcast, but I'm gonna assume that you're human. That's what humans do. But because I can see how many photos are in each monthly folder, I can gauge, oh, do I need to? Take more photos next month. Do I need to try to be more, aware of each moment? Because if I see a month with 600 photos, I'm like, wow, that was a good month. If that next month I see a photo or a folder with 115 photos, I'm gonna think I need to start being more aware of light, of moment, and just be more conscious of having a camera on me so that I can have more plate appearances so that I can have more swings so that when the time comes in, we do have a lot of things planned. Maybe it's a trip, maybe it's a special event. I'm going to be camera ready. So I know that I've shared, some stories, obviously Freddy, Cody Bellinger as well, and these are professional baseball players. Now, you may be thinking to yourself, all right, Raymond, we get it. You love the Dodgers. Woo-hoo. Everybody loves the Dodgers. Go Dodgers. But baseball is a team sport. if you were to fail seven outta 10 times, well there's somebody else who's going to pick up the slack, who's gonna come up to play right after you. And in a game, I would say that's true. But if you listen to interviews from other professional baseball players, they talk about how they learned from former teammates, how they learn from maybe a minor league coach or how there's a player on another team who played. That's actually a great example. Mookie bets also on the Dodgers. Played right field, right, played right field phenomenally for years, four, five years maybe on the Dodgers, but all throughout high school he played shortstop. He was put into right field because, well, Dodgers needed a right field player and Mookie bets was the bat that the Dodgers also needed. Well, when the opportunity came for Mookie bets to move from right field to shortstop, which is what, he loved playing in high school. Do you know what he did? He didn't just say, Hey, I'm one of the highest paid players I am. on paper, one of the best MOB players that there is. What he did was he called other shortstop, players from other teams who he admired, who he liked, and he asked them questions. He's played shortstop. Having a team and having others around you is not just to progress you in a game, it's also to help you, help you get better at the things that you lack or that you don't see, or that you don't notice, so that you can grow because yeah, you know, while. It is only you who's behind the camera when you're taking a photo. Photography can also feel like a team sport, right? Sure. It can be solo. It can also be a community experience if you wish. You can absolutely take those swings on your own, but if you really, really want to grow, you gotta be around other people. Other photographers, other people taking messy swings and then cheering you on. That is why we started the Beginner Photography podcast, Facebook group. That's why we do challenges. That's why this podcast exists. So if you've been lurking, you've been thinking about posting in the group, but you never do, well, this is your nudge. Okay. Get in the game, share something, even if it's not quote unquote your best, share it and then ask a question. Leave a comment on somebody else's win. You will be surprised at what kind of progress you can make and what community does for your momentum. So if you wanna join the Beginner Photography podcast Facebook group, then we'd love to have you. Just head over to beginner photo pod.com/group and come join us. Now in baseball, mechanics is really important to look at. Mechanics are, the things that you do like with your body, right? Like how you move your body to do the thing. Different hitters swing the bat differently than each other. Different fielders, have different ways of catching a ball, but they all move their body, and that's the mechanics of it, right? So just like how, infielders learn how to react to the ball without thinking, photographers need to work on their mechanics. That's not so much the physical aspect of it, but it's, It's reacting to light. I can tell you sometimes I walk into a room or I'm just driving down the road and I see some light and I'm like, holy cow, that is beautiful. Right? Even if I don't have a camera and my wife will look and be like, what are you talking about? It's the way that you see and can anticipate a moment. you hear somebody say something and you know that there's gonna be a reaction to it, so you're ready for it. It's the way that you build a composition. Your world is in a 360 degree view you can turn in any direction that you want, look at anything that you want, but a camera has to be pointed at something specific. So the way that you point and frame your shot is incredibly important. So how do you go through the world and look at it almost in a four by three aspect ratio to figure out what would look good in a frame, even if you don't have the camera to your eye? Those types of things are only possible through reps. And there's this phrase that you've heard me say all the time, right moment matters most, moment matters most. Look, you can capture a great moment with terrible settings, and it's still gonna be a photo that connects with people. That's why a moment matters most, but when you know your settings. When you know how to read light, when you know how to build a composition, and then you wait for the moment so that you can combine the two, right, the settings, the technical, the mechanics, and the moment. Holy cow, you have pure magic. Anybody can take a technically perfect photo. But when you combine it with moment, it all comes together. But getting to the point to where you know your settings, like it's just you know, second nature when you do that, then you're free to be able to capture the moment with more ease and more intention. The same way a baseball player doesn't think about their swing mid-swing. They've done it a million times, it becomes second nature. You shouldn't have to be panicking about your ISO when your kid starts blowing out their candles, right by that point, it's too late. That's where getting in the reps beforehand is going to prepare you for whatever happens. The more you shoot with purpose, even in short bursts, the faster this all becomes second nature. If you shoot a lot of weddings, well, you've gotta get really good at being able to read light and see light so that you know where to be to capture photos in the best. That's something that you should be practicing everywhere you go. Looking for pockets of light and figuring out, okay, what would I do in this situation? Like maybe set a timer on your phone it'll go off every 10 minutes or, or 20 minutes, or even, I don't know, twice a day. And at those times when the timer goes off, you have to stop, look around you and say, okay, where's the light? If I was at a wedding right now, where would I place my couple to get the best photo that I could to get the best light that I can? And sometimes it's not gonna be a great photo, but looking around and being conscious of lights direction, the source of the light is going to help you do those reps, even if you don't have a camera in your hand. But again, practice how you play. Now, let me tell you about another one of my favorite Dodgers, Kike Hernandez. This dude is amazing. Now, you might be asking yourself, oh, okay, Raymond Kike Hernandez. That's a cool name. What position does he play? And I would tell you, oh, kike Hernandez plays shortstop. Okay. He also plays second base. He's also played, left field as well as center. He's played third base. He's played right field. He's played first base. He's even pitched in multiple games. In fact, the only position that Kike Hernandez has not played on the field is catcher. In baseball, there's a role called utility player. A utility player is somebody who can play a bunch of different positions, and they're valuable in all those spots. He's not the best at any one thing, but he's really good at all of these different things. And maybe you've heard me on the podcast say, you gotta find a niche in photography because it's the best way to go deeper into a style of photography and get really good at it. Get known for it, and get paid well for it because it's what you specialize in. I absolutely still believe that to be the case, but there are some photographers like Joe McNally, who consider themselves a generalist. They don't hold themselves to one style of photography, and Joe McNally is really good at what he does. It can be done. It is really hard if you want to be successful and make a living that way, but it can be done. So if you're thinking to yourself right now, I don't know what I wanna shoot. I'm still trying to figure it all out. That's fine. In fact, that's good. You should be trying out everything. Try portraits. Try macro. Try streets. Try pets. Try weird shadows on the wall. Try food. Try everything because every type of photography will teach you something. That year 20 16, 20 17, where I felt like I was really in a slump, I remember. trying to get out of it. And I remember thinking, what can I do to get outta the slump? And it was winter time. And, I must have seen a video on YouTube. Maybe it was about a product photographer who was photographing beer. And it looked pretty challenging, but I thought, I think I can do that. So that's exactly what I did. I set up a stool in my kitchen. I set up a little backdrop. I placed the beer on the stool. I had a little spritz of water to make it look like it's sweating, like it's nice and cold. I set up some lights. I took the photos. I tried to get better at it. I tried to at different apertures to get a different depth of field. I did some blending. And that photo, I can still picture the photo in my head. I like the photo a lot. I'm proud of that photo. but more importantly, and what I didn't know at the time is that that photo helped me to better create ring photos. It helped me to understand that when you're shooting something really close up, the background is so much more out of focus, but you can add certain elements to make it look really interesting. Before I was shooting, rings and stuff at f like 2.8 to try to get like this really creamy depth of field. But when you're shooting something extremely close up, I mean, your depth of field is like the width of two or three hairs. It's extremely thin. So shooting, this bottle of beer helped me to realize, oh, if you're shooting at F eight, F 11, you can still get an out of focus background if you. do it the right way where your background is far enough, away and it becomes out of focus. So again, try something new. Try something that you've never shopped before, because every photo that you take will teach you something and your thing will more than likely come, right? Your niche, your style. Or maybe it won't. I don't know, but the point is, every position that you play makes you better. Now here's a name that you may have heard of, even if you're not really into baseball. If you haven't heard of this name and you have kids, more than likely they have heard of it. It is Shhe Tani In 2024, shhe O hit 54 home runs for the Dodgers. Now. For comparison, if you don't know much about baseball, the average number of home runs hit per player. That season was just 18, he tripled it. He is arguably the best hitter in professional baseball and maybe, you're Yankee fan. I'm sure that you're gonna send me an email about Aaron Judge, but Aaron Judge has way less overall hits and strikes out way more often. Soge Tani is a better all around hitter. I will fight you anyway. Shhe Tani, again, arguably the best hitter in baseball. Guess what he has? He has a hitting coach. He has somebody to coach him on how to hit the ball. Shhe Tani is the best and he still has a coach. Why? Why? We think of coaches as people who teach us or help us do something that we haven't done that we don't normally do. But I promise you Shhe Tani has more hits than his batting coach. Shhe Tani understands that you can swing a thousand times on your own and hope that you figure it out, or you can swing a hundred times with feedback and grow infinitely faster. Shhe Tani's batting coach is actually just the Dodgers batting coach is Aaron Bates. Aaron Bates says that, of course he looks for things like mechanics, to see what's what's working and what's not working, of course. But what he's also looking at is what kind of pitches shhe is swinging at, what kind of pitches he's passing up, what kind of pitches he's connecting with. Just for example, maybe, you hate swinging when the ball is up and away. A coach can look, objectively and say, well, actually, you hit the ball the hardest when it comes up and away, and 43% of your home runs are pitched there. So maybe even though you don't like'em, try swinging at them more. A coach is gonna help you grow. That's their job, right? It doesn't mean that they have to be the best in the world at the thing that you're trying to achieve. They're there to help you grow. In photography, I want you to find people who will look at your photos and actually help you improve, not just say, oh, nice shot. Or a good job, but well, what if you tried this next time? Or have you thought about what this might look like? That's the kind of critique that is a shortcut to growth, and that's what being a part of the Beginner Photography podcast community is, is not only is it photo challenges, not only is it group post, it's the comment section as well. So if you're in there, don't be afraid to ask for feedback. And if you're not, again, we'd love to have you beginner photo pod.com/group. So, I know that I'm talking a lot about professional baseball players. Professional baseball players have tons of resources they've experience of course. But we all know that nobody walks onto the field and becomes a pro day one. Right? Where do they start? They gotta start in little league. In Little League. They got these little wobbly swings, you know, they're just swinging at everything. Maybe they get a hit and then they'll run to third, right? That's what little League is for. We as photographers, maybe we're taking weird exposures. Maybe we have compositions that don't work, right? Everything's directly in the middle of the frame. Tons of headroom. Logically, we know that you're not supposed to be great right away the first time you pick up something, but I think that we also forget that photography is a journey and to get really good. You gotta go through that journey, right? That's the whole point of learning something new. You go through this journey. So whether you're picking up a camera for the first time, or you're coming back after a long break, don't worry. You are in the perfect place to start. But, also know that the starting line is not, Even if you're really good at Little League, what am I trying to say here? If you're really good at Little League, that doesn't mean that you're ready for the pros. I mean, like the best person in little league in the country isn't ready to go pro. So what I'm trying to say here is that maybe you're thinking about charging for your work or doing some sort of big creative. A project or something. I know a lot of photographers want to get into weddings because it can be good money with a relatively low time investment, but know that weddings are a huge undertaking. They're like the world series of photography. Very high risk, but very high reward if you're prepared. And guess what? When you show up to a wedding. The confidence doesn't just magically appear, right. You don't get confidence just by being around a wedding. You have to trust in all of the, meaningless, that you took when nobody was watching. That's how you're gonna gain confidence on a wedding day. In fact, remember Freddie Freeman, who I talked about earlier? Here's something wild. If you go to YouTube and you search his name, the top result is his walk-off Grand Slam in the 2024 World Series. Remember, he's been playing professional baseball for 14 years. I mean, he's had some amazing plays. He's had some amazing moments. He has had some amazing at bats. But this one moment is the top result. Why? I want you to picture it. Okay. Close your eyes. Just kidding. Don't do it if you're driving. Okay. But just imagine this in your head. At the end of the ninth inning of game one of the 2024 World Series, the game was tied, which meant that the game went into extra innings. It went into the 10th inning, the top of the 10th inning, jazz Chisholm. is on third for the Yankees. Now Anthony Loppe hits a grounder, which allows Jazz Chisholm to score, and then the Yankees take the lead. This is the 10th inning. that gives the Dodgers one chance to score, otherwise they lose the game. But you know what I love about our boys in blue is that they got that dog in them, and they never, ever quit, ever. So here we are, it's the bottom of the 10th. The bases are loaded. We got two outs, and Freddie Freeman takes the plate. Could you imagine that the weight of the world is on your shoulders. It's the last out in the World Series, and the world is looking at you to be productive right now.

And the bases will be loaded here for Freddy Freeman with the Dodgers down three to two and down to their last out in game one. Now the kind of at bat that every kid that plays baseball dreams a one day happen. You tell yourself, right? All right, bottom of the tent bases loaded. World Series one Run Game. Dodgers, Yankees, reality for Freddie Freeman right here. Cortez delivers Freeman hits the ball in the right field, sea is gone. Hobble Game One Hero for the Dodgers, Freddy Freeman with a walk-off Grand Slam to Win Game one of the World Series six three over the Yankees. Unbelievable. I mean, there's just no way to describe it. Would you say you don't believe what you just. Saw. Yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

Freddie Freeman is now a hero. Now, that moment, it's not just luck. What was it? It was the right wing at the right moment, but it was backed by years of repetition in that game. Let me share with you some stats real quick. In that game, Freddie Freeman had five at bats and saw a total of 13 pitches. Now, he only made contact with two of them. That means that he missed 11 times, and yet it was just one swing in the one right moment and he made history. He then went on to become the World Series MVP, like imagine that not only do you go on to win the World Series, but you're the most valuable player of the World Series. Like it can't get any better than that. And he did that despite having 2,521 pitches thrown at him that entire season. Trust me, I went back and I counted. I watched every game, watched every pitch. I'm just kidding. But out of those 2,521 pitches, he only got 256 hits. And that means that on average, he was only productive once for every 10 pitches thrown at him. And there is no doubt that Freddie Freeman is gonna make it into the Hall of Fame. So when you're out there and you're taking photos and you're feeling like, man, nothing is working. Remember Freddie Freeman, you're not gonna get a hit. With every shot you take, you might not get a hit in every nine shots that you take. You know, Freddy's a professional, but you need those misses because the more swings that you take, the better prepared you are when your grand slam opportunity shows up. That's what practice does. That's what reps are for. That is what photography is. It is a game of showing up over and over again. When you shoot the same street corner 10 times when you miss focus, but you keep going. That's the foundation that supports the pressure later on. If you wanna prep for the postseason, right? If you wanna be the hero, you have to do it now, and you do that by building your photo muscle while the stakes are low. That's all I got for you today. So go ahead, get out there and shoot, because as you know, the more that you shoot today, the better of a photographer you will be tomorrow. Go Dodgers.