Episode 37: We're back

We are back! After a very long hiatus I will be back posting episodes again! This first episode is just an hello and catching everyone up on my own life from the past 2 years. We will start having guests coming on soon!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
What's Up, What's happening? Welcomeback to the Minor League Take after two
long years. Sorry, I haven'tuploaded for a while, I haven't posted,
I haven't done anything. It's beena crazy two years since the last
time I posted one of these.I miss you guys, I miss talking
to you guys, I miss recordingthese and putting the stuff out and getting

(00:20):
feedback from everybody. But it's goodto finally be posting again. And this
episode is just going to be ajust kind of a rundown a, you
know, talking about what's been goingon with me, what's been happening,
and kind of give us some updateson my personal life and some other stuff
that I've been able to achieve throughbaseball and it's been an absolute blast.

(00:43):
Most importantly, though, I'm gonnagive you guys an update on all the
alumni of the Minor League Take andtheir stories and kind of what's happened all
of them, and to hear about, you know, the guys that you've
been following along see what's happening tothem. I'm gonna also give you know,
kind of an update on where wherethey're at in life. So but

(01:04):
yeah, let's uh let's get started. So first things first, back in
twenty twenty two, when I wasdoing these episodes, I would often reference
a company called, or an organizationcalled Advocates for Minor Leaguers, and that
was run by initially Garrett Procius,who went on to help us get you

(01:25):
know, a huge settlement for ourclass action lawsuit against Major League Baseball for
unpaid minor or for unpaid minor leaguersin spring training because we've never been paid
for that before and thankfully now weget paid like six hundred bucks a week
in camp, which for most peoplethat hear that and they're like, ooh,
that's not good. That's not good. Uh, But for us,

(01:45):
that's a huge bump. That's imean, six hundred bucks more than what
we were making. There's a lotof problems with the system. And as
you guys kind of hear me talkabout it and kind of give you my
inside look into all of it,because I was not only you know,
an active member of the Advocates fromMinor lea Big Baseball, I was a

(02:07):
pretty active bargainer when it came tothe actual CBA for the minor leagues,
and that was you know, gotfinalized negotiating in twenty twenty three. But
yeah, so I initially got involved. I kind of I'll start at the
beginning to kind of really help youguys understand how long I've been a part

(02:30):
of this fight to make things betterthan the minor leagues. So it was
twenty It was twenty nineteen. Iwas taking classes at Rollins College, my
college before I got drafted. Iwas trying to take some classes try to
get my degree and graduate finally.And I had a teacher who we were

(02:52):
talking about this, that and theother thing. He was a philosophy teacher,
and we were going over he kindof just posed a general question to
the class of you know, aremen and women different? And he wasn't.
He had no political, malicious viewpoint, but he knows that in today's
world there are views one way orthe other about that stuff. And a

(03:14):
lot of the women in the classchimed up and said, yeah, bs
may get paid this, that andthe other thing. And I was like,
I am not experiencing that at all. I'm not experiencing these great paychecks
as a man at all. Ihave no idea what you guys are talking
about. This doesn't make any sense, and they started quoting a study that
I'm not going to get it intoright now. I kind of responded with,

(03:37):
well, since February until now,I got paid six thousand dollars to
do my job, so I don'tknow what you're talking about. And they
the whole class kind of was takenaback and was like, what are you
even saying right now? My teacherwas like, yeah, what are you
saying? And I was like,yeah, I only made six thousand dollars
this year as a professional baseball player. And a lot of them were confused,

(03:57):
and after class my professor grad meand was like, hey, what
do you mean you only get paidsix thousand. I was like, we
only get paid six thousand for theyear. It's like, how do you
survive? I was like, honestly, you get creative. You eat a
lot of eggs, you eat alot of BB and J's, and you
kind of just grind away and youfigure out a way to save that little

(04:18):
money that you do have. Andhe's like, this doesn't make any sense,
you guys, this is a realjob, Like, you guys are
actually there for tons and tons ofhours, Like does this make any sense?
I was like, I don't know, and he's a lawyer, and
he goes, well, I wantyou to find out. He goes,
I'm a lawyer. I know whatI'm talking about, but you need to

(04:39):
know what you're talking about. SoI want you to go ahead and do
the research and understand what's going onwith all this. So I did,
and I found a lot of corruptionand a lot of people behind the scenes,
not only in Major League Baseball butin Washington, DC, that were
helping make this all possible. AndI was sick to my stomach. I

(05:00):
was already not happy with how oursituation was, but I was even angrier
now now that I knew that peoplewere maliciously looking out for their own wallet
while they were crushing guys that wereworking really hard. And these are billionaires.
These aren't people that you know can'tafford to do it. Okay,
anytime you've ever heard a baseball teamtell you that they're not making any money,

(05:24):
they're not. They're lying to you. They're they're directly and pointedly telling
you a lie to get you tofeel bad and to get you to give
them more money. That is allthat is I and I am not going
to pretend like that's not a reality. It's been going on for over a
hundred years. Like this isn't anew trick. Every time the team has

(05:45):
ever said like, oh, wejust don't have the money, they're lying.
They're lying to you, and I'mover it. And as someone that
knows baseball history really well, it'sbeen happening forever. And so I went
I went back and I found thisthing called the SAP Act, this Save
America's Pastime Act, And essentially whatit is is it says that Major League

(06:09):
Baseball has an exemption from minimum wagelaws, so now they no longer have
to worry about paying people an actualliving any not even a living salary,
a salary just to really begin,Like if you're at extended spring training,
you're just there for free, gettingall this, you know, training and
working out and doing all this stuffevery day to try to hopefully get promoted.

(06:31):
They're not on any kind of dyingfor you. So it was pretty
nuts. I go into twenty twentyknowing all this stuff. But I mean,
you know, I'm not gonna sayanything because my career is going really
well up to this point. Myfirst let's see, I got drafted in
twenty eighteen, and by the endof twenty nineteen, I had played in
five different levels, and I feltlike I had a pretty good child to

(06:56):
make Double A in twenty twenty,and then COVID hits and I did what
everyone did, kind of lost mymind a little bit and was just looking
for anything to latch onto. Andthen in twenty twenty, I come across
the tripper page called Advocates for MinorLeague Baseball and I click on it and

(07:18):
I read a little bit about whatthey're trying to do, and I was
like, Wow, this is reallycool, and I message it and I
said, hey, if you're lookingfor more information, like I'm a minor
league baseball player, I can tellyou my experience. But most importantly,
go look up the SAP Act andthis corrupt politician out in Illinois who helped
pass it. And the page respondedwith, Wow, that's awesome. Can

(07:40):
you give me a call tomorrow,here's my number. I said, yeah,
sure. I forgot to mention backin twenty nineteen when I did on
my initial research, Garrett Brocius wasa guy that came up in an article
talking about how he's trying to,you know, work on the behalf of
minor leaguers and try to get usa class action suit. And I call
the number, and sure enough,on the other line is Or on the
other side of the phone is Garrett. Now he was. He has been

(08:03):
an awesome guy. He's been phenomenal. He's been an absolutely integral part to
this whole movement into this whole thing. And without him, we'd probably still
be at square one, we'd probablystill be making six grandy even in this
uh, even as inflation takes overthe whole country. So so I get
involved with him, and we startedgetting a couple of guys together on zoom

(08:26):
calls. And one of the firstguys in the zoom call it was me,
Joe Hudson. Uh, as faras I know, we're the we
were the first two players involved inthis thing. And you know we the
word union got floated, and Ipanicked. I said, I am not
trying to do that. I'll getfired instantly. I'm not gonna stick my

(08:50):
neck out that far, because thatreally is just done. Job's over.
So I guys stepped away and backedaway for a little bit. But then
as twenty twenty one came around,I still stayed involved a little bit I
talked to them, and then duringduring the twenty twenty two season, I
started getting I ran too my ownpitfalls. I ran into some things that

(09:11):
I really struggled with, and Iran into some obstacles that I didn't handle
well. I had a lot ofanger, I had a lot of frustration,
and kind of as my outlet,I turned to advocates as a way
to get my frustration off of myselfand to try to turn it into something
positive and try to help out otherpeople. But a lot where that frustration

(09:35):
came from was actually from my demotionfrom Triple A. Because as a twenty
twenty two season started, I thankfullymade Triple A out of spring training,
which I was unbelievably excited about,and I was so happy. Indianapolis is
such a cool city. I loveit there. I can't wait to go
back. But yeah, I madeI made a spring training. I made

(10:01):
Triple out of spring training. Itwas fantastic. Way I would say.
The thing that like that got meon that team was two things. First
was I did exactly what they asked. They asked me to figure out how
to differentiate my four seam for mysinker and for the guys that are baseball
metric people out there. A fourseam. I was throwing it with like

(10:22):
twelve inches twelve thirteen inches avert,which is not great, but for my
lower armslot it was decent. Whatmade it good, though, it was
my sinker. My sinker is gettingaround zero inches avert on average, which
was just straight down. It isjust dropping down. And that was my
normal fastball. And I really tookthe approach of like, all right,
I'm gonna throw that throw that throwthat sinker, heavy, heavy, heavy

(10:43):
sink, and then all of asudden, force them up at the top
of the zone. Now it's onlygonna be ninety two, but it's gonna
fool guys because they're not looking forit because they see down, down,
down, and then up. It'sa very effective way, and I think
any young kids out there that aretrying to learn something crafty, that's pretty
good, interesting way to go.But I made the team not only because

(11:05):
of the four seamen synker thing.I also made the team because I had
one awesome game in spring training.As a lot of people know, like
you know, spring training games startup in March, and as you're down
there, they have these big leaguegames and they don't always have enough pitchers
or guys, you know, theycan't finish the inning and they don't want
to throw too many pitches, andthey can't just cut to commercial with only

(11:28):
two outs, so they need aminor leaguer to come out there, finish
up the inning and get those guysoff the field. So as minor leaguers,
we get to go. We getto go hang out for the day,
eat big league food, which isamazing, but most importantly, we're
there to play. We're there toplay learn, and just when our opportunity

(11:50):
comes, throw strikes. That's ourbiggest thing. And I got to go
and it was really cool. Ifeel like I did a you know,
I did a decent job of talkingto the staff, talking to the play
and trying to get to know everybody, and I warmed up a couple of
times, but unfortunately it didn't getin. And then until one of the
very last games of spring training,I'm sitting there and they only have eight

(12:13):
pitchers, big leaders that they have, you know, prescribed innings for that
day, and they look at melike, hey, case, do you
want it. I was like,yeah, yeah, absolutely, They're like
all right, let's go it's yours. And I start warming up and I'm
fucking shaking, dude. I wasso nervous, and I just get going
and I get out to the moundin the on the game mount and it's

(12:35):
uh. The Pirates spring training facilityis the same as the brain Timmurauders facility,
which was our you know, twentynineteen, that was our high eight
team. And I had so Ihad played there before, and I was
like, I've been on this field, like, I can do this.
And I get out to the moundand ball one not close like Buck Paul
two not close. I'm like,oh my god, this is not going

(12:58):
well. Like I need to Ineed to figure this out right now.
I step off the mount, takeany breath, tell myself, I've been
on this field before. I cando this. I just need to throw
strikes. It doesn't matter if theyhit it. I just need to make
sure that it's a strike. Strikeone, strike two, strike three.
Swinging a mess, I was like, holy shit, all right, that
worked. There we go there.It's pretty sweet. And I'm facing big

(13:18):
leaders right now. And the nexttime it comes up, strike one,
strike two, strike three, you'reout. So I threw you know I
started off throwing two balls, andthen I threw six strikes in a row
to be in an awesome spot,and I'm like, there we go,
two punches, let's go, let'sfinish this guy off. Let's get another
strike out right here, and Ithrow. I think I threw a change
up and the gig rolled over tofirst base for a ground ball. Nice

(13:39):
easy play, three up, threedown. I think I threw nine pitches.
It was cake. It was ablast. I was so excited I
get off the get off the mountand getting the dugout, and the big
league pitching coach is standing there.He goes in case I was well fucking
talking about man, and he gaveme a big hug. It was awesome.
It was really cool. And soI tell that story though because of

(14:00):
two reasons. I think that's whatgot me onto the triple A roster.
Honestly, they said, wow,all right, this kid actually might have
something. And then secondly, Ithink that was a like for me.
At least. There is the timeI really found a way to step off,
take a deep breath, and saylike, all right, I fucking
got this, and I truly believedit. And I think that when it

(14:24):
comes to confidence. I know inmy own experience, Uh, cockiness can
kind of get in the way ofthat, and you start thinking that you're
too so great and so good,and so you know, no one can
stop me. That's an important partof confidence. But the cockiness aspect of
it is you start thinking that nothingbad can happen. And I think the

(14:46):
right approach in the confidence aspect ofit is to accept the bad things that
might happen. It doesn't you knowthey're gonna happen. You cannot stop all
the bad things in the world fromhappening to you. They're going to happen.
It's more importantly about how you're gonnarespond to it. And I think
that the most important key with allof it. You're still believing yourself nonetheless

(15:11):
not being bogged down by anything badthat might happen. And I feel like
I really tapped into that in thatmoment. But yeah, so I you
know, I made the Triple Ateam. I'm so excited. I go
I do really well. It's funny. I ran into Vinnie Pasquentino this this
past offseason and we started just riffingback and forth about how, you know,

(15:37):
a couple of bats. We hadshit. It was like a year
and a half ago at that pointwhen we when we ran into each other,
and then we're all in that firstweek. Then the next week we
go to what's it called God,We go to Saint Paul, Minnesota and
freeze our butts off. I pitchin a game there, it's like twenty
degrees out. I got you know, one, two, three or I

(16:00):
think it walked guy. Whatever Idid good there, got home and then
I had one of the worst gamesof my life, and I basically felt
like, you know, it wasjust bad thing after bad thing after bad
thing, and I couldn't felt Icouldn't do anything about. It wasn't walks,
it wasn't even you know, shitjust happens. That's kind of just
what happens out there, and itis what it is. And I did

(16:23):
terrible and I gave up a tonof runs and it looked really really bad,
and then they left me, youknow, they kept me around for
another week, and then after thatthey demoted me. Because this was the
same year. This was twenty twentytwo, so the Major League CEBA just
got signed and because it got signedlate and they had to get things together
they had extra roster spots in thebig leagues. Because of those extra roster

(16:45):
spots, they were only there forthe month of April. So then once
in the month of May came around, guys got demoted from the big leagues
to the minor leagues. And thenI became the odd man out. I
got sent down to Double A,and I didn't take it well at all,
and any of my teammates that werearound me, then I do you
know, I cannot apologize enough forfor how I let that interfere with me.

(17:08):
And I held onto it and Iweirdly found a way to harness it
and to really use it out there, and I became I just became a
crazy person and I'd be out therefoaming at the mouth, spitting curse and
you know, ready to rip offanybody's head. And it worked for me.
And I don't I do not advocateto go down that route. Man.

(17:30):
It was a lot of fun.It was a lot of fun.
I did really good. I was, you know, getting a lot of
guys out, and I had somegood numbers. I gave it a home
runn to Derek Dietrich. That wascool. But then it got uh poptros
steroids, so in my book thatdoesn't count. But yeah, so it
was a it was an interesting seasonand all I wanted was to to make

(17:53):
it back to Triple A and Inever did. And I fought and I
fought and I fought and I triedmy best and I didn't really happened.
So, you know, I,you know, I came up with the
idea towards the end of the yearthough, like, all right, well,
if I go to winter Ball,maybe I can shove there, do
really well and get promote and youknow, being a good spot to you

(18:15):
know, cement my place in TripleA next year. And I so,
I, you know, I tellmy coaches, hey, I want to
go play in Puerto Rico, andthey reach out to someone and I get
it all set up, and sureenough I got sent to the Puerto Rican
Winterly baby hell man, uh giganteaCarolina. I lived in Rio Grande for
a month and a half. Itwas like an hour fifteen from San Juan

(18:38):
itself. So it was, uh, it was interesting to say the least.
Man, I think I gotta totell these stories correctly. I think
I gotta get a Will cobost Onthe podcast. I think that'd be the
only right way to do it.So I'll definitely be reaching out to him
some sometime soon fleet spring training.I can get him on and we'll tell

(19:02):
you some hilarious stories about Puerto Rico, because that place was crazy. But
I go to Puerto Rico and abig hope of mine was I'm not afraid
to say, at this point,I was trying to get real five.
I was trying to get a teamto pick me up and essentially steal me
from the Pirates because I was doingwell in this other league and it doesn't

(19:22):
like this league wasn't a joke likelind Or was. I don't know if
Lindor showed up the year Baia showedup, Didy Groria showed up, Pablo
Sandoval was there. There was athere's a good amount of big leaguer's uh
Russy Castillo for Red Sox fans outthere. Rusty Castillo signed this big deal
out of Cuba with the Red Soxand then just played like ten games for

(19:45):
the big league team ever and justmade seventy million dollars in triple which is
crazy, which is great for him. But like I was facing guys like
that, some really good players.And I did great. I did,
I did, I did really great, my friend. Four innings, I
think I only let one guy onbase, and then I think, uh,
and then I ended up At onepoint I had to leave. I

(20:07):
had to go pop over to UHto Arizona for this conference that we were
doing for, you know, withadvocates. Oh shit, I didn't even
talk about the union process. Butyeah, I'll get back to that in
a second. But yeah, throughmy first nine innings there, I only
gave up one run, and theone run was after I got pulled out
of the game. I thought Icould have I could have finished the ending.
It was fine, but they pulledme and they put this other kid

(20:29):
in and then he gives up therun. I was like, go,
God, damn it or whatever.But I gave it one run through my
first nine innings, so I wasI was loving it. But yeah,
let me take a step back andtalk about the union pro union stuff,
because uh, that was all veryscary time because a lot of guys,
a lot of teammates, and II'm saying, you know, it's bad
for them to not have wanted to, you know, sign the stuff.
And sign the union card and allthat. Like, I get it.

(20:52):
I understand the fear. I understandall of it. I've been there.
But you know, we got unioncards, which means that, you know,
hey, we all want to starta union and be unified as one
unit, as one bargaining unit,so the league can't step all over us.
And you know we do that.I field did all the questions from
my pirates team. I did everythingI possibly could. I got all of

(21:15):
my teammates on board with it.I had some guys that had arguments with
and at the end of the day, we came out with you know,
all right, we don't agree,but you know, you got to support
this. And I think, uh, I think we're all in a really
good spot now. And we unionizedfor the first time in our history,
and it's incredibly important because we justwere in a bad spot. Guy,

(21:36):
we weren't making a lot of money. They kept on cutting jobs, They
kept on cutting this corner of thatcorner and doing whatever they wanted to us
because they could and no one wasstopping him. And when I say them,
I mean the league. Like Ilove baseball, I love baseball to
my you know, the very outto the very last ounces of my soul.
I love baseball. The people thatrun baseball were not concerned with They're

(22:00):
not concerned with baseball. They're concernedwith money. And I get it,
as America and the world runs onmoney and all that, but a little
bit soul still has to be inthere, a little bit of a heart
has to be there for the guysthat play this game. At one point
during bargaining, we were sitting thereall talking and I looked their lawyers in
the face. I said, theguy making hot dogs shouldn't make more money

(22:22):
at me. This is insane.People are coming to watch me and my
friends play, They're not coming toget a hot dog. That's part of
it. Absolutely. I'm not sayingthe hot dog guys should work for free
like we used to, but weshouldn't be left out in the cold like
this. But yeah, the unionizationprocess was a lot of fun, and

(22:45):
we got ourselves to a good place. And then, you know, when
I was in Puerto Rico, Ihad to go to Arizona. We did
a conference out there to kind oftry to figure out like how we're going
to do this form of strategy,and we met with the major League Baseball
Players Association, their head lawyers,and if some of the best people I've
ever met in my life. BruceMeyer, Harry Marino, Matt Nasbaum,

(23:07):
I Penny, Tony Clark especially mostof all, because he's the one that
opened up the goddamn doors for usand helped us out, and it was
really cool, it was really special, and to see the support from them
has meant everything. But yeah,so I get back from Puerto Rico and
literally scheduled my flight so I wouldbe getting off the plane and walking straight

(23:33):
into the boardroom in New York Cityto start to continue to help those negotiations.
Unfortunately, though, the meeting gotchanged the last second because people caught
COVID and I was like shit.I ended up being a couple days later.
But then I basically, you know, I get home from Perto Rico,
jump right back into training and jumpright back into bargaining. So it
sucked. It was a lot offun, but it sucked. It.

(23:56):
We would go into this boardroom andsit down, talk about our strategy,
talk about what we want, andtalk about how we're gonna get it,
and then Major League Baseball came inthere and basically said, you know,
screw you. We're not gonna giveyou anything, and you're gonna have to
like it. And gave me alot of chest tightness, a lot of
stress, but it was good becausewe ended up getting into a really good
place and like I said, thingsare a lot better now. At one

(24:19):
point during the bargaining too, Ikind of just sit there and I'm starting
the like we're talking about numbers,like how much money we're trying to make,
and we're literally putting up numbers ofour desired salaries, and right next
to it is like the poverty linenumbers. Not like, oh, like
I know the poverty line numbers.No, No, we had those numbers

(24:40):
next to each other and we're justtrying to beat the poverty line. Then
just sitting there laughing my ass off, and people are like, what's so
funny. I'm like, guys,we're like, we realized the goal line
here right, like this is thebar that we're setting, and we're like,
yeah, we don't really have anotherchoice. So I'm pleased to announce
that we now make thirty thousand dollarsa year roughly depending on the levels and

(25:00):
everything, but yeah, I meanto go from making six thousand dollars a
season to thirty thousand dollars a season, like I'm investing myself more. I'm
taking the time to buy better food. I'm taking my time to rent a
better apartment, especially while I'm heredown at tread where I'm spending my money
to try to train better. Iwas spending more money when I was home
trying training. This place called ATPAdvanced Therapian Performance, awesome place out in

(25:23):
Sandford, Connecticut. Go check outJosh Sheen and go check out the ninety
mile and hour formula. They're fuckingfantastic people there, and I love the
training environment. And that's a lotto you guys like Brett Kennedy, Luke
Dawson, Awesome Pope, Nick Pidella, Santosmansini, all those guys that are
there. They're all wonderful human beingsand I cannot appreciate it enough. If

(25:44):
you're in the New York area,Connecticut area, go check out ATP.
This is not a paid advertisement,but it basically could be. I should
probably try to get Josha on herenow I'm thinking about it, but yeah,
it's so it's been. We're ina better place now and there's still
a lot of frustration and a lotof things that were challenging, but it's

(26:08):
all for the better. And thisis not about you know, Tony has
said this a lot. Tony Clarkhas said this a lot. Obviously,
Yeah, we want the best dealpossible for ourselves, but it's not about
that. It's about laying a groundwork, saying this is the bottom line,
this is our rock bottom. Wehave set a new standard because of this

(26:29):
deal. They cannot go backwards onit. They have to always respect this
deal and we're gonna build from here. When when major leaguers first unionized back
in the sixties, which I couldprobably have someone on to talk about and
give a kind of a history lessonon that, and that could be fun,
at least I think it'd be fun. But yeah, we can.
I don't talk about that one day. But yeah, it was about building

(26:52):
a foundation of a deal and thensetting it enough for the guys in the
years to come. Is a quotefrom Believe Thomas Jefferson. You know,
Oh wow, all right, soit's I thought it was. I always
thought this was Thomas Jefferson. Butit says anonymous Greek proverb society grows great
when old men plane trees whose shadethey know they shall never sits in.

(27:12):
And I have always said that,you know, I never thought i'd see
the day when i'd be a playerand see these changes happen in the minor
leagues because I thought one of twothings, I was gonna make it to
the big leagues there was gonna begone before this. But hey, we're
still here, baby, whoa.But uh yeah, I always thought this

(27:37):
was, you know, being aunionized minor leagues. I always thought it
was going to be. Uh.I dream those too far down the road
where I was gonna lay the groundworkand then hopefully, you know, the
younger guys were going to take itover and really make it happen. But
it never did because I was stillaround and I was still like, you
know what, I'm gonna fight.And part of the frustration I found in
twenty twenty two is like, dude, I like, ah, this is

(27:57):
telling me is that they don't likeme. And when I say they,
I mean I mean the pirates.I was truly in belief that, you
know, they did not see meas a major leaguer. And I was
like, you know what, well, if I'm not gonna do that.
If I'm not gonna make it,if my dreams aren't gonna come true,
I'm at least gonna, you know, stand up for my friends. I

(28:18):
try to make things better for them. I and I think the most important
thing that I learned in that process, truly and sincerely I was I was
in my car when I was drivingto the field, and I was like,
man, I don't know if Ishould do this, Like like I
can, I can do the Ican look at it for myself and just
try to make it to the bigleagues and try to like take care of

(28:40):
myself and really just focus on thator can or can do the right thing?
And I just something slapped me inthe face, and I was like,
am I really making a decision rightnow between what's selfish or the right
thing? Like I acknowledge it asthe right thing to do, and it
made my decision right there. Soall the work I put in for minor
league ers, advocates from minor leaders, the MLBPA, the Minor League PA,

(29:03):
all that that has all been inan effort to work for other people.
And I think there's a lot offreedom in that. There's a lot
of Uh, you find a lotof meaning and when you stop worrying about
yourself and start worrying for others.But what's important is is very easy to

(29:26):
diet to identify. But yeah,so we finished bargaining up during spring training
of twenty twenty three, and atthis time I've basically broken my back,
not actually, but you know,I screwed it up pretty bad. I
got out of the car driving fromNew York to Florida and was having bad
back spasms. My whole back waslocked up and I couldn't move, and

(29:48):
then I tried to push through it, of course, as anybody would.
Uh, I'm not gonna ask forhelp, that's crazy, But yeah,
I pushed through, and my backgets worse, and then I really screwed
up. And then I basically can'twalk anymore. And I go to our

(30:10):
team you know, I go toour our strength coach for the whole Pirates
facility, and I'm like, Corey, please help me. I can't I
can't walk, and he's like,okay, let's get you to a doctor
right now. And he got mein front of a team doctor before you
know, I don't think it waseven five minutes. The guy was already
handing me, you know, asteroid pack to help me loosen on my
back. I don't worry. Itwasn't for home runs. Although I made

(30:30):
that joke before I knew it.Yeah, he got me in front of
a team doctor and they were givingme multiple axers to help loosen on my
back. But then also they gaveme steroids. And I remember looking at
him and me that he goes,all right, these are the steroids.
You know, take this now,No, no, and I look at
me. I go, sir,I'm gonna hit so many home runs this

(30:51):
year. He did not like thatjoke at all. Well, but I
thought it was funny. And I, you know, took the rehab process,
which was, you know, afrustrating and I actually got yelled at
one day because every day I wouldend my session, end my PT session
with Okay, is there anything moreI can do? And they were like,

(31:12):
Brad, no, there's nothing youcan do. Go lay down,
go relax, go let yourself heel. I'm like, okay, fine.
And then finally one day one ofour one of our you know, our
minor league director for pitching, bringsme into his office. He's like,
Brad, I keep on hearing thatyou're like trying to do too much and
like, this is this how Igo, sir. I bought a leave
back for my back and heating pad, and I asked them every day is

(31:36):
there anything more I could do?I'm like, if that's too much to
do, then I'll stop to dothat. And it kind of just chuckles
like, all right, you're good, just go go back your day,
dude. But yeah, the rehabprocess sucked. It was frustrating too,
because I, uh, this isn'tsomething I've really talked about too much,
even with you know, some close, uh close people of mine. But
I went into that's bring training sayingI'm either going to triple air, I'm

(31:59):
going home like I'm done. I'mdone, you know, playing, And
you know, I wanted, Iwanted to face the best and I want
to see if I was, youknow, ever gonna be able to be
ready to do it. And youknow, it is what it is.
I trowed up hurt and I knewI no longer had a leg to stand
on. I had a great WinterLeague, I had a great double a
year in twenty twenty two, andthen essentially, I mean, I it's

(32:23):
uh essentially, I yeah, Iwas you know, I was hurt,
so I couldn't do anything about it. And then I kind of went into
it with you know what, I'mcool with whatever. I was like,
I got to rehea first, soI gotta get healthy and then I can
kind of make some kind of rashdecision that I want to make. So

(32:45):
twenty yeah, and then uh soI started getting healthy. A spring trainings
wrapping up, they said them inthe low way, I go rehab.
It was actually a lot of funbecause I get to go meet with all
the younger guys, talk to themabout all the new stuff with the with
you know, the minor league rules, with our CBA, talk to them,

(33:05):
kind of be able to you know, shed any knowledge, any information
that I got for them, andthen kind of continue on. And then
I go to High and then Igo to Hya to continue my rehab and
I got I got absolutely torched.I did so bad. I was just
sitting there. I'm like, dude, this sucks because the last time I
was in Greensboro, I was twentynineteen when it was a low way,

(33:29):
and I was unbelievable. I wasreally good. I had everything, I
had sharp stuff, I had control. I had, you know, as
a starter back then, and Idid really, really well. I went
like a month and a half withthat walking someone and I get there in
twenty twenty three, rehabbing, andI couldn't you know, I was getting

(33:50):
my stuff turned around. I wasleaving stuff over the plate. I was
doing bad, and I kind ofjust as like, dude, I don't
know what's going on anymore. AndI had a sit down with one of
our our mental skills coaches and Ikind of talked to him and told him
a lot of stuff that was goingon with me. And he was like,
well, he sounds like you're alwaysthis angry person out there. And
I was like, yeah, Ijust can't find a way to get angry.

(34:12):
And now he's like, we'll tryto be happy. He's like,
try to love baseball. I waslike, yeah, sure, I'll all
right. You want to tell yousomething, Yeah, I'll try that out,
because why not at this point,like I got nothing to lose,
Like I'm doing terrible, I mightas well go out there and just love
baseball. I go out there.I go out there and I go all
right, I'm gonna have fun rightnow. I'm gonna enjoy playing baseball.

(34:34):
The first pitch I threw was asinker low on the zone, and then
that ball went right through the thesix hole and right into the outfield,
and I went, motherfucker, Ihate this game. And I was dying
laughing. So I was like,all right, well, shit, all
right, we're back. We're back, aren't we. And then after that
it was a breeze. It waseasy. It was easy to be to

(34:57):
be good again for me for awhile, and I was doing really well
and then you know, I gethealthy. It took it took me like
a month of rehab there because Ijust couldn't you know. It took me
over Like I said, it tookme a while to get into a good
groove. But once I did,I was back up into double A and
I had a first bat. Youknow, my first game there was bad.
And then after that I was ona roll and I was good for
like it was good for I wantto say, like a month and a

(35:20):
half. And then I had forme one of my most special moments I've
ever had in baseball. I gotgiven a start. I had a couple
of starts. I had started gettinga couple of starts, which was a
lot of fun, but it wasyou know, the thing that was most
special for me was that I gotto do that in summer set New Jersey
against the Yankees, double a affiliate, And the best part about it was
that all my friends and family couldcome because they knew what day I was

(35:42):
gonna pitch. They knew I waspitching it on that Tuesday. So I
had a bunch of friends and familyout, my brothers, and it was
a blast. It was awesome,and I really when I look back at
you know, if I look backif my career I ended right now,
I can look back and be like, that's one of my favorite baseball memories
because not only were they able thereto watch, I did awesome. I

(36:05):
go out there, I do Ido pretty well. For the first two
innings. I'm placing Jason and Mingusand Austin Wells, who are in the
big leagues with the Yankees, myhometown team, and at the time,
obviously they weren't in the big leagues. But you know what I'm saying,
they eventually get called up and Igot I shruked them both out like I
think four times that week or somethinglike that, not each I combine and
I think it struck them out fourtimes. But I was doing awesome.

(36:29):
I was shoving. I did reallygreat. And then I kind of,
you know, I snapped at onepoint in the like in the third inning
because some play I didn't make aplay that went my way. And then
I snapped and I got even betterand it was awesome, and I had
some of the most fun I've everhad on a baseball field because when I
was done pitching, I got tolook up into the stands and wave to
my friends and family and like havethem on the field afterwards. And it

(36:50):
was an absolute blast and I really, I really loved it, and it's
gonna be, like I said,one of my favorite baseball memories in my
life. But then after that,some guys got promoted, and don't get
me wrong, very happy for them. And I don't want this to sound
like, you know, I'm I'mever hoping for any tawnful of anybody,
because I'm not that person at all. I want, you know, to

(37:12):
me, it's me and all myfriends in the big leagues forever. But
I was a little frustrated because Iwas like, man, I feel like
I deserve a shot, like what'sgoing on. And I decided that,
you know, like maybe uh,you know, maybe maybe I should,
you know, think about not playinganymore. And if you know, I
was kind of cool with it.I was like, you know what,

(37:32):
hey, like, I, youknow, if I'm not going to go
to the Triple A soon, thenI think I should probably just go home.
I got to a point though,mentally where I was just kind of
like, you know, I don'tknow how much longer I want to do
this. And then everything went downout from there. I started getting hit,
I start getting hit hard, andI just got so demoralized so fast.
And it was all because of amental change of like, you know,

(37:54):
why why I keep on pushing forwardif I'm never going to see any
you know? And he fruits tobear from it. So I finally have
another really bad game in Harrisburg.And the bad game in Harrisburg, I
just go into the into the lockerroom afterwards, and I kind of just
I sit down and I start praying, and I just say, you know,

(38:15):
God, like I'm I'm done,Like I don't care what you do
with my life anymore. Like clearlyyou're showing me that baseball's not my path
and that's fine. I just Iwant to do whatever you want me to
do, Like just do that,Let's do that, Okay. I've become
a much more religious person the pastcouple of years. I have my two
tattoos are religious. I do readthe Bible every day now. But at

(38:39):
the time, I would say,like, you know, I believed in
God, but I wasn't like Iwasn't reading the Bible for sure, And
I just say, God, I'mdone trying, Like you do whatever you
want to do with my life,like it is your pick. I'm done
trying. And I felt like helegitimately went okay, sounds good. Two

(39:00):
days later, I got called upa Triple A and I was just like
what. I was like, readwhat? And I go to Triple A
and I'm like so excited to beback there again and basically got the phone
call of you know, hey,we need you. Yeah. My manager
calls me as I'm home after thegame and I'm like, oh fuck.

(39:22):
I'm like hello and he's like,hey, case, where are you.
I'm like, I'm in my apartment. What's up? And he's like,
okay, come to the field.I'm like what. He goes, I
need you to come to the fieldand pack yourself. And I'm like what,
And I thought I'm released. Ithought I'm done. And he goes
climb to the field, pack yourself. You're going to Triple A and I
was like what. I was like, all right, let's go. So

(39:45):
I ran into the field, packedup my bag, packed up my apartment.
Seven am. The next day,I was driving to Indianapolis because they
needed guys to pitch that next day. They needed a you know, a
fresh iron to pitch that next daybecause I hadn't uh you know, I
was. I was ready to go. And I get there and I don't
pitch for like four or five days, and I was just like, really,
guys, I rushed all the wayhere just to sit. But anyways,

(40:09):
I finally get a chance to goin the game and I do terrible.
And it was crazy too, becauseit was just it was moments where
it was like it'd be like dank. It'd be like all right, one
out, two out, dank basehit. I'm like, are you serious?
And then home run, I'm like, are you fucking serious? And
then the second ending was the samething. It was like it was like

(40:32):
out out, all right, whatever, base hit. Okay, another air
or I was not even an air. It was just like another dinky hit.
And then I'm like, oh mygod, another home run. I'm
like, you gotta be kidding me. So some stuff just wasn't going my
way, and I was really frustrated, and I was kind of like,
uh, I was pretty discouraged.But I was like, you know what,
I'm just happy I'm here, atriple a dude like I was.
I was just happy I was there. Yeah, we go to to Moin,

(40:55):
I kick ass into Moine. Ido great. I get a good
there, and then when you comeback from Des Moines, it was like
a sleeper bus back. That wasso much fun. Guys, sleeper busses
are the best. That is agood time with the boys. But we
get back and uh, I pitch. I pitched a Tuesday game. It's

(41:21):
a Tuesday game at home. Andthen the next morning I think I did
okay. It wasn't a great ending. I think I give up a run,
but it wasn't like oh I gotbashed around. It was like,
all right, whatever like that happens. But funny enough, the last pitch
I throw is a to two cutterin on the hands to a lefty to

(41:42):
Sammy Siani's older brother. I forgetthat guy's first name, but it's Sianni's
older brother, who is a guythat I play with. I played with
in Greensboro and it's strakeout swinging astrikeout and I'm like sweet. Cool.
Next day, our farm director isthere and our farm director goes, hey,
Brad, how are you doing today. I'm like I'm okay, Like
how are you. He's like,I'm good, Hey, I need to

(42:05):
talk to you later. Okay.I'm like what okay? And I was
like that didn't feel great. SoI'm like, oh no, this isn't
gonna go well. And I'm likeall right, whatever. And then I
see him again. I'm like,hey, like, what's going on,
Like you want to just tell mewhat's up. He's like, no,
no, no, we'll talk aboutit later. I'm like, okay,
I'm just you get me kind ofnervous. He's like, oh, it's

(42:25):
only about your career. And I'mlike, oh, well great, thanks,
awesome, appreciate that. And Igo in. I go in for
a meeting after the game. It'shint it's our minor league farm director John
Baker it's Miguel Perez, er TripleA manager, and and Dan Meyer,

(42:46):
our Triple A pitching coach, andthey all sit me down. They go,
hey, so we have some Wehave an idea for you. We
have an idea that after twenty sevenyears, after twenty sixty years, you're
no longer gonna throw like a normalperson. You're not gonna throw like a
crazy person, and you're gonna throwside arm. This is obviously not what
they said, but they basically werelike, yeah, you're gonna throw side

(43:07):
arm now, or you're gonna gohome. I was like, oh shit.
And they showed me all these dataand these metrics and these reasons as
to why I could possibly be prettygood at this, and I was like,
okay, yeah, all right,this this makes sense. I was
like, let me think about it. Let me call my parents, let
me call my agent, let me, you know, take a second to

(43:29):
take it all in. And Ithink about it, and I'm like,
this makes sense. Okay. I'mlike, you know what, I still
got some baseball in me. Iwas like, let's go for this,
let's try it, and they go, yeah, sounds good. So I
packed up all my stuff and Idrove all the way to Florida. So

(43:51):
in a calendar year up to thispoint, I had driven from New York
to Florida, to Greensboro to Altoonato Indianapolis to back to Florida. So
it's been a long year up tothis point. But before I go any
further, I do want to sayit was very cool when we were in
Omaha right after the all start break. I'm there and I got to which

(44:12):
Quinn Priester get calls up to thebig leagues, who hopefully all have on
at some point on here, andI also got Indie Red. We also
got Indie Rodrigoz called up to thebig league. So it was a really
really great experience just to be therewatch them both make it, you know,
make their dreams come true. Itwas pretty special and I'm unbelievably excited
for both of them. I hopeAndy's rehab process goes well because I know
we hear his elbow and winner ballthis year. But he'll be back and

(44:36):
he'll be better than ever. He'sa fucking phenomenal baseball player. Yeah.
So anyways, Yeah, I goto Florida, all right, I practice
and you know, they have thismeeting with me about throwing side arm.
The next day, I go andI throw a bullpen and I'm like,
sure, let's try it out.And I was like, all right,
this is insane, this is prettycrazy. But guys are like, this

(44:57):
is actually pretty gross, Like youshould definitely try this. So I'm like,
okay. And I also, Ido want to give a shout out
to all these awesome individuals in TripleA, all these older guys. Rob's
is Instry can't even say his nameright, He's he knows this, Okay,
Chase, the young Dwayne Underwood,Chris Owings, migueley, and Hart
mcgah. I got to play withmcguelly and Heart. That was cool for

(45:20):
me. But yeah, all allthese guys were so unbelievably supportive and they
were like, Brad, you like, this is definitely a weird path,
but you can do this, Likeyou like, there are crazy thing,
crazier things out there, but yougot this. I'm like, all right,
you got it. So I believed. I believed, and Chase said
one of the best things that anyone'sever said to me is like, you
got to write your own comeback story, Like this doesn't make sense. He's

(45:44):
like, none of this is supposedto make sense. But if you believe
anything can happen, I'm like,sounds good. So I get in the
car and I drive to Florida andfor a month straight, I practiced throwing
side arm and I started throwing bullpensand I'm throwing strikes and I'm hitting the
metrics kind of of what they wantme to ahead. But uh, it's
it's tough. It's hard. It'sreally hard to just all of a sudden

(46:06):
start throwing sidear him. I haveto change my routines. I have to
change new stuff. And then abouttwo weeks into it, though, I'm
scrolling and scrim and as every baseballplayer does, and as every baseball player
should. I follow Trent Athletics andthey have a post of a one of
their coaches who just dropped down andhe's throwing ninety five miles an hour from

(46:28):
a dropdown slot. And I said, holy shit, I'm hiring that guy.
Because I now make more money,I am more willing to invest in
myself as a baseball player. SoI reach out to Mark Fisher. I
say, sign me up for yourprogram. I want to do what you
do. Let me, you know, let me do what I'm gonna do
for the rest of the season.And then once this offseason starts, like,

(46:49):
let's start, let's get to it. He's like, sounds good.
So I'll circle back to him andI'll hopefully have him on the podcast next
week. But yeah, So Ibecome a sidearm pitcher and they brought me
in some rookie ball games. Itgoes okay, it goes solid. I
got I did really well. Myfirst inning, I tried to catch a

(47:12):
ball bare handed. That was fun. The same pt Brian that helped me
with my back was watching that andhe was like, don't break your fucking
fingers there. So that was prettyfun. But it was good. It
was a good process. And youknow that season ends and they're like,
well, you got to go playa little bit more so we can get

(47:32):
a better idea of what's you knowwhat we got here, So why don't
we send you to High I SoI'm back to Greensboro. I'm like,
great. I go to Greensboro andthe first week I'm there, they put
me in three games. First firstouting, I go one, two,
three, I do great, threeouts. Good job, Brad, you
did it. You got three outs. As a sidearm pitcher. I'm like,

(47:53):
awesome. The next outing I didn'tget a single out and I was
like great, this sucks. Andthen the next the outing and after that
I only got one out. Sothrough three outings and h A, I
got four outs and I was like, dude, this is a wreck.
I don't know what I'm going todo. And the last week we got
we go to Bowling Green, Kentucky, which I drove to because the season

(48:15):
was over and I wanted to justdrive straight home after that. So great,
but anyways, I you know,I yeah. So so we go
into the last week of the seasonand we're on Bowling Green. I I'm
just sitting in the bullpen praying theydon't pitch because I'm like, dude,

(48:37):
I can't throw a strike. Ican't figure out anything. And then I
think it's the Friday game. Iwant to say Thursday or Friday game and
it's then so, yes, it'sthe Friday game. So Thursday night they
pulled me into the office after thegame. I'm like, hey, Brad,
h how many bullets you got inyou? And I go what?
And he goes, how many?How many pitches do you think you can

(48:57):
throw? In a game. I'mlike, I don't know why. He's
like, well, we need youto start because we don't have any more
pitching, Like a holy shit,fuck it, I'll figure it out.
And he goes, sounds great,we got a plan. You're starting tomorrow.
So I all of a sudden gofrom you know, I don't even
know. I don't think I'm gonnapitch to a. Holy shit, I

(49:17):
have to start, and I basicallypray to God. I said, hey,
like, up to you again.I will dedicate my household to you
forever if you helped me through thisgame. And sure enough, I walked
the first guy and I'm like,holy shit. And then the next guy
runs into a dope light and thenI get the next guy out and then
I go three scoreless innings and likewith a strikeout with the bases loaded.

(49:42):
It was awesome. It was seriously, it was some of the scariest stuff
ever because I was throwing eighty threeto eighty five miles an hour. It
was pretty bad. But it worked. I got out. I did it.
I accomplished my job, and that'sreally the job at the end of
the day. And I did itdoing sidern and I got to end my
season on that note, which waspretty great for me. But I go
home. I'm there for a littlebit. I oh, I get I

(50:02):
I win an award to go toPittsburgh to for community service. So do
community service, you know, getfree trips to Pittsburgh and hang out on
the field in the big leagues.And I got to see all my friends,
which was really cool because I hada bunch of friends that were in
the bigs. So I, youknow, I go to I go home,
hang out for a little bit,and I go out to tread.

(50:24):
I come down to Charlotte, NorthCarolina, and I work start working with
my coach Mark, and we startfrom the basics. We start from like,
okay, holy shit, how arewe going to figure this out?
And we started doing drills and thefirst pull upon my throw was on a
Monday, and I was throwing eightyto eighty three miles an hour. I
had no idea, well where theball was going. I had no idea
what was going on. And hewas like, okay, yeah, so
we got to start. Let's startall over. And we did, and

(50:46):
we started from the basics, andby the end of the week, I
was up to eighty eight, andI was like, holy shit, like
let's go, we could do this. And then I kind of want to
just wrap this up. I'll definitelytalk a bit more about my experience with
Mark as as I kind of get, you know, as I get him
on the show, but I endthe season or not the end of season.

(51:08):
I've been up to ninety one fromout here from side arm. I
throw, you know, I throwdecently hard and for guys, you know,
for people that really don't know whatI'm talking about. Side arm is
when you're just armists directly out tothe side instead of being up over the
top. Guys in the big leaguesthrow roughly ninety from there. And if

(51:29):
I can do that, then I'mon the same level. I'm I'm able
to compete with the best in theworld, and I'm incredibly excited for it,
and the sky's the limit and yeah, so I'm excited for what's gonna
happen this year in twenty twenty four. And then trying to just to end
this, I'm gonna I'm gonna gothrough the alumni and talk about what's going

(51:53):
on with them. I'm gonna startWow, oh my gosh. Or October
twelfth, twenty twenty, I hadJojo Gray on. Jojo was a prospect
with the Dodgers at the time,got traded for Max Scherzer, and now
he's a starting pitcher with the Gnatsand he's like their main guy. He's
he's an unbelievable human and he's beendoing really well with them. Joe Jakes
was with the Pirates. We heend up getting Rule five to the Red

(52:15):
Sox and debuted this year. He'sa sat arm guy. Funny enough,
he was a sat arm guy fromthe left side, and he's been great.
He's been awesome. We were roommatesin twenty nineteen and then now he's
down here at tread as well.Right now with me, Mason Martin has
been fucking phenomenally. Crushes the balland I believe he's a free agent right

(52:35):
now, still trying to look fora job, and I wish him the
best of luck because he crushes theball. Joe desorsa high school teamate of
mine, made his debut with YeahMay's debut with the Rays in this past
year. Yeah Guy called up,got dfaide sent over to the Nats,
and now he's with Josiah Gray.So he's doing well. Pat Dorian was

(52:59):
with the Oriols when I inter viewedhim. He's now been traded over to
the Brewers and is the lasher ofhis deal as well. I believe Garrett
Garrett had some you know, Idon't even know what to call him.
He's some struggles with us, hadsome interesting things happened in his life.
But now he's a free agent.He's trying to get signed back into pro
ball. Hunter Shatton debuted in twentytwenty three. He fucking slings it.

(53:22):
He's awesome. I love that dude. He's a great human being. Mike
Burrow's going to debut this year.He's gonna rehab from his TJ. He'll
be up there justin hare. Phenomenalkid. And he's out just living with
his wife. I believe in eitherMontana or Washington. I think Washington.
I don't know. I gotta Ijust probably call him. He's a great

(53:44):
kid. Anthony Toronto is still helpingout running. Anthony Troado is still running
youth baseball camps in Orlando, youthbaseball programs. He's kicking butt doing that.
Eric sim is no stranger to anybodyin the baseball world. Huge personality,
if you don't know him, gocheck him out. He's the man.
Chris Corbett actually just got hired asa Kansas City Royals coach. I

(54:07):
can't fucking wait for him. Uh. And when I say coach, I
mean in like in the minor leagues. So he's gonna be kicking. But
Johnny Schneider, I believe he's retiredfor baseball. Matt Pierrepont is a Triple
A picture coach with the Mariners,and that is a nasty dude, all
right. He is. He wasa great pitcher. He was a really
great pitcher, and it really hurtsto me that he never got his shot
in the big leagues. Jack Hermanis has he had some uh I think

(54:32):
broke a foot or something. Sohe's been doing a lot of rehab down
in Pirates City trying to get healthy. And he'll be He'll be going somewhere
for sure. Nick Mears debuted withus with the Pirates since the Rockies and
now the Rangers. I should probablylook that up. He's a phenomenal guy.
Right Smith still in Triple A withthe Angels. Nosa OLiS out of

(54:53):
baseball, but he's another phenomenal guy. Justin Hageman got traded to the Red
Sox and was in Triple Al.Hopefully he'll debut this year. I'm excited
for it. Matt Sielinger became afree agent and you know, went from
the He got traded so many times. He was with the Pirates, the
Rays, the Giants, and thePhillies. Unbelievable. He's got some really

(55:15):
special stuff. Zach Kelly debuted withthe Red Sox and still on their forty
man Mark Washington ran to an injurytowards the end of last year, and
I hope the God that he canget signed and in debut because he is
shit out of the ball. He'sawesome. Caamvu debuted in twenty twenty two,

(55:36):
the year after I had him onthe pod, and he was with
the Angels last year and now Ibelieve he's with the Tigers, so I
wish him the best as well.Jeff Bazentino is a pilot. Now he's
getting his private pilot license, andanybody that knows Jeff knows that he's going
to make a lot of money,signed a lot of NDAs for some awesome

(55:59):
trips on private Shane Mary lives withhis wife and his kid in Chicago killing
it. Eli Fishman is working withthe Somerset Patriots and actually saw him this
past year. It's a great kid. What's up Eli. Aaron short Ridge
played in Triple A last year.Has really grind his butt off in Double
A and I'm very excited to seewhat happens with him. Josh Bissonette one

(56:22):
of my best teammates I've ever had. He will be He also won Community
Service Award for the Triple A teamand he's been a phenomenal guy and I'm
excited to see him next year soi can see him at spring. Awesome
Pope. Wow, I gotta goback and listen to this episode because this
is one of my favorites. Buthe's been awesome. We trained a lot

(56:43):
together up at atp in Stanford,Connecticut. He throws the shit out of
the ball. He's hitting ninety nine. It's so scary to watch him throw
baseball because it's just it's nice,smooth. But I'm fires off. Eric
Sexson still works in baseball. CanaanSmith and jigba is Is. He debuted
with the Pirates this past year.He's doing well. Awesome Roberts. We

(57:04):
unfortunately got he got rule fived overto the Mariners, but he's been doing
phenomenal so yeah. So I hopeyou guys check out those old episodes or
at least go follow some of theseguys that I've listened, because they're all
fantastic human beings. I love allof them so much, and I can't
wait to see them all in thefuture. I hope to see some of
you guys in the future. Ito see you guys in games. I

(57:25):
hope to see you, uh screamingat me to throw strikes. But thank
you all for listening. I knowit has been a very long episode of
just me talking and gammering or on, but I think there's some good stuff
in here. Please find the socialsMLB, take at m ILB, Take
at the m ILB, take allthat stuff. Find us on YouTube,

(57:47):
Instagram, Twitter, My all mysocials are at brad kso Brad underscore kso
go find me there, like subscribe, follow. I don't know I forgot
how to do all this stuff,but I love you all. Shoot me,

(58:07):
shoot me messages on people that youwant to see on. Shoot me
messages that I stink at baseball,shoot me messages they say how much you
love baseball, but anything same thingto take away here. Please reach out,
tell me what you guys want,because I'd love to give you guys
some good content. So love y'alland go Pirates.