As Foghorn Leghorn put it in the 1954 Looney Tunes short film “Little Boy Boo,” “I say, there is something kind of eeeh about a kid that’s never played baseball.”
Toronto native turned Glenwood Springs resident Mike Irving agrees — and he’s built a life around making sure kids don’t miss out on the joy of the game.
His sandlot-style BatterUp Baseball School camps emphasize play over perfection, with a focus on “FUNdamentals.”
Irving discovered his love for coaching when he was just 16 years old.
“I got a job working as a coach at the Canadian Pro Baseball School in downtown Toronto,” he said. “It would take me an hour-and-a-half bus ride to get there, but I just loved baseball so much that I couldn’t believe they were paying me.”
Today, that passion burns just as brightly. BatterUp Baseball School is currently in the first of its two-week summer session at North Face Park in Carbondale. The camp is open to boys and girls of all ages, and this summer marked the first time the program surpassed 100 signups in the U.S.
The philosophy behind BatterUp is simple: Let the kids play.
For Irving, It’s never been about teaching kids the proper mechanics. Rather, it’s been about inspiring them to see the game in the same childlike, innocent light that he’s always seen it in.
“Sometimes you have to just crush a soda can and use that for the bases,” Irving said. “You don’t need the nicest field or fancy-dancy equipment. All you need is your friends out there with you.”
Rather than rely on rigorous drills and rigid instruction, Irving builds the camp around game situations and spontaneous learning moments.
“We’re not just playing scrimmage games once a week or in the afternoon if we have time, we’re going to spend very little time on skill and drill stuff, and we’re going to get more into the game situation,” Irving said. “(That’s when) we can teach them how to play the game well, how to run the bases well, how to throw the ball in from the outfield, who to throw it to and why you throw it there. What are the strategies involved and more like that?”
He first introduced BatterUp to the Roaring Fork Valley in the fall of 2024 with single digit signups, but word spread like wildfire. His winter 2024 camps had increased signups to over 40 kids, and the Glenwood Springs and Carbondale based summer camps in 2025 broke triple digits for the first time in the U.S.
“This is not a business recipe,” Irving said. “This is a recipe for the all out general health of this generation. They need to get outside to have some fun. I don’t really care what the other baseball camps are doing, that’s not who I’m competing with. I want to compete with the alternative use for a kid’s time during the summer. Do you want them sitting at home and doing whatever they’re going to do, or do you want them at the park playing?”
He first began hosting his own youth baseball camps while playing Division I baseball at Grand Canyon University when he was just 19. He met his wife, Glenwood Springs native and Game On Camps founder Cassandra Irving, and over the course of three decades built the nonprofit into a global youth sports camp movement — offering youth camps in Canada, the U.S., India, Ukraine, and more.
“I try to inspire my instructors to not take for granted who they have in front of them and how good these kids are and how not good these kids are,” Irving said. “We can have so much influence over these kids, and you never know how what you say or do will affect them.”
Over the years, Irving has remained committed to creating a space where kids can have fun, make mistakes and learn organically — the same teaching method the game of baseball offers.
“We don’t really advertise much,” Irving said. “We sort of just do things, and parents tell other parents, ‘Hey, you gotta come check this out, the kids will love this,’ and people just started to come more and more.”
He didn’t think his undying passion for the beautifully innocent game of baseball would ever be able to support the future he lives in, but is eternally grateful for it.
“The thought has always just been: make a living, have fun, keep the kids involved, and my hope is they will carry on the torch some day. It’s cool because it’s one thing that AI will never be able to do, getting kids to have fun playing baseball with their friends.”
For more information about the camp or registration information, visit batterupbaseball.ca.
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