Ben & Woods On Demand Podcast

Bret Boone: "I'll take the Padres against anybody to win the World Series RIGHT NOW"

Audacy MLB insider Bret Boone joined Ben & Woods on Wednesday morning! Listen here as Bret talks about the mental gymnastics he would go through when facing a tough pitcher, why he likes the Padres chances to win a World Series this year, and MUCH more!

Duration:: 17m
Broadcast on:: 28 Aug 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

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Brett, the host of the Brett Boon podcast featuring notable names from MLB and around sports every week, including Homer Brave's pitching coach Leo Mazzoni. This is Mazzoni or Mazzoni? Mazzoni, was it Mazzoni or Mazzoni? What's that? I call it Mazzoni. Mazzoni. All right. Yeah. I've heard both. Yeah, I've heard both. I think I've heard both. Either way, a guy who coached, you know, Maddox and Glavin and Smol. Yeah, Avery, I mean, Nasty. Which, and we've been talking about Greg Maddox this week, Boonie, with that documentary talking about with his brother and just some of the great stories that he's been sharing. The only Greg Maddox or Brave's pitching stories for us? It's funny. I was watching it. I called Greg Midway. I said, "I'm midway through your documentary and, you know, in Maddox. That's Boon. What do you think?" I said, "I think it's just so you." Maddox, he's unbelievable. You know, he's eccentric. He's smart as anyone I ever met from a pitcher standpoint because pitchers are usually not very smart. But I think he kind of spread that around to that staff and why it was so astute. I mean, you hate as a hitter when you're thinking through at bats. Usually nine times out of ten, the pitcher on the mound is just worried. He's so wrapped up and just getting it out and getting the next out. But those guys weren't. They're reading body language. They know if you're sitting on a pitch and the '90s braves, I think. And obviously, I only got to see my generation, but the best starting rotation, I think, I've ever seen. And Leo was right in the middle of it. I got to play there one year and my spot was right next to Leo and they'd be rocking back and forth. And I used to, you know, grab him and go, "Listen, you're stressing me out, which is awesome." Like, "Boonie, I've been doing this for ten years before you got here." I said, "Well, just give it a rest." Leo's great. He has some great insight and really they had a philosophy in the '90s that nobody else had. They had a way to get you out. I knew what they were going to do. And if they executed their plan, "If I come up and I talk about this all the time, if I come up my first hit bat and you hang me a slider and I hit one of the seats, nine times out of ten, I just eliminated slider from your repertoire. You don't want to throw it again." The real smart, high level guys, they'll throw me four sliders in a row to start with my next hit bat and I'm going back to the dugout goal. What's he thinking? Didn't he see? Well, he's thinking one move ahead of me. I hated when he started thinking with me. I like to eliminate a pitch and then build my case for my next three bats off that. If I can eliminate fastball away, just a base hit to right field. I don't need to hit a homer, but if I can take a well located fastball down and away and hit a knock and that hole on the right side, that pitch is going to... She, how did he hit that? I located it, I did it well. I pretty much eliminated fastball away. Now all I have to worry about is coming in on me, which I don't want to hit anyway, where you're going to try to trick me and eliminate the pitch. And that's all I ever try to do offensively. If I can eliminate a pitch, I get the advantage. It goes the pendulum swings to my favor, but not with those guys. I mean, it didn't matter. They could throw me anything anytime and it didn't matter the success or the failure. There was no rhyme or reason. I couldn't eliminate a pitch. This SOB in this video, I watched Greg Maddox talking about in a meaningless blowout game, he's going to throw a pitch that he wants Jeff Bagwell to hit out for a home run, wants him to, wants him to. So that... I don't know if I buy that. It sounds great going for the legend. But yeah, except for the legend and the playoffs, because we're going to face these guys, the playoffs, guess what he's looking for, that three straight change-ups away. Bagwell swings over every single one of them, game over, because he's sitting on that two-seamer in... He's touching and he presses like, "Are you insane?" And he's like, "What are you doing?" You know he pounds it inside, "Don't I'm going to throw one inside and watch him hit it out." And it's just didn't say, "Yeah, it could be all BS, or happenstance." But they call them the professor for a reason. And you know, Brett, I want to ask you, I hope this makes sense too, you're talking about that. When did you start, as a player, a kid, when did you start thinking in your ABs, instead of just, "See ball hit ball, I'm going to pound this ball, I don't really care where it goes, what was the age for you where you're like, I have to start taking these, I never thought of. I was so scared up there, I just wanted to hit the ball and really not embarrass myself. But for you, when did it start thinking through ABs like that?" You're right, I mean because, you know, when I'm talking to young players, I got to assess whether they're ready for this information, whether they can handle that. You mentioned you were scared, you didn't have the confidence in yourself to sit on a pitch and lay off the other one. It took me a long time. And I wish, I look back on my career, that's one thing I wish I would have gotten a grasp of earlier in my career. It was the second half of my career, I was pretty much a see ball hit ball, coming through the minor league, swinging hard, hair on fire, didn't care. I got to the big leagues, I got a little humble pie real early and I started sitting on breaking balls but I really didn't have a formulated approach to the second half of my career where I had the ability to stick with a program by the time I left the on deck circle, each at bat after a bat after a bat for 162 games, that's when I became really a fully rounded player in my opinion and I had an approach. Some days it didn't work, some days it did, but when it didn't work, that didn't mean I abandoned it. I knew to give myself the best chance to be as successful as I can. I had to do it over 162 games schedule and that was going to give me that ability. It's really a cat and mouse, a chess match, I knew Pedro Martinez was reading my body language. I knew if I took a fastball for a strike in a situation, he was on to me going, wait a minute, why did Boonie take that in an RBI situation? He must be sitting on something else. Now I had to counter my thinking so with the rare guys like that, it was really a chess match but I think it's what makes the game. When I was young, Edgar Martinez took me inside and said, "Boonie, you're gonna have to start sitting on breaking balls." This one I'm a kid and I remember Ken Griffey Jr. walking passes with his hat on backwards. He's like 22 years old, he's already been the three all-star games. He looked at me and he goes, "What are you guys doing?" I said, "Grip, us normal people were trying to formulate a plan for tonight." He said, "Just what you said was," he said, "I just see ball hip ball." He walked by and I thought, "Well, it must be nice." Edgar looked at me and he goes, "Don't listen to him. He's different than us." That's when I knew I had to have an approach but really I didn't put that fully into the process until the second half of my career. All right, Boonie. It's you against Pedro Martinez. Oh, oh, count. He throws you a fastball and you take it. You take it. Depending on the situation. Depending on the situation. Then he's thinking, "Why did Boonie take that fastball there?" Or how did I take it? How did you take it? Did I get my foot down late, like I'm looking curveball or slider and the fastball got there too quick so my front foot got down late. Guys like Pedro would recognize that. Guys like Maddox, Smolz, they'd recognize that and I knew it and I'd get a glance at them. See if they caught it and I could tell whether they caught it or not now I got to redo the thinking in my mind. It's a nightmare. David Wells was good at it too. David Wells would throw me a heat, I wore him out the first half of my career. He'd throw me a fastball for a strike. I'd hit one in the bleachers. Next to that he'd throw me three fastballs and he'd be laughing at me because I was facing him out. I'm going, "What are you doing?" That's a higher level thinking. David Wells would do that in the second half. David was very successful with me. That first part of our career had all the success, second half. He had all the success and I had to make the adjustment. It's an unbelievable game. It's my favorite part about the game, the game within the game and long-term thinking as a hitter. It's weird, man. I didn't do any of this until I turned 40. No one told me about this when I was 16, 17. It was... It's not a guess and that's what people say, "Oh, you're guessing." "Oh, it's an educated approach." I love that. I'm not sitting on a curveball. I'm sitting on a curveball slider or a changer if I'm sitting soft and if I get one of those and he might throw me three fastballs to start. I might be 2-1 and he just throw me three hitters. That doesn't mean I abandoned the break-and-ball approach. That means I'm waiting and, baby, it's common. If you can wait them out, get it, then you won the game. But the second part is when you get your pitch, don't miss it. Yeah, that's it. You're missing it. 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Obviously, Judge is playing the field every day. O'Taney is going to come back and pitch next year. Who's the best player in baseball? Well, best offensive player is Aaron Judge, I think. I think he separated himself like in my generation, Bohn's did. I think he's the most prolific, the biggest different maker on the offensive side of the ball since Barry Bohn's, and I don't even think it's close. I think Juan Soto is a great player. I think Bobby Wood's a great player. I think Shohei O'Taney is an electric player, but offensively, I think Judge is just heads and tails out at this stage of his career. If you're going to ask me to take one, if Shohei, can you preface it, is Shohei going to be like a real solid number two or number one? Yeah, coming back next year, and he's pitching like he was before he got hurt. I don't think that's a no brainer. No brainer. I'm thinking Shohei O'Taney. He just, when you add that, he's essentially two all-star players, an all-star pitcher and an all-star hitter, and I don't need to think the greatness of Judge on the offensive side. I don't think you can fight with a guy that can, oh yeah, by the way, I'm going to go out and pitch a 7-8 and shut out ball tomorrow. As I go two for three with a three-run homer to win the game, you can't really fight that. How's your brother doing in New York, man? This is always that time of year. Can he get down to it? He's doing great. He's doing great. And I laugh. He's sitting there right there with the second best record in baseball, and it seems like he's been hired and fired six times this year already. Yeah, kind of. If you look at it, it's been 600 times. Hey, it's unbelievable. It's just the beast of New York, but I always tell him, where else would you want to be? Who cares about the Twitter? Who cares about the talk shows? You know what you're doing. They're having a really good year. It all comes out of the postseason for them, especially in New York, and it's the team that's healthy in 2024, we've talked about on this show quite a bit. Nowadays, the most important thing is having a healthy roster going into the postseason because health is such a premium with the amount of injuries that happened in the game today. And now that we are getting close here to the last month of the season, and the Yankees are fighting for a division title, the Padres and Diamondbacks are just three games back. There's been this whole thing, though, about the teams that wait and don't play in the wildcard series, getting kind of rusty or cold or not playing well. What's your take on the postseason format and how it impacts teams at the end of the year? I love the format as a fan because I think it's the best thing for baseball. I don't like it as a player because I think it cheapens the postseason berth that you get and put on your resume. That being said, I'm a fan now. I'm an analyst now. I love the postseason in the history of baseball to be able to predict what's going to happen because you just never know. And that's why I say health is at such a premium right now. And then not just because I'm on the radio in San Diego, I'll take the Padres against anybody in the World Series right now with a fully healthy roster, must grow coming back and be in that horse that he's been on the way his pitches first. I know he's going tonight, his first reality has been pretty darn good with Darvish coming back soon. Tatisse is going to come back to. I'll take San Diego gets anybody right now and Arizona. How is Arizona? I've been looking at the roster. How are they doing? It's incredible. Arizona just rattled off 15 and 5 and they're coming. These guys are making an eraser in the National West. Phillies haven't played the greatest, but on paper, they're as good as anybody. You don't hear about Milwaukee and Minnesota, but they're dangerous. And then you go over in the Cleveland, Kansas City is coming out of nowhere to make that central race, the Houston Astros. You can never count them out in the young town at Baltimore Orioles. There's just so many options. Right now in the National League, I'll take San Diego as it stands today, August 28th. I'll take the Padres right now that bullpen is a whole different world man with that bullpen down there. You've got weapons everywhere. You get a lead just like last night. They came back the way they did. They've been so good offensively. It's chipping away when they're down and then you get the lead late in the game with that bullpen. A lot of teams on the other side go, man, it's over and when they start, you start mentally making them feel like it's over. That's a pretty good thing. That's what that bullpen can do in San Diego. Love it and Brett Boone is no homer for Sandy again, you see, he'll tell it like it is. No doubt about it. Brett, thank you so much. We'll chat with you next week. You got it, guys. Thanks. I was on a CMLB inside of Brett Boone, insider calls again presented by Granger with supplies and solutions for every industry. Granger as the right product for you, call clickgranger.com or just stop by. I think that's the prevailing thought right now that with the Padres playing as well as they are getting healthier at the end of the season. There's no reason to think that they're not one of the favorites in a World Series tournament. Yeah, the stuff from Booneing that I love more than anything is those the internal battles, you know. That was amazing. But it also is disappointing because it makes you, when you hear that, you go, I know nothing. I know nothing. I really don't know a damn thing about this game when you hear that he's watching how your foot lands on a take and makes you feel stupid to every comment on this game. It really does. But it doesn't surprise you when you're doing something hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of times, you're going to get pretty next level on the thinking when it comes to whatever it is. It's true. It's true. Fascinating stuff. From Brett Boone, we got one hour to go. Paulie's got a Rondel report, get some headlines there. Look ahead to tonight's game in St. Louis all coming up with Beno Woods, a 97-3 the fan. AT&T customers switching to T-Mobile has never been easier. We'll pay off your existing phone and give you a new one free, all on America's largest 5G network. Visit tmobile.com/carrierfreedom to switch today. Pay off up to $650 via virtual prepaid master card in 15 days, free phone up to $830 via 24 monthly bill credits plus tax, qualifying, porting, trade and service on Go 5G next to credit required. before canceling entire account to continue bill credit to credit stop and balance and report finance agreements do.