Latest / The Layback Podcast / Joshua Landry, Hope International University LHP

Transcript

Joshua Landry, Hope International University LHP · The Layback Podcast

0:00
What's up everyone, Welcome back to the Layback podcast.
0:03
Joining us today is 2024 NAIA national champion, left-handed
0:09
pitcher, Hope International legend, record holder.
0:13
Yeah, we're going to boost his ego now so maybe he shares a
0:16
little bit more with us down the line, but this is Josh Landry.
0:20
I've had the pleasure of getting to know Josh mostly via text
0:23
during the background of face times with his pitching coach
0:26
Peyton Lobdell over over the past couple years.
0:29
And just after watching Josh's success and hopes positioning.
0:34
Now hoping they can make another run in the NAIA World Series
0:38
here, that it was the perfect time to finally get him on, have
0:42
him tell the story of his career in baseball and really the
0:46
success of the program at Hope, a program that's kind of near
0:50
and dear to our hearts at this point.
0:52
Our first NAIA program. It's been awesome to work with
0:55
those guys and get to know a handful of them over the years.
0:58
So, Josh, thanks a ton for the time today.
1:01
You're obviously joining us from sunny Southern California.
1:05
So I don't know if even West. Coast to the best coast.
1:08
Yeah, even if we before we get into the bio, if you want to
1:11
give us the the quick little verbal tour, obviously we have
1:14
some visual listeners, but. This is it right here, folks.
1:18
West Coast. West Coast.
1:19
The best coast. For for those who are audio
1:24
only, Josh is sitting in a cabana chair on his rooftop in
1:30
Are you Huntington Beach? Are You Irving?
1:32
Huntington. Beach, technically, and he told
1:35
us he's a mile off the Pacific Coast.
1:38
You can see the beach from his rooftop here.
1:41
So if that wasn't a recruiting pitch enough, who cares about
1:45
how good the baseball program is?
1:46
You can just sit on your rooftop and look out at the ocean,
1:49
right? Oh yeah, it's right down the
1:50
street. It's only a mile.
1:52
Smell the ocean every morning. Now that we got that out of the
1:55
way, Josh hit us with the bio hit.
1:57
It hit us with the highlights. Well First off, thank you.
2:00
This is a blast. I was stoked when I woke up and
2:04
saw you had text me asking if I wanted to come out and do this.
2:08
And I was like, absolutely, this is going to be fun, but what's
2:12
up? I am a very old senior.
2:16
I'm 25 in my senior year at Hope International.
2:20
I went to Cypress College before this and I graduated from
2:23
Cypress High School in 2018. So it's definitely been a little
2:26
bit of a longer path than I thought I was signing up for.
2:31
But after everything that's happened, I honestly, I cannot
2:35
complain. I'm blessed to be able to to
2:38
continue to play this game, to be where I'm at, to have the
2:42
help I have, including you. You've been an Immaculate
2:45
resource the last three years. So I just wanted to say thank
2:50
you for that as well. Well, I appreciate that.
2:53
I definitely didn't expect you to hit the shout out quota this
2:56
early. I expected you to check that off
2:59
way at the end of the podcast when I hit my little reminders
3:02
of like, hey, Josh, thank me, thank us.
3:04
But no, seriously, that that really does mean a lot.
3:07
As I said in the intro, it it's been awesome getting to work
3:10
with you guys, get to know you guys and you guys have certainly
3:14
helped me to feel like a winner because you guys win a lot of
3:17
ball games. So I don't know if we want to
3:19
kick that off 1st. I I guess give give people a
3:23
little look into the Hope International program in
3:26
general. Well, it's very, very
3:30
articulated with how we do everything.
3:32
Even in the fall. LOB has a very complex plan for
3:36
everybody. Bullpen guys have their own
3:39
plans, starters have their own plan.
3:41
Even with our in season stuff, with our Flexpro, we have the
3:45
starters and bullpen, there's a lot of different stuff that we
3:50
do incorporate armor HEAT into things too, so.
3:54
Hey everyone. My apologies for chiming in
3:57
here, but it appears we had minor technical difficulties
4:01
with the recording of Josh Landrieu's podcast.
4:05
We missed a little bit of his intro and really defining what
4:11
makes the Hope International program special, as you guys
4:14
might have heard, or the last thing that you probably heard
4:16
was him referencing all of these starters and relievers having
4:20
their own individual plans and what it looks like
4:23
developmentally through the program.
4:25
And then as you start hearing us pick up the conversation again,
4:29
Josh talks about the new turf field in the turf mound out at
4:34
Hope International and how he actually misses a dirt mound.
4:37
And then I go into referencing how we might need a biomech and
4:41
this to come on because Josh said he previously had a lot of
4:45
arm pain, a lot of shoulder pain, but got all of that stuff
4:50
taken care of through Flexpro Grip and their programming at
4:54
Hope International. But now a lot of the guys he
4:57
feels might be dealing with some knee pain or lower body things.
5:02
And he threw up the little flag of referencing that he believes
5:07
turf mounds might be the cause of some lower body injuries and
5:10
pitchers. So look forward to that.
5:13
We I made note of it on the side as you'll hear me reference and
5:18
I'm going to look to explore that maybe with someone on the
5:21
podcast in the future, but just wanted to address the technical
5:24
difficulties. Hope you enjoy the rest of the
5:26
podcast. Renaissance that's going on we.
5:30
Just. Need to call it a biomech in
5:31
this real quick. I don't know.
5:32
I'm going to write this down next time I have a biomech
5:36
specialist on the on the pod, I'm going to make sure that
5:39
question gets addressed. Well, it's I also miss clean
5:45
amount. I miss doing things the old
5:47
fashioned way. I used to do the mount barefoot
5:50
and you know, get the toes all in the grass grounded.
5:54
Well, now that we have a quick little look into the way plans
5:58
are set up, I want to clarify a few things.
6:01
So you mentioned LOB, that's coach Peyton Lobdell, owner,
6:06
operator, backyard bullpen and assistant coach with you guys at
6:09
Hope International. You, you obviously join LOB on
6:14
the field. What was that the fall of 2023
6:17
going in the 2024 season, if I'm correct, that's when you
6:20
transfer it over from Cyprus. Did you work with Lob previously
6:24
at the Yard or is that kind of your intro to him?
6:27
That was the first time I had worked with him, but I was going
6:33
to, I was teammates with Connor and Trey at Cyprus and so they
6:36
had already been going to lob. They've been doing all the, you
6:40
know, the dock workouts in the Cypress gym and you know, you
6:44
see them doing this stuff over there, over there and you're
6:45
like, bro, what are you doing? Like come do the come do your
6:51
deadlifts. You know, we're doing just the
6:53
regular traditional strength and conditioning stuff and they're
6:56
over here doing these crazy workouts.
6:59
Fast forward a year later and you're like, oh, makes sense.
7:05
So that was that was the first time actually working with Lavas
7:09
in the fall of 23 and it was fun right away.
7:13
You could tell like this guy, this guy's a player's coach
7:17
fresh out from playing, so he gets it.
7:20
And he definitely made the pitching staff unified.
7:24
It was a whole lot of fun that that 2024 staff was a lot of
7:27
fun. The exclamation point of the
7:29
whole deal was winning the national championship, of
7:32
course. So that's that's not so bad.
7:34
Anything would be fun if you if you go out on top as a winner.
7:38
But before we spend too much time on the career at Hope, I
7:43
want to back pedal now. I want to back pedal to the
7:46
start. You said you graduated in 2018
7:49
from high school and we are now in 2026, so.
7:53
For. Those of you who aren't as
7:55
gifted with math, that means it has been eight years almost
8:01
since your high school graduation date and you're still
8:04
playing out the string college baseball.
8:06
I personally am jealous. I text friends of mine all the
8:09
time saying I think I have eligibility with all the new
8:11
rules. As far as I'm concerned, I still
8:13
have my medical waiver to use for my 6th year that I I'm
8:18
fighting here and there. I don't know when or where I'm
8:21
going to be able to use it, but I'm convinced I can still get it
8:23
if I pull on the right strings and call the right people.
8:27
So I don't know. Hope might be the spot for for
8:29
all I know with how NAIA works. I was going to say NAIA.
8:32
You get away with it for real. Get away with that being an AI.
8:36
What has transpired for how to still be in college baseball at
8:41
this point? So my first year at Cyprus, I
8:45
was going, that would have been the 2018-2019 year.
8:49
I red shirted that year. But we had this pitching staff
8:54
at Cypress College. We had five guys go D1 and
8:57
another one go to LC. Just a whole lineup of dogs.
9:02
So if you were incoming freshmen, odds are you're going
9:06
to end up either getting less than 10 innings and you're going
9:11
to lose out on your your freshman year of eligibility or
9:14
you red shirted a lot of guys red shirted.
9:17
I red shirted come back next year.
9:20
COVID cancels it. So red shirt COVID training with
9:25
Brian Bass down in Aliso. And he expressed to me even he
9:29
goes, you know what the amount of force that you're putting
9:32
out, I don't know if your body's built up.
9:34
Sure enough, we go first inner squad of September.
9:38
I throw a nasty change up. I think it broke 7 feet arm
9:43
side, but but I felt the the nastiest bite in my elbow and I
9:52
was like whoa, that wasn't right.
9:54
Tried to throw another pitch and I was like, I didn't say
9:58
anything. Ended up, you know, getting the
10:00
last out, still nothing but cut fastballs.
10:03
It's all I had, yeah. Should have had imaging done,
10:07
but I didn't. We tried to rehab it for later
10:09
on, get back that year, didn't work out.
10:12
I ended up losing that third year and the fourth year due to
10:17
Tommy John and then my fifth year, my freshman year.
10:22
So we played that last year at Cyprus, that fifth year at
10:26
Cyprus, and then in 24/23/24 is when I transferred over to Hope
10:31
and that's when I was a sophomore with six.
10:34
Clock had never really started at that point because I know red
10:38
shirts are a little bit funky, especially in the California
10:41
Community College system because nobody's on money.
10:45
You always have to remind people of that when you have the
10:47
discussions. It's almost like club ball in a
10:50
sense. I mean, granted, it's the best
10:52
club ball around. I'm not.
10:54
I'm not trying to make people think California junior college
10:57
baseball is some joke. Obviously you said you had all
11:00
those guys sign D1, but guys aren't scholarship guys don't
11:04
have housing, guys don't have whatever.
11:06
So it's almost like it's back to like youth travel ball in a
11:10
sense, like you're paying to be a part of this team more or
11:12
less, and you just have to take class.
11:14
Thus your your clock never started.
11:16
So then it let's just summarize. So for lack of better
11:21
terminology, weren't good enough your first year because your
11:25
your staff was a bunch of dogs. Yeah.
11:28
Get hurt, Get hurt in the fall of your sophomore year.
11:31
Yeah. COVID.
11:33
Sorry, missed the. Next year COVID.
11:35
COVID. Then Tommy John, Tommy John
11:38
which rehab two years for Yep, and then play one year.
11:43
So then you finally play one year, sign out of Cyprus to
11:48
Hope, and now we're a sophomore at Hope at this point in the
11:52
2023-2024 year with one collegiate baseball season under
11:57
your belt. That is correct.
11:59
That's. Absolutely insane.
12:01
So let's spend a little bit of time on the Tommy John.
12:03
I know this is like a lot of years.
12:06
You obviously didn't have flex pro way back then and we're
12:09
we're treating you like an old man now.
12:11
Like how could you ever recount what happened way back in 2021?
12:15
But how did you feel about your rehab process?
12:20
What do you think, if anything was missing?
12:24
Do you think you guys like were absolutely nails on certain
12:27
pieces? Obviously we're asking to play
12:30
2020 hindsight. However, you're also, knock on
12:33
wood, healthy and dominating now.
12:36
So it's not like we can say like, oh, my rehab was super
12:39
shitty. You obviously you're at a.
12:41
Point no it was that was probably more so the reason why
12:45
it did take the whole 2 years I had.
12:48
So I first inner squad is when I I popped it, I went over to the
12:52
trainers, they did the tests. They were under the impression
12:56
it was a strain. So I'm thinking, you know, woo
13:00
Hoo, it's not torn, you know, I get.
13:02
Six weeks, I'll be back. Yeah, right.
13:05
So you progress through the throwing program, which I did.
13:08
And then I got to the bullpen stage and I remember I was
13:13
throwing it at like 75% in the pen.
13:15
And Rachel and Nicolette, they, they are the trainers over at
13:20
Cypress College, bless them. They, they got me through all
13:23
that. They were there for when they
13:26
told me, you know, how much the rehab was going to be and this
13:30
and that, they you know, I cried.
13:32
It was, you know how it is. Whole world comes crashing down.
13:35
But yeah, we ended up doing about four months worth of
13:43
prehab. It was rehab which turned into
13:45
prehab when we found out that it's torn like you're you're at
13:50
it 8590% tear. You got to have surgery.
13:54
And so I'm like, oh boy, I'm thinking I wasted all that time.
13:59
Well, I have the surgery and right away in the first post op
14:05
I had where they take the cast off Shepherd, doctor Shepherd.
14:09
He's like, dude, you got great mobility.
14:12
And I remember he takes my elbow and he he straightens it out and
14:16
I could feel all the scar tissue breaking and I could feel the
14:19
blood rush through the fingertips and rush back up into
14:22
my head. And I got all light headed and
14:25
it was just half of it was I was scared that he just snapped my
14:30
snapped my arm back again. But and then we go over to SMI
14:36
with Joan. It was funny.
14:37
Cody Ponce, he was, he was there the same time I was every
14:42
Tuesday morning at 7:30. We both had, we both had PT in
14:47
there. And so it's cool to see him
14:50
progress through the KBO, then to go over to Japan or while he
14:53
was in Japan, then to go to the KBO and then get signed.
14:58
It was devastating watching the his outing.
15:02
Hopefully he gets better soon. That that sucked to see.
15:06
But yeah, they took really good care of me over there at, at
15:09
SMI. It was long, it was meticulous.
15:11
It sucked. It's a mental battle that they
15:15
all kind of tell you like, hey, like this is going to be like,
15:19
this is going to be long. Are you sure you want to go
15:21
through this? And you're still like, yes, like
15:23
I want to play ball again. Come on, like, let's do this.
15:25
And then you're 13 months into it and you're like, Oh my gosh,
15:30
I just want my identity back. Couldn't even golf for the 1st
15:34
10. You know, what are you?
15:36
What are you supposed to do? Yeah.
15:38
No baseball, no golf. Like who am I now?
15:40
I, I couldn't hold the fishing rod.
15:43
I couldn't go fishing because that's I'm holding, I'm holding
15:46
it in my left hand. I'm ambidextrous and certain
15:50
things. But yeah, it was just a, a long
15:54
rehab process. That was the same time Dustin
15:57
May needed to have his second Tommy John and I was being asked
16:03
to go fill in for, I forget which summer ball team.
16:06
And that happened and I was like, no way.
16:09
I'm not. I'm going to take the extra two
16:12
months, do my throwing progression at Cyprus and be
16:17
ready to go for season. So it was a little bit longer of
16:22
a rehab than it normally would have been, but ultimately I
16:24
think it was better playing chess, not checkers.
16:28
Same thing with the eligibility. During that time I went part
16:31
time for school. That way I didn't burn semesters
16:35
that I wasn't playing with. You know what I'm saying?
16:38
There are certain things that I did think and it was going to
16:41
buy me more time to play Division One, but because I went
16:47
part time, I didn't have the amount of credits.
16:49
So it was, I had like 3D twos in Colorado, Dominguez Hills, San
16:55
Marcos, another one in Oregon, Washington.
16:59
And then Pope and Hope was like, hey, you know, online classes,
17:05
we have a field job because they heard that I love to do the
17:08
mound at Cyprus. That's my pregame ritual.
17:11
And they're like, we got a mound here that you could do and we'll
17:14
pay you. That's my scholarship.
17:16
You know, the field job was my scholarship.
17:18
So which you know what? I don't know if I'm able to say
17:22
that. I'm pretty sure I'm able to say
17:24
that. It's like work study, I mean.
17:26
It is, it is a real thing that it is work study don't work.
17:29
Genuinely a work study. OK, OK.
17:30
You're not going to lose eligibility for that.
17:32
No, no, man, You're good. Good, good check, good check on
17:35
yourself. But no, that that's the thing at
17:37
every school, especially, I mean, I don't know, I can't
17:40
speak to what's going on now at like the Power 4 schools.
17:43
Those dudes don't do work. Study.
17:45
But no, they get nil. They get.
17:47
Yeah, they get everything. I just only got played in the
17:49
tape with a bunch of those guys and I'm sitting there like damn
17:51
good team manager, nice. Doing team laundry, like that's
17:55
work study stuff. Doing whatever it is going to
17:57
work, going to work that the lines or be like a ball chaser
18:01
at volleyball or soccer games, that's work.
18:03
Study stuff that happened at my schools.
18:05
All right, don't worry. Because I said that and I was
18:07
like, wait a minute. We're leaving this in and the
18:10
reason we're leaving it in is maybe this will provide
18:12
reassurance to others out there that are in a similar position,
18:15
like no, it is OK to accept money to do work.
18:18
Yeah, especially now with Nili think think you could could I
18:21
think all that has gone out the window now.
18:23
So I just had AI just had a little scare for no reason.
18:27
It's all good. Wouldn't you entice the?
18:29
Thing to get you to hope we're like hey man, well you can do
18:32
the mound here. Honestly, that was sold.
18:35
I was sold. They said.
18:36
They said, look, we know you love to do the mound, we'll pay
18:40
you to do it. And I was like, no way like you
18:43
will. And on top of that, at the time
18:46
the pitching coach was not lobbed, it was Gavin.
18:51
This is actually what sold me. I'm going to hope he goes as a
18:55
pitcher. When I was in college, I hated
18:57
shagging BP too. So pitchers, once they get their
19:01
work done, they get the conditioning, you know, you guys
19:04
are good to go. I'm like, no freaking way.
19:07
I'm there. I hate shagging BP.
19:10
It used to be fun and then now you get older and you're just
19:13
like. Now you're 5-6 years into
19:16
college baseball. Yeah, you're like.
19:19
I'm screaming at people why are you fouling the ball off in BP?
19:22
Like, holy cow, you're you're paying to go play fetch
19:26
essentially. But yeah, I know.
19:29
So he sold me on that. I'm like, hell yeah, no BP any
19:32
shagging. Well, then I come to find out
19:35
which great news. You know, he's leaving lobs
19:39
coming and I'm like, that's that's phenomenal.
19:43
You know, I was talking to Trey at that time and how much is the
19:47
yard be 50 a month and I don't know if I could do that.
19:52
Shoot, let's see. We'll have to work something
19:54
out. Oh, he's going to be our
19:55
pitching coach now. Let's go.
19:57
You know, like it was just everything kind of fell into
19:59
place. But as much as I not take
20:03
advantage because it's utilizing my resources and having LOB, I
20:07
went up to Canada for a summer, preached his name out there
20:11
everywhere I go paying Lobdale pack our bullpens, you know, So
20:15
it's trying to give credit where credit is due for sure.
20:19
I want to hang our hats on one thing real quickly in Tommy John
20:24
discussion. It sounds like for you, given
20:28
your emotional reaction that you said you experienced with your
20:32
athletic trainers back at Cyprus, you talked about having
20:36
the impression when you saw Dustin may get hurt again after
20:39
returning. It sounds like for you a lot of
20:44
a lot of the physical stress wasn't necessarily the problem.
20:48
It was more dealing with the mental struggles of 100% am I
20:53
ready? So what do you think ultimately
20:56
gave you that pat on the back or reassurance that you are
21:01
emotionally and mentally ready to pick up the ball and go
21:05
again? Honestly, it was the time it was
21:09
Joan at SMII was itching to get back to it.
21:13
Now you got to remember this is after COVID, you know, so like I
21:17
redshirted, wasn't able to play. Then COVID comes along and takes
21:23
it from you and you're like, man, like I'm itching to get
21:27
back out there. Then I pop my elbow and now it's
21:33
a this is AI did the math. It was over almost 1200 days
21:40
over three years and I was just itching to get back.
21:45
So I think it was understanding that look, I came back to Cyprus
21:50
physically ready. You know, you know how PT is.
21:53
You start working on muscle groups that you had no idea even
21:56
existed. You know, I had what, what do
21:59
you mean? My so as what even is a so as
22:03
muscle, you know, like you have to have people explain things to
22:06
you so that we understand how your body works.
22:09
So people always would say like, oh, you had Tommy John.
22:13
Did it make you throw harder? It's like, no, like that's,
22:18
that's not how it works now. Yes, they took my the that extra
22:22
vein out of your wrist. I was going to I was going to
22:26
hold off on the name for the for the joke, the punchline, But
22:29
after I had come out of surgery, they go, hey doc, you know, how
22:34
is it? I'm all loopy.
22:35
You're good, you're good. You had a real nice palmaris
22:40
longus. And so we're able to, we've been
22:42
in there, sew it up and I go, that's what she said.
22:47
Hey, dude, you started laughing inside.
22:50
So everyone, my palmaris longus. I go, yeah, I got a nice
22:53
palmaris longus, that being the initial reaction.
22:56
Coming out of surgery, anesthesia is incredible.
23:00
We got to look at the inner workings of the Josh Landry
23:03
mind. I think with the wrong side of
23:04
my brain. I'm a lefty.
23:06
They say lefties are weird. I I'll wear that proudly.
23:09
We are, we're, we're different. But to circle back to the mental
23:15
and physical side of returning from Tommy John, look, you've
23:18
done the work you've done and you have to be disciplined in
23:23
doing your rehab. You have to understand like,
23:26
hey, man, you're laying low. You're staying under the radar.
23:30
You're stacking your chips up so that way you can cash in one
23:33
day. And that's genuinely how I felt
23:36
about it. So when I came back and it was
23:39
cool, you had a bomb bomber over there.
23:43
He's the coach of FJC. He came across the field to
23:47
shake my hand and he was like, hey, big man, I heard what
23:51
happened and I'm I'm stoked to see you back out here.
23:57
We even had PT. He actually would come in and
23:59
we'd have PT together at SMI. He would be there sometimes.
24:03
So it's cool to hear that from other people and know like, OK,
24:06
cool. I'm, I'm on the right path, I'm
24:07
doing what I'm supposed to be doing and it's paying off.
24:11
It's a little bit of that validation.
24:13
So yeah, as long as you stick to do in your rehab, you stick to
24:16
doing the work, you shouldn't be questioning anything.
24:19
You should be getting to the point to where everything you do
24:23
off the field, even now, everything I do off the field is
24:27
so that way when I get to touch the ball, it goes the way we
24:30
want it to go. It was a little bit rough that
24:32
first year. They always say command is
24:34
usually an issue and looking back, it definitely was.
24:38
But at the time I was like, wow, I'm in and around the zone like
24:42
this is great. And and now as you evolve into a
24:46
different picture, you're like, wow, no wonder had arm issues,
24:50
man. Your your body is not moving
24:51
right. But yeah, I would just say it's
24:54
more so just it was a thirst to get back out there.
24:57
I've been gone for almost 4 years.
25:00
I posted the the memoir that Michael Jordan I'd sent out on
25:04
his return from retirement after he came back from the White Sox.
25:08
Then it was just two words. I'm back.
25:11
I think actually ever since then, I watched The Last Dance
25:14
every time I I take the ball. So I think that's what started
25:18
it. So it's a, it's definitely the
25:20
mentality of just being like, I'm ready to go.
25:23
I'm ready to go when we get back out there.
25:25
That's cool. I'm happy to hear that from you
25:29
that actually having the time was beneficial because my line
25:35
of work is obviously to help guys stay on the field or get
25:41
back to the field. And we can look at muscular
25:44
readiness, tendon readiness, and offer all these objective points
25:49
to try to make sure an athlete is in the proper place.
25:53
But we need to acknowledge that feel is also a very real thing,
25:59
that the athletes mental state is also a very real thing.
26:02
And sometimes it is the data that can help support the
26:06
athlete and let them know that you are doing the right things
26:09
and it is now time for you to go.
26:12
You've checked every box, you're good and that offers
26:15
reassurance. But for others, it is truly just
26:19
having the time away to themselves, looking back at what
26:23
they had gone through all the work in having that itch, that
26:27
fire again, like literally having you having the ball taken
26:32
from you for four years. That yes, it was probably
26:35
difficult to get over the hurdle of like kind of like the devil,
26:39
an Angel on your shoulder saying like, oh, it's been so long,
26:42
like you're not going to be ready to go back.
26:44
But on the other side of like, Nah, man, it's time.
26:47
You can do this. You you've trusted the process,
26:50
you've put in all the work that you can put in, you'll be OK.
26:55
Yep. Well, that is awesome and I
26:57
appreciate you sharing all that. And now let's move on a little
27:02
bit from the injury and you began to talk about some of your
27:05
performance. Now you cemented your names in
27:10
the record books at Hope International as a starting
27:12
pitcher. However, when you made your
27:14
return, you were a reliever at Cyprus and you were a reliever
27:19
your first year at Hope. Was that come back to being a
27:23
reliever because the team was still so stacked?
27:26
Was it trying to manage your innings or were you just not
27:29
good enough at that point to be the starting pitcher?
27:34
You could ask Carlos Gonzalez over there at Cyprus.
27:37
I think I was in his ear just about every day.
27:39
Lois, give me the ball. Give me the ball.
27:42
When are you going to let me start Lois?
27:44
I'm sick of coming in in the 4th inning and going 5 innings like
27:50
I was the the O shoot guy for Cyprus.
27:53
We had Trey, who is a guarantee. I I don't think I ever pitched
27:58
behind Trey until we got into the playoffs.
28:01
It was a guarantee and then we had Connor.
28:05
I love you Connor. I had I had to come in behind
28:08
Connor decent amount. I think 50% of the time now I'm
28:12
getting 2020 mixed up because I know that year I was supposed to
28:17
take over for one of our starters, Patti Monroe, I was
28:20
supposed to take over his role. And that was at Saddleback on
28:24
the day that NBA canceled their season, V league was canceling
28:29
theirs and all of a sudden the domino effect was going on.
28:31
So it was I was flirting with that starting role for so long,
28:38
but they found more value in me being an oh shoot guy out of the
28:42
pen. You know, when I could come in,
28:44
shut the door. I I scalloped so many wins that
28:48
year. I think I had, I think I had
28:50
more wins than our third starter just based off of coming in in
28:54
the 4th, 5th inning and. Right, and coming in at the
28:56
right time. And just taking it the rest of
28:59
the way it's. Landry's win now.
29:01
Yeah. And it was just like, come on,
29:03
let me, let me start this. That way we could, you know,
29:07
start the game with the lead instead of trying to push this
29:11
rock uphill. Why are we doing that?
29:13
So it was also my first year off of TJ.
29:18
So it was more so like understanding I'm not going to
29:22
be a starter. I'm going to be in this this
29:25
limited role. I think I only had 36 innings
29:28
that year. But then we go to hope.
29:31
And again, I was a bullpen guy who was who was it was me.
29:36
There's a picture. I'm trying to remember who it
29:39
was. I think it was me and Chili.
29:42
We were the the O shoot bullpen guys.
29:44
It was me and him high leverage. And then the starters took a
29:50
picture in the beginning of the year and I just the in the back
29:53
of the room. I just go for our media day and
29:56
I just go, that ain't going to last long.
29:58
It's like, yeah, take a picture of that again in three months.
30:03
And sure enough, it was a different looking starting
30:05
rotation. We had Tyler Tilton go down with
30:09
a knee injury and they were like, hey, like you're next in
30:14
line. And boy, I took that.
30:16
I took that crumb and I, I freaking ran with it.
30:19
And I had, I had no intentions of giving that cookie back
30:22
anytime soon. Even this year, who tilt his
30:26
back. He's one of our starters again
30:28
and he's like Andre, I want my 7 innings back because I've been
30:32
the seven inning demon. You know, I go out there and I
30:35
just, I go 6 and then Lob pulls me because he doesn't want me to
30:39
break his record. That's right.
30:42
That's confirmed. I have text to show that it's
30:47
text. So we don't know.
30:49
We don't know if he's joking or not.
30:50
I saw. I'm taking this as a serious
30:52
admission of guilt that Bob is pulling you specifically because
30:57
he doesn't want you breaking his complete games record.
31:00
I wish I can screen record right now and send you the picture of
31:04
what my profile pic is for LOB. It's a text message from him
31:09
saying 5 CGS for the record next year sound like that and I was
31:13
like I'm a hold you to it. I I think I should have 5 CG
31:17
Chevy's this year, but I think I only have three right now.
31:21
Because he keeps following you. Yeah, Larry, Larry, let me do
31:26
it, please. Yeah.
31:27
So I, I took over the the starting role and that's when I
31:32
started to evolve as a pitcher. That's when I started doing
31:35
starter lifts, started doing these dock workouts.
31:39
My game evolved and I got a whole lot better.
31:42
So yeah, I think it was. I had always been a starter at
31:47
Cypress High School. I was a starter get into Cypress
31:50
College, and that's the only place that I really wasn't a
31:52
starter. But I would throw starter
31:56
innings, you know? So then Tommy John happens,
32:00
limited bullpen innings, get to hope, work my way, crawl my way
32:04
out of the bullpen. I just been running with it ever
32:07
since. So I've definitely prefer
32:09
starting. I like having my routines, even
32:13
in summer ball because in 2024 I went up to Canada to go play
32:18
with the medicine at Mavericks and I was a reliever up there.
32:22
I only had, I had 36 innings exactly to pitch up there.
32:28
That was all I had left. I'm sorry, No 26.
32:31
I think I had 26 innings. So I'm like sweet, 26 saves,
32:36
let's do it, you know? And that was the league where it
32:38
was like you're either blowing the team out or you're getting
32:42
blown out. And one in every three to four
32:45
games was a close game. So I didn't pitch too much up
32:50
there because there wasn't enough high leverage innings for
32:52
me to pitch my innings. And then we get to playoffs and
32:57
I have 14 innings left. So I go to the coach on my hey,
33:00
I'm a starter. I think I gave you the best shot
33:03
to beat these guys. And sure enough, we go out to
33:06
Saskatoon Berries and I had a 88 innings pitched, A100120
33:14
pitches. But BLOB, when you're watching
33:15
this, sorry I didn't tell you. That it's in the past.
33:18
Yeah, it's in the past. Yeah, I had. 12 You're stronger
33:21
for it now. Yeah, yeah.
33:23
I made the whole city of Saskatoon shut up.
33:26
It was great. I felt like I felt like Curt
33:31
Schilling telling the story how he's making making all of New
33:36
York shut up. Oh man.
33:37
I was on the Ripper that day. It was great.
33:39
It was so much fun. I never heard that many people
33:42
get that quiet and it was loud like it was The silence was loud
33:47
and I was having so much fun up there.
33:49
The Western Canada League is crazy, man.
33:52
It is so I was, I was playing with Med Hat, which is the East
33:56
Division, and you got some real dinosaur franchises over there
34:01
like Wayburn. Woo Hoo, I hated going away.
34:04
Burn. You're playing in the middle of
34:05
a horse track. Yeah, you got you got some some
34:09
of the newer stuff on the West Coast, on the West side.
34:12
You know Okotoks Energy City. You know what is the one up to
34:17
Fort Mac? You know, there's some big
34:19
stadiums. But yeah, I got 2 appearances as
34:24
a starter out there. Came back as a starter for all
34:28
of last year and then I went out to the Cape this past summer as
34:33
a starter. And then that transition, I
34:38
don't know if I should have prepped better.
34:41
I wasn't able to do my, my normal routines that I normally
34:44
do. So my V low was down and I'm
34:48
thinking, oh, but it was, I was, I was getting outs.
34:51
Everything was going great. But I'm like, I look back at the
34:54
board like, oh boy, 8485, what what is going on?
35:01
Like this is not good. This is not the place to be
35:03
doing this right now. A stouting I had out there.
35:06
I finally had a week's worth of time where I was able to do long
35:09
toss, do my stuff like a starter would.
35:13
And I go 5 innings in the Eastern Conference championship
35:17
game, no runs. I threw a jam.
35:19
I know it was it was amazing. It was it was beautiful.
35:22
And I would look back at the scoreboard and I was back up to
35:25
88 and I was like sweet. So there definitely is a a big
35:29
transition difference between bullpen and starting.
35:33
I would much rather be starting. And you know, I'll do whatever I
35:36
got to do. Trust me.
35:37
Don't get me wrong, I'll do whatever I got to do to help our
35:40
guys win, to help whatever team I'm on win, and I'll do it
35:43
proudly. But if I had to pick the two, I
35:46
would say starting. Yeah, starting is fun.
35:49
We're going to give you the opportunity now to to your own
35:53
horn for a little bit. You obviously you had tremendous
35:58
success statistically last year. You're having a statistically
36:02
great season this year. Back in your first year with
36:05
hope you had a good year, but not compared to what you had
36:09
last year and what you're having this year.
36:11
What do you credit the statistical transformation to
36:16
Ayton Lobdell? No, but seriously, the the
36:21
picture I am now is leaps and bounds away from who I was in
36:27
2324. Mechanically, my body wasn't
36:30
moving properly. The things that I was learning
36:33
at 24 years old are things that I wish I would have learned at
36:38
17/18/19. It it just, it so happened to be
36:44
a little bit later and that's fine.
36:46
I got to learn, I got to get better, but I was just starting
36:51
to starting to do those, those dock lifts, starting to do all
36:55
the starter routines. So I think my body and my game
37:00
was still adjusting to being in that role versus being a bullpen
37:04
guy where it's like every day you got to be WAR, Every day is
37:09
WAR, every day is a Red Bull, you know, that gets exhausted.
37:14
That's very tiring at the end of the season when you're supposed
37:18
to be the high leverage guy. It is fun because you're like
37:23
every game I get to go. But shifting to be able to hone
37:28
that in on one day, it took a little bit of an adjusting to as
37:33
a bullpen guy, you get your reps every day.
37:34
You're you're playing catch every day.
37:37
As a starter, you have certain high intent days, certain low
37:44
intent days and certain moderate days.
37:46
So everything's scheduled to where that way you can maximize
37:49
your output on one certain day. And again, the lifts, the
37:55
workouts that go into that, I was still trying to figure out,
37:59
it's like I was like a baby, baby deer.
38:03
I remember first starting to do these workouts and just thinking
38:05
to myself, am I, am I cut out for this?
38:09
Like, what am I doing? My body hurts so bad doing these
38:14
lifts. And it did.
38:15
That's another thing the adjustment that my body
38:18
physically had to make took time to be honest.
38:22
And so I think that's what that was in 23 and 24.
38:25
I was just working on fine tuning things that were rusty or
38:31
that I didn't have. And then last year, last year,
38:35
me and Trey went to the yard. We pitched every day together.
38:40
We were both the the day one, game one and two.
38:43
It was 100% success rate. And we knew that because we knew
38:48
like we're playing a team that we know we're going to beat.
38:50
It's like, hey, all right, whoever has the best outing, you
38:55
know, buys a round of golf or whatever it is, you know, or
39:00
that, I'm sorry, whoever has the worst, you know, between the two
39:03
of us buys another golf. And we were in the yard together
39:06
every day. We had the same workouts.
39:09
We pushed each other like it was the epitome of iron sharpens
39:13
iron, and we pushed each other. We both knew that we're both
39:18
aces and neither one of us wanted to let the other one
39:21
haven't went up on each other. But I love Trey like no other.
39:26
He's a brother to me. You have bled together, we have
39:29
cried together, We have celebrated the highest of the
39:34
highs and we have fought through the lowest of the lows.
39:37
We were teammates at Cyprus. This is my first year and five
39:41
years that I haven't had him next to me.
39:45
So adjusting to that this year and carrying that mentality into
39:50
this year. So that way I could still be,
39:54
you know, a well oiled machine. You know, I pivot towards Trey,
39:59
I'm coming after your wins record.
40:02
You know, I got him on that two wins ago.
40:05
Trey, I'm coming after your strikeout record.
40:07
I think I'm 10 away from I'm either 9 or 10 away from the all
40:11
time record there. So like there's.
40:14
A lot of things that is all right.
40:16
It's still me versus you, buddy. Like this is this is what's
40:20
helping me. And so I'm I'm a I'm a run with
40:24
it. All right, we're going to go
40:25
summary mode again real quick. So you feel one of the major
40:29
jumps for you just came from being physically prepared.
40:33
Whereas early on you you were just straight up competing with
40:36
what you had. But it took you truly a year to
40:40
get where you felt like you were physically prepared to handle
40:45
being a high level college pitcher and a starter at that.
40:48
Then this is where the questions actually going to come in.
40:52
And I find this very interesting because you hear people preach
40:55
constantly, especially in the sport of baseball, that you
40:59
should never compare yourself to anyone else.
41:01
You should always be concerned about your own process.
41:04
Nobody's the same. And of course, you know,
41:06
nobody's the same like that. It doesn't take a rocket
41:09
scientist to find out that you and Trey actually are different
41:13
pitchers. He's a super hard throwing
41:16
explosive righty and you're a long lefty with crazy deception
41:21
and all this. So you guys are getting your
41:23
results in very different ways. But why do you think you have
41:27
found success in trying to compete with those closest to
41:32
you as opposed to just solely focusing on you and you alone?
41:38
Well, as far as the team perspective, you're only as good
41:42
as your weakest link, right? So if I'm only focusing on me
41:48
and I'm not trying to share any of my knowledge with anyone else
41:54
and I'm closing doors off to my team mates, even if they're not
41:58
team mates and they're they're friends that play on other
42:01
teams. You know how tighten it the
42:02
baseball community is like that's like the number one way
42:06
to to castrate yourself from everyone else and isolate
42:09
yourself. I want to win.
42:11
I hate losing. And I think I think losing is
42:15
embarrassing because it means that look, unless, unless it was
42:19
a close game and he was like, man, you know, you give draw,
42:22
you give it 100% and you still didn't get it.
42:25
Then you know what, tip your cap.
42:26
That's fine. But let's be real.
42:29
How many times is it like that? Maybe 10% of the time.
42:32
It's like that. Nowadays at least, it seems that
42:35
everyone's just like, man, we got beat today.
42:38
Yeah, we got beat today because we don't do the stuff on the
42:41
side that is going to set us up to have success.
42:45
When it's time to go, you can't just expect things to fall into
42:48
place. And so I try and I try and
42:52
communicate that to my team mates.
42:54
Sometimes. I don't do it in the nicest
42:57
ways. And you know what, that's fine.
43:00
I tell people at the beginning of the year, look, we start the
43:03
year with 50 dudes. I am not going to know 50 of you
43:07
guys's names. I'm going to wait until you
43:09
prove yourself that you have some sort of value, and then I'm
43:13
going to remember your name. And I don't want to come off as
43:17
being a Dick. This is my eighth year of doing
43:20
this. I have, I can't remember
43:22
everyone's names. You know how hard it is to
43:24
remember 40 new names in the fall?
43:27
Like I'm trying to recognize faces.
43:29
So we get into inner squads, we get into finding out who our
43:34
team is really going to be. And then that's when you're
43:37
really able to double down and elaborate and know whose role is
43:42
going to be what and then help them get themselves comfortable
43:46
with it. But having having someone like
43:49
Trey, having someone like Thrift this year, it's thrifty.
43:52
You know, he's he's been nasty. So that's who I'm competing
43:57
against on this year on the the ERA leaderboards.
44:01
He's the number one. I'm going after him.
44:05
It's a very doggy dog world because we're not there yet.
44:09
You have to have that sort of mentality if you want to get to
44:12
the next level. Everyone wants to get to the
44:14
next level, but how are you going to separate yourself?
44:16
You got to go to war against, you know.
44:19
It sounds like this will be a decent call back, hopefully.
44:24
You talking about the Michael Jordan I'm back falling in love
44:28
with the Last Dance, watching that, using that to motivate
44:32
you. It sounds like that is kind of
44:34
crept into the way you go about your business, in your training,
44:37
your preparation as well, not just mentally, but I know that
44:41
was a big thing with Michael Jordan or whenever you hear Kobe
44:44
Bryant be talked about, either of them.
44:46
We're not going to let other people prevent them from having
44:49
success. And it sounds like in your
44:53
tenure, that is something that has become very important to
44:57
you. You have very specific goals,
45:01
both personally and for the team, and you are not going to
45:04
let someone else get in the way of you being able to achieve
45:09
your goal. Oh, believe me.
45:11
And I vocalize those those thoughts too.
45:13
And I have a lot of people or more people this year that have
45:18
issues with it. And at the same time, it's like,
45:20
well, those people are also the same people who are who are not
45:24
fully bought in. So you put two and two together,
45:29
you're a lively. Vet man No, I get it.
45:32
It's. Cool to have.
45:33
This conversation with you and I appreciate your ability to step
45:38
back and like actually assess your positioning here because
45:42
it's not like you're trying to have this conversation and be
45:45
like, people don't get me, they don't understand me.
45:47
I don't get it. You just have, you know, this is
45:50
finally your last year of college baseball, unless there's
45:54
something that I don't know about going on in the background
45:56
or somehow you're getting in 9th year.
45:58
But with this finally being your last year, like what is the
46:02
point of holding anything back? You want people to know exactly
46:06
who you are, what they're going to get on the daily basis and.
46:10
It's. Probably only worth doing if
46:13
you're going to go all the way anyways.
46:15
I'm sure that's how you feel at least.
46:17
To be honest with you, I've always been this way.
46:19
I've always, every single team that I've been on, I've I've
46:21
been put into a leadership role. Naturally, that happens after
46:26
your first year at JUCO. You're a returner, you're part
46:30
of the upper class, so automatically you're supposed to
46:34
have some sort of leadership responsibility.
46:37
But not everyone takes that on, so it falls onto a few
46:42
shoulders. Well, by the time it was my
46:45
fifth year, even though when I was doing rehab there at school,
46:51
not playing, I would show up to the field and I was still in a
46:54
leadership role. Guys were still coming up to me
46:59
asking advice as far as pitching.
47:01
So I was vocal throughout Cyprus, not as much, but when I
47:07
got to hope, I automatically took on that role because I know
47:12
who I am. I know what what was my
47:14
responsibility is. Larry and Phil even told me
47:17
like, look, I expect you to be in the leadership position.
47:19
You're an older guy, you've been around.
47:21
You know it's supposed to be done.
47:23
We would have guys here in VP again, don't stand in the effing
47:27
group during VP and I won't get mad and I'm not going to yell at
47:31
you. Everyone has a job to do during
47:34
VP. It is to go run down baseballs.
47:37
Why am I standing in left field by myself while there's 14 of
47:42
you guys in center field spread out?
47:45
So I got, I got very accustomed to yelling at people to spread
47:48
out. You'd have guys standing against
47:50
the fence in the shade and loud as have louder than the music,
47:55
get off the fence. And I would yell out people's
47:59
names. And you look in, you see the
48:01
coaches and they're smiling because they find it.
48:05
They find it amusing. They're like good yell at them,
48:07
yell at the people who aren't doing what they're supposed to
48:09
be doing. Being vocal has has definitely
48:13
been a part of my game as well. It just comes out.
48:18
I don't mean it all the time. You execute a pitch, you might
48:21
hear a, you know, a war cry. You know, you know, it's just
48:26
I'm not mad. Even if it's a ball, it's like
48:28
blue. I'm not mad at you.
48:30
I'm just I'm happy with the execution right there.
48:33
It's what we wanted. You know, every, every pitch
48:36
means something and everything you do means something on the
48:39
field. We do PF PS guy misses the ball,
48:43
throws it away. I'm the first person yelling hit
48:45
the pole. Hit the pole this year more than
48:49
ever Like I was saying we've had had more issues with guys this
48:53
year just because in 2024 I was a missing puzzle piece to an
49:00
already painted picture. Me and Trey and a few other guys
49:05
just were feelings to what they already had and we would hear
49:11
how they lost to Georgia Gwinnett at the World Series.
49:15
They lost to Georgia in the regional years prior to that.
49:20
They get walked off on it LC by LC, just this team has
49:26
experienced so much losing on the on the biggest stage, but
49:31
they won to get there and they just, they're right there.
49:35
And so we had that desperation to win for them.
49:38
And in our regional that year, I pitched Game 1 championship
49:41
game. I pulled a Kershaw moment.
49:44
I choked. And I remember being so
49:47
devastated, thinking to myself, wow, you just blew it for all
49:51
these seniors, man. Like these guys really cared and
49:55
you choked it for them and ultimately winning it all.
50:00
Just the standards that were set that year, majority of the guys
50:03
returning were bullpen guys. So we knew that we had to
50:07
maintain that same quota. We made some adjustments for
50:10
guys that were coming in because you can't have the same exact
50:14
identity every year new faces come in.
50:17
They have. Their own exact same team, As
50:20
much as you want to say it is, someone's gone, someone's new.
50:25
Like we had a for the most part, we had a whole new position
50:29
player roster. We had a few returners, but we
50:33
lost all of our infield, two of our outfielders.
50:37
So we had, so we had a lot of new faces coming in, but the
50:40
staff was able to maintain the culture and was able to uphold
50:45
the traditions and the standards.
50:48
This year, This year, it's like, it's like yelling at a brick
50:53
wall. Sometimes you know, it's I blew
50:58
up in the outfield one day during practice because we
51:01
already had to, we already had to run 45 seconds from foul pole
51:07
to foul pole twice, which neither time we made, but
51:12
blessed lob for not making us do it again because we didn't put
51:16
our BP away in time. We were it took us 3 minutes to
51:20
tear BP down when it should be under a minute and 30.
51:23
But realistically, when everyone locks in, we could do it within
51:28
55 seconds to a minute. That's the standard, right?
51:32
It's the little things. But guys didn't want to uphold
51:35
the standards. So we had to run.
51:37
And then after we ran, we get done with catch play.
51:40
We go to the back as you're sitting down.
51:42
I go, what are we doing? We have we have stuff to be
51:46
doing, man, we just ran and when I heard that I got I got about
51:54
this much peeved off right and immediately I go, what the you
51:59
mean that was punishment for not doing the little things right.
52:04
That wasn't conditioning. And the person who said it by my
52:08
tone right away in my response knew he messed up, put his head
52:12
down, grabbed his stuff, went over to where we do go do our
52:14
sprints. Someone else chimes in with some
52:18
stuff that really ticked me off. It's not that serious.
52:22
And I went from this piss to about like here and and I just,
52:29
I just blew up talking about have an obligation to uphold
52:34
standards. Why don't you guys stand for
52:36
something, you know, not being soft, but not in a nice way at
52:43
all. And so we all go, we do our
52:45
sprints, then we go out to shag BP.
52:48
And you would think after getting our our stuff pushed in
52:54
that guys would pull their heads out of their behind and go out
52:57
and do the little things, right? Nope.
53:01
Everyone starts standing around, balls are hitting the fence.
53:04
I could see Larry's shifting and I'm I just blew up.
53:09
I was like, there's a whole lot of in this group that needs to
53:13
re evac, look in the mirror and re evaluate what they want to be
53:16
doing here and what their role is in this program.
53:20
And I was hot BLOB comes walking out because all the coaches
53:24
could hear me blowing up and it's like, what's going on?
53:27
You want to put their two cents in about how this program should
53:31
be ran? You know, this and that.
53:33
And he's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, but it's it's passion.
53:37
I there's no reason that I should put in and other people
53:42
should put in as much work as we do for a select few to hold us
53:49
back. And I have no issue being the
53:52
voice for those other people that come to me with the same
53:56
issues and concerns. I have no problem.
53:58
You don't have to like me. You don't have to like me and I
54:01
don't have to like you. But on the ball field, I'll go
54:05
to war for you and I expect you to go to war for me.
54:07
But off the ball field, if you don't like how I handle things,
54:11
that's fine. That is fine by me.
54:13
Like, like we're, we're adults, that's fine.
54:17
But on the ball field, when we wear the uniform, you better DAP
54:20
me up because I'm gonna DAP you up and I'm gonna show you love.
54:22
You better show me love. It's that's just how it should
54:26
be. But yeah, there's a there's a
54:29
falling standard and I hate to see it.
54:32
My, my girlfriend's dad uses the analogy.
54:34
Don't catch a a falling knife, that's a falling knife that I
54:39
will grab 10 out of 10 times because I would rather grab the
54:42
knife by the blade and be the one to get cut then see the ship
54:46
sink because the blade hit the ground I had.
54:50
I have no problem being that voice and like my coaches have
54:54
to tell me sometimes hey tone it down some, but they never have
54:58
to tell me to turn it up I'm. Sure, they're gonna love this
55:02
part of the podcast then. When they go listen to it.
55:05
They'd be like, dude, what were you on going into that?
55:08
But I, I think, I think my job now is to make sure the masses
55:13
recognize what this means to you and also how good you guys
55:19
actually are. It's weird to say that you guys
55:23
are having a down year record wise because I mean the record
55:28
is not quite as good as it was the past two years and
55:32
performance. Wise.
55:33
Performance wise, that's that's also me saying it like, Oh my
55:36
gosh, you guys are the 18th team in the country right now
55:39
according to the rankings instead of the second team in
55:42
the country or the 7th team in the country or whatever you were
55:46
the prior years. So it's not like you guys are
55:48
bad. It's funny, like someone could
55:50
listen to this, have no idea what's going on the NAIA
55:53
baseball landscape and think like, whoa, they have really
55:56
fallen. They must have tanked.
55:59
Wow, this, this Landry guy is really up Schitt's Creek without
56:02
a pass. No, you're just you.
56:05
You just want to win a national championship.
56:07
And that's what I was trying to allude to at the front of this
56:10
podcast is you've been a part of very special teams and I know
56:15
this program is special to you, so you want to go out with that
56:19
special moment. And it's not, it's not like the
56:22
year can't be special without a national championship, but it's
56:27
just way sweeter if you do win the national championship.
56:31
So maybe, maybe we take the lighter side now, just for a
56:35
moment after we saw you get heated.
56:37
And now, now we talk about the ways you celebrate instead of
56:41
the ways that you get peeved off.
56:44
So I have heard you're a big protein consumer and the way you
56:48
reward yourself post game is with a steak.
56:51
And it seems like you have very specific cuts of meat or types
56:56
of meat that it has to. Be.
56:59
Yeah, I guess. Yeah, Wagyu steak is the proper
57:01
way to reward yourself. But hey, I guess that kicks off
57:04
the recovery process. So how?
57:06
Did this. Tradition start like what's
57:09
going on man, It's just like that.
57:11
Wagyu steak is just the best way to recover postgame.
57:14
Man, well, this, this, it was on a road trip.
57:17
We're in Arizona. It was all over 100°.
57:19
So they push the games back. So we have all day.
57:22
So we were just bored trying to find places to go, things to do,
57:29
found a shop down the corner that is a box of Wagyu.
57:34
And then I looked at it and I was like, you know what, I had,
57:38
I miss Wagyu. I need that.
57:40
I'm going to get that, I think. I think the boys will like that
57:43
as well. So yeah.
57:45
And then it's just a Wagyu. It just.
57:49
Became tradition from there. Yeah, pretty much.
57:53
Just I think that's about as far into depth as I could go into
57:57
Wagyu. Hey, you got to let some things
58:00
be team things. I'll I'll reserve.
58:03
I'll reserve any fishing questions, but I'm glad to know
58:07
that the boys are fed. The higher ups are reporting the
58:10
Wagyu. The boys are fed and that that
58:13
makes me feel good. I I love those little like
58:15
inside team jokes and just how like traditions can start.
58:19
I I think that stuff's hilarious.
58:22
Yeah. I mean, don't fix what isn't
58:24
broken. If you if you want to celebrate
58:27
some wins with some high cuts of meat, by all means, go for it.
58:32
I got new. As long as there's as long as
58:34
there's no mouse traps, can't do my cap to the guys from last
58:38
year's, can't do the mouse traps.
58:41
OK, well, I'm gonna, I'm gonna let that one be.
58:43
I feel like that is too far off the deep end.
58:46
Like this is we're getting in. We're getting into like Nick
58:49
Saban rat poison territory of just like things being planted
58:53
and like that's us. That's that's them trying to
58:56
take us down. That's almost what this sounds
58:59
like to me. Is you guys have had so much
59:02
success? For so long that you need to
59:05
find things to keep you and the boys motivated.
59:09
Maybe that's just the take Is Joshua Landry is closer to Nick
59:14
Saban than I ever could have imagined.
59:16
That's what I'm walking away from this interview with.
59:19
You know, when you put it that way, I could kind of see it.
59:24
You're willing to celebrate, but you'll only celebrate.
59:27
When the job is. Done.
59:29
The job has to be done. It's something to where it's not
59:33
only a superstition, but I find it actually is.
59:37
It's the baseball gods. You know how it is they see,
59:42
they see what you do. Even this year it's been
59:46
something that I'd still, it's like no job's got to get done.
59:50
We have guys that go play poker. You know, they have the the
59:55
poker tournament at the house and I would I would love to go,
59:59
but you guys love to to play poker the night before I pitch
1:00:04
and I can never do that so. Hey, I'm glad some of the
1:00:08
routines have stuck. You seem to be a a man that
1:00:12
sticks to the script. No matter what that script is,
1:00:15
it's going to be your script. And I respect that.
1:00:17
So Josh, we have now come to the part of the podcast which is
1:00:21
potentially the toughest question of the day.
1:00:25
What, if anything, did we miss in that you feel we still need
1:00:29
to get off your chest? Well, I want to more so no,
1:00:33
because walking through the Guardians, because this is when
1:00:37
something I wanted to ask you when I was walking through the
1:00:39
Guardians complex, I saw and you know how it is.
1:00:44
Anyone who has a flex pro recognizes the case, right?
1:00:48
So I look up and I see three flex pros sitting in the
1:00:52
trainer's office on top of the the cabin.
1:00:56
And I look at the look at the forget his name.
1:01:00
He's the the Guardians facility director there.
1:01:02
Now look at him. I go those flex Bros.
1:01:05
Oh yeah, they got about 100 more of them over on the minor
1:01:08
leagues side. I was like, damn.
1:01:12
So how did how did you come into working that out?
1:01:17
How did? Because seeing that was sick
1:01:20
being like, whoa, we got those. I know what those are, you know,
1:01:24
like. Yeah, getting started with the
1:01:25
Guardians is kind of a funny story.
1:01:29
If we really tell the full Guardian story, I'll spare some
1:01:33
of the details. But while we were starting to
1:01:36
spread a little bit in Major League Baseball, we routinely
1:01:38
would send out emails about the research that we were doing or
1:01:43
like what we believe we can provide with Flexpro.
1:01:46
And this might have been back now in maybe the spring of 2022.
1:01:54
Yeah, that sounds about right. I think this might have been
1:01:56
spring of 2022. Now we get an e-mail from
1:02:00
someone with the Guardians. I don't know their title and I'm
1:02:04
pretty positive they are no longer there, but it was someone
1:02:07
like high enough up that it was like we had to listen.
1:02:12
They said in their response like thank you for the continued
1:02:16
updates. We are not interested in Flexpro
1:02:18
Grip and please refrain from emailing us going forward.
1:02:22
We will let you know if we ever have any interest again.
1:02:26
And so so we got like a very politically correct, very kindly
1:02:31
worded, stop talking to us, like just go away.
1:02:35
And so we're like, all right, well, I guess the Guardians
1:02:37
aren't interested. Year and a half later, maybe.
1:02:41
Yeah, I think like 2024, we get outreach from the guardians
1:02:46
saying like, hey, we've been hearing a little bit about this
1:02:48
like flex pro grip stuff. Like, is there a way we could
1:02:52
like try something out? And we're like, Oh yeah, like
1:02:56
we've got like all this stuff that we've been doing for the
1:02:58
past year and a half, but we haven't sent it over to you
1:03:00
because this. And we forward the e-mail back
1:03:03
to them because we still had it. And they were like, OK, I
1:03:06
totally understand. Not sure how that was
1:03:08
communicated. But that person is no longer
1:03:10
with us. We are very much interested in
1:03:13
Flexpro Grip and would love to learn more about how we could
1:03:16
get involved with what you guys do and what started with the
1:03:19
Guardian. So we, we just did testing.
1:03:23
They didn't do any training whatsoever and they just wanted
1:03:26
to do testing with a handful of individuals, handful of players.
1:03:29
Then after doing initial testing, they were like, well,
1:03:33
this is dumb. If we just test and we find out
1:03:36
like some guys are in a good spot and some guys are in a
1:03:38
crappy spot, then like what do we actually do with these guys
1:03:42
who are in a crappy spot? So then it turned around from
1:03:46
just testing to trialling some training and actually like
1:03:49
having an initial like test group or like beta group for the
1:03:54
Guardians. And they had positive results.
1:03:57
The guys enjoyed it. The the organization really
1:04:00
liked the direction it was headed.
1:04:01
So then we get called out to start working with their
1:04:05
incoming draft guys for that 2024 draft.
1:04:10
Then going in 2025 spring training, they test all across
1:04:14
the organization and all training is still optional
1:04:18
because of course professional baseball, you can't force anyone
1:04:21
to do anything. So guys still have to opt into
1:04:23
it, but they test all their guys as a part of their physical
1:04:26
assessments. 2026 the exact same thing.
1:04:30
So there's guys in the organization that we work with
1:04:32
directly on their programming. There's other guys that get
1:04:35
their programming directly from the medical department, and then
1:04:38
there's guys that just assess when they're told to do their
1:04:42
testing and that's their only involvement with the device.
1:04:45
But yeah, we we've now had the Guardians as a partner
1:04:47
organization since 2024. OK.
1:04:50
So that's that's how you devised all the long holds and
1:04:56
essentially all of them, OK. Like some of it is like working
1:05:00
with those pro orgs where it becomes very helpful is devising
1:05:03
more like the in season programming stuff in determining
1:05:07
where do we feel players, not only from a physiological
1:05:11
perspective, like according to the literature are getting the
1:05:14
greatest positive effects, but also from the subjective side.
1:05:19
Like the feedback where they're telling us this is where we feel
1:05:23
our best or we are still seeing positive objective results, but
1:05:29
feeling amazing as opposed to as you know what?
1:05:32
You can do something that's amazing on paper, but makes you
1:05:35
feel like shit. And truthfully, like at the
1:05:37
beginning of our days with Flexpro Grip, we probably did a
1:05:41
little bit too much of that where we just followed the
1:05:43
literature to AT and we're pushing guys harder than they
1:05:47
needed to be pushed. And one of the greatest things
1:05:50
we learned from the Guardians organization is actually
1:05:53
stepping things back a little bit.
1:05:55
They would admit they probably operate a little bit more
1:05:57
conservatively on the training side and even seeing the
1:06:01
positive adaptations that have occurred from handling guys a
1:06:05
little bit more conservatively opened.
1:06:08
Our. Eyes to what can happen even at
1:06:11
lower intensities or lower loads and then reserving the higher
1:06:15
intensity dosages for either a certain time of year or certain
1:06:19
athletes that are like, yeah, I need it.
1:06:20
Give me more like the the juice head kind of guys.
1:06:24
No, the long hold stuff that came from a guy out your way,
1:06:28
specifically up at UC Davis, though.
1:06:30
So a good way up. What what is that I5 maybe up
1:06:35
the five from you guys. I think I know my California
1:06:37
highways, but there there's a researcher out there named Keith
1:06:41
Barr, who is one of the foremost tendon researchers on the
1:06:46
planet. And he he does a lot of work
1:06:50
with long hold isometrics, long duration isometrics,
1:06:54
specifically at low intensities and what that can do for
1:06:57
cellular repair, blood flow, collagen synthesis, basically
1:07:02
all the fancy words that lead to tendon recovery and tendon
1:07:08
repair. So that's why we do those
1:07:10
things. Then we mix it with like the
1:07:12
really widespread programming that we get involved in with
1:07:16
these pro organizations, and we got this perfect marriage of
1:07:21
information that we can then hand out to the Hope
1:07:23
International pitching staff. Well, it's it's definitely been
1:07:27
an asset the last three years. But the last two years I would
1:07:32
say is last year I was able to maintain a spin rate and
1:07:38
velocity. I think Trey was able to
1:07:40
increase his a little bit. But yeah, that's something to
1:07:43
where it's, it's definitely helped a lot.
1:07:45
So it was cool seeing that up there and be like, yo, big
1:07:50
league tools. I got big league tools, yeah.
1:07:52
That's right. Yeah.
1:07:53
We're you got that? I hope that's right, guys.
1:07:56
I know I, I sent the text to you and you sent me the picture and
1:07:59
I said it's got to be reassurance knowing that you
1:08:01
guys are doing the right thing. And you responded like, Nah,
1:08:05
man. The stats from last year I think
1:08:07
were the reassurance that I needed.
1:08:09
But I'm sure for like some of the younger guys in the program
1:08:13
that might cannot like fully understand it of of course it's
1:08:17
that whole like. Buying in.
1:08:19
Standard and buy in thing like you've seen it, you've had the
1:08:22
results, you can be told until the cows come home what's
1:08:25
actually going to help you. But sometimes you need to hear
1:08:28
it from somewhere else or someone else or see it somewhere
1:08:32
else or from someone else. And I'm sure you had guys on
1:08:35
your team that look up and see Flex Pro in the Guardians
1:08:39
clubhouse and then they think like, maybe I should take that a
1:08:42
little bit more seriously. To be honest with you, that was
1:08:48
I would have hoped for that, but we only had four pitchers go
1:08:52
with us to the Guardians thing. OK, Yeah, yeah.
1:08:54
Just it was very, very disappointing.
1:08:57
Very disappointing. Turn out.
1:08:58
We had all the hitters had to go because they had to hit in the
1:09:01
cages and it was left up as an optional thing for the pitchers
1:09:05
as far as who wants to go, play cash, get their throwing in.
1:09:09
Yeah. So now you understand a little
1:09:12
bit of the frustration even more clearly now with what I'm saying
1:09:16
as far as a lack of buying in. I just, that would have been
1:09:21
really cool. I've been really cool,
1:09:23
especially for them to see that come.
1:09:25
On Royals, I'm not going to let you guys go out like this
1:09:27
because as much as this is Josh's last shot and my identity
1:09:32
at the NAIA level is partially tied to you, it used to be used
1:09:37
to be wholly tied to you guys, but we also started working with
1:09:40
Doan, who you guys could potentially run into.
1:09:42
In the tournament. Doan's having a really good
1:09:45
year. So between you guys and Doan, my
1:09:48
NAIA heart and identity and livelihood just relies upon your
1:09:54
pitching Staffs. So I'm going to, I'm going to
1:09:56
need the boys to lock in. Every six, seven, 6th or 7th
1:10:01
day, you know. That's the first appearance of
1:10:05
that on this podcast and I'm I'm a little upset by it.
1:10:09
You know, every, every time I get the ball again, I'm a quote
1:10:14
the it's from the last dance. I forget who it is.
1:10:18
I don't know if it's his agent or it's one of his buddies, but
1:10:21
he's talking about Michael Jordan.
1:10:22
He goes that if you guys are going to show up and watch me
1:10:26
play, that I have an obligation to you guys to give you my 100%.
1:10:31
And that's how I feel with my team.
1:10:33
And there's times where I'm getting myself amped up.
1:10:36
You know, I have Isaiah 68 written on my glove.
1:10:39
Send me, send me. I'm, I'm ready.
1:10:42
I'm I will go for our guys. And having that sort of
1:10:46
mentality, I think is what is allowed me to to continue to
1:10:49
have success and allowed me to still play ball, allowed me to
1:10:53
to be on the right side of the stat sheet.
1:10:57
But yeah, yeah, it's a shout out.
1:11:00
Michael Jordan in The Last Dancer.
1:11:03
Such a great Netflix series. If it means anything to you,
1:11:06
maybe you know this, but to me, that quote that you just said
1:11:11
actually originated with Joe DiMaggio.
1:11:14
And I, I kept it in my bat bag for years.
1:11:17
I, I got it on a laminated sheet of paper.
1:11:20
I, I don't know the quote word for word.
1:11:22
And of course this was said way back in the 40s or 50s or
1:11:26
whatever. So it's probably been changed a
1:11:28
few times. But that was when Joe DiMaggio
1:11:30
said there's someone out there that's seen me play for the
1:11:35
first or last time and I owe them my best.
1:11:37
So exact same sentiment. And that that's stuck with me
1:11:41
throughout my entire baseball career.
1:11:42
It's not. It's not that you have to owe
1:11:44
everyone your best performance and you have to be your best
1:11:47
every single time you step out there because that's not
1:11:50
controllable. But you can give someone your
1:11:52
best effort, your best attitude. Yep, Amen to that.
1:11:55
That's and I told every, I told the staff that this year I go
1:11:59
all I ask and this was in the fall.
1:12:01
Like all I asked from you is to give 100%.
1:12:04
You're going to get 100% from me.
1:12:05
I may not be 100% right, I may be wrong, but I'm I'm going to
1:12:11
be 100% wrong, 100% or nothing. So yeah, that's I didn't know
1:12:15
that I got a Now I'm I'm going to want to go look that up
1:12:18
myself. There you go Landry.
1:12:21
With that, I just want to say thank you for the time today.
1:12:24
This isn't this has been a great conversation.
1:12:26
It's been fun to laugh it up with you.
1:12:27
Thank you. I love having you Cali boys on
1:12:29
and I'm just trying to wrap my head around the height of the
1:12:34
rotation at Cypress knowing that there were two lefties at 6 foot
1:12:38
6 string beans. There is no way either of you
1:12:42
guys were sniffing 200 lbs between you and Connor Wilde.
1:12:45
You guys are releasing the ball about four feet from home plate
1:12:48
between you 2. And I probably was releasing it
1:12:52
a little further at that point too, because my front side would
1:12:56
collapse. You were getting way down on.
1:12:59
The I was getting down there in the.
1:13:00
Catcher's glove. Be careful man, you're about to
1:13:03
open up a new a new door for us to go down with a full
1:13:05
mechanical breakdown. So if anything, just win some
1:13:09
more games so you can keep playing your career and then we
1:13:12
can have you back on for the for the Joshua Andrew mechanical
1:13:15
breakdown. Because if we start.
1:13:16
Down that road, it's going to be another hour and a half that
1:13:19
we're on this podcast. We'll have to do that after you
1:13:22
have someone on to talk about mechanics on on turf.
1:13:26
That's like I said, I wrote it down.
1:13:28
I'm staring at that note right here next to me.
1:13:30
So I guess everyone listening, there you go.
1:13:33
There's a teaser for a future episode.
1:13:35
Everyone can hold me accountable on that because I owe you guys
1:13:38
my best. I owe Josh my best, and I owe
1:13:40
you guys my best. So we're going to dig into that
1:13:42
somehow, somehow, someway. Josh, thank you so much once
1:13:47
again. This really has been a pleasure.
1:13:49
I've enjoyed it tremendously. And unfortunately, it is time
1:13:53
for me to let you go. But big thanks, as always to
1:13:56
everyone back with us. Thank you for having me go
1:14:00
Royals guys.