Lift Big, Throw Gas, Hit Tanks: The Mindset That Built Baseball's Loudest Voice on YouTube - Eric Sim, "King of JUCO" Content Creator

Host Darren McMains introduces Eric Sim, whom he coached in the San Francisco Giants organization from 2010 to 2015. Sim was drafted by the Giants in 2010, released in 2015, spent two years bartending, and began making videos in 2020. By the time of the episode, he had roughly 3.45 million subscribers across social platforms and nearly 600 million views, making him one of baseball’s biggest influencers and earning him the nickname “King of JUCO.” McMains explains why Sim belongs on a podcast about the “no show dogs” mentality: rather than caring about looking good, Sim repeatedly chooses difficult work and authentic performance. McMains highlights Sim’s statement that his journey to throwing 95 miles per hour was more rewarding than anything he accomplished in professional baseball, including being drafted or leading a league in hitting. He argues that the most meaningful satisfaction comes from difficult goals nobody else requires you to pursue—the “sweat equity” and calluses earned by choosing and climbing your own mountain.

Sim says he did not begin creating content with a plan to become a major influencer. After professional baseball, he took a bartending job, enjoyed making cocktails, and filmed himself preparing drinks on an iPhone. He then spent about two years focused on bartending and making money because he was broke, while avoiding exercise and baseball. At one point he weighed about 290 pounds, looked in the mirror, and decided to change. He went to a local park, threw 74 miles per hour, and felt immediate pain in his elbow. He began filming his throwing and diet every day, lost roughly 35 to 45 pounds, and trained during the COVID-19 shutdown. When gyms closed, he watched a video of someone in India making concrete weights, bought concrete and supplies from Home Depot, and built makeshift plates with rebar and a crowbar. Those backyard lifting videos grew from roughly 30–60 likes and 500–600 views to thousands of views, with one home-gym video reaching around 10,000 views. Sim then documented a deliberate goal: going from 73–74 mph to 95 mph on the mound. He worked as a bartender and hotel-bar manager while cooking ground beef, chicken, and rice, sleeping, lifting, and throwing whenever he could—even on rough Canadian fields without proper mounds. After 151 days, he reached 95 mph. The video eventually passed 100,000 views, his first major YouTube breakout, and he says the result felt better than his professional playing career because he had transformed his body and completed a goal he had chosen for himself.

McMains asks whether the throwing series was primarily for Sim or for an audience frustrated by simplistic baseball advice such as “do these three drills and gain 10 miles per hour.” Sim answers that it was primarily for himself, but he wanted to show the process authentically rather than present a flashy shortcut. He remembers the principle as “lift big, throw gas, hit tanks.” The journey was not a straight climb. Sim reached 90 mph relatively quickly, then stayed stuck for roughly two and a half months. He says that plateau was miserable, but he refused to quit. Eventually, mechanical adjustments helped him move through 91 and 92 mph, reach 94, and then hit 95. He believes viewers responded because the process was genuinely difficult, uncertain, and visible—not a ten-day transformation. Sim connects that persistence to earlier hardship. He played junior college baseball, attended USF, played in Korea and Canada, and spent six years grinding through the minor leagues. He recalls surviving on peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches and $2 cafeteria pizza slices, while minor leaguers received only $20 per day, paid clubhouse dues, and tipped the clubhouse attendant. McMains adds that players once ate Costco-bought food, including so many poppy-seed muffins that he tested positive for trace opioids and had to explain his diet to investigators. Both say those experiences made Sim more resistant to discouragement.

McMains recalls Sim’s unusually strong throwing arm as a catcher. In rookie ball, Sim led the league in back-picks at second base while also hitting well. During one game against the Athletics, Cy Young winner Barry Zito came down to make a rehab appearance. Sim noticed a runner straying too far from second, put the back-pick sign on, and received the sign back from the shortstop. When Zito delivered, Sim threw behind the runner. The runner tried to catch the ball like a fly, nearly taking it in the face, but was tagged out. Zito, initially unaware of Sim’s reputation, became excited and hugged him after the play. McMains uses the story to describe Sim’s ability to make people feel seen, a quality that appears in his current videos when he hugs and high-fives young players. Sim says this has always been part of him: he was a clubhouse person who liked celebrating, joking, and talking trash when appropriate. At Penn State, he asked players to get louder when they were trying to fire him up to break 90 mph; their increased energy helped him reach 91, and they celebrated together. Sim says he tries to take pictures and connect with everyone at events because he does not view himself as better than anyone else. He believes fans respond because he is the same person on and off camera. Although professional baseball made him miserable near the end, he now enjoys baseball more at age 37 because he controls the setting and can share the experience with others.

McMains recalls seeing Sim at both ends of his baseball career: hitting .352 and leading the league while looking like a major-league prospect, then later becoming unhappy and ineffective in Lexington. Sim says his third year in Low-A was especially difficult because he was not starting and felt miserable. Looking back, he is glad he endured it because those years made him harder to break. McMains says Sim had the traits of a potential backup major-league catcher—an exceptional arm, work ethic, clubhouse magnetism, and willingness to call people out—but the emotional toll of professional baseball was real. Sim says the most transferable lesson from baseball is learning how to deal with failure. On YouTube, every video receives immediate feedback. YouTube ranks each upload from one to ten compared with his recent videos; a “one out of ten” is performing best, while a “ten out of ten” is performing worst. He might know within 24 hours whether a video is succeeding, though a later algorithm change can alter its trajectory. He says he is happier when a video ranks one out of ten and visibly sad when it ranks ten out of ten, because he remains an emotional person. Still, he tries to analyze both outcomes. A poor video prompts him to ask what can be improved, while a successful video prompts him to ask why it worked. He compares this to baseball’s immediate results and says creators, like players, must avoid simply pouting over a bad result and instead adjust their routine, preparation, or approach.

Sim describes a structured content process that begins with a large list of ideas in Notion. The team does not simply choose concepts because they sound fun. They examine the “packaging” first: whether the title and thumbnail are clickable and what the thumbnail should communicate. Then they work through logistics and research. For a hypothetical video about catching a baseball from space, that could mean contacting NASA or other specialists. For collaborations with the Giants, the team has to work through the constraints of an MLB organization. He generally does not script his videos. Once the logistics are settled, he travels with his team and figures out the story in the moment. A pitcher cannot be ordered to throw a perfect pitch, so the content depends on what actually happens. Sim says his role is to make the best video possible from those circumstances, increasingly focusing on narrative and emotional impact rather than simply completing a challenge. He points to a video in which he built a baseball field in his backyard so his daughter Sophia could hit a home run. Although it was not a conventional baseball challenge, the journey and the family story helped it reach two million views. He also describes working with MrBeast on a video involving a baseball cannon that fired at 150 mph, as well as collaborating with major-leaguers such as Fernando Tatis Jr., Jackson Merrill, Alex Bregman, and Derek Hill. Sim says he does not get intimidated because major-leaguers are people, and informal competition usually produces better content. His brand partnerships follow the same principle. He favors companies willing to make authentic, content-driven material rather than overly polished advertisements. He says phone-shot content can sell better because it feels genuine and consumable. The King of JUCO brand now includes clothing, batting gloves, and sunflower seeds, but he chooses partners based not only on money; he wants them to care about making engaging content.

Near the end, McMains tells a story from the end of extended spring training, when players were exhausted, earning only $20 per day, and waiting to learn whether they would make a full-season affiliate. In an intersquad game, a player named Cuevas hit a walk-off home run. Sim came around to score and stomped on home plate while celebrating with fellow catcher Joe Staley, who was competing with him for playing time. Staley considered the gesture disrespectful, grabbed Sim by the throat, and chokeslammed him onto home plate while newly drafted players watched. McMains says one SEC catcher saw the incident, decided professional baseball was not for him, returned his contract, and left. Sim agrees that professional baseball is a harsh environment in which no one is coming to rescue a player. He says the same is true of content creation: even with sponsors and a large audience, if he stops making videos, the world continues and YouTube moves on. He started without making money for roughly a year and a half and says he would still create at a smaller scale even if his current partnerships disappeared, because he enjoys making videos he would personally watch. For the final “no show dog” question, Sim says success has required willingness to do what others will not. His example is taking a 90-mph fastball to the groin while wearing a protective cup because it might make good content. He says he would not do it again, but he was willing to do it once. McMains closes by directing listeners to the podcast’s Instagram for Sim’s three additional questions.