Two-time USA Baseball alum and Olympic silver medalist Scott McGough returned to his highschool discipline on Saturday, October 3, to co-host a Homegrown Clinic with USA Baseball. Standing on the identical diamond at Plum Senior Excessive College the place scouts as soon as got here to observe him play, McGough welcomed 65 native youngsters for a day constructed across the fundamentals of the sport and giving again to the neighborhood that raised him.

“It means quite a bit. That is the place it began for me as a younger child taking part in down within the borough fields,” McGough mentioned. “To provide again to the neighborhood for every part that I’ve discovered all through my journey is simply an superior feeling.”

All through the clinic, youngsters rotated from station to station, engaged on base working and the basics of throwing, catching, and hitting alongside one among Plum’s most achieved athletes. As soon as the stations wrapped up, the youngsters put these expertise to make use of in video games, with McGough taking the mound to pitch to them. He then sat down with the group for a Q&A session earlier than signing autographs for each child in attendance.

“I had an unimaginable journey. It began proper right here. This was my highschool discipline,” McGough mentioned. “I labored myself all the best way as much as the key leagues, performed abroad in Japan, bought to compete within the Olympics, and simply had a very superior profession and a very enjoyable time.”

A two-sport athlete at Plum, McGough was named the East Western Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic League (WPIAL) Participant of the 12 months and All-WPIAL below head coach Carl Vollmer. Vollmer, who has led the Mustangs for the final 23 years, bought the job the identical 12 months McGough arrived as a freshman.

“From the get-go, when Scott was a ninth grader, he stepped proper into the lineup, which is uncommon,” Vollmer mentioned. “He was our shortstop early on and our nearer as a ninth grader, which the extra I take into consideration that after 23 years, it is simply such a uncommon factor.”

McGough first represented Crew USA with the 2010 Collegiate Nationwide Crew, posting a 0.82 ERA and 13 strikeouts in 11 innings because the U.S. went 16-3 and gained a silver medal on the FISU World College Video games. Eleven years later, he returned to the purple, white, and blue on the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Video games, hanging out six over 5 appearances to assist america earn a silver medal.

“Attending to do it in faculty and taking part in abroad for USA Baseball was unimaginable,” McGough mentioned. “It is a uncommon expertise to have the ability to try this, and also you simply have a lot enjoyable and a lot satisfaction taking part in with the USA on the entrance of your chest.”

Lengthy earlier than any of that, McGough was a younger shortstop in Pittsburgh with a hometown function mannequin of his personal in Pirates shortstop Jack Wilson. The 2 related whereas McGough was in highschool, and Wilson walked him by every part from a weight coaching program to pregame preparation and a each day routine.

“Jack Wilson was the man that I all the time seemed as much as,” McGough mentioned. “It was actually cool to have a significant league man like that, such an achieved big-league participant, have the ability to give his time and his effort of serving to out only a younger child in the identical city.”

Wilson’s personal path later ran by USA Baseball, the place he served as an assistant coach for the 2021 and 2022 18U Nationwide Groups. His son, Jacob, a 2022 Collegiate Nationwide Crew alum, was McGough’s teammate with the Athletics in 2025, McGough’s remaining skilled season.

“I bought to play along with his child with the A’s, which was loopy,” McGough mentioned.

That instance stayed with McGough all through his profession, and it’s a large a part of why he made the journey again to Plum.

“I had plenty of older guys, plenty of veteran guys assist me alongside the best way. Present me the ropes, the right way to do issues, the right way to be skilled,” McGough mentioned. “It is my flip to form of give again and do those self same issues.”

For Vollmer, a former participant who now lives throughout the nation asking to convey a clinic house got here as no shock. He additionally sees what it might imply for the youngsters locally to be taught from somebody who began on the identical fields they play on.

“It could possibly truly occur. It could possibly truly occur to a child from Plum,” Vollmer mentioned. “For him to come back again and make this journey and form of attain out and say, ‘Hey, let’s do that right here in Plum,’ it does not shock me due to the kind of particular person he’s. His degree of generosity in each method has all the time been excessive.”

That generosity confirmed up within the small moments, too. Amber Eller, whose youngsters began taking part in softball and t-ball this 12 months, noticed it on the autograph desk.

“Scott, he remembered my son as a result of he is a lefty,” Eller mentioned. “In order that was cool that he truly paid consideration and interacted with them throughout the entire clinic.”

Vince Miller grew up taking part in with McGough, and the 2 went to the Pony League World Collection collectively. This time, Miller watched his personal youngsters share the sector along with his previous teammate.

“It was superior for the youngsters, the mother and father to come back out and see their youngsters taking part in with someone who did it on the highest degree and likewise grew up taking part in on the identical discipline right here,” Miller mentioned. “You could possibly see their faces mild up when Scott was out right here pitching to them.”

For McGough, each the profession and the return house had been what he hoped for as a child in Plum.

“That is precisely what I dreamed of as a child, and it is actually cool to see it come to fruition now and be right here,” McGough mentioned.