- 2 days ago
Chad Tracy talks with Rich, Ken, and Ted about Roman Anthony’s injury, his relationship with Craig Breslow, how he is as much of a therapist as he is a baseball manager, and more.
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00:00well chat okay so let's just start off by saying at least you guys are hitting lately so that's
00:06that's nice i mean obviously the team is a little they're snake bitten at home and um the record
00:11isn't great but um when you see some of the forward movement with the offense and you still
00:19just can't get over that hump does any of that give you any kind of hope i know you want
00:23the
00:24wins and i know you want the w's but at least there's some sort of step offensively that looks
00:29like you're going in the right direction i think that's well said yeah i mean you you got to win
00:34games like everybody knows that coaches know that players know that so there is no moral victories
00:40but there is in a sense when you're playing 162 game schedule and the american league is not
00:46performing as a whole and you feel like um you know as we've gone along in the month i've been
00:52here
00:52like you know hey our offense needs to be better um and you feel pretty strong your pitching is going
00:57to be good you know that even if it has a blip here and there um so to see us
01:02scoring runs like
01:03you know you know consistently you know getting you know four or five six runs at least over the
01:07last couple of weeks um as a group in a baseball sense you look at that and say if we
01:12can continue
01:13this for a long stretch of time we like our chances you know yeah um that being said we just
01:18it's come but it's happened to come at a time when we were enough games under 500 but we realized
01:22we
01:22have a lot of a lot of work to do as well can you read anything into it being fenway
01:27where you guys
01:27seem to be snake bit most of all no other than just the results of the games this week you
01:32know
01:32where you feel like um you know maybe you get a lead and you didn't hold it you know like
01:36and um and
01:37then you you're trailing and you make a you know a vicious comeback like we have three out of the
01:42last
01:42four nights and it comes up just short and and so yeah that can make you feel snake bitten and
01:47and make
01:48you feel like uh that sense of like man nothing's going right um but at the same time like there's
01:55there are still a lot of good things happening that weren't before yeah um and you have to look
01:59at it that way but yeah no question like you know there's a lot of things we have to do
02:02better we have
02:03to win games like and the biggest one and the most telling one is like we got to win games
02:08at home
02:08yeah you know and that that changes the whole dynamic so we get all that um but how do you
02:14do that
02:14like take the pitching and the offense and put them together for a stretch of time that's how
02:18teams go on runs where you say man they won 12 out of the last 15 yeah um that's how
02:23that happens
02:24you take the pitching that's been good at times you take the offense which looks better and you put
02:27those together and if you have one of those runs everybody looks up and goes man like they're they're
02:32kind of right in it or they're they're in the second wild cards whatever that's how you have to look
02:36at it when you have 100 and whatever games left uh chad can you tell me because there's been
02:40kind of conflicting reports can you tell me exactly what's wrong with roman anthony's injury
02:44like what what his actual injury is it's a strain in the in his tendon's finger on the top of
02:50his
02:51hand so it's basically just gives him discomfort with certain movement movements and the way he
02:56flexes his wrist to swing okay um so he was able to take some swings uh yesterday for the first
03:02time
03:02which was good it was progress over the last time he tried to swing and it still was uncomfortable so
03:07there's a lot of things he's able to do obviously it's not related to his legs he's able to keep
03:11his
03:11legs in order he can shag he can run he can throw this motion doesn't hurt it as much so
03:17it's it's a
03:17waiting game is all it is and i know that's uh tough but if the nature of the injury is
03:22it's you
03:22got to be able to swing you got to be able to use your wrists and your hands to swing
03:26a baseball bat
03:26so you're waiting for that discomfort to go away so you can ratchet up the the activity so would
03:31you consider his injury a matter of pain tolerance um in a way it can be described as that um
03:38but
03:40also no at the same time because i could say as a player like there's maybe something that bothers
03:47you on a certain part of your body i can handle that but like if i have to swing a
03:50bat for a living
03:51yeah um and i have to go out in my job especially roman like everybody knows roman has seen him
03:56last
03:56year like what this guy can do to help us right yeah which is with a bat in his hand
04:00in the batter's box
04:02and my biggest attribute to help this team and i i can't do that with one hand yeah you know
04:07like
04:07what what you would be asking him to do is like you know we got to be able to get
04:11him healthy you
04:11know like you don't you want to take a guy that can give you his best of what that is
04:15and then say
04:16but we only got 50 percent of that because one of his hands is not functioning properly so yeah um
04:21so
04:21yeah i mean in a sense like he's got to be able to be comfortable with it but because of
04:24where it is
04:25yeah um it's really hard to do that so that's a good way to describe it because i you know
04:29ted being an
04:30ex-athlete and we've spoken to athletes before that you know when you hear that a player is dealing
04:36with uh pain tolerance and that's the thing that's wrong you know it almost it we have heard from
04:41athletes that you know it classifies an injury when it's pain tolerance it paints the players being soft
04:45if they don't return right so you know and can you see how that clarification you know really helps
04:52out a player like what you just said that it's not just a pain tolerance thing because if you're roman
04:56anthony you're like oh geez man you know what what are people thinking if they think it's just
05:00i'm not tough enough to get out there and play but it seems that that's not the case it affects
05:04the
05:04actual like his actual performance right yeah i mean i think try to think of it like if you're a
05:12an outfielder and your shoulders barking a little bit well you know you might have to throw two balls
05:16during the game and you throw the ball in and hit the cutoff man like that's that's different than
05:20this guy's impact is as a hitter but one of his hands isn't working yeah like that's that's not
05:26um those are not that's not an apples to apples thing yeah that's what i'm saying like there there
05:30are things that athletes all athletes have you know pain and discomfort at different times during
05:35the year and they say i can grind through this because i know overall like it's not going to affect
05:40you know the outcome of a game um but as a hitter of roman's capability and what he's able to
05:45do
05:45hey we need you to hit without one of your hands like you know without you know full use like
05:50that's that's not it so like for us as an organization like yes we want him to get
05:53healthy yes we want him back yeah um but we're not looking like oh it's 50 like get out there
05:58you
05:58know like it's it's not easy to do that so um we want it to move along like i hope
06:03he gets better
06:04fast and we're making improvements now which is great um is he going to be sent down like to get
06:10some get some oh i would imagine so at this point you know like we haven't fully got into that
06:13yet
06:13we'll start talking more about that as we get closer to feel like hey he's ready to go
06:17um but the amount of time he's missed like you it probably fair to the kid like let's go get
06:21some
06:21at bats and get our timing back uh chad who has the how's the overall morale right now who are
06:27your
06:27dudes who are the guys that you've identified as maybe being kind of the flag carriers that
06:31you know picking guys up and and kind of pulling guys through these you know times like right
06:37you're in right now believe it or not the morale is pretty good uh interestingly enough like i feel
06:41like it's it's almost better now than it was two weeks ago when we were when we were winning
06:44games but finding a way to win them like three to two and just um scratching out some wins but
06:50because the bats have started to come to life a little bit um i feel the morale and i think
06:56it's
06:56what we just talked about the sense of the guys knowing like in the long haul if we can if
07:00we can
07:00if we found our rhythm offensively we can hold on to that for a while we feel they feel pretty
07:04good
07:04about we could we'll have a run at some point um but to answer your question all of them like
07:09you
07:09know wilson contraris has been an amazing addition for us like he's been around the league
07:13for a long time and plays the game as hard as a veteran player as that you'll ever see
07:19um you know that is huge for us and we have you know crochet and ranger all these guys sunny
07:26when
07:26they're not pitching they're the they're the guys standing right on top of the dugout rooting for the
07:30group to get it going they know what it can mean if our offense gets going so we have a
07:35really tight
07:36knit group um and i think when you kind of watch what's going on they're everybody's on the same page
07:41and feels like you know are we where is our record what we want not even close like it's it's
07:45not good
07:46enough um but i think everybody views it the same way that like the team's capability if we do some
07:52of the things we're talking about like you know it could it could be a two-week stretch where that
07:56changes dramatically and you have to continue to look at it that way we're talking to socks manager
08:00chad tracy and uh one addition to the game that i love this year is the introduction of the abs
08:05challenge
08:06system i get irrationally excited when uh it's challenged i know the people in the crowd too
08:11too it's like everyone leans forward and are they going to get this one right it's it's quick and
08:15it's truly added to i think the enjoyment of the game however when it comes to abs challenges the red
08:20socks i just looked it up they're unfortunately dead last they are the only team as of this afternoon
08:24that has lost more challenges than they've won i think it's a success rate of 48 yeah um is that
08:30something you're discussing with the players and is the team doing like any kind of teaching on
08:35when to when to challenge and what they should be doing talk about it a lot actually talked about
08:40it yesterday um believe it or not like uh we look i mean you guys know i've been in triple
08:46a for a long
08:46time this stuff originated in triple a i've been watching it for four years um 48 sounds terrible and
08:52it's you know but even in triple a all the years they did it like i think the average was
08:56like around 51
08:56so like it's not a massive thing like you know it's usually just 50 50 slightly above um and we
09:03have
09:04numbers that we look at i don't want to turn it into a math equation but like per challenge that
09:08we get right like our run value is is actually pretty good the problem is we're not challenging
09:12enough um we we have we leave opportunities on the table so our conversations with our players are not
09:19necessarily about missing one because everybody misses half of them like you know on average yeah
09:24it's more about there are opportunities even maybe in situations where there's nobody on base where
09:29you know you want to use those and keep them around for big situations yeah there are certain
09:33egregious calls with nobody on um if you know you know go you know and uh not leaving strike one
09:40that's
09:40this far outside and just being okay with it being strike one yeah that's the conversations is like you
09:45know is being more uh more willing to use them in spots that maybe aren't with bases loaded but if
09:51you
09:51know you know so we're having conversations around that that topic pretty regularly trying to to get that
09:59thing to swing the other direction for instance ranger missed one yesterday that was not a great one
10:04and he knows that too are pitchers even allowed i mean i've some teams just every once in a while
10:09picture and you know in frustration or if they think maybe somebody says they'll they'll rip one
10:13and that happens um but yeah that one was far pretty far out like instantly i was like hang on
10:18what's going on that one was pretty far outside i was gonna ask you about craig breslow
10:23you he had a quote that he said you guys were feeling each other out getting to know each other
10:27obviously you know who each other are but i'm sure in a more intimate sense how's that been from
10:31your perspective you're you know the players probably may be better than you do uh craig in
10:34some sense talking about craig and i yes yeah no it's been good um he's you know obviously we know
10:40each other it's been the last few years as me working on the miles but just not a lot of
10:43you know
10:43day-to-day interaction yeah so now i've been here a month and and um he's very present and we
10:50get to
10:50have multiple conversations a day before the game after the day and um and uh that's come along nicely
10:55you know the more you're around somebody and the more you get to talk to the processes and put them
10:59together um in addition to our staff it's that's really good so um that's come along well as far
11:05as uh you know he and i's working really for instance like on on the marcello meyer decision
11:09to play him at short to not play him at short how close do you guys how many discussions do
11:14you have
11:14to have with management about what the lineup is on a day-in day-out basis lineup wise none um
11:20as far as
11:21as marcello playing short yeah we had a lot of conversations around that and that wasn't just
11:25brez and i that was flow who's works with our infielders on a day brez and you're a marrow like
11:29we all talked about um you know how we're going to handle that all the way down to knowing like
11:35we
11:35have to wait and see like what's going on with trevor's story like do you want to mess with this
11:38young kid and move him to second and then two weeks later have to move him to short rather two
11:42weeks later have to move all the ways of the different things and how it affects people
11:48um and being very strategic about what we're gonna do that and once we've realized that was
11:52going to be a long-term thing we're going to move the kid over there we got him the work
11:55he needed
11:55but as far as day-to-day um here's who's playing tomorrow like i get with uh flow and and
12:01um we talk
12:02about that at the end of the day and we look at it and i make a lineup and send
12:05it out like and and um
12:08based that on what i'm seeing what i think's good matchups for the pitcher we're going to face the
12:12next day who do i think's playing well and i want to keep in there um and and sometimes brez
12:17is in
12:18there and has thoughts or whatever but for the most part but not for the most part holy holistically
12:22that i've said this before pen to paper like at the end is is my decision with roman out um
12:28jaron
12:29durant's more of an everyday player now and it feels like there's maybe a correlation to his uptick
12:35in his hitting do you see it that way just the fact that he's he's getting to play in the
12:40field more
12:40and that maybe that's a reason why he's hitting the ball a little bit better or is it something
12:44else um i don't i don't necessarily think it's because the field i think you know maybe maybe
12:50there's something to he's in there every day and it's in the same spot in the lineup that could be
12:54um it could be that um he just found he's finding a little bit of a rhythm you know and
12:59he's he's
13:00starting to square the ball up there was periods there my first couple weeks were like he wasn't
13:03getting results and he was hitting balls hard that can start to grind on you mentally when you feel
13:07like you're doing everything right and and you're not getting the results um he's getting some
13:11results now so it could just be that you know when as an athlete when you start to feel positive
13:16things happen it starts to stack um so but certainly like maybe just leading off every day
13:22and the trust of being there and but what i know about jaron is when jaron's good and and jaron
13:27is
13:28himself he helps us score runs um you know any guy leading off if he's struggling it's gonna you know
13:34you're not gonna score but when he is right and what he's capable of doing as a lead off hitter
13:38hit the ball of the ballpark hit it in the gap for a triple he helps us win so uh
13:43he's starting
13:43to swing the bat better and it's it's probably no coincidence that we're scoring a little bit more
13:47too chad it's been it's been kind of interesting watching the way you put the lineup together in
13:52that you are definitely someone who it seems like believes in having a merit-based lineup if somebody
13:57gets in there and you give them a shot and they play well they seem to end up having more
14:01playing time and by the same token if somebody goes in there you give them a shot sometimes they'll go
14:05back on the bench like how is that philosophy affected how you put the card together every day
14:10well sometimes it's you know you see a guy maybe goes in there and does well and he's not but
14:15some
14:15of it's based on like who you're facing you know and you take a look at an opposing pitcher you
14:20know
14:20and there's lefties in the league that are more vulnerable to right-handed hitters you know and
14:24and it makes stack right-handed hitters you know and get as many difficult matchups for that
14:29pitcher in there as possible and some of your right-hand hitters are better hitting lefties
14:32so that's part of it and the next day there's a righty and the lineup switches well it's because
14:36there's a righty on the mound and you're looking at all the information about your own players
14:40what this guy's we're facing is good at or not and then in other senses it's when I got here
14:46like
14:46we were struggling offensively so I was doing different things to try to spark the offense and
14:52also taking my own I had just gotten here take my own mental notes of what I'm seeing what do
14:56I
14:56think a quality at bat looks like and and how do I get as many of those in the lineup
15:01as I can
15:02um quality at bat score runs you know the more and quality at bat can be you made an out
15:07and you
15:07saw seven pitches and drove the pitch count up like that can be a quality at bat so I'm watching
15:11these
15:12things and and trying to figure out like how do I get to a place where I feel like that's
15:16the best
15:17lineup on a given day and um and I think you guys have seen like it's you know doesn't mean
15:21it sticks
15:22but like a lot of it was how do I get masa and and gasper both in the lineup yeah
15:26it's been hard
15:27and he's gonna have to catch you know I want him to go out there and catch and and Izzy
15:30has now
15:31taken a jump forward since his at bats in Kansas City so like yeah there's there's there are things
15:36that you see and you're seeing trends and you want to run with those things when you see them and
15:41try
15:41to keep as many quality at bats in your can it is no secret that we needed to score more
15:45so we're
15:46trying to do that Izzy said after the game he's he came here to hit pull side home runs and
15:50he's had
15:50more that that must make the driveline guys so happy right this is like it's this is exhibit a
15:55of why we're doing this he wants to do he wants to do more damage is probably uh exactly what
15:59he's
15:59what he's trying to say is like he's Izzy's been around the game for a long time he knows he
16:03has
16:04he's got a gold glove he knows he's probably got a role to fill anywhere right um he also knows
16:09that
16:09that that role in a lot of cases likely is you know as a utility player that doesn't play a
16:13lot like
16:14when I first got here he wasn't playing much you know I think in his mind it was in his
16:18age is
16:19if I want to stick around for a while and maybe I can grab you know grab some more playing
16:23time
16:24whether it's here or you know next two years down the road if it's somewhere else that if he can
16:28showcase that he can do some damage and I I give him all I give him so many props for
16:32jumping in on
16:33something to say I know who I am as a player I know I can help but I want to
16:39do more you know and
16:41that's why he's jumping in on like there's I have more capability in my bat and I'm going to try
16:45to explore those things and not be afraid of that I give him all the credit in the world for
16:49that and
16:50and he's he's earned the right to to get some starts right now I'm sorry am I wrong to roll
16:54my
16:54eyes every time I hear driveline and the over no it's just that it just seems like you're taking
16:59something and over analyzing it to the point where it doesn't get in their heads like if you're like
17:05a batter and you've you've been raised one way and you've been hitting dongs your entire life and
17:10then somebody tries to come in and use analytics to change the way you hit doesn't that isn't that
17:16a negative effect on most players um it can be it's why I've said before about um driveline or
17:22driveline even if you use that word it's not a one size fits all thing if you don't know exactly
17:30what
17:30it is yeah it's just becomes driveline and everybody uses this punchline word it's driveline and you don't
17:36know like driveline you know the hitting philosophy and encompasses a lot of things right um swing
17:44decisions is what we call them or for us swing it strikes take balls yeah right would we all agree
17:50that that's a very important thing sure yeah that's a good thing hitting the ball hard or an exit block
17:56hit the ball hard yeah is that an important thing yeah right right ball flight now you're talking my
18:00language ball flight which is not yanking in the air at 900 feet in the air it's like hit the
18:04ball above
18:05the infield yeah because that's where extra base hits are is that an important thing sure this is
18:09what it is now who are you as a player right well x player uh you know he is really
18:17good at a b and c
18:18but his you know his uh swing decisions are poor yeah they're gonna focus on like let's make better
18:23swing decisions yeah you know that's what it is it's not everybody go into the batting cage and open
18:29your front shoulder and put in the air that's what I think people's view of it reminds me a little
18:33league when the dad who unasked yeah goes up and grabs your shoulder right and pulls it sideways
18:38and that's and that's not what it is jaron duran for example like right now jaron duran is is on
18:43he
18:43we've talked about jaron ran just a second ago he's on the heater he's swinging the bat better
18:46like jaron when he swings at balls he swings a lot when he swings at balls he's not good when
18:52he takes
18:53him he starts swinging the bat well he's brought his his chase outside the zone down about 10 percent
18:58this period of time and he's hitting better yeah that's what it is it's not hit it over the monster
19:05straight down the line and that's what people think it is it's not the case it's this is our
19:09pillars and this is how we view good hitters yeah where do our hitters lie in each one of those
19:14things and how can we make them better in that one or that one or that one and make sure
19:17hey you're
19:18really good at that keep doing that and half of it's like being just a good therapist right that's
19:21it that's always been that's always been a part of hitting yeah you got to be a good therapist
19:25you know one of one of my favorite stories it's a game of failure yeah it is it is and
19:29i remember
19:29we were talking to david ortiz one time and he was talking telling about this one time he was going
19:33through a slump and uh terry francon is just kind of standing i'm watching him at batting practice
19:38and ortiz is just you know he doesn't have it and he goes you know terry what what can i
19:44do like
19:44what's wrong like can you help me and he goes you're david freaking ortiz i can't tell you how to
19:49hit a baseball and at that moment on he went on a tear and it was just he just needed
19:54to hear
19:54right you're one of the greatest hitters that this league has right and he said that boom instantly
19:59it turned him around and it's just that weird thing that someone like in your position it's not
20:04just the x's it's not just the you know the stats and putting together the lineup cards it's literally
20:08having to be a therapist at all times you're not wrong about that like sometimes sometimes it
20:13literally is just something you say to somebody yeah that reminds them you know because you can
20:18it's you know there's more failure involved in baseball than any other any other sport it's like
20:23you you go to the field every day to fail that's what the sport is yeah so sometimes it's just
20:28saying something like that to remind somebody as they are struggling and they forget how good they
20:32are um which is easy to do when you when you go through a stretch of failure and say something
20:37like that and they remind them man i'm i'm pretty good you know yeah and it can be i've seen
20:41that too
20:41where it's like one little comment and the guy goes out and gets three hits that night it's it's a
20:45it's a mind-boggling game well let's hope the failure at home stops night on that let's see if maybe
20:51that's taking his tarp off oh yeah that would be in the uh the the uh right right field check
20:58that
20:59out in the third inning you will not be able to miss him well well chad uh thanks for coming
21:02in
21:02man it's great to meet meet you the first time and uh hopefully things get turned around because
21:06as i said you know there's and you have guys on this team who don't even know what fenway is
21:10like
21:10when your team is winning i know and and and just to be able to tell them and show them
21:15it's the
21:16greatest place on earth when this team is winning fenway park is one of the greatest places on earth
21:20debate and just for them to you know see that would be something else we feel the same but they
21:26are
21:26gonna work and we're gonna work and we feel the same that's what we're fighting for awesome all
21:29right well chad thank you so much for coming in and good luck uh tonight and for the rest of
21:33the
21:33seasons we talk to you next
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