Joe Ryan: Welcome to the Moffitt Method podcast. I'm your host, Joe Ryan. And if you're serious about taking your team to the next level, you're in the right place. Each episode, I'll bring you into the huddle with some of the most respected coaches and leaders I've met throughout my career, sharing their stories, their strategies, and the knowledge bombs you can use to build a winning program. Before we get to work, if you're a first time listener, please take a moment and hit that subscribe button and leave us a review. It really helps us bring more great guests to you. Now let's get to it. Today we have coach Reagan Willis. Coach Willis is from central Louisiana and earned a bachelor's degree in science and athletic training from Louisiana State University, while gaining experience working with LSU soccer, cross country, track and field, and football. After graduation, Reagan served as a graduate assistant athletic trainer at Nicholls State University while completing her master's degree in higher education and administration with a concentration in leadership. During her time at Nichols, she worked primarily with the football program before being hired on full time. Most recently, Coach Willis was named head athletic trainer at University Laboratory School, where she leads the sports medicine department and works to promote the health and safety and success of all student athletes across U High's K through 12 campus. Welcome in, Coach.
Raegan Willis: Thanks for having me.
Joe Ryan: Absolutely. It's great to have an old friend on and someone that we work so closely with for so long. And I guess, yeah, I guess I can't even call you Coach Willis for much longer, right? What we got.
Raegan Willis: For sure, just a little close. No, not unless they want to add power lifting, but I don't think so.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, right. So they call you Coach Willis or Coach Reagan?
Raegan Willis: They call me Mrs. Yeah. I'm trying to, I try to stay away from the coach term unless I'm actually coaching.
Joe Ryan: Mrs. Reagan, Mrs. Reagan, I like that. Right, but you know, any adult to kids is coached sometimes. So, Talking about Nicholls State, how about that win against UIW this weekend? I'm gonna go ahead and say, you know, Norms was going crazy. Maybe downtown was a little crazy that night. I don't even know if they call it, what are they, Roxies now? Roxies, whatever it is.
Raegan Willis: ⁓ yeah, for sure. I'll take it. That was crazy. That was awesome. It was good to see the Colonel's win. It's Roxas. Roxan the Goose.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, I haven't been down there in so long. Like the place used to be called the library on the corner across street from Peppers. It was still the library when you were there.
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm. No, the library is out. Library closed.
Joe Ryan: Library's out. well, those were a lot of good times down there in Thibodeau, especially for the Thibodeau Parade. So how's everything? Y'all have practice today, right?
Raegan Willis: For sure. Yeah, we did. We got a couple hours and a couple hours of treatments too. Nothing, nothing crazy. Good fly around.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, yeah, who do I got this week?
Raegan Willis: We have done on that part for you.
Joe Ryan: Dunham at Parkview. Parkview's having a big old jamboree, I guess. You know, here in Louisiana, we have these big jamborees or sometimes like in my school, I'm at Denham Springs High School, we jamboree against a district opponent where we'll play freshman, JV, then varsity all in one night. So each team gets about two quarters of playing time. So you see a lot of that. So they're going to have a little you had number one player in the nation in his class and you had Dunham. Well, y'all y'all have the number one player in the nation in your class.
Raegan Willis: Yep. Yeah, that's awesome.
Joe Ryan: at U High as well in his respective class just committed to LSU.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, we do. He's a good kid. Awesome to work with.
Joe Ryan: That's really awesome. So how's everything else going? Life's good, transition's good. You we talked about leaving Nichols back in May, you're heading into U-Hi. This is kind of the, went the summertime, school year started, everything's, transition was smooth and easy.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, it's definitely different going from like the college setting where like even if they aren't full adults, they think they're full adults to K through 12 campus. And think even the K through 12 campus is even different than being at Denham and coaching at Denham because we school and we have little kindergartners walking around that are ⁓ up to knee. ⁓ Yeah, so it's definitely growing. It's definitely learning every day.
Joe Ryan: Right.
Raegan Willis: We're getting better every day, which is the best part of it.
Joe Ryan: Yep. Yeah, definitely. For those that don't know, know, Coach Reagan coached with us at Denham for four years, five years. Five years. was a long time. A lot of kids came through there, a lot of, state champions, you know, all thanks to her. That was, I had no part in that at all. You know, I was, I didn't even, I didn't even freaking power lift in high school. You're talking to like a quadruple time state champion right now.
Raegan Willis: five years. Yep. ⁓ no. It was only three. I bombed out my sophomore year.
Joe Ryan: ⁓ Only three she bombed out her sophomore year, but she was really good at it. She actually just got inducted into Louisiana's hall of fame this past year for powerlifting. So it's a big time accomplishment for anyone, but as quick as she was able to get in, we have some people in this state who aren't even in yet and they've done doing it for many, many years. So look, let's get to some questions here. Starting off, us how you became an athletic trainer. How'd you get into the world of it? ⁓ What made you want to do it? Is this your first choice?
Raegan Willis: So I was just like majority of athletic trainers. I was the kid that got hurt while playing sports. So I spent some time in the trainer room in my high school career and it was literally as simple as my junior year I was in there getting treatment. And one my teammates dared me to be a student trainer and I did it. Then I ended up being like a student aid my senior year and I really liked it and I really enjoyed it. And then it turns out I wanted to go to LSU anyway and they had a really good sports medicine program and athletic training program. I just went ahead to ⁓ and I really enjoyed it, really liked it. It came naturally to me and it just kind of continues to come natural every day. ⁓
Joe Ryan: Now your time at LSU, think Coach Moffitt was there the whole time you were there, right?
Raegan Willis: He was there, I was there up until the transition. So my year at football, I worked with Coach Moffat the first semester and then the new strength staff came in the second semester.
Joe Ryan: And then, yeah, and then you moved on to Nichols after that, right? After graduation. That's awesome. That's awesome. So you get into it in high school, you know, everybody kind of finds what they want to do. At some point, you know, everybody asks like, Hey, here's a 15 year old. Let me ask them what they want to do with the rest of their life. But you kind of found out at an early age, um, you know, what's some back then, or even five years ago, I'd say, what's some advice you would have given your younger self on?
Raegan Willis: Yep.
Joe Ryan: life or passion as an athletic trainer or things you maybe could have done better or anything like that. Just some sort of advice.
Raegan Willis: I say I would give kids advice and like myself the advice of like don't be afraid to try everything. I was the kid in high school. I never wanted to be like identified as one thing. So never wanted to be just the athlete or just the person that was good in school. I wanted to try all the different things and then see what I was the best at, but also what I enjoyed the most. And then going on to look at a career and a profession, you want to see where you can have the biggest impact. So not only where you have the opportunity to make the biggest impact with the people you work with and the people you're around, but the one that has the biggest impact on you as well.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, some really, really solid advice. You know, not everybody, like I said, knows what they want to do at such an early age. You know, I kind of getting into the strength world for me, you know, was kind of a did it as a senior project. Wasn't sure what I was going to do. Got a degree in something else. All came full circle to be back to where we're at right now that what I originally wanted to do at 18 years old, I ended up doing.
Raegan Willis: Thank Yeah.
Joe Ryan: to a few people involved in the Moffitt method, know coach Matt Bruce over at Catholic High, but that's story for a different day So awesome, you know talking along those lines Did you have growing up, know, whether it was in high school or whether those in college at LSU or even at Nichols some mentors that may have helped you along the way that ⁓ you Got you to where you are now in this profession because again, you're still you know to be a head athletic trainer such a prevalent school in Louisiana You know, you're still you know, pretty young to be able to do that, you know.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, for sure. I definitely have people that have helped me out and continue to help me out every day. The biggest thing about like your career and your journey is like you form a relationship with everyone you're with. And the thing about is no matter how much time you spend at a place, you need to make sure those relationships are solid enough where you can ask people for advice even when you're not there. I would say like the biggest people that have had an impact on my career is probably like Derek Calvert, who's one of the athletic trainers at LSU, he gave me the advice my senior year, because it was kind of similar to the last year of high school. I didn't know what I wanted to do in my last year of college. I didn't know what to do. just knew I wanted to go to grad school and I wanted to stay close to home. And he said, you can go do anything for two years. And I said, okay. So then the people at Nichols called me and they said, hey, you want to come to Nichols and work for two years? And I was like, yeah, I can work really hard. And that's how I ended up in Thibodeau. So he definitely had a huge impact on me. My year at football with LSU, that was also Bo Lowry's first year at LSU. ⁓ just seeing the way he transitioned and the way he worked every day, he was definitely one of those, he was our boss, but he was one of those bosses that made you want to work harder because of the way he worked. So it was definitely great to be around him and like, He was a good example of what I thought and think what a leader should be. So those are probably two people.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, kind of lead by example people that, you know, and I love those types of leaders. You know, you see them everywhere, you know, in every facet of life, whether it's in, you know, a traditional white collar workplace or the blue collar workplace. You know, I still consider us in the, in the school system as blue collar workers. You know, it's, it's long hours. It's, know, sometimes difficult. You're not just coach. You're not just athletic trainer. You're not just, you know, teacher. You're psychologist. You're sometimes, you know,
Raegan Willis: For sure.
Joe Ryan: father figure, mother figure, things like that. know, a lot of the times that paycheck is kind of being able to mentor young athletes or young students and kind of show them the ways and how you should present yourself and present yourself. know, represent your last name really is what it all boils down to. And I think a lot of us get those mentors and, know, it sounds just like you did. Talking about, you know, just along those lines too, you know, we always can't be work, work, work, work, work. You know, it's you'll go insane. mean, absolutely. You know, people call it burnout. You know, you go insane. You get out of the profession. You know, I've seen people that they get a year in and they're gone or they get, you know, 15 years in and they're just I can't do this anymore. And eight years in or whatever it is, you know, people get burned out. So you got to have hobbies outside of this, you know, personally, I mean, I'm 35 years old, but The one hobby I have is playing freaking college football on the video game. I know that sounds childish. know that outside of like hanging out with kids and hanging out with family and the people you work with are really your best friends, especially in this world. You have longtime friends, friends that you'll never forget, maybe one or two of them from high school, a few from college, but your best friends are the people you work with day in and day out and outside of them.
Raegan Willis: Hahaha
Joe Ryan: I'm not ashamed to say it. only hobby is I get on that friggin Xbox and I try and try and win the college football playoff every year and go undefeated and you you can spend hours on there and I didn't play all the way until COVID. COVID happened and it was like I ain't got nothing else to do. I'm getting paid to sit at home, let's play some games. So talking about hobbies, mean, outside of work and I know as an athletic trainer, mean, that's geez. mean, y'all, y'all spend some friggin time up there with all the
Raegan Willis: you
Joe Ryan: How many sports y'all have at UF?
Raegan Willis: Take care. I think it's something crazy, like 17 high school sports, but then you have to also consider middle school and elementary. Yeah.
Joe Ryan: 17. Yeah, so time for hobbies for you is probably pretty far and few, but do you, mean outside of it, you know, like, do you have anything that you like to do? Go, you still, still kind of pump iron a little bit, lift a little bit, you know, go running.
Raegan Willis: ⁓ I'll be honest with you for the last five years, coaching powerlifting was my hobby. It was my escape from having to actually take care of kids and not saying I didn't take care of our lifters too, but just escape the training room and get out. ⁓ now I would say I dabble in a little bit of working out, but I'm not going to compete ⁓ anything.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, so code. Yeah. Yeah, nobody's going to come.
Raegan Willis: But I try to work out when I can early in the morning, definitely not late at night. I enjoy my sleep. But I would say that's my hobbies as of right now. ⁓
Joe Ryan: Yeah, no, that's always fun, know, and shoot with marriage right around the corner for you, you know, your hobbies turn into your spouse's hobbies, your spouse's hobbies turn into your hobbies sometimes. You know, so some of that changes, you know, as you get move on and transition in life and, you know, things like that. So I get it. I definitely get it. So let's talk about work day. You know, like we just talked about, you know, it's crazy. You you have a K through 12 school.
Raegan Willis: For sure. Yeah.
Joe Ryan: You're dealing with middle school kids, you're dealing with high school kids, you you got 17 roughly sports on campus, you know, that's from everything from swim to football to tennis to, you know, softball to everything in between. You know, you have all that to worry about. So typical day for you. You know, what's it look like? were early riser, you said, you you like to get things done in the morning. We're good to go. What's what happens?
Raegan Willis: Yeah, this change and like moving from U High to Nichols, my schedule got absolutely flipped. Because Nichols, we did everything in the morning. U High, obviously things majority go on in the afternoon. But right now at U High, we have cross country first hour, then there's a break. we're not set up like denim where we have athletics every single hour. We have they they're in school, they're in class. And then our seniors get out around roughly 1230, which is around lunch where we see majority of our kids, but they don't have a long lunch. So we literally have like 20 minutes to work with kids. And then after that, we're working predominantly where our seniors who are out of school. And then we work with our other athletes once seventh hour starts and after school. So seventh hour is pretty crazy because everyone finally gets their athletic hour. Lunch is pretty crazy because a lot of our sports don't practice and work out and stuff on campus. They go to off campus places like Baton Rouge Soccer and Traction and the Cub Complex, which is on campus, but our county is off campus because it's 10 minutes away from the school. So we're not directly there. So it's just a lot of things going on in a small amount of time. So you got to make sure you plan well and like you're getting the most out of the little bit of time you can with kids.
Joe Ryan: Yes, how, you know, with your seniors coming in at lunchtime, you know, that's got to be difficult because especially being in a school where you could kind of have, I don't want to call it checks and balances, but those younger kids need to learn from the older kids a lot of time, you know, how to carry yourself, how to practice, how to work out, you know, you come in as an eighth grader or freshman and you're just real wide-eyed and you're just,
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm.
Joe Ryan: going on here? Where do go? How do I get here? How do I do that? You know, how do I handle this situation? Do y'all run into some of that over there where, you know, maybe it's a little bit longer for those younger kids to grow up and kind of, all right, now these kids can be, and I know you haven't seen a, you've seen a small sample, not a very large sample yet, but now these kids are ready to be leaders and these kids are ready to take on more responsibility.
Raegan Willis: All right, I feel like it's almost opposite of that because it is a K through 12 campus because even though you have your seniors getting off the campus early, they come right back for athletics. So like I'll give you the example of like our quarterback crew. Our quarterback is a senior, so he leaves early, but we got with him and we're like, hey, we can maybe be doing some sort of our arm care maintenance that's not just an ice bag and stuff like that. So then. we talked to the other quarterbacks about it and we have an 11th grade quarterback as well, 10th or 9th grade quarterback, but we also have an 8th grader who's playing JV. So we have what's called like quarterback club and the senior took upon itself to invite the other quarterbacks and they come in three days a week and they do quarterback club, which is really arm care. So I feel like our seniors do well at leading the other kids in like they're still together during practice and they're still together during team activities and stuff like that. But ⁓
Joe Ryan: That's awesome that they'll come in and take that responsibility. You don't see that very often with kids. They'll come in, they'll take that responsibility amongst themselves. Hey, we gotta get this done because it's important. It's gonna help us either win games or if we don't do it, possibly lose games and that's a big time. So talk a little bit about that because that's a great thing that not a lot of people do, ⁓ care. Is that something you handle? Is that something that strength coach or position coach or head coach or...
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Right.
Joe Ryan: you're kind of in the same boat as a strength and conditioning coordinator that, you know, each individual sport coach is almost your boss, you know, outside of, know, the head of your school or the athletic director, but each kind of sport is kind of, you know, y'all work hand in hand to take and make sure that these kids are taken a hundred percent care of. is that, is that something that you handle or they handle or how does that work?
Raegan Willis: So we like to run each sport individually because they are individual sports. Football specifically and like all of our sports, they've been very supportive of everything. Jack, who Jack's our assistant athletic trainer. Jack and I have brought up to them ⁓ anything we can do to prolong athlete health or help them make it deeper in the season or help prevent injuries. All our coaches have been bought in and we kind of head all that up. ⁓ after that, it's kind of like on us for finding the time. like we wouldn't do it per se as like, okay, instead of doing the team workout, you're going to do our workout. It's going to be in addition to the team workout. You're also going to do this and we're planning time before, during, and after based off when it would be the best to do maybe like soft tissue on them versus like J-bands versus like plyo balls. so I would say we definitely, definitely dictate it the most. Jack's kind of my arm care specialist because he worked baseball at LSU. So I got him in my back pocket, but he definitely heads up that.
Joe Ryan: mean, shoot, national champions, mean, what more can you ask for? Whether he was there or not, talking about the most historic baseball program in the country. And what better person to have by your side to help with some of that arm care? Cuz what a lot of people out it is baseball and ⁓ baseball players quarterbacks, a lot of that same arm care is done. ⁓ I get with baseball coaches all the time, like, hey.
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Right.
Joe Ryan: Help me out with this arm care on top of our athletic trainers, because we're blessed to have three on campus full time that are all teachers there. But what are some arm care we can do? Because you're taking care of those baseball guys to where, and giving them enough rest that they're only pitching every few days. And they have a pitch count, it's the same thing as a quarterback. Well, I do still believe quarterbacks, pitchers, baseball players, they do need to hit upper body hard. You know, it's not just a thing to where we're just ignoring the upper body. You know, when they become get blessed enough to come become professionals, maybe, you know, that's a different ball game because those guys have many, many, many, many miles on them. So, you know, kind of getting that that body strong, that upper body strong, you know, everything between from muscles to joint care to their flexibility, their mobility of muscles, you know, everything that matters.
Raegan Willis: For sure. Right.
Joe Ryan: So that's awesome. You know, I love to see some good arm care with, with a quarterback. You know, when we hit our quarterbacks and our workouts, like it will go, you know, I'm a creature habit, just like anyone else, you know, where we have like get big Thursdays, cause it's our last workout the day before a game. And you know, the kids at the end love, love, love, love to hit buys and tries, but who doesn't, you know, especially those football, those football kids, you know, what, what 15
Raegan Willis: Thank Mm-hmm. Right.
Joe Ryan: 18 year old boy doesn't like to buys and tries. You know, that's why I put an upper body emphasis at the end of our weeks. But our quarterbacks, instead of doing buys and tries, they'll do all their arm care during that time, you know, for that workout specifically. Other days they have different time to do it, whether they come in before or after, very similar to what y'all do. So that's real awesome. That's some really, really good stuff. So. You kind of touched on a little bit how you communicate with the kids and about injuries and their recovery process and taking a little bit of accountability for themselves as far as showing up and wanting to get recovered. Not just, okay, I went to treatment one time and I'll be better. I mean, I was just as guilty of it. I had chronic shoulder and ankle injuries because I went to treatment one time. I put my ankle in ice for 20 minutes or 10 minutes or whatever it was.
Raegan Willis: Yeah.
Joe Ryan: See you later, I'll be good for the rest of my career. So, you know, talking about injuries and recovery, you know, how do you communicate that to the kids?
Raegan Willis: Yeah, I think our biggest thing is getting the buy-in not only from the kid, but all the stakeholders in the situation. So it's very easy for us to, if we get little Johnny over here who has the ankle sprain to buy-in to treatment and rehab, okay, he's likely to show up every day. But then if we can get Johnny and his parents to buy-in to what we're doing and trying to provide in the training room, then he's more likely. But if we can get Johnny, his parents, and the coach to buy in, that kid's gonna be there every day and we're solid. I would say the biggest thing is just communication. And that's the thing I try to tell people. What athletic trainers do, it's never a secret. If you think it's a secret, something's going on. ⁓ yeah, you're living in the past and I think the biggest thing is you have to realize everyone who's a part of the decision making. ⁓
Joe Ryan: You're living in the past or yeah.
Raegan Willis: the conversation, they have a unique point of view and something that is giving is contributing to that kid's care or that kid's ability to play. even circling back to the arm care stuff, like it's not just us coming up with some bands, like it's us pairing that with the bands plus what the coaches are planning on them throwing. Plus like, does the coach ⁓ the kid to throw on a Thursday or a Saturday? Like that kind of stuff and it all plays a role. So I think the biggest thing that comes with that is just like communication among our parties and getting everyone bought in to like what we can do.
Joe Ryan: Right. So do you, do y'all have a specific strength coach or do y'all just have the head coach or, know, and that's a lot of schools, you know, that's how it works. You know, I've been at schools where it wasn't a specific strength coach, where it was just, here's the head coach who has a tremendous amount of knowledge in the weight room, which is prevalent in a lot of places they don't necessarily call the strength coach because, Hey, who's higher than the totem pole, the head coach or the strength coach, you know? So
Raegan Willis: ⁓ Right, right.
Joe Ryan: Do you work closely with that person, whoever it may be, you know, hey, this is what's going on with this kid. How can we get stronger? How can we avoid injuries? How can we tweak certain things to make sure that both of our jobs go a lot smoother? You know, you don't have kids injured and we don't have kids coming to the training room for stem this and stem that. And we got lower back and, know, there's a little bit of, noticed this with kids and I'm sure we were the same way growing up to an extent, but.
Raegan Willis: Yeah.
Joe Ryan: kids comfortable being uncomfortable. There's a level to that and it's at all facets all levels of ⁓ any You have to get comfortable being uncomfortable. Your healthiest day, our head coach says it all the time, the healthiest day you're gonna have is the first day. You'll feel the best your first day of any sport, any you'll feel the best of that season.
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm. Right.
Joe Ryan: And after that, you'll never feel the same, you whether it's pains and aches and muscles and constant recovery and, you know, talking about that recovery, those kids, they don't realize how important sleep is. You know, that's sleeping, eating right, know, eating Takis and drinking a diet pepper for lunch is not, not ideal if you want the fuel to, to make it through practice and to make it through four days of practice leading up to a game.
Raegan Willis: For sure. haha
Joe Ryan: two games a week, if you're a basketball or softball, baseball player, sometimes more than that. But do you kind of work with those people to kind of avoid some of these injuries and help get stronger? Nothing's preventable, obviously. Can we reduce it? Yeah, I mean, you can reduce it, but what's gonna happen is gonna happen. can't be your broken bones. mean, that's, it happens, some of those things happen, so.
Raegan Willis: I would say once again, every sport at U High is unique. So you got to look at each sport individually. I would say football ⁓ in a of our larger sports, it's kind of like you alluded to, like that the coach on the staff has like a lot of knowledge and strength and conditioning. So they program them their own team and we sit down with them and we're like, Okay, these are the injuries that are most common in your sport. What are we doing to be able to prevent that? Like, what are we doing in the weight room to be able to prevent that? Then you have other sports on the other end of the spectrum where they might not have a coach that's competent in the ability to program for the weight room or instruct the kids on how to do things in the weight room. So those teams will go off campus to like a D1 or attraction. But. That's how we do strength and conditioning. It's different everywhere. What was the other part of the question?
Joe Ryan: ⁓ yeah. Just as far as, you know, avoiding injuries, you basically answered it, you know, how they get stronger, how they avoid injuries. You know, do y'all work hand in hand together or, know, do you help provide some of that knowledge to them that because, you know, in my job and being the strength coach of the whole, of the whole school, I like to know like, okay, what are our current injuries? Like what are, what are we seeing? What's the trend? Because
Raegan Willis: Yeah, we definitely... Yeah.
Joe Ryan: Whether anybody wants to admit or deny it, there's a trend every year, it seems like. Like this is the year of the hamstring. This is the year of the shoulder. This is the year of the ankle. You know, like it's very trendy. I think, you know, in my experience, you know, right now we had a little spell of not hamstring pulls, but just little tweaks and, you know, I try and find ways. How can we get better? How can we do things? And, know, anything Bush X Sniders wrote is a wealth of knowledge, you know, like, ⁓ I mean, like,
Raegan Willis: Pretty sure. Mm-hmm. course. Yeah.
Joe Ryan: Boo has probably forgotten more than I know. it's anything that he writes is like gold. So we see that often and I like to chalk it up or at least I have to hope that we're just faster this year as well. We're getting tweaks. I hope that we got them fast enough this off season this summer that we're just seeing tweaks. But we'll see. But seeing some of that, does that come into play where you're like, hey coach, we can do this a little bit better?
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Hahaha Help!
Joe Ryan: We kind of talked previously and I asked you about this, you like you talk about mentors or people you can talk to. I mean, shoot, I come to you for a lot of stuff. You know, we talk about the no sweat Wednesday stuff. You know, we're doing that this year. That's part of that injury prevention, getting the central nervous system to go to sleep, waking it back up. You know, I keep saying prevention reduction.
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Yeah. Right, right. I would say definitely with modifications, the biggest thing with kids and student athletes is getting them to understand you can be injured and you're hurt, but you can still do stuff. Like very rarely is there a situation where we should be at complete rest. And very rarely is there a situation we should be at complete rest and then jump straight back into football practice the next day. So we definitely work hand in hand with our coaching staff and the people in the weight room and our student athletes, getting them to understand like, okay, you might have a shoulder injury. So like you might not do X, Y, and Z in the weight room, but instead of X, Y, Z, you can do this instead that'll still hit the same thing. And it won't make your injury worse. I will say like we've been very blessed so far with all my conversations with coaches. One of the first ones I had on UIS campus, ⁓ My coach said, he said, we have a way we do things. Everything has a plan and there's a goal for the plan. But if you can present me research that says what you want will help the plan. He goes, I'll do whatever you want. So I think that's the biggest thing. Like you have to have a why as to why you do things. And then after that, you have to have buy-in, which obviously, obviously going to be hesitant, but you, you, if you're able to present the research and like,
Joe Ryan: Absolutely.
Raegan Willis: why and the scientific knowledge of like why this is going to help and how this is going to help us get better and ultimately help us win championships. As long as you get by and after that you should be good.
Joe Ryan: And yeah, absolutely. have to have the why. You know, there's, I'm a nerd for numbers and I'm a nerd for like, here's the why, you know, here's, here's why this works. Here's why it's going to help us get better. And here's why everything happens. You know, I'm a nerd for that. And I'm real big on that too, is if we can get a why of why it makes us better. Well, Hey, whatever it does to help us win. We're going to do it.
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm.
Joe Ryan: You know, whether that's a big thing that I sold this year to the kids and to the coaches is, know, we'll, we'll get, you know, kids will have big protein intakes all during the off season. Well, you can still do that in season guys. Like there's no, you actually probably need it more because you're burning so many more calories and you're not, you know, in season working out and even summer working out isn't the same as winter working out. You know, I put.
Raegan Willis: Right. Mm-hmm. Great.
Joe Ryan: I consider winter as we're putting on that winter coat. We're going into hibernation, you know, and we're not running a lot. We're lifting and lifting and lifting. And then when spring hits and when summer hits, you're running a lot more. And that's where you really, really need to start that intake of protein and getting good calories. And, you know, again, not eating Takis and diet Dr. Pepper's, you know, your water intake. So some of that.
Raegan Willis: For sure. For sure. One of our biggest assets going off of that is we, the foundation, they partnered with Eat2Win, which is like a mobile nutrition app. we, dude, it's awesome. It's awesome. Like it's a wellness tracker, sleep tracker, calorie tracker, weight tracker. Anything you can think to like nutrition and health and wellness, it tracks.
Joe Ryan: I think I've heard of that.
Raegan Willis: It makes student-athlete individual profiles with like individual goals. So I'll tell you like you think a normal human needs 2000 calories in a day. And then you're like, okay, they're an athlete so they need a little bit more. We have one of our kids we sat down and did the calculation on it. He needs to be eating 5,400 calories a day. Like, hey, yes. Right, right, right.
Joe Ryan: I wish I could. I can't do that anymore. You know, I eat 5,400 calories and it's gluttonous and it's frowned upon.
Raegan Willis: Right, and he's just, he's a very massive human with a very high activity level. And if he wants to maintain his weight and not cramp up and prevent injuries and all the things, this is what he has to do. like the biggest thing is the education piece of that. So like, once we got him locked in on like, okay, you need to eat more. And it's like, okay, well, you need to drink more too. Like, I need you to do this too. And then even if you eat well and you drink well, if you don't sleep right, you're probably going to cramp as like also. So like you have to get the younger kids and the student athletes to buy in. It's a multifaceted thing.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, no. you know, talking about some of those calories and eating all that stuff and you know, it's, they don't realize how important it is, especially because, hey, everybody wants to go D1 these days, right? And they don't realize what it takes to get there. But you talked about something right there about, you know, talking to these kids and that specific kid that, you know, this is where you need to be to get better. That's got to be rewarding. So kind of talking a little bit about that, you know, what's the most rewarding part of your job specifically?
Raegan Willis: Yeah.
Joe Ryan: as an athletic trip.
Raegan Willis: I would say, yeah, I would say the biggest thing is the relationships you're able to have with the kids. It's kind of part of the reason that I like stepped away from college because of the whole transfer portal thing. You only get to know kids for a year or two. Like you'll get those one, ⁓ few kids that you get for three or four, but majority of them are coming and leaving. So I think the high school aspect of it of like getting to know those kids for four years or on campus. our campus the potential to know a kid from kindergarten through 12th grade and then like you get the opportunity to see him sign a D1 scholarship like that has to be super rewarding so I'm looking forward to that.
Joe Ryan: Right. That's a unique, know, not many people get that, you know, that's a unique thing that you can experience. It's almost like your own kid growing up from, you know, four or five years old to being 18 years old and moving on in life. And, know, while that's rewarding, sure that's got to be some sentiment to it too. You know, I get, I get all sentimental when it's four years that a kid's in and out or, know, some kids I deal with from sixth grade moving forward, but it's like,
Raegan Willis: Yep.
Joe Ryan: get cinnamon for that. can't imagine watching a kid go from kindergarten all the way through. That's gotta be a totally different ball game. So talking about that, everything we've talked about in this episode, there's been much knowledge dropped and so much of why you do what you do and how you do it. Why is it important that high schools have an athletic trainer?
Raegan Willis: Yeah, I would say immediate is just having like medical personnel available on the campus, but also during athletic events, like injuries are a part of athletics and like there's no ifs, ands buts about it. They're going to happen. So having medical personnel available to your kids and your coaches and like having that resource there, that's I would say is the biggest asset of having one is the emergency management of it. If you're looking from our point of view, we have kids that are going to go college D1, D2, D3, NAIA the whole way. So you're educating them at a young, young age of what all an athletic trainer can do and what a resource can be and how, how we can help them reach their best potential, not only as an athlete and as a person, but for those other kids who aren't potentially going to college, you're just. instilling healthy habits that they're gonna have for the rest of their lives.
Joe Ryan: Right, and it sounds like you're holistically building these athletes. It's not just, hey, athletics are a thing, you know, it's the full part of athletics. It's, you know, your character, your schooling, your athletic part of everything, you know. Not everybody goes on to play college sports.
Raegan Willis: for sure.
Joe Ryan: You know, we're neither of us are naive to that one. know, not everybody does it. very few and far between these days, especially like you said, that transfer portal thing kind of get some of these kids from being recruited at a high school because they need people that need to make an impact immediately. You know, the days of seeing a kid get redshirted and maybe in two years, they'll be a starter. And in three years, they'll be an All-American. That's doesn't really happen that much anymore. So.
Raegan Willis: Right. Right.
Joe Ryan: You know, having those rewards and having the knowledge to be able to give those kids that whether they move on to athletics or just in life, you know, you're holistically building them. And that's why, you know, having that athletic trainer on campus, you know, how add to it is, very important, you know? So that's my important questions. Something new we're doing with this revamp is kind of asking some fun questions for you.
Raegan Willis: for Hm.
Joe Ryan: or big one that I want to ask and you won't be the only one. If you were stranded on a deserted island, what's one piece of weight equipment you would have and why?
Raegan Willis: like weight room equipment, anything that's in a weight room.
Joe Ryan: anything that's in a weight room, can be in the athletic training room that doubles as in the weight room. can be, you know, but what's one piece of equipment that, you know, you have to have? It's the only thing you have. And it can only be one of it. You can't say, ⁓ I want a set of dumbbells. Like, it can be one.
Raegan Willis: I would go with like the battle ropes. Like you, yeah, like you can use ropes for a lot.
Joe Ryan: The Battle Road.
Raegan Willis: You cut out. What'd you say?
Joe Ryan: ⁓ I said that's one I haven't heard from anyone. I've asked a few people this question just face to face and battle ropes is not one that I've heard from anyone.
Raegan Willis: feel like you can do so much with a rope. I watch a lot of the Loom. You can tie a lot. You can start a fire. You can build a shelter.
Joe Ryan: You can. So it's just, it's multipurpose. It's not just the workout part of things. It's, it's having a multipurpose. Oh, we looked at this in a totally different way. looked at it as what piece of workout equipment do I need to actually work out? But it's cool to see. That's what I want to know. I want to see like, all right, where's your mind at with this?
Raegan Willis: heck no no you're trying to survive you're trying to survive ⁓ it actually worked. Athletic trainers, it's always life or death. ⁓
Joe Ryan: I take, and that's a great, great perspective to have, you know? So that's my, that's my one random question of the day. You know, I can't thank you enough for coming on this episode. I know that, like we've heard your schedule super busy. You got a lot going on, 17 sports, hundreds of kids you got to take care of, coaches you have to work with, transition to a new job, start of the school year. I mean, I'd lower and list and list and list and list. And on top of that, getting married, ready for a wedding, you know, or.
Raegan Willis: You Yeah.
Joe Ryan: Not far from that, as far as it may seem, you're not far from getting married. That's great.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, I'm going to say championship.
Joe Ryan: I hope y'all do make it. That would be great, you know.
Raegan Willis: I hope we do too. Doing everything we can to get there.
Joe Ryan: Absolutely, absolutely. Well, coach, I thank you again for stopping in today. It means the world to me as former colleagues and as friends that we can make this happen and you can be a part of this for us over here at the Moffitt Method.
Raegan Willis: Fisher, appreciate you.
Joe Ryan: Thank you, thank you. Thank you all for listening today. If you would please give us a follow on any of our social medias, give our podcast a follow, subscribe, leave us reviews, tell us how we're doing. We look forward to having more guests on in the future and we hope that you stop in.
Raegan Willis: Thanks for having me.
Joe Ryan: Absolutely. It's great to have an old friend on and someone that we work so closely with for so long. And I guess, yeah, I guess I can't even call you Coach Willis for much longer, right? What we got.
Raegan Willis: For sure, just a little close. No, not unless they want to add power lifting, but I don't think so.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, right. So they call you Coach Willis or Coach Reagan?
Raegan Willis: They call me Mrs. Yeah. I'm trying to, I try to stay away from the coach term unless I'm actually coaching.
Joe Ryan: Mrs. Reagan, Mrs. Reagan, I like that. Right, but you know, any adult to kids is coached sometimes. So, Talking about Nicholls State, how about that win against UIW this weekend? I'm gonna go ahead and say, you know, Norms was going crazy. Maybe downtown was a little crazy that night. I don't even know if they call it, what are they, Roxies now? Roxies, whatever it is.
Raegan Willis: ⁓ yeah, for sure. I'll take it. That was crazy. That was awesome. It was good to see the Colonel's win. It's Roxas. Roxan the Goose.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, I haven't been down there in so long. Like the place used to be called the library on the corner across street from Peppers. It was still the library when you were there.
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm. No, the library is out. Library closed.
Joe Ryan: Library's out. well, those were a lot of good times down there in Thibodeau, especially for the Thibodeau Parade. So how's everything? Y'all have practice today, right?
Raegan Willis: For sure. Yeah, we did. We got a couple hours and a couple hours of treatments too. Nothing, nothing crazy. Good fly around.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, yeah, who do I got this week?
Raegan Willis: We have done on that part for you.
Joe Ryan: Dunham at Parkview. Parkview's having a big old jamboree, I guess. You know, here in Louisiana, we have these big jamborees or sometimes like in my school, I'm at Denham Springs High School, we jamboree against a district opponent where we'll play freshman, JV, then varsity all in one night. So each team gets about two quarters of playing time. So you see a lot of that. So they're going to have a little you had number one player in the nation in his class and you had Dunham. Well, y'all y'all have the number one player in the nation in your class.
Raegan Willis: Yep. Yeah, that's awesome.
Joe Ryan: at U High as well in his respective class just committed to LSU.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, we do. He's a good kid. Awesome to work with.
Joe Ryan: That's really awesome. So how's everything else going? Life's good, transition's good. You we talked about leaving Nichols back in May, you're heading into U-Hi. This is kind of the, went the summertime, school year started, everything's, transition was smooth and easy.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, it's definitely different going from like the college setting where like even if they aren't full adults, they think they're full adults to K through 12 campus. And think even the K through 12 campus is even different than being at Denham and coaching at Denham because we school and we have little kindergartners walking around that are ⁓ up to knee. ⁓ Yeah, so it's definitely growing. It's definitely learning every day.
Joe Ryan: Right.
Raegan Willis: We're getting better every day, which is the best part of it.
Joe Ryan: Yep. Yeah, definitely. For those that don't know, know, Coach Reagan coached with us at Denham for four years, five years. Five years. was a long time. A lot of kids came through there, a lot of, state champions, you know, all thanks to her. That was, I had no part in that at all. You know, I was, I didn't even, I didn't even freaking power lift in high school. You're talking to like a quadruple time state champion right now.
Raegan Willis: five years. Yep. ⁓ no. It was only three. I bombed out my sophomore year.
Joe Ryan: ⁓ Only three she bombed out her sophomore year, but she was really good at it. She actually just got inducted into Louisiana's hall of fame this past year for powerlifting. So it's a big time accomplishment for anyone, but as quick as she was able to get in, we have some people in this state who aren't even in yet and they've done doing it for many, many years. So look, let's get to some questions here. Starting off, us how you became an athletic trainer. How'd you get into the world of it? ⁓ What made you want to do it? Is this your first choice?
Raegan Willis: So I was just like majority of athletic trainers. I was the kid that got hurt while playing sports. So I spent some time in the trainer room in my high school career and it was literally as simple as my junior year I was in there getting treatment. And one my teammates dared me to be a student trainer and I did it. Then I ended up being like a student aid my senior year and I really liked it and I really enjoyed it. And then it turns out I wanted to go to LSU anyway and they had a really good sports medicine program and athletic training program. I just went ahead to ⁓ and I really enjoyed it, really liked it. It came naturally to me and it just kind of continues to come natural every day. ⁓
Joe Ryan: Now your time at LSU, think Coach Moffitt was there the whole time you were there, right?
Raegan Willis: He was there, I was there up until the transition. So my year at football, I worked with Coach Moffat the first semester and then the new strength staff came in the second semester.
Joe Ryan: And then, yeah, and then you moved on to Nichols after that, right? After graduation. That's awesome. That's awesome. So you get into it in high school, you know, everybody kind of finds what they want to do. At some point, you know, everybody asks like, Hey, here's a 15 year old. Let me ask them what they want to do with the rest of their life. But you kind of found out at an early age, um, you know, what's some back then, or even five years ago, I'd say, what's some advice you would have given your younger self on?
Raegan Willis: Yep.
Joe Ryan: life or passion as an athletic trainer or things you maybe could have done better or anything like that. Just some sort of advice.
Raegan Willis: I say I would give kids advice and like myself the advice of like don't be afraid to try everything. I was the kid in high school. I never wanted to be like identified as one thing. So never wanted to be just the athlete or just the person that was good in school. I wanted to try all the different things and then see what I was the best at, but also what I enjoyed the most. And then going on to look at a career and a profession, you want to see where you can have the biggest impact. So not only where you have the opportunity to make the biggest impact with the people you work with and the people you're around, but the one that has the biggest impact on you as well.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, some really, really solid advice. You know, not everybody, like I said, knows what they want to do at such an early age. You know, I kind of getting into the strength world for me, you know, was kind of a did it as a senior project. Wasn't sure what I was going to do. Got a degree in something else. All came full circle to be back to where we're at right now that what I originally wanted to do at 18 years old, I ended up doing.
Raegan Willis: Thank Yeah.
Joe Ryan: to a few people involved in the Moffitt method, know coach Matt Bruce over at Catholic High, but that's story for a different day So awesome, you know talking along those lines Did you have growing up, know, whether it was in high school or whether those in college at LSU or even at Nichols some mentors that may have helped you along the way that ⁓ you Got you to where you are now in this profession because again, you're still you know to be a head athletic trainer such a prevalent school in Louisiana You know, you're still you know, pretty young to be able to do that, you know.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, for sure. I definitely have people that have helped me out and continue to help me out every day. The biggest thing about like your career and your journey is like you form a relationship with everyone you're with. And the thing about is no matter how much time you spend at a place, you need to make sure those relationships are solid enough where you can ask people for advice even when you're not there. I would say like the biggest people that have had an impact on my career is probably like Derek Calvert, who's one of the athletic trainers at LSU, he gave me the advice my senior year, because it was kind of similar to the last year of high school. I didn't know what I wanted to do in my last year of college. I didn't know what to do. just knew I wanted to go to grad school and I wanted to stay close to home. And he said, you can go do anything for two years. And I said, okay. So then the people at Nichols called me and they said, hey, you want to come to Nichols and work for two years? And I was like, yeah, I can work really hard. And that's how I ended up in Thibodeau. So he definitely had a huge impact on me. My year at football with LSU, that was also Bo Lowry's first year at LSU. ⁓ just seeing the way he transitioned and the way he worked every day, he was definitely one of those, he was our boss, but he was one of those bosses that made you want to work harder because of the way he worked. So it was definitely great to be around him and like, He was a good example of what I thought and think what a leader should be. So those are probably two people.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, kind of lead by example people that, you know, and I love those types of leaders. You know, you see them everywhere, you know, in every facet of life, whether it's in, you know, a traditional white collar workplace or the blue collar workplace. You know, I still consider us in the, in the school system as blue collar workers. You know, it's, it's long hours. It's, know, sometimes difficult. You're not just coach. You're not just athletic trainer. You're not just, you know, teacher. You're psychologist. You're sometimes, you know,
Raegan Willis: For sure.
Joe Ryan: father figure, mother figure, things like that. know, a lot of the times that paycheck is kind of being able to mentor young athletes or young students and kind of show them the ways and how you should present yourself and present yourself. know, represent your last name really is what it all boils down to. And I think a lot of us get those mentors and, know, it sounds just like you did. Talking about, you know, just along those lines too, you know, we always can't be work, work, work, work, work. You know, it's you'll go insane. mean, absolutely. You know, people call it burnout. You know, you go insane. You get out of the profession. You know, I've seen people that they get a year in and they're gone or they get, you know, 15 years in and they're just I can't do this anymore. And eight years in or whatever it is, you know, people get burned out. So you got to have hobbies outside of this, you know, personally, I mean, I'm 35 years old, but The one hobby I have is playing freaking college football on the video game. I know that sounds childish. know that outside of like hanging out with kids and hanging out with family and the people you work with are really your best friends, especially in this world. You have longtime friends, friends that you'll never forget, maybe one or two of them from high school, a few from college, but your best friends are the people you work with day in and day out and outside of them.
Raegan Willis: Hahaha
Joe Ryan: I'm not ashamed to say it. only hobby is I get on that friggin Xbox and I try and try and win the college football playoff every year and go undefeated and you you can spend hours on there and I didn't play all the way until COVID. COVID happened and it was like I ain't got nothing else to do. I'm getting paid to sit at home, let's play some games. So talking about hobbies, mean, outside of work and I know as an athletic trainer, mean, that's geez. mean, y'all, y'all spend some friggin time up there with all the
Raegan Willis: you
Joe Ryan: How many sports y'all have at UF?
Raegan Willis: Take care. I think it's something crazy, like 17 high school sports, but then you have to also consider middle school and elementary. Yeah.
Joe Ryan: 17. Yeah, so time for hobbies for you is probably pretty far and few, but do you, mean outside of it, you know, like, do you have anything that you like to do? Go, you still, still kind of pump iron a little bit, lift a little bit, you know, go running.
Raegan Willis: ⁓ I'll be honest with you for the last five years, coaching powerlifting was my hobby. It was my escape from having to actually take care of kids and not saying I didn't take care of our lifters too, but just escape the training room and get out. ⁓ now I would say I dabble in a little bit of working out, but I'm not going to compete ⁓ anything.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, so code. Yeah. Yeah, nobody's going to come.
Raegan Willis: But I try to work out when I can early in the morning, definitely not late at night. I enjoy my sleep. But I would say that's my hobbies as of right now. ⁓
Joe Ryan: Yeah, no, that's always fun, know, and shoot with marriage right around the corner for you, you know, your hobbies turn into your spouse's hobbies, your spouse's hobbies turn into your hobbies sometimes. You know, so some of that changes, you know, as you get move on and transition in life and, you know, things like that. So I get it. I definitely get it. So let's talk about work day. You know, like we just talked about, you know, it's crazy. You you have a K through 12 school.
Raegan Willis: For sure. Yeah.
Joe Ryan: You're dealing with middle school kids, you're dealing with high school kids, you you got 17 roughly sports on campus, you know, that's from everything from swim to football to tennis to, you know, softball to everything in between. You know, you have all that to worry about. So typical day for you. You know, what's it look like? were early riser, you said, you you like to get things done in the morning. We're good to go. What's what happens?
Raegan Willis: Yeah, this change and like moving from U High to Nichols, my schedule got absolutely flipped. Because Nichols, we did everything in the morning. U High, obviously things majority go on in the afternoon. But right now at U High, we have cross country first hour, then there's a break. we're not set up like denim where we have athletics every single hour. We have they they're in school, they're in class. And then our seniors get out around roughly 1230, which is around lunch where we see majority of our kids, but they don't have a long lunch. So we literally have like 20 minutes to work with kids. And then after that, we're working predominantly where our seniors who are out of school. And then we work with our other athletes once seventh hour starts and after school. So seventh hour is pretty crazy because everyone finally gets their athletic hour. Lunch is pretty crazy because a lot of our sports don't practice and work out and stuff on campus. They go to off campus places like Baton Rouge Soccer and Traction and the Cub Complex, which is on campus, but our county is off campus because it's 10 minutes away from the school. So we're not directly there. So it's just a lot of things going on in a small amount of time. So you got to make sure you plan well and like you're getting the most out of the little bit of time you can with kids.
Joe Ryan: Yes, how, you know, with your seniors coming in at lunchtime, you know, that's got to be difficult because especially being in a school where you could kind of have, I don't want to call it checks and balances, but those younger kids need to learn from the older kids a lot of time, you know, how to carry yourself, how to practice, how to work out, you know, you come in as an eighth grader or freshman and you're just real wide-eyed and you're just,
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm.
Joe Ryan: going on here? Where do go? How do I get here? How do I do that? You know, how do I handle this situation? Do y'all run into some of that over there where, you know, maybe it's a little bit longer for those younger kids to grow up and kind of, all right, now these kids can be, and I know you haven't seen a, you've seen a small sample, not a very large sample yet, but now these kids are ready to be leaders and these kids are ready to take on more responsibility.
Raegan Willis: All right, I feel like it's almost opposite of that because it is a K through 12 campus because even though you have your seniors getting off the campus early, they come right back for athletics. So like I'll give you the example of like our quarterback crew. Our quarterback is a senior, so he leaves early, but we got with him and we're like, hey, we can maybe be doing some sort of our arm care maintenance that's not just an ice bag and stuff like that. So then. we talked to the other quarterbacks about it and we have an 11th grade quarterback as well, 10th or 9th grade quarterback, but we also have an 8th grader who's playing JV. So we have what's called like quarterback club and the senior took upon itself to invite the other quarterbacks and they come in three days a week and they do quarterback club, which is really arm care. So I feel like our seniors do well at leading the other kids in like they're still together during practice and they're still together during team activities and stuff like that. But ⁓
Joe Ryan: That's awesome that they'll come in and take that responsibility. You don't see that very often with kids. They'll come in, they'll take that responsibility amongst themselves. Hey, we gotta get this done because it's important. It's gonna help us either win games or if we don't do it, possibly lose games and that's a big time. So talk a little bit about that because that's a great thing that not a lot of people do, ⁓ care. Is that something you handle? Is that something that strength coach or position coach or head coach or...
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Right.
Joe Ryan: you're kind of in the same boat as a strength and conditioning coordinator that, you know, each individual sport coach is almost your boss, you know, outside of, know, the head of your school or the athletic director, but each kind of sport is kind of, you know, y'all work hand in hand to take and make sure that these kids are taken a hundred percent care of. is that, is that something that you handle or they handle or how does that work?
Raegan Willis: So we like to run each sport individually because they are individual sports. Football specifically and like all of our sports, they've been very supportive of everything. Jack, who Jack's our assistant athletic trainer. Jack and I have brought up to them ⁓ anything we can do to prolong athlete health or help them make it deeper in the season or help prevent injuries. All our coaches have been bought in and we kind of head all that up. ⁓ after that, it's kind of like on us for finding the time. like we wouldn't do it per se as like, okay, instead of doing the team workout, you're going to do our workout. It's going to be in addition to the team workout. You're also going to do this and we're planning time before, during, and after based off when it would be the best to do maybe like soft tissue on them versus like J-bands versus like plyo balls. so I would say we definitely, definitely dictate it the most. Jack's kind of my arm care specialist because he worked baseball at LSU. So I got him in my back pocket, but he definitely heads up that.
Joe Ryan: mean, shoot, national champions, mean, what more can you ask for? Whether he was there or not, talking about the most historic baseball program in the country. And what better person to have by your side to help with some of that arm care? Cuz what a lot of people out it is baseball and ⁓ baseball players quarterbacks, a lot of that same arm care is done. ⁓ I get with baseball coaches all the time, like, hey.
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Right.
Joe Ryan: Help me out with this arm care on top of our athletic trainers, because we're blessed to have three on campus full time that are all teachers there. But what are some arm care we can do? Because you're taking care of those baseball guys to where, and giving them enough rest that they're only pitching every few days. And they have a pitch count, it's the same thing as a quarterback. Well, I do still believe quarterbacks, pitchers, baseball players, they do need to hit upper body hard. You know, it's not just a thing to where we're just ignoring the upper body. You know, when they become get blessed enough to come become professionals, maybe, you know, that's a different ball game because those guys have many, many, many, many miles on them. So, you know, kind of getting that that body strong, that upper body strong, you know, everything between from muscles to joint care to their flexibility, their mobility of muscles, you know, everything that matters.
Raegan Willis: For sure. Right.
Joe Ryan: So that's awesome. You know, I love to see some good arm care with, with a quarterback. You know, when we hit our quarterbacks and our workouts, like it will go, you know, I'm a creature habit, just like anyone else, you know, where we have like get big Thursdays, cause it's our last workout the day before a game. And you know, the kids at the end love, love, love, love to hit buys and tries, but who doesn't, you know, especially those football, those football kids, you know, what, what 15
Raegan Willis: Thank Mm-hmm. Right.
Joe Ryan: 18 year old boy doesn't like to buys and tries. You know, that's why I put an upper body emphasis at the end of our weeks. But our quarterbacks, instead of doing buys and tries, they'll do all their arm care during that time, you know, for that workout specifically. Other days they have different time to do it, whether they come in before or after, very similar to what y'all do. So that's real awesome. That's some really, really good stuff. So. You kind of touched on a little bit how you communicate with the kids and about injuries and their recovery process and taking a little bit of accountability for themselves as far as showing up and wanting to get recovered. Not just, okay, I went to treatment one time and I'll be better. I mean, I was just as guilty of it. I had chronic shoulder and ankle injuries because I went to treatment one time. I put my ankle in ice for 20 minutes or 10 minutes or whatever it was.
Raegan Willis: Yeah.
Joe Ryan: See you later, I'll be good for the rest of my career. So, you know, talking about injuries and recovery, you know, how do you communicate that to the kids?
Raegan Willis: Yeah, I think our biggest thing is getting the buy-in not only from the kid, but all the stakeholders in the situation. So it's very easy for us to, if we get little Johnny over here who has the ankle sprain to buy-in to treatment and rehab, okay, he's likely to show up every day. But then if we can get Johnny and his parents to buy-in to what we're doing and trying to provide in the training room, then he's more likely. But if we can get Johnny, his parents, and the coach to buy in, that kid's gonna be there every day and we're solid. I would say the biggest thing is just communication. And that's the thing I try to tell people. What athletic trainers do, it's never a secret. If you think it's a secret, something's going on. ⁓ yeah, you're living in the past and I think the biggest thing is you have to realize everyone who's a part of the decision making. ⁓
Joe Ryan: You're living in the past or yeah.
Raegan Willis: the conversation, they have a unique point of view and something that is giving is contributing to that kid's care or that kid's ability to play. even circling back to the arm care stuff, like it's not just us coming up with some bands, like it's us pairing that with the bands plus what the coaches are planning on them throwing. Plus like, does the coach ⁓ the kid to throw on a Thursday or a Saturday? Like that kind of stuff and it all plays a role. So I think the biggest thing that comes with that is just like communication among our parties and getting everyone bought in to like what we can do.
Joe Ryan: Right. So do you, do y'all have a specific strength coach or do y'all just have the head coach or, know, and that's a lot of schools, you know, that's how it works. You know, I've been at schools where it wasn't a specific strength coach, where it was just, here's the head coach who has a tremendous amount of knowledge in the weight room, which is prevalent in a lot of places they don't necessarily call the strength coach because, Hey, who's higher than the totem pole, the head coach or the strength coach, you know? So
Raegan Willis: ⁓ Right, right.
Joe Ryan: Do you work closely with that person, whoever it may be, you know, hey, this is what's going on with this kid. How can we get stronger? How can we avoid injuries? How can we tweak certain things to make sure that both of our jobs go a lot smoother? You know, you don't have kids injured and we don't have kids coming to the training room for stem this and stem that. And we got lower back and, know, there's a little bit of, noticed this with kids and I'm sure we were the same way growing up to an extent, but.
Raegan Willis: Yeah.
Joe Ryan: kids comfortable being uncomfortable. There's a level to that and it's at all facets all levels of ⁓ any You have to get comfortable being uncomfortable. Your healthiest day, our head coach says it all the time, the healthiest day you're gonna have is the first day. You'll feel the best your first day of any sport, any you'll feel the best of that season.
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm. Right.
Joe Ryan: And after that, you'll never feel the same, you whether it's pains and aches and muscles and constant recovery and, you know, talking about that recovery, those kids, they don't realize how important sleep is. You know, that's sleeping, eating right, know, eating Takis and drinking a diet pepper for lunch is not, not ideal if you want the fuel to, to make it through practice and to make it through four days of practice leading up to a game.
Raegan Willis: For sure. haha
Joe Ryan: two games a week, if you're a basketball or softball, baseball player, sometimes more than that. But do you kind of work with those people to kind of avoid some of these injuries and help get stronger? Nothing's preventable, obviously. Can we reduce it? Yeah, I mean, you can reduce it, but what's gonna happen is gonna happen. can't be your broken bones. mean, that's, it happens, some of those things happen, so.
Raegan Willis: I would say once again, every sport at U High is unique. So you got to look at each sport individually. I would say football ⁓ in a of our larger sports, it's kind of like you alluded to, like that the coach on the staff has like a lot of knowledge and strength and conditioning. So they program them their own team and we sit down with them and we're like, Okay, these are the injuries that are most common in your sport. What are we doing to be able to prevent that? Like, what are we doing in the weight room to be able to prevent that? Then you have other sports on the other end of the spectrum where they might not have a coach that's competent in the ability to program for the weight room or instruct the kids on how to do things in the weight room. So those teams will go off campus to like a D1 or attraction. But. That's how we do strength and conditioning. It's different everywhere. What was the other part of the question?
Joe Ryan: ⁓ yeah. Just as far as, you know, avoiding injuries, you basically answered it, you know, how they get stronger, how they avoid injuries. You know, do y'all work hand in hand together or, know, do you help provide some of that knowledge to them that because, you know, in my job and being the strength coach of the whole, of the whole school, I like to know like, okay, what are our current injuries? Like what are, what are we seeing? What's the trend? Because
Raegan Willis: Yeah, we definitely... Yeah.
Joe Ryan: Whether anybody wants to admit or deny it, there's a trend every year, it seems like. Like this is the year of the hamstring. This is the year of the shoulder. This is the year of the ankle. You know, like it's very trendy. I think, you know, in my experience, you know, right now we had a little spell of not hamstring pulls, but just little tweaks and, you know, I try and find ways. How can we get better? How can we do things? And, know, anything Bush X Sniders wrote is a wealth of knowledge, you know, like, ⁓ I mean, like,
Raegan Willis: Pretty sure. Mm-hmm. course. Yeah.
Joe Ryan: Boo has probably forgotten more than I know. it's anything that he writes is like gold. So we see that often and I like to chalk it up or at least I have to hope that we're just faster this year as well. We're getting tweaks. I hope that we got them fast enough this off season this summer that we're just seeing tweaks. But we'll see. But seeing some of that, does that come into play where you're like, hey coach, we can do this a little bit better?
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Hahaha Help!
Joe Ryan: We kind of talked previously and I asked you about this, you like you talk about mentors or people you can talk to. I mean, shoot, I come to you for a lot of stuff. You know, we talk about the no sweat Wednesday stuff. You know, we're doing that this year. That's part of that injury prevention, getting the central nervous system to go to sleep, waking it back up. You know, I keep saying prevention reduction.
Raegan Willis: Yeah. Yeah. Right, right. I would say definitely with modifications, the biggest thing with kids and student athletes is getting them to understand you can be injured and you're hurt, but you can still do stuff. Like very rarely is there a situation where we should be at complete rest. And very rarely is there a situation we should be at complete rest and then jump straight back into football practice the next day. So we definitely work hand in hand with our coaching staff and the people in the weight room and our student athletes, getting them to understand like, okay, you might have a shoulder injury. So like you might not do X, Y, and Z in the weight room, but instead of X, Y, Z, you can do this instead that'll still hit the same thing. And it won't make your injury worse. I will say like we've been very blessed so far with all my conversations with coaches. One of the first ones I had on UIS campus, ⁓ My coach said, he said, we have a way we do things. Everything has a plan and there's a goal for the plan. But if you can present me research that says what you want will help the plan. He goes, I'll do whatever you want. So I think that's the biggest thing. Like you have to have a why as to why you do things. And then after that, you have to have buy-in, which obviously, obviously going to be hesitant, but you, you, if you're able to present the research and like,
Joe Ryan: Absolutely.
Raegan Willis: why and the scientific knowledge of like why this is going to help and how this is going to help us get better and ultimately help us win championships. As long as you get by and after that you should be good.
Joe Ryan: And yeah, absolutely. have to have the why. You know, there's, I'm a nerd for numbers and I'm a nerd for like, here's the why, you know, here's, here's why this works. Here's why it's going to help us get better. And here's why everything happens. You know, I'm a nerd for that. And I'm real big on that too, is if we can get a why of why it makes us better. Well, Hey, whatever it does to help us win. We're going to do it.
Raegan Willis: Mm-hmm.
Joe Ryan: You know, whether that's a big thing that I sold this year to the kids and to the coaches is, know, we'll, we'll get, you know, kids will have big protein intakes all during the off season. Well, you can still do that in season guys. Like there's no, you actually probably need it more because you're burning so many more calories and you're not, you know, in season working out and even summer working out isn't the same as winter working out. You know, I put.
Raegan Willis: Right. Mm-hmm. Great.
Joe Ryan: I consider winter as we're putting on that winter coat. We're going into hibernation, you know, and we're not running a lot. We're lifting and lifting and lifting. And then when spring hits and when summer hits, you're running a lot more. And that's where you really, really need to start that intake of protein and getting good calories. And, you know, again, not eating Takis and diet Dr. Pepper's, you know, your water intake. So some of that.
Raegan Willis: For sure. For sure. One of our biggest assets going off of that is we, the foundation, they partnered with Eat2Win, which is like a mobile nutrition app. we, dude, it's awesome. It's awesome. Like it's a wellness tracker, sleep tracker, calorie tracker, weight tracker. Anything you can think to like nutrition and health and wellness, it tracks.
Joe Ryan: I think I've heard of that.
Raegan Willis: It makes student-athlete individual profiles with like individual goals. So I'll tell you like you think a normal human needs 2000 calories in a day. And then you're like, okay, they're an athlete so they need a little bit more. We have one of our kids we sat down and did the calculation on it. He needs to be eating 5,400 calories a day. Like, hey, yes. Right, right, right.
Joe Ryan: I wish I could. I can't do that anymore. You know, I eat 5,400 calories and it's gluttonous and it's frowned upon.
Raegan Willis: Right, and he's just, he's a very massive human with a very high activity level. And if he wants to maintain his weight and not cramp up and prevent injuries and all the things, this is what he has to do. like the biggest thing is the education piece of that. So like, once we got him locked in on like, okay, you need to eat more. And it's like, okay, well, you need to drink more too. Like, I need you to do this too. And then even if you eat well and you drink well, if you don't sleep right, you're probably going to cramp as like also. So like you have to get the younger kids and the student athletes to buy in. It's a multifaceted thing.
Joe Ryan: Yeah, no. you know, talking about some of those calories and eating all that stuff and you know, it's, they don't realize how important it is, especially because, hey, everybody wants to go D1 these days, right? And they don't realize what it takes to get there. But you talked about something right there about, you know, talking to these kids and that specific kid that, you know, this is where you need to be to get better. That's got to be rewarding. So kind of talking a little bit about that, you know, what's the most rewarding part of your job specifically?
Raegan Willis: Yeah.
Joe Ryan: as an athletic trip.
Raegan Willis: I would say, yeah, I would say the biggest thing is the relationships you're able to have with the kids. It's kind of part of the reason that I like stepped away from college because of the whole transfer portal thing. You only get to know kids for a year or two. Like you'll get those one, ⁓ few kids that you get for three or four, but majority of them are coming and leaving. So I think the high school aspect of it of like getting to know those kids for four years or on campus. our campus the potential to know a kid from kindergarten through 12th grade and then like you get the opportunity to see him sign a D1 scholarship like that has to be super rewarding so I'm looking forward to that.
Joe Ryan: Right. That's a unique, know, not many people get that, you know, that's a unique thing that you can experience. It's almost like your own kid growing up from, you know, four or five years old to being 18 years old and moving on in life. And, know, while that's rewarding, sure that's got to be some sentiment to it too. You know, I get, I get all sentimental when it's four years that a kid's in and out or, know, some kids I deal with from sixth grade moving forward, but it's like,
Raegan Willis: Yep.
Joe Ryan: get cinnamon for that. can't imagine watching a kid go from kindergarten all the way through. That's gotta be a totally different ball game. So talking about that, everything we've talked about in this episode, there's been much knowledge dropped and so much of why you do what you do and how you do it. Why is it important that high schools have an athletic trainer?
Raegan Willis: Yeah, I would say immediate is just having like medical personnel available on the campus, but also during athletic events, like injuries are a part of athletics and like there's no ifs, ands buts about it. They're going to happen. So having medical personnel available to your kids and your coaches and like having that resource there, that's I would say is the biggest asset of having one is the emergency management of it. If you're looking from our point of view, we have kids that are going to go college D1, D2, D3, NAIA the whole way. So you're educating them at a young, young age of what all an athletic trainer can do and what a resource can be and how, how we can help them reach their best potential, not only as an athlete and as a person, but for those other kids who aren't potentially going to college, you're just. instilling healthy habits that they're gonna have for the rest of their lives.
Joe Ryan: Right, and it sounds like you're holistically building these athletes. It's not just, hey, athletics are a thing, you know, it's the full part of athletics. It's, you know, your character, your schooling, your athletic part of everything, you know. Not everybody goes on to play college sports.
Raegan Willis: for sure.
Joe Ryan: You know, we're neither of us are naive to that one. know, not everybody does it. very few and far between these days, especially like you said, that transfer portal thing kind of get some of these kids from being recruited at a high school because they need people that need to make an impact immediately. You know, the days of seeing a kid get redshirted and maybe in two years, they'll be a starter. And in three years, they'll be an All-American. That's doesn't really happen that much anymore. So.
Raegan Willis: Right. Right.
Joe Ryan: You know, having those rewards and having the knowledge to be able to give those kids that whether they move on to athletics or just in life, you know, you're holistically building them. And that's why, you know, having that athletic trainer on campus, you know, how add to it is, very important, you know? So that's my important questions. Something new we're doing with this revamp is kind of asking some fun questions for you.
Raegan Willis: for Hm.
Joe Ryan: or big one that I want to ask and you won't be the only one. If you were stranded on a deserted island, what's one piece of weight equipment you would have and why?
Raegan Willis: like weight room equipment, anything that's in a weight room.
Joe Ryan: anything that's in a weight room, can be in the athletic training room that doubles as in the weight room. can be, you know, but what's one piece of equipment that, you know, you have to have? It's the only thing you have. And it can only be one of it. You can't say, ⁓ I want a set of dumbbells. Like, it can be one.
Raegan Willis: I would go with like the battle ropes. Like you, yeah, like you can use ropes for a lot.
Joe Ryan: The Battle Road.
Raegan Willis: You cut out. What'd you say?
Joe Ryan: ⁓ I said that's one I haven't heard from anyone. I've asked a few people this question just face to face and battle ropes is not one that I've heard from anyone.
Raegan Willis: feel like you can do so much with a rope. I watch a lot of the Loom. You can tie a lot. You can start a fire. You can build a shelter.
Joe Ryan: You can. So it's just, it's multipurpose. It's not just the workout part of things. It's, it's having a multipurpose. Oh, we looked at this in a totally different way. looked at it as what piece of workout equipment do I need to actually work out? But it's cool to see. That's what I want to know. I want to see like, all right, where's your mind at with this?
Raegan Willis: heck no no you're trying to survive you're trying to survive ⁓ it actually worked. Athletic trainers, it's always life or death. ⁓
Joe Ryan: I take, and that's a great, great perspective to have, you know? So that's my, that's my one random question of the day. You know, I can't thank you enough for coming on this episode. I know that, like we've heard your schedule super busy. You got a lot going on, 17 sports, hundreds of kids you got to take care of, coaches you have to work with, transition to a new job, start of the school year. I mean, I'd lower and list and list and list and list. And on top of that, getting married, ready for a wedding, you know, or.
Raegan Willis: You Yeah.
Joe Ryan: Not far from that, as far as it may seem, you're not far from getting married. That's great.
Raegan Willis: Yeah, I'm going to say championship.
Joe Ryan: I hope y'all do make it. That would be great, you know.
Raegan Willis: I hope we do too. Doing everything we can to get there.
Joe Ryan: Absolutely, absolutely. Well, coach, I thank you again for stopping in today. It means the world to me as former colleagues and as friends that we can make this happen and you can be a part of this for us over here at the Moffitt Method.
Raegan Willis: Fisher, appreciate you.
Joe Ryan: Thank you, thank you. Thank you all for listening today. If you would please give us a follow on any of our social medias, give our podcast a follow, subscribe, leave us reviews, tell us how we're doing. We look forward to having more guests on in the future and we hope that you stop in.
