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Oh, I know. I need to get a haircut.

Well, today went and worked out, and I've been helping my girlfriend's, been helping her dad. He has some trees that are growing into his fence, so we've been cutting down trees and doing all that.

Yeah. Derby.

Yes.

Yes, sir.

I was born in Oklahoma City. I was born in oklahoma City. Raised in McLeod area. Kind of when I was younger, my mom gave me up to my aunt. I lived with her for about seven years. My mom came back into the picture.

From there, I lived with my mom, so she introduced me to what would become my stepfather. And they were married for seven, eight years.

They got a divorce when I was, like, 14. I still talked to him most of the time here and there because obviously he taught me a lot of stuff after that. My mom was practically she was a single mother, she still is, but bounced from house to house. I don't try to have people think or sympathize for me because of that. I'm just telling you. Right.

Yes, sir. But from there, I played three sports when I was younger till about my freshman year of high school. I just chose baseball. One is what I enjoyed the most. I love it, obviously. But I only had one offer coming out of high. Ottawa. That summer ended up being seen by Butler. I wanted to go junior college and so I ended up decommitting from Ottawa, going to Butler. That was the year of yep. Our season ended. So from there, after the season ended, we got sent home. Well, I just started working. Started working construction, helping my mom here in a bit, but nothing too crazy.

And then that was like that following summer. That's when Coach McVeigh, coach Reese were just like, Dude, come like, please come back. So talked to my mom about it. She was like, if this is your dream, go do it. Go chase it, please. And so, I mean, it's probably the best decision I've made in my life.

So I dropped out that year or I started working. So I had a lot of catching up to do.

Got you last year. So my freshman year, COVID freshman year there was a lot of catching up to do.

So this year it was more of like, I'm on top of it, I got committed. That was like my main goal was just get a commitment somewhere. Yeah, I got that. And now I kind of set myself up in a better scenario than what I was.

Man. I would say a little bit of both. I was working with one of my cousins in the construction field and me and him, we grew up kind of together, so we were kind of tight. And, I mean, as soon as I started working, I was making good money. I was putting in like 50, 60 hours work weeks on top of working out of town. So you get per diem and I mean, 1920 years old, you're making $2,500. That's a lot. Yeah, no doubt to me, at least in my mind. I was like, there's no reason for me to go back. And then I realized because I had a conversation with my aunt.

She was like, you have an opportunity to go get yourself a degree. You have an opportunity to go do something that you actually love to do instead of working that six to six job or that, you know what I mean? While I was working, I also had to mature because I had to understand that you have the rest of your life to work. So my freshman year, I just took it for granted is what had happened. There was the first time being by myself, obviously everything you probably already know, I just didn't handle myself the way that I should have. So that full year of working and understanding what adulthood actually is, I don't know what, but it flipped a switch in me.

It sucks. But like I said, you have the rest of your life to look. So when I was given the opportunity again to come back, I was like, it's 100% and you're going to do it.

Based off the two years, I think I've grown a lot mature, wise, I've grown into my body, stuff like that. I just feel like I can handle myself 100 times better than at what.

Oh, my gosh, yes.

Being around the guys, man. Being on the field, for one, what I told the freshman coming into fall, I was like, look, dude, it's going to be a grind because one, you're at a jico, you got to buy into the process. For one, you have to, two, you're going to make some of the most memories you'll ever have here. And for me, I'm a hard worker. I love working hard and I love being able to see someone else next to me doing the same thing because at the same time, they're putting in as much work as you are and they're bettering themselves. I'm not there just for myself. Yeah, you have your own independent success, but at the same time you're on a team and if you're not having success as a team, then there's something going wrong in the chemistry, et cetera. You need to fix that and we can get on. But I was just like, the atmosphere during playoffs, the atmosphere during conference play, that is what drives this is some of the best points that I could get. For instance, playing against Barton this past year, I threw a seven inning complete game. So necessarily it's not a complete game, but yeah, right. For me and the teammates, it was like, I don't know, it was a great feeling. That's the reason why I love playing. You don't get that feeling. I mean, other people have other opinions, but for me, that's the feeling that I love.

No, you don't.

So they called me, I would say, a handful of times throughout that summer, like, hey, man, the first couple of calls, I was like, I don't know if I would come back. I was kind of skeptical. And then there is one call towards, I would say the end of July, and I think it was McVeigh, if I remember correctly, and we had probably like a 40 minutes conversation, and he was just like, tell me the reasons why you should stay, for one. Honestly, I was probably the most lost I've ever been because balancing between staying home, working, being with family, or going and pursuing a career that you've always wanted since you were a little kid, and it's like, do I stay here, keep the family happy, or do I go make myself happy?

Some point in your life you got to be a little selfish because you can't make everyone happy, right? And so they called me and me and McVeigh sat down, and I was honestly like, there's probably not enough reasons for me to stay. There's just not enough.

Like I always knew I was a good player. I always knew because from Little League all the way up to kid pitch, et cetera, I was one of the best on the team. I always threw the hardest. I just took every rep seriously. So obviously you take every rep seriously. It becomes and it shows. Well, coming back, I knew if I put the hard work in, if I continued to be determined in becoming successful on the field and in the classroom, it would help.

I knew there was something there, but it was just a matter of finding.

I just didn't get enough exposure.

Dell City High School. Okay, so at the time, he's not there anymore, but his name is Coach Hammer. He got me onto this app called I don't think he had a whole lot of experience on it. So I was also, I think, one of the first players in the last, I think, ten years, I think somewhere around that that was like, I could possibly have a future in baseball. So I don't think he tried to pursue pushing me into getting more exposure.

I didn't until my senior year, which I kind of shot myself in the foot there because bouncing from like I would play on two teams during the summer when I was younger, and I mean, you're there from Friday night to Sunday night most times. And it was at that point this is where I kind of like in a sense, I kind of got over baseball because it was just constant, constant, constant. Like, I didn't have time to go do this, and I wanted to go hang out with friends. Freshman to junior year, it was kind of like, I don't even know. And I didn't even really do much outside of going to school and baseball, which is kind of insane to think about. I honestly just stayed home most of the time, and I would go and play basketball with my older brother here and there, go hang out with them. But then that senior year, summer, going into commitment, I had this guy named Jacob Baca. He seen me. I don't know how he seen me, though, which is I don't know, but somehow he seen a so there's a guy named Braxton Hyde. He got drafted last year. I don't know if you know him or not.

He was set to throw this game at Rose Hill, and from there he ended up not throwing, so I threw. And that's when Strunk at the time, he seen me. And from there, we ended up discussing what happened and stuff.

One thing that I didn't do now that when I say I shot myself in the foot, is I didn't get into weightlifting. I got into weightlifting, honestly, my freshman year, like the true freshman year, Butler. And from there, it's been like, I can't go a couple of days without going to the gym. The times that I did during practice, I was always the first one there. I would get reps. I was recruited as a shortstop. Now I miss shortstop because I like making the plays.

So I also pitched here and there. Primarily, I was a shortstop, and then I started pitching because coaches seemed that I could throw hard.

And so Strunky sat me down. I was like, have you ever thought about just focusing on pitching because you have an electric arm, et cetera, stuff like that? I was like, I mean, no, because I like being out there. I like making plays. I like making those diving plays and stuff like that. We probably had an hour long discussion about it, and at the end of it, he was like, let's just be real here, because he was really good at building mechanics and stuff like that. He was like, I'm going to be honest with you. I think you personally could get to a high level D two pitching wise. I think you could get all the way up there, and that's just me being serious with you right now. And I was like, you know what? Let's do it. That year I pitched lights out. I wouldn't say lights out, but obviously you run into mishaps and stuff like that, right?

Okay, he taught me a lot of good things, and he taught me a lot of bad things.

You obviously got to take things from other people with a grain of salt, because like you said, everybody is different.

He taught me a lot of things about working.

Taught me how to cut he taught me how to cut grass, build things, like just being kind of like what a man should be. But the bad things is, he didn't treat my mom well.

There'd be times we would come home and they're having an argument, throwing things. You'd call every name in the book, and it's just like, now that I am in a relationship, thank God for the girl that she is, because she had brought a lot of things to light that I didn't even know I did.

So now it's more of like, I have heard to help me kind of get away from those habits that were instilled.

I would say it was like when I don't think someone's understanding my point of view on certain things, I would raise my voice.

And that is not something you do.

And so she was like, how come every time we have a discussion or something that you're going to have things that you agree on and things that you don't agree on? But it's not problem, it's how you two work the problem out. And I never seen my parents do that.

So it's like, now it's like having a healthy relationship and being able to communicate is probably the biggest thing you could actually have. She comes from a family where her parents, I've watched them get into a disagreement, and I never once heard her father raise her voice.

Me and him, we've talked, and I've asked him multiple times I wouldn't say multiple times, but I've asked him. I was like, in those situations and you feel like you don't like, she's not understanding where you're coming from, what do you do? He was like, step back for ten minutes, come up with a different approach, with a different way of saying it, and then reassess the situation with her.

Coming up? A year and six or seven months.

How'd you meet Butler?

That true. Freshman year, we knew of each other. We kind of knew each other. I took that year off, came back, and we actually ran into each other in Walmart.

From there. We're, like, swapped numbers.

Yes.

I would say recently it's been better. She understands where a lot of things where I come from, and then I also understand that she is my mom. At the end of the day, if you can't forgive for things that happened in the past, then there's no change. So me and my mom have been working a lot on just one, communicating with each other. Honestly, I love our relationship now because I can be honest with her and she can be honest with me.

I would say every other day, yeah, got you.

And it's more of just like, hey, how's your day going? Yeah, I'm doing good. How's work?

Just kind of simple stuff.

Oh, yeah. I actually talked today, but now she has two kids of her own. She works at is that your mom's sister? Yeah.

She works at home. She actually converted her garage to, like, a hair salon because she's been doing it since when she started raising me. She was 1617 years old. And now she's able to be able to stay at home with her kids and still work, and, I mean, it's awesome. So she's busy. So we find every other I would say once a week, we communicate with each other.

Biggest adversity, man, just understanding. So there was a point where my COVID freshman year, I was in the house. One of the guys on the team let me stay on a futon in their living room. Okay, I pay rent, blah, blah, blah. Well, I also worked. I mean, it felt like a full time job. I was there from 05:00 to 1130, if not midnight. So for the first month, it was awesome. It's great. And then I pay my second months of rent, and every time I would come home after work, they wouldn't greet me. If you're welcoming someone into your house, you should greet them. They wouldn't greet me, blah, blah, blah. Well, after a while, I got the feeling of, like, they don't want me here. That's probably the worst feeling. They don't want you there. So I end up moving into the dorms, but there was an altercation. After weightlifting, I'm walking out to my truck, and the kid comes out behind me and is just, like, yelling at me. It's like, you need to move. You need to get out now. Blah, blah, blah. And I was just like, Well, I kind of knew it was coming. So I've already mentioned to the coaches of what's going on? So I told him. I was like, I've already talked to the coaches, man. He was just picking at me. He's like, Go now, go now. So I just went, finally got moved into the dorms, and from there it was just like you don't realize how much tension you actually have until it's gone. After that, it was just like, oh, my gosh.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

I was actually a cook for a restaurant.

I started off as a salad boy, and I think within two weeks, I moved up to the fryer. Then I stayed for the fryer because there's some people that just can't do it. So I stayed there for a while, and then I ended up moving on to the grill, which I actually learned how to properly grill a steak and all the different rarities and stuff like that.

Fall and also spring.

It was long nights, man. Long nights?

So the guy that owned the restaurant, I just told him I was like he knew I was a baseball player. He knew that the days that we didn't lift or the days that we didn't have a game, I would work. Yeah, it got rough.

Well, one, because I ate at the Calf, but at the same time, I wanted to have money for when I wanted to go get a drink at QT or go get a meal. I wanted it. One, I knew financially, my mother couldn't really help me after working that year. I understand a lot about money. Right. I was like, I got to work. It was more of like, I wanted to be able to know if I could do it by myself, and I did.

This is when I came back.

She does. She worked at an animal shelter. But I would say recently, I think for the last four or five months, she got a new job working as, like she manages the Bills and just business stuff for this business.

I have two older brothers.

One so the oldest, his name is Joseph. We call him Joey. He played baseball, basketball, football. He would always beat me when I was younger, and then I became really good in baseball, and I started beating them in baseball. But I was actually 15. My brother was 1718 at the time. And we came home one day and we see our mom crying. So as usual, mom, what's going on? And she ended up telling us, hey, you have another brother? And so we ended up meeting with mean his name is Christian Holyfield. He's from so, like, I would say we hung out. I wouldn't say as much as we could, but every time we had a chance, we did.

He is two years older than me.

My oldest brother is three to four years older than me. Yeah.

No. I mean, my oldest brother, I would say a little bit, but Christian not really.

He's a bank teller.

Yes.

I wouldn't say I'm close with him, but we both know we're so, like, when we see each other, obviously we catch up and stuff like that. But he has a kid, he has his own family that he looks after, so I don't try to make an approach or anything.

Not in high school. I was all the way up until high school.

Yeah.

When I lived, my aunt, she actually had a husband. His name was Chad, but I can't really have any memories to base off of.

My grandfather. Grandfather. Well, great grandfather grandmother. Great grandmother. Go ahead.

So this past year or the year before?

Okay. Cesar Garcia, he kind of took me under his wing in the gym. He taught me the ropes. I mean, I was 155 pounds, and now I'm sitting 193. 195.

Um, this kid named Kaden Kickaffer, he's a pitcher. He was our number two this past year. That kid there, he's a great guy. My roommate this past year, Jaren Brown, that kid works. He just overanalyzes everything, which is fun to watch.

God. Yeah, I'd say him, man. Physical things. I think I just put on weight. Obviously you take arm care serious as a pitcher, so it was just finding a routine that, one, fits your body, two that helps your body and just sticking to it.

My buddy, Jaren Brown, he was like, look, dude, first day in of getting into the dorms, me and him had a conversation. He's like, Dude, do you throw like 95? I was like, yeah. He's like, have you ever thought about trying to touch 100? I was like, I mean, dude, that's insane. He was like, well, how about this? Because he's like a fitness maniac. And I love it because every day he was on me about eating like five meals. But each five meals had to be a certain number of protein, a certain number of calories. He's like, you got to understand your intake and your output. And he broke it down for me. He built me a plan. And every day we would just go work out, eat homework, go work out, eat homework, baseball. Honestly, I think personally without him forcing me, one, to become better, two, forcing me to be better eating wise.

Mean me and him, we keep tabs with each mean? He lives in McPherson Gotcha, which is like an hour and a half, 2 hours away. But me and like the other day he sent me a video of him squatting and I sent him a couple of pictures of what my physique looked like. We just bounced off of each other.

Oh, yeah, obviously we have our team let's in the morning. Then we have our practices that extend into the evening and we would come back, we would get like a small quick snack, and then we would go to the gym with each other. And his leg day kills me every time.

I think it was just this past year, really, because I started to understand my body a little bit more. So after an outing, honestly, so I'll tell you before the an outing before an outing, I would go and I would go sit in the sauna. I'd go into the cold tub. I would go sit in sauna steam room and from there I'd do that for a process of until I got chilled, until I started sweating. And I would just bounce off for probably about an hour to 2 hours. And then later in the season, I started doing like I wouldn't say necessarily swimming, but it was more of like I would get into chest high water and I drop down and I would just kind of sit here, do arm circles. The whole time I'm just trying to keep my body weight above the ground. I did that. And some days it was to the point where it was. Like, oh, my gosh, I could go throw 100 right now.

Other days where you're a bit more tired and stuff, you're like, Dang, man, I know I don't want to do it, but I need to do it right.

No weighted balls, but bands, I use them more for a stretching thing instead of like a warm up thing. So I'll put them against I'll lock them onto the chain link or whatever, and I'll actually grab two of them and I just let them extend my arms out my lats. And I do that and I'll do a single arm lean over and it just pulls this whole shoulder. Do it both ways. And I'll take them and I'll face forward and I'll bend down and it stretches my hamstrings to my calves. I probably do that, I would say, for like five minutes.

It was great. It was a really good experience. Definitely like a big learning experience, too. It was the first time I actually called my own, like the pitching coach there, Michael Landry. After my first outing, we talked and he understood that it was like my first time and stuff like that, and he started teaching me how to necessarily dissect a hitter's approach, dissect a hitter swing, stuff like that. So it was a really good experience for me. I had a great time. I enjoyed it.

Things I wish my bullpen going into the game. I always knew bullpens before a game were really important, but in JUCO, for me, it was just based on like, all right, I put this pitch in the strike zone every time instead of really focusing on one pitch or focusing on the feeling of that pitch when I want to do this and stuff like that. Mike Landry, he watched my first two bullpens, and he was like, Dude, you work fast. And so I've always known once I get in a rhythm, I just stay to that rhythm instead of trying to slow it down, understand what I'm feeling here, understand what my body did here and stuff like that. And going into this coming up year, wherever I end up taking that approach of slowing it down, understanding I want this pitch to do this well, I didn't do it well, what do I need to do? And stuff like that. I would say that's the big side of it, the bad side of it was I worked too fast. My outings were all right. They weren't up to my expectations. And that's what really kind of makes me mad, because there'd be an inning where it got bad and it's just like, dude, and then I would be liked out the next inning or following innings, and it's just like, dude, what am I doing wrong in this first inning?

I just know I kind of knew going in that they were going to be a little bit more disciplined and I wouldn't get a lot more chases than I did in JUCO. I knew the strike zone was going to be a little bit different. So kind of already having that mental approach behind it. I used it as like a learning curve, understanding that I need to understand how to set up each pitch.

Not just go out there and just rely on the fastball.

Not executing pitches, leaving a change up. I mean, I left a couple of change ups that were probably too much in the zone, and they would get the top of it, bounce it over first base, or they would be able to find a hole in the infinite. Hats off to the kid that took 95 at his chest out.

I also think part of that was kind of the learning curve of knowing how to set up each pitch. Understanding if this kid just fouled one, he's late on the fastball, why are we throwing a change up? Or why are we even going to think about throwing a slider and stuff like that. There's some instances where I knew the kid was late and I was throwing off speed and he would catch it out front, and it's like, well, I mean, you kind of ran into that to yourself.

Strengths. I like to compete. I like to win. I'm very outgoing when I'm on a team. I like being social with the team guys, understanding where they are. I hate saying this, but I'm always a cheerleader. I like rooting for the team. I like getting team wins. Weaknesses is when I understand sometimes you should say something and sometimes you shouldn't. And I would say most of the time I don't say anything.

I would say that's probably my biggest weakness.

Yeah.

Being more consistent with this was during the Cape. It was the first time I actually got to understand some of the analytics side of baseball, like track man stuff. So there's some inconsistencies with my fastball. There's times I throw it and I have I think it was like 17 or twelve inches of vert, and then there's fastballs that I put in the dead zone, and it's like, what am I doing differently? I would say that is probably a weakness. And then, like I said, understanding how to dissect the hitter swing.

I think because when I grip a fastball, if I had a baseball to show you but imagine you have your two seam and you flip it over to the four seam. Okay. There's times I hold it like this and with the horseshoe this way, sometimes I spread them out and I horseshoe is this way. And I think that's probably what the inconsistency is. Different ways and stuff like that.

Honestly, forcing. I've always been able to beat people with, so I don't know. I've always told my one this is what my coach kind of instilled in me a little bit, probably a little too much. He was like, dude, your fastball is plus plus. Grip it and rip it. Don't think anything of it. And so I just probably got into a habit of just filling the seam and not really caring about finger placement.

Here? Recently during the cape, I probably didn't throw it enough. I would say during the spring I threw it a lot because I faced a lot more lefties. I think personally, every time I faced a lefty, I would pound two seam down, two seam down, maybe have it run off, and then I'd go forcing up where it's a little straighter. And I would just say also I would throw it in on righties, but there'd be times where I would start it inside and it would run into them. So I kind of had a mix and mix my approach there, and that's when I kind of struggled during the spring. Elevating the fastball. I was always told you look down and it's kind of hard to turn a 94, 95 miles an hour down. But urinars are good hitters. They have no problem doing that.

My best outing?

I would say probably my very last one.

Yeah. What's terrible is I had my last outing the week before.

Oh, my gosh.

Yeah. It was against allen county.

And it was like I couldn't buy him out.

I know this isn't an excuse or anything like that, but I was sick.

And going in the game day. It was probably one of the worst days I felt. I told my coach this and I will stand by it. I'm not going to let a sickness keep me from playing. For me, it's just not in my book.

Slider. I feel like I have almost every game, and then there's days where I have my change up and my slider and I don't know which one to throw.

It's like, well, my change up is working really good. There's an outing in the Cape where I probably threw fastball change up more than fastball slider. I threw probably three change ups to this. I did. It was a three pitch strikeout, and it was like the change up was insane. And then I would turn around and have an AB or having that bat against me, and I threw sliders, and the kid didn't even know what he was touching or thinking he was swinging at. And it's like, some days I'll have my slider more than my change up. And so those are the days I rely on my slider, and then the days that I do have my change up, that's when I throw it. If I do need to throw that slider, I know I have it.

Had to pick one, I mean, this man, I would say being able to understand what the hitter is doing. Yeah.

Also say whatever the team needed me to.

Because, I mean, at the end of the day, you're a team, you need to get the team.

I didn't hear what you were just saying.

Yeah.

Yes, sir.

If the opportunity presents itself for me to play pro, I will play pro, but at the end of the day, I can go play Big Twelve baseball.

You know what I mean? At this point, it's out of my control. So I try not to worry about it. The only thing I can do is just leave it to God and let him put it in his hands.

Yes, sir.

Honestly, I'd probably say both. I'd go see my family. I'd go see my mom. I'd go see my aunt, my great grandfather, but I would probably come back home to Derby, and as much as I got to stay in the gym yeah. So I'd probably just come back and just get right back to work. Because for me, I just cannot sit here knowing the fact that there is people out there that are still working and it's day in, day out.

Oh, yeah. Thank the Lord. I've never had I knock knock on white, but I've never broken a bone. Never broken a bone. Never had, like a muscle sprain or anything like that.

Pro ball.

Dang. Oh, man. But.

But he doesn't know his future.

Know his future.

We I would say we talk every like, I was on his sideline when he got drafted, and we've had discussions and we've had talks of what to expect this year for me and stuff like that. And he's been a guy in my corner. Honestly, I should have said he's probably one of the better friends I've made at Butler.

But I talk to him all the time about his outings. One of his previous outings, he was 96, 98. And at Butler, 98. Wasn't even in the talk yet. Talked to him about that. And I was like, dude, that's freaking sweet, dude.

I wouldn't say I was disappointed. I was more of the fact, like, I knew there was an opportunity there, but it was a slim opportunity. So I knew if it didn't happen, this is the year that I got to get to it. I got to get work.

God has a plan. You got to give it to him.

I would say yes. I've said probably 22 to 24.

Mariners, Astros?

We talked to the Angels the other day.

Say again?

Yeah, we've talked here and there. We have, like, a spreadsheet that he takes me through every now and again, and he's kind of informing me. I kind of let him deal with most of that because, one, that's his job.

But at the same time, I tell him, if there's anything important that you think I should know, vice versa. Right.

Okay. If you could go back in time when you were young, buck, 22, 23 years old, what piece of advice would you give him?

It does.

Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

Oh, yeah.

Yes, sir. Thank you. By the way.

Yes, sir. You too.