Tim Corbin – a man known for building the premier college baseball program that is Vanderbilt. Appearing in five NCAA Division I Baseball Championship tournaments and taking home two of them has sealed his legacy in collegiate baseball history; But, he more importantly will be remembered for his commitment to integrity, community, and fun and the impact that he has had on the players and coaches he has been around.
Just days ahead of the 2025 Little League Baseball® World Series, Presented by T-Mobile, Corbin took a trip to Williamsport, Pennsylvania, to speak with the managers and coaches, preparing them for the spotlight of the international tournament ahead of them, the impact they’ll have on their players, and the experience of a lifetime that they would enjoy over the next two weeks.
While at the Little League International Complex, Little League caught up with Corbin for a special “Six Innings Conversation.”
First Inning: What is a piece of advice that you would give to coaches?
For a coach that is around kids who are growing inside the game of baseball, it’s important to share your creativity with them and make it about the development of the game. Many focus on winning, but winning is a byproduct of what you do with development. Keeping your practices fun and light is the key to keeping the kids engaged. Also, smiling and being positive in those environments is important because the players emulate the behaviors of what they see. So, have the ability to smile, keep it light, keep it fun, but emphasize fundamentals and development.
Second Inning: What should a parent look for in a baseball/softball program?
You want to look at the leadership within a program and what they stand for. Little League is about development, and that is something I would look for as a parent or grandparent. When looking at coaches, you don’t necessarily want to look for a ‘good’ coach but instead one that develops the whole child. When you choose Little League, you’re opening an opportunity to a young person who can’t even fathom the joy that is in store for them. Oftentimes when kids go through an experience and are emotionally tugged by it, they will give back to that program or in a similar way later in life because of how it made them feel as a kid. That’s legacy. It’s leaving something behind you and our ability to give back to organizations that made us feel special as young people. The organization that gave us great meaning, great things to think about, and long-lasting relationships.
Third Inning: What is the hardest part of maintaining a top-tier program year in and year out?
It’s consistency, which is very difficult to do. The biggest thing in trying to nurture a program is showing unwavering amounts of commitment. The commitment is the amount of energy you put into a program on a daily basis, and from there, your expectations of the kids and the other staff members become a reflection of what you want. The hardest part of this is recreating it every year. You’re trying to continually move up and forward all the time. There’s not a day that I’ve ever looked at where I would stop doing this. To me, consistency is a wheel that goes round and round, and all I want to do is make that wheel go faster. If we’re going to be who we want to be, then it takes having someone at the top to move at the same speed that he did when they first started.
Fourth Inning: How do you keep the game fun for all players?
That is dependent on a person’s creativity. Using your mind and using what’s around you — whether it’s videos, drills, or other people — is what keeps things fun. What can become repetitive and mundane is throwing out the same training plan every day and expecting the players to recreate that fun energy themselves. Players don’t have bad practices; coaches do. Making something fun requires competitive drills, drills that allow players to use their imagination, and not playing the game by numbers all the time.
Fifth Inning: How do you try and teach the importance of integrity on and off the field?
To teach integrity, you must model it. Integrity is actions and words aligning with one another and the person who’s responsible for integrity is the leader of the team. Someone who has integrity is real and is trusted by parents and by kids. Integrity is everything. Integrity covers gratitude, humility, self-discipline, being a positive life force, and mental toughness. If an adult has it, they’re much more inclined to pass that on to the people they’re coaching and teaching. If you see a team that has integrity, then they have a lot of team pride. If they have team pride, there’s a great chance that team is going to be involved in a lot of positive outcomes.
Sixth Inning: Why is having a child-first perspective so important for parents, coaches, and volunteers, especially on a big stage like the Little League Baseball World Series?
The stage gets set for the Little League Baseball World Series all year long, and in 12 days, the whole event will be over. When you ask the kids to reflect on what their greatest memory was, they never talk about winning. I talked to two of my own players who played at the Little League Baseball World Series, and their fondest memories were sliding down the hill when it was raining. As adults, we should respect that. At the end of this, all the kids want to feel is happiness and joy. The only people that can get in the way are the adults. Adults, whether coaches or parents, should release the opportunity to the kids because it’s theirs.
NOTE: If you know of a Little League graduate who would fit into any of these categories and is not listed, please complete the Little League Alumni Submission form. To learn more about former Little Leaguers who have gone on to incredible careers, visit LittleLeague.org/Alumni.