You Are Too Smart to Play Baseball

You Are Too Smart to Play Baseball

A Memoir by Jon Sintes

A coach once looked me in the eye and told me I was too smart to play baseball.

What started as one of the most confusing sentences of Jon Sintes' life eventually became one of the most important. This memoir is the story of the kid who kept going — through Choctawhatchee High, Pensacola Junior College, the University of West Florida, two elbow surgeries, the Frontier League, four trips to the NBC World Series in Wichita (one MVP for the legendary Mickey Deutschman), the Pecos League, the Mexican Pro League, and a garage on Convoy Court in San Diego that he turned into Cutternation — a pitching development program now producing the next generation of arms.

This isn't another grind-it-out baseball book. It's a field manual for the pitcher who reads spin rates, watches Greg Maddux tape on his phone, and refuses to accept shallow explanations.

What you'll learn:

• Why "too smart for baseball" is the worst compliment a coach can give you — and how to weaponize it
• The Maddux trick that beats hitters who've already seen your fastball twice
• What a borrowed catcher's mitt in Mexico taught Jon about the cutter
• How to read every hitter in every count, every time
• Why the scar on Jon's elbow gave him a better career than the arm he had before it
• What fifteen years of coaching MLB-bound arms taught him that no pitching lab can measure

About the Author

Jon Sintes pitched 415 innings of professional baseball with a 3.21 ERA and 487 strikeouts. He is the founder of Cutternation in San Diego, Pitching Coach for the Padres Scout Team, and Pitching Coach at San Diego City College. His current student Aiden Kuei threw the first SDCC no-hitter in over twenty years and led the PCAC in strikeouts (86) in the 2026 season.

This is his first book.

30 chapters · ~125 pages · 6×9 trade paperback

Available in Standard Paperback ($19.99) and Signed Paperback ($26.99). The signed edition ships from San Diego, hand-signed by Jon, with optional personal inscription on request.