Like, what do you feel towards that?

Yeah.

That's a loaded question, but I definitely have thoughts around it.

I feel like I do think the hardest thing that they deal with is the lens, right? Like the ever present eye on them, right? So like for any of us, like if you're going to dance in a room alone, right? Or a small like friend gathering, you're probably let it eat a lot more than you would at a wedding that you know is being like videoed for packaging for everyone to have, right? Like the awareness of someone watching you can impact your ability to express yourself.

And so it's this weird dichotomy of like they're expressing themselves more than they ever have, but there's more people watching them do it.

So does that affect how they do it, right? And again, like I'm not an athlete right now, but I see them deal with it on a regular basis, right? You know, this clip went viral or this happened and everybody sees it within 10 or 12 hours of it happening, right? And I think related to like expressing yourself, right? You talked about crying, to go back a little bit.

For me, the times that I cry the most are not when I'm sad.

We

Like, what do you feel towards that?

Yeah.

That's a loaded question, but I definitely have thoughts around it.

I feel like I do think the hardest thing that they deal with is the lens, right? Like the ever present eye on them, right? So like for any of us, like if you're going to dance in a room alone, right? Or a small like friend gathering, you're probably let it eat a lot more than you would at a wedding that you know is being like videoed for packaging for everyone to have, right? Like the awareness of someone watching you can impact your ability to express yourself.

And so it's this weird dichotomy of like they're expressing themselves more than they ever have, but there's more people watching them do it.

So does that affect how they do it, right? And again, like I'm not an athlete right now, but I see them deal with it on a regular basis, right? You know, this clip went viral or this happened and everybody sees it within 10 or 12 hours of it happening, right? And I think related to like expressing yourself, right? You talked about crying, to go back a little bit.

For me, the times that I cry the most are not when I'm sad.

We

And you start thinking about how do you get guys to throw in the zone? How do you command the zone? How do you get ahead of hitters? You and I have always talked, first strike is always the best pitch, but how do you teach that? How do you get guys implemented to go after these hitters?

Yeah, I think some of it is on the acquisition front.

I think Alex has been really strong on acquiring and signing strike throwers, like Robert Suarez, one of the best strike throwers in the league, and so adding him into the mix, kind of the rising tide rises all boats.

But I also think that You know, we focus heavily on count leverage and getting ahead, you know, like attack mode on the first pitch and then race to two strikes.

And so if guys have any issues in that department, whether it's getting ahead overall or getting ahead of righties or lefties at a different clip, like guys might get ahead to righties, you know, at 75% and they might get ahead.

to lefties at 50%, so just finding some more ways for them to get ahead versus left, whether it's a pitch type or a location to go to.

Those are some things that we focus on.

What does that mean to you?

Is that an easy task to do, and how hard is that to try to influence new pitchers on some of your thoughts?

thoughts?Yeah, I, I think at this point it doesn't feel, um, like I'm doing anything too advanced.

It, it, it just feels like part of the job.

Uh, I had some really good examples with Minnesota, with Pete Mackey, uh, with Andrew Bailey and Brian Bannister over in San Francisco, and now with Hef here.

I think, um, you know, people like to kind of lump it all together as, like, analytics, like it's this, this boogeyman.

But really it is, really, really all it is is, is just good information, right? Like well, well-thought-out objective information.

Um, we're not shooting from the hip on many things.

Some of the things that you had to incorporate from what you learned to now with the Braves, anything different?