Perseverance pays off

PAUL BUTLER, HOST: Today is Thursday, August 5th.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Paul Butler.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: a trickshot artist.

If making insanely difficult trickshots was an Olympic sport, Michael Shields would be a gold medalist.

Shields’ feats of eye-hand coordination have earned him more than 3 million followers on TikTok. But, as WORLD’s Sarah Schweinsberg reports, he’s hoping his page points people to someone higher than himself.

SARAH SCHWEINSBERG REPORTER: It’s March 2020, and Michael Shield’s office has sent him home. He’s kind of bored.

SHIELDS: I could still work during that time, but work was a lot lighter. And so I spent some free time just thinking, you know, what, what other things do I enjoy doing?

What the 31-year-old has enjoyed doing since he was a kid has been designing and making trick shots. Things like flipping a book backwards over his shoulder onto a shelf.

SHIELDS: That's something I've done, you know, probably since middle school.

So, as a joke, he decides to start doing some tricks with—of course—a roll of toilet paper. And if he’s going to put time into devising a trick shot with toilet paper, it’s only logical that people should see it, right?

SHIELDS: So I looked for where's the easiest place to grow right now. And it was TikTok. And the rest is history.

He named his TikTok page “That’ll Work.” In his first video, he and his wife goof around with a roll of toilet paper around the house, throwing it off of walls into baskets, onto toilet rolls, and into a basketball hoop.

SOUND: MUSIC FROM VIDEO

SHIELDS: We had a disclaimer at the end that no toilet paper was harmed during the making of that video.

He kept going with the toilet paper theme. Until one really took off.

SOUND: MUSIC FROM VIDEO

In the video, Shields is standing on a bed with a golf club. He’s using it to hit a roll of toilet paper at a toilet paper holder. He keeps missing. Over and over and over again, until he finally sinks the shot.

SHIELDS: That's what I would consider my first, I mean, it wasn't even viral. But my first in my mind, viral trickshot.

That trickshot proved to Shields that he could do this. He could make strange objects flip, land, and fit into hoops, wii game consoles, toasters, cups, bottles, and toilet paper holders.

SHIELDS: If I would have never hit that shot, I probably wouldn't have continued because I spent, I spent like three hours on that just late one night. So that was kind...the turning point of me actually pursuing this a little bit further.

Shields was a financial adviser by day. And became a trickshot artist by night. He began posting up to five videos a week. Throwing bread over his head into a toaster, stacking golf balls, and throwing disks into a wii console from 24 feet away.

Sometimes his wife jumps in to participate. In one video, they try to throw magic markers into the top of a glass coke bottle. Markers cover the floor, evidence of hundreds of misses until…Yep.

SOUND: GASPS

Shields has to work around a busy family schedule. He has four kids under 4.

SHIELDS: I have a very flexible job. So I can go take off, do those kinds of trick shots that need to be done during the day during business hours. But after that, I'm really not doing any other trick shots until probably nine or 10 at night.

His tricks take a lot of patience. Some take days to film. In one of his most popular videos, Shields uses a baseball bat to hit a kickball off a softball tee. He’s trying to hit the kickball 150 feet through the air into a basketball hoop.

SHIELDS VIDEO NARRATION: I spent days. Hitting this over and over over again.

He keeps missing. And chasing down the ball. Until sweet victory.

SHIELDS: SOUND OF SCREAMING

SHIELDS: It did take 12 hours and it was over four days. And on the fourth day I finally hit it.

What does it feel like to be successful after 12 hours? Shield’s hands pump above his head, and he lets out excited hollars.

SHIELDS: It's a mix of emotions. You're excited because you finally made it. And the second emotion you feel is relief, because I'm finally done.

Michael Shields often shows a lot of misses in his videos before the one that works. That’s intentional. First, it builds suspense for the make. But it also shows how many failures he has before a victory.

SHIELDS: I get a ton of messages, especially from younger kids. They're saying, man, I love what you do. You really inspire me to, you know, to never give up. I love how you never give up.

But he has given up a few times.

SHIELDS: There's been, there's been probably four or five that I have quit on. Just couldn't get it.

Shields videos all of his tricks himself.

SHIELDS: So my film crew is mostly me. Me and a tripod.

There aren’t many people who want to stand around and watch him attempt a trick for hours on end.

That’s why one day, he’d love to make his side-gig into a full-time job with a team.

SHIELDS: If I could have a team around me that that also is, you know, enjoying having their job, getting out and hitting a baseball into a basketball hoop. I mean, it just sounds amazing.

A growing audience is helping him do that. Followers and views help him generate ad dollars and sponsorships. But Shield’s also wants his page to be about more than money and personal fame.

At around 50,000 followers, he decided to let his audience know what was most important to him. He put “Jesus Saves” in his bio.

SHIELDS: I realized, you know, this could turn into something bigger and, and I want it to be something bigger than me, you know, something bigger than myself.

Though as corporate interest grows, he says he definitely feels pressure to take Jesus out of his bio.

SHIELDS: I'd be lying if I if I said I wasn't wrestling with, you know, our ad partners, not, you know, partnering with me, because I have that on my page. Is Tiktok gonna suppress some of my videos because of that?

But in the end...

SHIELDS: There have been a few instances where I've gotten to share Jesus with people and explain why I believe what I believe. I mean, that's, that's worth everything that I've done.

Shield’s says even if he can’t go full-time someday, he’ll keep his hobby going. He can’t turn his mind off. Even at 2 a.m. the ideas will keep coming to him for another trick that just might work.

SOUND: SHIELDS CHEERING

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Sarah Schweinsberg.

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