Speaker 1: Welcome to the show. Barry bonds Man.
Speaker 2: You seven time MVP, fourteen time All Star, eight Gold Gloves,
Speaker 2: all time leader, and home runs single season home run leader,
Speaker 2: the greatest baseball player of all time. When you hear that,
Speaker 2: what comes to your mind?
Speaker 3: I don't really talk about it. I let my peers
Speaker 3: talk about it. I always tell people, if you're good
Speaker 3: at something, they'll talk about it. You don't need to
Speaker 3: say anything, So I don't really talk about it. I
Speaker 3: know statistically where I am. I don't need to explain it.
Speaker 3: I'd rather just help the young generation and give you
Speaker 3: the information that was given me teacher, as much as
Speaker 3: I know. And then, you know, I always tell people
Speaker 3: always ask me, like, how do you do it? I'm
Speaker 3: just stay around long enough for someone to talk about you.
Speaker 3: That's pretty much is just don't be a commercial, right,
Speaker 3: you know, if you want to be really good at something,
Speaker 3: you just don't have to be doing it a long time.
Speaker 2: Well, obviously very humble about your success, but do you
Speaker 2: ever kind of look back and at the stuff you've
Speaker 2: accomplished in some of the records that will never be touched,
Speaker 2: Like do you think, hey, like when I was playing,
Speaker 2: I was I really did it at the highest level
Speaker 2: I do.
Speaker 3: I look back and it's different. I have this, you know,
Speaker 3: like you talk about Michael Jordan, you can talk our
Speaker 3: i Q is like way up here, tiger. You know,
Speaker 3: it's so high. And I think for myself, I look
Speaker 3: back at the gifts that God blessed me with, and
Speaker 3: then I look back at the hard work that I
Speaker 3: put into it. And then I try to find ways
Speaker 3: of how do I give this to someone else, or
Speaker 3: how do I teach this, or how do you pass
Speaker 3: this on? End names and and when you have your
Speaker 3: peers talk about you, and you know, that's just the
Speaker 3: top of the list. There's there's no other lists greater
Speaker 3: than it. I don't care who you are, what you are.
Speaker 3: If you have your peers talking about you out a plus.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the show, Dale Strawberry. You got a chance
Speaker 2: to play when you were Barry?
Speaker 1: Yes, that was that.
Speaker 4: Barry is the greatest player I ever ever seen. I
Speaker 4: saw Barry when he first came up with the Pirates.
Speaker 4: Never seen nobody like that. I was like, Wow, it
Speaker 4: was this guy, a little skinny kid. They got Pittsburgh.
Speaker 4: He turns a ninety five mile par fastball. Doc gooding around,
Speaker 4: hit it out of the ballpark. I said, man, he's special.
Speaker 4: Then I saw him play. I was like, there's nobody,
Speaker 4: nobody like that. And I mean nobody. I don't care
Speaker 4: how many players have played this game. There's never been
Speaker 4: a player like Barry Bond.
Speaker 1: Never.
Speaker 4: Boy could do everything good and he'll let you know it,
Speaker 4: which was which was great because I know and understand
Speaker 4: why he was like that, and you know, the media
Speaker 4: didn't know and understand why he.
Speaker 1: Was like that.
Speaker 4: But it was like that because they treated his father
Speaker 4: bad and his father was a great player, and he
Speaker 4: never got the credit for, you know, the kind of
Speaker 4: player he was. See what a lot of times, well
Speaker 4: people don't understand this. Black players never get the credit
Speaker 4: for how good they really are and what they do
Speaker 4: because you know, the media always want to make it
Speaker 4: out of well, well, well you should, you make it
Speaker 4: look so easy. This is not easy what you're doing.
Speaker 4: I mean, this is hard what we're doing, you know,
Speaker 4: out there on the ball field and trying to be
Speaker 4: a complete player. And that's what Bobby Bonds was and
Speaker 4: that's what Barry Bonds was. Barry took right after his
Speaker 4: father being a complete player, playing the game of baseball.
Speaker 4: I have never seen nobody ever that good.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the show, Dusty Baker's that wrong, bro? You
Speaker 2: join the Giants right after they signed Barry. He had
Speaker 2: a great relationship with his father. I had Royce Clayton
Speaker 2: on last week. He told me how Barry came in
Speaker 2: with the backwards hat, the dangling earring, the jokes.
Speaker 1: Did you know.
Speaker 2: Barry earlier before he got to the Bigs? Because of
Speaker 2: obviously your connecting to Bobby Well, I.
Speaker 1: Held very couple days. I think he's born, you know Riverside,
Speaker 1: Uncle Dusty.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and so uh hey man, Bobby used to tell
Speaker 5: me how good Bearry is going to be because I
Speaker 5: had lost contact with Barry because I was off doing
Speaker 5: my thing and Bobby wasn't lying.
Speaker 1: You know, he's one of the best.
Speaker 5: No, he's the best player I had and the best
Speaker 5: player alongside Hank Aaron that I you know that i'd
Speaker 5: been around.
Speaker 2: What's his day to day?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: We got a chance to sit down with Barry in
Speaker 2: the way he broke things down and pitches and how
Speaker 2: he played the mental game in his head, that it
Speaker 2: was just him and the picture. It wasn't the defense.
Speaker 2: I mean obviously his preparation was top. Yeah, because see
Speaker 2: most time he don't tell.
Speaker 1: You he opened up. I'm surprised. Even his daughter's like, well.
Speaker 5: He opened up now because he ain't playing against you.
Speaker 2: There you go.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5: But see, the thing about it is he was very disciplined,
Speaker 5: not only on the field, but off the field.
Speaker 1: He worked hard.
Speaker 5: A lot of times people think that he didn't didn't
Speaker 5: take batting practice, or didn't do this or that. A
Speaker 5: lot of times he'd get up in the morning and
Speaker 5: go work out, or they'll come back and then you know,
Speaker 5: we'd be amazed. Sometimes he hadn't picked up a ball.
Speaker 5: Sometimes he hadn't swung a bad And now now they
Speaker 5: got sleep rooms where they used to get on Burier
Speaker 5: before about sleeping before the game, and now they have
Speaker 5: designated rooms to sleep you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: So you would take just to take a nap.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but see you got to like shake you and
Speaker 1: jump back because the swing, Yeah, I think so, you know,
Speaker 1: And so like the.
Speaker 5: Thing about it in this man, he knew what was coming,
Speaker 5: like Hank all the time. He had total recall, you know,
Speaker 5: and everything. And he's a guy that should should be
Speaker 5: in the Hall, and he's a guy that should be
Speaker 5: in the games.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of knowledge there is.
Speaker 2: I agree that you managed him through arguably one of
Speaker 2: the greatest offensive season in baseball history, the two thousand
Speaker 2: and two season, where he hit seventy three home runs
Speaker 2: in the dugout day to day being just up to
Speaker 2: be able to see his greatness. What was that like?
Speaker 5: Well, every day you just knew he's gonna hit one. Literally, yeah,
Speaker 5: I mean, you just didn't know how he's going here, right,
Speaker 5: And Sean Dunstan is a guy that really really uh
Speaker 5: you know, pumped him up because you know, Barry Design,
Speaker 5: I don't know. S Yeah, you can do it, man,
Speaker 5: you could do it.
Speaker 1: They had a bet, you.
Speaker 2: Know, I remember he won a car off it, right.
Speaker 2: I wasn't gonna say that, but yeah, no, I think
Speaker 2: he told us about that. Didn't he tell us about that?
Speaker 6: And you know, very little tight man.
Speaker 1: He didn't want to he didn't.
Speaker 2: Want to spend that money. Two thousand and two World Series.
Speaker 2: You go seven games, right, you guys are up three
Speaker 2: to two or go six. You were up three two,
Speaker 2: three outs to go, and and somehow it ended up
Speaker 2: slipping away.
Speaker 5: Hey, man, just oh, that game at seven. Yeah, you
Speaker 5: know we got two thousand, twenty twenty two. Yeah, oh yeah,
Speaker 5: I went seven. And yeah, I mean that's that was
Speaker 5: a big motivator for me after we lost that serious
Speaker 5: because my dad told me, he goes, man, I don't know,
Speaker 5: if you didn't win that game, you may never win one.
Speaker 5: And you know, back in the old days, negative motivation
Speaker 5: was something that that.
Speaker 1: You know, would resonate. But now you can't.
Speaker 2: Use negative motivation, so it doesn't work.
Speaker 5: You know, I was along ride home. I knew that
Speaker 5: I was that I was leaving, and you know, Bill,
Speaker 5: Bill Watson told me sometimes you can stay somewhere too long,
Speaker 5: and that's why I left.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the show, Kenny Lofton. You didn't have a
Speaker 2: long time with them, but Bonds.
Speaker 7: I mean, it was.
Speaker 8: It was weird seeing him in the clubhouse and walking around.
Speaker 8: You're like, dude, this dude is a specimen. And seeing Barry,
Speaker 8: I've never seen a guy let the ball get right here.
Speaker 2: Before you swing the back.
Speaker 1: That's that's uncalled for.
Speaker 6: That's just unseen.
Speaker 8: And me and I still remember let's play. We were
Speaker 8: playing the playoffs. It was against uh No, I was
Speaker 8: thinking it was the last series of the year and
Speaker 8: we were playing against We were playing against the Braves.
Speaker 8: Smokes was pitching. So the day before we were running
Speaker 8: the outfield the game or whatever, and Smost was out
Speaker 8: there doing stuff and he told Barry, I'm gonna come
Speaker 8: right at you brain.
Speaker 6: He's like, bringing it, get out, bring it out.
Speaker 8: I'm like, oh, she's in the next day and all
Speaker 8: of a sudden, they came warming up and I'm like,
Speaker 8: and then Barry hollered out and said, yeah, bring He said,
Speaker 8: I'm gonna break it. We got to the game, right,
Speaker 8: so we you know, the first pitch, Smoke through ninety
Speaker 8: eight right there, and Barry jumped back, got back in
Speaker 8: the battlest box right. Barry looked at it right the
Speaker 8: next pitch, she threw ninety eight again, almost in the
Speaker 8: same spot with a little over the plate, hit that box.
Speaker 8: Team rolls up line drive and me and me and
Speaker 8: Reggie Sanders and the dugout was like, did you just
Speaker 8: see that? He knocked him, not knocked him down, but
Speaker 8: he's just.
Speaker 6: Didn't even think about.
Speaker 8: The next pitch was almost the same height, just a
Speaker 8: little bit over the plate.
Speaker 6: Going, light work going, and we.
Speaker 8: Look up w very well, looking at Reggie, he was like,
Speaker 8: did you.
Speaker 2: Just see that.
Speaker 6: I'm like, yeah, I just saw that, Bro, That's not human.
Speaker 8: Reggis like, that's not human. No, you can't do that, bro.
Speaker 8: It was and just seeing the discipline he had at
Speaker 8: the plate, man, it's like and the tough part about it.
Speaker 8: They didn't want to throw him a strike and when
Speaker 8: they want to strike it through, he was in the
Speaker 8: seats well at the stadium.
Speaker 6: That was the only guy I played against. Where we
Speaker 6: played it. It was at and T Park at the
Speaker 6: time in San Francisco, and we would play a couple
Speaker 6: feet in front of the warning track in San Francisco
Speaker 6: at night, which one of the big ball and we
Speaker 6: were positioned correctly because it was either a walk or
Speaker 6: a d fly ball that was stopping. You catch it
Speaker 6: at the walls, be gone, Oh it's gone. And it
Speaker 6: wasn't nothing, but wasn't It wasn't no like broken bat,
Speaker 6: bass hits, was none of that. It was just this
Speaker 6: or that. And I would go out early every day
Speaker 6: and watch Barry hit like this is when I'm twenty
Speaker 6: two years old and you just watching this dude like man, incredible,
Speaker 6: and he looked out for me too.
Speaker 2: That's dope.
Speaker 9: The show man.
Speaker 2: Another slugger home run hitter during your era was Barry
Speaker 2: Bonds battling against him? Uh, you know another five tool guy.
Speaker 2: What were those battles liking? Did you guys have any
Speaker 2: personal relationship?
Speaker 10: Yeah, you know we talk in and out and until
Speaker 10: we saw each other, always see each oldn anytime they
Speaker 10: spend trending because you know, we have a speak training
Speaker 10: in Arizona. But also Erryman was something else, I mean,
Speaker 10: the guy something else. Ye mean, I mean I conceded
Speaker 10: myself with a good heater, but he was in the top.
Speaker 10: I mean I chased so many by peaches, but he
Speaker 10: never chased any by peaches. He wait for his own peaching,
Speaker 10: and when when he's speaching, never meets.
Speaker 1: For the show.
Speaker 2: Barry Bonds joins the team in ninety three. What do
Speaker 2: you remember most about that team? And you know, your
Speaker 2: first real experience in the big leagues.
Speaker 11: Well, especially in the ninety three team, it was you know,
Speaker 11: with Barry becoming that main guy, and you know it
Speaker 11: was still Matt Williams, will Clark, Robie Thompson, William McGee,
Speaker 11: Kevin Bass. We had Vass, you know, veteran leadership. But
Speaker 11: Barry came in with his hat backers here ring on
Speaker 11: with some hot top shoes. First day of spring Trader
Speaker 11: just starts talking about everybody.
Speaker 1: Damn man. But he took it.
Speaker 11: That was like my big bro because my brother played
Speaker 11: the Arizona State with him, so I knew him because
Speaker 11: my mom would cook dinner when they come to play
Speaker 11: UCLA USC So Barry was already.
Speaker 1: At the house talking about me. Yeah. So then when
Speaker 1: we became teammates.
Speaker 11: It was like, man, I got another big brother right here,
Speaker 11: happens to be the best player in the game.
Speaker 1: But it was a great experience. Man.
Speaker 2: Before we get to just seeing Barry day in day out,
Speaker 2: I wanted to ask about Matt Williams and Will Clark
Speaker 2: the hot corner over there third base, and then Will
Speaker 2: the thrill man.
Speaker 11: It was like great story because Robbie Thompson was my
Speaker 11: double play partner and they'd all come together to the
Speaker 11: big leagues around the same time. So very very just
Speaker 11: hard on those dudes, man. And when I got caught
Speaker 11: up in ninety one, Joseo Rebay was still a short
Speaker 11: stop taking ground balls and shortstop and I asked mister
Speaker 11: Thompson where do you like to feed? And he walks
Speaker 11: behind second base and stands there like this.
Speaker 1: So I'm like, okay, sure enough, I get in the game.
Speaker 11: I think chef hooked won. Bip was on first. I
Speaker 11: was sliding the hole man made a good play and
Speaker 11: through it a little bit inside. Robbie went to the
Speaker 11: back of the back and just watching it going to the
Speaker 11: right feet.
Speaker 2: He wasn't getting taken out.
Speaker 1: And then.
Speaker 6: So he could have grabbed it.
Speaker 11: He could have got it, bro but he was like,
Speaker 11: taught me a lesson, and we led the league in
Speaker 11: double plays. And okay, so, but Barry was always talking shit, right.
Speaker 11: He said, I'll bet you two grand you don't hit
Speaker 11: three hundred or two eighty, and if you do, I'll
Speaker 11: give you two grand.
Speaker 1: If you don't, you owe me a grand. So I
Speaker 1: was like, all right, cool back.
Speaker 11: I was already hitting close to three hundred. So we
Speaker 11: come into Dodger Stay and we won the first three games.
Speaker 11: We had to win the fourth in order to play
Speaker 11: the Braves in the playoff because they already won one
Speaker 11: hundred and four games, and being at home in La,
Speaker 11: we got smoked. Oh man, a little Sorda was going crazy.
Speaker 11: It was just one of those Dodger Giant rivalry things.
Speaker 11: And I'll never forget. After the game, I was just
Speaker 11: so dejected and Barry hands me two grand says good job.
Speaker 11: I was like, man, how could he be thinking of
Speaker 11: this shit? We just lost his game. But that's just
Speaker 11: the kind of dude he is. People don't know that,
Speaker 11: but it meant a lot to me. But just to know,
Speaker 11: like during that time he still thought about that.
Speaker 2: It was crazy getting to see him day in day out,
Speaker 2: his work ethic, his VP and just his greatness on
Speaker 2: the field.
Speaker 1: What was that like?
Speaker 11: Man, it was different because I'm having the best players
Speaker 11: I've ever seen in my life, you know, the Tony
Speaker 11: Gwinn's and all these Barry Larkins, all these dudes.
Speaker 1: Asking me like, how is it playing with this dude?
Speaker 11: I'm like, man, you're totally like how you asking me this?
Speaker 11: But you know, we had a good time with it,
Speaker 11: and I think I picked up I was able to
Speaker 11: understand his mental because at the time you're young, you're
Speaker 11: just seeing this dynamic player. You're not understanding how mentally
Speaker 11: superior he is to be, how good he is. So
Speaker 11: different examples like we would go I remember we were
Speaker 11: playing the Reds or somebody, and he looks at me, goes, man,
Speaker 11: we don't get paid for overtime. Why I'm dibbles throwing
Speaker 11: a hundred. Barry comes up first, pissed.
Speaker 1: Oh. I was just like, oh, my dad, Yeah.
Speaker 11: I've never seen a dude besides him and Griffy. I'll
Speaker 11: tell you Griffy story. But those dudes were just different,
Speaker 11: like how good they were and confident and their mental
Speaker 11: was just like different.
Speaker 2: Fourteen time all start, eight gold gloves, all time leader
Speaker 2: and home runs, Barry bonds.
Speaker 3: You know, like with my career, you know, I took
Speaker 3: a little bit from everyone. I mean, the greatest of
Speaker 3: the greats become they kind of like steal gifts from
Speaker 3: other people, and you're able to create yourself, you know,
Speaker 3: like Tony Gwinn here, Pete Rose here, you know, Willie
Speaker 3: May's here, Hank here and there, and you know, we're
Speaker 3: able to see all these qualities in each individual player
Speaker 3: and then you kind of invent yourself. I just wanted
Speaker 3: to be a great hitter. I knew I had power,
Speaker 3: I knew I could do certain things, but my dad
Speaker 3: always told me, you know, be a great hitter. Don't
Speaker 3: chase the fence, chase the fence, you're gonna lose. Be
Speaker 3: a great hitter, and that's that's all I.
Speaker 1: Wanted to do.
Speaker 3: So I had to take Tony gwyn as a great hitter,
Speaker 3: Pee Rose at a great hitter, Rod Carw, and I
Speaker 3: had to take contact hitters because I could hit the
Speaker 3: long ball, but I was striking out a lot when
Speaker 3: I was younger, and I had to close that gap.
Speaker 3: And so my dad always told me, we're going to
Speaker 3: think you don't do well, son, things you do well,
Speaker 3: you always gravitate to that. If you can bring twenty
Speaker 3: percent or thirty percent or ten percent of what you
Speaker 3: don't do well, that increases what you do well. So
Speaker 3: it kind of balances them together.
Speaker 2: You mentioned, I mean Rod Carew, Tony Gwynn, Pete Rose,
Speaker 2: some of the greatest contact hitters of all time. What
Speaker 2: were some of the things you watched that they did
Speaker 2: that you kind of picked up on.
Speaker 3: Their patients the way that they can calculate things on
Speaker 3: the field. I was able to mathematically calculate what a
Speaker 3: picture can and can't do. Once I can calculate you,
Speaker 3: then I could beat you. And then then it becomes
Speaker 3: this what is beating him. The goal of hitting is
Speaker 3: it's me and him, and if I can keep that
Speaker 3: tunnel vision between me and him and forget the goons
Speaker 3: that are around him, because in theory, my job is
Speaker 3: just to hit him and be good against him. Understanding
Speaker 3: the velocity of a pitch just a fastball. So we're
Speaker 3: just going to use a fastball analysis because you have
Speaker 3: a guy who throws batting practice to you every single day,
Speaker 3: and he only throws a fastball, right, and he tries
Speaker 3: to help you be really good, and we screw that
Speaker 3: up half the time. So I had to figure out
Speaker 3: how to master batting practice first, because this guy is
Speaker 3: trying to help me, So how do I can direct that? Now,
Speaker 3: I'm going to piece it to speed. Now I have
Speaker 3: to understand what my swing technique is and then understand
Speaker 3: the velocity of a pitch and the velosy of the ball.
Speaker 3: The further the faster it comes to me, the further
Speaker 3: goes right. But I don't change who I am. Right now,
Speaker 3: if I can focus on him, I already know the
Speaker 3: speed of a ball. Off my bat goes a certain speed,
Speaker 3: I don't care how many people over here, I can
Speaker 3: still squeeze it through you. It's not like you're going
Speaker 3: to catch every single thing, right, So my job is
Speaker 3: my victory is to make contact off of him. Once
Speaker 3: I do that, everything else is out of the equation. Right,
Speaker 3: So in theory I win. I really do win, even
Speaker 3: though the pictures standing on the mounta going I got
Speaker 3: you out. No, the second basement did a downfielder did?
Speaker 3: Oh this guy, you were already out of equations. So
Speaker 3: we took all these people off the field. You would
Speaker 3: lose so much and be really crazy. Right, So now
Speaker 3: I have to redirect my brain into this tunnel vision
Speaker 3: of understanding. If I can concentrate enough to me and him,
Speaker 3: they slowly disappear. But I can't fight two people at once.
Speaker 3: I can't say a hit the line drive to a
Speaker 3: short stop, or hit the line drive to the outfielder
Speaker 3: and he made a catch. Now I want to try
Speaker 3: to beat them both. You can't one on one. I
Speaker 3: can fight, but I can't fight two on one.
Speaker 1: I'm going to lose.
Speaker 3: So I have to refocus and go right back to
Speaker 3: here and go, let me try to do that again.
Speaker 3: Let me try to do that again, and let me
Speaker 3: try to do that again, and then my success rate
Speaker 3: with him and me become better to my face because
Speaker 3: now I'm focused on him, and now his math has
Speaker 3: to change. And so we're going to play chess constantly, right,
Speaker 3: But in theory, there's a lot more to the game
Speaker 3: than it is. Because he's sixty feet six inches and
Speaker 3: he has to throw a ball seventeen inch home plate
Speaker 3: within this gap. Well, lots of physics tell me he
Speaker 3: can only do it so many times. Even if I
Speaker 3: just stand there and never sweep, He's only gonna be
Speaker 3: able to do so many times, and then mathematically he
Speaker 3: has to come to where I get the advantage.
Speaker 1: It's just that's just.
Speaker 2: My idea of those breakdown. He just gave you so
Speaker 2: many layers of the Yeah, it's.
Speaker 3: Just it's just it's hard to explain where my brain goes.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: Have you ever had those computer guys that do all
Speaker 3: this and you're like going and he looks at you, like,
Speaker 3: this is a computer one on one you stupid. Well
Speaker 3: that's how my brain was in baseball. I'm like, you know,
Speaker 3: I'll get these questions like what do you think about
Speaker 3: so and so. I'm like, it's April or it's true, dude,
Speaker 3: I don't no, you know, I don't. I don't have
Speaker 3: that equation. There's so many things that can go wrong
Speaker 3: and right that I don't get excited. I don't get
Speaker 3: excited over the first city.
Speaker 1: Of a home run.
Speaker 3: I'm like, you know, okay, we got nine innings. I
Speaker 3: don't jump enjoy.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: All I'm doing is focusing on that picture, focusing on
Speaker 3: the mistake, or focusing on something else that can happen,
Speaker 3: you know. And that's just how I think rubs people
Speaker 3: the wrong way.
Speaker 1: But so many I can do it that works for you.
Speaker 2: That's all that matter. Is welcome to show, David Justice
Speaker 2: the goat in your opinion.
Speaker 12: Well, in my eerror the best hitters, no doubt, Arry
Speaker 12: Barry bonds for show. And if you say it wasn't him,
Speaker 12: you just wasn't watching. So Barry Barry is the goat
Speaker 12: as a as as a hitter, the picture the goat
Speaker 12: as a picture. Hell man, I might I almost say
Speaker 12: a three way time Pedro Martine as Greg Maddox and
Speaker 12: I'll even put Roger Clemens there too.
Speaker 2: You think Barry will ever get in the Hall of.
Speaker 6: Fame, Barry gonna have to be six ft under to
Speaker 6: get in the hold of just like they ve p ROAs.
Speaker 12: They're gonna You're gonna have to be sit.
Speaker 1: You're gonna be ye.
Speaker 12: Him and Clemens are gonna have to be underground before
Speaker 12: they get in.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the show. Howard Bryant the steroid era. He
Speaker 2: wrote a whole book on the beginning of it. I
Speaker 2: think steroids save baseball at a certain point. Am I
Speaker 2: am I crazy to think that, but I said, I again,
Speaker 2: that's the best time I remember my teenage years. I'm
Speaker 2: reminiscent again. Forgive me, y'all, but this was the best time.
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously, I'm a football baseball basketball player. Football
Speaker 2: and basketball my two fair sports. But I couldn't wait
Speaker 2: to get home to watch that raaseball.
Speaker 13: It's true, and it can you make the argument that
Speaker 13: the steroid eraror save the game.
Speaker 2: And the MLB played into it. I mean, chicks dig
Speaker 2: the long ball. There was commercials and all kinds of
Speaker 2: other shit that went along with it.
Speaker 13: They did, they did, and as a Hall of Fame voter,
Speaker 13: they left it to us. And this is one of
Speaker 13: the reasons why I stopped voting for the Hall of
Speaker 13: Fame was because it was like, well, wait a minute,
Speaker 13: you didn't give us any rules on this. You gave
Speaker 13: us rules on Pete Rose, we couldn't vote for him.
Speaker 13: Heave holes on Jackson, he couldn't. He's not on the ballot,
Speaker 13: we couldn't vote for him. Right, But you profited off
Speaker 13: as steroids. Your managers are in the Hall of Fame.
Speaker 13: Who managed these guys? Tony the Russes in the Hall
Speaker 13: of Fame? He had, he had Maguire, he had Conseko,
Speaker 13: you know he had, you know, Ruben Sierra, all the others,
Speaker 13: guys who were accused of using steroids. Right, Joe Torres
Speaker 13: in the Hall of Fame. And Roger Clemons isn't in
Speaker 13: the Hall of Fame. Alex Rariguez isn't in the Hall
Speaker 13: of Fame. So you're gonna punt and leave that to me.
Speaker 13: You're gonna make me the management stooge for not voting
Speaker 13: for these guys when you put all your guys in.
Speaker 13: Bud Selik has a statue in front of Miller Park
Speaker 13: in Milwaukee, so you have you erect a statue to yourself,
Speaker 13: but you leave it to us to keep these guys out.
Speaker 13: So I didn't think that was very fair.
Speaker 2: When you say leave it to us, is it kind
Speaker 2: of like a a consensus or what's understood doesn't need
Speaker 2: to be explained, Like everyone knows not to vote for that,
Speaker 2: I mean because Barry Bonds.
Speaker 14: No.
Speaker 13: Because what I used to do with my Hall of
Speaker 13: Fame vote was I was I would always call the
Speaker 13: Hall of Famers. I would call guys. I would call
Speaker 13: Jill Morgan, I would call Dennis Secresley. I would call
Speaker 13: a lot of guys and say, what do you think?
Speaker 13: Because once again, like we cover the game, right, but
Speaker 13: we see the game differently than the way you see
Speaker 13: the game. And so what I was always trying to
Speaker 13: do with my with my ballot was to try to
Speaker 13: make it a panorama, try to get everybody. Here's what
Speaker 13: his peers thought about him, Here's what I saw, Here's
Speaker 13: here are all the different layers and ways, here's the way,
Speaker 13: Here's the way the fans saw it. And I would
Speaker 13: ask all those questions. The Hall of Famers didn't want
Speaker 13: us to vote for the steroid guys either. Really, in fact,
Speaker 13: there had always been a movement that of Bonds, and
Speaker 13: some of those guys got in. We're not coming as
Speaker 13: a protest, so you know, we try to blame the
Speaker 13: writers all the time, and it's a massive thing.
Speaker 2: I was just going to ask that. I was gonna
Speaker 2: say what that, because I mean, I feel like as
Speaker 2: former players, like whether you get the recognition or not
Speaker 2: from the media or the fans or whatever, I think
Speaker 2: you really hang your hat on what your peers think.
Speaker 13: About those old school Those guys were old school, very
Speaker 13: and those old school guys are like, no drugs. Even
Speaker 13: though they were using drugs. They were using greens and
Speaker 13: they were using you know, weed and whatever else they
Speaker 13: were using. And some of those guys would say, hey,
Speaker 13: would I use steroids if I had the chance. I
Speaker 13: don't know, but they were very, very clear you cheated.
Speaker 13: And so my attitude has always been, if Bonds gets
Speaker 13: into the Hall of Fame, he earned it. If he
Speaker 13: doesn't get into the Hall of Fame, he earned it.
Speaker 13: Did over a Rod, you know, did over all those guys.
Speaker 13: You can't look at them and say, there's no reason
Speaker 13: why you're not in, right, we all know what why
Speaker 13: they're not in. It's not like the writers or the
Speaker 13: the now the Veterans committees now that they don't know
Speaker 13: they're making a decision. They're making a judgment, and they're
Speaker 13: making a call. But here, Matt, here's the other thing.
Speaker 13: I think I've softened on this because I look at
Speaker 13: it this way. There is the death penalty, or there's parole.
Speaker 13: That's kind of kind of how I see it. You know,
Speaker 13: there's life without parole or life with parole or whatever. Right,
Speaker 13: and so from a parole standpoint, if we're going to
Speaker 13: do it from illegal, you know, use the legal jargon.
Speaker 13: If you put Barry Bones in the Hall of Fame
Speaker 13: right now, twenty years after he retired, and he's the
Speaker 13: greatest baseball player I've ever seen, right, we all know
Speaker 13: that he paid the price for that. We all know.
Speaker 13: It's not like, oh man, we don't know why Barry
Speaker 13: didn't get in, you know, in twenty twenty seven. So
Speaker 13: to me, it sort of feels like, even if you
Speaker 13: do put these guys in now, they've all paid a
Speaker 13: pretty haven't they paid a pretty good price?
Speaker 1: Well, my question enough to cut you off.
Speaker 2: I mean, you look at some of these guys that
Speaker 2: you know, and my thing is it was it was
Speaker 2: it against them. There was no rules on.
Speaker 1: It at the time.
Speaker 2: Correct the law, but it wasn't a rule in MLB
Speaker 2: right now.
Speaker 13: It wasn't a rule in MLB at the time. However,
Speaker 13: my counter that had always been if there was no
Speaker 13: rule and we were all acting ignorantly because there was
Speaker 13: no rule, why'd you hide it? Would youly?
Speaker 14: For?
Speaker 13: I mean, everybody knew you're not supposed to be doing it.
Speaker 1: We all knew what.
Speaker 13: Everybody knew what was happening.
Speaker 2: So then my second question to that is, you look
Speaker 2: at Marvel Wires rookie year where he hits forty plus
Speaker 2: home runs and Barry Bonds had but two or three
Speaker 2: MVPs before he even was accused of so you know
Speaker 2: these guys can play the game at the highest level.
Speaker 13: I don't believe that it's part of the question. I
Speaker 13: don't think anybody is looking at Barry Bonds and go
Speaker 13: I wonder if he was talented enough. That's not the
Speaker 13: that's the question. The conversation is the drugs. We're talking
Speaker 13: about drugs. And I remember when I did juice in
Speaker 13: the game five and I was on sixty minutes with
Speaker 13: Mike Wallace and had to run down to spring train.
Speaker 13: In the next day, Derek Jeter comes by and hits
Speaker 13: me on the leg with the bat and he goes, hey,
Speaker 13: sixty minutes, We're not all doing this, you know, so
Speaker 13: they all had the same conversations, and I felt and
Speaker 13: I do feel like when people say, oh, you can't
Speaker 13: have a Hall of Fame without Barry Buns. Yeah, I
Speaker 13: mean there's this is the price. When people talk about legacy,
Speaker 13: this is the price. And everybody lost. I mean the
Speaker 13: players got to keep their money. You know, sure there's that,
Speaker 13: but really, this whole generation of players, Maguire, palmerow A,
Speaker 13: Rod Sosa, Clemens, Roger exactly. I mean, you know all
Speaker 13: of them, and you're looking at this and you're going,
Speaker 13: we're talking to Jason Giambi about this, and I and
Speaker 13: I covered g and he's one of my all time favorites.
Speaker 13: And if you ever had he, as I always say,
Speaker 13: there are guys who make the job easy, guys who
Speaker 13: make the job hard. Jason made the job.
Speaker 1: Very, very, very easy.
Speaker 13: And I'm sure you had it on your side as
Speaker 13: a players. There are writers who walked in the room
Speaker 13: who made the shit easy, and there were guys who
Speaker 13: were like, come on now, I.
Speaker 2: Want to deal with you.
Speaker 13: And I remember Jason was the only guy. And I
Speaker 13: remember this like it was just that they were sitting
Speaker 13: there at Legends at Stein Burnerfield when Jason had finally
Speaker 13: got cornered in the subpoena and the Balco grandurad and
Speaker 13: it was all and he looked in the camera and
Speaker 13: somebody said, Jason, did you use steroids? And Jason looked
Speaker 13: at the camera and he said no. And everybody there
Speaker 13: who knew and who had covered Jason, nobody was trying
Speaker 13: to get him. Nobody was out again, and we all
Speaker 13: felt terrible because we knew what a good dude he was.
Speaker 13: And Jason the next year, after all the grand jury
Speaker 13: stuff went down, he was the only guy who just
Speaker 13: walked over to me and he shook my hand and
Speaker 13: he said, I apologize for lying to you, really, and
Speaker 13: he said I was stuck. There was nothing I could do.
Speaker 13: They all the cameras were me and I was like, gee,
Speaker 13: you apologize to me. Like we all knew what was
Speaker 13: going down, and it was a very difficult situation for everybody.
Speaker 6: Yeah, welcome to.
Speaker 2: The show, Gary Sheffield, Barry Bonds, you guys used to
Speaker 2: trying together.
Speaker 1: What was that like?
Speaker 2: What'd you learn from him?
Speaker 15: Well, I I had just got married, like I told you,
Speaker 15: and I made la with my home for the off season,
Speaker 15: so I didn't have no training partners in my routine
Speaker 15: got compromised because I'm not going back to Florida. So
Speaker 15: Scott Boyd suggested I go work out with Barry Bonds
Speaker 15: up north, up in San Francisco. And actually Barry wasn't
Speaker 15: even there when I got there because he was in
Speaker 15: aspen skin. And when I first got there, I discovered
Speaker 15: I had to have surgery on both of my legs
Speaker 15: and didn't know it was wrong. I had cysts in
Speaker 15: the back of my legs and doctor teen behind your knees,
Speaker 15: behind my knees and doctor team he performed the surgery.
Speaker 15: So when Barry showed up, I was in two casts
Speaker 15: like in both legs and so but they was They
Speaker 15: said in about three four weeks, I'll be fine, and
Speaker 15: so I go in the gym. But when I got
Speaker 15: the cast off, I asked Barry, I said, how do
Speaker 15: you come back from knee injuries? Because I know you
Speaker 15: had knee injuries. He said, you got to start training
Speaker 15: right away. So I was like, okay. So I went
Speaker 15: in the gym and I did some squats, and I
Speaker 15: was doing squats and then all of a sudden, my.
Speaker 1: Stitches burst over.
Speaker 15: Yeah, it burst open, and then all of a sudden
Speaker 15: that the trainers kept putting this this this cream stuff
Speaker 15: on it, and they just kept rubbing down and then
Speaker 15: they taped it up, and I went to the doctor
Speaker 15: and I went and got stitches foot back in and
Speaker 15: then after that, all of a sudden, I start training
Speaker 15: with Barry. And then Barry started, you know, like leaving
Speaker 15: me in the morning, you know, because this is all
Speaker 15: part of his game of making me, you know, get
Speaker 15: up early and mentally tough and all this type of stuff.
Speaker 15: So I was going through that and then I was like,
Speaker 15: you know, I'm not with this, and I left. And
Speaker 15: next thing, you know, I get a call that I
Speaker 15: got to go testify, you know, against Barry Bonds. And
Speaker 15: I'm like, whoa, So now I laway up, I go
Speaker 15: down there and testify. I was on the stand for
Speaker 15: probably three questions. That was it. And so now all
Speaker 15: of this stuff comes back full circle. And when I
Speaker 15: look at this stuff, that decision of going to work
Speaker 15: out with him may have cost me more than I thought.
Speaker 2: What was the kreamans putting on you?
Speaker 15: I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. But
Speaker 15: but the thing is that when you're in a gym.
Speaker 15: What could they possibly be putting on you? Yeah, you know,
Speaker 15: so they put it on there. I went back to
Speaker 15: the doctor, got stitches, and then the rest is history.
Speaker 15: Now they got testing in place, So now everybody want
Speaker 15: to see what you made of Now, nothing change. My
Speaker 15: number steer the same, still staying.
Speaker 2: Barry Man, We appreciate you, we love you. Thoughts on
Speaker 2: no Tani, I mean I think he came in and
Speaker 2: has taken MLB by storm and then signed a monster contract.
Speaker 2: Thoughts on just his ability to do hit the ball
Speaker 2: the way he does and also pitch, and just the
Speaker 2: versatility of his game.
Speaker 3: The pitching and hitting has been outstanding. For what he's
Speaker 3: done in base running and stuff like that, he's a
Speaker 3: complete player. I mean, there's no doubt about the type
Speaker 3: of player he is, what he's accomplished in his career.
Speaker 3: The game has just changed. I mean, the game is
Speaker 3: way different than it is than when I play the
Speaker 3: same way Michael talks about it or anyone else. Oh,
Speaker 3: Tani is not going to hit two home runs without
Speaker 3: seeing one goal right here in my generation. I don't
Speaker 3: care what he does. He's not going to steal two
Speaker 3: bases without somebody decapitating his kneecap and slow him down
Speaker 3: because it's a different game back then today's game. They
Speaker 3: take batting practice all day. They take batting practice at one, two, three, four, five,
Speaker 3: all the way up. These guys hit more than I've
Speaker 3: ever seen in my entire lifetime that we didn't do,
Speaker 3: and they should be better than us. It's hitting wise
Speaker 3: because they can hit a home run, flip their bat
Speaker 3: up in the air, run around, get a taco, come
Speaker 3: back down, have a limo, drive around. You know, all
Speaker 3: these antics that we weren't allowed to do.
Speaker 1: If I did.
Speaker 3: Anything like that, there's no way I'm going to see
Speaker 3: a star. You know, I'll see the hospital, but I
Speaker 3: ain't gonna see baseball. And so as a hitter, we
Speaker 3: had to hit in a way to where I hit
Speaker 3: a home run. I know what's coming in next set
Speaker 3: back our possibility. So my thing is I have to
Speaker 3: be a little more defensive and be more of a
Speaker 3: contact hitter to get out of a problem than it's well,
Speaker 3: they can just do and hit, hit, and sometimes I
Speaker 3: think it could be a disadvantage. But o Tani, dude
Speaker 3: boy can play. There's no question about who he is.
Speaker 3: I just my opinion.
Speaker 1: I just hope he.
Speaker 3: Just stays at the hitting category because his hitting ability
Speaker 3: is off the chart. Pitching, I just think might tire
Speaker 3: him out. I think he should come out of the
Speaker 3: bullpen here and there, like he has because he's dhing.
Speaker 3: He come out of the bullpen and throw an inning
Speaker 3: or two here and just because he's so good as
Speaker 3: a reliever too, Like he could be one of the
Speaker 3: dominant relievers and dominant starters. I think as a starter, man,
Speaker 3: I think it might get wear a tear a little
Speaker 3: bit and tire him out. Why fix something that isn't broken,
Speaker 3: because that's like I couldn't me. I'd be like, no,
Speaker 3: I fix my name broke. This is good, I'm good piece,
Speaker 3: this is great. But I think coming out of the bullpen,
Speaker 3: he could really dominate.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the shelf.
Speaker 6: C Yeah, I'm tiny in the sport.
Speaker 9: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 9: I think there would be other people that can come
Speaker 9: along and hit and pitch. I probably think there probably
Speaker 9: were some other people that could have did it, but
Speaker 9: I don't think at this guy's level. Like, yeah, he's
Speaker 9: the best baseball player I ever seen. And I said
Speaker 9: that I saw him play one inning of one game
Speaker 9: and he hit a grundball to shortstop the DD and
Speaker 9: he beat it out at first base. And I was like,
Speaker 9: this guy's the biggest, the fastest, he hits the ball,
Speaker 9: the furthest he throws the ball the hardest. You guys,
Speaker 9: remember that guy which all Little League when youa was
Speaker 9: twelve years old whatever, his name was the best player.
Speaker 9: That's so turney at the highest level. At the highest level,
Speaker 9: is it?
Speaker 2: I mean, and this is just sport. Is it early
Speaker 2: too early to say he is or will be the
Speaker 2: greatest of all time?
Speaker 9: I said it the first day. He's the greatest baseball
Speaker 9: player to ever play? Really? Yes, absolutely? And I'm a
Speaker 9: huge Berry bonceman. I grew about here. Barry's the goat.
Speaker 9: But Barry can't go out and throw seven innings. Yeah,
Speaker 9: you know what I'm saying, Like, this guy is basically
Speaker 9: Roger Clemens and Barry Boner, you know what I'm saying. Like,
Speaker 9: So that that, to me, you know, sets him apart.
Speaker 9: But Barry is a close second for me, you know,
Speaker 9: growing up out here. But but no, it's so tiny
Speaker 9: for sure, definitely different. No, I mean, I think it's
Speaker 9: just fundamentals, right, Like if you talk about European basketball,
Speaker 9: like they do everything right and even if you want
Speaker 9: a young team at a young age, everything is fundamentally
Speaker 9: like locked in. So they come over here and it's
Speaker 9: you know, they do everything the right way and it
Speaker 9: makes the game easier for him. And I think now
Speaker 9: you're starting to see like power and slug from these guys,
Speaker 9: where at first it was, you know, it was more
Speaker 9: you know, the each ye roads and those type of guys.
Speaker 9: But now, I mean, you got Otani and you got
Speaker 9: you know, the guy that came from the white size,
Speaker 9: I can't think of his name, but you got real,
Speaker 9: you know sluggers that are coming from over there that
Speaker 9: can play this game. So it's fun to watch. How
Speaker 9: much credit does Matsu deserve one thousand? I mean, I
Speaker 9: think if you ask so Tani, he would say each
Speaker 9: rods got one right that I think so, I think so.
Speaker 9: I think if you asked ough Tony, he would say
Speaker 9: each yi rosisness rat. I have no idea. I've never
Speaker 9: heard him say that he took the game by staring.
Speaker 9: He did okay, and he didn't strike out, but he
Speaker 9: I mean, he was a three thirty hitter with you know,
Speaker 9: all the hits and stuff. But he could have easily
Speaker 9: hit two eighty and hit forty homers every Yeah, you
Speaker 9: know what I mean. So he I mean four thousand
Speaker 9: hits in his career. I mean unbelievable players. So I
Speaker 9: think he kind of kicked down the door for what
Speaker 9: we saw as Japanese you know, hitters. He was really
Speaker 9: the first one.
Speaker 6: The first one five players in the league you like
Speaker 6: watching most.
Speaker 9: Right now, I'm gonna always watch Aaron Judge if he's on.
Speaker 9: I'm always watch Bobby with Junior. I don't know if
Speaker 9: y'all seen him. Bobby with Junior is an animal. Gunner
Speaker 9: Henderson third such short stop for Baltimore. I love watching Jazz.
Speaker 9: I like watching like the Yankee games obviously, and Jackson
Speaker 9: cheerio centerfielder for the Brewers. I love watching hitters, man.
Speaker 9: I don't like watching the one and nothing game. I
Speaker 9: want to watch eight to nothing like I was flying
Speaker 9: around the bases, hitting the balls hard. So I love
Speaker 9: watching offense, so I'm always name hit her.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Showmokie Betts, oh Tani. We'll talk about
Speaker 2: him on the field and how incredible he is, but
Speaker 2: what is he like off the field? Is the is
Speaker 2: there does he speak any English? Ship does he got
Speaker 2: any jokes? He got some jokes, but.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 16: Honestly, you don't see him. Don't see him, No, you
Speaker 16: can't really see him. He's he's that person that he
Speaker 16: just he literally cannot go anywhere. He can't live a
Speaker 16: normal life, and so it kind of sucks, like we
Speaker 16: after we leave the stadium, you don't see him, and
Speaker 16: it's I get it, he can't he can't go anywhere.
Speaker 2: So but what's he like in the locker room when
Speaker 2: he's cool, He's just be chilling, like he's really he's quiet.
Speaker 16: He only hit this year, so you know, he was
Speaker 16: kind of hanging out chilling. Then he started throwing a
Speaker 16: little bit when he would go outside throw and then
Speaker 16: come back. And he never never worked way too much
Speaker 16: and never worked a little. He just did what he
Speaker 16: needed to do. And I mean, he's just more gifted
Speaker 16: and more gifting, just better than everybody and there's nothing
Speaker 16: you can do about it.
Speaker 2: On the field, I mean, you've seen him do some
Speaker 2: incredible things. Hopefully he gets back to the mound this
Speaker 2: upcoming year. But you know, the hitting, we actually went
Speaker 2: to a game that you guys went back to back
Speaker 2: for the game before the game. But you know, just
Speaker 2: to kind of see that that energy. But what is
Speaker 2: he like as just a guy out there on the
Speaker 2: field or you know, whether he's just hitting or on
Speaker 2: the mound.
Speaker 16: He's really he's really normal. Like it's just what he
Speaker 16: does is so unnormal. Like he's really normal in his preparation.
Speaker 16: He goes and talks and he competes.
Speaker 1: He didn't.
Speaker 16: He's not more of a competitor than that I am.
Speaker 16: He's just you know, and so you know, everybody sees,
Speaker 16: you know, they see him as a normal guy. We
Speaker 16: all see him like, you know.
Speaker 1: It's just show.
Speaker 16: But then he goes put up fifty to fifty, you know,
Speaker 16: and wins every award in the world, and you're like, damn, yeah,
Speaker 16: you know, you forget, Like he show helly.
Speaker 2: World Baseball Classic. The title comes down to you and them.
Speaker 2: Yeah they got y'all. Yeah, that's against his former teammate.
Speaker 16: We got old tiny dog, we got o tiny A
Speaker 16: lot of teams do.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 16: He did the whole country of the USA. He did
Speaker 16: the best of the which is why and then you
Speaker 16: know how cold he is right there? He did and
Speaker 16: he went through you know, the top of the lineup
Speaker 16: as well, and so yeah, that that was a cool experience,
Speaker 16: you know, Team USA being able to put on that
Speaker 16: uniform that was that was amazing.
Speaker 1: That that was amazing.
Speaker 16: How I'll play that was cool.
Speaker 1: My man, Nick.
Speaker 7: They call him Swish show hal Tony who By the way,
Speaker 7: I don't know what he's like on the inside of
Speaker 7: the locker room, but all I'm saying is you need
Speaker 7: to watch that motherfucker and you're like, damn, I respect
Speaker 7: the shit out of him because every second of every
Speaker 7: day is spent towards being the best player in the
Speaker 7: world for him. But he got I think I heard
Speaker 7: he's got like a watch or something, and it like
Speaker 7: judges like how much sleep he gets, and if you
Speaker 7: don't get enough sleep, he goes back to sleep, and
Speaker 7: then when the watch beaks, he gets up brow.
Speaker 1: Hey, y'o. Hey they're different.
Speaker 7: Hey, if you've been up on Otani at all, you've
Speaker 7: been up on him.
Speaker 2: Yeah. He's a big dude.
Speaker 1: Like he got pipes too. Shit.
Speaker 9: Yeah, I guess.
Speaker 7: Motherfucker was made in a factory.
Speaker 1: Bro for real, This dude is for real.
Speaker 6: He said you never took VP on. He never even
Speaker 6: ran it.
Speaker 7: Takes VP on the field. No, you never take it
Speaker 7: on the field. No, No, I'm telling you, man, I
Speaker 7: heard it.
Speaker 1: Fuck man.
Speaker 7: I forget his name, manager, and I'm forgetting his name,
Speaker 7: and I'll grab it here in a minute. But I
Speaker 7: was doing some work for Peacock and we had Sunday
Speaker 7: Sunday Morning Baseball when they was trying to get that
Speaker 7: off the ground. And the coolest part of that job
Speaker 7: was I was doing pre I was doing pre and
Speaker 7: post And the coolest part of that job is being
Speaker 7: able to go and interview the managers for the game.
Speaker 7: That's the dopest part about it because like for me, Bro,
Speaker 7: like that's who I need to learn from. Like, I
Speaker 7: want to be around those motherfuckers.
Speaker 1: I want to see what they're doing.
Speaker 7: Yeah, you know what I'm saying, Like, that's the guys
Speaker 7: I want to see, Bro, Like, those guys are better
Speaker 7: than me. And I've always taken that route. You flock
Speaker 7: to the people or that are better than you, and
Speaker 7: you'll get better along the way, you feel me. So
Speaker 7: I was interviewing him and we're just bullshit and we were.
Speaker 1: Just catching up.
Speaker 7: He was our bench coach in New York for Boone
Speaker 7: Either for a minute, and yeah, Phil Nevin and I said, dude,
Speaker 7: tell me, tell me about Otani. He's like, bro, you
Speaker 7: you couldn't ask for anything better. Like there's there's nothing
Speaker 7: he does wrong. Like you ain't got worried about Autani
Speaker 7: going out till three am. No, no, no, because he
Speaker 7: was when his watch click.
Speaker 1: He's a bad you know what I mean.
Speaker 7: So like when you have someone like that who's at
Speaker 7: the forefront of not only your organization but for your
Speaker 7: league on the international front.
Speaker 17: Cauz, this dude's a global superstar.
Speaker 7: How many fuck people can say they're a global superstar. Yeah,
Speaker 7: we got some, we got some. We got some amazing
Speaker 7: players over here, but we ain't talking about global cause
Speaker 7: you know what I'm saying, Like he hits on a
Speaker 7: different level. Oh, by the way, you know he's fucking
Speaker 7: pele bro. He only got one name now he like prints.
Speaker 7: You don't even need to say his name anymore because
Speaker 7: you know.
Speaker 2: Well, we see another player of his type on on
Speaker 2: the on the mound.
Speaker 1: Are they coming?
Speaker 12: So?
Speaker 1: Are they coming?
Speaker 13: Yeah?
Speaker 7: I hope so, because at the end of the day, man,
Speaker 7: like listen, we are in that Velo era and these
Speaker 7: young ThunderCats got some cannons for arms.
Speaker 2: Bro thundercasts too. They're just so the kid. These kids
Speaker 2: are big whatever they are, They're fucking.
Speaker 7: Much just the overall it's like these dudes peak and
Speaker 7: like they're full like grown up at like twenty one.
Speaker 7: I'm like, what I look like a little kid, I think,
Speaker 7: brot the point.
Speaker 2: I think to your point, the international, the influx, the
Speaker 2: Japanese influx, with the pitching the I mean.
Speaker 7: Commissioner man for BRO, I'm like, yo, thank you guys.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 7: You guys are fucking they're they're putting us on a
Speaker 7: level global. Yeah, I'm saying, like what themo Just overall
Speaker 7: in general, just being able to have the ability to
Speaker 7: not only be to be able to have all races
Speaker 7: represented in our game, it's fucking awesome, dude. It's such
Speaker 7: a It can be more diverse, but it is a
Speaker 7: diverse group, which I think is awesome. But not only that,
Speaker 7: just think of all the stud Asian players that have
Speaker 7: just come over as of late, and because they rolling
Speaker 7: them in now, the way these young kids over there
Speaker 7: is trained. It's development, bro, It's about fucking getting yourself better.
Speaker 7: They're not chasing fucking little plastic ass rings at eight
Speaker 7: years old.
Speaker 1: No, they ain't like.
Speaker 7: That, dude. That's why when these dudes come to the show,
Speaker 7: they're ready, they're ready, ready, and they're fucking contributing. Like
Speaker 7: nah some mental process crazy. Yeah, welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Tyler Glassna obviously huge Japanese presence on your guys side.
Speaker 2: I came up in locker rooms where no way was
Speaker 2: off limits, Like do you guys have fun talk shit
Speaker 2: to them?
Speaker 1: If they do?
Speaker 2: If you do, how do they react? How do they
Speaker 2: take it?
Speaker 10: Like?
Speaker 17: What is that interaction like when it's not the game,
Speaker 17: just like the entering between Yeah, it's just all the same.
Speaker 17: Nothing's off limits. That's what I feel like too as
Speaker 17: a baseball player, as an athlete, Like we're very fortunate
Speaker 17: to have that. My whole life has just been that,
Speaker 17: like there's no you can do this, you can't do that,
Speaker 17: there's no like hr type of thing. So you really
Speaker 17: you develop like a good sense of humor and tough
Speaker 17: skin and like, and you have to learn how to
Speaker 17: talk shit yourself exactly, Like it's important to learn, you
Speaker 17: know exactly, Like it's a good it can't just be like,
Speaker 17: well I'm gonna tell on you and then now nothing.
Speaker 17: This isn't going to be a thing. It's like you
Speaker 17: kind of have to learn how to become a thing.
Speaker 6: You don't know the language all you do and learn
Speaker 6: the curse where it's exactly.
Speaker 17: Yeah, but they from there, Yeah, they're great, like they'll
Speaker 17: they got tough. Like we everyone talks shit to everybody,
Speaker 17: and it's like, you know, it's out of love. You're
Speaker 17: not like trying to be mean, so it's no one cares.
Speaker 17: Everyone's like talking, especially keik And and clop House like he's
Speaker 17: talking shit to everybody.
Speaker 1: It's perfect.
Speaker 2: It keeps it loose.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and it has to be a dream come true
Speaker 6: for you to be a Solka kid.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Plan for the Dodgers was that was the dog where
Speaker 6: the Dodgers always your squad.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 17: Growing up, we live like thirty five, which could be
Speaker 17: like two hours to the field, so like we would
Speaker 17: go to games sparingly, but like on weekdays generally and
Speaker 17: like lead before traffic. But I've always liked them. We'd
Speaker 17: always go to games. I remember watching games in the
Speaker 17: backyard of my dad all the time, and it was like.
Speaker 1: I always liked it.
Speaker 2: Dottery not only a hometown team, but when with your
Speaker 2: hometown team. That's got to be.
Speaker 1: Different, insane.
Speaker 17: It's crazy, and I think it'll really sink in when
Speaker 17: I'm like done.
Speaker 6: And just at that moment. Yet in that moment standing
Speaker 6: on the mound looking around, like yeah.
Speaker 17: I think comparatively because there's been some postseasons that I
Speaker 17: haven't won, and you go into the off season, Like
Speaker 17: with the Rays, you go to the off season and
Speaker 17: it stings for like three months, like you think about
Speaker 17: I wake up in the middle of the night like damn,
Speaker 17: like you know what I mean, Like if you don't
Speaker 17: pitch well or this or that, there's always like that
Speaker 17: ruminating thing that happens randomly, like you get a little
Speaker 17: anxious thought of like it just got you think about it,
Speaker 17: and it's like a little virus that's always there. And
Speaker 17: you didn't win and you think about it, and it's
Speaker 17: it's like I'll be at Thanksgiving dinner like having a
Speaker 17: good conversation, I'm like, oh we lost. Yeah, Like so
Speaker 17: it's just I can I can feel that, and then
Speaker 17: after twenty five feeling that at Thanksgiving being like oh
Speaker 17: my god, we want like I pitched one and I
Speaker 17: participated and so it's cool to feel the contrast of both,
Speaker 17: but I think the real zoom out part of it'll
Speaker 17: be what I'm done, and I'll appreciate it a lot more.
Speaker 2: What's the Atini experience been, like, I mean, arguably the
Speaker 2: most famous athlete on the planet. Yeah, what's that like?
Speaker 2: Just a day to day traveling with that and seeing it.
Speaker 17: He's a man, He's he's kind of a unicorn in
Speaker 17: a sense of obviously like his physical talents and stuff,
Speaker 17: but his like, like the mental fortitude part is pretty insane.
Speaker 17: Like I think for the most part, when you're around
Speaker 17: you know this when you're around dudes for seven months
Speaker 17: a year, Like how up and down people can be.
Speaker 17: And there's all different flavors of up and down, but
Speaker 17: everyone has like good and bad days. Some people are
Speaker 17: a lot more volatile than others. But some people hide it,
Speaker 17: but no doubt you can tell. But with him, I
Speaker 17: really have. It helps when he hits like four hundred
Speaker 17: and a million home runs every year, but he's had
Speaker 17: some tough times and bad starts and things have gone on,
Speaker 17: and he's the same dude all the time, and he
Speaker 17: does the same thing on the flight. He's always smiled, smiley, happy.
Speaker 17: He has to do, like all the extra media compared
Speaker 17: to what we do after the game. He's got like
Speaker 17: five hundred people sitting there talking to him. He's always smiling,
Speaker 17: he's always respectful, and he's just like he's it's crazy,
Speaker 17: like he'll he sits on the flights no matter how
Speaker 17: long the aar and he reads comic books. It's crazy.
Speaker 17: Like he doesn't look at like electronic screen. He does
Speaker 17: like it's like perfect. It's crazy. He just reads comic
Speaker 17: books and sleeps and sleeps like so much. I'll ask
Speaker 17: him how many hours of sleep he guys he's like
Speaker 17: eleven hours, Like, no problem.
Speaker 6: That's part of the culture. I guess I always want
Speaker 6: to learn. It's crazy. I remember being teammates with playing
Speaker 6: with him with the Angels he was a rookie, and
Speaker 6: seeing his ability to make adjustments, never get down himself,
Speaker 6: Like he has this inner confidence of knowing everything is
Speaker 6: going to work out, like things that you would tell
Speaker 6: your boy, like you know you're gonna be fine.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 6: It's like he knows that, yeah, And he decides early
Speaker 6: in the season, all right, who am I going to
Speaker 6: be this year? If he has Tommy John and he
Speaker 6: knows he won't be able to pitch. All right, I'm
Speaker 6: gonna be a slugger stolen based guy. Yeah, all right,
Speaker 6: what this year I'm going to pitch? All right, I'll
Speaker 6: take it back on the stolen basis. I'll, you know,
Speaker 6: to be able to mix and match through this, but
Speaker 6: to see somebody have to balance out the workload of
Speaker 6: locking in and all the work that goes into it
Speaker 6: being a starting picture and flip it on. As soon
Speaker 6: as he gets through the ending he has to turn
Speaker 6: it on and go to the batrack, get his helmet,
Speaker 6: get his bat and be locked in for one of
Speaker 6: the nastiest pictures in the game. Because everybody's discussing these days,
Speaker 6: like how do you feel like he's able to manage
Speaker 6: the mental workload that that comes with it and have
Speaker 6: some level of personal life or do you just not
Speaker 6: have a personal life. I don't know.
Speaker 17: I don't you have to ask him. I'm not sure
Speaker 17: what his personal I mean, he's married as a kid, like,
Speaker 17: he loves his dog, and his dog is well trained,
Speaker 17: so clearly there's some times.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 17: I think I think it's sleeping comic books. I don't know, Like,
Speaker 17: I don't know what else he's doing, but he just
Speaker 17: seems I don't know, I don't know, like what he
Speaker 17: does all the time at home, but he's always chilling
Speaker 17: on the road and just hanging out. And I'm not
Speaker 17: quite sure everything. But I think for the two most
Speaker 17: obvious things, like the sleep, I think.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you want to call.
Speaker 2: Fellow, you got any questions the biggest Dodger faner of
Speaker 2: the world, where you want.
Speaker 6: To what do you got my question? Like, I'm sure
Speaker 6: of great baseball.
Speaker 1: Growing up, And.
Speaker 18: Yeah, I mean it's hard to even know where to
Speaker 18: begin with with a guy like him. First off, I mean,
Speaker 18: you look from an offensive perspective, he's you know, top
Speaker 18: two three, you know, offensive threats, and all of baseball,
Speaker 18: if not the most offensive threat, teams are fear him.
Speaker 18: He has the ability to hit any pitch really over
Speaker 18: the fence. The fact that he's one of the fastest
Speaker 18: players on the field as well is remarkable. So that's
Speaker 18: one aspect. There's a hitter of show, hey, you know,
Speaker 18: top top three hitter in all of baseball. And then
Speaker 18: you go away to say he can also pitch. He's
Speaker 18: a number one starter on you know, the best team
Speaker 18: in baseball, and he's a top I don't know what
Speaker 18: three to five pitcher in baseball. We've never seen it before.
Speaker 18: Maybe maybe Babe Ruth, but hard hard to say. I
Speaker 18: don't think we'll ever see it again, to be honest
Speaker 18: with you. It takes so much time and effort to
Speaker 18: be good at one thing, and for him to be
Speaker 18: good at two things at the highest level is just unimanageable.
Speaker 18: And also, I mean to throw on the top that
Speaker 18: he's the most famous star in Japan, right and and
Speaker 18: we know how fanatical the fans are, especially in Japan.
Speaker 18: He doesn't have any downtime. I mean, he's he's always
Speaker 18: has to be always has to be on and he's
Speaker 18: and he's got so much to do. Now that I'm
Speaker 18: around a little bit, you just see how much he
Speaker 18: does on a daily basis. Sometimes he's in the cage
Speaker 18: and he's going to do his his pitching work. Like
Speaker 18: there's a lot of a lot of moving parts in
Speaker 18: his world and he's able to figure him all out
Speaker 18: and have a ment success. So I don't I don't
Speaker 18: see another player being like him ever.
Speaker 2: From a business standpoint, the impact of these Japanese players
Speaker 2: and the influx of it, what do your thoughts, just
Speaker 2: as a as a baseball mind.
Speaker 18: Yeah, there's no doubt there's some pretty talented players coming
Speaker 18: out out of Japan and that's a obviously we were
Speaker 18: actually just in Tokyo a few weeks ago. Is it
Speaker 18: on a family trip? Which is you spending time over there?
Speaker 18: That It's great, super clean, so fun, just very interesting
Speaker 18: and I would definitely recommend it. But you know, it's
Speaker 18: a it's a big country, big baseball culture that's been
Speaker 18: going on for for a long time. They obviously have
Speaker 18: their professional teams, but it's a huge audience, right, It's
Speaker 18: a massive audience that follows sho he Otani and the
Speaker 18: other guys. But show he is like up here and
Speaker 18: he's on when you go there, you see he's on
Speaker 18: every billboard, he's on every bus, he's on it. You know,
Speaker 18: his marketing team is doing a pretty pretty good job.
Speaker 18: He's everywhere over there. He's the biggest star by far
Speaker 18: over there. I kind of I would say he's like
Speaker 18: Michael Jordan and Michael Jackson at their highest. He's wrapped
Speaker 18: up into one dude, which is pretty remarkable. So with
Speaker 18: that said, yeah, it's creating a lot more opportunities and
Speaker 18: obviously him more in a Dodger uniform is helpful for
Speaker 18: the Dodgers our time, and when we were in Europe
Speaker 18: in London, I mean, the whole goal there was just
Speaker 18: kind of slowly expand the sport in other areas. Obviously
Speaker 18: Japan already huge baseball culture, Latin America huge baseball culture,
Speaker 18: but once you kind of go that side of the Atlantic,
Speaker 18: not so much so just trying to get another footprint
Speaker 18: over there. NFL has been doing it for a long
Speaker 18: time and they've had some success at MBA, as you know,
Speaker 18: are really starting to spend spend some money over there,
Speaker 18: and Inajor League Baseball wants.
Speaker 2: To be the same. Welcome to the show.
Speaker 1: Jeff Passon.
Speaker 2: Was instrumental in breaking the Otani interpreter gambling story. That story,
Speaker 2: along with any others that you worked on, that really
Speaker 2: come into mind as some of the crazier stories you've
Speaker 2: worked on during your tenure.
Speaker 19: I first heard the tip about Otani's gambling, and by
Speaker 19: the way, that's how it was framed to me. First
Speaker 19: tip was Shoheatani might have gambling problem, and it's like, oh, first,
Speaker 19: the first thing I think is, oh God, like the
Speaker 19: thing that's too good to be true. Actually is, and
Speaker 19: you know, I reached out to a reporterer with our
Speaker 19: investigative team, t Thompson, who I knew, and she's much
Speaker 19: better at that area than I am. You know, She's
Speaker 19: got sources in places that I don't, and Tish's done
Speaker 19: an incredible job on this, and she was the one
Speaker 19: who had the conversation with Ibe Mitzuhara where that like
Speaker 19: forced the Dodgers to address this in Japan and inside
Speaker 19: the clubhouse, and we were getting ready to run with
Speaker 19: that story when you know, they reach out to us
Speaker 19: and say, actually, this is not what happened.
Speaker 1: Wo.
Speaker 19: Yeah, And so I was I was not quite in
Speaker 19: the middle of that. But as all of this is
Speaker 19: going on, I remember I was sitting there. I was
Speaker 19: at a gas station filling up my tank, talking to Tisha,
Speaker 19: like what is going on here? And how has this
Speaker 19: thing broken as wildly as it has? And I just,
Speaker 19: you know, I look at all of this and we're
Speaker 19: in such a such a conspiracy loving society that there's
Speaker 19: a large segment of people out there who still believe
Speaker 19: that show Hao Tani was the one who was gambling.
Speaker 19: I am never going to entirely discount any story because
Speaker 19: the world's a weird place. But I just ask those
Speaker 19: same people to read the thirty something page indictment against Depay,
Speaker 19: to listen to the phone calls that were made by
Speaker 19: him to get money transferred out of that account. There's
Speaker 19: just a lot of evidence, and if it actually is
Speaker 19: all a cover up, it is one of the greatest
Speaker 19: cover ups in the history of the world. And I
Speaker 19: give him so much credit for covering it up like that.
Speaker 2: You did something that I think is very admirable because
Speaker 2: we live in such a day and age where clickbait
Speaker 2: runs and hot takes are prevalent, and you publicly apologize
Speaker 2: to a tani for we laugh. But I mean I
Speaker 2: appreciate because I'm a former athlete and now transitioning in
Speaker 2: this media space. I see people and I remember as
Speaker 2: a player, I didn't like it, but I appreciate people
Speaker 2: who have an opinion, and there's always the facts to
Speaker 2: your opinion. But then when you see that it's not
Speaker 2: what you thought it was, most people just let it go.
Speaker 2: You decided not to do that.
Speaker 19: Why would you ever be angry about being wrong? We're
Speaker 19: wrong at things every single day, and if I'm going
Speaker 19: to teach my children that Acknowledging when you're wrong is
Speaker 19: the most important thing that you can do, because it
Speaker 19: shows humility and because it shows fallibility, and because it
Speaker 19: shows vulnerability and all these things that are important in
Speaker 19: being a productive, contributing member to society. Then I'm just
Speaker 19: a hypocrite if I don't do that. And also he
Speaker 19: was so good and I was so.
Speaker 5: Wrong, like there's wrong and there's God damn, you fucked
Speaker 5: up this one.
Speaker 1: And you know I didn't do it.
Speaker 19: I didn't write that story, Matt for like, I don't
Speaker 19: care about clicks like that. That's the honest to god truth.
Speaker 19: I'm comfortable enough with the work that I do that
Speaker 19: I don't need validation through numbers. And I've done this
Speaker 19: for twenty five years almost now, and I'm thrilled with
Speaker 19: where my career has taken me. So you know, I
Speaker 19: can lose scoops that I'm fighting for and not beat
Speaker 19: myself up too badly. And I can get things wrong,
Speaker 19: but getting it wrong to that level. I had talked
Speaker 19: with scouts and people who had watched him all spring,
Speaker 19: and let's remember, like Shoho Tani, this is how talented
Speaker 19: he is. He really did struggle at the plate that spring,
Speaker 19: and he decided to make a swing change on the
Speaker 19: eve of his first season. He was leg kicking with
Speaker 19: his front leg during spring training and his timing was
Speaker 19: just all askewed. And then you know, you see it now,
Speaker 19: the little ankle twist here before he goes. That was
Speaker 19: suggested to him during the last preseason series that they
Speaker 19: had against the Angels. They did, you know, they just
Speaker 19: did a couple exhibition games down in La and Otani
Speaker 19: changed his swing there and that changed the course of
Speaker 19: his career.
Speaker 1: Absolutely.
Speaker 2: He deferred nearly seven hundred million dollars of his contract. Obviously,
Speaker 2: he's probably one of the globally the biggest stars in
Speaker 2: the world. Is there an estimate estimated amount of money
Speaker 2: you think he's making per year just all in.
Speaker 19: I mean personally, with all of the advertisements, with all
Speaker 19: of the sponsorships and stuff like that. I mean, it's
Speaker 19: upward of one hundred million dollars. And the Dodgers, the
Speaker 19: Los Angeles Dodgers are not the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Speaker 1: They are the show.
Speaker 19: Heyo Tani Shell Corporation like that. I mean, like it's honest,
Speaker 19: it's and and hey, good for them.
Speaker 14: They saw what the Angels never did goodn't They understood
Speaker 14: that Otani himself is a monolith, that the game almost
Speaker 14: revolves around him as much as anything. They saw the
Speaker 14: international possibilities and what they could do in Japan, they
Speaker 14: saw the business possibilities, and and it's it's everything.
Speaker 19: It's the tours, it's the tourists who come in to
Speaker 19: take them, it's the merch it's the sponsorships, it's the
Speaker 19: whole kitten kaboodle. And the Dodgers just last year became
Speaker 19: the first Major League Baseball franchise to have more than
Speaker 19: one billion dollars in revenue in one year, and they're
Speaker 19: going to do it again this year and.
Speaker 1: Probably every year after that. He's there.