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FTMB Episode 4 - Mitch Lukevics
50 Plays1 year ago
Veteran Agent for MLB players David Sloane speak with Mitch Lukevics, his former client, now Special Assistant to the General Manager of the Tampa Bay Rays
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Transcript
Introduction to David Sloan and Mitch Leukovich
00:00:09
Speaker
Welcome to Follow the Money Wall. I'm David Sloan and I have opinions. I also have 44 years of experience as an agent for MLB players to back those opinions up. My guest today is Mitch Leukovich. Mitch is currently special assistant for the general manager of the Tampa Bay Rays. How you doing Mitch?
00:00:29
Speaker
Never been better, David. Thank you. That's very good.
Mitch's Early Life and Multi-Sport Background
00:00:32
Speaker
So, you know, I've always felt the best place to begin a story is at the beginning. So I'd like to share with my listeners a little bit of your background. I know you are from Pennsylvania and you obviously played baseball. That was where you and I got together. You were my client and a very good one. I wish I had more Mitch Lukavix's in my client list.
00:00:56
Speaker
However, my listeners don't necessarily know so I'd like to get into that a little bit obviously Like many people you played ball from a very early age. Were you always a pitcher? always a pitcher really from lawn it just happened I could throw harder than most and when you throw harder than most that's where they put you uh-huh and did you only pitch and
00:01:20
Speaker
No, you know, you pitch, play shortstop, maybe on occasion outfield. But yeah, throughout high school, you know, when you're in Little League and high school, Teener League, Connie Mack, you always play two positions. Then when you got into college, you know, my first year at Penn State, we hit pitchers, hit my first year, and then they got rid of it and had the designated hitter in my sophomore year. So say,
00:01:46
Speaker
somewhere in 1974, you know, pitchers stopped hitting. But when you're a kid, you play multiple positions. And you know what, I enjoyed the heck out of it. It was a lot of fun. Right. Before you got to Penn State, obviously, Pennsylvania has always been a hotbed of athletic talent. Did you specialize just in baseball or did you play other sports as well?
00:02:09
Speaker
I played three sports in high school football basketball and baseball and I got recruited, you know, the one took visits to West Virginia, Syracuse, North Carolina State, Indiana State and
College Recruitment and Focus on Baseball
00:02:25
Speaker
I play with a great player. Mike Harnstein played 13 years with the Bears. So, you know, my high school films got to be seen by a lot of colleges and as a byproduct of that. You're talking football season 1970 now, you know, and
00:02:42
Speaker
We didn't go much from Bethlehem to Allentown, PA, let alone go to Syracuse or North Carolina State and Raleigh, North Carolina. So the only way I got seen was because of a great player on my team that my films got viewed by a lot of different colleges. What position did you play in football?
00:03:02
Speaker
Well, I was a running back and then I was a defensive end. My junior year I'll be being a running back. I was a defensive back, but my senior year they moved me to defensive end. I was long and lanky. So that position actually was pretty much fun. Go get the quarterback. Yeah, yeah. Defense is always was always better than I thought. Yeah, I'd much rather hit somebody than get hit. No question about that. So basketball, were you a guard or did you play the front court?
00:03:30
Speaker
Oh, we were forwards, you know, six, two, and, uh, we had another, well, the guy that I talked about with playing football, he was the other forward. He was six, three, two 35. So that was great. And, uh, you must have been a lot of teams up. Well, we had decent year, not a great year. You know, there's always someone bigger and better, but we, you know, when you're in Pennsylvania played multiple sports simply because of the weather,
College World Series and Drafting Experience
00:03:56
Speaker
you know,
00:03:56
Speaker
When you're in Florida, you can play baseball year round outside, but here you go from football to basketball to baseball to summer basketball to summer baseball back to football. It's great. You know, when you're near 15, 16 years old, what's better? Yeah, nothing. You know, yet school is always a priority. But when you're out at classroom, you're on a ball field somewhere. Didn't matter what the weather was.
00:04:24
Speaker
Right. Now, your parents, I assume, were supportive of your athletics. Extremely, extremely. And I come from a, you know, my dad wasn't the athlete of the family, but my uncle Ed, he was a three-year letterman, a pitcher at the University of
00:04:39
Speaker
Pennsylvania. My Uncle Al's kid in our other high school here, Freedom, was the first athlete of the year at Freedom High School in Bethlehem, PA. I call my uncle, but he's my cousin, Bill. He just passed away.
00:04:55
Speaker
It was a first thousand, you know, points score in the Lehigh Valley here in Penn State. He's in the Moravian College Athletic Hall of Fame and played with the great Pete, Pete Kirill. And so I come from a family of athletes that maybe I got a little luck with the gene pool, David. Definitely. That's a hell of a track record. Yeah. Yeah.
00:05:17
Speaker
So tell me this, strictly talking about high school and limiting it to baseball, because again, that's where you really flourished. Did you play against guys who went on to pro ball or college ball?
00:05:31
Speaker
Well, in football, yeah, baseball, not so much. You know, we're talking 50 years
Transition to Professional Baseball and Early Career
00:05:38
Speaker
ago, David. The sports scene back then compared to now is quite different. You know, in football, Tommy Donches was a senior when I was
00:05:51
Speaker
a junior, he went on to Penn State and played a little bit for the Bears and I believe the Buffalo Bills. So you were around these athletes, Chris Barr, you know, long time NFL kicker was at the chimney and kicked off to us. Well, you know, in those days, you couldn't return them if you kicked.
00:06:10
Speaker
you know, they kicked it in the end zone. And so you were around really good athletes the entire time. The exposure was different because, you know, we didn't even have fax machines back then. So I don't even know how we got seen, but, you know, you enjoyed every minute of it. It was a highlight. Back then, they barely had the post office, Mitch.
00:06:34
Speaker
Pony Express, right? Yeah, exactly, exactly. So, okay, so you graduated high school and I assume Penn State was not the only school that recruited you for baseball. Well, baseball, they didn't recruit. Football recruited, you got more exposure. But David, I went to Fort Ewing Military Academy the year after high school. Right. And for my senior year in high school, for my entire football season, I was 16.
00:07:01
Speaker
I turned 17 that December. So, you
Coaching Career and Administrative Roles
00:07:05
Speaker
know, you talk about 16 as a senior football player. You're underdeveloped. You're young. You know, school was average. So I went to prep school and then at Fort Union. That was the greatest place in the world, but for the right people, it is. And it was a wonderful education. But how did that happen every day? How did you wind up leaving your home and going to the prep school?
00:07:30
Speaker
Well, Bob Buffen, my head coach, used to be head football coach there. Right. Being young and being an average student, everybody thought it was in my best interest to take a year off and go to the prep school. So I played football and I played baseball there. Right. I signed with West Virginia.
00:07:50
Speaker
Bobby Bowden was the head coach there. Wow. And I broke my thumb in an all-star football game. My dad said, maybe you start thinking about baseball, not football because baseball wasn't, you know, it's not like today, you know, with Mike Trout here in New Jersey, you know, he had much more exposure. And so I went that route and I got drafted in high school by the Tigers and the Tigers scout called Chuck Miller at Penn State. And that's how things worked out for baseball there. Oh.
00:08:19
Speaker
my thumb really, the right thumb. Absolutely. Okay. My, my pop goes, maybe I ought to think twice about this football stuff because you know, David, everybody's bigger, stronger, faster. Always. Unless you're here, you know, who's the best in the NFL? There's always someone bigger, stronger, faster. Without a doubt.
00:08:39
Speaker
my longevity would be in baseball. And that's how I ended up at Penn State, Joe Holden, my scout with the Tigers. I didn't sign with that big bonus of $3,000 and thought that if I got my education paid for, you know, my dad had an eighth grade education. My mom graduated high school, you know, education back then with my dad's age, man, the Depression, you know, I was born in 1922, so you had to work.
00:09:06
Speaker
Yeah. But it was smart enough to know 3000 was enough and a full ride for college was pretty darn good. So that's how all that materialized. It's funny how it all works out.
Player Development Philosophy at the Rays
00:09:17
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Well, and you know, you mentioned bigger, stronger, faster, even when
00:09:21
Speaker
Even when you're big, strong, and fast, when you're playing football, you're still getting beat up. I'll tell you a quick story. One of my cousins was an attorney, and he worked for a big firm that represented a healthcare company out in California. And Deacon Jones, the former defensive end of the LA Rams, did PR for them.
00:09:41
Speaker
And I was in LA one time and I was visiting my cousin and he said, Hey, Deacon Jones is here today. Would you like to meet him? I'd always been a Rams fan, even though I'd grown up in South Florida. Go figure couldn't have been a team further away at that point. And I said, yeah.
00:09:56
Speaker
Hell yeah, I'd like to meet Deacon Jones. So Deacon, he calls on the phone and Deacon comes in. Well, first of all, he fills up the entire doorway. And I walk over to shake his hand and he walks over to me limping, badly. And then I go to shake his hand and he said,
00:10:13
Speaker
Easy. And I'm like, what do you mean? He said my hand and he showed me his hand. Literally every finger went in a different direction. Yeah. You know, didn't get any bigger, stronger, faster than Deacon Jones. And here's a guy who wasn't walking well, couldn't shake hands and, you know, no doubt had a whole lot of other injuries that plagued him as well. So you definitely made the right decision. And you happened to play at a Penn State team that was pretty damn good as well. Right. Yeah. Yeah. We got to the college field series.
00:10:43
Speaker
right, you know, freshman year, but again, the
00:10:47
Speaker
you know, it wasn't the same as it is now. You had like eight area regions and we had to beat temples, Seton Hall and Buffalo. And we did to go to the College World Series today, you know, the fourth seed in the West out in California or Texas, they could come out East and you know, they're really good. And so we got to the College World Series, which I'm proud of, but more than likely we would not have
00:11:14
Speaker
uh if if you're in 2023 with no disrespect to anybody but the college real series a different format but we did go we played 56 and six Arizona State we were at 19 and five and uh we walk into we we had the night game David I think it was seven eight o'clock but we get to Rosenblatt Stadium
00:11:40
Speaker
And I think, oh my God, it's Minnesota and Oklahoma. Dave Winfield and Jackson Todd.
00:11:48
Speaker
Yeah, I never saw anybody throw as hard as big Dave Winfield. And he was really, really good. And you had to wonder, like, he just went right to hit. Now, I don't know him. I do. Everybody knows who he is. Right. So I and I'm thinking I'm not that good. Everybody's bigger, faster, stronger, smarter. He struck out 17 that day. Jackson Todd was a really good college pitcher back then. So to beat him and I thought, oh, my God, how am I going to
00:12:18
Speaker
How am I going to do this with Arizona State 56-6? They held out Eddie Bayne, one of the most prolific college pitchers in history. He was 16-1 and we faced 15-1 Jim Otten. We got beat 3-1. I lasted eight and a third innings and I thought, oh my God, this was a
00:12:36
Speaker
one heck of experience. And years later, I played with Eddie and
Impact of Media and Money on Baseball
00:12:40
Speaker
Jim in Des Moines, Iowa. You know, when Mike Colburn was the catcher, that introduced me to you. I played with both of those guys, but they saved Eddie Bayne for Jim and Jim was 15 and one. How about that? I was six and one. He was 15 and one. That's our record.
00:12:57
Speaker
Yeah. And that 56 and 16, I had gone out for the team that year and I knew I wasn't going to make it. For me, it was like a fantasy camp that I didn't have to pay for, but I made it up to the next to the last cut. So that's the one way I will pat myself on the back for any sort of athletic accomplishment because that was a hell of a team, a lot of talent. That was a really
00:13:20
Speaker
really good team and a lot of big leaguers that played on that team. It was special. I never thought getting beat was an honor, but getting beat three to one and lasting eight and a third as a freshman, I thought, well, that's pretty good.
00:13:36
Speaker
Well, I'll tell you what, I think they could have taken that team into a minor league and competed very well, I would say, up to at least a double A level. There was so much. Yeah. Yeah. You know what? A lot of those teams, I mean, same with I think Southern Cal, one at all. Yeah. Yeah. Dave Winfield was the MVP. You know, Keith Moreland and Bob Shirley. Bob Shirley one hit us the next day, you know, and we were out of the tournament. Oklahoma beat a 6-0.
00:14:04
Speaker
I ended up playing with Bob Shirley up in Anchorage, Alaska in the summer of 74. But what great exposure. Holy cow. That SC team, I mean, they had Freddie Lynn,
Scouting, Development, and Modern Challenges
00:14:20
Speaker
Rich Dower, Roy Smalley. God, who else? And the pitchers on that team was Busby on the team that year, and he graduated already.
00:14:29
Speaker
I wasn't sure. How about Randy Scarberry? Scarberry was on my, not my Des Moines, you know, in Sec Taylor. But at some point, Randy Scarberry, Eddie Bain and Jim Otten were on the team. In Alaska? Oh, in Iowa, yeah.
00:14:46
Speaker
Well, they also had Pete Redfern on that SC team who pitched in the big leagues. I mean, the talent was just unbelievable. Absolutely unbelievable. That was a vintage year for college baseball. So eventually you get drafted by the White Sox and they offered you an enormous signing bonus, I'm assuming.
00:15:07
Speaker
Well, it would be enormous today, about 2.6 million. Back there, it was 17.5 in my last year at Penn State. So, you know, that enormous bonus was like, wow. Yeah. Well, I think I was 34th big overall. So, you know, today it's like 2.65. I don't know. It's a different day and age. Good for the kids today. Well, back then there were, look, I recruited
00:15:34
Speaker
The Cubs number one pick in 1975, a guy by the name of Brian Rozanski. They signed him. Oh, yeah. They signed him for 40 grand. I wonder what arrow they said. I Carol Baines, you know, he was the number one pick for the white side shortly after. I think, you know, the rumor was that Bill Beck signed Harold, who is in the Hall of Fame now. Yeah. 40 grand as well. Yeah. I love being a hitting high school outfielder from St. Michael's, Maryland.
00:16:03
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. No, it was a different world back then. I mean, when I first got into the agent business, I can remember clearly calling players up that were first round draft choice prospects, second round draft choice prospects. They were afraid to even talk to me because they were, they were afraid that if it got back to the team, that they were talking to an agent that the team draft them.
00:16:26
Speaker
You know, with David too, I don't know how it is today in a sense, but you know, I was honored to get drafted. I got drafted fairly high. I wanted to go out and play.
00:16:36
Speaker
You know, I never thought about, well, if I don't get, you know, 5,000 more, I was going back for my senior year. That wasn't the case. The case was, give me the best you can. I'm ready to go and, you know, and take my, take my chances. It didn't work out as well as I would have liked, but you know what? In the end, it was, it was okay. So you weren't going to hold out for life-changing money as the, the, you know, like I said, when I got drafted in high school,
00:17:05
Speaker
you know a couple years earlier it was 3,000 and you know I got my college education so when I did sign and I went from the room my first year I went from the rookie league the golf coast league right to triple-a six weeks I
Career Reflections and Gratitude
00:17:20
Speaker
was writing dear mom letters mom I can't believe how hard they hit the ball here my and that was our home you know Des Moines Iowa
00:17:27
Speaker
And Tony La Russa was a player on our team. Pete Vukovich, former Cy Young Award winner, came back, you know, from the big leagues.
00:17:39
Speaker
Billy Parsons, I think was the rookie of the year. Chet Lemon was the third baseman on the team. Larry Doby Johnson, Lamar Johnson, Manny. Hey, you can remember it like yesterday. I was, I was like awestruck. Yeah. And, uh, and I didn't do well, went to double A and, uh, you know, I got back eventually to triple A, but I was a good amateur and it was a challenge in, in pro baseball really was.
00:18:07
Speaker
So you played how many years before you decided that manage years and then Dave Dabrowski.
00:18:13
Speaker
that March of 81, they're going to release me and offer me a coaching job in the same conversation, which, you know, I just got married in January of 81. This is March of 81, you know, teaching jobs, which I was saying that I did go back my first two years of pro ball because Bill Vech didn't have money. We didn't have instructionally.
00:18:39
Speaker
And I did go back and the best thing I did, I got my degree at Penn State because without it, I couldn't have been doing what I was doing in the front office without it for all those years. So that worked out well. But Dombrowski offered me that coaching position in the same breath with being released.
00:18:59
Speaker
I've been in it since April 1981 and 2023. It's a long journey, David. It is. It is. So you're a lifer. You are a lifer. No question. Yeah. Forty nine professional seasons this year. Wow. That is great. That is that. Yeah. Not many people get a lot of good. Seen a lot of good athletes, a lot of good people. You know, it's it's the older I get in it, the harder the game is really is
00:19:26
Speaker
hard game someone throwing a hundred miles at you and it moves and you have to hit it and it's just not that easy as all the fans think. But the good ones can do it and we try to get everybody to reach their full potential. We can do that and in player development we're happy.
00:19:44
Speaker
Right, right. Well, once again, I'm talking with Mitch Lukavics, the special assistant to the general manager of the Tampa Bay Rays. And, Mitch, tell me this, you were a coach for how many seasons before you went into the front office?
00:19:59
Speaker
Well, let me see here. I think six years I coach. I was in three years with, uh, in the golf extended program, the golf coast league. And then no five years. And then two in two in a ball and Appleton, Wisconsin, Appleton, Wisconsin, then we all got fired. It was a 85. We all got fired. I was an instructionally pitching coach and you know, I'm out of a job and I'm thinking, Oh my God, now what am I going to do?
00:20:27
Speaker
You know, and Roland tried, Roland Heiman, the great general manager of the White Sox, and one of the best human beings on the face of the planet, trying to get a job. And he's fallen short. And structurally, he went late, like in November. So you're out of a job. There was a regime change. And Hawk Harrelson came in and had Alvin Darke come in as his farm director.
00:20:52
Speaker
You know, a long time San Francisco giant manager and they fired all of us. We were out of a job. And then all of a sudden, Steve Novarita calls me. He was my pitcher in the Gulf Coast. He was in the office. He said, what do you think about the office? I said, Ken, I got it.
00:21:09
Speaker
you know, a wife, two kids and a mortgage and I'm out of a job. So I went in the interview with Howard Pizer. I got the job before you know it. I mean, thank God my father had eighth grade education, proved out to be like he had a PhD, you know, better go to school, you know, dot, dot, dot.
00:21:30
Speaker
And before you know it, I'm doing workers comp. I'm doing, you know, I'm doing immigration. I'm doing budgets. I'm doing expenses, you know, scouting player development. I'm ordering equipment, medical supplies. And, you know, the 11 years as a player and certainly a coach on the field helped assist that. And basically, you know,
00:21:55
Speaker
common sense of logic. I wasn't involved with player movement or anything like that. It was pure administration. So I learned that end of the business as well. And I got lucky, you know, I'm out of work. I was going to look for a teaching job. There are no teaching jobs. And again, a minute, 49 years. I got lucky. So that was sometimes David, that was your graduate school. Yes. What was your first title?
00:22:23
Speaker
I think I was minor league administrator. I did it all, you know, and then I had to do the budget, you know, Oh my God, I had to do like a 450 pages, some assumption sheets, and then you had to meet across.
00:22:39
Speaker
Jerry Reinsdorf and Eddie Einhorn are owners and you had to do a first draft, second draft, a final draft. I was nervous as hell. I never did a budget. Thank God. The budgets, you don't have to have geometry. You don't have to have extensive math. You have to be able to add 300 baseballs times 30 dozen equals. You got 400 line items, add them correctly, but you had to turn the page
00:23:05
Speaker
Every assumption sheet which had to be over four hundred you know talk to the owners about it. I was scared to death really so you were presenting to iron horn and rhinestorf. Right across the table what was that like three books and they're racking you know and and i enjoy a little bit.
00:23:28
Speaker
He always wanted you to call Jerry because I was a player, so I got to know him a little bit, but still, you're talking intimidating the owner of the Chicago White Sox, Eddie Einhorn, owner, very nerve-wracking because I had to do it three times, first draft, second draft, final draft.
00:23:47
Speaker
And they knew everything, what you were spending, how you were spending it, why, you know, why you were spending it. It was quite the education. And which, you know, we all learn in every business that we're in, whatever we do, we learn and we grow. And that was certainly nerve wracking, but really well worth the experience for me.
00:24:15
Speaker
Well, you had some pretty good professors between Roland Heman and Einhorn and Reinsdorf. You had some pretty good professors to learn from. Yeah. Yeah. And then I played for Tony La Russa three years. So he's a Hall of Famer. I always laughed. I played with a Hall of Famer with Harold Baines, you know, and I played with Harold Baines. I played for Tony. And of course, during my Yankee years,
00:24:41
Speaker
you know, Mariano Rivera and Derek Cheaters. Well, we got to get to that in a second. I know. I know. I'm not trying to get ahead of anything, but I understand how lucky I am. I understand. But let's not miss out on giving you some credit that, yes, you had some pretty good professors, but you also had to have been a pretty damn good student as well, because I'm sure
00:25:01
Speaker
that there were other people that were there at the same time who didn't wind up as a special assistant to a general manager of a very successful ball club as well. So let's give you at least a small pat on the back as well. I like small. Small is good because you surround yourself with good people and all collectively is why they call it a team. Collectively together you do some good stuff, David.
00:25:26
Speaker
Right, right. So you started off in administration with the White Sox and that was for how many years before you became? Three years, three years. Okay. And then from there you went to what position? I went to the Yankees from there, you know, director of minor league operations, but my first, you know, three years was all administration. George Bradley hired me who was a scout for us with the White Sox. He went over there as vice president of player development and scouting.
00:25:56
Speaker
and basically I did all administration you know certainly to go with another club you got to get a better title you got to get better a better salary with all that worked out and then yeah George uh I can't recall me George Bradley rest in peace he was another fine man and uh
00:26:17
Speaker
I don't know if he resigned or he got fired, but either or. And then Bill Livesey and Bryan Sabian came in my life. And that was awesome from a player evaluation, learning more baseball than paper. But George Bradley, to get back, he was the man that brought me over. What was that year? What was the first year with the Yankees? 1989.
00:26:43
Speaker
Yes, I was with the White Sox in 75 through through the season of 88 and 89 comes on with the Yankees. But George brings me over there and I'm basically an administration and I screwed up something. George, George.
00:27:00
Speaker
I gotta tell you, I screwed this up, you know? And he can tell he was on the phone, Mr. Steinbrenner, because his hair was messy. You know, he's probably in his head. His hair's like, you know, Doc Brown. And then I go, George, I really screwed this up. And he goes to me, is it solvable? He said, absolutely it's solvable. He said, go out there and solve it. Talk to you later.
00:27:25
Speaker
And I use that all the time. When I was farm director, I use it all the time. Never panic. You know, a hot, hot knife through butter, nice and easy. Never scream, never yell. And then I use it. I use it.
00:27:38
Speaker
I've used it a lot in my lifetime. You learn from everybody, David, you know, and I'll never forget George Bradley for that. He's not there anymore. And I'm with Brian Sabian and I'm with George. I'm with Brian Sabian and Bill Livesey. My whole world changed. It went from administration to player evaluation. Then I become the farm director and Bill Livesey was my mentor and player evaluation, process, procedure, profile, changed my whole
00:28:08
Speaker
came around from what I thought I knew and found out how much I really didn't know to take this day Yankee experience to another level and then get to another organization, Tampa Bay Devil Rays and then Rays.
00:28:23
Speaker
with that experience to parlay that into a long career. Yeah, yeah. Well, again, Livesey and Sabian both, like yourself, baseball lifers with outstanding reputations who had been in many, many different roles.
00:28:39
Speaker
I mean, Sabian, when I first met Brian, he was a general manager of the Giants. That was my friend who attacked with him. And he wasn't there by accident. Brian Sabian was a very, very sharp person. He didn't miss very much. So once again, it seemed that now you're getting your PhD. You first got your master's with Professor Heman and Professor
00:29:02
Speaker
Dombrowski and Professor La Russa. Now you're getting a PhD from professors Sabian and Livesey and Bradley. And you're going into a different phase of your career, as you say, evaluating players. Night and day different, David. You know, it's interesting. I see on baseball, we have 30 teams, but they go about their business 30 different ways, you know, leadership. This guy is different from that guy. This guy believes in this. That guy believes in that.
00:29:30
Speaker
You know, everybody thinks it's the same, but it's not the same. And you can see it who's involved. The ownership's involved or not involved. And let me tell you the key to everything is a great owner. And that's what we have with the double raise and then the raise here with Mr. Stuart Sternberg. And without that, it's a hard challenge. It really is.
00:29:49
Speaker
Well, and you had experience of going from the White Sox, who, as you said, Bill Vek was, let's be generous and say he operated on a shoestring. And you went from there to the Yankees where money, to a great extent, was no object.
00:30:07
Speaker
And particularly back then, this was when free agency had just started in 74 and Steinbrenner realized that the way for him to have the great equalizer was to use his pocketbook and buy players that maybe the minor league system wasn't quite developing yet.
00:30:28
Speaker
But you were involved back then of changing that around. So yes, 89, 90, 91. I'm assuming you saw tremendous change in the players that were coming through that system, correct? Absolutely. Yeah. And then, you know, Bill is he taking over Brian, like you said, left to go to San Francisco with Bob Quinn and then later to go over for Bob.
00:30:52
Speaker
when and then Bill Bill was the man in charge of player development and scouting. We were in Tampa. Jean Michael was up in New York in Yankee Stadium during those years, but that whole thing changed because Bill was over scouting. Bill was over player development and he tied. He tied both of those departments together. We got the right raw resource. We had a plan on how we wanted to develop these players. And before you know it, you know.
00:31:21
Speaker
My goodness, Derek Cheater, Mariano Rivera. You know, we had Bernie was in the system. Brad Osmos was in the system a year. But we got Andy Pettit. We had Russ Davis from Hueytown, Alabama. And I could go on and on. Paul O'Neill. Tell you about how those trades for Joe Girardi and Tino Martinez and Paul O'Neill. But Bill Lizzie had a plan and a process behind everything. And
00:31:48
Speaker
Yeah, they've written books about it, actually. Yeah, literally. So I was lucky to be a part of that, to learn that, and then come to the raise, which, you know, after we all got fired by Mr. Steinbrenner, me, Bill, Kevin Elfring was our coordinator of scouting, we got fired, Buck Showalter, and I come to the raise and I had the choice of being a
00:32:14
Speaker
Golf Coast League pitching coach or joined Brian Sabian as a special assistant out there. And I took the pitching coach position because of I wanted to be around home more. And I think it was the best decision I made. I didn't take the money. I didn't follow the money. I didn't follow the title. I got back to grassroots baseball. Mike Hill with Dan Jennings was in the front office in scouting.
00:32:41
Speaker
Bill Lizzie was over there and that's how he got to the double raise.
00:32:46
Speaker
And then after the first year, because we had a team in the Gulf Coast League, the Devil Rays, Tom Foley and Dennis Rasmussen, with Howard Johnson, Hojo, led a team in Butte, Montana. And then they added, because we were expansion, they added two more teams. At that time, they got me out of coaching and asked me, you know, would you want to come into the office? And of course, you know what? Hey, you want Salami? You get Salami, no problem.
00:33:15
Speaker
And Michael Hill, who was in administration, you know, he's done a nice job with Colorado, certainly the Marlins who was a GM and now he's in the commissioner's office. He went solely for scouting. I was solely in player development and did that till
00:33:33
Speaker
So it was almost 10 years between being a farm director and getting my second chance of being a farm director with the race and under new ownership with Mr. Sternberg and Matt Silverman and Andrew Friedman.
00:33:50
Speaker
Well, that was that was what changed the raise from a horrible team to the consistent player factory that they have come. And that's one of the main things I wanted to talk to you about. What does it take in your opinion? Because the raise have never had a big budget to opt out with. But yet they have consistently done as good, if not a better job of developing players
00:34:17
Speaker
than any team in baseball and they've taken assets they had as players that for whatever reason they evaluated were not long-term solutions and turned them into long-term solutions by trading them to other teams that had placed a higher value on them.
00:34:35
Speaker
What was the key difference, let's say, between the way the Yankees evaluated and developed players and the way that the Rays evaluated and developed players? Because again, if you look at those two organizations and the success that the Rays have had with a very limited budget versus the Yankees, let's call it lack of success with pretty much unlimited budget, it's night and day.
00:35:01
Speaker
So David, if you're asking about the development part of it, there wasn't much difference between what we did with the Yankees and then when I took over as farm director because I learned what worked. And then I brought it to the race about process, procedure, and have an experience as a player and have an experience as a coach. How do you treat people?
00:35:22
Speaker
Now, the evaluation of players and obtaining players, it's night and day different where, you know, they did with the Yankees go out and buy players and they still do. Right. With the Rays, it's really terrific evaluation on what we do and how we value players and assess the valuation of a player and all players.
00:35:45
Speaker
And that changed considerably when we became the Rays under Mr. Sternberg, Matt Silverman, and Andrew Freeman, and certainly now Eric Neander, how you value players. And that is significantly different. But how we develop players on the field and what's not important,
00:36:10
Speaker
wasn't much difference actually because if it wasn't broke, this is what I learned and over the years you learned what you did not want to do. I just know in the minor league system, you have to have a lot of patience and there's a lot of failure and
00:36:29
Speaker
you know, we in the monologues, you have the potential to perform, but in the big leagues, you have to perform. And what happened when Mr. Sternberg came into this here with Andrew was, no wine is fine before his time. So we're in the devil race, you know, we weren't doing too well, and
00:36:50
Speaker
You know, we had to, we had to rush players, in my mind, a little bit faster than what you should under the new administration. No wine is fine before his time. We were to take our time. Now, obviously, there's outliers with Evan Longoria.
00:37:07
Speaker
you know, David Price, but you look at James Shields, Matt Moore, Matt Moore, repeated in Princeton in low A twice. You look at Alex Cobb, who pitched in the All-Star game this year, you look at their journeys, and then you look at Wade Davis, and then you look at Andy Pettit.
00:37:25
Speaker
You know, they had similar track records. You look at Derek Jeter and how he went through the farm system. And then what we did, we kind of, you know, mimic that type of stuff where no one is fine before it's time. It's like this, David. You know, the genius is maybe can go from first to fifth grade, fifth grade to 12th grade. But most of us got to go from first to second to third to fourth.
00:37:52
Speaker
Well, okay, you do have outliers. Wonder Franco's an outlier. Delmon Young was an outlier. Man, when he came to us, he was the number one, number one pick in the draft, signed a major league contract. He went to low A. Charleston. He only hit 25 home runs, 116 RBIs, and hit over 300. Who hits 100 RBIs these days in the minor leagues?
00:38:18
Speaker
And one team, well, you know, today you play a half year you do good you move to another level you do to another level. But, you know, we were lucky back then that our ownership was behind what we did. And that's everything. Because if you don't have that.
00:38:36
Speaker
You're going to panic. You're forced to do things you really do not want to do, David. Right, right. Well, and you mentioned the difference between now and then. And one of the things that blows my mind back when I first got into the agent business, I had some clients that were
00:38:54
Speaker
Pretty damn good players in AAA and couldn't sniff the big leagues. In particular, I represented a player by the name of Skip James. Skip had come out of the University of Kansas. He was a first baseman, but he could also play the outfield. And Skip had at least two years in a row where he hit
00:39:13
Speaker
over 300 in the Pacific Coast League. Didn't have great power, but he was a very good defensive first baseman and hit over 300. Couldn't sniff the big leagues. Couldn't even sniff the big league roster. Then a third year he was back in AAA and he was doing really well. And I think what finally made it possible for him to get to the big leagues was he there was an injury at the big league level. Had it not been for that, he'd have been in AAA again. Now you got guys that are being called up from AAA hitting 255.
00:39:43
Speaker
and the press can't stop talking about what a good hitter they are and that just to me is mind-blowing. Now I'm sure analytics possibly plays a significant role in that evaluation of that 255 hitter and they look at his exit velocities and his launch angles and things like that and say
00:40:04
Speaker
Well, he's got the capability to take that to the big leagues. And if he can replicate that performance, he'll be successful in the big leagues. But that versus a track record of a guy consistently being successful in the minor leagues. I mean, to me, it just seems like the balance has kind of gone out of whack.
00:40:22
Speaker
So while I can add this to that, David, to add on to what you're saying, matchups have everything to do with it, too. You know, you could be performing very well at the AAA level, but if you're not the right matchup, you know, for that big league team, whether you're right-handed hitter, left-handed hitter, same thing with pitching right-handed or left-handed, you might be doing better
00:40:45
Speaker
But the other player is going to get called up because we're so in the matchups today and the game has changed. And you know, it is what it is. It's not like, OK, the best guy in AAA, he has a 1.2 ERA. They got more statistics, underlying stats. They call him at 1.25 ERA might not be the same.
00:41:05
Speaker
you might not get called up. Someone could have a four-year rate and, okay, underlying statistics, but because if he's a left-handed pitcher and you're facing maybe a predominantly left-handed big league team, you're going to get called up. That's how the game is, and I don't think there's anything wrong with it, but let me tell you,
00:41:25
Speaker
It's so different from years ago. The best guy would get called up, or the best performing guy. It's how it is. Everybody knows it, David. Everybody knows it. That was when you had a lot of major league teams relying on the sporting news stats in order to figure out who was coming up because the sophistication level wasn't much beyond that.
00:41:50
Speaker
We know everything about everybody. We know every pitch where it's located by every umpire. We have a lot of data today. The use of all this good data and the human eye coming together is the perfect plan. You can't have one, you can't have the other. But when you get both,
00:42:13
Speaker
That is where you can have success. Yeah. Yeah. True. Very true. So tell me this. I had many clients that always complained about this other guy got called up instead of me. And the reason he got called up instead of me was because he got a bigger bonus to sign.
00:42:31
Speaker
How much of a factor from the perspective of player development and administration, how much of a factor was that in terms of who you recommended as far as getting called up? My impression from people I've spoken to in that position was once a guy signed, we didn't care what he signed for. All we looked at is what he had done since he walked in the door.
00:42:54
Speaker
That's absolutely right. The bonus never came in the play. And I can tell you, Kirby H is pitching for Atlanta now. Mike Brissow, I think he just got released, but hit one of our biggest home runs against Chapman, you know, against the Yankees. And Elliott Johnson, our three players that we signed were non-drafted players.
00:43:16
Speaker
We've had Travis Phelps here 83rd round when the draft was a hundred. They all play in the big leagues now What what I think bonus money might help a little bit more you might get a little longer shake, you know You might get a little more benefit of the doubt but when it comes to getting to the big leagues and even moving up You don't think about it because I think you can put them in
00:43:39
Speaker
wrong predicaments. And with those wrong predicaments, that player could get hurt. I think you got to be fair to the players and the players all see it. But, well, OK, David got that big bonus. We're going to move my own. But with my three organizations, I really have not seen that. I mean, my goodness, Derek Jeter on the last game of the Gulf Coast League, he was about 190 something. He got two hits to get over to Mendoza line.
00:44:06
Speaker
you know okay we did move when we had 56 errors in the next year but the following year we looked at skill we just looked at pure skill we looked at age well okay let's move because he was the number one pick he had skill and you know the rest is history and there are some guys that might be more now players
00:44:29
Speaker
They might be ahead of their league because they're a college player, and maybe we wouldn't move them as much, but Mikey Brussaux's got moved to Kirby Eights, and they weren't even drafted. So I don't know, I don't think there's that perfect formula of moving players. So you gotta be flexible. You gotta be flexible. That's a good word, be flexible. You can't just have a cookie cutter, so to speak, and say that if you don't fit that mold, you're not moving.
00:44:58
Speaker
Right, no, I agree with that. So that Gulf Coast League team and Instructional League team that Jeter was on, I had a client on that team, Ray Suplee. Oh yeah, from Sarasota. Exactly. And there was just a tremendous amount of talent there. There was Suplee, there was Jeter, obviously not on a par, but nonetheless, I think Ray was like a fourth round pick out of high school. There was Posada, there was O'Neill, there was Rivera. Was that one of the more talented
00:45:27
Speaker
groups that you saw in your tenure with the Yankees? Absolutely. You know, because we were, you know, when I got there, Yankees were not a good team. We had Brian Taylor, number one, number one pick. Right. That's not a great place to be when you have the number one, number one pick, but just does you had a lousy year the year before and the Yankees were not good.
00:45:52
Speaker
But over time, you know, Brian Taylor, who, you know, we all know his story, he was going to lead the charge on the mountain, Jeter at shortstop. But it's so much talent around those guys, whether it was Bernie Williams, you know, my God, Brad Austin was mistaken in the 35th round.
00:46:11
Speaker
great athlete, couldn't hit a basketball with a bodor, kind of learned how to do it. And he ended up 18 years in the big leagues. We took Russ Springer on a flyer. He was hurt. It would have been a number one pick, but he was hurt. We took him in the eighth round or something like that. And my boss, Bill Livesey, goes, you know, we're going to challenge our medical team. We're going to challenge them, then we're going to challenge our
00:46:37
Speaker
You know, our pitching coaches and he ended up spending eight years in the big, but a lot of talent, a lot of getting the right raw resource player from the scouts, player development.
00:46:50
Speaker
people doing what they needed to do to where, you know, you keep your crops like cheater, passata, petit, mariano, and you take some to the market to trade to get Tino Martinez, Joe Girardi, Paul O'Neill, David Cone. We traded a non-drafted free agent, a third, can't think of,
00:47:14
Speaker
12-13, 13-14-3 for David Cullen was a perennial all-star. He converted Mike Dijon from his shortstop to a pitcher and he went in a trade with I think Steve Schumacher, a fourth-round pick to get
00:47:32
Speaker
Joe Girardi. So, you know, there's a process behind this. You know, you trade Chris Archer, you get glass now, you get, you know, Shane Bos, and the name alludes me now, and it was a good outfield for us. We traded to Detroit.
00:47:49
Speaker
And I can picture his face. It's just the name of it. So, you know, Austin Meadows. That's it. Yeah. What a wonderful young kid. And thank you, David. And so with that, you know, you keep the crops you want. You take the ones you want to trade might be good for another team, you know, and we all benefit. So you mentioned Bernie Williams. You mentioned Bernie Williams. And I recruited Bernie. Bernie was in the Florida State League when I met him.
00:48:18
Speaker
and got together with him in Orlando actually. The Yankees team were playing there and how nice a guy was he?
00:48:27
Speaker
Great. I mean, you know, and you know, what Bernie Williams could he ran like a deer, you know, those strides were so long. He did it so effortless. But I can say the guys that I mentioned, whether they, you know, the Yankees and all those young men that I mentioned and all the young men that I mentioned with the double raise and raise every one of them.
00:48:50
Speaker
There is good of a person that you want to meet. They were better. I always said Derek Cheater was a better person than a player. He's in all of fame. Yeah, he's a whole thing person. Well, I mean, Evan, David Price, you name it, they were really good people. They all really worked very rare to find players that are just.
00:49:09
Speaker
not nice and don't work be successful David well there's a correlation there really well to me character was always what separated the men from the boys because eventually if a guy's a good player he's going to get to the point where
00:49:27
Speaker
He's having so much smoke blown up his ass. People telling him how great he is and women throwing themselves at him and money now comes into the equation when they get to the big leagues. If it's not a high character individual, sooner or later that is going to have a corrosive effect on their personality and there's no way that that can't translate to how they play on the field as well.
00:49:53
Speaker
So I agree. And the guys that I see that you're talking about really don't make it to the big leagues or there are a few, at least when I'm talking from my experiences from the White Sox, my former teammates, you know, some of the guys I coach like Bobby Thigpen, you know, my goodness, what a stud, what a stud human being. And all the guys from the Yankees to the White Sox, you know,
00:50:19
Speaker
Yankees have this mystique about them being a little pompous, and they're the Yankees. I can tell you, none of those players acted like that. They were good people. They were good baseball players. And every one that I mentioned to, you know, I can I can mention a thousand. I'm, you know, BJ Upton, Carl Crawford, Josh, you know, Josh Hamilton was a fabulous gifted athlete. He just ran a little bit of straight. But my memory, he was a league MVP.
00:50:48
Speaker
He was fabulous and he wasn't.
00:50:51
Speaker
like as a teammate, a bad person, he just, you know, we're all born different, David. We all, and I'm not trying to pick on Josh Hamilton, we're all born different, different socioeconomic backgrounds. Part of what we do in player development is to get them in line with what we do. So they're a teammate, they understand what a teammate is. And when they get to Kevin Cash, you know, they know how to behave so we can function as a team and we can,
00:51:20
Speaker
Bottom line, win games. Right, definitely, definitely. Now, we've talked about money a little bit. I'd like to talk about it a little bit more in terms of the way that it has changed the game now versus the way it was years ago. When you and I first got into the game,
00:51:44
Speaker
First of all, the media coverage was not what it is now. Back then, generally, even at the big league level, even in towns like New York, Chicago, or LA, there were two or three newspapers that covered the team, and that was it. Now, you've got those same two or three newspapers at least, and you've got 25 websites.
00:52:09
Speaker
that cover the team. So everything is magnified tremendously. And in terms of TV, back then again, you had one game of the week on Saturdays, and that was about- Yeah, Tony Kubek and- Kurt Gowdy. Oh, Garagiola. Or Kurt Gowdy. And Kurt Gowdy, right, right.
00:52:32
Speaker
Yeah, so now you've got every game on every day for every team on MLB ticket. And as a result of that,
00:52:42
Speaker
things are much bigger, and I'm using bigger in air quotes here. What effect do you see that having in terms of the effect, if you will, on the individual players? Because yes, the guys are making more money, the teams are making more money, but in terms of the overall effect that the money created by that media focus,
00:53:10
Speaker
the effect that that has on the individual players? I don't see a lot like it affects players. I think what comes down to it, David, players have to get on that mound, whether they make 30 million or a million or league minimum, players do not like to get embarrassed. They take their
00:53:29
Speaker
They're pride in what they do as a profession. Nobody wants to get embarrassed, so they take, give or take, we're all different.
00:53:42
Speaker
but they take the craft pretty darn serious. Where the money comes in now is in the minor leagues where, my goodness, the pay's better, the housing is better, the food's significantly better, everything is significantly better in the minor leagues. Does it change anybody? No, but it's long overdue and we're happy it is, not 1978 style, but when it comes to big leagues,
00:54:10
Speaker
And even the minor leagues, everybody wants to work, everybody wants to play, give or take.
00:54:17
Speaker
individuals, but my goodness gracious, no one wants to perform and not perform well, even if they're making 30 million a year. I mean, I wouldn't want to not perform in Philly or New York. And if you don't perform, you know, boy, oh boy, it's a, it's a tough go. So they got, they all, you know, they, they, they strap it on regardless of how much money they make.
00:54:44
Speaker
Well, I had kind of a different experience in that when I first got into the agent business, money was a factor because everybody wanted to get what they could get. Right. At the end of my involvement on that side of the game as an agent,
00:55:00
Speaker
it was so much more of a factor. I had so many kids who, and when I say kids, I mean kids, high school kids, 16 year old high school juniors who in effect had already picked out their place in Cooperstown where their plaque was going to go. And I met so many parents that use the term, if my kid doesn't get life-changing money, that it really, it made me want to vomit. My comeback,
00:55:27
Speaker
My comeback to that in many instances was life-changing money. If your kid signs a baseball contract for $1.50, it's gonna change his life. If he goes to the army, it's gonna change his life. If he goes to work at a gas station, it's gonna change his life. What in the fuck are you talking about life-changing money for? Parents seem to see the kids in one of two ways, either as a meal ticket,
00:55:51
Speaker
or as a way to jerk off their egos to be able to tell another parent that their kid played travel ball with my son got more money than your son. Now, you mentioned a player previously, Brian Taylor. And for the people listening who don't remember who Brian Taylor was, Brian Taylor was a big left handed pitcher out of North Carolina, I believe, who threw very hard and was taken with the first pick in the first round of the draft. And I signed a major league contract right out of high school.
00:56:21
Speaker
And the expectations for him were sky high and part of the reason that the expectations for him were sky high were his family. His mother was involved in the negotiation of his contract and his mother had made statements basically saying that he was going to pitch in the big leagues right away and all the rest of this stuff.
00:56:42
Speaker
And then Brian Taylor's career was essentially cratered when he got into a bar fight protecting his brother. So here was a kid and at the time he was underage. He shouldn't have even been in a bar and he gets into a bar fight protecting his brother. Well, you know, good for him protecting his brother, but nonetheless bad for him being in a bar fight when, you know, he shouldn't have been in a bar to begin with.
00:57:07
Speaker
But money was the big thing in terms of Brian Taylor. He signed for more money at that point than any player had in the history of the draft. And I'm just wondering if a player with that level of talent
00:57:21
Speaker
may not have had that media spotlight on him from day one and who may not have tried to exploit that media spotlight from day one to the degree that he had if things would have been better for him or different. Now it's impossible to state with any degree of certainty because you can't change the past.
00:57:41
Speaker
It was what it was and he was tremendously talented. Would you say him as one of the players who you worked with in your administration career with the Yankees, would you say before he got hurt he was one of the better left-handed pitchers you've ever seen?
00:58:00
Speaker
Absolutely, unequivocally, without question. And I have to say this, David, because I was in contact with someone within the last month, two months on a story about Brian Taylor. And we all thought it was a bar fight, but it wasn't in a bar. Oh, it wasn't. Record be corrected. OK. And he was his brother. And the thing was,
00:58:24
Speaker
It basically ripped his left arm out of the socket. Right. And so when he signed with us, he came to sign ladies on, you know, 60 minutes or more. They say for an all this, they came to us and good. Well, I saw his last game with Jean Michael and Brian Sabey. And then I thought, oh, my God, how does he do what he does? What I hear because he warms up like.
00:58:49
Speaker
like nobody I've ever seen. And then the first pitch of the game was 96, the second was 97, the third was 98 on the knees. And it was just phenomenal. Tall, lanky, six, three, maybe 180, I don't know, maybe 190. So now the negotiation's a little bit tougher. We end up signing them. And he comes to instructionally and it's like, oh my God, he cannot hold a runner up. He doesn't know, you know,
00:59:17
Speaker
feel the bunt. Everything other than throwing the baseball over the plate, he was not accustomed to because he struck out that many in a high school that he wasn't exposed to it. So, okay, we get through that spring training comes, goes to Florida State League. What does he do?
00:59:33
Speaker
He leads the league in strikeouts. Now, he was an older sign. He was in like Gary Sheffield. They were 19 years old as a senior sign. And then he goes to AA. And his numbers were not as good, but a lot of strikeouts, a little more walks.
00:59:53
Speaker
But in the Florida State League, David, you know, the Florida State League, I thought he was like a rock star. Lengland would be sold out. You know, every city would be sold out. They want to see this phenom. And I'll never forget being in New Britain, Boston, New Britain, the Yankees. He couldn't get out of the bus. They're calling him every name in the book and they're tugging on him.
01:00:17
Speaker
It was a lot for a young man from New Bern, North Carolina, Beaufort, North Carolina, and I thought, oh my god, and they're all over him. He's warming up in the bullpen like eight feet away from the bleacher as well. His AA year wasn't as good, and then as we all know, the fight and
01:00:41
Speaker
It's really sad when I talked to this other gentleman, you know, a month ago, I thought I was going to lose it because I thought Brian Taylor was just an innocent young high school kid that was gifted. He without, I wouldn't be direct. It wasn't worldly, David. Right. You know, it's a little little and he wasn't little, but he was from this small community, a little naive, very shy and wonderful.
01:01:08
Speaker
wonderful young man that God gave him this gift, and on one incident in life, boom, took it all away. And I think about it, I get a lump in my throat, I wanted to talk to him, you know, and this gentleman brought up the whole history and
01:01:27
Speaker
You know, I've been interviewed and Brian Taylor was a wonderful young kid and with a great future and just at the wrong place, at the wrong time and life change completely firm. Oh yeah, in the blink of an eye. In a blink of an eye. Just devastating. It still eats me to this day.
01:01:50
Speaker
Well, tremendously talented young man. Yeah. Who would you say was the best right handed high school picture you've seen?
01:02:00
Speaker
Oh my God. Well, we had a lot of them with the Rays. I mean, Wade Davis was really good. Jamie Shields was really good. I'll tell you who was really good. Bringing up the left side was Matt Moore with the Rays. We, you know, led all the baseball two years in a row in strikeouts. It was an eighth round high school pick from the hotbed, New Mexico, you know, the baseball hotbed in New Mexico. He blew everybody away. Like, holy cow.
01:02:29
Speaker
You look at Brian Taylor, you look at David Price, you look at Matt Moore. Andy Pettit was good, but he wasn't in. He was a good big league pitcher. Better than Matt Moore, but the right raw resource. Matt Moore had more. Andy used it better and parlayed into an outstanding career, same with
01:02:48
Speaker
certainly David Price, not for Sally, for Brian Taylor, but right-handed pitchers. White Davis comes to my mind. Jamie Shields comes to my mind. You know, Jamie Helixen was rookie of the year for us. I had Bobby Dick Penn when I was with the White Sox, and at the time he led the American League in saves for a couple of years. He set the save record.
01:03:18
Speaker
um so but but more so some hitters you know whether it was my old roommate Ron Kittle with the White Sox was American League rookie of the year you know it's like oh my god he's in Knoxville, Tennessee hitting these balls through the warehouse windows I'm like
01:03:37
Speaker
This is like Babe Ruth. You know, it's just stuff like that over the years. But and it's hard, David, you know, it's hard to sing aloud players like who was while Josh Hamilton. But I'm telling you, I'm leaving out dozens of really good players that are not coming to my mind. I can tell you.
01:03:56
Speaker
The reason that I was asking that question, Mitch, was to get to this other subject. And it ties back to Brian Taylor. You mentioned Taylor came from a small town in North Carolina. And back then, one of the things that did not exist, that currently exists in the world that baseball deals with, is showcase baseball.
01:04:18
Speaker
Kids nowadays, even from a Beaufort, North Carolina, they get the opportunity to play against other kids that are on a par with them in terms of their abilities. Because you take a kid like Taylor, he's pitching to a high school sophomore who's 15 years old, who's barely strong enough to hold the bat, and here's this kid throwing 97 on the black at the knees.
01:04:44
Speaker
Whereas, you know, he throws the same pitch in a showcase tournament to one of the outstanding hitters in that class and maybe that kid at least is able to put the ball in play. Do you feel that that is an asset in terms of both scouting and player development?
01:05:04
Speaker
Absolutely. They definitely come hand in hand, David, without question. You know, it's amazing what scouts do and they look at you at seven. They look at a player at 17 and have to project.
01:05:17
Speaker
like, what are you going to be like in 21? What type of body type do you have? Well, let me tell you, it's fairly clunky now. What do you think it's going to be when you're 22 years old? Clunkier, you know, thicker. But what these guys do for a living to evaluate not only the skill, the bat, the bat speed, the arm speed, the foot speed,
01:05:40
Speaker
What type of person is he? It's amazing the job scouts do. I think it's just definitely the hardest job in baseball by far. I think player development can be hard at times because you're dealing with different personalities. And you have to learn to be a teacher. You have to learn to break down a different subject.
01:06:04
Speaker
and break it down so everybody could understand. You know what I'm saying? You got the players like humans, we learn at different speeds. So if you're a teacher, it only teaches for one speed, you're not a very good teacher. And so between the scouting and the player development and the blending together is really it's an art and it's not easy to do. Or you would see more players.
01:06:35
Speaker
in the big leagues that are coming.
01:06:37
Speaker
that are developed internally. True, true. And I think it's tragic what's happened over the last 10, 15 years, the way that scouting staffs have been absolutely gutted by Major League Baseball teams, where it used to be that teams had a multitude of scouts who were covering virtually every part of the country. And now it's not like that so much anymore. Now you've got...
01:07:05
Speaker
I can say, not to interrupt you David, I can say for the Tampa Bay Rays, we are not in that group that we do believe in scouting. We do believe in player development. We believe not only in the amateur, you know, amateur scout, the international scout, the professional scout. When certain organizations shut down their pro scouts and want to get it all off of video,
01:07:27
Speaker
we increased ours, we changed it, you know, our guys changed the format for all this to be more modern than when it was 30 years ago. So, and it all stemmed, Tony, it all stems from ownership and upper management and
01:07:44
Speaker
and their vision and how they foresee the future and what they want to invest in. And I'm happy to say we're not one of those teams. And I think we have greatly benefited from those decisions.
01:07:59
Speaker
And the proof of that is what's happened on the field. Again, the Rays have put a consistently competitive team on the field with a budget that ranks in, I'm being generous here, the bottom third of all baseball teams. That's right. And nonetheless, they've been able to compete with the biggest budget teams in baseball and be very, very competitive. Very competitive. And that's really, you know, David, it's not easy, but it's fun.
01:08:29
Speaker
I mean, it's fun. And when you beat the juggernauts at David, then Goliath, I always say these teams that have the kind of money they have, they ought to be 160, 260, two and all, and never had the luxury. But okay, what our guys do, they're serious as anybody I've been around, and they make very smart decisions.
01:08:55
Speaker
You know revenue is important for us because of the attendance which it's got a little bit better but it's it's funny when you beat the juggernauts it really is yes definitely. Well hopefully you have your crystal ball handy for this next question.
01:09:13
Speaker
What do you see in terms of the future as being the biggest challenge and the biggest benefit coming down the road for Major League Baseball?
01:09:27
Speaker
Wow. The biggest challenge for Major League Baseball? I don't know. You know, they have everything. Maybe expansion. You know, is that going to go through? I know, you know, a couple teams need stadiums and what's that going to be like? I mean, the sky's the limit. I mean, it's a big big business. I think I thought I read 13 billion dollars a year. Yeah.
01:09:50
Speaker
I don't, I don't even know how to answer that. I mean, they, they have everything. I mean, I'm always looking because I'm minor league mentor, you know.
01:10:00
Speaker
to having our two teams back. Everybody knows how I feel. We lost Princeton and Hudson Valley, and it hurts in the development stage. Like I said, you do not go from first to fifth grade to 12th grade, and you need to have that latter system that we do not have. And then we do not play games in these young levels on Wednesdays.
01:10:26
Speaker
You know, we're spending the same amount of money. We won games. We just would move around players to get other players more of an opportunity. That would be my wish. I know you didn't ask that. No, no, no. But you pinpointed the challenge. The challenge is adapting to the new format.
01:10:44
Speaker
in the minor league because it used to be where every team... We all have to get used to it. We all have to figure it out and thrive in it. But, you know, when the Phillies can sign Trey Turner for $300 million after they signed, you know, certainly Bryce Harper for $300 million or the Mets who they since traded Scherzer and Verlander and they're making $40 million, you know, why are we on the same, you know, minor league playing?
01:11:13
Speaker
surface. If we wanted to have X amount of teams and if our owner wanted to have it, why couldn't we? But you know, all of baseball complains about that, to be honest. And you know what, we just, that is a challenge. And what it is, is we have to figure it out and do better. But if I had my wish, if I can wiggle my nose, I would do a few things different, that's for sure.
01:11:37
Speaker
Well, I'm not in, I don't have that, you know, I don't have that capability. I hear you. I hear you. And having kids that are in their second year, let's say, of pro ball in their first year was basically a half a season. And now instead of playing at a level where they're, you know, with other kids similarly experienced, they're playing in leagues where they're playing against kids that have had two full seasons.
01:12:04
Speaker
Yeah. And with the draft being later, okay, I recognize all those issues, but we're getting kids 10 innings in their first year. You know, we're getting, you know, we traded Kyle Mansardo to Cleveland, right? I think it's for sure. He got 50 plate appearances. Well, Fernando Perez, his year got in Hudson Valley, I believe 275. So the development table is, you know, way different. And let me tell you,
01:12:35
Speaker
You can't rush development. Everybody grows at different pace. And when you have the different grades, I say grades, which means levels, when you have those levels, you have a safe place to put kids in. Let me tell you, like I went from the Gulf Coast League to AAA. My man Roland Heman, I longed to death.
01:13:00
Speaker
But that was a tough go. And you put players in competition that they're, for the most part, not ready. The journey of player development is longer and there's more bumps in the road. Yeah. Well, one of the biggest flaws that I saw from my perspective as an agent was it seemed that baseball was afraid to let players fail.
01:13:25
Speaker
that they felt that failure would damage their confidence to a degree that it would not make it possible for them to succeed in the future. Whereas I always felt that players could learn as much from failure, if not more, than they can learn from success.
01:13:44
Speaker
Who doesn't fail in this game? You hit 300. You fail seven out of 10 times. We all fail. Baseball is a game of failure. Every stat is based on failure. I don't buy that so much. We just need to put players at the right grade level for their sake. And when you put them three grade levels above,
01:14:08
Speaker
You know, again, for the outliers for the Delmon Youngs or the Wonder Francos or the Evan Longoria's, you know, you have those outliers, but for everybody else, it's a tough, tough, you know, sled and
01:14:24
Speaker
I don't care for it. But as everybody says, it is what it is. So, you know, we have to figure it out. No question about it. No question about it. Well, Mitch, I'll tell you, I've I've taken a lot more of your time up today than I thought I was originally going to do.
01:14:41
Speaker
I'd love to have you back on and continue this conversation. I know you have a million more stories that my listeners would love to hear. I hope you would agree to come back sometime when you're not too busy scouting or traveling. I really appreciate it. I've loved catching up with you today. Mitch Lukovic, special assistant to the general manager of the Tampa Bay Rays, a baseball lifer and
01:15:08
Speaker
a major league human being. I can't thank you enough for having been my client for a few years and having been my friend for many years. Many years, you bet. I'm a very lucky man. Very lucky man. Me too, David. Me too. Thank you for having me.
01:15:26
Speaker
I'd like to thank Mitch Lukavics, Special Assistant to the General Manager of the Tampa Bay Rays for being my guest today. Thank you for listening to Follow the Money Vault. My next guest will be Greg Borus, President of PowerX Communications and former Director of Communication for the Major League Baseball Players Association. I hope you'll tune in again.