Latest / The Layback Podcast / Ethan Landon, University of Toledo Pitching Coach (Ep. 65)

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Ethan Landon, University of Toledo Pitching Coach (Ep. 65) · The Layback Podcast

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Hey everyone, welcome back to the Lay Back podcast.
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Joining us today is first year pitching coach at the University
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of Toledo, Ethan Landon. Ethan had an incredible first
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year with his group up with the Rockets.
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I was proud to see him bring some glory to my hometown of
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Toledo and really bring the Rockets to new heights that not
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only did the Rockets have some amazing team accomplishments as
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well as staff accomplishments, but they made their first
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appearance in the Mac Championship.
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Probably stole his Thunder a little bit on that one.
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But before we even let him talk about his background, we have to
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get into probably the possibly ugliest conference tournament
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game ever played. These are my words, not his.
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I don't want him getting fined. I don't want anything happening
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to Toledo here. This is a game that probably
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never should have been played. Again, my words, not his.
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Even if you just want to open up to start with your opening round
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matchup against BGSU and whatever it was, 50° in an
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absolute downpour. Yeah, what a way to open up
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tournament. Play well, it's what you play
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the whole season for, right? It was one of the more
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unforgettable experiences I've ever had in my life.
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You know, as a coaching staff, we've got multiple decades in
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the game of baseball and we're all looking at each other in the
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dugout. Like, have you ever seen this
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before? Let's add a little context.
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Thursday morning, the conference tournament, we're playing
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Bowling Green and obviously our rival right down I-75.
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And it it was raining about as hard as I've ever seen in a
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baseball game. There was in two innings, double
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digit walks, double digit wild pitches, balls flying around all
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over the place. And The funny thing is you look
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at it and you're like, OK, so Bowling Green starter who's
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really, really good. Our starter who's really, really
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good. You have two of the premier
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strike throwers in the Mac on the mound.
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And I saw a snippet in the screenshot.
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It was like at one point there was seven straight walks.
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And both pitchers are out there. Like between pitches they have
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their hand in their back pocket trying to keep it dry, recycling
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waterlogged wet baseballs back in onto the field.
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It was certainly an experience. Thankfully we only had to put up
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with that for two innings before we had about a 7 hour delay.
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But it it was one of the crazier experiences.
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I could coach for another 50 years and hopefully I don't have
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another experience like that. But you know, life's about
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collecting experiences, and that was certainly one of them.
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Yeah, I think there's a few ways we could look at this and we
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could probably go the statistical route to start.
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And with Jackson Bergman on the bump for you guys, I think he
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hit a third of his season total and walks in that one inning
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alone. Well, I took a mountain visit
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and I don't really even know like what my coaching point was.
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I was just trying to give him a second to kind of cool down.
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And we come back into the dugout and we're like, hey, and this is
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the best coaching you've ever heard of in your life.
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I'm looking at Rob, our head coach, and we're like, who can
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throw a strike? Like who can throw a strike?
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And we have a, we have a six year senior, Yanni Scary Otis,
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who's one of my favorite guys I've ever coached.
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He perks up. He's like, I could try.
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And so we sent him down to the bullpen and he came in and he
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got us out of the jam. And when you look at how that
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game finished out, it was massive that he came in and he
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threw strikes and he got us out of that thing.
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Still up two runs going into the rain delay.
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I talked to him about it multiple times.
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He's kind of chapped because he felt like he should have been on
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the all tournament team just for that 2/3 of an inning coming in
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there. But you look at that inning goes
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really weird and everybody knows the game of baseball.
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Who knows what the outcome of that game is once we resume.
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So it was certainly something out of a storybook for sure.
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Yeah, 9 out of 14 pitches for strikes in that inning might be
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the single most impressive baseball stat ever recorded.
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A. 100% I told him, I said, listen, you're going to be
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telling the story the rest of your life.
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He's going on to Med school and he's going to be really
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successful in everything that he does in life.
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And I'm like, whatever you do from here on out, nothing is
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going to be more impressive than you coming in when the rain is
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blowing 30 miles an hour in your face and you threw 9 out of 14
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strikes. I think stories need to be
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written about that single performance right there.
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Nothing else Like that's that's the highlight of the college
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baseball season. That's, that should be the
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focus. I mean, Johnny should probably
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have a biography written about him, about those 14 pitches and
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the adversity he faced within it.
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It was wild and it was a wild start to a wild tournament,
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right? Then you end up playing six
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games in three days after that and it was all hands on deck and
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certainly a successful run through the Mack tournament for
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us. We came up one game short, but
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you look at how that thing started and we're all sitting
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there going, as I said, we we played the whole season for this
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and this is how it's going to start out for us.
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It's. Crazy stuff, but with this we
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should probably back it up and at least let you share a little
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bit of your background. I just had to get into this
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right away. To me there there is no farting
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around of letting you actually talk about yourself.
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We we had the address, the elephant in the room right away,
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which was probably the craziest game of college baseball ever
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started, let alone finished 12 hours later.
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Yes, well, and rightfully so. That game is much more important
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than anything. I could tell you about my
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background, but no, I pitched at Michigan State when I got into
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coaching, actually got an unbelievable opportunity.
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My pitching coach from Michigan State, Skyler Mead.
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I've got the head coaching job at Troy University and
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thankfully he thought highly enough of me during my playing
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days that he thought I'd be a great coach and brought me down
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to Troy with him. And those years were
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instrumental in me kind of learning not just the other side
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of the game from a coaching perspective as opposed to seeing
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it as a player, but kind of seeing the motor, seeing what it
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takes to be a really high level coach.
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And this last season, thankfully, I got an opportunity
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to come up here to Toledo and kind of take over my own thing,
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right run my own pitching staff, which ultimately was my goal
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getting into this and had a lot of success in Year 1.
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We're number one in the in the Mac and ERA batting average
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against and a lot of different statistical categories.
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And thankfully we have really good players.
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Good players make good coaches. But no, it's been a lot of fun
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so far and I'm loving my time here in Toledo.
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One thing of tremendous significance that we can
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probably address off the jump with you taking over your own
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program is you really had some unprecedented success from young
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players. You guys had the freshman
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pitcher of the year as well as what you and I have talked a
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little bit about offline, quite possibly the runner up for
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freshman pitcher of the year on the same staff.
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So not only did you guys have fifth year guys perform at a
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high level in this realm of college baseball where you
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mostly see fourth year, fifth year and even 6th year guys take
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the bump, you guys had first year dudes really perform well.
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So if you could even begin to comment on why or how young guys
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were able to have success in your program, I think that would
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be a really cool insight. Absolutely.
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And as you touched on, like it's kind of an old guy's game right
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now, college baseball, and that really started with like the
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COVID area with guys getting extra years.
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And it kind of is unprecedented in college baseball nowadays for
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freshmen to come in and really hit the ground running right
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away. You don't see it a whole lot.
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And I think you see two different profiles of guys, both
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really, really unique and talented in their own ways.
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Brady Sass as a kid who has really good stuff and I think he
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hasn't even begun to scratch the surface of what he can do as a
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baseball player, but he probably has better command and throws
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more strikes than any 18 year old kid I've ever seen.
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And it's real compete. He wants the baseball.
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And again, he does some really unique things when he's on the
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mound. And then you've got Braden
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Curry, who's a local kid here. His dad pitched in professional
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baseball, pitched in the big leagues, got a cup of coffee up
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there, super high slot guy. That's an incredibly
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uncomfortable at bat. I would talk to other coaches
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and other pitching coaches in the league after he threw and
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they're like guys are coming back into the dugout doing I
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don't I don't see it. It's weird and for him, again, a
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guy that came in, he got on campus, he did his first
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physical, he was 146 lbs. A 146 lbs to 9 months later, he
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was one of the best relievers in the league and have had
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tremendous success as a freshman.
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It's a testament to how much hard work he put in on his body,
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on his stuff, understanding who he is.
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But it is fun to see young guys have success.
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When you turn on the TV and you're watching regionals, when
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it's a lot of 4th and 5th year guys like, it makes you excited
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about the future of the game, that young guys can still come
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in and pitch and succeed right away.
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Obviously those guys were in a system that enabled them to be
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successful. I know they came in with talent.
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Nobody plays Division One baseball these days without
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talent. But maybe this is a chance for
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you to toot your own horn a little bit, or maybe for the
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staff as a whole to toot their horn for how you were able to
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get so much out of guys that maybe you didn't expect a ton
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out of early on. Because you have to create an
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environment for these guys to be successful.
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And don't worry, I'm going to come back and try to poke some
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holes later on. 1st, we'll give you an opportunity to say what
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went really well before we we start to find the problems with
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anything. Yeah, I think when you're a
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coach and you're coming into a situation where it's a lot of
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new guys and for me coming into a new staff last year was
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totally new guys. Like even guys that had been
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here, I had never coached them before.
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So a lot of it early on was trying to meet guys where they
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were at. Everybody is at a different
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stage of their development. When you get them, you get the
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Yannis who are 60 year seniors who are super physical and they
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know their stuff and they've been in the weight room and
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they're strike throwers and it's a little bit more about like
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tweaking and developing in our that can help them get everybody
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out. Whereas with the freshman, it's
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laying the foundation. For Curry, the weight room was a
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massive emphasis. You talk about over the course
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of a four month, 56 game season, like he needed to add some
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weight, he needed to get stronger.
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His stuff was pretty good, but it was a matter of making sure
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that he could make it through the course of the season.
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It'd be really successful the whole time.
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So for him, when we get all these guys and they come in,
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it's an evaluation process initially.
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So we go through all the same evals that I'm sure a lot of
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people do with the athletic training staff, the strength and
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conditioning staff, and we throw bullpens on the Trackman units.
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We can kind of get a foundation of, hey, here's what your stuff
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looks like, here's the zones that your stuff is going to play
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in. And then we build out plans and
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routines for those guys. And those are constantly under
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construction throughout the course of the fall.
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That's a very small sample size for us to see, OK, what's
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working, what's not. Let's make sure that we adjust
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quickly if something's not working and let's play to your
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strengths and continue to get you better.
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And for SAS, it was the same thing.
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He was a kid that came in with a little bit more of a training
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history. I still think that he can
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continue to get bigger, faster, stronger, more physical.
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It was a little bit more about like the arsenal with him
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because he was so advanced. The big thing for me when I get
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all these guys and these new guys is trying to make sure that
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they understand that we're not going to cookie cut any singular
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one of them. Every guy's program needs to
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look a little bit different for them to maximize who they can be
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as a pitcher. Like I said all the time, my 6-7
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left-handed pitcher and my 510 right-handed pitcher need
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something different. I have to coach both of those
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guys in different ways. They have different movement
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patterns. Their ball flight is different.
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Where they're going to pitch in the zone is going to be
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different. We have our pillars as a
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pitching staff of what we believe in cohesively, but
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everybody can get to that result a little bit differently and I
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think that's where you get the uniqueness of a really good
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pitching staff. Now even the structure of the
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pitching staff, I want to spend some time on this because you
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were not afforded the opportunity to create the
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pitching staff, right? You weren't, you weren't able to
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recruit, you were given whoever was recruited for you basically,
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and you lucked into a pretty good situation.
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You had absolutely very talented dude.
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So that was a good little draw you had there.
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Given that you stepped into a situation where you're your
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familiarity is really only what you can find on scouting reports
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or on Synergy or some sort of online system or what somebody
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has told you about these kids. How much of what a player has
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done before influenced how you went about your structure in
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programming this year, Like, for example, a kid like Bergman?
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Who? Was a starter in the weekend
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rotation. Granted he he dealt with
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something in the fall, but maybe someone in a similar situation
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like Yanni who threw relief innings historically.
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Do you go off the jump knowing that that guy is going to be a
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reliever in your mind? Or is it just complete open
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season because you're walking into a new situation much as the
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players are? I tried to go into it with an as
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much of an open mind as possible.
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Now, when you have a guy like Bergman coming back who had been
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a weekend starter and it's Turbosync and it's a good
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breaking ball and there's like tons of strikes, you have a
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pretty good idea like that guy's going to throw a bulk share of
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innings for us, right? But you're also trying to take
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stock of, you know, there's some talented guys on the staff that
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haven't had success in the past. And a lot of that is trying to
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figure out, OK, is it like a stuff thing?
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Is it a mental thing? Like, does he need a fresh
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start? Like, do we need to start to
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tweak the delivery in the arsenal?
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Like there's any number of reasons that guys haven't had
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success in the past. And so a lot of that is just
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like having conversations right away.
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I'm a massive believer that like if I can communicate with a
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pitcher, we can figure it out. The communication aspect in the
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relationship aspect of building pitching Staffs is a massive
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importance to me. And so it's having conversations
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with those guys. Like if I come in day one and I
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have a system and it's super rigid and it's everybody needs
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to throw the same way. You throw the same plyos, you
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throw the same distance, you throw the same bullpens, you
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throw the same everything. Right away, it's going to work
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for the guys that it should work for.
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But then you have all these other guys off to the side where
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you don't know what the maximum of that picture looks like.
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And so again, to your point, like you do have kind of an idea
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coming in about, you know, we had Jacob Taber, who was a
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freshman All American as a bullpen guy the year before,
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Like we had a pretty good idea that he's a guy that was on
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track to become a starter. That's kind of the general
14:37
trajectory in college baseball. If you're a really good relief
14:40
guy as a freshman, you bump up into the weekend rotation as a
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sophomore and then you keep building from there.
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But there was still some development that needed to
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happen there for him and keeping an open mind on a couple guys.
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Like we have a kid named Nathan Lininger, who is a massive
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bullpen piece for us this year. And he does some really, really
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unique things. He's tough on hitters.
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He didn't have a great sophomore year.
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And I kept watching video before I got here and met all these
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guys. I'm like, why isn't this guy
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having success? And so having tons of
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conversations with him in the fall and working on some of the
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mental side with him and kind of tweaking his stuff.
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He comes out this year and he's a real dude.
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Players are allowed to get better, right?
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I say that all the time. And we kind of lose that
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sometimes in college baseball nowadays where it's, hey, you
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got one year to show us what you can do and maybe then it's on to
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the next guy in the portal. Players are still allowed to get
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better and develop. And I think that we had a good
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kind of mixture this year of guys that had had success, that
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continued on having success. And then guys that had the
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profiles to have success, the stuff to have have success and
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helping build that confidence in their stuff, their arsenal and
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all that allowed them to have breakout years this year.
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And we're we're super proud of that.
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How do you juggle that as a coach, specifically with giving
15:56
a guy time to get better when obviously your livelihood
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depends on winning ball games, your head coach's livelihood
16:04
depends on winning ball games and doing things the team is not
16:08
done before. Thankfully, you guys were able
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to do a good bit of that this year and it sounds like players
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were able to get better. So I'm very curious how you guys
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as a staff are able to juggle development of a player who
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might not get a lot of time on the field or needs to show
16:25
significant improvement to crack a rotation, but they're not
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constantly getting game exposure.
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I think initially in the fall, it's putting them in positions
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to be successful, if that makes sense, like how we structure
16:39
some fall formats. We're putting guys out there and
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opportunities for them to be successful and it does take
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patience at times. I preach all the time with these
16:48
guys like baseball is a really, really hard game.
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If you ride the highs and you ride the lows, you're not going
16:54
to have very much fun playing baseball.
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So if you go out there in the fall and you have 2 innings and
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you strike out three guys, but you give up four runs, the
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conversation with me with these guys in their post outing
17:06
reports is let's take the really good stuff that happened and
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understand like let's find a way to continue to replicate that.
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Let's not dwell on the bad. Let's understand why it happened
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and we can make adjustments for that.
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But like, you can't ride those highs and lows on every single
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pitch that you throw. It's having the mentality of I'm
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going to walk some guys, I'm going to give up some hits,
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somebody's going to make an error behind me.
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I think it's making it OK for guys to fail every once in a
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while and knowing like I'm still going to get another
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opportunity. This is about my development.
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It's not about having a 0 ERA in the fall.
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It's about develop. With fall being so much about
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development, and fortunately you will have a fall now with a
17:51
little bit of a background on what your guys can actually do
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instead of just going in blind. Is anything going to change now
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that you have an idea of what these guys can do instead of
18:04
predicting what they can do now you've actually seen it for a
18:08
good chunk of your dudes. I know you still have some
18:10
recruiting to do, but you're going to be able to build on
18:15
something now. It's not just like staring at
18:18
unshaped clay or unchiseled marble and just hoping now
18:23
you're you've actually made some progress.
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So what? What maybe is going to change
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this fall from the previous? Well, I think you still have to
18:32
lay your foundation and your principles immediately with
18:35
everybody, right? But you're exactly right, like a
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lot of our conversations and exit meetings with the guys that
18:40
are coming back was about what's going to be expected of them
18:43
next fall and going into next season.
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And then conversations about their development.
18:47
When you get guys back, if you have a full season and a full
18:51
fall worth of sample size with them, you know how they go about
18:54
their business, you know what they're good at, you know what
18:55
they're bad at, how do we layer more ability on to what they can
19:00
do as a pitcher? So if you're a guy that has a
19:04
really good breaking ball and that's how you get misses and
19:08
it's down in the zone, like can we expand that miss zone and
19:11
throw a fastball up in the zone and continue to add layers to
19:13
that, continuing to develop arsenals for the guys that have
19:16
been here. And then with the new guys,
19:18
it'll be a lot of, again, meeting guys where they're at,
19:21
trying to understand where everybody's at and their curve
19:23
of development will be a massive emphasis.
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But I am excited to go into a fall and have a lot of guys that
19:29
are back that I have a track record with.
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They know my system, they know what's expected of them, and
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I'll put a lot of onus on them to make sure that the new guys
19:37
are coming in and they're being brought along correctly.
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We did things a certain way and I'm not super rigid in my system
19:44
in terms of like every guy has to do everything the same way.
19:47
But I'm hoping that we have a lot of good older guys that have
19:50
great routines and work really hard and they go about their
19:52
process the right way and the new guys come in and they see
19:54
how the older guys work. That's how you get really,
19:57
really good players. They understand what's expected
20:00
of them and. The expectations are that you
20:03
get a little bit better every single day.
20:06
Given the importance that's put on the buzzword now or buzz
20:10
phrase of a throwing on ramp, I'd love to hear more about your
20:15
system. What does it look like for
20:18
somebody to step in to the Toledo Rockets pitching staff
20:23
and grow through the Ethan Landon system or the Rocket
20:27
system? Yeah, I just actually had some
20:30
conversations last night with freshmen that are coming in.
20:33
Unfortunately, last fall I had not recruited any of those guys.
20:37
So like I didn't have a background with them coming in
20:41
and I got the job in July. And at that point, like you're
20:43
trying to hit the ground running and get your feet wet, whatever.
20:45
But I was having some conversations with freshmen that
20:47
are coming in next fall about, hey, where you at with your high
20:51
school season right now? Are you playing summer ball?
20:53
If so, you're going to be good to go.
20:55
You're going to hit the ground running when you're here.
20:57
If you're taking a little bit of time off after your high school
21:00
season because you've hit a certain innings limit or
21:03
whatever, like let's make sure that we're mapping out.
21:06
So when you guys get here in August, you're going to be ready
21:08
to go. So from an on ramp perspective,
21:11
obviously it matters like where guys are at and they're throwing
21:14
progression. If you're coming off of a season
21:18
where you threw 6070 innings and then you went out and played
21:22
summer ball, the fall for me is a little bit more about let's
21:26
work on some of the things that we didn't maybe do incredibly
21:29
well last year so we can continue to develop your
21:31
arsenal. But like the focus on like
21:34
facing hitters all the time maybe won't be quite as
21:36
important as the new guys coming in and they've got to get ramped
21:39
into the system. We have to see what they can do
21:41
against hitters, but it's different for everybody.
21:45
Is there a specific throwing program that you have any of
21:50
your guys doing? Are you messing around with
21:53
throw counts or how are you managing workload?
21:57
I wouldn't say like a specific throwing program per SE.
22:02
Like I have guys that love to long toss and they do it
22:04
multiple times a week. I'm cool with that.
22:07
I have guys that love to throw to 90 feet at Max intent cuz
22:11
that's where they feel like they're at.
22:13
I'm cool with that. Like it's all about making sure
22:15
that you understand what makes you good.
22:17
Now for those freshmen that are coming in, so you're talking
22:20
about like the throwing plan that I'm giving them.
22:22
The throwing plan that I'm giving them is basically that
22:24
they're going to be throwing in some capacity five times a week.
22:27
Now I've scheduled in high days, low days, medium days, recovery
22:30
days, and they're getting off the mound about twice a week as
22:33
they get up to being here on campus with one of them being a
22:36
heavier day and the other day being a touch and feel day.
22:39
As we go throughout the fall, like we'll touch the mound the
22:41
first week we're back here on campus last week of August ish.
22:45
And then that progresses as the fall goes on.
22:48
I always take it from a perspective of let's make sure
22:52
that we're feeling good early. Like we don't play the Mack
22:55
tournament the last week of August.
22:57
So like, let's schedule in maybe a couple more of those recovery
23:00
days for guys that are working back into an on ramp of a
23:03
throwing program. And then as we get closer to the
23:06
starting of like our inner squad scrimmages, let's get off the
23:09
mound a couple times a week. Let's make sure that there's at
23:12
least one of those days. It's really high intensity.
23:15
You know, if you're talking about an intensity scale of one
23:17
to 10, if you have two, 88 out of 10 days a week, 9 out of 10
23:21
days a week, those are your competition days.
23:23
Those are your Max intent. Bullpenses are days you're
23:25
facing live hitters. You need to have two days that
23:28
are probably ones or twos like we need to take the recovery
23:32
aspect of this thing really seriously.
23:34
Usually those are days immediately after throwing.
23:37
So that's four of your seven days.
23:39
And then the other three days are again, kind of based on what
23:43
that guy likes to do. Is it I'm going to go long toss
23:45
and pull down at the end of it. OK, that's another like fairly
23:48
high intent throwing day. So let's make sure that we
23:51
litter in like a low intensity or a medium day after that.
23:54
But again, it's it's kind of based on what's best for each
23:57
guy. And maybe my last pressing
24:00
question on this topic before we shift a little bit is going back
24:04
to your ability to support individuality amongst your
24:09
staff. It sounds like that's really
24:10
important to you to allow guys to be themselves not just on the
24:15
bump, but in their programming to ensure that what they're
24:19
doing they have comfort with and that they're confident in.
24:23
So how when? Everybody needs to throw with a
24:27
partner. Are you a bucket guys?
24:30
Yeah, we bucket guys. We'll like bucket guys into
24:32
different categories. Yeah, I probably should have
24:34
said that a little bit earlier, but we'll bucket guys into
24:37
different categories. So when they do their evals with
24:40
the strength and conditioning staff and the athletic training
24:42
staff, I kind of bucket them based on how they move.
24:45
Like super loose guys. They're going to be doing not
24:49
the same thing, but along the same lines of what they do in
24:53
their warm up routine and their post throw routine and they're
24:56
throwing programs are going to look relatively similar.
24:58
You get your super stiff guys. Those guys kind of move the same
25:02
way. Those are generally guys that we
25:03
need to open up range of motion. They're probably more along the
25:06
lines of, hey, get out there too, a little bit further
25:09
distance, open everything up so they understand like the buckets
25:13
that they are in. It's not just complete total
25:17
chaos of every single guy is, you know, completely off the
25:20
wall doing their own thing. But we buck you guys generally
25:24
into categories of how they move and what their their arsenal
25:27
looks like, if that makes sense. OK, Yeah, that, that makes
25:31
sense. Like I said, I wasn't just going
25:33
to hype you up the whole podcast.
25:34
I I defined. No, you got to hit the hard
25:36
hitting questions. No, you got to hit the hard
25:38
hitting questions. For sure.
25:40
I love talking about this stuff so I could talk about it all
25:42
day. Perfect.
25:44
Well, we're probably going to make not the smoothest
25:48
transition, but we are going to jump ahead from the fall all the
25:53
way back into our current place in baseball, which is tournament
25:57
play, the postseason. You let on that you guys had
26:01
quite the interesting path through the conference
26:04
tournament. We talked about the opening game
26:06
a good bit already, but then as you mentioned, you played six
26:11
games in three days all the way into the conference
26:16
championship. So I definitely want to talk a
26:18
good bit about pen management. But of course, to get to the
26:22
postseason you have to manage things effectively to even have
26:26
a shot. So we're going to back things up
26:29
in potentially A tougher question here.
26:33
How can you as a coach set your staff up for success when you
26:39
don't necessarily know what role they're going to be throwing in?
26:44
Obviously in a tournament or in the postseason, we're seeing
26:48
starters come out of the pen, we're seeing relievers get
26:51
extended. We're seeing guys who throw 1
26:54
inning normally are all of a sudden throwing 1 inning in
26:59
three consecutive games on three consecutive days.
27:03
So it's not stuff that is normally in the regular season
27:07
schedule, but of course the reason we play the regular
27:10
season is to ultimately compete for a championship.
27:14
So please shed any light you can on this extremely difficult and
27:19
timely topic. I'm not going to lie to you, it
27:22
is challenging. I think you have to be really
27:25
intentional about investing in guys throughout the year.
27:28
I'll just be straightforward, if you like, from a Mac
27:30
perspective. There's never been multiple
27:33
teams that have ever made the NCAA tournament from the Mac.
27:36
It would be really challenging as an SEC team that's playing
27:39
for RPI every single weekend and you're trying to host and you're
27:43
like, hey, I've got my four horses.
27:45
We have to win all of these games.
27:47
We're obviously trying to win every single game we play.
27:50
But we can take a little bit more of a long term approach in
27:53
a midweek game and it's like this guy's going to have to get
27:56
big outs for us at some point this year if we're going to do
27:59
the things we want to do in the conference tournament.
28:01
We were having conversations like that in March.
28:04
Honestly, hey, this is a guy we absolutely have to get into this
28:07
baseball game today. We have to invest innings into
28:10
this guy. And I think when you go back and
28:12
look at our stats throughout the year, we we had basically 10
28:16
guys that threw over 30 innings this year.
28:18
So it helps you and you see when you're able to play six games in
28:23
a conference tournament, there are a lot of teams that did not
28:25
have the pitching depth to do that.
28:27
It helps you when you go play Kent State in the second game of
28:30
the day in a conference tournament.
28:32
And both the guys that we rolled out there hit pitched a lot
28:34
throughout the year. That was game five of the
28:36
tournament for us. But those seeds were laid early
28:40
in the season when it was talked about.
28:43
We're going to need this guy to get outs for us if we're going
28:46
to do the things that we want to do.
28:48
So like we're going to put him out there in the fire and see if
28:51
he's capable of doing it. And ultimately, growth happens
28:54
through succeeding and failing, right?
28:57
I can't tell you how many conversations I had with guys
28:59
this year where you see it at the end of the season when
29:01
everything comes to its culmination.
29:03
But during the season, it's hard to see sometimes when you don't
29:06
have a great out. And it's like, hey, this is
29:08
building towards something. I promise to understand what's
29:11
going on, trust the process, continue to be confident in your
29:14
stuff. We're going to continue to
29:16
build. You're A1 inning guy right now.
29:18
Next time you go out there, we're going to see if you can
29:21
get through that second inning and continue to build and build
29:23
and build. But it's it's that investment
29:25
into guys throughout the course of the season when maybe it
29:29
would be really easy to just say, hey, Logan Jones is the
29:32
best bullpen guy in the league. We have a 8 to 3 lead right now.
29:36
Let's just roll him out there cuz we know the game's over if
29:38
he goes in. No, like we need to get some
29:40
other guys in there and figure out what they have.
29:43
But it is, it is challenging. There is no doubt you have to be
29:46
committed to. There's a long term process
29:48
here. Maybe the second layer to that,
29:51
since you already talked about kind of scheduling guys to an
29:56
extent or forcing dudes to throw in uncomfortable situations, but
30:02
that that's with like the proper on ramps, you're at least able
30:07
to tell a guy like, hey, you're going today so you're able to
30:10
give them some fair warning. Now, the other piece of the
30:14
conference tournament or postseason play is guys throwing
30:18
in abnormal roles. Like you're seeing a Friday guy
30:21
who's then coming in to throw in relief in a clinching game on a
30:25
Monday or something like that. Or as we said, a reliever that's
30:29
going back-to-back, which normally might have only thrown
30:32
on a Friday and a Sunday. Are those there's also things
30:35
that you're taking into consideration or trying to prep
30:38
for or are those just game time decisions?
30:42
I think it's a little bit of both.
30:43
You're having conversations with guys all the time.
30:45
I walk into the bullpen every single day and the guys will
30:48
chuckle because I walk up to every single guy.
30:50
I'm like, how do you feel? How do you feel that you feel
30:52
good? You hang in your lap, sores,
30:54
your cap sore, whatever. We're very, very blessed.
30:56
We have an unbelievable athletic trainer here, Devin Cassidy.
31:00
He was actually a college baseball player himself, which I
31:02
think is incredibly valuable in the game that that we play.
31:06
He understands the rigors of the season, the rigors of the
31:08
position, how your body feels when you just got back on a red
31:12
eye flight from Seattle early in the season and we got to turn
31:15
around on a bus trip two days later.
31:17
He does an unbelievable job of making sure that these guys are
31:21
recovered and they're doing the right things all the time.
31:24
But there are times where it's game time decisions, for
31:27
example, in the conference tournament, like we're playing
31:30
against Miami of Ohio and you know, I guess this will sound
31:33
however it sounds, Yanni scary Otis was a six year senior and
31:36
he's like, I will throw 190 pitches today.
31:38
I'm going to be playing golf next week.
31:39
Like I don't ever need my arm again.
31:42
That's a guy that's willing to lay it all out on the line.
31:44
Whereas like Jacob Tabor is our Friday guy.
31:46
He's a sophomore. He's going to the Cape this
31:48
summer. He's a real dude.
31:50
He's going to be a guy first going forward.
31:52
He walks up to me before the game on Sunday after throwing
31:54
100 pitches on either Thursday or Friday.
31:57
He's like, hey, I could maybe give you an inning today.
32:00
I'm like, absolutely not. That's why we developed depth
32:02
throughout the course of the season.
32:03
I I will not do that to you, man.
32:06
And so it's having those conversations with guys, it's
32:09
understanding who bounces back, who recovers really quickly, who
32:12
doesn't recover really quickly. Let's make sure that we're using
32:15
that guy early in the tournament, early in the
32:17
weekend, so that if we want to, we would be able to bring that
32:21
guy back later in the weekend. And then I'll pump you guys for
32:24
a second here. Like we started using Flex Pro
32:27
this year and the recovery times that we saw for guys were
32:30
unbelievable. Like guys were bouncing back
32:32
really, really quick. They kept their strength up
32:35
throughout the course of the season.
32:36
Like we were able to utilize all of our bullpen guys in bounce
32:40
back roles at times. And I think a large part of that
32:43
is due to the fact that they were training correctly.
32:46
So it's a little feather in in your guys's cap for sure.
32:49
Well, I appreciate that part tremendously.
32:52
I don't want to talk about us too much.
32:55
Yeah, I just, I had to give you the pump.
32:57
Yeah, No, no, no, no. I appreciate it.
32:59
Trust me. That's that's staying in there.
33:01
It's not, it's not like we're cutting it.
33:02
But no, what I wanted to go back to is a piece that probably
33:08
doesn't get addressed enough. And as you said, this is going
33:13
to sound, however it sounds to many people, it is an elephant
33:17
in the room that a lot of these guys aren't going to play
33:21
baseball a week from whenever that last game is, that it's
33:26
literally the last game they will ever play baseball.
33:29
And there are so many guys even throughout their senior year,
33:33
let alone if it's the conference tournament or not, are realistic
33:37
enough to understand I'm in 89 mph, righty with average stuff.
33:43
But I'm a good college baseball player.
33:46
I will do whatever I can to support this program in
33:50
truthfully through those conversations, in a lot of
33:53
honesty and a lot of trust. Those are generally guys that
33:58
want to take more risks. It's not only that you can take
34:02
more risks with those guys. I I would be hard pressed to
34:06
find a college baseball player that doesn't want to be out
34:11
there every single second he can, given the trust in the
34:15
rapport that you're able to build throughout a season.
34:17
For instance, with a guy like Yanni who's been a part of it
34:20
forever, who's going to go on to Med school.
34:23
That's a dude that if you ask him to throw every single game
34:27
of the entire season, he would do it.
34:28
Probably would have. Yes, well, and that's where I
34:31
think context matters. So you talk about like over the
34:34
course of the season, that's where it's still my job to be
34:37
intelligent and make sure that guys are doing the right things
34:39
with that long term approach. When you get to the conference
34:43
tournament and it's it's all hands on deck, obviously you go
34:47
towards those in game decisions of like, hey, how do we win
34:49
baseball games? But like, there were times
34:51
throughout the year where I had pitchers who were going to be
34:54
done after this year. This is their last year of
34:56
baseball and they're like, hey, I'm ready to bounce back today.
34:59
I'm like, no, you're not. You're not ready to bounce back
35:01
yet today. We still have to be intelligent.
35:03
We have two months left in the season.
35:05
We're not just throwing all caution to the wind.
35:08
We do have a lot of other really capable pitchers that are good
35:11
that we're continuing to develop and invest in.
35:14
And again, like, I think the proof's in the pudding.
35:16
You see why we can go through a conference tournament and have
35:18
enough pitching to play six games.
35:20
I don't think many teams in our league, I don't think many teams
35:22
nationally have enough pitching to go through six games in
35:26
three, 3 1/2 days in a conference tournament.
35:28
And so it's a testament to what we did throughout the year.
35:30
But yeah, I think you, again, you have context throughout the
35:34
course of the season. You manage it correctly and
35:36
intelligently with the big picture in mind.
35:39
And then once you get to the conference tournament, if
35:40
there's a guy that says I'll throw 275 pitches today or
35:45
whatever it may be, you go win a baseball game.
35:48
You cannot exclude the human element from all of this and
35:51
what these guys want to do for the legends that they want to
35:55
write about themselves. And it's so funky to talk about.
35:59
Of course we're, we're coming at this as an arm care company,
36:03
like we, we want to preach the right decision, the smart
36:07
decision, the data-driven decision.
36:09
But at some point we have to acknowledge that we are playing
36:13
a game and there is an end to this game for all of us.
36:18
And the fact that for some of these guys it can be in a
36:22
championship situation is pretty freaking cool.
36:25
So you might as well. Remember that the rest of their
36:27
lives, right? They'll remember it for the rest
36:29
of their lives. And we actually talked about it
36:31
before the conference tournament where like Toledo's been being
36:34
playing baseball for 100 years. They've never won the conference
36:37
tournament. Like we have an opportunity to
36:39
go do something that you guys will a remember for the rest of
36:43
your lives. But every time you guys come
36:44
back to Toledo after this, you'll be the group that did it.
36:48
And I think guys were pretty inspired by that, especially
36:51
that group of seniors that wanted to leave their legacy
36:53
going out the door is, hey, we're the group that finally did
36:56
it for Toledo. Now we feel great about the
36:58
foundation we have going forward and those guys helped lay those
37:01
bricks that we hope are building towards winning a conference
37:04
championship and getting to play in an NTA regional.
37:07
But again, like I said, you, you act intelligently.
37:11
We would never put a guy in a situation where we thought, hey,
37:15
this guy is going to absolutely blow out on this pitch.
37:19
We would absolutely never do that.
37:21
But you have a senior out there that's that's in his last ever
37:24
college outing and he wants to try to win a championship.
37:27
You go try to win the game. Stepping things back to the
37:30
regular season, how are you managing workloads then for guys
37:35
that maybe aren't in that upper group of the rotation?
37:39
I know you said you're scheduling outings for guys.
37:42
You're ensuring that dudes get in the game, even if they aren't
37:47
necessarily the bonafide back end dude that you need to shut
37:51
the door. Because you can kind of play
37:54
around with your results a little bit, knowing that winning
37:58
the conference tournament is ultimately all that matters at
38:01
the end of the day for a postseason bid.
38:04
But there are only so many games and you have a roster of
38:08
whatever 18 pitchers. So there's got to be creative
38:12
ways that you build work capacity for these guys, even in
38:16
season. Does that involve extending out
38:19
bullpens or going live on off days?
38:22
How do you do that? Yeah, we have guys on the mound
38:25
a lot during the course of the season.
38:28
Now, a lot doesn't necessarily mean they're throwing 50 pitches
38:31
every time. It might be, hey, multiple times
38:33
this week, you're going to get up there and you're going to
38:35
throw your set and it's going to be 1012 pitches.
38:38
We're going to throw the hitting dummy in there.
38:39
We're going to simulate a couple hitters just to give you the
38:42
feel. And then exactly what you talked
38:44
about, like if we have a practice day and we only have
38:47
one midweek that week, and we know, hey, through this midweek
38:50
we're only going to have three or four guys that go into this
38:52
game. We still need to get the other
38:53
three or four guys work. We'll throw an inning, we'll
38:56
have like a two or three inning scrimmage that day and we'll get
38:59
those guys all an inning of work so that they're sharp going into
39:02
the weekend if their name gets called.
39:05
But it's being on the mound, it's being intentional about
39:07
being on the mound and it's making sure that those guys are
39:10
staying in the right mindset. Again, I talk a lot about and I
39:13
think every coach talks a lot about confidence and mindset,
39:16
but just making sure guys know like, hey, we haven't forgotten
39:19
about you. We're still invested in you.
39:21
We are going to do everything we can to make sure that you're
39:23
staying sharp and you're doing the things that you need to do
39:26
to make sure that when we're out there at the end of the season,
39:28
you're a big part of it. But it's being intentional about
39:31
getting guys work for sure. Now, going into specifics of
39:35
your roster makeup, did you have any guys during the season
39:40
really elevate roles that may be going into the year?
39:44
You didn't expect them to play a massive part, Whether they just
39:48
showed out when they got their opportunity or through
39:51
consistent work in those live settings or those extended pens,
39:56
were they gained additional trust from you or the rest of
39:59
the staff? Yeah, I think those two freshmen
40:01
are a great example of that. Through Fall ball, you see both
40:05
of those guys have success and you're like, there's something
40:08
there with both of these guys, but you don't really know until
40:11
the lights turn on. And we opened up at Oregon this
40:14
year, who was a regional host. It was one of the best college
40:17
offenses I've seen in a long time.
40:19
I mean, they could run, they had Jews, they could hit, they could
40:21
do everything. And you're like, it's going to
40:23
be really interesting to see when these freshmen get out
40:25
there against a bunch of third, fourth year guys that have
40:28
played a lot of college baseball and they're going to play
40:30
professional baseball for the first time.
40:32
And both of those guys were really good that weekend.
40:35
And we kind of looked at each other as a coaching staff.
40:37
We're like, these guys are gonna play a massive role in this
40:40
thing. Curry comes in to a game on
40:43
Sunday and the first hitter he ever faced with Jacob Walsh,
40:45
who's the all time career home run leader at Oregon.
40:48
And we're like, hey, welcome to college baseball, man.
40:51
You you get to face a guy that has 65 career home runs.
40:54
I hope it goes well, but I think you saw both of those guys
40:57
elevate throughout the course of the season.
40:59
There's a couple other guys I mentioned late.
41:01
Nate Leininger was a guy that hadn't had a ton of career
41:03
success coming into this year. He was one of our first guys out
41:06
of the bullpen on that opening weekend and and had a ton of
41:08
success. And I think that confidence led
41:11
him into being a guy that had a massive role for us.
41:13
We used him to close games. We used him in middle relief.
41:16
We started him in a midweek game.
41:18
He he kind of was like our Jack of all trades from a role
41:21
perspective. Those are really three guys that
41:23
I think elevated throughout the course of the year.
41:25
We all knew that they had talent, we all knew that they
41:28
had stuff. It was just about doing it when
41:30
the lights turned on. Now, sticking to the theme that
41:33
I mentioned earlier of I was going to pump your tires and
41:36
then deflate you at some point during the process.
41:40
This is the potential retrospection point where I do
41:44
try to poke and prod a little bit.
41:46
So what are a couple things that you think you maybe could have
41:50
done better or that you're hoping to improve upon going
41:53
forward? I think obviously having a
41:57
season where these guys coming back, we'll have more of a
42:01
foundation laid with those guys. Like there's a couple guys where
42:04
we tried to develop some Arsenal stuff and it just didn't work.
42:08
The number said that it should have worked and the ball flight
42:11
and the trackman, all the data said it should have worked and
42:13
it it just didn't really work. And that's where you have the
42:15
ability to pivot. I think sometimes people get in
42:18
their feelings or they have an ego about it and they're like,
42:21
no, this is going to work. It's my way or the highway.
42:23
I had multiple conversations with guys this year where what
42:27
they were doing we thought was going to work and it didn't.
42:30
And so we'll have a little bit more sample size going forward.
42:33
I think from a perspective of fall ball, maybe making sure
42:37
that that guys are getting out there a little bit more
42:40
consistently for the new guys like this.
42:43
Last year we were very conservative with some of our
42:45
guys, Maybe getting them out there a little bit more so they
42:47
can get their feet put out to the fire and have some of those
42:50
successes and failures a little bit earlier on.
42:53
That could be something going forward.
42:55
But I do feel really good about our process.
42:57
Like, we're certainly not perfect in that regard and we're
43:00
always evolving, but I think our process and the proof's kind of
43:04
been in the pudding and we'll continue to adapt as we need to,
43:07
but we're going to do a lot of the same stuff this year, I
43:09
would say. Part of the reason I even wanted
43:12
to ask is going back to what you said earlier about players are
43:17
allowed to get better so much in the environment that we are in
43:22
now in college baseball. It really has been a what have
43:27
you done for me lately type of league.
43:29
Everybody is so results driven that often times players feel a
43:35
pressure that they need to be performing in the moment.
43:38
Now, not only do players have the right to get better, but
43:43
coaches have a right to grow as well.
43:45
And really I think that that side by side action process, it
43:51
can be really powerful. I guess maybe maybe let's talk
43:54
about that communication point a little bit.
43:56
As you hit on it earlier, you said the communication piece is
44:00
so big for you. So have there there been
44:03
specific times where you've had to go to a guy and be like, yo,
44:07
hand up on me? I messed that up.
44:09
That's I'll fix that. I.
44:11
Mean there was there's multiple times we had to do that.
44:14
I think about it even in games sometime with like calling
44:17
pitches, like we, we game plan, we do all this stuff and
44:21
sometimes a guy gives up a hit and I'm like, why did we do
44:24
that? Why did we throw that pitch?
44:25
And you go to the pitchers. And I think guys appreciate
44:28
honesty. Like there was a time with
44:29
Bergman this year, I walked up. I'm like, Hey, I think I just
44:32
screwed you there. Like we should have gone to
44:33
this. This would have gotten that guy
44:34
out and he was like, no, I appreciate it.
44:37
We had a kid named Logan Jones who was a bullpen guy this year.
44:40
Really, really, really good spin.
44:42
Like can spin multiple shapes and different speeds.
44:45
It's really good. Towards the end of the season
44:48
there was teams that started the game plan for that a little bit
44:51
and he started giving up some hits.
44:53
And I remember he came to my hotel room one night after an
44:55
outing and I just said, hey man, and this is on me.
44:58
Like you're breaking ball. Your slider, your cutter has
45:01
been so good this year that we haven't really had to go to
45:05
anything else. And it it finally nipped us.
45:07
So like now it's time for us to throw a counter punch.
45:10
And that's part of my job is to help make sure that we're doing
45:13
those things. I think that players really
45:16
appreciate that. Obviously, it doesn't feel good
45:18
when you fail at times, but it kind of humanizes the coaching
45:22
aspect of it. None of us are perfect.
45:24
I'm trying to continue to advance my game at all times.
45:27
I have a network of coaches and mentors and people that I talked
45:30
to constantly about, hey, how do you go about this?
45:33
What would you do in this situation?
45:34
How would you handle this player?
45:36
We're always constantly trying to grow and evolve just as
45:38
players are. And I tell our pitchers all the
45:40
time, like when we're talking about outings, like you are
45:45
going to walk some people, I don't want you to, but you are,
45:48
you are going to give up some hits.
45:50
I don't want you to, but that's going to happen.
45:53
And giving guys freedom to fail at times, I think it lifts a
45:57
little bit of that weight off their shoulders that like, hey,
46:00
coach, if I give up a hit, he's not going to be throwing his
46:02
clipboard in the dugout really mad at me, right?
46:05
Like it's about being able to adapt and pivot really quickly
46:08
and and keep big numbers off the board at that point.
46:11
How do we change our mindset in the moment?
46:14
I think why I even pause coming out of this was thinking how I
46:19
wanted to ask this next question.
46:21
You talked about that Logan Jones example and having to
46:24
pivot. So maybe from there since I'm
46:28
not coaching, I'm not in it. When I was coaching, we didn't
46:31
have advanced data or synergy where we could really like dive
46:36
deep on anything. It was just going off of a stat
46:39
sheet. I got to love low budget D2
46:42
baseball. But now, now that you have a
46:46
little more at your disposal, how much internal scouting are
46:50
you doing? Or like game planning in that
46:54
sense. All the time.
46:55
And it's that that question of like, do I pitch to my pitcher
46:59
strength or do I pitch to the hitter's weakness?
47:01
Now, ideally your pitcher's strength lines up with the
47:04
hitter's weakness and then it's great.
47:05
But ultimately I never want to pitcher on the mound looking at
47:09
the pitch watch going, I'm not comfortable throwing this pitch,
47:13
even though it may be the right pitch to that hitter.
47:15
I always feel like pitcher's strength is greater than hitter
47:19
weakness. And so we we call most of what
47:22
we do to pitcher strength thought that we do tons of
47:26
scouting and we know each hitter inside now.
47:30
But ultimately the convicted pitch that you have confidence
47:35
in may be better than the pitch that's this guy doesn't hit, but
47:40
it's not your best pitch. If we go up against the guy that
47:42
hits 360 against breaking balls and doesn't really swing and
47:45
miss them, does that mean that I'm not going to throw that guy
47:47
breaking balls because that's like what our guys best pitch
47:50
is? No, like we're still going to
47:51
try to win with our best pitch when we do have to pivot.
47:54
When you talked about having some of that data, then it's
47:57
having a conversations about what is the pivot.
48:00
If guys are leaning out over the plate and they're starting to
48:03
sit on spin, are you comfortable going in with fastballs to back
48:07
them off the plate so they have to respect the other half?
48:10
Are you comfortable throwing right on right?
48:12
Change up something that goes the other direction.
48:14
Like there's all these different pivots that we can do within the
48:16
arsenal, but it's having those conversations about I'm not the
48:19
one throwing the pitch. You are.
48:21
So like, what are you gonna be convicted in?
48:24
What do you believe in so that you're throwing that pitch with
48:27
the maximum conviction you possibly can?
48:29
I think that was well stated and again I appreciate the candor.
48:33
So once again, I'm going to pivot as we kind of near our end
48:38
on time here today because of my personal poor scheduling, but
48:42
we're going to fight through it like we.
48:44
Thought mine was not great on on my end either so I appreciate
48:48
you working with me man. Hey, as you said to your guys at
48:52
the conference tournament, if we can fight through this game,
48:56
this opening game, we can get through just about anything.
48:59
Nothing will be that hard with what people haven't seen in this
49:03
podcast recording. This is probably a similar
49:06
situation at this point. If we can get through this, you
49:09
and I can do just about anything if it comes.
49:11
All we need is. The rain to start pouring down
49:14
in both of our offices right now.
49:15
It'll be the. Exact same thing, Yes.
49:19
Well, given that you have so much at your disposal, you're
49:25
now in the portal just like every other school and coach
49:28
this summer. Just given the nature of college
49:31
baseball, I would love not necessarily a prediction, but
49:36
what you are hoping for with the Toledo baseball roster going
49:41
forward, what you think you can build upon, what you guys are
49:45
doing really well right now and maybe again, really hitting that
49:50
introspection, Where do you think you guys can improve as a
49:54
whole? Yeah, I think when you look at a
49:56
roster building perspective, we're always going to have to
49:59
develop high school guys. And with the portal being the
50:02
way that it is and everybody else getting older in college
50:05
baseball, maybe we have access to better high school players
50:08
than we've ever had access to before.
50:10
It's maybe a different way to frame it and look at it.
50:13
We have to build our foundation in that way.
50:15
Now, does that mean we don't plug holes in the portal where
50:17
we see fit from a roster perspective?
50:20
Like everybody has to embrace the portal.
50:23
But for me, the thing that I guess I love about college
50:27
baseball is you still have the ability to like, coach and make
50:32
an impact on these guys. I'm a younger coach, so I hope I
50:35
don't lose this as I get older, but I still remember vividly
50:39
what it was like being a player. All I wanted to do is get better
50:43
at baseball. It's all I cared about.
50:44
And so there are times when you get frustrated.
50:47
As a coach, you have to remember A, it's a hard game and B, none
50:50
of these guys want to fail. And so it's about how do I build
50:53
a relationship with this guy to make him feel comfortable with
50:56
me to where we can all get better.
50:59
I can get better at my job, he can become a better pitcher.
51:01
So I think the relationship building side of it is huge.
51:03
We want to continue to be really good at that as we develop high
51:06
school players and piece together our roster in the
51:08
portal. But we we talk about the roster
51:11
stuff daily. And if you're not as a coaching
51:14
staff in college baseball right now, you're falling behind the
51:17
curve and in an ever changing world.
51:19
You and I played not that long ago.
51:21
It looks completely different than it's ever looked in college
51:24
baseball. I think there's more
51:25
opportunities out there than there ever has been before.
51:28
We we've got a pitcher on our staff, kid named Ryan Kennedy
51:31
who went to Virginia Tech out of high school.
51:33
Really big name coming out and it it just didn't work out.
51:36
But there's a place for him where he can come through A50
51:39
innings and develop and get better and get there, get out on
51:41
the field and hopefully be able to live out his dream of playing
51:44
professional baseball. And I think that's where if kids
51:47
are intelligent about the decisions they're making and
51:49
making them for the right reasons, you're going to get
51:52
yourself to a place where you can compete and play and have
51:55
success. You even stole a bit of my next
51:57
question because I was going to ask about the development or
52:02
changes in the game that you've even seen the short time it's
52:05
been since exiting as a player and re entering as a coach.
52:10
Yeah, I would say there's certain things that I would even
52:14
echo from my last game of college baseball in 2017 of
52:21
Scene 1, how much more widespread the talent is.
52:25
I feel like just overall the the bar has risen.
52:28
The tremendous baseline floor is so much higher than it ever was.
52:33
Whether it's Velo, whether it's swing decisions on the offensive
52:36
side, whether it's raw stuff, you just seen more talent in
52:40
more places than that I ever did.
52:43
At least that's the way that I look at it.
52:45
But what's good is still good. I mean, even beyond that, and
52:49
I'll ask you to respond to this because it's not just about my
52:52
opinions really. I don't really care about my own
52:54
opinions. That's what that's why I have
52:56
people on the podcast to talk about it.
52:58
I feel like players are also, for the most part, smarter than
53:02
they ever have been before, or at least have been exposed to
53:06
more than they ever have. Even in my day, I felt like guys
53:10
were guys just knew whatever their town ball coach told them
53:13
or whatever their dad or high school coach told them.
53:17
Now with the access to information, players can at
53:20
least talk the talk. Even if they don't walk the
53:22
walk, they can talk the talk like they never have before.
53:25
It makes you know your stuff as a coach and that's why we have
53:28
to constantly continue to challenge ourselves to evolve
53:31
and to learn. There is more access to
53:33
information than there's ever been before, and I think that's
53:36
a really good thing. Now there are times where like a
53:39
guy wants to go down a rabbit hole and it's like, hey, Spencer
53:42
Schrider does that because he's Spencer Schrider.
53:44
That might not be for you. And so you have the real guys
53:46
back in from time to time. But I think it's a really good
53:49
thing that guys have some ownership over their own careers
53:51
and some buy into what they're doing.
53:53
And we talked about like developing routines in the fall.
53:56
Like I like guys have a say in some of the stuff that they do
53:59
because that's going to create buy in from them.
54:01
If they're like, hey, coach just gave me the sheet and I have to
54:03
do all this stuff and I don't know why I'm doing any of it.
54:07
You're not going to get the buy in from them.
54:08
But if you have those conversations, if you understand
54:11
the data or the viewpoint that they're coming from in terms of
54:14
why they want to do this, that or the other, as long as it's
54:17
not going to make them worse as a player, I think getting some
54:19
buy in from them and letting him do a thing or two that they feel
54:22
like makes them better can be a great thing.
54:24
You got the Cressy Sports Performances of the World and
54:27
the Tread Athletics who provide incredible resources online on
54:31
Instagram and Twitter for these guys to go take a look at.
54:33
Like, I think that's a good thing.
54:35
I think that's a good thing for players going forward.
54:38
I think it's a good thing that they have access.
54:40
And then they come with great questions a lot of times like,
54:43
hey, why does this guy do this or hey, why does this guy do
54:45
that? And we can kind of go through
54:47
the process of what makes this guy good.
54:50
This is why he does this. I don't know.
54:52
I, I'm a nerd about this kind of stuff, so I always enjoy having
54:55
those kind of questions with guys.
54:57
But I think overall it's a very good thing.
54:59
And then the final question that I'm going to leave you with
55:03
probably doesn't matter to anybody else listening aside
55:07
from maybe Daryl or a couple of your players at UT.
55:12
What has been your favorite local spot to eat in Toledo in
55:17
the now 11 months you've lived there?
55:20
Stubborn brothers pizza, no doubt.
55:22
It's funny, we do what like in the bullpen every day I'll throw
55:26
out a question and like you'll be like, hey, if you were on a
55:29
deserted island, you got 3 foods for the rest of your life.
55:32
Like what would it be? Hey, it's an ice breaker B.
55:35
It gets guys talking and kind of talking crap to each other,
55:38
which is fun. It gets it lively in the
55:39
bullpen. But I'm a pizza guy when we talk
55:42
about that. Like I am a pizza guy through
55:44
and through. So Stubborn Bros Pizza.
55:47
I think Dave Portnoy rated it like an 8.1.
55:51
That was a big sticking point. When I came to town, everybody's
55:54
like, hey, the pizza guy said this is the best pizza and it's
55:57
really good. You're a Toledo guy, so you know
55:59
exactly what I'm talking about, but I love Stubborn Bros pizza.
56:03
Heck yeah, I'll take it. And it's kind of funny because
56:05
Stubborn Brothers opened while I was in college, I think in my
56:10
later years. So I've actually only been there
56:14
once in my entire life because of when it opened and then just
56:19
where I was in my own living situations.
56:22
So I definitely have to give it another whirl.
56:25
I loved the one experience I had there, so it will be on my list
56:29
the next time I'm back up. I'll tell you what we'll get.
56:32
So I went there with our athletic trainer not that long
56:35
ago and he goes all the time. I guess he ordered a pepperoni
56:39
and sliced potato pizza. It's basically like throwing
56:42
potato chips on top of a pizza. I kind of looked at it with a
56:45
weird look on my face when he did it.
56:47
And then I was like, wait, there's no way that can be bad.
56:50
And when it when it showed up, man, it was a 10 out of 10.
56:53
So when you're in town again, we'll go grab a slice of sliced
56:56
potato pizza. Hey, sounds great to me.
57:00
I'm looking forward to it because I'm always looking for
57:02
somewhere new, and the problem is, spending so much time in my
57:05
life in Toledo, I really felt like I'd hit just about every
57:09
place I possibly could. Yeah, no, it's, it's a good one,
57:13
man. We'll have to hit it.
57:14
Hell yeah. All right, well, thanks a ton
57:16
for the time today, Ethan. This was awesome.
57:19
I apologize if I force you to keep anything close to the chest
57:23
because of the shortened time of our chat today, but it was a
57:27
pleasure getting to throw some stuff at you and see what you
57:31
could handle. Absolutely no.
57:33
I enjoy talking about this stuff, man, and when you asked
57:35
me to do this, I was so excited because you guys have been a
57:38
great resource for us and just getting to talk to you and Daryl
57:41
the last couple months. You guys are a massive part of
57:44
what we've been able to do and always happy to talk about
57:47
college baseball, man. Awesome.
57:49
Well, once again, Congrats on an awesome season with the Rockets
57:52
and looking forward to, as you said, putting the bricks
57:55
together and building something really cool over at Scott Park.
57:58
Absolutely, absolutely man. Thank you for having me.
58:02
Of course, and to all the listeners out there, thanks for
58:05
laying back with us.