Joseph Contreras did not need the ACT.
He’s the son of José Contreras, who pitched 11 seasons in the majors. He throws up to 100 miles an hour. By the time he came to us he had college baseball offers and, later, a Vanderbilt commitment and a place on MLB.com’s list of the top 50 prospects for the upcoming draft. Every door the ACT is supposed to open was already open.
He had a 21. He studied anyway.
Why he bothered
The reason he gave was that he didn’t want to be the kid who relied on athletics to get him everywhere in life.
That’s a harder thing to build a study plan around than a scholarship threshold, because there’s no external deadline forcing the issue. Nobody was going to reject him over a 21. He was working toward a standard he’d set for himself, and the only thing enforcing it was him.
Most of our students arrive with a number they need and a date it’s needed by. Joseph arrived with neither, which meant the program had to be worth doing on its own terms.
Working around a pitching schedule
Joseph’s constraint was the same one every serious athlete has, just more so. Practice, games, travel, showcases. Not much of it negotiable, and none of it moving to make room for test prep.
So the work went short and asynchronous, on his clock. And it ran across two test dates rather than one, which is how we handle almost every athlete: bank a real score at the first sitting, then use what that test exposes to aim the second push. Joseph went from a 21 to a 28, then from a 28 to a 30.
Nine points, from a student who had no external reason to gain a single one.
Six months later, against Team USA
On March 6th, 2026, Joseph pitched for Brazil against the United States in the World Baseball Classic. He was 17—the youngest player on any roster in the tournament.
He came in and loaded the bases. One out in the second, and Aaron Judge at the plate.
He threw a 94.4 mph fastball. Judge grounded it to third, 5-4-3, double play, inning over.
Judge, afterwards: “Impressive. I know I wasn’t doing that at that age. Just great stuff.”
You can read the whole thing at MLB.com and FOX Sports.
What Joseph’s story shows
We’re not going to claim the ACT had anything to do with getting Aaron Judge out. It didn’t.
What the two things have in common is the person doing them. Joseph is a kid who, offered a legitimate excuse to skip something hard, went and did it properly instead. The nine points and the double play come from the same place.
The parents this matters most to are the ones whose kid already has a path—the recruited athlete, the student with a family business waiting, the one who’s already been told they’ll be fine. The honest answer is that they probably will be fine. A good ACT score is not the thing standing between them and a life.
It’s just that “you don’t strictly need this” is a poor reason not to be good at something. Joseph didn’t need a 30. He has one.
What we did differently
- Built the plan around a pitching schedule, which meant short sessions he could do on his own clock rather than fixed weekly appointments.
- Ran it across two test dates instead of one, so the first score was banked before the second push started.
- Targeted the specific question types costing him points rather than reviewing the whole exam.
Coached by
Boosted Brains coaching team
Every Boosted Brains coach has a perfect or near-perfect ACT score and has been personally trained by Carson Weekley (perfect 36) and Martin (Head of Student Success).