E481 Trevor Bauer

29:30But I don't drink or do drugs. So it's like sometimes I give myself a little bit of a leeway. But I just like my own energy is better. I'm able to sit and have a more comfortable conversation with people. And so at a certain point, it's like I have to give it up just because I'm missing out on. I'll be short with people. I won't want to stay in a moment because I want to go vape. Just shit like that. Do you self-reflect a lot on things? Do you look at your own behaviors and stuff and analyze yourself? Or how do you get that feedback? Yeah, I started doing that more. I've done some ayahuasca over the few years, and I bring that up a lot.

30:05But that plant medicine, that stuff is really interesting for exactly that. It helps me learn. It's not as much time that I spend learning something. Say I'll read or write something or be in a class. But it's the time I go sit back with what I've written and have a relation, have like a integration. That's what I'm learning is so much more crucial. It's like, because for so long I was like kind of learning and getting information, but a lot of things weren't sticking because the big part I was missing out on was integration. You know? And so I think that's where some of that comes from. And being in conversations with some neat people over the years makes me start to think more.

30:46Yeah. and leads me into wanting to be more introspective and wonder why I do things. I have a brother that helps me think about that kind of stuff a lot and make me kind of question, you know, so I start to not only be myself but also see myself a little bit. If that makes any sense. Yeah, no, for sure. The studies on the ayahuasca and the mushrooms and stuff like that for brain function, like treating PTSDs and past experiences and stuff like that is pretty interesting. I follow it decently closely just because I'm very interested in the effects of the brain and how do you learn something, how do you get over something, how do you change behaviors, stuff like that.

31:29So, yeah, the last couple of years has been a lot of cool stuff that's come out about that, stuff that was like 10 years ago kind of demonized and looked at this really bad thing. Now we're starting to learn a little bit more like, oh, this could be useful in these certain areas. there's like shades of gray in there right it's not just like it's good or it's bad it's like it could be a useful tool in certain cases it could be abused in certain cases yeah it's interesting yeah i love that i love that it's book that kind of says becoming like a new modality or whatever whatever term people use for people to try and get well you know yeah because it almost goes really back to our roots like literally back to like it's like native american root medicine yeah that they would use to like really have a better look at themselves kind of um but i i recommend it i think it helps it's helped me a lot in just having different ways to think about things yeah um when did you start being good at bait like when did it start to add up because if you're doing all those unique pitches like some of the like you just have such a cool like assortment of pitches i almost feel like yeah somebody's rolling up to the mound this is from your channel right here yeah oh this is back in uh 11 years ago yeah wow you've had your channel for a long time.

32:40Yeah, I started, I think, 2011 to do like, you know, try to connect with baseball fans and like give some information. And then I actually stopped it for like six or seven years there from 2013 through maybe 2019 or 2020. I should have kept it going. I'd have a lot more subscribers. You got a great amount of subscribers. 690 ,000 is amazing. Yeah. And did, what made you stop? What was the break? Was you, were you getting busy with baseball? No, so I actually got in trouble. So when I was growing up, in high school and college, I watched a guy named Tim Lincecum, and I studied everything about him.

33:17Wait, did you play for the Giants? Yeah, yeah. And his college film, his Giants film, minor league film, I can still close my eyes and picture the exact delivery from a video from University of Washington he was throwing. It was like 40 degrees that night. half long sleeve like i can see the video in my head um but i studied him non-stop and one of my most fun things to do in college was every time he pitched i would go on mlb.com and i would see the highlights and i would just watch them over and over and over and i got a lot of enjoyment out of it so i actually started putting a segment up on my channel when i signed i was in the minor leagues there was no way for fans to watch me pitch in the minor leagues and have that same experience of highlights so i would take video clips from the games make a little highlight reel i called it weekly whiffs and i would put it up on youtube channel i did two episodes of it and then the organization at the time that i was with at the time was like yeah you can't do that it was just different no one was doing that it was right you know it can be looked at as like you're trying to embarrass the other hitters or whatever it had nothing to do with the hitters i was just trying to entertain the fans yeah um and so i made a couple more videos after that like the pitch grips video in 2013 and a couple slow motion videos here there but um it kind of in a way it took a little bit of the fun of like trying to entertain fans out uh and so i just i was off of it i went more towards uh twitter at the time which is now x but um trying to just have that like back and forth connection with fans and grow it that way um and that ended up getting me in a lot of trouble as well unfortunately people like you'd have your own voice a lot of times yeah you which is if you're involved in something that's bigger, like when you have to go into organizations like Major League Sports, college sports, where there's a lot of big business interests on the back end of things, they really don't like a lot of guys to have their own voices.

35:11It seems like they don't. You're not really allowed to, but are you really allowed to? Yeah. It's an interesting. My perspective on that has changed a good amount recently. So coming up, I was like, okay, I'm my own person. I'm going to have my voice. Like you as my employer don't control me. I'm going to say what I want, whatever. And I was very kind of bullheaded on that. And then I started a business and I have employees and I deal with employees who remind me very much of myself and they have their own voice and they express stuff in certain ways. And I'm like, OK, I got to handle this a little bit differently as a business owner than I would as an employee.

35:48And now I can understand the different perspective. I'm still very – I'm very protective of trying to tell my employees you can't say this or you can say this or putting guidelines on it. But I do see how someone like me coming up that has these opinions, especially when I would be critical of the league. Like here's an employee of the league who's being critical of their boss publicly. And at the time, I was like, well, this isn't right and this isn't right and I disagree with this and blah, blah, blah. And so I would just say it and then without considering the opposite perspective. And I think I was a lot more like I can identify this problem and I'm just going to say that there's a problem and blame instead of now what I really try to do is look at and say, OK, I identify a problem.

36:30But what are some potential solutions? Let me present the solutions that I think and have a discussion about it instead of just like, hey, you're wrong, you're wrong. Do this this way. So some of that like evolution over time growing up and getting older and learning from past mistakes, starting a business, seeing other perspectives. In your business, you're talking about your YouTube channel, your Trevor Bauer channel. It's a cool channel, man. Yeah, we have Trevor Bauer channel. We have also Momentum channel and Eric Simms channel. We're kind of like a content group. So Momentum is the company, and it started in 2019 to grow baseball, entertain baseball fans.

37:07And so we bring people in. Wow, you have a lot of subs, the kids call them. You get a lot of subs on there, man. Yeah. Eric just passed. I think he's at like 520 now as well. So I'm at 690. Momentum's at 567. Eric's over 500 as well. We've got a couple other creators that come in. The idea is basically you bring guys in that love baseball, that have a good personality. You have a group channel where they can get exposure to a lot of people, entertain a lot of people, and then they end up growing their brands and can go in their own different directions. You have someone that does gaming. You have someone that does action.

37:40You have someone that does card reviews. You have someone that does whatever. And so you start branching out and entertaining all factions of baseball fans and growing the game organically where the audience is. One of the things that I think NBA was probably the first sport to really adopt it is the social media push, like delivering content to fans where the fans are. I mean, you go on NBA or you go on Twitter or X or whatever social media platform when the playoffs are going on in NBA. It's like the second Steph Curry hits a three, like it's everywhere. Yeah. Right. you have the same opportunities in baseball where it's like hard to find content and so i was like okay this is a problem but instead of just like blaming i'm gonna like try to actually do something about the problem so momentum is kind of my attempt to like help impact the marketability of players help impact the growth of the game you know young people aren't playing baseball nearly as much anymore there's so many other opportunities um you got streaming services so they can watch on their iPad.

38:39You got gaming that's huge, esports. People aren't outside as much playing. So the game is like shrinking a little bit at the youth level. So we're trying to grow it in ways where kids will consume the content and get interested in it. Yeah, man, dude, that's so kudos, bro. Just be a part, be doing something, your job, but then also wanting to create this other, more of your job kind of, you know, like, this is not a lot of guys that have that have their own channels like that baseball has given me a lot this chart is sad this is share of children age 6 to 12 who participate in baseball on a regular basis in the United States from 2008 to 2021 and in 2008 it says 16.5 % and now we're down to 12.6 % down like 25 % in the last 15 years I'm kind of shocked because I know we have a larger growing Latino culture, and I know baseball's big in Latino cultures.

39:38Why do you think that is? Why do you think there's been a tail-off like that? I think baseball has gotten expensive. The equipment's very expensive. The travel team's very expensive. Also, baseball doesn't have the cool factor that NBA has. NBA has sneakers and rap culture, pop culture. They've blended the two together in a very cool way. That's a good point. And so when you're going through high school and you're trying to figure out who you are, you want to be part of the cool crowd. And it's the sneakers. It's the new rapper, the new album. It's the entertainer. And that's synonymous with NBA.

40:26Baseball hasn't had the same success in blending and getting the cool factor for young kids. Baseball always was like the kids would go off and do it in high school, but you didn't really know. And a lot of times you wouldn't be a part of the pep rallies a lot of times and stuff. So, yeah, there was always a missing a little bit of that. In football, you have the crossover. You have the cheerleaders, and you have the football players. There's integration of the whole school, right? And it's one game, and the school shows up, and it's our school versus your school. And so there's a lot of involvement around football.

40:58NBA has the pop culture integration. Baseball's struggled to get their thing. And, you know, there's a lot of games. So it's not like if you miss out on this game, there's not going to be a game tomorrow. Right. That's a good point. And it's always been that baseball has like an older demographic. It's a slower game. I think his attention spans are shrinking. tick tocks around shorts youtube shorts instagram reels all this stuff attention is shrinking that cadence of baseball is slow right um where nba it's like 20 seconds and then there's a new play and then this and then that football it's like there's always something going on baseball it's like well there's you know four minutes in between innings and then there's 30 seconds in between a pitch like one of the things they tried this year is like a pitch clock so it shrink the time in between pitches which is seemingly made the game more popular yeah i feel that i felt that energy when i went to some games this year yeah it felt faster it felt a little bit more and it kept you a little bit involved because it was just enough time where you didn't kind of zone out and go get on your phone of that extra five or six seconds yeah like even more saying that extra habitual moment where you kind of start to check out yep i would stay involved you know we went to see zach gallon pitch a couple times which was really cool um who else did we go oh going to a Padres game is so much fun, man.

42:23That park is so much fun. Did you go in San Diego? Yeah. Yeah. Dude, that park is so much fun. They do a good job down there. So the Padres and the Dodgers were a lot of rivalry going back there. Dodgers players won't say it's a rivalry, but it's a rivalry. Yeah. All right. And so in 2021, I was with the Dodgers. We'd go down, play in Padres, and it was like so loud and so cool. The stadium's like pretty compact. It feels good. You got the industrial building out there that kind of squeezes things together, and they pack it full. It's really energetic. And, yeah, we played some really fun games down there.

43:00It is such a fun place to be a part of. It's cool. It's right downtown. The backdrop's really cool. You're right by the ocean. The weather's always great. Like, you literally leave the stadium, and there's bars right there. Right outside. Right downtown. Like the best area. It's cool. They got some great players down there too, man. Yeah. No-No Joe is one of my buddies who pitches over there. He's awesome.

43:27Udarvish, Machado, Tatis. Yeah, it's fun. That's a fun place to see a game. So when did you start to be like, okay, I've got the mechanics. I've been working on this so much myself. I have my own interest in it. When did you start to be good, and what was that like? So I was good my freshman year. I was good my sophomore year in high school. I made varsity team towards the end of my sophomore year. But then I really exploded my junior year of high school. My velocity jumped a lot. I was throwing in the 90s. I struck a lot of people out. I had like a sub-1 ERA for the year. What? Started getting a lot of, yeah, I think I was at.79 ERA or something.

44:12I don't remember the exact number. But, yeah, I struck out like 106 people, I think, in 72 innings or something along those lines. So I had a really good year. I went 12-0 that year. Our team was really good. Actually, there's a senior pitcher. I was a junior. Mike Montgomery was a senior. He was getting a lot of looks. He ended up getting drafted in the first round by the Royals that year. So we had a lot of scouts out at our games. Wow, so you had a lot of influence to see that this could really happen, right? him and he's right there ahead of you and this happens in front of you so baseball is such a small world too that like in the 2016 world series the last person to throw a pitch for the cubs michael montgomery the last person to throw a pitch for the indians me wow high school teammates were the last ones to throw pitches in that for our respective teams in that world series but uh yeah and so he was good and i don't like losing to people on my own team i don't like losing period like i'm a super intense competitor so like he would go have a start and i'm like okay I gotta be better than that and then that really drove me to be better and so actually I ended up graduating high school half a year early and so I never played my senior season in high school I just went to UCLA to start so I graduated December I think 18th and I started UCLA January 4th and then I played what would have been my senior season of high school as my freshman year in college so you was doing one of the younger pitchers that year yeah one of the younger pitchers I was actually the freshman pitcher of the year in all of NCAA that year.

45:40And that's after that year is when I made Team USA and went, played in Japan in 2009 as basically a high school senior. So, so what happens in that space? Cause like, um, and pitching is so perfect for you then it sounds like, cause it's your own little war that you're in. You're like this, this orchestra, you're the, you're this guy, but you're also the guy playing the, you know, it's like, um, Um, it's you versus them. It's very clear cut how things go. Um, what, uh, oh, dang, I had a great question. Um, oh, it's probably wasn't that great, but I thought it was pretty decent. Um, this is my brain checks out every now and then, but hold on, I'm gonna stay with this.

46:18What, uh, what about, did your ego, did ego start to build up? Cause that's one thing I always talk about a lot in here. Just like our ego and what that's like, you know, cause what was it like when you start to get like a claim for that? If you're kind of have this social uncomfortability. Yeah, I've always tried to separate ego on and off the field. I haven't been great at it, but I think having an ego on the field is super important. Like when you walk out there, you got to know that you're the best. You have to believe that you're better than him and him and him. And you got to feel like you're the best guy out there to be like the true competitor.

46:57you know off the field like going around telling everybody that you're better than them and acting like that's not great right so i'm not naturally like inclined to be egotistical i because the way i view things it's never like a static point everything is i'm improving or i'm getting worse it's all it's a fluid situation and so if i'm either getting better or getting worse i'm on a journey just like you're on a journey you have your struggles and your your successes i have my struggles and successes i view myself as like even with every other person but on the field like when it's competition time like i am the best person on the field and if i'm not that day it's because like i didn't work hard enough or i need a better process but like every time i step on the field i have to believe that i'm the best person there and i've had times in my career where I lost that belief and it was, those were very dark times performance wise.

48:00I was terrible on the field and I had to like trick myself and like fake, like fake it in my own mind that I was still good. And then when I started doing that, the results came back. But, um, yeah, it's interesting at levels of success, how you have to sometimes trick yourself to stay there, how you have to use little manipulations, life hacks, all those. There's so many different things that so many different people who are top performers in their world or sport or whatever it is, line of work do. I think I'm a little predisposed to depression for whatever reason. I don't know if it's something chemical or what it is.

48:43I'm a very like kind of flat personality. I don't have like a ton of highs and lows. so when baseball would go bad like my mood would go really bad and i had to find a way to kind of pull those two things apart and be regardless if baseball is up or down i needed to be able to like be okay in my life um and would you do to go did you like would you like if when things got bad how would you would you booze a little like how would your world so i've never i've never been drunk I never done drugs. Wow, bro. You are riding the fucking world. Like, that's intense. It's incredible, man. I didn't have friends to invite me to the parties in high school.

49:29So I never got started. But, yeah, I would, like, when I would have it early in my career, let's say prior to, let's say July 2017, I would have a bad outing and I would go home. And I would study it for hours and hours. And I would be up till 4 or 5 in the morning. And then I wouldn't sleep well. And then I'd be miserable the next day because I'm like, okay, I should have done all these things that I didn't do. And now my results are bad. And we lost the game. And I'm this and that and whatever. And then I was just, the start of 2017 was like the worst half of baseball that I've had. And I had like a 7 or 8 ERA.

50:11And that's a lot. I could have that. Yeah. I mean, I probably couldn't. Any number of people could have done that. Let's just say some people could have it. Yeah. Sorry, man. That was kind of offensive. No, no. I mean, it's true. It's just a fact. I was bad. And I had to trick myself into believing that I was good. Wow. Because I'm so analytical that I was like, I am the worst pitcher in Major League Baseball right now. Factually. And I had to pull myself out of that and somehow trick myself on the field to thinking that I was good. and then I also had to pull myself a split myself from baseball so I could find a way to be okay personally in life and um so I had to start developing some other interests some stuff that when I went home I would get interested in that thing instead of studying baseball so much and then from 2017 on outside of two months at the end of 2019 I was probably like a top 10 pitcher in baseball.

51:08But that split of being okay personally and finding a way to level out that depression and some of those really down moments made me better and more stable at doing my job on the field as well. And would you go spend time with the guys after the games? Or would you still kind of do your own thing a lot? So baseball is, because games are played at night, when you get out of the field it's 11.15, 11.30. So if you're going to go spend time with the guy it's like what bar are you going to what club are you going to there's not a whole lot of other options right on the road sometimes you go back to the hotel room go play cards have a glass of wine or something in someone's room and hang out with the guys but it's not like you're just going to dinner at 7 o 'clock and having a nice night so I would typically just go from the field back home most of the time you do you spend with guys during season is like prior to the game so you get there at noon or one play cards in the clubhouse play some video games joke around whatever or day games when you get done at four and you can go to dinner.

52:08Those are usually like Sundays if you're not traveling. Do you find yourself in social atmospheres? Do you feel pretty uncomfortable? How do you feel in social atmospheres? Do you feel pretty – has it changed over time? Yeah, it's definitely changed. I'm very uncomfortable around large groups of people that I don't know. I'm not very good at starting a conversation. I just – I think too much. And so when I look at another person, I'm like, well, they don't want to talk to me. like what am I going to say and well how do I not come up I don't want to come off awkward and disturb them but I also like kind of want to talk to them but I and I just I just don't do I just think too much where I watch some guys they just like go up hey how's it going and then like have a great conversation I'm like damn like yeah and then they're married and you're like god that guy that's awesome yeah dude sometimes I would always marvel at people that just had that disposition to be able to be comfortable.

53:05Man, I remember there's a WWE wrestler, The Miz is his name. And he was just, he was always so comfortable wherever he was. And it was the, I never saw anybody like it. The guy just, and he just, it was just effortless, you know? And that was one thing I was always so envious of certain people that had, they didn't have to fight inside of themselves to be comfortable. And, you know, and that was always like, something I really, uh, I just noticed a lot. Yeah. I'm comfortable with myself, but I'm not comfortable like going into like unknown groups and like just somehow integrating myself. Uh, now if I know a couple of people and we're out, like I'm fine, like meeting one of their friends and having a conversation, like talk to someone all night, but I'm not the one that's, I don't know how to go start those conversations.

53:58You might have a freaking hit of the tism i got it you know what i'm saying no judgment dude some of the greatest like people of our time now have i think a low-key dose you know you know seven eight percent i think i wouldn't i wouldn't be surprised yeah it's awesome man yeah i mean elon musk definitely is riding you know he's riding some bezos has it for sure yeah um a lot of the greats have it some people think that mike tomlin is that his name the football coach right yeah he you know you don't see a lot of a dark tism going on but i bet he's got a dose um but yeah i think there's a lot of it out there it's creeping up on all of us but i think it's helping in some ways it's because i think we some of us are having to evolve we've gotten into such a uh digital and like a world that is uh that if you have are able to conceptualize things almost a little more electronically sometimes it's a light word I'm using, but that you have more success because we're just becoming more like hypothetically like robots as people.

55:05So it just kind of makes sense. It doesn't make any sense to you. Yeah, for sure. I mean, prior to social media, if you're going to get information, you're going to read a book, you're going to ask people around, you're going to be in the community and like learn from people around you. So your habits of ingesting information were reliant on being able to have those interactions, you were outside more. There was less to do on your phone personally, like less connection digitally. There was no connection digitally for a long time. Your grandpa was like shitty Google. Remember you go to your grandpa?

55:35Yeah. Remember the thesaurus? Yeah. Oh yeah, dude. Gotta go look up in the thesaurus. Now you just chat GPT or Google it or whatever. Yeah. You can, now you can just, you don't even have to, you can like go to myfakefamily.com and just pick out a family on there, and they'll send you a picture of you in a family. Yeah, that's crazy. And you can frame it and put it on your own. You're like, who the fuck are these people? Yeah, that's crazy. It's a different universe. But it's kind of fascinating. If we don't look at it, that kind of stuff, as a negative, I think sometimes we look at it as we're part of evolution, you know, in a way.

56:08So sometimes that's kind of interesting to me. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. You know, if you're struggling with something, And if something, there's a specific thing, maybe you can't handle it anymore. Or maybe it's just a general feeling of depression or uncertainty. Some of that's normal, but some of it isn't. And if you feel like you need help, then BetterHelp is a great place to try. That's for sure. I've used BetterHelp. It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapists anytime for no additional charge.

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59:25Try Blue Chew free when you use our promo code Theo at checkout. Just pay$5 shipping. That's bluechew.com promo code Theo. To receive your first month free, visit bluechew.com for more details and important safety information. And we thank Blue Chew for sponsoring the podcast. It must be interesting to be you though, because I feel like when there's more going on in your head as much as it is a curse it's also kind of there's enough of a world going on where you're kind of you're dealing with that yeah you know there's a lot of stimulation yeah um i don't do well when i'm bored like my mind needs something to be working on yeah so there's never a shortage of that um but i think that's why getting into business has been very beneficial for me because I don't have those like blank moments or blank hours where I, I don't know, I would, I would fill those early in my career.

1:00:23I'd fill them going on Twitter for three hours. And I was so much fun. It was so much fun. And I, I had fun with it, but I think me having fun with people is usually like playful banter. Like I'll kind of like throw a little like jab your way and you throw them back my way and it's like because the jousting match and i like that because it's witty and it forces me to think and like it's and i'm having these conversations with people and i'm like laughing and joking with them in person yeah and you get a sense of like i'm not being serious you can tell very clearly that i'm not being serious but on twitter doesn't come across that way and especially not even though the person that you're doing it with may feel that way may not other people reading it might get really confused yeah and so i would banter with a lot of people and i think it got construed negatively by the media i know it got construed negatively by the media the larger media as a whole and then i get this reputation of being combative and stuff and i was never doing it from a competitive standpoint i understand how it looks that way and how it came off that way and so those blank hours where i was just had nothing to do and i was just like joking with people on firing stuff off.

1:01:32Got me in trouble. Trump has a great, Dave Portman, I interviewed Donald Trump, and he goes, you ever just like, was he asking Nick about proofreading some of his tweets or something? And Trump's like, yeah, you ever just fire something off and just go to bed and just hope it's okay? And Trump was like, yeah, all the time. You know, and you're like, what the hell is going on? Yeah. But you do that, if you think about Twitter being a parallel to real life, like someone says something to you and you just fire away because if you pause for five seconds to think about what you're going to say it almost like gives you the yips like you almost don't know how to respond then because we're so conditioned like you say something and i'm like i have a response right but if have you ever thought about what proofreading like in real life would look like like you would ask me something and i would think of my response and then i would pause for five or six seconds and really think through my response.

1:02:31And then I might say something slightly differently. Can you imagine a conversation like that? If it was like you say something and I pause for like 10 seconds and then say something back to you and you pause for like 10 seconds and like really actually think through it. Like we'd be like processing our answer and then it'd be printed out for the person. Yeah. It'd be so bizarre. It'd be so bizarre. It'd be almost like a script then. Yeah. Probably. It would be a very awkward conversation. It's not like a normal human tendency to have an interaction like that. So when you read something, it's like, oh, someone just said something and I'm going to say it.

1:03:03Now it takes longer to type it, but you're still having the thought. And so you never have the option in person to like, okay, I just said this. Now let me proofread it. Let me read it again. Let me check for this. Let me go over and say it to my friend. Right. Is this okay? Is this weird? Yeah. But on Twitter, then it's like the expectation now for people in the public eye is that you would proofread it and then you would check with the publicist or you would check with someone or whatever. You would make sure that it wasn't – It was everything. And just not the normal flow of conversation. Now, it might be in the future as humanity moves more towards a digital presence.

1:03:39Like maybe that's what happens. It's going to be sad. But it's not normal. Yeah, it's certainly abnormal. What was that thing? Did you bring it up, Nick, what Trump had?

1:04:18Oh, now and then people like take it down people say it's like it's definitely it's weird it's weird the way that we communicate now how foreign it is and i think also how like as humans we're not supposed to adapt to the way we communicate like it's so abnormal to nature our nature i think that a lot of it ends up making us feel sick or confused sometimes i'll send stuff to nick and I'll be like, is this okay? Do I seem chilled? Does this seem crazy? Am I gay? I'll be right in that. He's like, dude, this is fine, bro. You're doing fine. But it's like, I think, yeah, and as you have some notoriety, especially for your sport, I'm sure the microscope gets even tougher.

1:05:07Okay, so you get through. So you're going through the major leagues. Yeah, there's some great videos of you out there impersonating other players and stuff. Dude, it's so funny, man. so when when you start to get the entertainment aspect how did that kind of come into you do you feel like i think when i got comfortable that i was good and that i had largely like established myself where i was going to be able to have a career like early in your career you're just fighting to stay there and it's like if you have a bad outing you might not be there the next day but once you get to a certain level it's like okay i have some leeway here i can't be bad forever But if I have a bad start or two, it's not going to be like I'm gone.

1:05:50And so that gives you a little – It becomes manageable. Yeah. And it gives you a little sense of like settle in. You can take a breath. You can be a little bit more comfortable. And then you start having some of these longer standing relationships with guys on your team because now you've been teammates for two, three, four years. And you have some of those jokes. and each game and moment becomes a little bit less serious because of that comfortability. And then you can start joking around and you can start having fun. So really like 2018, I had a really good second half of the year 2017, really good start to 2018, and I started feeling more comfortable and settled with the team.

1:06:34And then I started entertaining. I'm pretty like I'm I like the banter like we talked about I like the kind of witty interactions and so I like figuring out the puzzle of how do I like take this normally mundane thing and just put a little twist on it like make it more entertaining for people and then yeah starting in like 2020 really after I started the media company Momentum in 2019 it was like okay this is an attention economy so in order for baseball to grow there have to be clips that are viral enough to get to the youth that they see it like oh baseball is fun right and then i'm like okay how do i start making some of these viral clips well let me study nba what goes viral in nba oh when people do something like they dunk on someone and they celebrate it like when lebron's flexing on someone like that's everywhere right when curry hits a three but before he the ball's in the bucket he's already running down the court like celebrating it because he knows it's in like that's everywhere so like okay how do you apply some of that to baseball it's like all right what can you do in baseball like are you going to celebrate a strikeout that'd be comparable to like flexing on someone when you dunk on them right are you gonna call your shot on you know the day before the game oh i'm gonna do this with this person are you gonna have some sort of you know what does that look like in baseball it's a good point yeah and so i started getting the entertainment aspect of it because I was settled with the performance.

1:08:02Like I can entertain and compete at the same time. Right. So I can compete and just not do any entertainment. And you're going to get the same level of performance out of me that you'll get if I'm also doing a little bit of entertainment because I've, it's like my base operating level is intense competition. You're an interesting dude, bro. I'm all messed up. No, it's great though. My mind's. It's cool. It's just neat to get a look at how you operate. It's really interesting. I appreciate you talking with me, man. Yeah, because you're right, though. If you're trying to build this sport, that's what you have.

1:08:38You need some of those moments. There's a video out there, and it's a bunch. It's a view just impersonating some of the other players on your team, I think, when you were with the Indians. We were in Pittsburgh. With the Indians. Shout out Sunshine Clevenger over there, too, dude. You know Mike? Yeah, yeah. Definitely been around Mike, man. And he's such an entertaining guy. Yeah. So this is a funny story. A lot of people don't know the follow-up to this story. So you can see the guys in the background on this video have rain tarps on or whatever. So it's raining. Right. So you're in a raining game, and this is here, Cleveland versus Pittsburgh.

1:09:15What year is this? This is 2018, maybe? Okay. I don't know. And as you come up to bat here, you keep kind of impersonating, I guess, different players on your team. Their batting stances. Yeah. Yeah, so we had a lot of unique batting stances this year. And so always, like, we get four days off in between starts as a starting pitcher. So we're in the dugout just messing around, like, we don't have anything to do. And so I was always grabbing something and trying to impersonate, you know, Mike Avelis, Jason Kipnis, Rayburn, Brantley, like some of these guys that had really unique characteristics.

1:09:47And so at one point, I think it was Mike Avelis, like, hey, when are you going to do that for real? Like, you won't. And I was like, I'll do it. so I go and I have this at bat where I do Rayburn and Kipnis where they all shocked if you look at the dugout I don't know if there's a view of it they're all laughing that's Mike right there Kipnis seems like such a neat guy Kip's awesome so the follow up to this though is I walk in this at bat and so I'm on first base and I'm just this stupid pitcher running the bases and so the catcher obviously Pittsburgh wasn't super like Oh, they're applauding. Yeah, that's cool.

1:10:25Pittsburgh wasn't super, like, pleased with that event. Oh, because they're like, you guys are joking around out here? Yeah. So right after that, the next pitch, like, I take my lead off first, and the catcher catches the ball and, like, fakes like he's going to throw it down. First baseman was nowhere close, but I'm not used to being on base because I suck as a hitter. I'm never on base, right? So he goes to throw it down to first, and I freak out, and I, like, dive back, and there's no first baseman there, and it's muddy, and I stick in the mud, and I don't even make, like my hand sticks. I don't even make it back to the base.

1:10:56I'm just laying there by the base looking around. There's no one there. The catcher never threw the ball and I'm covered in mud. And he just like pointed at me and like threw the ball back to the pitcher. I'm like, all right, all right, that's good. You got me. That's good. I respect that. That's classic. That's such a neat thing about life too, how it works. It's like the second you start to get on your high horse, even just a little life's like, here you go. There's another really good example that we're playing the Padres 2021. We're at Dodger Stadium. And I'm facing Eric Hosmer. Now, I knew Hos from he was in Kansas City when I was with Cleveland, so we played each other a lot.

1:11:35So we have a little bit of a history playing each other. So the first at bat, I throw him a curveball. He half swings at it and strikes out. And I hit him with my sword celebration. And the next at bat, he comes up. I throw him a curveball. instead of missing it he hits a rocket right back at my face like it would have it would have killed me if i didn't get out of the way i end up like laying on my back and i'm like laying down on the mound like what just happened fortunately it didn't hit me and he's over at first base and i start to sit up and there's actually a picture of me yeah this is probably it is this yeah that right and i don't know if this video clip goes long enough but uh see if i laugh right here yeah yeah right there so he's at first base he like hey and i look over at him and he uh he gave me the sword back so i got him the i got him the pitch the bat before and then he just like got me back and then let me know about it tatis had a great one he hit a home run off me like put one one hand over his eye because in spring training i had like thrown in a bat with one eye closed and then against the Padres and then they waited and then when he got me back he put his hand over.

1:12:48Do you mind the stuff you think it's fun? I love it. Yeah it's cool actually. If people would like celebrate on me all the time I don't care like that's good for the game. Yeah dude and it would be so kind of there's one thing like Savannah Bananas you know you see them. Some of the shit's gotten crazy they're like doing the newsies the musical between fucking second and third inning Jesus Christ is a fucking 90 minute musical like yeah let's get the game going you know uh but it's also there's something that's just fun about um just a little bit of the of the adding more to it and i think you're right i think if you do you know there's a little bit more ambiance between some of the players it definitely right there you're like oh shit he's gonna it's almost like when you you know that um like gary payton was gonna guard uh michael jordan or something like oh i want to i want to tune in because I know that four times they're going to face each other.

1:13:45Let's see how this shakes out. Strickland and Duplessis just fought, right? That fight was not really interesting until they had the little skirmish in the crowd and Strickland threw the elbow and they fought and then everyone's like, oh, we got to watch this fight. It was a great fight. I thought Sean won personally. What did you think about it? I thought it was 3-2. I thought he outstruck him. didn't think that Duplessis got much out of the takedowns a lot of takedowns but not a whole lot came from them I don't hate the decision like very close fight could have gone either way I had it 3-2 Strickland judges had it 3-2 Duplessis you like the fights?

1:14:25yeah I'm a big UFC fan oh cool bro me too I feel like there should be a little more gravity if you're going to give the belt away that's what it felt like to me it's this close and you're going to give the belt away Like if you're going to beat somebody for the belt, there should be a little more gravity to it. Yeah. It should be like definitive. You beat them. Yes. Yeah. Like if it's a regular match, I get it. Yeah. But, and maybe that's, I'm just a, somebody who sits in the crowd and wishes they could be tough enough to be out there. But, um. Yeah. I wouldn't want to be in the ring. But you know, one of the things you said earlier made me think what I've heard a lot of guys say.

1:15:02They're like, they can be great guys, neat guys, but they have to believe when they go in there. Yeah. that they are the baddest motherfucker in the world. Because if they don't believe that, what can happen is just they're not giving themselves any sort of a chance. God, that's just got to be... I can't imagine what the walk must be like. It's you and another human in a death match. It's got to be a crazy adrenaline rush. But it's also got to be super scary. Like, walking out to play a baseball game, like, you win, you lose. It sucks if you lose. But, like, there's not that visceral consequence.

1:15:48Yeah. Like, you walk out there, I don't think they've ever had a death in the UFC. But, like, you get seriously hurt. Like, bad. Yeah. And some of the guys, they seem already hurt before they ever fought. And you're like, damn, this guy, he needs to keep whatever he's got still in the tank. he can't lose anymore. Oh, but yeah, the fact that they, and they love it. That's the crazy thing, some of them. They love it. You could see sometimes like Gaethje or Poirier just how just fucking... That's their thing. Yeah. That lights them up. Imagine only getting to perform like twice a year or two. That's the toughest part.

1:16:27I hate baseball cadence where I only get to play once every fifth or sixth day. I can't imagine twice a year, once a year. Yeah. Yeah, imagine once a year Trevor Bauer gets to come out and pitch a game. For like 20 minutes. God. Can you imagine training for a year, and then you get 20 minutes, and it could be over in 30 seconds? I can't. It's almost like I think penguins are only fertile for like 11 minutes out of the year. Oh, really? Yeah. That's a crazy stat. I never heard that before. So it's almost like that.

1:17:04But yeah, if you find anything on that, Nick, let me know. Interesting. I got a buddy who said he had some – I shouldn't say this, but he had the option if I wanted to get a little bit of penguin meat, which would be crazy to eat. I've had puffin. Have you really? In Iceland, yeah. Oh, my God, Trevor. I've had puffin. Kangaroo, puffin, Icelandic horse, shark. Shark was terrible. Oh, the fermented shark. So they ferment the shark and they freeze it and they serve it in these little cubes. It's like a delicacy in Iceland and they love it. It tastes like gasoline. I couldn't. It was, I don't know.

1:17:41I've had a little gasoline. Acquired taste for sure. Oh, yeah. Yeah, especially, yeah. And if you've had real gasoline, it's like you don't want an imitation. Yeah, you want the real thing. But yeah, I've had reindeer somewhere. I've had owl. I've had, what else have I wanted to have? I don't know if you want to have Penguin though People just love them They're kind of like the French Bulldog Of the north I feel like You couldn't imagine eating French Bulldog No Frenchies are way too cute People would be pissed Now it would taste good I bet I'm not even going to go down that route I know some Frenchies And I know people that love their Frenchies I can't even imagine Let's don't even say anything else about it So you get to Your career's going to get you a Cy Young winner That had to be unbelievable Are you chasing that at a certain point to the season Does it get like where you're almost like the drivers In NASCAR where it's like I chased that for 10 years Wow So I went to college and like I said earlier I studied Tim Lincecum And he won a Golden Spikes award which is basically the Heisman Trophy of baseball Goes with like the best college baseball player and I went to college and my only goal, my only personal goal, I wanted to win the College World Series and everything like that with my team, but my personal goal was to win the Golden Spikes Award and I won that my junior year of college.

1:19:09So check that box off. Did you really? I didn't know that. Dude, congratulations. You were the best player in college baseball. Yeah. The 1-1. Yeah. Wow, bro. Yeah, it was pretty cool. Mainly because I set a goal and I spent literally all of my time. I should have gone to class more. I just did not go to school. But it was like baseball. And it was just my thoughts, my training, everything was just on that. And I accomplished it. And it was like a sense of pride that I could set a goal and accomplish it. It wasn't the ego of being the best guy. It was the fact that I set a goal and worked my way and actually accomplished that goal.

1:19:49And so after that, I was like, okay, what's next? and like well Tim won two Cy Young Awards I think he has he might have had three I think he has I know he has two and I was like okay that's the new goal and so from 2011 when I won the Golden Spikes for the next 10 years I was chasing the Cy Young Award and everything I did was like okay who's the best pitcher in baseball what do they do better than I do and like let me go work on that and it's did he get uh oh yeah three-time World Series champion two-time Cy Young Award yeah Back to back 08 and 09. Dude, he was. You're halfway there. Those two years were.

1:20:26Gas. I remember that. Something different. Like it was just so, so unique what Tim was able to do. Tim Lincecum. Yeah. Yeah. And so, yeah, from 2011. He had the long hair too, remember? Yeah. God, to be able to do so well with long hair too. Randy Johnson did that. Or Eckersley did that. It's just, it's a special. Yeah. Just to be like, yeah, my hair fucks. And then go out there and throw total gas on people. That's crazy. What are you saying? He won. So he won two of them. So I won the Golden Spikes 2011. I was like, all right, I want the Cy Young. And so everything I did for the next 10 years was centered around, like, what does the best pitcher do that's better than I am?

1:21:11And, like, let me develop that skill set. What pitch does he throw? How hard does he throw? Is he durable? What's his command? How's his nutrition? Like, all this stuff. and so I just worked at it and then 2020 I won the Cy Young which is like a the the pitching coach at with the Reds Derek Johnson I've been I've known Derek for he's like one of my guys I've known him since 2000 since I was getting recruited to college I wanted to go to Vanderbilt and play for him he was at Vanderbilt at the time but he's like in the baseball circles that I kind of run in. Caleb Cotham was the assistant pitching coach.

1:21:49He was, I trained with him for years. Because you were your dog. You guys were your dogs. Eric Jaegers was there. Like he was, I trained with him. And like one of my guys, like all my people, Sonny Gray was there. Like all my people were there. And like to have that year, it was super special. Do they get also a copy of the award? No, so they give out one award. but for my catchers I got them they're both kind of like watch guys so I got we all got like Rolexes I let them pick their watch and it all has like 2020 NL Cy Young engraved wow dude look how happy you look yeah yeah and actually this was we were playing the Reds this day so Sonny and Louis Castillo and DJ actually came over for the ceremony I had some pictures with them so you won it with the Reds but you didn't get the award until the next season yeah When you were playing with the Dodgers.

1:22:45Wow. And then for. You were playing against the Reds when you got it. Yeah. I think they scheduled the ceremony for that day for that crossover. Dude, that must have been so crazy. Yeah. Go on. For 10 years on my phone, I had a picture of a Cy Young Award. I think it was. I don't remember exactly whose Cy Young Award it was. I used to see the name every day. And then every time I opened my phone, that was the background picture of my phone. every time i was looking at it i just would see it in my mind and then i replaced that picture with now the background of my phone is my cy young award um because i want another one but yeah i chased it for 10 years and finally like finally accomplished it which is a a pretty crazy um to chase something for 10 years and finally get it is like such a cool feeling i didn't even know like how to feel it was like i can't believe this actually happened yeah are you able to feel proud pride like kind of well do you uh not not in the moment um and by the time i win something i've already like set the next target yeah and i was like i won it and i was like okay but anyone can win one like wow you can't win who can how many guys have won two how many have won three and like so i just it's one of my struggles i need to get better at it is like actually enjoying the fact that i did this really cool thing what a trickster your brain is such an because sometimes our brain is like a trickster it's like oh well it's like and what about this you know it's like it's sometimes if i can look at that almost like yeah and try and enjoy it not be too hard on myself not you know constantly be pushing the goal line but sometimes if i can just look at myself and be like what a fucking trickster you are brain yeah you're gonna going, we just did it.

1:24:40Yeah, let me hang out here for a little bit and enjoy this. But if I can at least laugh at that part of me that does it instead of look at it like, man, it just keeps moving and I'm never able to have any fun. Sometimes that can help me have a little bit of a different space there. I get long-term enjoyment out of it. It's like little hits of it here and there. So the award is actually up in my room at my parents' house where I grew up. And this is where I still have artwork that I made in high school. that's on the walls and like hats that i had signed by people that are hanging there like it's it's like my room um and so the award is like hanging up like in my childhood room um because i feel like that's where it belonged like most people will put it in like a case and like that's where the journey started got it and like that's where it i feel like it just belongs like the young kid that like never thought he'd play big league baseball because big league baseball players are they're superstars they're like different than me and all of a sudden i end up being one of those people and have this thing that like only the best of the best get and it's like still when i see it up there i'm like this is crazy like yeah i have a note from my high school coach threatening to kick me off the team next to like the Cy Young award like the the the disparity between those things is like such a such an interesting contrast you know bro it's that oh that's so many feelings that's so much at once dude yeah what was what was he threatening to kick you off or do you remember dude I was I have like four or five of them uh I got thrown out of a game one time i was hitting and uh umpire made a bet what i thought was a bad call so i flipped my bat and i like drew a line in the sand of like where the ball crossed the plate didn't say a word i got tossed and then of course like you're getting thrown out of a game not good look for the high school program there's times where like the park that i mentioned earlier where i'd go up and do practice like i would go up there and throw bait there's a tennis court with like a really high fence next to a big open grass field and so i would throw a long toss on the open grass field and the ball would hit the the fence and like die there and i had to throw by myself so i'd have two buckets of balls and i would throw them all and then go pick them up and keep throwing and then one of the local tennis instructors didn't like the noise of the ball hitting the fence and so he would go and like we had this years long like feud and he would come out in the middle of his tennis lessons and like grab my buckets of baseballs and steal them so i couldn't throw and then he would like call the cops on me and all this stuff.

1:27:23But the thing is there was no signs. It's a public park. No signs on the fence saying that I couldn't throw against it. We'd gone to city council and like cleared it and made sure it was okay. He just didn't like it. So a lot of just technical back and forth. Yeah. But you like to make sure that you're kind of like me, I think it seems in some ways. I think I always wanted to make sure how I felt was known. I always wanted to have my say in things. Or be able to have my say. That's what I felt like. And sometimes it's a blessing and sometimes it's a curse. For sure. I had, I remember the morning that that kind of like changed for me.

1:28:04I was 17, I was in high school. I had gotten up in the morning to go to the YMCA, did my preschool workout, came back, showered, was looking in the mirror. I was like, you know, why, what is it about me that like I don't have friends, that people like don't like me, that they bully me, that they pick on me, like all this stuff. And I just made the decision that day. I was like, I like myself. Like I'm good in school. I treat people well. I'm hardworking. I'm whatever. Like I like what I see looking back at me. So I'm going to be okay with that. And I'm not going to, I'm going to stop chasing like approval from other people.

1:28:38And as long as I can be proud of myself, like I'm cool with it. And so that gave me the freedom internally to like have a voice. voice and when someone would say something to me I'd fire back and I would feel better about myself because I felt like I was defending myself and standing up for myself and my life got a lot better uh through the rest of high school and into college because of that because I felt like I had a voice and I was being heard instead of just being like swatted down all the time and then as my life situation changed you know something that can be good at one point can be bad at other points um as my life situation changed as people stopped picking on me as much as you know i got into professional baseball and my profile in baseball grew i was still very quick to just like fire back at people and you know fans normally in like the bantery like good-natured way but media people you know uh on-air personalities writers and stuff like that um they would write something about me that I didn't like or that I disagreed with or I felt was untrue.

1:29:42That's one thing that really bugs me is when someone writes something that is not true about, about anyone, like, I don't think you should, because it affects a person's, uh, reputation and stuff, you know? Um, so I would just fire back at them and I was like, okay, I'm justifying this to myself because they attacked me first and they said this stuff that isn't true. They set the terms where they're going to just come out of, they're going to go out of their way to like, I wouldn't pick on them. They're going to come after me. Well, okay, unleash it. Fire back. Yeah, which I think makes good sense.

1:30:14Yeah, I would just unload on people, though, said some pretty hurtful things, and then I get the reputation of being this combative person, which I'm not, but that's how I appeared online. online and i don't think i updated my like how i uh behaved and interpreted the world like i don't think i updated that as quickly as like my life situation changed i see and so i got to a point where like i didn't need to be doing that stuff and there's a much more mature way to handle those things like just have a conversation with a person right instead of just like online like firing back um so that's one thing over the last couple years i've really tried to like update evolve in update my my how i perceive the world like how i operate in the world to match like my life situation well sometimes it makes sense that that takes like um sometimes the world doesn't take into account that we have to get to certain places where we have enough space to look around at our environment and update our own software.

1:31:20Yeah. Right. And, and, and sometimes that takes time. It's like, and, and that's just what it is, you know, but, um, the media is also gross. I want to, I'll say that you don't have to say that. And, um, uh, I think the media is very gross these days. There's countless things that are printed all the time and said that have no, uh, jurisprudence. Is that a word, Nick? Why am I saying that? sounds right jurisprudence i don't know what oh it just means a legal system oh yeah yeah i just i don't know merit i don't know i think i remember just reading uh scarlet letter and that popped into my head for some reason but i'm forever stuck on whatever books i read like fucking ninth grade bro forever dude people like bro you you have a good vocabulary i'm like dude if it wasn't in fucking uh the scarlet letter dude i don't know it um but no it's interesting man and especially i think learning more about you you see like oh well this is this guy has had to kind of like create his own operating software to fit what works with him in his world you know and that's um a lot of people you don't get to know that about them you know um i think society there should be more uh the way society is right now is everything's like very short attention span and very final yeah it is this or it is that and then that's true for the rest of time um where in reality it's like this might have been the case at this specific moment in time with these circumstances this person feeling one way on that day because of this other thing this other person feeling this other way on and then like that situation changes so the people change the next day the next week the next year but you look at you look back at something someone said five years ago and you're like oh well he's a terrible person because of this or oh I love him because of this one thing when like it's a tiny snapshot of a brief moment that doesn't describe the whole of the situation the person the intent the anything but society I think is like so short with forming an opinion well especially with athletes you only get to see certain amounts of them yeah like um and when they go on to a lot of long-form conversations a lot of times there's a lot of fear about saying certain.

1:33:45They don't want to get in trouble. You only see certain snapshots of them on the sideline. You see a guy get upset two times. You have no idea what's happened or what's going on, but suddenly you're like, oh, that guy's the problem. I saw the best example of that. It's an NBA game. I think it was Durant. It might have been someone else, but I'm just going to say it was Durant because that's what's in my head. But he's doing an interview on the court right after the game. And the reporter asks him a question. He's got a microphone on his face. Oh, yeah, the team this and that and the other whatever.

1:34:19And he's got this polished, you can tell he's been trained how to talk to the media, say words without saying anything at all. Don't say anything at all, basically, but say something. So in the middle of one of his answers, one of his teammates, or I think someone from the other team comes up like hey good game and he steps away from the microphone for like three seconds and completely changes just like oh what's up brother hey he's great going into this whole thing with someone that he's comfortable with in a different way and he comes back to the interview right back into like the media mode and I'm like if that's not the perfect example of how like what you see is not always what is true I don't know what is Yeah, there's a certain protecting of the realm in a lot of ways, you know, which part of it makes sense, too, especially, I think, with baseball, because baseball has this.

1:35:15I have to pee so bad. Is that OK? Sure. Do you have to pee or are you OK? I'm good. Wow, that's amazing when people don't have to pee to me.

1:35:24So everything was going. So your career was going great. Yeah. And then you had this. You had the instance that happened with the allegations, right? Is that the best way to say it? How do people? Yeah. I mean, there's allegations against me, stuff I didn't do. But Dick gets out in social media. The media writes about it. And to be fair, they were very serious allegations. Like what was alleged should be investigated and should be taken very seriously. Just the way the system works, it's like those allegations get made. There's an open investigation. I'm advised not to say anything. So it's a very one-sided discussion for a long period of time.

1:36:09And then that influences public perception over it. And then when the facts start coming out, when the truth starts coming out, it's a much smaller—there's a lot less buzz around it. And so the public perception's already been influenced in a certain way. It must have been harrowing to go through. Yeah, it sucked. It sucked. It still sucks. um but um so and it doesn't even sound like it was that it sounds like there was just you messaged with a woman online you guys both agree to spend time together you spend time together um it's later revealed that she had the idea that she wanted to she had a plan or a strategy

1:37:05to take from you? I'm trying to think what the strategy was. There's texts about taking my money, getting in, yeah, stuff like that. Yeah, next victim star pitcher for the Dodgers. And what's so crazy is, Trevor, is I was, like three months ago, I'm looking at some stuff online. Am I okay talking with you about this? Yeah. Do you feel okay? For sure. All right. I'm looking at some stuff online. I see pictures of the girl and I'm like, how do I know this girl? I had, she had connected with me over social media at some point. And we met up, she came to a comedy show. And then she came afterwards, we went to my hotel.

1:37:46We just sat in the lobby and chatted. And she like knew some friends. We had some mutual friends and stuff. But we just sat there and chatted and then I got her an Uber home. yeah um thank goodness i guess because you know but but that it just blew i'm like looking i'm like how do i but even that to me because i know she i felt like she wanted to stay over and spend time you know it just blew my mind i'm like is this is this like a thing like was this person like doing this kind of stuff regularly or was it just happenstance that you know anyway it just that and that got me even more into your world kind of yeah and uh and i really started to look back at what had gone on and and man it was just i think a lot of people felt like it was just a really raw deal yeah i mean i certainly feel that way um i can't change it obviously at this point like it it is what it is like the situation happened um i've had to i've had to do like two like two main things one i've had to like self-reflect okay how did i get into this situation where like something like this is even possible yeah and then two i've had to look towards the future and try to have something that i'm moving towards or something that i'm trying to accomplish because if i don't i would just get mired in this really negative stuff and that's you know it's not good for mental health it's not good for productivity or the people that i'm around or you know wow stuff like that so i've done a lot of reflecting and like looking at mistakes that i made and um in a lot of that like there's a lot of components to this whole situation like number one like my interactions with uh females like in general like i paid very little attention to my personal life because i was so focused on baseball and then when i started my businesses it was baseball and business i just didn't pay attention to anything else so i just like i didn't think anything of it someone would hit me up on instagram and like oh yeah yeah let's go over you can do whatever i i didn't think anything of it and i think it at the time it was like well i i treat people well and i'm respectful and like i don't i'm not doing anything improper and so like that's fine yeah that's a way to live i'm living the way you're supposed to be living yeah and it never even crossed my mind that something like this could happen um but you know i was associating with people that were not that didn't see yeah people were like hitting me up on instagram because they knew me somehow but i didn't know them right you know i would just meet up with them i knew very little about them um that was dangerous in my position part of like what we discuss about the software update like i see myself as this guy that's like even with everybody else it's just you know and then i get into a position in life where that's not the case and i become a target and i just didn't see like the signs of being a target or whatever and so i didn't update my software early enough and it's a bummer yeah it's a bummer because you also you want to be able to meet people on even terms that's the toughest thing about sometimes having some popularity i think and something that's sometimes kind of like i don't want to say sad because nobody's like hey look man you get to have a lot of neat do a lot of yeah i don't ever want to come off like a victim like it was like i was treated no i don't think it's this way or whatever it's just like there are realities to the certain situations right definitely very very positive like being a professional athlete and like having that opportunity like there's so many positives to it um i don't ever want to come off like i'm complaining yeah but there are certain realities that go along with it that you have to be cognizant of and um yeah i just i didn't update quick enough to be cognizant of them before it happened i've updated now like i've changed a lot of things how i do things in my personal life like i'm very careful of who i meet and how i meet them um you know i'm not having the same type of just casual sexual relationships i'm not agreeing to do the same types of like sexual things um i'm not like dating a bunch of people i've like really locked down my personal life and gone back to the square one like what do i care about in a personal relationship okay i want someone that's a b c d whatever okay let me go try to find those things actively instead of just being okay with anybody that's approaching me just to have someone around in those blank moments where like oh i have two hours at night and i have nothing to do so like i'll just have someone i'll meet up with somebody exactly yeah oh dude it's saying look i can relate i'm not trying to take your conversation here but just young men can relate to that just the same type of thing it's like and even young women it's like it just becomes a habitual thing yeah you know people think there's you know but it's like yeah sometimes the reason why maybe i haven't landed exactly where i would like to be um it's yeah it's like have i if will i just if i just kind of take whatever like shooting star passes through the sky yeah as opposed to going out and looking for like somebody that's the real fucking sunshine you know it's like and not you mike clevenger but uh like a preferably female yeah but um but yeah i feel you man it's like i can all day because people just kind of come and go all the time yeah and that's fine you can do that but if you really want to go out and you and like emulate what you want into the world and then hopefully get that back you know I think long term wise, it's just a much more healthy situation for me personally to be surrounded by people that are interested in the same things that push me in a positive way to get better, to learn more, to achieve more or whatever that support me in moments.

1:43:49It's one of the biggest things is like getting through the last couple of years. And even today, like it's still a struggle today with, you know, there's still ongoing like ramifications of everything. But just having the support group around you that like, you know, these people care about you and not the attributes that you like, not the bank account or the fame or the notoriety or whatever, the lifestyle. like having that support group you know weeding out some of the people that were around that like didn't feel that way right and really locking down the people that you vibe with and that like you know have your back and are going to give you some of those free spaces to mess up and like as long as you learn and continue getting better they're not just like gone when one bad thing happens.

1:44:40That's been so important. And I'm so thankful for those people, my family, my business partners, my agent, Rachel, there's a lot of other people, friends. I can't name everybody, of course, but those people, the support group that are there, it's so important. Yeah. When shit hit the fan, was it totally a shock to you? it was it was pretty bad yeah um i went from focusing on my next start to then like this article came out and then i'm having all these conversations and then i'm not allowed at the field and i'm still going to pitch in two days but then i'm not going to pitch in two days and then i can't take the team flight back uh because i'm not allowed to be with the team right now and then i can't take a commercial flight back home because i'm my name's everywhere and it's such a big story that like it's going to be a disaster at you know taking commercial flight to renting a car and driving from dc like back across the united states in the middle of season not knowing when i'm going to rejoin the like it was a who drove with you um i drove with my agent Rachel.

1:45:52Oh, that's sweet of her. Yeah, she was in D.C. and then we were there for two or three days and then drove back across country. Fuck. Yeah, it happened pretty quick and then obviously you have the legal stuff that plays out. You have investigation and was never arrested for anything, was never charged with anything. Yeah, there was never any. That drug out for drug out is the wrong word because the allegations are serious and they looked into them thoroughly and I respect the hell out of the police for doing that. I think all allegations like this should be looked into with that amount of thoroughness.

1:46:32But it lasted for nine months before the decision was made that there was going to be no charges or whatever. The whole time I was not able to be with the team. There was no resolution. I didn't know when any of those decisions were going to come out, so I'm just in this holding pattern. and then there was MLB suspended me and then there was you know we appealed the suspension and then that took another I don't even remember how long that took another period of time things move slowly in the you know as they go through courts and as they go through arbitrations and stuff like that so who was there who was like really there for you while you like yeah parents have been parents have been great um uh rachel i've mentioned um she was their business partner tosh a lot of my uh employees that i consider close friends kevin eric um you know we've hired more people along the way as well that have been like there um the whole time um Yeah, friends.

1:47:41I mean, there's people that I just know that for, you know, since high school or whatever that, like, would check in with me. Coaches. I don't want to name names because I don't mean whatever, but a lot of coaches that I've known through baseball, a lot of players, teammates. So you had some good support. Yeah. And I think it's because people that I've played with, people that I've been in the clubhouse with, people that I've known personally looked at their experience with who I am and what they know of me and like what's being said and they just like nope there's no way that there's no way that happened and um yeah so I think you know publicly it's been seen as like I'm this you know there's reports that I you know Dodgers organization doesn't want me around and teammates don't this and I'm not welcome here and all that stuff but like what's been seen publicly and my experience of what's been going on kind of behind the scenes and and my interactions with people and stuff like that have been completely different wow um so it's actually been it's been good like knowing that you know the the people that i know that have been around me have that uh amount of i guess trust or that have had a good experience with me and like believe.

1:49:02Yeah, I saw Mookie Bess said some nice things. Or that's what they put out in the articles. You just don't know with a lot of these articles, man. And the lawyers too, that's the shadiest part sometimes. It's like it seemed like in your instance, the lawyers use the media to make you look worse. Yeah. That's crazy. That's fucking... Why wouldn't you just do what the... But like it just, man, that fucking made me, it just was sick. It was sickening. I don't know enough about the legal system to warrant having an opinion. So I don't want this to come off as like I am advocating for one thing or another.

1:49:45But it seems like there's this loophole having been through it where like you can make a domestic violence restraining order request. You can file for one of those and you can write a whole bunch of stuff. and that's fine because you have to be able to write what happened and make your claim and then that is filed that becomes a public document you don't have to attach your name to it but you can attach the other person's name to it wow and then it takes time for that to go through to get scheduled to get heard to get decided upon but the damage in today's society has already been done as soon as that becomes public that like you know we we went to the domestic violence restraining order court which is like the lowest standard of proof that you have to in order to get that to win a domestic violence restraining order like it's the lowest standard of proof we went to that and won like there was no restraining order granted but in the month or I think it was actually like a month I think it was like six weeks in between when the initial filing and articles came out and when that happened that's six weeks of one side of the story being out there and like the damage is done I can't say anything and I've had great legal representation and they've advised me well along the way and the advice is don't say anything and it kills me because like I want to defend myself I want to get the truth out there and then it's like okay well what's the reparation for the damage that's been done here.

1:51:19And it doesn't seem like there's any sort of... Yeah. Yeah. And maybe there's some sort of update that can be made to that process. Like, I also see the other side of it where, you know, for people that are in those situations that need a place to be able to go and, like, get help and to get out of a bad situation and to protect themselves. Like, we never want to discourage that from happening either. So I don't know what the solution is here. Right. But just, like, having talked to people in professional sports like a lot of people have reached out and like hey man i went through something similar this is what they did to me or this is what happened in my case or this was it was seemingly was helpful or whatever like this is a thing that happens a lot again for i don't i just know what happened with me just from what i've been told right this is your instance yeah it's um you know the the general way is like you make these allegations and then tell the person you're going to file this thing and in order and they you know the implications can be very bad for you and so then money exchanges hands and i've talked to multiple people where that's been the case right so it's just like uh people can do that and threat and make and then you have to pay to get rid of it yeah yeah yeah you know i don't know how they have data and it's tough that they don't have to attach their name to it because then there's no real repercussions for them you know yeah um i'm sorry you had to go through that man yeah you know i know that doesn't help or anything but i think a lot of people probably feel that way we all have our struggles and i don't like i'm very fortunate to be in the position i am even with all this stuff like i'm not blind to that and so again i don't want to i never want to come off as like oh what was me and like i was victim or anything like that i mean i believe that you were a victim there and i'll just say that for myself but um i don't think you sound like that at all yeah um It was a tough situation.

1:53:09We all have tough situations in life. And like, hopefully, something that I say about how I got through it or how I am trying to like learn from past mistakes and be better is helpful to the next person that goes through it. So it makes their time a little bit easier than my time was. It's thoughtful of you. It's kind of a powerful to get to that place. I'm sure it's been an interesting journey, you know. it's been interesting I think in like 10 years when I look back on it I'll be I think there'll be a lot of things in my life that have happened because of changes that I made during this time period that I'll be very happy with it's just very hard to like see off into the future when you're so in it and when you feel like you know everything you knew about your world is completely like gone like you're basically just torn down to zero like where do i go from here what am i doing um but as far as like updating the software and stuff i think i'll be happy in in five or ten years that like changes that i've made because of this experience um have helped me like grow as a person.

1:54:23Wow. Fuck, dude. You're fucking in. It's a. It is a high road attitude to hear from you. For me, like I can't I can't go any other road because it'll just it's poisonous. Yeah. Yeah. So what's next then? What's next? How do we get to see you? Because I want to see you go for that second sight young yeah I'm gonna be really really honest with you yeah I'd love to I mean that's the goal like I'd like to play uh in MLB um you know looking for looking for a contract and um yeah I mean I still I've been training the whole time like we talked earlier about how baseball is like my backdrop like when things go bad I go back to this and this has been one of the most difficult things is like when baseball is taken away like what do I fall back on so I just And I've improved since people saw me.

1:55:26I'm throwing harder. I've developed new pitches. My command's better. I'm still one of the best pitchers in the world. I'd love to prove that. Obviously, I realize there's a lot of other considerations besides just talent at this point. So I'm hopeful that I get a job and I get an opportunity to go out and prove that I'm good and I have a lot to offer. I think I got a lot to offer the baseball community as a whole with content, entertainment and all that. I have a lot to offer a team. Like one of the things I'm really passionate about is helping young baseball players have their journey be easier than mine.

1:56:01So we actually train. I think we got like 20 guys that we train for free at my facility in Arizona in the offseason pro guys that come in. I've been working with all the pitchers there and developing pitches and feel and mindset and all that stuff. I love that stuff. So I have a lot to offer from that perspective, I think, to a team and a clubhouse that I'm with. Obviously, like performance, like you got to win games. I know I can do that. That's not even a question in my mind. What was like the financial? Because you were making good money. Yeah. Right? Yeah. I signed. So I won the Cy Young in 2020.

1:56:35And that was your contract year? I was a free agent after that, yeah. Wow. Yeah. Bro. That is a dream. Very fortunate. And look, I love it when dudes get paid. That's what George Kittle told me. He goes, everybody's happy when somebody gets paid, man. Yeah, for sure. So you had three years,$102 million. Yeah. So it was kind of a unique structure. I had opt-outs after every year. The plan was always to play the first two years and then opt out and be a free agent after the third. And I would have been two years for$85 million, the way the contract worked out. So an average value of$42.5 million a year.

1:57:10Wow. Which was the highest annual average value at that time for any baseball player. I think Shohei just crushed it. No way. So you were like the top of the heap. Yeah. Wow. And did they still have to pay you a certain amount of that? Yeah. I got some of it. I also lost some of it in the, you know, I think, I don't remember exactly what the numbers shook out to be, but I lost a significant amount of it with the suspension and stuff like that. And was it expensive, like the attorney fees and all that? Yeah, man. lawyers are uh very much needed like very specialized and like you know you need you need them but um very expensive yeah so it's been um obviously baseball has given me a lot financially um i'm doing fine i don't want to come off like i'm you know not fine but uh it's been a heavy a heavy hit for sure um and how do your agents like do you try to go back at the same rate?

1:58:09How does that even work? Is that fair to ask you about? Yeah, that's fine. I don't I just want to play. That's where I'm at. I'll play for league minimum and earn my money based on incentives. I don't care. Whatever the structure for the team is that makes them most comfortable, it's fine with me. I just want to go play. Incentive-based. right? Yeah. You want to, you, I'll show you if, yeah, if you sign me and like something's not going right and you don't like the reaction or you don't, whatever, like you can cut me and then you don't have to bear the, um, you know, the brunt of signing this, let's say it's a$10 million contract and you know, something's not going right and you still have to pay the 10 million.

1:58:58I don't, I don't need that. Like I just want to, I want a job. I want to go play. And let me just prove that I'm still one of the best pitchers. Let me prove that I have a lot to offer for the organization. And then I'll get paid an incentive. I'll earn based on what I perform. I'm happy with that. I've never, like, I've always wanted to be that way too. Like it's, I've only wanted to sign one year contracts because I never want to be the guy that signs a long-term deal and then is like, okay, well, I'm getting paid regardless. So performance doesn't matter. And I'm just going to like play out my years or whatever.

1:59:35Yeah, I'm just going to get massages or whatever, or paint my nails or whatever. Yeah. Like, shout out to the guys that paint their nails. No problem with it. Yeah, no judgment. Yeah. But, like, I'm an intense competitor, and I just want to go compete. Right. And, like, I would like to be compensated fairly for what I produce. So if I produce nothing, I don't feel like I should be compensated anything. If I'm the best pitcher in the league, I feel like I should be compensated for being the best pitcher in the league. And the easiest way to do that is just, like, minimum risk for the team. I'll play for the minimum.

2:00:07And then if I pitch really well, then have incentives that reward me for pitching really well. And the value that I give to the team is equally shared and both sides feel like they won. Wow. I'm happy to have any sort of like. I want to work together with the team I want to be a positive in the community, in the clubhouse, on the field, like overall for the game of baseball. I know that I can be that. I have no questions about it, which is why I have no problem taking like an incentive-based contract because I know that I can go out there and deliver. I know the type of person that I am. I know the type of results that I'm going to be able to produce.

2:00:46And I'm willing to bet on myself in that way. Amen. But at the end of the day, like I just want to compete. Like I just want a chance. to go compete and like do the thing that I've spent 30 years becoming one of the best in the world at and the thing that I love to do um bro I would if I had a team if I had even if we had a spot here I'd hire you right now I'd hire you to pitch what would you what would you call it what would your what's your team name be oh that's a great question huh put you on the spot what's a good team name probably maybe uh the reverb or the lisps the lisps yeah one of my best friends growing up douglas had a lisp and i would always um i would impersonate him because i was in it was like the he had the unique voice yeah one of the teachers one time thought i was making fun of him i'm like what do you mean i'm not he's like he god put that remix in him like He's doing something different.

2:01:44I just thought it was so cool. So the Lists could be kind of cool because it's like taking something that can be considered maybe not the best, but making it positive. It could be pretty dope. What else? The Nashville Lists. Dude, it's got a ring. Yeah. Yeah, dude. It might be it. The Lists, dude. I'd sign up. Thrike. I sounded like Howie Mandel saying that joke. But dude, if we could afford you, Even at basic minimum, we'd pay you to pitch here, but we don't have a team. We don't have a field. But God, dude, yeah, we just got to see you back out there. There's no valid reason why you shouldn't be back out there.

2:02:23Yeah, I appreciate you saying that. There's no valid reason. It doesn't even make nothing. If the universe doesn't make this happen, it doesn't even make any sense anymore. Yeah. Yeah, I'm hopeful that it will. I'm hopeful that it will. I just, I'd like to entertain people. I'd like to pitch. I'd like to win. When does spring training start? Usually like second week, around Valentine's Day, second week of February. Some teams are like February 12th, some teams are like February 16th. It's like, they all kind of report at different dates, but yeah, middle of February. Bro, date with the diamond, huh?

2:02:56Yeah. And that's not Dustin Poirier. I'm talking about baseball diamond. Yeah. Yeah. We could see it, bro. Yeah, just looking for an opportunity. I want to play in MLB. I love Japan. I have absolutely nothing negative to say about Japan. and at some point being separated from the culture that I'm comfortable with and I'm used to it was tough being away from friends and family and stuff like that everyone there made it so much better than it could have been and I'm very appreciative but yeah I would like to play an MLB, I would like to chase the second Cy Young, I'd like to try to win a World Series I finished second Oh yeah you guys came in second place with the Dodgers?

2:03:35No with Cleveland in 2016 and I finished second in college. We lost to TCU in the national championship, or not TCU, to South Carolina in national championships. So I finished second twice. I'd like to actually win one. Wow. But, yeah. Dude, it would be so cool. What if you got to play with the Padres? What if you got to play with the Dodgers? Walker Bueller plays over there. Dude, they just went and signed Shohei and Yamamoto, too. Oh, that's right. I talked to Yamamoto when I was in Japan through an interpreter. he's a pretty special pitcher I'm excited to see how he does would love to play there Shohei's a pitcher over there too right?

2:04:15Shohei Yamamoto Bueller Kershaw is a free agent still I don't know if he's going to sign or if his spine's going to hold it he's pieced up in the spine he's amazing you gotta massage that you gotta get him into that wagyu shape because he's just, you know, his body's turned so much. He's got so many innings under his belt at such a high level that, like, no one's body can take it forever, right? But, I mean, even so, with all the years and the mileage, like, he put up a fantastic season last year. It's incredible seeing the longevity that he's had and, like, the consistency of results. It's like, it's crazy.

2:04:59And their head coach, who's the Dodgers head coach? Dave Roberts. Yeah, dude, that guy's cool, man. Bring up a picture of Dave Roberts, dude. UCLA. Yeah, bro. Oh, do you play with him at UCLA too? I didn't play with him, but he's a Bruin, yeah. Wow, dude. Yeah, he's cool, man. He's funny. Yeah. They got some funny guys over there. It's a cool organization. It would be cool to play. I'd obviously love to play for him. It'd be cool to play against him too because of the big, like, they just went and spent like 1.2 billion dollars in free agency yeah like okay this is the juggernaut like let's go see if we can take him down type of thing so yeah i could get up for either one of them you know mainly like i just i just want to i want to play man i haven't i i miss competing yeah was it tough to was there certain parts of the season that are tougher to watch like when it gets in a placer it's all just kind of tough it's been tough to watch baseball um because like i know i'm good enough to be out there and i i want to be out there and i haven't i haven't had the opportunity to be out there um when i was in japan last year i watched a lot of games because i was like okay i'm i'm here i'm playing i'm like in it i can respect what the other people are doing i can learn from it i'm like figuring things out and that was nice to have some of that back i just haven't i don't think it's been healthy for me to like consume mlb content the last couple years um which is sad because like everything that i've tried to build is like grow that entity and to like help build it and then um i'm still involved in doing that i'm still but i'm just pursuing in a slightly different way where i'm not even like i'm not really watching games and um i'd like to get back to a place where i can like watch and like be interested and appreciate the great things that other people in the league are doing.

2:06:56I just had to be a little bit protective of my mental health on that front. Yeah, because it would just break your heart probably? Yeah. It was tough, man. Seeing what other guys are doing and not being able to be happy for them, feeling that resentment of like, well, I should be out there being able to compete too. I don't like I never I don't you should have been there's no reason yeah I can't even imagine I don't like being negative towards other people and like feeling envious of other people's accomplishments I like to look at things and be like wow this person is really really good and I can appreciate it because I do it in all other sports like I watch Brady play and I'm like I'm going to watch as much of this as possible because he's going to be gone at some point and like you got to appreciate what this is yeah same with Saban Saban at Bama yeah Yeah.

2:07:50And Mahomes right now. Caitlin Clark I do that with. And Caitlin Clark, me and Caitlin Presley want to come to your game. So if you can help us. Sorry, I just had to say that out loud, dude. Love it. Mr. Pete, that's what I call her. I love watching her. But yeah, man, I think because there was no criminal wrongdoing. There was nothing wrong. Yeah. There was nothing wrong. Yeah. you can find things that if you look at yourself, yes, I could adjust some of these behaviors and stuff, but as a human being behaving in the world to not have done anything wrong. Yeah. And to have, it's really just a trial that you've been through.

2:08:33It's almost like a fucking scarlet letter. You know, it was like a scarlet letter in a way, you know? Yeah. You get branded with something and then you carry it. I'll carry it the rest of my life. Like I'll always be known for this in some way. And hopefully over time it'll be less and all the positive things that I do will get more attention and be more synonymous with my brand. But like this will always be there, which is tough. It's tough to – I can't even imagine. I can't think about it too much, you know? Yeah. Yeah, because it's just such a – it's such an anomaly. Yeah. You know? Yeah, so we got to get you.

2:09:11We got to – we don't have to do anything. I can't do shit. But it'd be awesome. Yeah, dude. I would love to see you get to play with the Padres too. They got Benny Snell over there on thing. He's a free agent right now, I think. They got Darvish. Darvish. I love Darvish. They got Musgrove. Yeah. They got a great team. Yeah, and they just got a new head coach on football too. Who was it? They got who? Harbaugh. The Chargers at Harbaugh, yeah, from Michigan. They got Harbaugh. He might come out to a game. That would be cool. Go blue. I got some friends that are big Michigan fans. Really? Yeah. Oh, all those people were so geeked recently.

2:09:50They had a crazy season. All the adversity they went through as a team. Yeah, right. It's crazy when you watch that and you're like, okay, adversity either tears you apart or makes you so much stronger. Yeah. They really came together and they put together a hell of a run. What do you say? What are your thoughts? Because you're almost relatable to like, I mean, it's very scary. scary like any somebody being like in any sort of like a public persona or something or popularity yeah it's very scary yeah right um man god it's just but there's probably guys who are imprisoned right now for things that they didn't do for sure like and that's try to keep that perspective and like yeah right i'm not trying to this has sucked i'm not trying to belittle what you went through it could be way worse what what but you're a person who's able to set goals and set and really get through like some of the tougher parts of life by your own manifestations and game planning.

2:10:53Yeah. Right. It seems like in your life, how do you like, what did you do? And cause I'm sure there are guys sitting in a cell right now who can, might be able to learn some stuff. Yeah. I think one of the biggest things is talking about it. and that was one of the toughest things that I couldn't talk about it publicly. So having someone privately that you could just talk to about it to at least hear yourself vocalize what you're feeling. If I didn't have someone to talk to, I would not have made it through this. That's a huge thing. It's scary to talk about things a lot of times and be viewed as vulnerable or to be viewed.

2:11:38You don't know how the other person is going to view your perspective, but it's so important. So I'd say, yeah, first thing, find someone to talk to, whether it's a therapist, whether it's a friend, a family member. A lot of people aren't fortunate enough to have family members around to talk to, or they don't have those relationships. But find someone that you can talk to. And be honest with. Yeah. Be able to just tell it how you're feeling it. Yeah, be honest about how you're feeling. Yes. that's that's the biggest thing i'd say and then having something some goal like humans need a purpose like we don't do well when we're like just existing for we don't have anything to do and if you can find some purpose that's controllable they're like you know for me it was business like i had a business so i woke up in the morning i'm like okay how do we get this thing firing or how do we get uh make a better video or how do we edit this way or okay i gotta figure out the you know what hire do we need to make so there was something that i was in control of that i was actively doing that i could distract myself in a way from the negative stuff and like focus on something that was like aspirational like okay in the future when all this stuff is done because it's going to be done at some point right maybe a day it might be a year it might be 10 years it's not gonna last forever so at some point in the future when it's done what is it that i have that i've been building that i can like aspire what position do i want to be when this is done like and can i make progress towards that like that's how i is like talking about it and having some sort of aspirational goal that i was chasing um but yeah the support group is is so big man yeah like just being able to vocalize your feelings is important.

2:13:32Yeah. Oh, yeah. I'm in a lot of support groups, dude. Fortunately and unfortunately. But some of those moments are the best moments of my life. Dealing with addiction and learning about recovery and stuff. It's given me some of the greatest gifts of my life, which are great conversations with people and learning how to be around people and feel and stuff like that. I think the humans learn by failing first and then adjusting behavior and then growing. And it's a sense of pride to be able to feel like you've gotten better at something or you're in a better place or a better person because of something.

2:14:14But the moments where you're failing, when you're in that, those are tough. but being able to have that comeback is so important because that's where you feel that sense of accomplishment or that sense of purpose or that you know whatever it is you get something from that if you never fail at anything like life's just like there's no richness to it yeah you know um so i can definitely i can understand how some of those moments like you fail at something you end up in a bad place and you find a way to like pull yourself back up and it feels a sense of pride. Yeah. Man, it's interesting how much you work with your own integrity and your own setting goals for yourself.

2:14:59It must be, it seems like you have probably a knowledge of yourself on a unique level that some people don't get to have, man. And I think that's... I think being an introvert, I don't do well in the social situations like we talked about. So I spend a lot of time thinking. And a lot of it's about external stuff. But I try to think internally too. and try to figure out why a lot of times. Like, okay, I did this thing. Like, why did I do that? What prompted me to react this way emotionally to this situation? Or what prompted me to go want to do it? Like, why do I like cars? Or what is it, right?

2:15:33Yeah. And I'm trying to figure out that puzzle because I'm a puzzle. Yeah, you're the puzzle. And you're the guy doing the puzzle. That's what's kind of cool once you realize that. Yeah. Because it can make your life kind of richer in a way. Yeah. When you start to like, not only am I me, but I'm also, I can look at me. Yeah, yeah. And it's a challenge because, like, you want to look at yourself, like, very surface level. Like, oh, yeah, I'm good. Like, I look good today. I'm in good shape. Like, oh, things are good. But when you start, like, digging down, like, maybe I'm not good in this area.

2:16:09Like, how could it be better? Or, like, I don't know if I like this part about me. Is it bad? Is it good? I don't know. Like, how do I actually feel about this? maybe I want to like try to do this a little bit better like those are those are conversations I have with myself all the time like fucking interesting dude bro you're a strange dude yeah I'm strange I dig it though I fucking dig it man it's a vibe I'm aware that I'm a little different and I mean that lovingly bro yeah I appreciate it I'm really reading that respectfully we gotta order us a Trevor Bauer bobblehead dude we gotta get one in here on the shelf man we wanna dude I got I got something you do?

2:16:43somewhere yeah yeah we're gonna make sure to hit up your alright yeah Rachel and make sure she sends us over one. Even if she has to drive it across country to get it here, we want it over here. We just want to, yeah, we want to, yeah, man, we just, yeah. I got some, I think I have a couple unreleased bobbleheads. So I was supposed to have a bobblehead day with the Dodgers, and so they had sent me some samples as we were designing it, and then I got put on administrative leave before it happened, and so they never ended up releasing the bobbleheads. Wow. But they had ordered some stock because they were going to do an in-stadium giveaway.

2:17:20So I got my hands on a couple of those that had never actually been released, which I think will be a cool collector item. If you happen to have one you want to part with or even let us host in here for a while, we're also willing to get one that has a blank jersey on and when you get your new deal, we're happy to put that one in too. Yeah, let me see what I got. I got something for you guys. I haven't looked at the inventory in a couple years, but I got something. That'd be sweet, man. Yeah, dude. Yeah, bro, I wonder. Yeah, dude, there's so many teams. How many teams are there? You could play for so many teams.

2:17:56Yeah, we got 30 teams out there. Bro, some of them are bad, dude. They need you. I mean, some of these teams are dang bad. Or they could be doing – you could maybe help. Yeah, I think I could. I mean, I don't think there's a team out there that I wouldn't help. in some way, right? But I also, you know, seeing the other side of things, like there's a lot of potential distractions, PR concerns. I don't think they're, I don't think they would be as much as people think they would be. I think it'd be like a couple days story and then it'd be gone personally. I could be wrong, but. You'd think there'd be some publications out there that would feel like, hey, the best, the least, a way that we could be supportive after, you know, maybe leading the charge with not being as supportive with trying to even the score, you know?

2:18:47Yeah. But I don't know. That's my thoughts. Yeah. I mean, it'd be nice, of course, but I'm not going to. It's out of your control. Yeah. If it happens, it happens. Like Mookie coming out and saying some stuff publicly was like a – I would never ask him to do that. He just did that. But it was so – like it meant a lot to me. Wow. Mookie's my guy. I love that guy. Yeah, dude. He built a house in Nashville. Yeah. That's what I heard anyway. Somebody might have lied. I texted him the other day. He's like, what have you been up to, Mook? He's like, ah, just out here bowling, man. He likes to bowl? Yeah.

2:19:21Dude, he bowls 300s. He bowls professionally in the off seasons. Oh, my God. Some people get all the luck, dude. Yeah, have you seen? He can dunk. He's a good basketball player, great baseball player, bowler. I'm like, I think he golfs. Oh, my God. Dude, he's just like, he's one of those guys that's just like, you put him in anything athletic, and he's just going to be one of the best guys. Look at that. Wow, look at him. Look at him. He's got the walk. He's got the smile. Yeah, he really does. Go back and look at that walk. Let's look at Mookie Vaz right here on this stride. Look at this, bro.

2:19:55You see that little fist pump before the, like, that's that curry. Like, he knows when he let it go that that's the one. It's just built into him. It's built into him. Yeah, dude, it's a little bit of Tiger Woods-esque, too, almost. The fist bump right there, you could probably overlay those and be... That's wild. Did you guys ever have some games like, is Mookie a card player? Would you guys do stuff? We had this debate one day. If you took the Dodgers position players and they had to pitch, and the Dodgers pitchers and they had to hit, who would win? This should be a spring training thing. It should be.

2:20:32You're always thinking about this kind of stuff. I was poking at him a little bit. I'm like, dude, we would dominate you guys for sure. You'd throw like 72. He's like, well, you guys wouldn't be able to play defense if we got one hit. And we had this 45-minute discussion in the clubhouse. It was just back and forth. Half the clubhouse was involved in it. It was a big argument. It was great. I hope at some point we get to test that out because it'd be fantastic content. Dude, you're right. Yeah. It's a great idea, man. I like the way you think, man. I really do. And I'm grateful to get to spend time with you today, man.

2:21:05And we wish you the best of luck, man. We're going to get that bobble-headed in here, and we'll be cheering you on, bro. I appreciate that. Thanks for having me on. It's been great. Yeah, that second Cy Young, baby. That's right. Get in there. Trevor Bauer, guys. Thank you, Trevor. Now I'm just floating on the breeze, and I feel I'm falling like these leaves. I must be cornerstone. Oh, but when I reach that ground I'll share this peace of mind I found I can feel it in my bones But it's gonna take