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Crude Conversations

Chatter Marks EP 110 From professional baseball player to mentor with Jamar Hill

Crude Conversations

crudemag

Society & Culture

5884 Ratings

🗓️ 7 May 2025

⏱️ 91 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Jamar Hill is a coach now, but before that, he was a pro baseball player in the Mets organization. He grew up in Anchorage, where playing baseball wasn’t always easy: limited facilities, long winters and not much opportunity to play year-round. He says that in Alaska, you get about a quarter of the playing time compared to other places. But in a way, that made him love the game even more. As a kid, he followed the Alaska Baseball League, one of the best summer leagues in the country. It brought in top talent every year — future first-round draft picks — and watching those games gave him an early sense of how the baseball world worked. By the time he was 16, most of the teams he played on included at least one future Major League player. And by the end of high school, he was drafted by the Mets. He became one of their top power prospects — a lefty bat who hit right-handed pitching especially well. He went on to hit over 100 professional home runs. But beyond the stats, it was his early exposure to high-level talent, and his ability to adapt, that shaped his perspective. That perspective is still with him today — as a coach, a mentor and someone who’s all about creating opportunities for the next generation. Today, Jamar is focused on giving back to the community that raised him. As a youth coach and founder of RBI Alaska, he’s spent the last 10 years helping young athletes grow — as players and as people. He’s currently leading the development of the Mountain View Field House, a year-round indoor training facility that will give local kids access to the kind of resources he didn’t have growing up. For him, coaching isn’t just about skill development, it’s about building character, creating opportunity and showing kids that their environment doesn’t have to limit their ambition. He mentors with intention, using his own experiences in professional baseball to help young players navigate the mental, emotional and physical sides of the game. Through that work, he’s helping shape confident, resilient athletes who are prepared for whatever comes next, on the field or off.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

I guess this whole time the Mets were like trying to sign me.

0:16.2

And we were in 29 Palms.

0:21.0

I think that's kind of like near Joshua Tree by a Walmart.

0:25.4

And my friend Kevin gets a call on his phone.

0:30.6

And I didn't even have a cell phone yet at that time.

0:33.3

This was like 2002.

0:35.0

And it was a guy, Steve Phillips, who is the general manager of the Mets, calling from the draft

0:44.3

like draft headquarters in New York.

0:48.3

And they were like, where the hell are you?

0:51.3

I was like, I'm in the desert.

0:52.3

Who is this?

0:53.3

He's like, this is Steve Phillips, the general manager of the team. He's like, we've been trying to sign you. And I was like, I didn't like your offer. He's like, this isn't what people do. Like you're supposed to like counteroffer. He's like you got to get back to like cell phone reception like as soon as possible. Yeah. And so we have to cut like our like senior so like our summer trip short and get back.

1:15.8

That was Jamar Hill.

1:18.1

He's a coach now.

1:19.9

But before that, he was a pro baseball player in the Mets organization.

1:25.1

He grew up in Anchorage where playing baseball wasn't always easy, limited facilities,

1:32.2

long winters, and not much opportunity to play year-round. He says that in Alaska, you get about

1:40.6

a quarter of the playing time compared to other places.

1:44.8

But in a way, that made him love the game even more.

1:50.0

As a kid, he followed the Alaska Baseball League, one of the best summer leagues in the country.

1:56.4

It brought in top talent every year, future first round draft picks, and watching those games gave

2:03.5

him an early sense of how the baseball world worked. By the time he was 16, most of the teams he

...

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