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3 Guys Before The Game - WVU Baseball Coach Steve Sabins Visits (Episode 562) · 3 Guys Before The Game

• 0:10
  There is music in the air, and it's time to go. Welcome in
• 0:15
  everybody. Three guys before the game, and we got a dandy four you.
• 0:20
  Mountaineer head baseball coach Steve Sabins joins us on three guys before the game.
• 0:27
  His first appearance. It's historic. I thought you'd lead saying this historic
• 0:30
  first appearance. And yeah, and if the pre show conversation continues, it
• 0:35
  maybe his last. He's looking at all, he's looking at us going like,
• 0:38
  I don't know this is He's not the problem. No, you were
• 0:42
  the problem. Hoppy was the poppy was jumping all over him, got all
• 0:45
  giddy that he was in Charlestown. But he really wasn't in Charlestown. We'll
• 0:48
  tell that story comes. It's trying to make a connection with the coach.
• 0:51
  I stand he was he immediately Sabans came in. He gave him the indicator.
• 1:00
  He took out a run around the building two times. Three guys before
• 1:03
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• 1:30
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• 1:34
  card right now? Unconfirmed. Three guys also brought to us by lou Wendell
• 1:38
  Marine at sales in Saint Albans. They sell family fund Steve just came over
• 1:42
  from the Baseball complex, did not drive, took a lou Wendell Marine right
• 1:47
  up the Man River, got off at the Marriott here and got on the
• 1:49
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• 1:55
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• 1:57
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• 2:02
  A. Check them out at louw Wendel Marine Sales dot Com. Episode five
• 2:07
  six two. I've been looking forward to this a ton, I mean it,
• 2:12
  yeah, yeah, Like this dude here is like give me a Yes,
• 2:16
  we're gonna pretend you're not here, Like, is he the most stealth
• 2:20
  dude of all stealth dudes that's been here for ten years? Like everyone says,
• 2:24
  everyone always goes like Steve Save and Steve Save and ste saves, Yes,
• 2:28
  saves man, saved, saved, saved, saves like like down has
• 2:31
  been out getting dudes, has been seen less than the Mothman, but suddenly
• 2:37
  he but but at the same time revered, yes, revered, respected,
• 2:42
  like has been on the road, getting dude beacting with you. He's got
• 2:46
  to go. Guys, Yeah, okay, now we're gonna pretend you're here.
• 2:50
  It's unbelievable introduction five sixty two as well, allowing you guys to do
• 2:53
  that many shows. That's fair point. Yeah, thats we we kind of
• 2:59
  say the same thing, no ourselves, like, how did we get to
• 3:00
  the sixty two? That's a lot. I didn't know that, Yeah,
• 3:04
  five sixty two. Brad and I have been here for all of them.
• 3:06
  Hobby's been here about one hundred and twenty. Yeah, I show up occasionally
• 3:08
  occasionally. So this is this is a big day eight coach, you know,
• 3:13
  like you know, you didn't know Hobby was part time coaching. You
• 3:15
  know, look elite pictures. You don't call them every day. That's a
• 3:19
  really good point. Yeah, like every fourth game, fifth you got to
• 3:21
  protect their arm. Nice. Thank you. Actually, really you're on fire
• 3:25
  today. I was really well done. Yeah, So congratulations man, thank
• 3:30
  you. I mean, this is this is awesome. Huh. It's been
• 3:32
  a blessing, unbelievable opportunity that that came my way, in my family's way.
• 3:37
  But like you said, been here nine years, this is home for
• 3:39
  us. So getting to keep rolling at home. That's the best case scenario
• 3:44
  any coach could ever ask for. The kiddos are how old. Got a
• 3:46
  six year old little girl named Charlie and a three year old boy named Tucker.
• 3:51
  I like both those names. So they know nothing but West Virginia.
• 3:53
  Like even though you're a Texan, they'll know nothing but West Virginia. Like
• 3:58
  there, I'm from West Virginia. There in West Virginia, their favorite team
• 4:00
  is the Mountaineers. This is where they're born and bred. I just today
• 4:04
  I asked Tucker for the first time ever, I said, do you know
• 4:06
  where you're from? And he said, West Virginia. And it's like the
• 4:11
  cutest thing right now. So we get him to say West Virginia as much
• 4:14
  as that's awesome, Yeah, that's awesome. He's a West Virginia that has
• 4:16
  been here nine years. You said always a Texan, but he's a West
• 4:19
  Virginia. I mean, what is official time that it takes to becoming I've
• 4:23
  been here in West Virginia forty years. Yeah, I'm twenty eight. I've
• 4:28
  been I've been forty. I've been forty and I still have people come up
• 4:30
  to go, I bet you root for SERI I know you do. Don't
• 4:35
  say you don't know. That's the facts. I know. Yeah, Like,
• 4:39
  yeah, I bet you root for Texas, don't you, Steve,
• 4:42
  You're born You're born there. I get it, what you get, Steve,
• 4:44
  no matter the level of your loyalty, it's also where were you born?
• 4:48
  I was born in Austin. Also, you're not from here. Oh
• 4:54
  okay, So we're mountaineers by choice. I mean, Brad's a mountaineer by
• 4:58
  choice. Got here as fast as we could. Like, yeah, I'm
• 5:00
  not going to go on a rant about that, but anyway, that's fine.
• 5:03
  Yeah, we've decided to live here. Thank you. So as I
• 5:06
  was saying, I mean it's just amazing what the last twelve months has been
• 5:13
  like for you. Really, it's like almost twelve months. It hasn't even
• 5:15
  kind of been twelve months. You're one of those rare guys that were tapped
• 5:20
  as the head coach and then literally it played through. It was like a
• 5:28
  storybook the way that it played through, and then you move on. A
• 5:30
  lot of times when people are designated, we know it just turns to be
• 5:35
  like a you know, it's not a good situation, and so it worked
• 5:39
  out like storybook for you, it was wonderful. I think everybody knew the
• 5:44
  risks involved with that, including Rinn Baker, Coach Mayzie, myself, and
• 5:48
  you kind of take those on head on. That's probably one of the most
• 5:53
  proud things that I am since being here for nine years is how smoothly that
• 5:57
  transition went. Because when you're dealing with a lot of differ different people with
• 6:00
  motives in a program, sometimes ego can get involved with sports and people and
• 6:05
  a bunch of super ambitious, driven people. So for coach May's and myself
• 6:12
  and for Ren, basically a lot of compromise has to happen where it's just
• 6:15
  what's the best thing for the program, what do we need to do to
• 6:17
  keep this thing moving forward? And I think we could all agree on that
• 6:20
  and that's why it worked out. So not super complicated other than swallowing a
• 6:26
  little bit of pride along the way for everybody and just trying to do what's
• 6:30
  best for the team. Seems a little coach speaky cliche, but that's really
• 6:33
  how it went and that's how it had to be. And so I think
• 6:36
  through all of that you end up kind of getting a stronger relationship with all
• 6:42
  the people in the program and the people around because everybody knows there's challenges,
• 6:46
  Like, there's challenges in that situation. That's why sometimes they don't work out.
• 6:49
  Yeah, that's just that's a fact. So I am really proud of
• 6:54
  that, and the team talk about it's tough on players too, because the
• 6:57
  players know, Okay, you got a head man in char you got someone
• 7:00
  that's probably gonna be in charge here shortly. What's the dynamic there. It's
• 7:03
  kind of like, do you throw the party when Dad's out of town?
• 7:06
  What's the responsibility? Right? And so there's a lot of things that players
• 7:10
  have to kind of understand and be delicate too as well. And staff and
• 7:15
  the list goes on. So it was a cool year. It was really
• 7:17
  cool year. Helped me grow become better coach. You answered that very humbly,
• 7:20
  But you also should get a lot of credit for that, because that's
• 7:24
  part of having to step back a little, is what you did. You
• 7:27
  continued in the role you were doing. I soon took on some more responsibility,
• 7:30
  but the program seemed to still have that one voice. That's a credit
• 7:33
  to you being able to make sure there was one voice speaking and your time
• 7:38
  will come. And you were very, very deferential to Randy in those moments
• 7:42
  when it was him at the end of the career. So I think you
• 7:44
  get a lot of credit for that. Personally, Thank you. I appreciate
• 7:46
  that. I think the summer before a year ago today, when some of
• 7:49
  the staff members included myself, if you have some other opportunities that come your
• 7:54
  way, it breeds some confidence in you as a leader. So you get
• 7:57
  to make that choice. And so when you make this choice to do something
• 8:00
  like be the head coach in waiting, you say, Okay, I know
• 8:03
  what I'm signing up for. It's gonna be difficult. I'm gonna have to
• 8:05
  take a back seat. I'm gonna be an assistant coach to Randy, I'm
• 8:09
  gonna echo his voice. I'm gonna do what's best for the program in my
• 8:11
  role. So you've kind of come to terms with that before making the decision.
• 8:16
  Versus if you don't have any of those choices, it's probably more difficult
• 8:18
  because you're trying to prove something or you need to be the next guy.
• 8:22
  So for me, it was kind of a Okay, I know what I'm
• 8:24
  signing up for. You ready to roll tab? You ready to do this?
• 8:28
  All right, let's let's go do it right And so ended up working
• 8:31
  out good, and you can't control the wins and losses, so it's nice.
• 8:35
  And I've said it like, Wren looks like a genius because we won,
• 8:39
  and Randy looks like a genius because we won. And if we would
• 8:41
  have lost, it would have been like, well, why are you hiring
• 8:43
  the assistant coach or the losing team? That guy's an idiot. So it
• 8:48
  ended up it ended up working out well in a lot of different areas,
• 8:50
  and some of those things out of our control, and just you were lucky
• 8:54
  and you had this record setting historic season. At the same time you didn't
• 9:00
  even have all of your health throughout the course of the years, Like,
• 9:05
  Okay, who's the one guy you couldn't lose this year? Well, okay,
• 9:09
  it was JJ Weatherhole, right, and you lose him for that,
• 9:11
  you know, chunk of games among others, and yet despite that, they
• 9:16
  eventually got back in the lineup. You guys have continued to win. That's
• 9:20
  what really made it special. It wasn't like, hey, that's that was
• 9:24
  storybook and everything went just as scripted. No, it wasn't. Man like,
• 9:28
  the worst thing that could ever happen was you lose JJ, and it
• 9:31
  happens so dog gone early and then you had to play without him. And
• 9:35
  that's why I think people really loved this team because it just grinded, that's
• 9:39
  it. And there were so many times where you could have said, well,
• 9:43
  it's not going to work out, like the way we anticipated. Great
• 9:45
  team not gonna work out. You had obviously JJ Weatherhole, but then David
• 9:50
  Haghim in fourth rounder has Tommy John, then Aiden major fifth rounder gets hurt,
• 9:54
  Logan save starting catcher breaks his kneecap. The list goes on. At
• 10:00
  one point every position player had missed significant time, so blessing and a curse
• 10:05
  I think you had all these young dudes that ended up getting playing time early,
• 10:07
  and they played great and we survived and we moved on, and so
• 10:11
  all these sometimes these dynamics on teams with culture where players could potentially get butt
• 10:16
  hurt because they don't get time all of a sudden, they're thrust into these
• 10:20
  positions, and so you have everyone played every day, someone's name might be
• 10:24
  in the lineup, and by the end of the year we got healthy and
• 10:26
  the young guys are like, Okay, we have some of these stars kind
• 10:30
  of coming back. It's my time to step back. But man, I've
• 10:33
  gotten plenty, I've got a lot of action. Let's let's do this thing
• 10:35
  together. Future is bright. And so we were able to maintain that culture
• 10:39
  through the injuries and really were able to develop our team, which you can't
• 10:43
  do because you got to win games. So a lot of times you got
• 10:45
  great players sitting on the bench rotting a little bit. We just certainly didn't
• 10:48
  have that this year. Yeah, you you talked about the coach and waiting
• 10:52
  and all the dynamics associated with that. Did you have any instances you don't
• 10:56
  have to give names, but any instances where there are play as a player
• 10:58
  or play who is looking ahead and you're going to be the coach and he's
• 11:03
  you know, he's looking at you more than he would look at Randy.
• 11:07
  I mean in any weird dynamic there during the season, all the time,
• 11:09
  every dynamic that you can imagine, as far as playing time, scholarships,
• 11:16
  nil deals, future cuts, transferring, all that stuff. It's a constant
• 11:22
  dynamic of should I speak to Randy, should I speak to Steve? Where
• 11:28
  do I go with this? Right? Because anything to do with the player's
• 11:31
  future would potentially come to me. So how did you handle that? Well,
• 11:35
  there's a lot of different ways, but essentially you got to just make
• 11:39
  sure you communicate with Randy on a consistent basis, and so you're always letting
• 11:43
  the head coach know. You're always letting them know what's going on, to
• 11:46
  make sure not only does he feel included, but he can adjust lineups and
• 11:50
  culture and things that he's going to say to the team based on what's happening.
• 11:54
  But it's human nature. You've got nineteen year old kids thinking about their
• 11:56
  future, and we're always preaching right b where your feet at, be where
• 12:01
  you are today, try to get good at what you're doing. In the
• 12:03
  moment, but in the back of their head. With these young guys,
• 12:07
  there is a future. There are making hard decisions, and so sometimes it
• 12:11
  was best for Randy who could play a little bit of that grandfather figure.
• 12:16
  I'm here for you long term, but I won't be coaching you next year.
• 12:18
  And then sometimes there were more questions directed toward me about you know that
• 12:22
  next season, or where do you see me fitting or what's best for my
• 12:26
  future. So it was a good dynamic played off of each other. There
• 12:31
  is certainly a role for Randy big time in some of that bigger picture stuff,
• 12:35
  like coach, give me your honest opinion. I know Saves wants me
• 12:39
  back because you think some important piece of this team. But how do you
• 12:43
  see this Well? Yeah, well you all survived it. You know that's
• 12:46
  tough and thrived, yes, and not even just survived, just thrived.
• 12:50
  And Tony's mentioned Storybuck a couple of times. What do you think it was
• 12:54
  that led the team and the program to get to where you got this year?
• 12:58
  Given all of that ups and downs, with the health that you went
• 13:01
  through, what will you remember most about this team and how you got that
• 13:03
  far? I think a whole lot of individuals putting ego aside to accomplish team
• 13:11
  goals. That's why we're in it. That's why I'm in it. So
• 13:16
  if you just have that ability to put everything aside to focus on something together,
• 13:22
  that's the funnest thing about a team. That's why you're a coach.
• 13:24
  That's why you get into this thing. It's never easy at the end of
• 13:28
  the year. We always say that last day sucks because it goes from like
• 13:31
  team and winning to all selfish, so it just flips a script immediately.
• 13:37
  But that we always talk about it, so we push off all those conversations.
• 13:41
  Nowadays, we're essentially talking payroll with players, right football, basketball,
• 13:45
  baseball. These are payroll stuff, and it's hard for adults to handle those
• 13:50
  things with jobs and contracts and the grass is greener on the other side,
• 13:54
  Like it's hard enough for adults. So these young guys were just preaching just
• 13:58
  this is team, this is our team this year, cherish these moments until
• 14:03
  the last out. When that last out hits, you do have to evaluate
• 14:07
  where you stand and what's going on in your future. We don't we're not
• 14:09
  naive. We don't try to pretend that that doesn't exist. It's just hold
• 14:13
  on with me, hold on with me until the last out. But when
• 14:16
  it hits, it sucks because you go from very strong bonds fighting for each
• 14:22
  other to like, you're never gonna be with that group of guys again.
• 14:24
  Yeah, And so it is it's a little bit of like a whirlwind slap
• 14:28
  in the face, like, oh, we got to get selfish needs and
• 14:33
  desires kind of paired and set aside and handled and through the draft and all
• 14:37
  these things and then we can work towards being a team again. And so
• 14:41
  the draft for me is so exciting, but it's most exciting because we're getting
• 14:45
  closer to having a finalized roster of that group of kids that you're going to
• 14:48
  go to war with again. We're not quite there, but you're getting close
• 14:52
  to, like, all right, we're about to be a unit again,
• 14:54
  right, And after that last out, it's not a unit. It is
• 14:56
  a little bit of a free for all trying to put the pieces together.
• 15:01
  I get that you understand this because this is the world you live in and
• 15:05
  you've always been the baseball guy. It's not like he came over from football
• 15:07
  or basketball. But the dynamic in college baseball is even way different. Than
• 15:11
  these other sports. These other sports are figuring out how to manage ANIL,
• 15:15
  But you guys have always had to manage scholarships before you got to managing the
• 15:18
  NIL. I think most people probably know that by now, but not every
• 15:22
  guy in your starting rotation of players is even on full scholarship, let alone
• 15:28
  NIL money. So you've had an extra layer of the puzzle, so to
• 15:31
  speak, for your whole career. That's a whole added challenge. Yeah,
• 15:35
  that's probably been something that I've been able to provide to the program, maybe
• 15:41
  more than anything. I think these other sports have positions called general managers now
• 15:45
  where they've basically went out and hired people that were experts at handling finances for
• 15:50
  large groups of people, And in baseball we've always done that. We have
• 15:54
  eleven point seven scholarships. We have had anywhere from thirty five to twenty seven
• 15:58
  men that could be on those scholarships, and so it's an equivalency sport.
• 16:02
  You're essentially dividing eleven point seven up between those to try to make sure situations
• 16:07
  are good financially for families, but you're also including academic money to try to
• 16:12
  increase those packages. Diversity money all stond money, random scholarships from churches and
• 16:19
  small towns that they allow. Right, so we're going to war. You're
• 16:23
  trying to find anything you can to add to our pot because the larger that
• 16:29
  pod is, the more financially secure our players can be. And so NIL
• 16:33
  has now become part of that equation. But it really is pulling from all
• 16:37
  these different areas, and you know, you learn super quickly there's one thing
• 16:41
  you don't mess around with people or families or kids. It's finances because if
• 16:47
  you don't get that right, you're going to lose trust instantaneously. So you've
• 16:52
  got to be very accurate in what you're saying, what you're portraying. And
• 16:55
  if we don't do that internally as a program, there's no one that's going
• 16:59
  to do it right, not some financial aid counselor that's sorting that stuff out.
• 17:03
  These kids need to be told the truth where they stand, why they
• 17:07
  stand there. And now with NIL that they're becoming more a little bit of
• 17:11
  that professional hybrid where they're having to handle professional conversations on these things more than
• 17:19
  ever, about where they stack up, where they're at with the draft,
• 17:22
  how they're valued on the team, all those kind of things so interesting dynamic
• 17:26
  to say the least, as far as team culture goes. Everybody's on different
• 17:30
  stuff, different packages, and it's about, like I said, when we
• 17:33
  start the fall, you're a team and at the end of the year,
• 17:36
  let's reevaluate and we go back to work. Has it helped Has nil helped
• 17:41
  baseball programs though? Is it giving you more money to work with than you
• 17:45
  had or it's just added more to the equation. It has helped. It
• 17:49
  has helped specifically at West Virginia. We do a wonderful job there. Goo
• 17:56
  Ahead. I was going to say, we had rent in on the last
• 18:00
  episode. Your world is about to change, though, because you're not exactly
• 18:03
  sure what this new revenue share deal is going to mean for scholarships, right,
• 18:07
  or we should say roster size and we're payroll, yeah, pay right,
• 18:11
  right, So you're a scholarship like a year from now, it could
• 18:14
  be a completely different set that you're working with, right, one hundred percent
• 18:18
  really unknown, But the last five years have been unknown, and so it's
• 18:25
  been a huge advantage to be, you know, thirty five, thirty seven
• 18:29
  years old, be very flexible, not said in your ways, not know
• 18:33
  exactly how it's going to be kind of on the aggressive side over the conservative
• 18:37
  side, because this has been the wild West, as you guys are aware.
• 18:40
  And so if you sit back and you wait for people to tell you
• 18:42
  how it's going to be, you're too late to the party. Mm hmm.
• 18:45
  See I like that. He You need to be park. You just
• 18:49
  need to go out there and just like, Okay, we're just going to
• 18:52
  cut the ground ourselves and cut through here. You gotta do you got to
• 18:55
  do and kind of figure that out as you go because there's no clear instructions.
• 19:00
  You talk to Rin, there's no clear structural or you didn't say I
• 19:03
  did guidelines, Yeah, sidebar convers You have to you have to make sure
• 19:08
  that you're responsible and aggressive. Those are the two things you gotta. You
• 19:11
  gotta go to work. Yeah, I'm sorry, I hop you had a
• 19:15
  question. I'm going out and literally left field now. So Sam White,
• 19:23
  it seems like in baseball more than most other sports that suspicion comes into play.
• 19:30
  And by that I mean that you watch these baseball movies and players have
• 19:33
  suspicions. If they're on a heater, if they're on a slump. Do
• 19:36
  you think superstitions? Oh, yeah, what I say, Yeah, yeah,
• 19:40
  I mean superstitions. Superstitions. I'm sorry, superstitions. So are you
• 19:42
  superstitious? And did you have players who like, Okay, they're on a
• 19:47
  hitting streak and so they're not going to change their socks, or they're slumping,
• 19:51
  so they're going to change their routine. I mean that is very common
• 19:53
  to baseball. Superstitions. Are you superstitious? And did you have do you
• 19:57
  have players who are superstition? So many players are superstitious. The game is
• 20:03
  so hard. I think part of my issue was like a little bit of
• 20:07
  that obsessive compulsive thing going on. So I'm counting how many seconds I'm drinking
• 20:11
  water and stepping over lines? Really when I played a lot more Now I'm
• 20:17
  calmer now as a way, calmer as a coach than as a player.
• 20:19
  But I think some of those internal anxieties kind of lead into the superstitions a
• 20:25
  little bit. So we talk through players sometimes too, because guys can get
• 20:27
  a little carried away with examples. You don't have to name names, but
• 20:32
  examples, how long they step out before they step back into the box,
• 20:37
  how many times they do their gloves, how many times they touch their helmets,
• 20:41
  jumping over the line readjusting your hat only with one certain hand. The
• 20:48
  list goes on, what's absurd, why is that? Why do you think
• 20:51
  that is? And does it Does it have an impact? Like I'm thinking
• 20:55
  of Bull Durham. If you're on a hitting streak and you think it's because
• 20:57
  you haven't changed your underwear, yes, absolutely, then with it. Yeah,
• 21:02
  it's a power. It's the power of the mind. But there's also
• 21:03
  a lot of dead time in baseball, and so they're trying to not think
• 21:08
  because if I'm doing my batting gloves and my helmet and my cleats and I'm
• 21:12
  doing other stuff, I'm not thinking. Eventually you just step into the box
• 21:17
  or make the pitch. You just go into executing, letting your body kind
• 21:19
  of get into that flow state, whatever you want to call it. Yeah,
• 21:22
  versus over analyzing, because in baseball you got time to overanalyze and just
• 21:27
  keep thinking and dwelling. That's interesting. Two strikes on the hitter. You
• 21:32
  and the hitter do this, what's that mean? Two strike approach? So
• 21:36
  we have a two strike approach. So it's really just telling the coaches and
• 21:41
  the players, hey, readjust we're in this together. Everybody's on the same
• 21:45
  page. We have a plan that we're working to. Essentially two strikes a
• 21:49
  little bit of a chaotic experience. You have to open up the zone.
• 21:52
  You got to swing it multiple pitches. Statistically you're in a bad spot,
• 21:57
  but you're trying to tame a caseaotic experience with an approach or a plan.
• 22:02
  So instead of thinking about, you know, the shit that you're in,
• 22:06
  you just go straight to your approach and you go to work. So you're
• 22:08
  an analytics guy. Are you a feel guy or an analytics guy? Definitely
• 22:11
  both both of those and my age would be kind of in the middle of
• 22:15
  both of those things. There's guys around my age that will probably feel strongly
• 22:18
  on both sides of it, but I kind of grew up in the middle
• 22:22
  of it appreciate both strongly. Do you think you'll go any more indapt analytics
• 22:26
  as the head coach? Will you go more feel leave analytics to somebody else?
• 22:30
  Will your approach change is the head coach? I think I'll probably be
• 22:33
  more feel oriented as far as decision making on the field, but we will
• 22:38
  incorporate more analytics in recruiting and with the game. We just hired a director
• 22:45
  of pitching and pitching personnel. And he's had a lot of time with the
• 22:49
  Boston Red Sox eleven years in professional baseball, and those teams draft a lot
• 22:56
  on models, so essentially algorithm them to decide what players are going to join
• 23:02
  the Boston Red Sox, and so he's very familiar with what they're looking for,
• 23:04
  why they're looking for, and how those things play in professional baseball.
• 23:08
  So we'll include those in our recruiting and the analysis of our own players to
• 23:12
  kind of figure out what do we think is the right recipe for success?
• 23:17
  Moneyball or Boulderham Which are those two movies. I have to lean towards Moneyball,
• 23:22
  Yeah, just because you're doing more with less. It's a thing of
• 23:27
  beauty, do more with less. I think we're going to institute the hands
• 23:32
  signal for Hoppy. Right just works for the Mountaineers because sometimes he needs what
• 23:37
  he needs his phone on or something he needs. Sometimes he needs to sell
• 23:41
  focus in right, he needs to settle those things are right. Things are
• 23:45
  getting a little bit of We need to come up with a signal for you,
• 23:47
  Hoppy. Yeah, we might we might use the same one. We
• 23:49
  might go. Let's bring it down, Hoppy it's things that's just settler down.
• 23:52
  I understand. But look, before the interview, I was thinking about
• 23:56
  this and I thought, I'm really curious about that question. So it wasn't
• 24:00
  about I mean, we talked a lot about the other things, and I
• 24:04
  was just curious about I did that all the time. People ask me that
• 24:07
  question all the time. What's going on there? We're gonna do it with
• 24:11
  Hopey. It's gonna be our signal. I like that. Yeah, I
• 24:14
  appreciate that. Yeah, I mean you're already said we use your guys.
• 24:18
  Never miss it. I mean I don't know that. Does this guy ever
• 24:21
  miss it and forget to do it? Uh not without hearing about it?
• 24:27
  Yeah? Do you what will you call pitches? I won't. Nope,
• 24:33
  it wasn't don't have a pitching background. That wasn't my forte. So we
• 24:37
  have two coaches that will work heavily on the pitching side, and so I
• 24:41
  haven't done it in my past, and so to think that I'll be better
• 24:44
  than guys that work with the pictures dabody. Somebody will call pitches correct,
• 24:48
  Somebody will call pitch each pitch, Yes, yeah, coach one will call
• 24:52
  each pitch. Pictures will have the right to shake. They absolutely want.
• 24:56
  Anytime you throw a pitch to the plate, convictions more important than the pitch,
• 25:00
  So be convicted. Attack. It always going to be more important than
• 25:03
  that specific pitch that's called. If there's doubt behind that, the hitter feels
• 25:07
  it. I don't know what the reason is, but the hitter ends up
• 25:11
  hitting doubles and homers when there's not enough conviction behind it. Yeah, makes
• 25:15
  sense. Commit to the pitch. Commit to the pitch. Yeah, I
• 25:17
  like that. Yeah, did you see schemes last night? I didn't see
• 25:22
  what happened there? He got a chance? Yeah, you think that might
• 25:26
  be all right? You think I think he's got might have a chance.
• 25:27
  He's pretty good. Yeah, what's that live arm? It just like every
• 25:32
  pitch coach is like one hundred miles an hour? Yeah, okay, And
• 25:36
  just like, who's the fastest pitcher you ever faced? What'd you see back
• 25:41
  in your day? Did you see a hundred? I never faced one hundred
• 25:45
  hitting. There's been quite a few hundred mile an hour guys in the Big
• 25:48
  Twelve over the last ten years, but I never faced one hundred mile an
• 25:53
  hour guy. Pretty common. Ninety five would be the upper echelon. But
• 25:57
  why do you think there are more people through one hundred. I think just
• 26:02
  cracking the code on the kinetic chain and how the body works, and science,
• 26:06
  and probably more young people treating their bodies well over the course of their
• 26:11
  careers. Just the facts. We're more educated on training, alcohol usage,
• 26:18
  you know, the calories they put in their body. All those things have
• 26:22
  improved. But we're also seeing a rash of injuries and elbow injuries just because
• 26:27
  the human body, it's it's hard on ligaments to throw that hard to move
• 26:30
  that fast. When you were a little squirked, like, how did baseball
• 26:37
  begin to take your life over? Like how old are you when you go
• 26:41
  like, I don't just like this thing, like I want I want to
• 26:45
  live this world. It's literally been my entire life. So since I was
• 26:51
  five years old, I was sleeping with a bat and a glove in my
• 26:55
  bed, and I remember going to round Rock Express and University of Texas baseball
• 27:00
  camps with Cliff Gustison and I was I was the hustle MVP, and like,
• 27:07
  those are big moments in my life that I remember, like kind of
• 27:11
  monumental things, and every one of those monumental things in my life ends up
• 27:15
  revolving around baseball things that happened in baseball. So I don't have a lot
• 27:19
  of other pillars honestly in my life, and even the bad ones. I
• 27:25
  remember going to a youth camp and my cleats were too tight, and I
• 27:27
  was super fearful that I wouldn't be able to take my cleats off and I
• 27:32
  wouldn't be able to play the next day because I wouldn't be able to put
• 27:33
  them back on because they're too tight. So I slept for four days with
• 27:37
  my cleats on. And it was an overnight camp, and I think I
• 27:40
  was six or seven years old. Made perfectly logical since the yeah I had
• 27:45
  the time, but the hell out of the sheets. Yeah, yeah,
• 27:47
  I think we were a sleeping on a clubhouse floor with a with a sleeping
• 27:51
  bag. Anyways, But yeah, I had had jacked up feet for quite
• 27:53
  a few weeks after that, but I didn't know any different. It's just
• 27:56
  kind of it's always been what I've done. That's awesome. Yeah. At
• 28:00
  what point, then, though, did you like, oh, Okay,
• 28:04
  I get it, I'm pretty good and I can do this. I mean,
• 28:07
  was there a moment, was there a seminal moment I was. I
• 28:11
  was a good player, but not a great player. I think probably my
• 28:14
  biggest strength was some of those leadership characteristics and finding a way for me to
• 28:19
  get better. I was obsessed with making myself better, and so that passion
• 28:25
  kind of turned into how could I help other people get better? Because I
• 28:27
  was average and probably played way above my skis, had some good moments in
• 28:32
  college and some cool experiences as far as playing, and ended up being a
• 28:36
  good player at a lower level. But that was my strength. So it
• 28:38
  was like being around people was a strength, communication was a pretty good strength,
• 28:44
  and then getting better with a limited skill set genetically was a strength.
• 28:48
  And so it kind of fit into what I'm doing. You know. You
• 28:51
  know, Brad was a pretty good player. I actually didn't know that.
• 28:53
  Not major league level though. No college. I mean he was a good,
• 28:56
  very good college in the Conference Yese player. Yeah, he was just
• 29:02
  at the draft with JJ Weatherholt, the seven pick in the major leage draft.
• 29:04
  We probably don't need to tell him about my I would like cons I'd
• 29:07
  like to hear more about it. The coach wants to hear more talk offline.
• 29:10
  It's not as impressive as JJ's tell us about that. The draft experience
• 29:14
  was unbelievable. Highest drafted Mountaineer in history. He's there, highest drafted guy
• 29:19
  that was at the draft. That was a pretty cool, nice little pop
• 29:22
  for the program that was that. What was that experience? Like? It
• 29:23
  was unbelievable just for JJ to include me and Coach Mays and uh Weston came
• 29:30
  and his family and that was pretty much the draft party. It really felt
• 29:34
  special because you were just like, this is amazing getting to share this moment
• 29:37
  with somebody, which is the peak moment in that guy's life. You just
• 29:41
  feel special. I mean, I'm riding the coach tells of JJ at the
• 29:45
  draft. Right, you're just a fan. Right, You're just a fan
• 29:48
  in that moment, and so more of a just an honor to be in
• 29:52
  a position to be valued in somebody's life. Not to get too cheese cheese
• 29:56
  out on you, but that's that's what it is. It was unbelievable.
• 30:00
  They end up saying, Okay, well, we have to sit backstage because
• 30:03
  they may call and they have to negotiate deals and we have to say yes.
• 30:07
  And it's an air conditioned area, but you guys have some seats like
• 30:11
  in the main arena and we're like, yeah, cool, we're just along
• 30:14
  for the ride, like all good. So he ends up saying like,
• 30:17
  yeah, so you're up there and we look and it's literally a leather couch
• 30:21
  that is closest to the stage as possible. And so we're going like,
• 30:23
  oh, these are the these are the tough seats, Like we're all in
• 30:26
  on this thing. So we had the best seats in the entire MLB draft.
• 30:30
  And so usually it's always go, go, go go, and you're
• 30:33
  working and you're trying to set the roster, and so you got to just
• 30:37
  slow down a little bit and just enjoy and be a fan and like a
• 30:40
  fanboy, you know, for for a little bit. And I took advantage.
• 30:42
  We had a recruit that we're getting after this summer, and I was
• 30:45
  sending some Hey, I hope you're I hope me and you were together in
• 30:48
  a few years, baby, like let's uh, let's do it. And
• 30:52
  so it's just it's just a fun, fun to be their honor to be
• 30:55
  there, a lot of a lot of great people and just awesome when his
• 30:57
  name's called, right, I mean that had to be as thrilling for you
• 31:00
  as him. Oh you hear that. It was. It was so cool
• 31:03
  there was I think Jack Caglione ended up being the fifth rounder. Yeah,
• 31:08
  and they came up and they said with the fifth pick overall they selected,
• 31:14
  and we're like all fired up, getting ready to go, but it was
• 31:17
  Jack and not JJ. So we uh, we got a little disappointed there.
• 31:21
  But two picks later, you can you can use that recruiting, right,
• 31:25
  We got some slats to feel because he might have heard JJ, well
• 31:26
  he's with the Cardinals now, so we can oh, yeah, we're gonna
• 31:30
  milk that. Yeah, recruiting up. Steve. What are your memories about
• 31:33
  recruiting him, iding him and finding him. One of the big memories was
• 31:41
  just being at Alderson BROADUS and so uh University in West Virginia. We had
• 31:45
  recruited him a little bit. We'd seen him at Bridge Fourth Field and he
• 31:51
  was going to play at Alderson Broad US and my dad was in town and
• 31:55
  he was playing for Beaver Valley Red fifteen US, so not a national team,
• 32:00
  just a small local town. And so I rolled up there with my
• 32:04
  old man and we were sitting in the third base box and it was so
• 32:07
  cool because during the draft JJ's dad was telling this story from his perspective about
• 32:13
  the West Virginia coach came to Alderson brought us, and we were nervous.
• 32:15
  And because you were the first ones in on JJ, we were maybe the
• 32:20
  only ones in, I should say, not just first, you were the
• 32:22
  only ones in. Yeah, only ones in and first ones in there,
• 32:24
  and so we're at Alderson brought us and got a couple hits, showed his
• 32:29
  speed. The biggest play, the kind of the monumental play for him as
• 32:34
  there's a Texas League or hit over the first baseman's head and it's just one
• 32:37
  of those cork dinks jam job kind of thing, low flight ball. JJ's
• 32:44
  playing second, and I was just kind of honed in on JJ the whole
• 32:46
  time, and he got an unbelievable read off the bat, some of those
• 32:50
  instincts that you can't teach guys that aren't ready every pitch. It's hard to
• 32:53
  be ready one hundred and fifty two hundred times in a single game. You
• 32:58
  have to be really dialed in. So gets a really good jump, he
• 33:00
  ends up laying out on his belly, slides into foul territory, catches the
• 33:06
  ball down the first baseline, and that's when I made my decision. I'm
• 33:09
  in, and I'm like, am I really recruiting a fifteen year old second
• 33:13
  baseman from Beaver Valley Red that weighs one hundred and forty five pounds, Like,
• 33:17
  we're gonna look good or I'm gonna get fired here in the next couple
• 33:21
  of years because you don't traditionally recruit he was small. He was definitely undersized,
• 33:25
  more of a local guy and playing second base, you recruit a lot
• 33:29
  of shortstops at the younger levels, and so I got to give Beaver Valley
• 33:35
  Red a shout out. Okay, but how did you know that there was
• 33:38
  a kid for Beaver Valley Red? Who told you that, Hey, hey
• 33:42
  there's a kid up here that might I think that happened. I think it
• 33:45
  started. That's a good question. You recruit so many guys along the way,
• 33:50
  but built a relationship. There's a coach named Patrick that works with Beaver
• 33:54
  Valley and I had seen him once before, and I think saw something special
• 34:00
  Sol in the swing and maybe reached out to Patrick and just said, hey,
• 34:01
  what do you got on this guy? Like, give me a little
• 34:04
  little background. He's like great kid, hard worker, looks like the bats
• 34:07
  coming along, So it was enough for me to kind of just stay in
• 34:10
  the mix, kind of just okay, I'll put it on the back burner,
• 34:15
  so you have jj reach out, Hey, little squirt, Hey,
• 34:17
  give me a shoot me a text. Whenever you're playing, let me know
• 34:21
  when you're around the area. You just kind of throw that out there.
• 34:23
  And part of recruiting is just seeing who cares enough to stay in touch with
• 34:27
  you, Like, is there enough passion, enough care for you to communicate
• 34:30
  with college coaches or is it not that important to you? Like that's always
• 34:35
  been my judge is if if you're not that into it, if a college
• 34:37
  reaches out to you and you're not all in, like I don't have time
• 34:40
  for that, because they got to do their part a little bit. So
• 34:44
  he was definitely communicating let me know where he's playing. Hey, coach,
• 34:46
  here's a video of me in the batting cage. Here's me lifting. I'm
• 34:50
  playing at Alderson broad US today at four pm. Love for you to stop
• 34:53
  by. I was like, all right, this kid's fighting for it a
• 34:55
  little bit. Let's go see what he's got. That's awesome. Yeah,
• 34:59
  because if you had gotten the message when you were the little kid and they
• 35:01
  said, hey, Steve, we're kind of looking at you would have drove
• 35:05
  to the coach's house one hundred yeah, brain, and you get it.
• 35:07
  I mean, and that's a story right in the workspace as well, whether
• 35:12
  it's sports or not, like show me you really want to do it,
• 35:15
  instead of just saying you want to do it? Yeah, okay, fine,
• 35:16
  and then run it out as fast as you can. Yeah, exactly
• 35:19
  did you did you then see something in him that was like you, oh,
• 35:24
  good question, hoppy, did you see a little Steve Church Well?
• 35:29
  Going deep? I think in recruiting in general, similar personalities attract each other
• 35:36
  just in general, like you look at any team across the country, and
• 35:38
  there's going to be a reflection on the coaches that are doing the recruiting.
• 35:43
  You can't help it because there's some of that magnetic personality stuff. So you
• 35:46
  like people that probably have some similar characteristics, mindsets, values as you.
• 35:52
  And so I don't know if it's intentional necessarily, but without a doubt that's
• 35:55
  a fact. That's why the staff matters and the people that are the program
• 36:00
  matter. It's not just evaluation skills. You need the people skills, and
• 36:05
  you want kids to want to be around coaches that they share those things with.
• 36:09
  So I hope so he's a stud. Three Guys before the Game.
• 36:14
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• 36:16
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• 36:22
  systems for businesses. For example, Steve told you, I mean communication is
• 36:27
  key, right, That's how they got JJ Weatherholt. So whether Steve needs
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• 36:40
  more. Visit them at COMAXWV dot com. Three Guys also brought to us
• 36:45
  by Gomart. You've been to a few go marts in your recruiting days.
• 36:50
  I mean you put a lot of miles on the car and the old empty
• 36:52
  comes up there. You pull up there and get it a lot and go
• 36:54
  in there, get yourself, big marshmallow pie, big mountain dew. Always
• 36:58
  go to Go Mart. Seven foot Slimjim. This looks like a fly rod
• 37:01
  and a cupcake that weighs thirteen pounds are all available to you. I had
• 37:05
  Gomark get the rewards card and again get all those rewards lined up, and
• 37:08
  basically the gas becomes almost free. Let's talk some other personnel guys from this
• 37:13
  past season. It's been fun to watch as a small school guy myself,
• 37:16
  to watch the Kyle Wests get shots. Right, a really successful D two
• 37:21
  player comes up, Dereck Clark. What an unbelievable story. JJ's a great
• 37:25
  story and you'll tell that forever. Derek Clark's a hell of a story.
• 37:29
  D two guy comes up here, able to do what he does. Talk
• 37:31
  about a guy that doesn't look the part necessarily either and just had an unbelievable
• 37:36
  season now getting a chance in Pro Bowl as well as fun of a story
• 37:39
  as anybody on our team. If you're a baseball fan and a West Virginia
• 37:43
  baseball fan, you can't root for a guy more. Obviously JJ's in that
• 37:49
  category, But Derek Clark so similar, like one is not better than the
• 37:53
  other as far as story goes. So he's a D two player that goes
• 37:58
  to the Cape Cod League and pitches great and leads the Cape Cod League in
• 38:01
  e er. If you do that, and you don't look like Derreck Clark.
• 38:06
  You're a third rounder. That's just how that works in that league.
• 38:09
  So he shows up to West Virginia and you always recruit and you sell guys
• 38:14
  on come to West Virginia, increase your draft stock, win championships, do
• 38:19
  great things, and there's always a little bit of a knock like, well,
• 38:22
  I'm going to be a senior. Could you really do that? You
• 38:24
  know, are you blowing smoke right here in the recruiting thing. So he
• 38:28
  is the definition of taking advantage of your opportunity. So comes to West Virginia,
• 38:34
  is a D two pitcher, he is an All American, he's a
• 38:36
  Gold Glove winner, he's a regional champion, and then he's a ninth rounder
• 38:39
  as a senior. This doesn't happen. So it's just like anything is possible.
• 38:44
  Don't tell me it's not. I'll recruit the hell out of it because
• 38:46
  it is possible. Look at Dereck Clark. So he's a statue for it.
• 38:50
  He's the Beanie Bishop of Mountaineer baseball. Right, Beanie comes in for
• 38:52
  one year, becomes a consensus All American. You go get this guy and
• 38:57
  he's just a classic wow wow guy, What are the non negotiables? What
• 39:05
  will be the non negotiables in your program to your coaching staff and to your
• 39:09
  players. It's always been on more of the recruiting front for me as far
• 39:15
  as what we're looking at. A big piece of that is team first,
• 39:20
  loves to play baseball. Those things are non negotiable. And seems kind of
• 39:25
  silly he loves to play baseball, but a lot of people like to play
• 39:29
  baseball. Not a lot of people love to play baseball because there's a lot
• 39:34
  of adversity, there's a lot of honest conversations, there's a lot of tough
• 39:37
  days. There's so much failure, so you just get your ass kicked like
• 39:42
  all the time. In our sport. You can be really good and just
• 39:45
  suck consistently. And so those are the non negotiables. But I'm not a
• 39:50
  very big rule guy. More again a little cliche, but a few standards.
• 39:54
  It's like, treat people the right way, beyond time, have great
• 39:58
  energy, bring big time effort every day. Just because I'm not going to
• 40:01
  coach energy, You're not going to coach effort, not going to coach desire.
• 40:05
  Probably goes back to like when I was talking about being a little bit
• 40:07
  younger. You just have to have those those are those are concrete. If
• 40:12
  you bring that, we'll coach the hell out of you, we'll get better,
• 40:15
  we'll enjoy it, we'll go to work every day. But we we
• 40:17
  can't go motivators. We're not We're not motivators. We need guys that want
• 40:22
  to be here because they want to be big leaguers and they're chasing dreams and
• 40:25
  goals. That's that's kind of the my big thing, coach. It was,
• 40:30
  let's go back to the Super Regional and it was I know, Coach
• 40:35
  MAYSI was talking about nobody expects us to win, and we're playing with some
• 40:37
  house money here. But you guys were so close, so close in those
• 40:40
  two games, and at that second game was just a it was a heartbreaker.
• 40:45
  I mean, what what was the mindset of the coaching staff and the
• 40:47
  and the team going through those games? Those two games, it was different
• 40:54
  than anything I've ever felt for West Virginia baseball. The there's more pressure when
• 41:00
  you're playing a small Northern mid major on a Tuesday in the regular season than
• 41:06
  there is in a Super Regional game against North Carolina. So you were loose,
• 41:12
  so loose, and the guys were having fun, and they knew they
• 41:15
  were good, they knew they could compete with anybody in the country. It
• 41:19
  was a feeling of let the chips fall because they had proven that they had
• 41:23
  been good, and so the repercussions of losing to a lesser team early in
• 41:30
  the year has massive playoff implications, Whereas, once you get there, we're
• 41:37
  just going to go try to win the whole damn thing. Right, It's
• 41:39
  just you're playing loose, you're free, the guys are having fun, the
• 41:43
  belief is there. So it was the first time literally in my career where
• 41:46
  like before the Super Regional Games, I was like, I'm pretty sure I
• 41:51
  can just like go along for the ride here, like I've kind of done
• 41:53
  what I need to do. Like, these guys are animals. They're going
• 41:57
  to compete at the highest level, and I got to make sure I do
• 42:00
  my job well, make sure I send guys when I need to send them,
• 42:04
  and I give some positive reinforcement. But at that point, you're not
• 42:07
  talking hitting and pitching and standards and being on time, Like you're way past
• 42:12
  that stuff. We're just going to compete at the highest level. So it's
• 42:15
  more of like a support role. It was the calmst I've ever been in
• 42:19
  my career. I thought, who's the guy for North Carolina hit the home
• 42:22
  run? Who's any cut? And I thought at that second game, I
• 42:24
  thought, oh god, me to play. You know, a major leaguer
• 42:29
  made a play. That's what happened and those moments. A lot of times
• 42:34
  it comes down to who are the big leaguers on both teams and who plays
• 42:37
  the best? What did your big leaguer do, What did your big leaguer
• 42:42
  do, who made the pitches, who got the knocks? But those teams
• 42:45
  were obviously pretty comparable when it came to talent, and so who makes the
• 42:50
  plays, who performs at the highest level. At that point, my job
• 42:52
  was just to get the guys in the right mind frame and to be loose
• 42:55
  and like, you guys are playing literally with house money, Go go do
• 42:59
  it. It's a great point on the house money. But at the same
• 43:00
  time, I would think you can take a lot away from that from a
• 43:05
  story standpoint, and I think that's exactly right. You that wasn't a plucky,
• 43:09
  upstart Mountaineer team. That was a college World Series level team that just
• 43:15
  happened to get beat by a couple of plays. I think if nothing else
• 43:17
  has done it, that showed hey, this program absolutely can be an omaha.
• 43:22
  That's agree, that's one hundred percent agree. And I think everybody felt
• 43:25
  that, the team felt that, the fans felt that. It wasn't a
• 43:29
  come from behind, chip on your shoulder, we're not quite ready kind of
• 43:35
  team. It was just we've worked for a really long time to create a
• 43:38
  really good group of kids that were ready to compete at the highest level and
• 43:42
  let's go heads up with anybody in the country and see what happens. Yeah.
• 43:45
  With that being said, then you look ahead to this coming year and
• 43:47
  I know your roster isn't final, final, final yet, but what excites
• 43:52
  you about this year coming and what excites you about the newcomers that are coming
• 43:59
  into the conference? A lot excites me. There's a lot of unknown We've
• 44:04
  lost eighty five percent of our starts from last year, so the pitching staff
• 44:09
  is essentially new starting over. There's a lot of returners on the position player
• 44:15
  side. There were some players that potentially anticipated on being drafted that were not,
• 44:21
  and so we'll likely have a lot of the position players back the only
• 44:24
  position players that we have officially lost at this point is Reed Chumney because of
• 44:29
  eligibility at third and JJ Weatherholt. So if you're able to bring back all
• 44:34
  those players and have some new guys coming in that are talented to transfer portal
• 44:38
  position players and then some freshmen as well and some sophomores that didn't get a
• 44:44
  ton of playing time, you're going to be deeper on the position player side.
• 44:46
  And we were pretty good offensively. It never helps to lose the seventh
• 44:51
  overall pick to the Cardinals, but it hasn't come that far back. You
• 44:54
  played twenty games without them, Yeah, yeah, yeah, And so a
• 44:59
  lot of newness on the mound. But we have some very quality rising juniors
• 45:04
  that we're going to lean on. Some guys that have been in the wings
• 45:07
  that have been working that it's their time to step up, so they're going
• 45:09
  to get their opportunities. We've signed four transfer portal pictures, so you try
• 45:14
  to the goal of the transfer portal pictures was experience high floor guys. We
• 45:21
  have some stuff and some really high talent guys that are going to be juniors.
• 45:24
  We needed to raise the floor as far as innings, experience, calmness
• 45:29
  on the mound, and so we went and got that can you confirm or
• 45:31
  deny this? Brad and eye like me one word answer, Confirmer deny.
• 45:38
  You don't have to answer that, coach, Brad and I have a strong
• 45:43
  belief that every year in like mid February, Canecious gets on a bus and
• 45:52
  they just drive around in like a two hundred mile circle from like Columbus and
• 45:57
  they come through Morgantown, they go back out near state and they're just like
• 46:00
  on a phone call system and like whenever you guys need a game, they
• 46:04
  just they're ready at any moment. Two hours. Can you can be here
• 46:08
  at two o'clock Tuesday? Yeah, got it? And they just turned the
• 46:12
  bus and they just is that true? Confirm or deny that? I can
• 46:15
  confirm that. And Uh, the craziest thing, like we've had so many
• 46:22
  conversations about Cancious because they're good, they're well coached. We play him every
• 46:27
  year. Darius Hill used to always say our biggest rival isis because there's been
• 46:36
  some absolute cutter dog fights. We've lost some games. There's probably been more
• 46:45
  more screaming after Cancious games than any team we've ever played. It. They're
• 46:49
  kind of a legend in our program. We didn't even know that. So
• 46:53
  you were saying, like, like the loss and the stress that that midweek
• 46:58
  game gives you was more than you were facing when you went to play North
• 47:01
  Carolina one. How about that? Not necessarily specifically, cainecious, but those
• 47:07
  games, those games conference early season, non conference early season, if those
• 47:13
  teams end up not having good years, how it affects your RPI and how
• 47:17
  you're viewed on the national scale are monumental. So people kind of poo poo
• 47:22
  those and as coaches it's the opposite, and sometimes as nineteen year olds it
• 47:27
  can be the opposite. And so you got to make sure people mentally are
• 47:30
  in the right place for those kind of games. Plus it's cold, and
• 47:34
  it's you know, sometimes it's rainy and it's but if I'm remembering correct,
• 47:37
  like we had extra innings against one of those midweek games earlier this past season,
• 47:43
  I'm thinking, like they're all so important, Like you put it in
• 47:45
  your pocket, You're like, let's move on. Yeah, we had some
• 47:49
  tough games. There was a we lost the game because we had an outfielder
• 47:52
  lose a ball in the sun. Early in the year. So some of
• 47:55
  those games where it's like very important and it's sun for God's sakes, you
• 48:00
  know, like some of those things, and that's just baseball. But you
• 48:04
  have to keep going and you have to stay the course and stay consistent.
• 48:07
  But baseball, there's a lot of times every season. We had our best
• 48:09
  season in program history, but you know, twenty games in we were losers
• 48:14
  and things weren't going good and right, and there were certainly there's there's ups
• 48:17
  and downs with baseball, which makes sure fun. What is your so when
• 48:21
  things aren't going well, but also maybe players or certain players aren't doing aren't
• 48:28
  reaching expectations or not doing what they should be doing, what's your go to?
• 48:31
  What is your go to for either motivation or inspiration or criticism or getting
• 48:37
  in their grill? What's your go to? My go to is normally consistency
• 48:43
  habits. You try to instill all those so it just becomes the norm.
• 48:46
  So probably just refocusing on the habits, the consistency. Sometimes young people will
• 48:52
  get out of their habits a little bit and could affect their performance, but
• 48:55
  there isn't always a solution. It's usually just keep going is the key thing,
• 49:00
  and not to panic. Coach May's has always been really good about bringing
• 49:05
  the team together and kind of talked to them about where you're currently at,
• 49:09
  your thirty percent of the season done. This is a comparison to some teams
• 49:14
  in the past that have been good, that have been bad. This is
• 49:15
  where we've started in conference and we've made regionals. So just perspective for young
• 49:21
  people to stay calm and stay the course. You're not a yeller, not
• 49:23
  much of a yeller. I'm a I'm more of an honest conversations, be
• 49:28
  pretty blunt, doesn't always feel good, but they know I love them and
• 49:32
  I'm trying to do it to help them. So not a lot of screaming,
• 49:36
  but more tough conversations, address confrontation often and early. Look, baseball
• 49:43
  is a hard sport to be a consistent screamer, though. I mean,
• 49:46
  I know there's guys to do, there's a lot of time, and it's
• 49:49
  a long season. It's that's hard to be up up in guys face and
• 49:52
  scream yeah. And sometimes you don't even know if they're doing good or bad.
• 49:55
  There's so many factors in baseball and a lot of some times the other
• 50:00
  team is doing well and it's more about just where you're at mentally. You
• 50:05
  can get upset about effort, you can get upset about how they're playing the
• 50:08
  game, but that's about it. Because it's so hard. Performance isn't really
• 50:14
  an indicator if if they're trying or not at that point, Yeah, yeah,
• 50:17
  what did it some? A number of times this past season. I
• 50:22
  mean the place was just rock in the stadium. I mean, what impact
• 50:25
  does that have? Did that have on this team? It's amazing. There's
• 50:29
  been five consecutive years with record breaking attendance. In the last two years we've
• 50:36
  broken the single game attendance record. It's pretty amazing that the biggest crowd in
• 50:40
  history was in twenty nineteen when we hosted a regional against Fordham, and then
• 50:45
  in twenty twenty three, the biggest game in history was against ou and then
• 50:49
  in twenty twenty four, the biggest attendance in program history was against pitt on
• 50:52
  a midweek Yeah, and so we had the biggest crowd in history on a
• 50:57
  midweek game that was bigger than when you're hosting regional. So it's unheard of.
• 51:00
  You don't get that very many places. Quite remarkable. It's remarkable when
• 51:05
  you think about what it was and what it is, and that was a
• 51:07
  true attendance number. We were in attendance at that game. That was a
• 51:09
  mob scene. It was that was passed. It was rocking. And I
• 51:13
  always tell kids in recruiting, you want to be honest. It's just if
• 51:15
  you believe you're a kind of player that will elevate in those environments, you
• 51:20
  need to come here. If you are a little bit unsure about the bright
• 51:22
  lights and the crowds and that energy, you don't want to come here.
• 51:25
  But there's so many players that play better in those environments. Those are the
• 51:30
  dudes. That's the guy you want, that's who you're looking for. That's
• 51:32
  Derek Clark. He's going I was good at Northwood D two, but under
• 51:36
  the lights in the regional I'm going to be really good. It's like feeding
• 51:39
  those guys steroids when you did with those crowds. He had to bring his
• 51:43
  own energy at D two. Right, there's thirty five people watching. You've
• 51:45
  got to get yourself juiced. Yep, forty five hundred people there. Let's
• 51:49
  go, let's go. Yeah, what do you envision that becoming? Because
• 51:52
  obviously Randy, you know, I always put layers and layers and layers and
• 51:55
  continue to build it and build it and build it. And it was like
• 51:58
  boof when he walked away, it was like at the peak. So like,
• 52:00
  now, what in your mind do you want to see? Do you
• 52:05
  go to Rent eventually and say hey about that one hillside, let's let's tear
• 52:08
  us this, or do you want more seats? Like what do you what?
• 52:12
  Do you what would you like to see? I don't need to you
• 52:14
  just did. That's unbelievable. Put it down rend a bulldozer. You probably
• 52:19
  don't have to tell rend to add seats if it leads to more revenue.
• 52:22
  I think on top of that, right, but do you do you have
• 52:25
  I think that's really fair. I think when you're selling out games consistently,
• 52:31
  you have to consider the prices. You have to consider the seating, You
• 52:35
  have to consider the luxury seating options. And I think we're right at the
• 52:39
  time to begin doing that. Need to capitalize on it. You have two
• 52:44
  burms that are not fan friendly, so to be able to tear those,
• 52:47
  that's a nice way of saying, you could slide your photographers go down on
• 52:52
  that first side. When I'm in the third base box, you'll have some
• 52:57
  people on the berm behind me, and you have kids hanging out on the
• 53:00
  berm and guys are hitting foul balls at one eleven off the bat, and
• 53:05
  I'm always like looking for kids behind me, Hey put your kid, sure,
• 53:07
  your kids under. Yeah, I'm like, I'm looking for that.
• 53:10
  But if you're able to tear those and maybe you turf it, maybe you
• 53:14
  put up some tents, you could create a really cool party atmosphere that was
• 53:19
  luxury seating and be able to sell those, and I think there'd be a
• 53:22
  lot of fans that were excited about it. Was when in our last episode
• 53:25
  Rehn was looking for ways to make a few more shekels. I think maybe
• 53:29
  that might be that might be it. But it was also talking about how
• 53:34
  they have a lot of needs and so you got to make decisions. He'll
• 53:37
  build, he said, he'll build stuff if there's an immediate pencil that says,
• 53:42
  yo, if you do this, you'll make this. We'll do it.
• 53:44
  They're aware of the seating possibilities there. That's it, right, win
• 53:47
  games, win games. That stuff follows pretty easy. Oh yeah, I
• 53:53
  wanted not think of that. Thanks. Major League Baseball is heading to robotic
• 54:02
  umpires at some point, right, we're already seeing it. Do you would
• 54:07
  you be an advocate to see college baseball with the trackers? That's a good
• 54:14
  question. That is a good question. I haven't really gone down that road
• 54:19
  too much. I like the human element of the game. I like you
• 54:23
  guys have you got some bad calls every now and then, and there's no
• 54:28
  doubt about it. I'm not I'm not against the robo umpire. I just
• 54:32
  like watching a ball game and fans being interested in what that guy's doing.
• 54:39
  I like the energy, yeah, I like I like the energy that it
• 54:44
  brings. So I don't I don't have the solution for you. I want
• 54:46
  accurate calls. I want to be treated fairly, so does everybody. But
• 54:51
  there is a human element. At what point are the baseball players robots?
• 54:55
  And everything is robots? So I don't worried about that. You can't you
• 54:59
  can't bow the machine AI machines. Yeah, yeah, just I don't know.
• 55:02
  I don't know how we uh, I don't know. Like the middle
• 55:06
  ground there, Brad, what do you think you played? I mean,
• 55:07
  I just think that the umpires, I mean they get it right vast majority.
• 55:13
  I'd say this, you have a great answer. That's that's the perfect
• 55:16
  answer, and I'm with him that until the Empire screws you if you want
• 55:21
  the robo ups. I mean, it's easy to have this conversation here.
• 55:23
  We're not talking about a super regional that hinged on a bad call or a
• 55:28
  check swinger. Yeah, that's where it starts to really ask it. It's
• 55:31
  very easy philosophically to say what we said there. Yeah, but we are
• 55:36
  talking about that and there's interest in the sport and there's a human element.
• 55:39
  How do you envision yourself because you've had to play second fiddle. Randy would
• 55:45
  go out and have conversations with the umpires when there was some rules that needed
• 55:50
  to be discussed, and he was extremely good at it, right. I
• 55:52
  mean, he was a huge rules guy. He knew the whole thing.
• 55:55
  How do you see yourself when we watched you next season walk out to discuss
• 56:00
  a call? Will you be animated? Will you be just like you are
• 56:06
  right now and use that? What do you think? Generally? I'm calm,
• 56:10
  but sometimes the game does things to you that you you're not really aware
• 56:15
  of that has you've had a couple of moments where you've gotten heated, You've
• 56:20
  just in the fray a couple of times for sure. The fun the fun
• 56:23
  one the staff always talks about is I got heated and Jagar ended up getting
• 56:29
  tossed. Remember game, I remember, Yeah, So I always tell Jaguar
• 56:31
  to chill out and calm down not to get tossed again. So I definitely
• 56:37
  cost What was it? What did you? Can you say what you said?
• 56:39
  You remember what you said? I don't. I don't remember. I
• 56:42
  was blacked out, but I walked from the third base box, Yeah,
• 56:45
  cut a cross and it's kind of shouting some shots as you were going through.
• 56:50
  Yeah, I took shots as I was going through. Yeah, through
• 56:53
  a grenade or two, and then started to head back to the dugout,
• 56:58
  and then umpires started chasing me and Jagar kind of got in the way.
• 57:01
  That was like, calm down. He kind of looked like he was going
• 57:04
  stampedes to ile towards the dugout, and Jaguar got booted for some uh,
• 57:08
  for interference, A little contact that happened, even though it was just protecting
• 57:13
  you. He was just standing in the way, just trying to diffuse and
• 57:16
  strikes calls. What was it? Do you remember? Because they don't it.
• 57:22
  It was something it was something from second base, It wasn't. Yeah,
• 57:25
  it was something from the field, So it must have been a play
• 57:29
  at second base, maybe an interference call, or it's probably most likely a
• 57:32
  judgment call from the umpire that I didn't agree with the judgment, but it
• 57:37
  was non reviewable judgment kind of thing. But don't plan. I don't think
• 57:42
  it ever really helps in general. Sometimes there's some strategy to get the kids
• 57:46
  fired up, but we always preach about not being motivated by external factors and
• 57:51
  turn the scoreboard off. So if I'm acting like idiot, that's not really
• 57:54
  the best thing for this. If it's Friday night in a three game series,
• 57:59
  you know they're gonna come back get your ass Saturday or so sure,
• 58:00
  it just doesn't. It just doesn't help. Yeah, I'd be I'd be
• 58:04
  the worst umpire, Like, you get it, you can't take care of
• 58:08
  you. Months later, you'd circle back on the road and Fort Worth is
• 58:12
  that right? You got that right? Saturday and Sunday. There's a lot
• 58:17
  of that. We always tell this. Here's a basketball story. So Pitt's
• 58:21
  playing West Virginia at Pitt and there's this Pitt fan basically on the baseline and
• 58:27
  he is wearing the official out, just killing him. You know. It's
• 58:30
  just a lot of emotion. So the ball comes out of bounds and clearly
• 58:36
  touched by a West Virginia player out of bounds, and the official took the
• 58:39
  ball said West Virginia ball, gave the ball West Virginia inbounded. Started the
• 58:45
  floor. Official look back at the guy from pitt that was screaming, was
• 58:47
  how'd you like that? So you gotta be careful, man, You got
• 58:53
  to be judicious and your criticism. Uh, you big eater. I'm a
• 58:59
  big I listened to an episode you were talking about a famous chef that I'm
• 59:04
  not familiar with, which one I don't know? The guy from West Virginia,
• 59:07
  Paul Smith. Yes, he won the Beard Award. Yes, And
• 59:10
  I was like, I gotta get in here, Charles. What was going
• 59:15
  on? That'd be a good team meal when you guys go down there and
• 59:16
  play in Charleston, like Paul Smith should should feed. So basically he wanted
• 59:21
  James Beard, which is the heisman of cooking. So yeah, you gotta
• 59:24
  go only one of the Spikes Award to put it in Steve's Wow, it
• 59:27
  was regional. It was a regional, but like to get the beard.
• 59:29
  Beard's like an Academy award. It's like a Grammy, it's the it's the
• 59:31
  premiere award. So like in, uh, give me your two favorite meals,
• 59:37
  Like if you're going to sit down and like there the menu is anything
• 59:39
  that Steve wants. What are you eating? I'm probably leaning towards a high
• 59:44
  end piece of beef Texas sure, yep. And then ribby where you go
• 59:50
  for ribeye and a I'll do both of those same time, No, but
• 59:57
  different occasions calling for different cuts there. What side goes with that? Probably?
• 1:00:06
  What are the potatoes that have the cheese grotten? All grotten potatoes going
• 1:00:12
  more than mast or baked for sure? Yeah, really for sure, more
• 1:00:15
  cheese, a lot of grotten. That's not the first draft you I mean,
• 1:00:20
  I'm I'm all for it. All grotten that usually doesn't come off a
• 1:00:22
  high end place like Ruth Chris or Morton's or something like that. Yeah.
• 1:00:25
  Yeah, you're getting all grotten with the spinach also come there on the side.
• 1:00:28
  Maybe a broccoli he mixed in there. Yeah, yeah, we're going
• 1:00:31
  Paul Smith stuff. It's like it a lot. Probably don't do a whole
• 1:00:37
  lot of chicken not a ton, but I'll get in there. We love
• 1:00:39
  pasta and with how do you want that done? I'd like a spicy pasta
• 1:00:45
  probably like uh something something a rabbiotta kind going on there? Very good.
• 1:00:51
  That's good dessert guy. Not a ton. Choice or just doesn't appeal.
• 1:00:59
  Choice definitely appeals. Just don't crush it very often. But more discipline than
• 1:01:04
  the two of us, I guess to go. Discipline on that favorite non
• 1:01:07
  alcoholic drink. What do you drink? Like? You got a water right
• 1:01:09
  there? Like, are you a water guy or do you I'm a water
• 1:01:13
  guy. Water and yeah, I'll mix in once in a while. I'll
• 1:01:19
  get going on like a spark advocare kick, you know, I'll put some
• 1:01:22
  powders in there to keep it going. But big coffee guy, big fan
• 1:01:25
  of coffee, not like a coffee connoisseur like, but I'm trying to establish
• 1:01:30
  you know that world. You know, we have our own three guys coffee
• 1:01:34
  called game Day Grind. It's brewed by Mountaineer Roasting here locally. I love
• 1:01:39
  Mountaineer Roasting by far the best coffee they make their coffee. Game Day Grind.
• 1:01:45
  We'll get your bag. Can we get a walk into that store right
• 1:01:47
  off on the left, on the shelf, you'll see it, golden blue.
• 1:01:50
  We'll get your bag. You hope it's there because people buy it so
• 1:01:52
  dog gone much a lot of times it's gone. But we'll get your bag
• 1:01:55
  of that. You you need that ground? Do you want this? Just
• 1:01:58
  straight? You gotta grinder at home? No grinder, Okay, we'll get
• 1:02:00
  a ski powder powder powderized. So are you a big coffee guy? Yes?
• 1:02:06
  I am, okay, and I don't quite know the difference. But
• 1:02:09
  when I go to Mountain, you're roasting and you drink it, your mouth
• 1:02:13
  kind of waters a little bit. Honestly, What do you order? What
• 1:02:15
  do you order when you go in there? You're getting drip coffee or what
• 1:02:19
  do you do? You go and drip coffee and normally a shot of espresso
• 1:02:22
  in there, whatever that's called. But I don't nothing else. Just just
• 1:02:28
  go straight ass coffee. Yes, I like that. Sugar, no sugar,
• 1:02:30
  no cream. I've never done either. One Texas, don't start,
• 1:02:35
  don't don't start. I didn't attack you, don't don't start on anybody.
• 1:02:38
  I'm not trying coffee shame anybody. I'm not going to. But he needs
• 1:02:42
  to have like chocolate juice, and care when I like. I'm consistently baffled
• 1:02:49
  by this. Why does he care what I like? You know? Why?
• 1:02:52
  Because he likes to stir. I like, I like good food.
• 1:02:57
  If I was going like coffee and steak, like red wine and cigar like
• 1:03:01
  I like all that flavors. So I don't know about that. But so
• 1:03:07
  here's the deal. We have this food court that we do before Mountaineer football
• 1:03:13
  games over there next to Daniels every game. Now, you know, fine
• 1:03:15
  looking Phil, right, do you know Phil? Mausers have to be fun?
• 1:03:20
  Yeah, they are. So. If you look at Phil's building,
• 1:03:24
  If you look at Phill's building to your left, if you're walking into Phills,
• 1:03:27
  you're walking in but you're on University. And to the left of that,
• 1:03:30
  there's a there's a there's a stone foundation. We take that over before
• 1:03:36
  every Mountaineer football game this coming season. And we have a we have a
• 1:03:40
  new confirmed we have a barbecue machine that's about thirty six foot long that's right
• 1:03:47
  now being custom made. It'll be there, is that, right? Yes?
• 1:03:51
  For every right about that? Shockingly that is true. It's a barbecue
• 1:03:54
  what's a barbecue machine? It's a food truck. It's a barbecue food truck.
• 1:04:00
  So redke sounded as if we over and west over Kevin, you know
• 1:04:02
  with him, So you know, I know Red called Rev Cave's barbecue,
• 1:04:08
  and I'm just telling you this as a Texas dude. His his brisket is
• 1:04:12
  absolutely as good as anything you've eaten. It fires me up because that's a
• 1:04:17
  pretty big knock I have. Is that the barbecue? Oh yeah, well
• 1:04:20
  you wait, got you it hasn't been. Hey, let me tell you,
• 1:04:26
  Rev Cave will Revkev will do two things for you. He will show
• 1:04:29
  you the light from the pulpit and he will show you the light in barbecue.
• 1:04:32
  I think that's a fair statement off when you agree with that, well,
• 1:04:35
  we've said many many times in order to be accurate here and make sure.
• 1:04:41
  I am told by our guy that you'll be able to order that off
• 1:04:45
  the episode eight Hunter dot Com. You can fall like be able to order
• 1:04:47
  your Saturday pickup. You'll be able to put the orders in through the website.
• 1:04:50
  You want a complete brisket, completely done, you just put it go
• 1:04:55
  in there episode eight hundred. Put your order in. Game day comes in,
• 1:04:58
  you go into your tail gate. Hey, I got my brisket ordered
• 1:05:00
  boom. He's got room for ninety six pans inside the inside the big barbecue
• 1:05:05
  truck. That sounds amazing. It's it's gonna be awesome. We'll have you
• 1:05:09
  over one of these Saturday. Yeah, I would love get coffee and coffee
• 1:05:13
  rust. You'll be over there from Mountaineer Roasting. Sure, he'll make it.
• 1:05:15
  So we'll get your coffee, we'll get your barbecue, get your big
• 1:05:18
  lollipop call it today. What about the our friends from Parkersburg? Oh yeah,
• 1:05:24
  Oh the beer we're also efforting. We're having a new beer come out
• 1:05:28
  this fall, three guys beer. The first one was called Kerchieveil. Now
• 1:05:31
  we're getting ready for the second one, have we I don't think we've announced.
• 1:05:34
  You got to play on Hop and Hop Sole right, Kerchival's last name,
• 1:05:40
  kerch of Ail, was the first one. Very very creative. I'll
• 1:05:42
  tell you what the next one, this next, this next beer that's coming
• 1:05:46
  out in August. I'll just say this. The can is so pretty that
• 1:05:53
  I don't even know if you want to open. It might be a collector's
• 1:05:55
  item. I think it is. It's gorgeous, like an art piece.
• 1:05:58
  It is an art piece. It's absolutely we had we had a taste test.
• 1:06:01
  I really liked it. It's really good. Yeah, it's really really
• 1:06:04
  cool. I think I'm only allowed to support roads trust. Yeah, I'm
• 1:06:12
  still you can still when you show up, coach, you can still have
• 1:06:15
  one of the three guys beers. And it doesn't have to be an endorsement
• 1:06:17
  and endorsement, just enjoy responsibly. We're all for the trust. We're all
• 1:06:23
  for. This is what we're for, buddy, Yeah, go ahead.
• 1:06:25
  We're all for great players. We don't care how. We just want great
• 1:06:30
  players. You know why. Great players make great coaches. Great coaches make
• 1:06:32
  great teams. Great teams win. We just want win, hey, coach,
• 1:06:35
  and we like to talk about winning. Hobbies, avocations, things when
• 1:06:40
  you're not working. What do you like to do. I've been accused of
• 1:06:43
  not having very many hobbies. Try to hang out with the family. Yeah,
• 1:06:47
  I really like if I can work out with the team or being around
• 1:06:51
  the guys, or do a sprint session or jump in with them, that's
• 1:06:55
  really fun. Just like being around the team and having energy and doing that.
• 1:07:00
  I'm into that. If I if I had free time going hiking or
• 1:07:02
  being outside, would be up there. But mainly you got a six and
• 1:07:06
  a three year old, so just trying to go to games, trying to
• 1:07:09
  play wiffle ball, trying to you know, carve out a pool day if
• 1:07:13
  you can. That's good man, that's the that's the that's the most important
• 1:07:16
  thing. So on wiffle ball. When the when the sixth year old doesn't
• 1:07:18
  hit, it's like, what are you doing? Dig in there? In
• 1:07:21
  there have you thrown when you do play wiffle ball with your with your dude,
• 1:07:27
  any breaking stuff? Yet you're throwing any breaking stuff at him just to
• 1:07:30
  kind of Yeah, I'll go fastball. I'll go fastball, change up in
• 1:07:32
  the living room. Yeah, I'll send it to the players too, and
• 1:07:38
  I'll be like, this guy's this guy's on the change up. At a
• 1:07:41
  young age, you can hit both pitches. You don't have to sit on
• 1:07:43
  a pitch stay heater or what Charlie she hit, Charlie hits she crushes right
• 1:07:48
  or lefties? What do we get both? And early on I tried to
• 1:07:55
  go lefty and he was going a little bit, but naturally kept rolling up
• 1:07:59
  to the right side, like can't fight this battle, gotta let let it
• 1:08:01
  go, let it be. It's stupid. Yeah, that's fine, he'll
• 1:08:03
  be all right, he'll be doing that. Yeah, well this is force
• 1:08:06
  him to take ground balls. He doesn't mind. He really likes to throw,
• 1:08:11
  and so he'll go ground balls some days. They they don't really like
• 1:08:15
  to just hit and sit there and hit. They always want to run.
• 1:08:16
  So, yeah, they hit it. They got to run to first base.
• 1:08:18
  It's like, what are we doing. We're not we're not taking VP.
• 1:08:20
  They don't have VP yet. Yeah, they gotta play the game,
• 1:08:24
  that's right. I can't teach speed. I can't teach speed. Steve.
• 1:08:27
  I told you he just wants to keep running, I know, but he
• 1:08:29
  needs to stay in there. Yeah, just the swings, no doubt.
• 1:08:32
  Wrap it up. Well, this has been good. Well I heard if
• 1:08:36
  you could if I don't know if you these microphones pick it up. But
• 1:08:41
  Steve's boat, did you hear the did you hear the horns sound Steve's boat
• 1:08:44
  from lou window as pulled up outside. Well, they took it from the
• 1:08:49
  river behest on Deckers right now, which is directly behow below us here we're
• 1:08:56
  right off the rail trail Deckers Creek in the dog park, and the horn
• 1:08:59
  is sound and don't forget. If you want the premiere pontoon boat experience in
• 1:09:03
  the state of West Virginia, it's lou Wendell Marine Sales, located in Saint
• 1:09:06
  Albans. They've been doing it for nearly fifty years. Look at that bad
• 1:09:10
  boy right there by the way, Steve. Don't know if you're a big
• 1:09:12
  James Bond guy, but every James Bond movie that has had a pontoon boat
• 1:09:17
  in it in the last fifty years, the boat has come from Lou Wendell
• 1:09:23
  Marine Sales. Is kind of net confirmed. Well, we're trying to get
• 1:09:26
  that confirmed, but visit lou Wendellmarnes Sales dot com. That's lou Wendellmarnes Sales
• 1:09:31
  dot com. I hope you. I hope you've enjoyed this as much as
• 1:09:34
  I have. I was looking forward to this, dude. It's been a
• 1:09:38
  blast. Thanks so much for having me on. Truly, it's really fun
• 1:09:41
  to get to know you guys, and I look forward to watching the show
• 1:09:43
  in the future. Dude, we look forward to watching you. This has
• 1:09:45
  been fun. It's like we already knew you because I mean, they're always
• 1:09:48
  looking at the third base coaching box, right you were always there. You're
• 1:09:51
  always there, and now you just go over to here. You're in first.
• 1:09:58
  I'm gonna still coach third. Yeah, yeah, man, that's I
• 1:10:01
  like that guy. Guys there Three Guys before the Game brought to us by
• 1:10:08
  Comac's Business Systems, keeping West Virginia's business data safe, secure and efficient for
• 1:10:12
  twenty five years. By Gomart Go for good times, Go for Gomart,
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  get the Gomart rewards card. And by Lou Wendell Marine Sales in St.
• 1:10:20
  Albans they sell family fund. Visit Louwyndelmarne Sales dot com Episode five six.
• 1:10:25
  Two of three Guys Before the Game with our special guest Steve Sabins is complete.
• 1:10:30
  Take care, thanks for being with us. Remember episode eight hundred.
• 1:10:33
  Dot com got all of our gear and all kinds of stuff. Stay well,