Sal Fasano - Assistant Coach, Los Angeles Angels

[00:00:04] Speaker A: Welcome to the ABCA's podcast. [00:00:06] Speaker B: I'm your host, Ryan Brownlee. Get the Pro treatment and design your very own custom Rawlings Glove just like. [00:00:26] Speaker A: Your favorite big league stars. [00:00:27] Speaker B: Choose from countless patterns, web types, lace colors and more to showcase your unique personal style. Start with a pro design and change it up with your team colors or build yours completely from scratch with your name, number and state flag. Visit Rawlings.com to design your custom glove today. Happy fielding. This episode is sponsored by Netting Pros. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time. Netting Professionals specializes in the design, fabrication and installation of custom netting for backstops, batting cages, dugouts, BP screens and ball carts. They also design and install digital graphic wall padding, windscreen turf, turf protectors, dugout benches, dugout cubbies and more. Netting Professionals is an official partner of the abca. Continues to provide quality products and services to many high school, college and professional fields, facilities and stadiums throughout the country. Netting Professionals are improving programs one facility at a time. Contact them today at 844-620-2707 or infoettingpros.com, visit them online at www.nettingpros.com or check out Netting Pros on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn for all their latest products and projects. Make sure to let CEO Will Minor know that the ABCA sent you now on to the Podcast Staying on the professional baseball side this week for the ABCA Podcast with the Anaheim Angels. Sal Fasano Fasano came to the Angels this season to work with the catchers and pitchers after spending eight seasons on the Atlanta Braves Major League staff. Fasano Fasano has a wealth of experience in professional baseball as a player and coach. Fasano is a journeyman catcher playing for 10 different MLB organizations in 13 seasons. Fasano is well versed in analytics and how it relates to on field performance. He worked directly with the Atlanta Braves front office and relaying information to the players. Get your pad and pen ready because. [00:02:36] Speaker A: It'S a behind the curtains look into life at the major league level. [00:02:39] Speaker B: Let's welcome Sal Fasano to the podcast. [00:02:44] Speaker A: You got a place in Anaheim? [00:02:47] Speaker C: Yeah, I'm actually right in the parking lot. [00:02:50] Speaker A: Are you ready? [00:02:52] Speaker C: Yeah. There's, you know where the front of the place is. This apartment complex is within walking distance, so it's kind of nice. [00:03:01] Speaker A: We've had the convention out there a few times. We haven't. We haven't been on the West Coast, I mean since I've been working for the abca. Just because the hotel costs I think they're gonna work with us in a couple places because we. That's our. Our highest total members is. Is in California. [00:03:18] Speaker C: Oh, is it really? [00:03:19] Speaker A: We can't get out there. Luckily they try. They're. They're well traveled. They do, they do a lot. But that's why I host many clinics in the fall called Barnstormers. [00:03:32] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:03:32] Speaker A: We're always somewhere in California. So I've been six years. I've been to California quite a bit. We're going to Sacramento State this year. [00:03:42] Speaker C: Oh, nice. [00:03:43] Speaker A: Yeah, we try to go between north and south every other year. [00:03:48] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:03:49] Speaker A: To give people a chance, but they're crazy out there. Like, we'll have foreign Southern Cal. We'll have coaches from Northern California fly down to Southern California for, for a one day event. We're at Pepperdine last year. That's first time. [00:04:03] Speaker C: I just met the Pepperdine coach the other day. [00:04:05] Speaker A: He's awesome because he caught. He caught in a bit. Yeah. Tyler latorre, He's a great guy. [00:04:10] Speaker C: Yeah, very. Our pitching coach Barry Enright told me that. [00:04:13] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:04:14] Speaker C: Actually Shane Lux, the guy who's your AAA pitching coach in here, he goes, you're not gonna believe this, but this guy's your biggest fan. I'm like, man, what's wrong with him? He said he was a catcher, always tried to grow Fu Manchu, and now he's freaking coaching Pepperdine. [00:04:27] Speaker A: I'm like, I know Shane because Shane for a while. [00:04:31] Speaker C: Yeah, change. A really nice guy. He came over when Barry Enright came over, so he plucked him from Arizona. And, you know, you got to have a good working relationship with your pitching coach, that's for sure. [00:04:44] Speaker A: I met him at Pitch a palooza. Like 2018. [00:04:48] Speaker C: Nice. I'm sure there's a lot of those guys are really smart when it comes to the pitching and the pitching mechanics. [00:04:54] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:04:54] Speaker C: You know, I'm kind of an old school, conventional guy when it comes to pitching mechanics, which is completely opposite than what I do with the catching mechanics. But it's funny just listening to them. They're. They're at a whole nother level, like thinking about how, you know, how they taught, like people that are the one seamer, basically, or the splinter is because they're a supinator rather than a pronator. Stuff we never even thought about, you know, back in the day. [00:05:19] Speaker A: Just grab the cameras, help with all that stuff too. And. And it really does detect it's out there. It's crazy. [00:05:26] Speaker C: The tech is nice. And Hawkeye, what we use in the big leagues is so good. You know, and we got all the, all the slow frame cameras, high speed cameras, every angle you can possibly get. We got a new pitching lab that does everything and it's like, holy cow. I don't even know. You step into another dimension sometimes. [00:05:45] Speaker A: Yeah, Yeah. I interviewed J.J. piccolo earlier at GM of the Royals, and he. He talked about Hawkeye, because I asked him, I'm like, hey, in the last five to 10 years, what's been the best tech that's come out? And he's like, for us, Hawkeye, just because it tells a story about the entire field. [00:06:03] Speaker C: Yeah. And there is an AI element in there that you can kind of teach it what you want and then it can kind of evolve some of the information that you're trying to get. I'm not as great, and I'm sure JJ was probably way better, but the stuff that I need, you know, the way the ball spins, the, you know, the high side release, all the fun stuff. When it comes to how we're going to locate pitches or how we're going to sequence pitches, you know, I let the other guys do all the funny stuff. [00:06:30] Speaker A: Here's Sal Fasano, Angels working with pitchers and catchers now, but it's been in professional baseball since 1996 as a player until 2009 and then coached the minors from 09 to 14. And then it's been with the Braves last 10, 11 years, but now with the Angels. So, Sal, thanks for jumping on with me. [00:06:48] Speaker C: Of course, Ryan. Happy to be here, buddy. [00:06:49] Speaker A: We go way back. Way, way back. But congrats on your new role and also the start that you guys are off to. [00:06:56] Speaker C: Well, thanks. It's kind of nice to come to a new place and learn some new faces and have a little success early. It's a lot easier to get buy in when you have success than when you're trying to struggle for survival. [00:07:09] Speaker A: You know, being with the Braves for as long as you is. How has it been coming to a new organization? [00:07:14] Speaker C: Well, it's actually been a really easy transition. Obviously, you know, you start at the top with Perry, Manasseh and Perry and I worked together in Toronto, we worked together in Atlanta. He actually is the one that hired me in Atlanta. And then when the opportunity came about to come here when he called, it's hard to pass him up. You know, he's treated me so good and, you know, I don't even negotiate a contract. I'm like, I'm coming, so hopefully I can be with you. And having washed there, you know, Ron Washington's Been a manager there for a couple years now. And we worked together in Atlanta for those six years before he left and Eric Young. And it was funny because as you start going down the rabbit hole of the organization, there's a lot of people that I worked with in Toronto, there's a lot of people that worked with in Anaheim. So basically all of Perry's tree kind of went with them. So I was just kind of happy to be a part of that. Now. [00:08:03] Speaker A: I was thinking about this yesterday. If you hadn't been drafted and signed with the Royals, what do you think you'd be doing right now? [00:08:09] Speaker C: Oh, gosh, I'd probably be a carpenter framing some fricking house somewhere. [00:08:15] Speaker A: Be in Hoffman Estates. [00:08:16] Speaker C: Yeah, I'd probably Joliet somewhere because I would have married Carrie, I'd be working for her family as an excavator. I'd be driving a freaking backhoe, you know, in dead a cold, wearing nothing but car hearts instead of a uniform. [00:08:29] Speaker A: You gave me some of the best advice and I thought about it a lot in 22 years of coaching. But when you were with the Royals, I think we were playing at Creighton and you came out with us and you gave me the best advice I ever got and said, as a coach, don't ever forget how hard it was to play the game of baseball. [00:08:48] Speaker C: Oh, for sure, for sure. I think on our end it's. We can. It's so easy to see what they're doing wrong. So easy. And sometimes it's hard to dwell on what they're doing right. I always say if you make your strength strong enough, nobody even notice your weaknesses. But if you don't forget how hard the game was, you don't, you don't understand like some of the easy concepts that we know. Because I've been in baseball for 100 years, these kids don't know, so don't, don't expect them to get some of these complex theories that we've done for 25 years to get in just two years. So the game is hard, you know, I mean, otherwise, I mean, heck, I'd be in the hall of Fame right now. If it was easy, you know, it's really hard. [00:09:33] Speaker A: And that was one of my questions down the line is how do you balance that as a coach with your players where focusing on their strengths and what they're good at, but also trying to shore up maybe some of the things they need to improve on? [00:09:46] Speaker C: That's a really good question. I'm going to name drop a little bit. I Was we had a four hour flight yesterday coming back from St. Louis to L. A. And Mark Gubiza is one of our analyst, or he's one of our color guys that works, you know, the tv. And we're sitting there talking, and he was the first guy ever caught in big leagues, so obviously we're pretty close. He said something that was kind of astounding. He said, nobody really ever told me, just go out there, do your best, nice job. And I was sitting there and I'm like, son of a gun. So when you come to talk about balancing, like, sometimes we can always say, hey, man, we probably could have done this. Probably could have done this. This might have been a better pitch choice. Or you could do this mechanically instead of saying, hey, you know, the 98 pitches you caught, they were really good, you know, and we forget about that sometimes because we only dwell on the four pitches that we didn't catch well. And like, oh, God, we're terrible. Like, no, man, it's freaking really hard to do. So I think always keeping that in the back of my brain keeps me humble and coaching it because it's like they're, they're not trying to make mistakes rise. As long as I've been in this game, and you can probably attest to this. Ever see a guy make an error on purpose? Ever see him walk a guy on purpose? Ever see him strike a guy out or strike out on purpose? No, they're not trying to fail. So what can we do to keep them in success or successful? [00:11:15] Speaker A: Is that a way to kind of get guys out of slumps too, is maybe have them watch when they're doing it correctly or when they're having success. [00:11:23] Speaker C: I always like looking at what they're doing. Good. I have this thing and I always say that it's, dude, if you just show me you can do it once, you can do it a thousand times. So sometimes when a guy is scuffling, we will go back and watch the video and like, look how good you were here. Look at your sequences, look at what you're doing. Look how your body's moving. Look at everything. You know, because we, we're in an industry that we're trying to attain perfection, and perfection is unattainable. And if you do square a ball up offensively, you nut it right, you hit it right on the screws, you backspin line, drive it to center field, that's the perfect swing. That's an out. So here we are trying to develop a perfect swing that if you get it is an out. It doesn't make any sense. So, you know, you hit it a little bit early, it goes in the left center gap a little late, goes in the right center field gap. You know, you get on top of it a little bit, you hit it 105 up the middle. You know, it's, it's crazy. The stupid game, it'll drive you crazy. And that's why I got all this gray hair all over the place now. But. [00:12:22] Speaker A: And for people that don't know Sal, one of the smartest baseball guys I've ever been around, but also the most passionate. I know you come across as self as facing sometimes, but Sal came and spoke at our leadoff dinner many, many moons ago at Western Illinois. And that's how good a guy is. He came in Saturday night for Sunday and I'm like, hey, we're having dinner. I'm like, hey, we got practice at 6am Will you show up? And Sal was like, yeah, for sure. So I go pick Sal up, we go to practice and it's indoors because it's cold outside. And he goes, what do you want me to do? And I'm like, just take the catchers. So Sal takes them out in a, in a hallway, in a, in a, basically a classroom area. He's got him in full gear. They're doing drill workout. And Adam McGinnis, who's still coaching, he's at Heartland now, but he comes in, he's a senior. I'm like, how was. He goes, coach, that's the most amazing thing I've ever seen. He goes, sal is punching the wall as he's talking about blocking. The only, the only negative of that whole deal is I got a, I got a bill from our facilities people at Western Illinois for cleaning up the floor. But that's how passionate you are about that side of things. And obviously made it a long time in the big leagues because of that. And you've made a long time as a coach because of that passion too. [00:13:33] Speaker C: I'm sorry you had to pay for that. [00:13:36] Speaker A: That's typical Western Illinois stuff. [00:13:38] Speaker C: Holy cow. Even though it's just a couple scuffs from Shingards, that's not too bad. But I think, you know, if you, if you're not really passionate about this game, you should probably get out. If you're trying to make money, you should probably get out. Like the guys that I work really close with, you know, these guys really have a love. And it's really not even about the game. It's about the players who are Playing the game, you love those guys. And you, you can't help but, like, be adamant about certain things and, and how you're teaching and what you're teaching. And if you don't have that, you know, that desire to make those guys be better and you don't love those guys, then go do something else. Because you can always tell the phonies. You know, we always say that locker room that when you walk into or the players, they know who all the phonies are. They sniff you out really fast. [00:14:26] Speaker A: Has your coaching style, has your coaching style evolved much over the years? [00:14:32] Speaker C: The biggest evolution was from my first year to my second year coaching because I was still kind of a. I was a very energetic player when I started coaching, started managing, and I had a couple good coaches that said you can't have that kind of emotion all the time because if you do, the players are going to sense it. They're going to either be fearful from you or they're going to run away from you or they're going to fail a lot. So I took that to heart. My next year in aa had a good coaching staff. Pete Walker, who's still a pitching coach in Toronto, Justin Mayshore and Danny Solano were the couple other coaches. And those guys really, like, got invested in me as a coach and because they'd already been coaching for a couple years and it was always about, just be relaxed, man, just be yourself. Those players will follow you, you know. And so I tried to just be kind of relaxing and more of a, I don't know, I guess a players manager. I kind of like a players coach too. I'm not a big ball buster, you know, like I said, I truly know that those guys aren't trying to fail. So what can I do to put them in the best position possible to have success and repeat it? And usually it's from really good relationships with guys. [00:15:46] Speaker A: I think your job with the Braves was hard because you would talk to the front office people. Correct. And then try to relay that information back down to the players. [00:15:55] Speaker C: Yeah, when we first started in Atlanta, we didn't really have an analytical program, so we kind of built it from scratch. And then, I mean, I was part of that build, which was fun. And then the guys who were giving the information to the coaches, I mean, a lot of them didn't know how to interpret all the fun analytics stuff. You know, I was somehow, by the grace of God, I was given the ability to dissect the information. So I was able to translate it to the players and to the coaches when they did want something. So, yeah, you work really close with the guys upstairs. You know, sometimes people can be really combative in baseball because you're looking at, like, the guys upstairs, they're always trying to do this, or, you know, they just think it's that easy. Well, no, they don't think it's that easy. They're giving you information to try to get them better, and they're just looking at it from a different lens. So instead of being resistant to it, you try to talk to the guys like, what do you really see with this? And then I try to implement whatever I try to see. You know, I don't know anybody who's trying to hurt any players, you know, but some of the old school coaches get upset about it. They don't need to be. [00:17:00] Speaker A: How do you balance that with the amount of information that you're getting as a coach to try to whittle down to what you're actually going to give to the players? [00:17:08] Speaker C: Well, there's a lot of rabbit holes you can go down. I always say it's kind of like a conspiracy theory, right? You got all these different things you can go through. You got to find some nuts and bolts that. Bolts that actually you can apply. And once you start figuring out what's good, what's bad, what's fluff, it's easier to. Easier to siphon through it all, and you can basically get to the nuts and bolts. Maybe it's a grip thing, or maybe it's really how you hold your target or whatever. Whatever part we're talking about, but whatever you can do to simplify it, because that's the biggest thing is information can be complicated, and people learn at different rates. Obviously, you're in college, and people who watch your show are all in college. I have an artistic mind, so I'm better with crayons and marker than I am with a computer. Now, do I know how to use a computer? Yes. But I also know that there's other guys out there that don't know how to read the computer or understand it. So I try to translate it to whatever my audience needs. So with Logan Ohap and Travis Darno, they're very visual learners. So I have to do a lot of sketching and show them lanes where when I had Sean Murphy, Sean was a big reader, and I could actually, like, write out programs or whatever I wanted for him, and he would understand that. So it all depends on what your audience needs. [00:18:26] Speaker A: I mean, how. How much different is the path to the big leagues now than when you, you got there. [00:18:33] Speaker C: This is gonna sound terrible, but it's a lot easier to get here. I don't, it's harder to stay. I mean it's really hard to stay, but it's always been. But I think when we had, I mean, gotta remember too, there were four less teams, you know, so there was more minor leaguers. You, you really had to be the best of the best to get to the major leagues. And on a physical side, like we always needed three tools. You know, you had to have a defensive tool, an arm tool or you know, the hitting, the power, whatever five tools you were. Speed. Obviously I didn't talk about that one with me, but when you, nowadays if you have one, they'll give you an opportunity. So I think that's kind of how it's evolved a little bit. The players are definitely more talented skillfully, but aptitude wise, I don't know how much they've been put on their plate. Not that I'm not going to rip the college guys. I'm not going to rip what we do. We wear a wristband too, you know, the catchers do. In college you see a lot of coaches calling the game for catchers hypothetically, right. So do they really learn? I'm trying to put my guys in a situation where they actually learn how to call a game. I'm not saying you shouldn't because obviously all you college coaches need to win, just like I need to win. But I want to make it to where if I teach them how to call a game, I mean they'll eat forever. It's like teaching them how to fish, you know, I mean, could you imagine your dad calling a game for me? I would have been freaking angry. I would have fought him. But he, for people who don't know, obviously I had Ryan's dad as a coach in Evansville, as my head coach in Evansville. But basically it was like they were giving me ideas on how to call the game and then I had to siphon it. But nowadays, like even the positioning, they look at their card and they got to get on a wreck and if you're off the wreck, you get penalized for it. So they don't have any adjustability. So it's kind of sad that, excuse me, the players don't have the freedom to adjust where they're setting up on given times. So that's my. Sorry, I'm on the pulpit on that one. [00:20:38] Speaker A: But some of the best ones at the college level are still doing that and still communicating with Their pitchers and their catchers about calling the game. And the earpiece has helped, too, because they're basically having a conversation with the catcher as they're going. So it's more of an open, flowing conversation with the pitch calling, but that, you know, with the pitch clock, too, I think that's changed a lot of that, too, with being so concerned with getting pitches in on time that they don't have a lot of time. But in between innings is where you'll see a little bit more of that communication on. [00:21:09] Speaker C: That's all right. How to do it. You know, I try to do it in between innings. You got to make in game adjustments. You gotta be able to see things. But you hope that the players have the freedom to do what they want to do. And then if they do make a mistake, then you have coaching opportunities. You know, that's. To me, what coaching is all about, is finding those opportunities where they can learn. [00:21:27] Speaker A: How's your Spanish evolved over time? [00:21:31] Speaker C: English, you know, it's pretty good. If I need to, I can probably talk to them. You know, I speak Italian, so worst case scenario, if they don't understand English, I speak Italian to them. And there's a little bit easier of a turnover. But for the most part, I try to do my best to keep in communication with those guys, and I. I try to show them the vulnerability of not knowing the language. So I'm gonna try to speak Spanish to them, and it might suck. And just like, I hope they would try English with me. And if it sucks, I'm not gonna make fun of them. You know, I had to learn English, so I know how hard it is. [00:22:06] Speaker A: I was gonna ask you, were you. Were you the one that recommended Ronald Acuna get his knob of his bat back to the catcher between the 22 and 23 season? [00:22:17] Speaker C: No. No. I try to stay away from the hitting stuff because those are really bad rabbit holes. I hear. I heard something funny the other day, so I said it's kind of a funny joke. But it was like, what do hitting coaches and everybody else have in common? It was something like that. But they said, everybody knows hitting and everybody knows how to grill a steak. You ask anybody how to grill a steak, they're all experts. Just like there are hitting coaches. Like, everybody's an expert in hitting. That's why I stay away from it. And I don't. I don't even want to talk about hitting. I'll talk about getting you out, but not hitting. [00:22:49] Speaker A: Are they surprised? Are you surprised anybody gets hits anymore? [00:22:54] Speaker C: No. I mean, there's still some really ultra talented guys. I'm not going to say that there's a big disparity in velocity from when we played to what it is now. I mean, obviously I played in a steroid era. Guys were freaking throwing the ball really hard. I think the design of the breaking ball has been the biggest change. So the equal and opposites that you see, like we, we have the technology to make something work exactly the opposite of your fastball. So if you got 8 inches of horizontal and 16 inches of ride, we can put a grip in your hand that'll make it do the other way. Equal and opposite. So people love using the term tunneling, but when it truly is tunneling and you got two factions that are breaking, and if you add a third one, which I call a branch, it makes it really almost impossible to hit. Where there was a lot more conventional pitches probably. And I played everybody slider was kind of the same. You know, everybody split was kind of the same. Everybody's curveball was kind of the same. But now we can really manipulate everything to an exact science to get those guys to have those true equal and opposites. [00:24:03] Speaker A: I mean, who has had the best approach, you know, whether. Whether who you played with or who you have coached at the plate. [00:24:12] Speaker C: I gotta tell you, Max Freed was probably one of the smartest pitchers I've ever had. And when we were adding pitches, me and Cranny, Rick Kran is our pitching coach in Atlanta. We would give him information. His ability to apply it was second to none. So it was like, holy cow, this guy really gets it. So now he's got command of six pitches to both sides of the plate. Good luck. That's why he's not a big strikeout guy. But he knows how to manipulate contact, you know, or suppress it for that matter. I think in the last five years he's been in the top five and the least hardest hit balls in baseball. And so it's usually a recipe to win. [00:24:53] Speaker A: Well, how do you work with guys who can't do that though? [00:24:56] Speaker C: Well, you try to use what they have gift wise. I mean, we've got Ben Joyce here right now. He's an anomaly because he can throw the ball 105 miles an hour. And he's got the splinter that like last night, two nights ago, he threw 97 miles an hour. He's not really going to manipulate a slider very much. You know, he's got to learn how to master those two. Once you master the two, then maybe you add a third or maybe he's like Kenley Jansen, who has one pitch. [00:25:25] Speaker A: You know, one really good pitch, one. [00:25:27] Speaker C: Really good pitch in one area that they know it's coming, and it's still hard to hit. You know, I think that's what people forget. It's really hard to hit. Why this guy striking out? Well, because it's hard. You couldn't do it either, otherwise you wouldn't be talking like that. [00:25:41] Speaker A: You know, as a hitter for those guys, though, they're probably guessing on mistakes, right, because the pitchers. Yeah, I'm always going to. Pitches hit a spot where they're. They're just sitting in their. Their area and hopefully the pitcher actually makes a mistake. [00:25:53] Speaker C: Yeah, he used a really good word area there. That's what a lot of the guys are doing now is their hunting areas. We call window shopping. Right. So you play against the team they're hunting in a certain area. You know, what can you do to either manipulate that ball out of the area or start it in a different location? And so if you find a team who has a team approach and they're really hunting that window like you said, or area, you know, like, what do we have in our tool belt that can combat it? And so that's the. That's the chess game that I love so much. You know, what are they looking for? How can we do it? Because the swing really doesn't change very much. Where they're looking changes and how we can affect their timing. I've never gotten a guy out because of a swing. I've gotten a guy out because of their timing. I don't know what people. Other people might differ, but that's what I think. [00:26:47] Speaker A: You know, you said you were an athlete. You were an athlete. You're a guy that could dunk for your size, which was. That's God given athleticism. And you did steal bases in college, too, by the way. [00:27:01] Speaker C: Yeah. You know what I'm really the proudest of? Before I left, I was the triples holder at the University of Evansville. Triples. Granted, our field was freaking huge, but, yeah, I could run back then. Just, you know, after years of catching, it just goes the wrong way. Like, speed never gets better for catchers. It only goes worse. [00:27:19] Speaker A: And I got to watch catch a lot, you know, very flexible, sat low, you know, do you. Would. Would you have messed around with some of the hybrid stances right now if that was more available, readily available back then for you? [00:27:33] Speaker C: Oh, there's no doubt. I think as I sit here with three knee replacements, I think I would Definitely go to one knee. I would teach or what I teach one knee. I don't teach a kickstand. I don't believe in it, don't like it. I actually think it's bad for your labrum and your hip. But the conventional one knee that we used in Atlanta, that we helped design, pretty proud of that actually. Tyler Flowers, when I got with him, we talked a lot about it and we kind of morphed it into a technique that we used and we had a lot of success. There was no knee injuries, no leg injuries. So I was really pretty excited about the success that we had with that. I'm trying to teach the guys here that, but that's not really my full job is to be the catching mechanics guy. But you know, something that I'd love to try to explain to guys, I, I think it just helps your life, you know, I, I'm not going to be able to squat probably the rest of my life. And I loved catching. You know, now when I can play catch and then when they come close, I got to be like, hey man, can you get down? Because I can't get down. I feel terrible. Then again, I really don't want to squat for Ben Joyce because he might break my freaking hand. My eyes aren't as good as they used to be either. [00:28:47] Speaker A: And also with the glove patterning stuff, you know, as much movement there as their pre pitch, you know, how have you adjusted with that over time too? [00:28:55] Speaker C: Well, I think that to me is the easiest part because if you know the pitch's profile, you can combat it with your drop and your route. I think, you know, like when I was catching back in the old days, you basically have your target still and you try to adjust to the ball and if your hands are strong enough, you can stop it. I never believed in soft hands. You had strong hands. But now if I know that the pitch is like a right handed slider and I'm catching, I can combat my hand position and work against it to combat that angle, to keep it in the strike zones sooner rather than carrying out of the strike zone. So it takes you learning your staff, learning what each pitch does individually, and then you can combat it with your drop, your. How you press to the ball and how you, how you receive it. So there's a little bit of studying you have to do to be a better catcher to actually catch the ball cleanly. It's not just like you see the guys with a quick glove drop and then they're always working up to the ball. There is A there's a method to the madness. [00:29:55] Speaker A: How long does it take guys to figure that piece out? [00:30:00] Speaker C: Well, I think a spring training is huge. Like those seven weeks when you're really getting a chance to know somebody. You know, you're catching their side, you're catching them in game, you understand what the expected misses. You. You kind of can pattern what the balls are doing and then you usually about two months. So we need all of spring training. We need every day of it just to get to get to know those pitchers. But it's really hard. I mean, you can go out there blindly. Like, I mean, how many tryout camps have we gone to over the years where we watched catchers and we judge them pretty harshly, as well we should, because it's a hard position. But like, if you've caught five pitches and you haven't made the adjustment to his heater yet, you got issues. You know, he might not be had, but you have a guy. Like, I remember watching Drake Baldwin as a kid becomes a big league camp and he's catching these guys. He recognized how to combat the angle early. I mean, he got it fast. So, you know, everybody's got gifts. But if your hands are bad and you don't understand the route, you're going to have trouble behind the plate. [00:31:02] Speaker A: I love that term you used, expected miss. [00:31:05] Speaker C: Yeah, it's the biggest term we have, I think when you, if you know what the movement profile of the pitch is, I mean, where are these misses is going to be and can you combat and still keep it in the strike zone or can you use it to your advantage to get guys out? You know, you can't just sit there blind and play defense. You know what I mean? You're not a hockey goalie. You're going to lose every pitch in the world. So you should kind of know where the ball is going to go and its movement. So expected miss is where you can make your money behind the plate. [00:31:35] Speaker A: Do elite players and pitchers want to be coached? [00:31:38] Speaker C: Oh, my gosh, yeah, they really do. When I first got to the big leagues, I had two older catchers. They both had 10 years of service time. I was scared. I was like, oh, man, this is my first year in the big leagues. And I got. I got Tyler Flowers and Kurt Suzuki, who are both tenured vets that are getting towards the end of their career. What I found was, was they really love to be coached. They're in it for that long. They want to be better, they want to be the best. You're not. You don't want to be embarrassed on the field, you know, because you're competing against guys who are 10 years your junior, you know, sometimes 15. I mean, I quit when I was 40. I'm like, man, I'm trying to compete with 23 year olds. I, if you had something to give me, I please give it to me. I could really use it, you know, and, but those guys made it really easy for me to share information and give them information and they loved it. They also were honest. Hey, this might not work. That's okay, I can give you something else, you know, so I think older players love information. They love being coached. [00:32:43] Speaker A: What about trying to help rookies adjust the big league level? [00:32:48] Speaker C: That's the hardest. That's basically you're trying to get what's going on in between their ears. Most young players don't have a good organizational of thought. You're playing second base, you did it. You understood what your pre pitch routine was, you understood the situation, you understood what the hitter was trying to do, you understood what the pitcher is trying to do. So you're going to make an educated guess on where you're going to go, where the ball's going to be. A lot of times the game is really fast for kids and they're not thinking about it at that level. So you try to teach them how to organize their thought so they can have a good pre pitch so they can make correct decisions. That because people, that's why like you can't just do mechanics because mechanics are easy. You're doing this wrong. Okay, why, why are you doing it wrong? And so it's always like, got to get your mind right before you execute the pitch or the play or the hit or the swing. So it's a good question. [00:33:48] Speaker A: And you talked about, you know, obviously easier to get there but hard to stay. What is the, what is the key to having a long career? You had a long career and you've coached guys that have had long careers. What is the key to staying up there? [00:34:06] Speaker C: Well, it's funny, it does sound cliche, but it's consistency. You know, if you get picked up by a team and you're not consistent, they're going to get rid of you. If you make the same bonehead plays you always make, they're going to get rid of you. If you can't execute, you know, just a simple bunt or you don't understand how to go first or third, people will get rid of you. I always say if you strike out, you get called up, you strike out, they'll give you another chance. Or if you're a pitcher, they call you up and you walk a guy, you'll get another chance. You make something fundamentally wrong with an older manager like Wash or when I played the Joe Torres or the Mike Socials, you're gone. But now guys will get those opportunities and they don't have that consistency or they make really, really dumb mistakes, which we consider dumb. It's not dumb, but the tolerance is short, you know, because they've got somebody else who's just as talented. If you and Double A, they'll give him a shot because he's cheap. So it's harder as a veteran player to stay if you're not really consistent in what you do. So there's a lot of turnover now. It's actually kind of sad because there's a lot of good players that are out there that don't have a job. [00:35:23] Speaker A: You mentioned earlier, with the amount of information tech you guys have, is it easier to coach pitchers now with, with all that information, or is it harder because there's so much information? [00:35:33] Speaker C: No, I think it's pretty easy, you know, because you can. We got the skeletals that say, hey, you know, you leaving the rubber early? Okay, how can we stay on the rubber longer? We got the drills for that. Or, you know, when you're breaking your hands, maybe you're just a touch late. Here's the skeletal of when you're good, and here's the skeletal when you're bad. And we can throw an overlay on there and we can say, hey, look at your 15 degrees different. You know, sounds easy, but it's really hard to fix. But we can identify it faster than we did in the past just because we would have to watch so much video of when you were rolling. And now we have the ability to, like, if we're throwing aside, okay, and Ryan Brownlee's delivery is absolutely perfect, we'll star it and then we'll use that as the comparable to when things are off. And so we always try to keep the baseline data, you know, within touch to where if we need it. This is when you were at your best. This is where you're at now. Look at the difference. Let's clean that up. And then they go, yeah, that sounds good. Let's do it. You know, like I said, guys want to be coached, so it's actually easier to do it once you understand the baseline. Just like hitting, you know, if you know what you're doing wrong in a swing, you know something's wrong. You can't figure it out. Okay, well, let's go to Hawkeye. Let's get the skeletal out. This is when you were rolling. This is, you know, how early your load stride was. And, you know, it's. We got to get back to that point. We. We work towards that. So I think the information is so good that we should be able to make. Excuse me. Make adjustments sooner. [00:37:11] Speaker A: Yeah. For me, the load with the Hawkeye is the biggest thing. I think for hitters, it just so huge timing, timing. You smash the ball. All right, Try to do that and be consistent. You say consistent. Try to be consistent with that. [00:37:24] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly. Sorry, I'm a little under the weather. Sorry. [00:37:27] Speaker A: So am I. Well, mine's pollen. Yours is. Yours is time change, but mine is piling out. Here we have a lot of youth coaches that listen in. So if you're going to start from scratch with a catcher, where would you start. [00:37:42] Speaker C: Finding a comfortable setup? People always talk about catching. They always want to talk about the hands or blocking or throwing. Every fault I've ever seen, and every catcher has to do with their setup. If you're teaching a conventional way, which I still would if I had to go back in time and, you know, know you have a son and you send them to me and I'm going to teach them how to set up where they're comfortable and movable. Then from there, I'm going to teach them balance from that position. Then I'm going to teach them how to hold their hand. I think the biggest mistake, and I see it a lot of, like, either collegiate level or I see it at the amateur. Amateur level. The really young kids, we are not strong when we're like this. And they always say, get your thumb under the ball, right? This is where you're the strongest. So find a way to get your target there. Stop buying new gloves for kids. Use old gloves. For really, really young kids, you know, they're trying to freaking hold this thing up. They're not strong enough to do it, and their thumb starts to drop. And then every ball they catch, their elbows up, and then the ball's just taking them all the way all over the place. I was equated to, like, when you do a push up, you know, you do a push up, you have your hands neutral. It's easy to do. Okay. Now all of a sudden, you put your hands like this, try to do a push up. It's freaking miserable. Nobody's that strong. And now you're trying to catch a ball that's coming at you hard. Whatever level you're at. If your elbow's in a bad position, you're going to hurt yourself. And it's usually because, sorry, coaches, but you say thumb down, that's wrong to me. So I wouldn't teach it. I always want the thumb up, thumb up. You can do a lot of things, you can move anywhere. So, but the setup this first, balanced. Try to be as square as you can if you're conventional. If you're not conventional, you're one knee. Basically, your hip level and your shoulder level should still be straight. The one knee stuff is kind of nice because like you could practice it just sitting, watching TV for a half an hour. Just sit on one knee should be comfortable. If it's not, you're doing it wrong. So without getting the actual mechanics of it, because it would take a little bit more time. [00:39:51] Speaker A: I've seen you push a lot of guys, whether it's hitters or catchers, to allow them to feel if they're in a good, strong, balanced position. I've seen you push a lot of guys to reinforce. [00:40:01] Speaker C: Oh yeah, yeah. I believe in it 100%. I think, you know, the martial arts background helps, but when you understand true balance and it's dynamic balance where you freaking can shoot left, shoot right, shoot forward, shoot back, you know, you're not just in a comfortable position, you're truly in a balanced position, which are two different things. Like, dude, I'm. I could just go to the couch right over there and sit down and watch TV and be comfortable. But am I balanced? If I'm balanced, I can do anything. So, you know, I used to be a real jerk. I would put, I'd have like a, I had a seven foot PVC pipe. I walked with every, everywhere I walked. And then when a kid got in their stance, I would put the freaking PVC pipe over their shoulders and I would make them sway, do moves, block from that position just so they would learn to keep their shoulders square. You know, I think how you use your feet are important. That's why when catchers are slow, it really hurts. Because if their feet are bad, they can't move, they can't block, they can't throw, they can't do anything. So understanding how to use the ball of your foot compared to getting rooted on your heel. If you get rooted on your heel, then your knee level gets too, too high. Sorry, this is complicated. But then they get stuck and they can't reach anywhere. If you can lower your knee level, it's a lot easier to keep your posture and Then you can move forward. [00:41:22] Speaker A: So are you still giving lessons in the off season? [00:41:27] Speaker C: No, not too much. [00:41:29] Speaker A: When's the last time you did it? [00:41:32] Speaker C: The. I've had people fly in, like pro guys fry fly in or drive in where they wanted a little extra work, and I would help them. I actually feel really bad charging kids information that I know. So I don't. I don't like charging. [00:41:52] Speaker A: I have a hard time with it. [00:41:54] Speaker C: Well, I was not a good businessman when I had my. I had a facility for about five years, and the first two years I charged five bucks ahead. The next years I charge 10. So I was like. My wife's like, you know, what are you doing? We got to make money. I'm like, don't really care about money. I like baseball, so I'm an idiot. [00:42:19] Speaker A: You know, injuries are kind of a hot buck. I think they've always been a hot button topic. But what, what are your thoughts with arm injuries? [00:42:29] Speaker C: Well, I think there's a lot of things that contribute to it. I'm going to start with something really, really simple. When the kids are at the youth levels, are they having a catch or are they pitching when they throw? That, to me is the biggest thing. Can you just throw, have fun? Like just play catch? Or do you always have to get in a pitcher's delivery and throw? That's number one. Number two, guys don't play multiple sports in the Midwest. We're lucky because most of us were football players, basketball players, you know, baseball players. When you start getting to the coast, they've been playing baseball since they were six years old. You know, being athletic and allowing some of your body parts to rest is important. Nobody wants to rest anymore. I mean, we're guilty of it, too. And the pro side, we would go see somebody in February and wow, he's only throwing 92 miles an hour. Freaking February. Like, what do you expect? So that stuff kind of bothers me a little bit. You know, the lessons that people pay for, I mean, if they're not reputable, they can put a lot of people in a lot of harm. But somebody wants to make money, so they do it, and they want their best for their kid, and they're just not educated enough to go to the right place. So those are a couple of the things I'm not 100% sold on all the. The heavy ball stuff that people are doing because, you know, they pushed it to try to gain Velo instead of using it as a recovery tool. And it's a lot of it. I mean, you saw you see, at the college level, probably more, but on the minor league level, when I. In spring training, we see the minor leaguers a lot. They'll use the heavy ball program without monetization. So people aren't paying attention to their specific drills. They're just allowing them to do the drills. And what if you're starting to do something a little, a little bit wrong? You're, you're inhibiting some of your movement and then you put yourself in bad position? All right, so that was like six things. [00:44:32] Speaker A: Well, how come, how come the Latin players don't get injured as much, by the way? They only play one sport down there. [00:44:41] Speaker C: True, but I think. [00:44:43] Speaker A: But they also don't. And they also train more, they throw more, but they don't throw off the mound as much. [00:44:49] Speaker C: Right. They don't throw up the ball, they. [00:44:50] Speaker A: Don'T play as many games. This has been a good topic of conversation over the last three, four, five years. Alan Jaeger, some other people that are interactive and good interaction on social media with this. Because everybody's like, well, they only play one sport. Well, their training is way different. They long toss a lot more and they don't throw as much off the mound. [00:45:11] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly, right. I mean, I mean, I threw long toss all the time as a kid. I remember when we moved to a new house, Albert Einstein School where I lived in Illinois, they had a 200 foot wall, they had 200 foot of easement. And I had these. Remember the old A tech balls, you know, when they were really bouncy. I stole a couple because that's what you do when you go to batting cage, you steal one of those balls. But I would go out there and my goal was to get to the 200 foot of the easement and throw it as high as I could. You know, not as hard as I could, but throw it as high as I could and try to hit it and make it bounce back to me where I could still work on my fielding too. I always believe long toss is critical in order to develop arm strength and to keep you healthy. But I always thought on your way out, if we went out to 180ft, I want to throw it as soft as I can to 180ft. And then as you start to come in, that's when I started putting pace on the ball because I've truly elongated, I've stretched, I've worked on my breaks, I've worked on my accelerators. You know, I think now we get to the point where we're throwing as hard as we can out, and we're throwing as hard as we can in. And so there's no yin and yang, there's no balance. And to me, if. If you are in a good long toss program, I think it can help a lot. That's right. Jaeger and those guys, they're ahead of the curve. But it, you know, to me, just going out and getting a good stretch sometime, it's kind of like as. As good as getting on the bike and getting on it for 20 minutes, where you just flush your arm rather than try to always work accelerators. [00:46:50] Speaker A: I think. I think it helps with command, too. [00:46:53] Speaker C: Oh, there's no doubt. I think the more you get a feel for the ball, the easier it is to command it. That's why I talked earlier about playing catch. Like, when you play catch with different arm angles, you. You find stuff that works for you. And everybody's progression as a pitcher, you know, everybody started like this. And as you get older, you learn to square your shoulders up, you drop your slot. But do you really drop your slot? No, because this is where I was. I just fixed my head, my. And my T spine, and put myself in a more natural position. But that comes with time and development and refinement of a delivery. And, you know, I don't know if it was right or not, but when I was a pitching coordinator, I tried to deconstruct the delivery. So, I mean, I wasn't a pitcher, so I had to look at it a different way. I actually recorded all their long toss. And I said, if this is what you're doing in your long toss, how can we turn that and incorporate that into your delivery? So instead of saying, this is your delivery, let's incorporate it to long toss. We went the other way. And so, you know, the reason why guys went over their head and, you know, trying to do their hip tilt and their shoulder tilt was because that was part of their long toss program. So it was easy. You got to get uphill to get downhill. But now there's. There's more ways to skin a cat. But I think when you. When you do something that's really natural, it's easy to repeat. When you're doing something that's unnatural, it's hard to repeat. So that would be my really wish for the younger players to go out there, play other sports, be an athlete, but throw from different arm angles, like, have fun, you know, like, think about how you threw the ball from second base or your brother. I mean. But now if you were going to make a relay throw, Home you were going to make a completely different throw. You know, I threw a ball one way to second base, to third base was slightly different, you know, or if I had to throw a ball 220ft, which I never had to, you know, I'm going to throw that a little bit different. So you have to judge on where you're, where you're actually throwing to. [00:48:54] Speaker A: But pitching is hard on that by the way. Watch, watch somebody play long toss and you'll figure out where their slots supposed to be. [00:49:01] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly right. We used to do a drill. Billy Connors, the ex pitching coach with the Yankees and the Cubs for a long time used to have the backhand drill. So if you're a right handed pitcher, he would put you at shortstop, you would hit the ball into the hole, you would backhand it without even thinking you're going to throw a howitzer over there to first. And then we would record it and say this is where your slot should be. And then they would work to do that. You know, if you're left handed, for the coaches that are listening, you put them at second base, hit the ball in a three, four hole and then they throw it to third. So you know, they would do those drills like that to keep them athletic. The delivery should be athletic. It shouldn't be weird, weird mechanically, you know, goofy, should be smooth. But yeah, everybody's different though. [00:49:46] Speaker A: Who do you feel like has had the most impact on you professionally in your professional career? [00:49:53] Speaker C: Well, obviously catching, I had Bob Boone, he taught me a lot, calling a game, catching. Obviously I was kind of a clone of what he did physically, you know, hitting wise. Terry Crowley, who was a hitting coach with us in Baltimore, he helped me a ton when it came to that. I became a better hitter as I got older. When I got into coaching, I got really lucky because I had two guys. One is Mel Didier and for the people who don't know who Mel Didier is, Mel Didier was the advanced scout for the Dodgers that basically told the coaching staff that every time in a 3, 2 count Dennis Eckersley is going to throw a backdoor slider, right. But Mel helped develop two organizations where came up with the Dodgers and also was a football coach under Bear Bryant in Alabama. Two sport athlete. He's got a book out there. I can't remember something about partner, but he was the guy I was really lucky. He helped me refine my coaching. And then the other one was Mel Queen, he had an eye that I've never seen. And for the guys who don't know who Mel Queen was. Mel Queen was the only MLB player to ever transition from center field to the pitcher's mound in the one season. In that season it was crazy. He's also the guy that helped turn Roy Holiday around. Guys like Doug Davis who helped me cultivate my managing style and what the organization wanted. And then over the years, it's been a conglomerate of trying to steal pieces from everybody. You know, there's really good coaches out there and if you take one or two things from them, they can really make you do well. But I really learned a lot from the guys who sucked what not to do. And that kept me from making the same mistakes over and over again. I won't name those names though. You don't get that. [00:51:48] Speaker A: Jeff Leister was a teammate of mine and then pent up on the coach with us at Evansville, but he signed as a Canadian as a 16 year old. Mel Queen, he said is the was the most intimidating human being he'd ever been around. [00:52:03] Speaker C: Mel Queen is great, man. He was. I mean, he's passed. But my first interaction with them where he's got a young pitcher on the mound, you know, like, because coaches, you know, we got 10 packs. So there's 10 guys pitching or eight guys pitching. And I'm just sitting there with Mel. I'm watching this kid throw and he's smoking a heater. So he's got his heater and he's bringing, you know, he kind of growled when he talked. He takes the kid kids all over the place. He goes, hey kid, what are you doing? He goes, well, I think my mechanics, I'm doing this, this and this. And he goes, shut up, stupid. You're throwing the ball up, throw the ball down. So kid goes, and he throws the next five pitches down and he turns around and he says, hey, what are you doing right? He goes, I'm throwing the ball down. And Mel was like, perfect, you're finally starting to get pitching. I'm like, I mean he was a pretty smart guy, but he used simplicity too to really be powerful. So I loved him, man. He was one of my favorites. [00:52:59] Speaker A: You said what learned not not what not to do. What are some examples of what not to do that you learned? [00:53:07] Speaker C: Well, you'll appreciate this because you were a head coach, you know, and you've seen baseball a long time being reactionary to mistakes that are made on the field. I have this thing with the catchers, right? When I was doing the catching, we would do receiving, blocking, throwing, receiving, blocking, throwing, day off. So Monday was receiving, Tuesday was blocking, Wednesday was throwing. If a guy had a really bad day blocking on Sunday, I didn't say hey, on Monday we're changing, we're going to block. No, we just had a bad day. It happens. We're still going to do receiving because that's the day for that. I stuck to my guns when and not be reactionary when guys made mistakes. One of the reasons why I chart every pitch of every game is because it keeps me from reacting. I think when we sit there, how many times do we see a guy do a bonehead play? You want to sit, you want to throw your hands up, throw your frickin hat, be angry. But you try not to because you're basically like sitting there digesting what he did wrong. What are the prosper, how are you going to fix it? But you don't want to do it right away. There's sometimes you talk to the players right away when it's a mental error. Yes, get them, get it done right there. When a guy's making a physical error, take your time. Physical errors happen. That's why we still got the freaking E column in our line every day. You know, you can live with the guy's physical errors. It's hard to live with their mental errors all the time. So that's kind of how I look at it that way. Like don't be reactionary as a coach, don't make them do drill work when they keep screwing up physical stuff, when they keep doing mental stuff. I completely get it. But you know, guy can't hit the cutoff man in the chest. It happens, man, somebody picked it up, ball, slip, whatever. Just keep working on your drills when you're supposed to. [00:55:05] Speaker A: Are there specific things you're charting on each pitch? [00:55:09] Speaker C: Every pitch, every location. Did they swing? Did they not swing? What kind of patterns are we falling into? Patterns? Are we staying away from patterns? When I review the next morning, I can play along with them. What would I called in this situation? What would I not called in this situation? What was working? What was not working? I mean, charting a game is important. I mean for the guys who, who do chart, you kind of understand that. You know, I, I also have a, a little baseball field in my chart where I can actually chart where they hit the guy. You know, I mean, I'm not a spread, I'm not doing a spray chart. But I want to know what their approach was against them, was it consistent? What they've been doing was this anomaly, you know, so I'm always looking for Types of stuff like that. I also chart first pitch soft, first pitch hard, first pitch strike, first pitch ball, first pitch in play, and then the most important count in baseball, 1 1. So 1 1. To me, how many times you control the count to lose the count. We know that there's a difference between what, 350 points of slug between 21 and 1 2. I want to keep control. So obviously there's a lot of stuff. [00:56:25] Speaker A: Do you have a fail forward moment, something you thought was going to set you back, but looking back now, it helped you move forward? [00:56:31] Speaker C: Oh, man. Every injury I ever had, I always thought that, oh, it's the end of the world. I remember blowing my elbow out and being sad for myself. And I go to PAO Pro Athletes Outreach, which is a Christian organization. And who am I sitting next to? Dave Dravecki. Dave Dravecki. Guys who don't know. Ended up blowing his elbow out, ended up getting a staph infection, and he ended up having to sever his arm. I'm like, here I am having a pity party for myself, and here's Dave Trevecki, one of the nicest human beings on earth, saying, it's going to be okay, you know, but what it, you know, like, because of blowing my elbow out, I realized how weak I was in my shoulders. So I took my gym work more serious. I remember breaking my finger in high school when I broke my ring finger. And then I realized because I can't bend it, it ended up being a perfect bridge for when I made an exchange. Because I. When I made an exchange, my finger was always like that. So all of a sudden I've always split the ball perfectly in half or breaking my thumb. This is kind of gross, but basically I broke it in half and my thumb was over here, and I reset it myself. And because of that break, it's a little awkward, but I learned how to tuck my thumb under the ball and I threw the ball harder. Every injury I ever had, I thought it was the end of the world. But it ended up being a, you know, happy accident. As Bob Ross used to say, you know, when he's making a painting. So that's what you look for. You look for happy accidents. Man, it doesn't suck. I'm gonna play for 15 organizations over 18 years. I used to always think woe was me. And then I realized that was the good Lord putting me in a position to learn how to coach. I mean, I wasn't gonna be a Hall of Fame player, but not be a Hall of Fame coach. But just help people through those tough times that they're having. Because you think it's bad. Look at my baseball card. It's not that bad, and I still survived. [00:58:35] Speaker A: That allow you to pay attention to the injured guys a little bit more because you went through it. [00:58:40] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. I mean, when you go through. When you go through a lot of the struggles, trials and tribulations that you go through, you become a little bit more sensitive to those guys who are going through it. With some of the injury stuff, you understand the precursors that why it would happen and how you can prevent it. So, like I said, in all those happy accidents that happened, there was a lot of learning on my end. And it can either help me prevent injuries in the future or it can help me, you know, make an adjustment that somebody. It might take somebody two more months to see, or we gotta wait till he breaks. So all the fun stuff like that, it's really helped me throughout the years. [00:59:22] Speaker A: How have you and Carrie been able to make it work this long? [00:59:25] Speaker C: Oh, my gosh. I don't know why she stuck around. She loves me. I don't know why. [00:59:31] Speaker A: It's an anomaly for somebody that's been in baseball that long and you guys are still together. And it's a great story because it doesn't normally work out that way. 99% of the time, it doesn't work that way in baseball for somebody that's been in it that long. [00:59:46] Speaker C: Yeah. I think my wife's a tremendous person. Obviously, I love her with all my heart. Actually, I think I love her more now than I did when we were younger. To go through what. I mean, baseball coaches that are watching know what your wives go through, how strong they have to be, how they have to raise all the kids. You're always the happy, go, lucky guy. You know, you're the fun guy. She's always the disciplinarian. It makes it really, really tough. And then when all the trades and all the movement that I've done in my life, you know, being grounded one, in faith, two in home and our families, I think those are really huge. Our support system, you think it would be greater? Like, all our families are there, but nobody knows what we're going through, you know? Right. Like, nobody understands it. So we lean on each other a lot. You know, I apologize a lot. I wish I was there for a lot of the things and, you know, for all the people that think it's all glamorous, I tell them, you were able to watch your first kid's steps. I Wasn't you were able to hear their first words. I wasn't. I missed out on a lot of crap. And now my kids give me crap because, like, you, like Travis Darnold, you treat him better than you treat us. And then I come back and say, yeah, he's the only son I had that made money so far, so. But, you know, I always try to treat players like I would treat my kids. I love them all. When they do good, I praise them. When they do bad, I scold them just like my kids at home. But my wife, I don't know how she did it, buddy. I have no idea. She'd be probably. [01:01:23] Speaker A: How many years did you guys live in separate locations? [01:01:26] Speaker C: Oh, man. For still even now, I mean, I'm in la, she's in Chicago. And we. I talked to her twice already on the phone this morning because we had a day off. But it's like, man, we're never together. I can't wait for Santo to go through college, get to college so we can be an empty nester and maybe be a family again, you know, I really appreciate our time together now. Except for the first two weeks. The first two weeks is really hard because I still have. I'm in baseball mode, so my schedule is a little bit different. And she's already been mom, so I got to like. Takes me two weeks to get into her schedule, so. [01:02:03] Speaker A: But also a great athlete in her own right. Great volleyball player. I think about that too. Like, she's. She has that compassion competitive gene in her too, where I think that that makes it. Maybe not. It's never easy, but I think she understands what you're doing and what you've done forever. Because she's been in that mode. And she was very competitive. [01:02:21] Speaker C: Yeah, she was. And I. I think because she was so goal oriented, she never wanted to hinder me with my goals. That's why she's a great supporting cast, like most of our wives are. Been very supportive. Like, she saw how heartbroken I was when I just got fired from the Braves and she saw how happy I was when I got hired and she felt the same way. It's. It's funny, we're so codependent on each other, even though we're so far apart. That, man, I don't know if I could have done this life without her, you know, I'd be a fool to say I could, but I'd probably be a drunk heathen, you know? But I love my wife, I love my life, and I couldn't do it without her, that's for sure. [01:03:06] Speaker A: What growing up in Chicago with two immigrant Italian parents do for you gave me work ethic. [01:03:15] Speaker C: My dad, to his credit, he saw me play a lot, but he was always working on three jobs at the same time. He was a carpenter. He was able to work a lot. My mom was a custodian, so she was always picking up after people, you know, like, English was my second language. I had to work hard to learn to speak English. I sucked at school, but I found a way to end up getting to college. Still can't spell for the life of me. I don't know why, but the work ethic and I guess their tenaciousness, like, when they did something, they were going to find a way to get it done. Like, they didn't know the language, they didn't understand the culture, but they still found a way to survive, you know, Raised two good kids, me and my brother Mike. You know, we're both pretty successful, you know, and they only wanted the best for us. So I kind of look at that for. With my kids too. Like, I want to work hard so they can be successful, too. And you just hope that they can carry that same tradition on with their kids and so on. But when. When you grow up with immigrant parents and, you know, like, I was the first one born in America, it gives me a lot more compassion with the guys who are from the other countries, you know, it's a lot easier to have conversations with them. You know, I know what you're going through, even though you think I don't, I look white as a ghost. But, you know, you. You are put in these situations to help, you know, and that's kind of how I was looked at it. And my mom and dad did everything they could to help me. So, you know, I. Same thing as my wife. Like, I love my mom and dad. I still talk to my mom probably every other day. My dad, not as much. He can't hear as well, so it's a little bit harder to talk to him. But yeah, I talk to my parents all the time. And, you know, just like Carrie talks to her mom and dad all the time. And hopefully you still talk to your dad all the time if he's not playing golf, you know, still, somehow, how. [01:05:17] Speaker A: Are you able to make your switch to going sober? [01:05:21] Speaker C: Well, that was after I came to Christ. That was easy. Good Lord took that out of my life like that. [01:05:28] Speaker A: Because you never struggled with it? [01:05:30] Speaker C: No. [01:05:31] Speaker A: The, you know, the family members or friends that I know that. That have tried to get sober like, it's. It's been a struggle for them at times. And yours. Yours was never a struggle. [01:05:40] Speaker C: No. When. When I was young, you know, for the people who don't know, by the age of 23, I was drinking a case of beer at night and a fifth of Southern Comfort. Okay. Which is not recommended, but 23, I had a bleeding ulcer. I get called up to the big leagues. I'm hanging out with a guy named Keith Lockhart, and he started influencing me with the Word. So, you know, I'd always kind of gone to Catholic church, but never really was. I mean, I wasn't a bad guy. I just, you know, I didn't know. I didn't know the truth at the time. So, anyway, the year goes on. The end of the year, I have a miserable year. Stomach hurts all the time. They go in. I've got a bleeding ulcer. I gotta have surgery to get it fixed. So I go to Kansas City to the doctor to go get it fixed. And in the meanwhile, I'm staying with Keith and Lisa Lockhart, and we're at the batting cage. One day, we're at Mac and Sights in Kansas City, and I actually stop in the middle of hitting, and I say, hey, man, I'm ready. They're like, ready? You mean you're really ready? Ready to receive Christ? I'm like, yes, I'm ready. So we stop everything we're doing in the middle of the batting cage. We pray I receive Christ. The next day, I go to the doctor, and he goes, I don't know what happened, but your ulcer is gone. We don't need to have surgery anymore. And after that, I know I got touched by God. And I never had an issue with it again. I never even had a desire to, you know? So when the good Lord took it out of my life, it became a whole lot easier to. To realize and focus on everything else. I can still have a good time. Don't need to be drunk to do it. But I'm like you. I know a lot of guys that really struggled with that drug use or alcohol. And for some reason, when he took it out of my life, he completely took it out of my life. [01:07:36] Speaker A: Because you're a big help to me. When you, you know, luckily, you and Carrie were dating. She was still at Evansville. You're a big help to me. When you would come back and work out with us in the off season. And that was help to me. Like, guys like you, Brad, Tyler, like, you guys helped me more than anything get through one Playing, but also having to play for my dad and brother. Like, oh, man, you guys are a huge help to me with that, with him and all that, so. [01:07:59] Speaker C: Well, I appreciate it, being with both of those two guys. I mean, I saw what. What Butch had to go through. I mean, that must have been miserable for him. But I still tell the story. We were at USI and Fluchi and Timmy did something wrong, and your dad sat him down and freaking punched him right in the sternum. We could get away with that in today's game. But I'm like, oh, man, my dad would have done the exact same thing. You know, I don't know if I could play for that. But we all know your dad. We all love him. But those hard lessons he gave us, man, turned us into pretty good players. [01:08:32] Speaker A: Yeah, people from the outside that. That didn't play for my dad. They don't get it. A friend of ours in Evansville played for Bobby Knight, and he asked my dad all the time, he's like, how do your guys that played for you love you? Because it was hard on us. But he still had that soft side. And he's got it, too. Like, he has that soft side to him, too. He's got both. [01:08:52] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, there's no doubt. Like, you knew. I mean, our generation was probably a little bit different than today's generation because we were always told, if they're not hard on you, they don't love you. And your dad was so hard on us that we thought he loved us in spades. And he did. I mean, I talked to your dad almost a week ago. I think he taught everybody before the season, wishing me good luck, you know, and that means a lot. I go back to when I actually went to Evansville, of all the schools that recruited me, and there were a lot just, you know, it was a good big league player. There's going to be a lot of people recruiting you. Your dad was the only one that hand wrote letters that meant a lot. You know, there was something to that, and you could tell that there was care. And he was so passionate about us being really good players and. And good people, too. You know, that gets lost sometimes in the shuffle of, oh, I'm not playing what was me, you know, heck, it was hard for me to sit a little bit, you know, and then he realized and got smart and let me catch. [01:09:51] Speaker A: But what are some final thoughts for I let you go? [01:09:58] Speaker C: You know, that's really a good question for. I think as a coach now, I have really. I don't enjoy Watching the game because I watch it with coach's eyes all the time. And it bothers me because sometimes I just want to watch a game and just enjoy it, right? But I'm like, ah, man, they should have threw this pitch. Or oh, he's doing this wrong. So I think about it more on the kids side. The only time that I truly enjoyed watching baseball is when my kids played. And I always promised myself I wasn't going to over coach them and I would always take him out for ice cream after. So I was like, I just wanted to have fun with them so they would just like love the game whether they played it or not. And my kids now, they don't play it at all. They never really did, except for Ange. But enjoy watching your son play. If they fail, they're not failing on purpose. Teach them, Love them, but be there for them. My dad didn't know anything about baseball and he was there for me. My mom was there for me. So if I can give anybody advice, be there for your kid. They need you more than you think. And they're going to be resistant than dicks, but they eventually turn around and go, man, pops, I couldn't do it without you, you know, So I don't know how many coaches or people that are listening can actually do that. But if you can, God Almighty, God bless you. If you can just love your kids, just love them. Don't be a coach all the time. [01:11:31] Speaker A: Thanks for the time, Sal. Love you. [01:11:34] Speaker C: I love you too, buddy. Thanks for having me so much. [01:11:38] Speaker B: Sal's one of the smartest baseball people I've been around. So happy for him to be able to stay at the major league level with the Angels. [01:11:45] Speaker A: Best of luck to the Halos this season. [01:11:48] Speaker B: Thanks again to John Litchfield, Zach Hale and Matt west in the ABC office. [01:11:52] Speaker A: For all the help on the podcast. [01:11:53] Speaker B: Feel free to reach out to me via email. [email protected] Twitter, Instagram or TikTok CoachBCA or direct message me via the MyBC app. This is Ryan Brownlee signing off for the American Baseball Coaches Association. Thanks and leave it better for those. [01:12:08] Speaker A: Behind you. [01:12:20] Speaker C: World that way Yep Wait for another day and the world will always return as your love is never for yearning and you know that way Wait for another D.