Speaker 1: And now an exclusive interview with David Bassey for Dodger Talking.
Speaker 1: There are certain people in the world that are always
Speaker 1: in demand, certain guys that even though they're not playing
Speaker 1: anymore and they have moved to the front office as
Speaker 1: a special assistant with Andrew Friedman, they are hard to
Speaker 1: get time with. And as you get older, it gets
Speaker 1: hotter and your short term memory goes. But this man
Speaker 1: always cool under pressure. World champion and former Dodger Jason
Speaker 1: Hayward joins us, Man, you are a tough guy to
Speaker 1: get time with these days. Everybody gravitate towards you.
Speaker 2: What and uh, first off, David, what an intro. I
Speaker 2: appreciate it, man, But no, it's it's a good problem
Speaker 2: to have, I have to say. And you know, attitude
Speaker 2: of fledged leadership, being able to be around Doc again
Speaker 2: as someone who played for him, but just hearing how
Speaker 2: he's handled all this attention of of course winning back
Speaker 2: to back to back World series and just know him
Speaker 2: being a guy in twenty sixteen his first run at
Speaker 2: this and now here we are a decade later, him
Speaker 2: being able to still make his mark on the game.
Speaker 2: He really appreciates the attention here, appreciates being someone who's
Speaker 2: asked to have a lot of responsibility. So I'm just
Speaker 2: doing my best to following someone like that footsteps, keep
Speaker 2: making my own mark, and most important, to keep learning.
Speaker 3: I'm glad you brought that up.
Speaker 1: How much do we not appreciate the fact that Dave
Speaker 1: Roberts not only has to manage twenty six players, manage
Speaker 1: his coaching staff, but also manage relationships with sponsors, with media,
Speaker 1: and more importantly, with the front office.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think you don't know until you know someone
Speaker 2: like yourself. Of course, you're around the game. That's another
Speaker 2: student of the game, which is what makes us all better.
Speaker 2: I think the more times we can be around people
Speaker 2: who are craving that knowledge, I think that makes it
Speaker 2: that much more helpful. You know, the environment that the
Speaker 2: company you keep when it comes to doc and managing sponsorships,
Speaker 2: managing the attention, going to speak to groups. Right, But
Speaker 2: then he's also very, very intentional with the prospects, with
Speaker 2: the coaches, with the people in front office, with the
Speaker 2: player development staff. He makes it a point to make
Speaker 2: sure everyone feels valued. But then he's also like, hey boy,
Speaker 2: wait a minute, I have a question, like, what do
Speaker 2: you think about this what do you think about this player?
Speaker 2: What do you think about this window of opportunity? Right? Like,
Speaker 2: those are all things that he is still very much
Speaker 2: like open about wanting to learn and being creating an
Speaker 2: environment where we can all help each other get better.
Speaker 1: How much do you see that in your position now
Speaker 1: more than you did as a player?
Speaker 2: Man, It's it's nice to be able to shut one,
Speaker 2: you know, one side of that off at this moment,
Speaker 2: right and being and really be present. I'm not focused
Speaker 2: on going to play. I'm not focus on turning watching
Speaker 2: video into a result that night. Now, it's let's solw
Speaker 2: the game down even more. Let's see how you know
Speaker 2: how long it really takes for certain things to play out.
Speaker 2: How many conversations you can have about whether it's the
Speaker 2: same player or whether it's the same metric, like a
Speaker 2: draft question, a post draft question when you're welcoming new
Speaker 2: players in No, it's just nice to have an opportunity
Speaker 2: to really buy into Hey, you're getting a lot of
Speaker 2: information each day. What do you do with that? How
Speaker 2: do you process it? But also over time, how much
Speaker 2: of the change.
Speaker 1: Jason Hayward is our guest. He's a special assistant for
Speaker 1: Andrew Friedman and the Dodgers Baseball operations staff. Now that
Speaker 1: we're getting closer to the trade deadline, you've had the
Speaker 1: experience of the draft talking to the players the Dodgers drafted.
Speaker 1: Now we're getting closer to the trade deadline, what have
Speaker 1: you noticed the most As far as the method that
Speaker 1: Andrew Friedman and his staff a clients.
Speaker 2: The method that they have that they apply is be
Speaker 2: as prepared as possible. There's there's no wrong question to ask.
Speaker 2: If you have a question, if you have something you studied,
Speaker 2: if you have something that an observation that that you
Speaker 2: want to bring up as a point, they welcome it,
Speaker 2: that they want to hear what everyone has to offer.
Speaker 2: But again it's you know, how many ways can we
Speaker 2: get better today or how many how many opportunities can
Speaker 2: we take advantage of and and whiden our margins, you know,
Speaker 2: make our margins greater than they already are. As far
Speaker 2: as we know, it's been put into this team starting
Speaker 2: in the off season. Financially, you know, the expectation is
Speaker 2: to winter ring each year, not about a back to back.
Speaker 2: But at the end of the day, it's you have
Speaker 2: a farm system, you have players. Sometimes you have more
Speaker 2: of one thing than another. Sometimes you might you might
Speaker 2: you know, need to fill a void or or want
Speaker 2: to take advantage of filling a void. And I think
Speaker 2: this is just like the long way of saying, like
Speaker 2: just be ready for whatever. You know, they don't leave
Speaker 2: any stone on turn.
Speaker 3: Are you going to be in there with him?
Speaker 1: Are you gonna shadow him all through Monday's deadline?
Speaker 2: I'll be as round as much as possible. That's it's
Speaker 2: But it's been cool because like, these are the things
Speaker 2: that Andrew Brandon gomes doc. You know a lot of
Speaker 2: our scouts, you know, everyone has said, hey, collectively, be
Speaker 2: in the room for these. You know, just just just listen.
Speaker 2: You know. Obviously there's gonna be times where there's a
Speaker 2: lot of things happening at once, and you know you're
Speaker 2: not gonna hear every conversation. But I think that's what's
Speaker 2: cool about it, you know, sitting in the draft room,
Speaker 2: seeing the amount of attention to detail that goes into there,
Speaker 2: and like the pouring of out output of like information
Speaker 2: that each individual has. But then those like main combos,
Speaker 2: so to speak, you know, will be very cool to
Speaker 2: hear what's on the table, what's not on the table,
Speaker 2: what's what sounds like it's off the wall, and then like, hey, no,
Speaker 2: that that actually sound realistic for where we are right now.
Speaker 2: But I think another thing that is cool is from
Speaker 2: this side of things. You know, as a former player,
Speaker 2: there are opportunities when you're an organization like this one
Speaker 2: to maybe make a move that's going to help a player.
Speaker 2: Meaning again, if you have a lot of one thing
Speaker 2: or or there's an opportunity to create a window for
Speaker 2: them somewhere else and you can still get better as
Speaker 2: an or Like that's also a conversation. You know, it
Speaker 2: doesn't mean it works out that way, but it's just
Speaker 2: nice to know that they are considering human beings. They
Speaker 2: are considering in the Dodgers organization, just doing the best
Speaker 2: you can to support their individual and like give them
Speaker 2: a great career.
Speaker 3: That's beautiful to hear.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people believe that it's all
Speaker 1: just about the numbers. But your former manager, Jill Mannin
Speaker 1: told me once that he believes Andrew Friedman's one of
Speaker 1: the best baseball scouts out there.
Speaker 2: Joe, I mean, and it's high praise coming from Joe.
Speaker 2: Of course, they have history, they have a lot of
Speaker 2: time together in Tampa. But Joe's also one of the
Speaker 2: better baseball mindset that I can ever be around. It's
Speaker 2: not about results, it's not about numbers, wins, losses. It's
Speaker 2: just about the fact that, like so many things that
Speaker 2: Joe is speaking on, come from experience. I think that
Speaker 2: is probably like the best thing you can go from
Speaker 2: when you're talking about the game of baseball. It's nice
Speaker 2: to study stuff, it's nice to read up on stuff, right,
Speaker 2: whether it's looking at video, whether it's watching a game
Speaker 2: that night. But when you can speak from experience and
Speaker 2: act on that, I think it goes a long way.
Speaker 2: And then we're talking about Joe. You're talking about Andrew
Speaker 2: seeing him in that draft room and how he is
Speaker 2: able to read the room, listen to the room, observe
Speaker 2: when he speaks. You see a smile on his face.
Speaker 2: It's not ah, boy, here we go. Now I have
Speaker 2: to like speak up on this and like put something
Speaker 2: in line. It's like no, Like he's like, here's an
Speaker 2: opportunity for everyone here to learn, but also an opportunity
Speaker 2: for him to like continue to get better, containing to
Speaker 2: sharpen his tools and just make his strength a weapon.
Speaker 1: Jason Hayward is our guest. He has a lot of
Speaker 1: baseball and life experience out there. All of us could
Speaker 1: benefit from Jason Hayward being our life coach. Before I
Speaker 1: let you go, we all know about you and Freddie
Speaker 1: Freeman and the relationship friendship that you guys have.
Speaker 3: Is it weird that you're Freddy's boss?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 3: Are you Freddy's boss and the position you're in?
Speaker 2: No? I think. I think what's very cool about our
Speaker 2: relationship is it's it's always been organic.
Speaker 3: Do you speak to him like you're his boss?
Speaker 2: No, it gets to remain the same, right, And what's
Speaker 2: coolest though, is like we both speak to each other
Speaker 2: like we want the best out of each other and
Speaker 2: the best for each other, So do not have the
Speaker 2: break stride and that it's just man like again to
Speaker 2: me in my mind, like the most dodger thing ever
Speaker 2: is like, no show up, be who you are, want
Speaker 2: to get the best out of yourself, want to get
Speaker 2: the best out of others around you, And like that's
Speaker 2: always been our relationship. Don't take it for granted. We
Speaker 2: do our best to have felt with it on and
Speaker 2: off the field. And you know, to see his son
Speaker 2: Charlie run around out here, in the outfield making diving
Speaker 2: plays and stuff. Super cool. And then my oldest son,
Speaker 2: Messi came in today earlier, you know, he was using
Speaker 2: Charlie's bat in the cage taking swings and as we're
Speaker 2: walking around Dodger Stadium. So like, those are the kind
Speaker 2: of moments now that we you know, Freddie and I
Speaker 2: get to pay forward to each other. It's like also
Speaker 2: being dads in a game that's given us a lot.
Speaker 1: And he's surprised that he's able to find himself hitting
Speaker 1: three hundred again this year.
Speaker 2: Yeah, super surprised.
Speaker 1: No, well, you know how everybody's so quick. You know
Speaker 1: this at the end of your career. Everybody wants to
Speaker 1: be so quick to end it for you when there's
Speaker 1: a lot more left for him and for other guys.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, absolutely, it's fair. It's more than fair for
Speaker 2: people to do that. They're only human, right you know,
Speaker 2: the critics are going to be the critics, and rightfully, so,
Speaker 2: you know, I feel like it's cool that I'll say this,
Speaker 2: Like a lot of those voices, especially when you get
Speaker 2: your the point of this part of his career that
Speaker 2: he's in, a lot of those voices have seen a
Speaker 2: lot of baseball, right, And so that being said, you
Speaker 2: also get the privilege and honor of being critiqued by
Speaker 2: some of the best in the game. And I think
Speaker 2: he wears that bad as a badge of honor, but
Speaker 2: no surprise at all that he's stubborn to his process.
Speaker 2: He wears his emotions on the sleeves. But he gets
Speaker 2: right back in there the next day and he's like, Man,
Speaker 2: how can I do this? This is how many swings
Speaker 2: I'm gonna take? This is gonna be in my approach?
Speaker 2: What do I need to tweak, like maybe less than
Speaker 2: a centimeter of amount of like an adjustment because he's like,
Speaker 2: I'm not going too far from from where I am.
Speaker 2: And for him to be able to look in the
Speaker 2: mirror at this point seventeen years later, say I still
Speaker 2: see the same guy. That's that's the badge of a
Speaker 2: Hall of Famer, for sure.
Speaker 3: No doubt.
Speaker 1: That's why I like these two guys, Hayward and Freeman.
Speaker 1: They got their feet on the ground, hungry and humble.
Speaker 3: That's these two guys.
Speaker 1: Jason Hayward especially, thank you for the time, and I
Speaker 1: love waiting for you.
Speaker 3: I'll wait tend deep to talk to you next time.
Speaker 2: I appreciate shit your waiting man, you know me, it's
Speaker 2: always gonna be the job first. But then absolutely make
Speaker 2: sure I get a chance to enjoy the people around,
Speaker 2: enjoy speaking to yourself, and also enjoy listening to you
Speaker 2: guys on iHeartRadio. And by the way, I'm not paying
Speaker 2: to say that. I know I got I got a
Speaker 2: gift card and all these things, but you know, whether
Speaker 2: it's me walking around Arizona at the complex or if
Speaker 2: I'm walking around Chicago with the fam, anything like that,
Speaker 2: like I do listening and tune in, and so it's
Speaker 2: nice to keep keep tabs on these guys. But also
Speaker 2: hear how invested that you guys are into the club,
Speaker 2: and it makes it that much more fun to be
Speaker 2: here in person.