Hold My Cutter
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Hold My Cutter
Stories Beyond the Diamond with Noah Hiles
Ever wondered how the worlds of baseball and cigars blend seamlessly? Join us for a fascinating conversation with Noah Hiles, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette's beat writer for the Pirates, as he recounts his colorful journey from a fervent young fan to a respected sports journalist. Nestled in the ambiance of Burn by Rocky Patel, mere steps away from PNC Park, we reflect on cherished baseball traditions and the deep bond between sports and family. Noah shares his insights on the evolution of the game, with a nod to the growing popularity of versatile players like Jerry Triolo and the honor of being part of the Gold Glove award discussion.
Our episode dives into the art of storytelling in sports journalism, emphasizing the power of human interest stories. Noah captivates us with tales of high school sports legends like Russell Schell and Maya Cochran, whose stories of personal growth and resilience transcend the field. From running alongside athletes to capture authentic narratives to reconnecting with life-changing sports heroes, Noah's experiences underscore the profound impact of thorough and empathetic journalism. These stories aren't merely about sports; they reveal the heart and grit behind the headlines.
We also tackle the evolving landscape of sports and sports reporting, from managing pitcher workloads to navigating the relationship between college and professional sports coverage. With anecdotes about memorable interactions with players and the intricacies of journalistic integrity, Noah offers valuable insights into the balance between immediate success and long-term player development. This episode promises an engaging blend of passion, storytelling, and professional wisdom, offering a unique perspective on the world of sports communication. Join us for these enlightening conversations, filled with humor and heart, that bring the world of sports journalism to life.
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Welcome to another edition of Hold my Cutter. We're coming your way, as always here at Burn by Rocky Patel. We're just a couple blocks away from the ballpark PNC Park, greg Brown and Michael McHenry and our special guest, as always, as you know. If you've been listening or watching, you know that each special guest on Hold my Cutter always asks for his or her special cigar and in this case our guest has asked for the Rocky Patel Gold Label Just came out about a month ago here at Burn by Rocky Patel, on the North Shore.
Speaker 1:Embark on a journey of flavor as the richness of old age tobaccos unfolds with every draw. Gold label delivers a sophisticated taste experience with earthy nuances, luscious caramel undertones and the bold flavor of coffee. A lingering sweetness rounds out each puff. Give it a shot. Mm-hmm Yep, that's true, leaving a lasting impression of indulgence. And it makes sense that this guy would ask for the gold label, because next year he'll actually be voting, more than likely, on the gold glove awards in major league baseball. He's the Pittsburgh post-gazette beat writer for the Pittsburgh pirates, one of two or three actually. Now Noah Hiles joins us.
Speaker 2:No, Bernie, this is the trio. This is the trio.
Speaker 1:It's a utility. Everything Now. As you're aware, this is the master of nicknames the Fort Michael.
Speaker 2:McHenry the Triolo. That's what this is.
Speaker 1:This is the Triolo.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean he's the one that brought it. He was like I have a little bit of a Swiss Army knife in me in my writing. What a great start Just like Triolo does on the field. So he brought this Swiss.
Speaker 1:He's also the master of the segue, because that leads us to Jerry Triolo who a gold glove nominee, the second year that Rawlings is now dishing out a utility gold glove.
Speaker 2:About time, by the way. Huh, about time. I love it About time, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:And I think that I wouldn't be surprised, moving forward, if, when you see more and more guys just kind of being so versatile defenders moving around that we might just not have position goal gloves, it might just be the nine top fielders. I know a lot of people probably wouldn't like that, but I think that that's kind of where the game's trending. Know that maybe 30, 40 years from now, it's just boy, I hope not best.
Speaker 1:Or maybe you just have corner, because if we have time we're going to get into it, because you're one of these young guys.
Speaker 3:You're too young to even be. It's going to get interesting.
Speaker 1:You're too young to even be having a cup of coffee, but you are. And how is the coffee, by the way, here? It's fantastic, yeah, awesome. He's got a straw Brownie yeah, he's got a straw that tells his age, yeah we'll get into that about where the game is trending and we won't be the well, I won't be the old man. Get off my lawn, McHenry might be I may be, you're middle-aged maybe.
Speaker 2:I'm right in the middle.
Speaker 1:Middle-aged man.
Speaker 2:get off my lawn, Start speaking of which you just got out of high school last week, right? Not with that mustache, that golden mustache 11 years ago wow, 11 years ago.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what high school.
Speaker 3:Burgettstown Area High School.
Speaker 1:And did you grow up a Bucko fan?
Speaker 3:I did. Yes, I went to every opening day since 2005.
Speaker 1:Whoa Wow.
Speaker 3:I've continued that streak now with my job.
Speaker 1:That's since you were six four.
Speaker 3:Oh, no. So that would have been when I was 10 years old. Oh, okay, close. My dad pulled me out of what a good dad. And he had a brand new Pirates hat and my glove sitting in the front seat of his car, and I still have that hat in my office.
Speaker 2:Where'd the glove go?
Speaker 3:The glove I don't know grew out.
Speaker 1:All right, no, but a lot more baseball gloves. Well, let's go back to that Now. Let's take that back. What precipitated that? Why, all of a sudden, would he surprise you for opening day?
Speaker 3:We'd just never done it before. I got really into sports when I was around eight years old. That's when I kind of became obsessed with it. Both my parents were always big readers, so they encouraged me to be a better reader, and part of that involved them getting me a subscription to Sports Illustrated and Sports.
Speaker 3:Illustrated for kids. So I would just read a whole bunch about it. And then we always had we, I think we had three different local papers delivered to us growing up and I would always, you know, my dad would encourage me like, hey, read this while you're waiting for the bus, just read about your teams. And so I got really into sports then and the year prior, when I was nine, we started going to games. We'd always gone to games as families, as a family, but my dad and I started going to a lot of games together that summer prior and we had he had never been to an opening day.
Speaker 3:I had never been to an opening day. Oh man, so that's when the tradition started. It carried through um, carried through high school. He had to schedule work meetings around this. I, at one point in time in college, took an exam a week and a half early so I could make it to one of the opening days when I was in college. Never missed it. The only one that we weren't together. I was two. We weren't together for 2020, obviously no opening day for fans. And then 2021, I was actually in the hospital during it, but we got to watch opening day in the hospital together and that was kind of cool. So I had a lot of great memories, even after, you know, I graduated from fandom and went into media and started covering it, still being able to go down there before first pitch, take our picture together and text our family. Hey, however many years in a row this is, I think we'd be going on what? 2025, starting 2005, it'd be 20 years, that's incredible.
Speaker 2:Why were you in the hospital?
Speaker 3:I was in the hospital actually with COVID I, 20 years. That's incredible. Why were you in the hospital? I was in the hospital actually with COVID. I had a blood clot in my lung.
Speaker 2:Oh no, yes, but everything's good now.
Speaker 3:Everything's good now, but yeah, I was in for seven days. It was pretty crazy.
Speaker 2:I hate to hear that when you talk about Sports Illustrated you guys are going to kick out of this. So my uncle lived with us for a while when I was growing up. He had a Sports sports illustrated uh subscription. I got excited because the sports illustrated swimsuit edition always came in once a year. So, just like billy madison, it's time to go check it out it's october I'm going out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was always a special time yeah, when you, when you do that my dad would always wonder.
Speaker 3:It's like how come that one was never on, like the dining room table, like all the other ones I get from the mailbox that's why you beat them to the mailbox.
Speaker 2:Why are you, yeah.
Speaker 3:Why are you where? Where do these ones go, yeah?
Speaker 2:my mom and dad had no clue. That was even ordered because I grabbed those magazines. I'd I'd keep them. Yeah, so yeah, I had a plethora of sports illustrated swimsuits, and I think I was eight to ten, it's like I don't know whatever, just roll with it. Oh, very popular yeah very popular, so that's why he really did it yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Um, now, so he surprised you takes you out of school. You do it every year with him, including in the hospital. Yes, you're watching it, and that has continued up until even last year yeah, even last year. So now he doesn't sit with you in the press.
Speaker 3:No, he does not sit with me in the press box. He has a step grandson now. He just recently got remarried, so now he's kind of taken Caleb under his wing and he's taking him to the games now, but I'm still able to stop down and say hello, you know, and I sit with them for 10, 15 minutes before first pitch and it's just a cool thing that we can continue to do. And you know, that's, I think, why baseball is just different than other sports, where you can have those types of traditions that maybe you don't necessarily have in football or basketball or hockey between you know family members or loved ones or friends.
Speaker 1:So baseball was your favorite sport.
Speaker 3:Absolutely Growing up.
Speaker 1:Favorite players.
Speaker 3:Favorite players growing up. I mean, aside from Pirates, jason Bay, jack Wilson that was the era I grew up in. Jason Kendall was a favorite of mine. Uh, it's funny, my dad just sold his house or is about to sell his house, so I was out there in this basement cleaning old things out and I had, uh, when I was in middle school I had an Andrew McCutcheon like poster where you can measure yourself to see how tall you are. My dad's like you should ask him to sign that.
Speaker 2:Now I was like I don't think I have it. Yeah, I found it in the basement.
Speaker 3:I was like I mean it was like rolled up, but I had that on my wall when I was a kid outside the pirates organization. I was always a huge derrick jeter fan.
Speaker 2:Uh just because you gotta like easy, gotta like um.
Speaker 3:when I really fell in love with baseball was 03 04, and I think that those two post seasons are probably the most iconic of my lifetime. I look at the 03, the championship series. You had the Bartman game on the NL side, you had Aaron Boone on the other side, and the next year, obviously, yankees come back and just stuff like that, on top of getting to come to the beautiful ballpark. That was brand new at this time for me. How do you not fall in love with the game?
Speaker 1:Have you met some of these guys that were your kind of heroes, your idols going up, oh yeah. And have they disappointed.
Speaker 3:No, I mean I haven't met a ton of them. Obviously, I've talked to Andrew because I cover him now and everything, and it's really cool to you know a guy who I remember on the way home from school. His MLB debut was a half day and I asked my bus driver can you put KDKA on? I, this guy's making his debut. I have to listen to it. Your voice is on the bus driver.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the school bus driver had to hear it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the whole, the whole bus 23 bold move and I heard his base hit against the Mets and he stole second base was the whole bus cheering when I was.
Speaker 1:I don't know about the rest of the bus, but next time tell the story you go from a guy like that. Yeah, you go tell the story. Everybody went bonkers. The bus driver had to pull over. The place was going crazy.
Speaker 3:The bus started shaking and he was a guy you know. For a lot of people you know younger or the late end of millennials, 20s, or people in their 20s, early 30s. You didn't have a player like that to watch growing up in pittsburgh until him, and so I had that type of admiration for him. But now it's cool to just talk about, like talk about music with him, you know, talk about just random stuff, and every now and then it's it's cool to like share with my dad. It's like the one time after the whole clubhouse cleared out last spring, we were sitting there talking about Tim Lincecum, Kutch and I for like five minutes. It wasn't you know for a story or anything, we were just talking and it's like man, like high school Noah would have geeked out over this. Like Tim Lincecum was a guy I loved watching pitch Kutch was a guy I loved watching play baseball and it's just like talking about these guys that I idolized when I was, you know, playing the game in high school and everything, and it's kind of cool.
Speaker 1:Is that a fine line where you're talking to like McCutcheon? Just a great example here. So how does he know that almost any casual conversation is off the record?
Speaker 2:Well, it's more, just like for that one, because you say off the record, right, no, no, but in this case you wouldn't have said all that. No, I'm just kidding you walked up to him.
Speaker 1:You started talking about Lincecum, and now back and forth and maybe he says something that you go wow, the light bulb goes off.
Speaker 3:You just obviously keep the details of those things to yourself. Or if he says something very interesting, you could say I mean You're careful, I write that. Yeah, hey, that's actually a decent story I did. Do you mind if we, if I, if I work this into a story or?
Speaker 2:whatever, it's a fine line for you, right? If you take something and you don't maybe portray what you're trying to do with it, there may be some issues.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but my whole mentality was with my first year covering this team for the Post-Gazette. I covered it for the fan a little bit when I was younger, but as the post-gazette I covered it for the fan a little bit when I was younger, but as a beat writer it was. Yeah, I want to tell good stories, I want to report good information, but part of that is building relationships with these guys, so I don't want to only talk to them when it's transactional. You know, if I'm only at their locker in the clubhouse asking them questions, oh yeah, of course, about certain things, that's going to be in a story.
Speaker 2:Sure, you know that it's going to get very cold.
Speaker 3:It's just going to get colder, it's just going to be. I'm viewed as a guy who, you know, it's just he's just here to answer questions, where, if it's like agenda guy, yeah, Like yeah, exactly when this just kind of came up organically and I was like I got to hey brain and I've done that with a whole bunch of guys on the team and it's just, I like talking baseball and these guys have played a lot of baseball and they played against amazing players and they played with amazing players and it's just fun to pick the brains of some of these guys.
Speaker 1:Is this something you wanted to get into at an early age?
Speaker 2:Yes, you can tell his passion.
Speaker 1:I mean writing though.
Speaker 3:My first day of seventh grade. We had this class at Burgettstown. I don't know if they still do it. It's called the Graduation Project. It starts in seventh grade. It goes all the way through your last year of high school and it's basically a class that prepares you for being an adult. It teaches you interview skills, it teaches you how to make a resume, how to write a cover letter, but it starts off. The foundation of it is the first day of seventh grade. They sit you down and you say what do you want to be when you grow up? You have to pick three careers and I was convinced at that time that, you know, Ohio state needed me to be their quarterback in 2014.
Speaker 3:And my teacher said you know, hey, 5'5 kid from Burgettstown, maybe that's not happening. So I thought, Shame on you, teacher. Right, you know, let a guy dream. But I thought to myself you know, I love sports. Both of my parents were communicators for a living.
Speaker 1:And what were they doing?
Speaker 3:My father, when I was growing up, was a pastor and my mom was an English teacher.
Speaker 2:Oh, wow, so you had kind of both worlds Right.
Speaker 3:So every Sunday I saw my dad speak in front of hundreds of people. Wow, so public speaking Does he still do that.
Speaker 3:No, he doesn't do it anymore. And then every day my mom was grading papers and working on that type of communication. So I was always very well-spoken as a kid and I was always really well-read. So I just decided, if I can't play sports for a living, I wanted to cover them and I thought so. My three career suggestions were play-by-play oh yes, that was one. Two was sports talk radio host and three was a writer. And I've done all three of those since graduating college do you do some play-by-play?
Speaker 3:I've done some play-by-play yes well, are you?
Speaker 1:are you good not?
Speaker 3:not as good. That's funny if you bring this up. The first time I ever spoke with you was at point park in the fall of 2016. It was you. Who else was it? Bill Hillgrove and Paul Staggerwald spoke at Point Park.
Speaker 1:They did like a forum.
Speaker 3:The head broadcaster at Mount Union. I called 130 games there in my four years of school and I was asking you. I wanted pointers for Mount Union football.
Speaker 1:if you don't know, when I was there, my senior year I think I remember this Were you wondering well, what do you do because you win so?
Speaker 3:much. Yes, we had blowouts every game. I'll never forget that conversation.
Speaker 1:Noah. After this event we did like a forum, the three of us Bill, paul, bill, he'll go. Steelers Paul did Penguins and I was doing Pirates, and afterward kids dealers paul did penguins and I was doing pirates, and afterward, kids were hanging around and asking questions and you and another kid yeah there's another my my color compensator.
Speaker 2:What's that? Did they stay after?
Speaker 1:well, well, we stuck around. Yeah, you know, good for you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love kids, my broadcast partner who now works for the arizona diamondbacks. He works in the business office. But yeah, aj, jolio. Uh, I was like I want to stay after and other guys were like asking for pictures and stuff and I actually think I did get a photo with you, but I was like I'm here to get information Like I want to learn.
Speaker 1:Because I actually use your name from now on. But I've talked about you and I've talked to others aspiring broadcasters who ask about you. Know what do you do when your team loses a lot, but you're the first person that says what do you do? My team?
Speaker 2:wins too much.
Speaker 1:Hilarious. That's what he said.
Speaker 2:My team wins too much Good problem to have, I guess, in my four years of college, my college football team lost four games.
Speaker 3:Three of those were or two of those were, in the national championship. My freshman and sophomore year they lost the national title. My junior year they won unbeaten. My senior year on senior night they lost their first regular season game. It snapped a 115-game win streak. And then we lost in the national semifinal. My senior year that was the last football game.
Speaker 3:Where was this Called Mount Union? It's the Alabama of Division III football. They have guys in the NFL Nick Sirianni is an alum there, iowa State's head coach Matt Campbell, dom Capers I could go on and on.
Speaker 1:It's so under the radar. Think about that 13 Division III national championships since 1993. Yes, that's incredible. Yes, what's also incredible is the mascot, the Purple Raiders, baby Wait wait, wait, purple Raiders, the Purple Raiders maybe.
Speaker 3:Wait, wait, wait, a macaw, the Purple Raiders Macaw. And you want to know what macaw stands for it's? Mount Union College Always Wins. That is what we call our mascot.
Speaker 2:That's called a culture. My friend, Wait a minute.
Speaker 1:But wait a second. The macaw hasn't always been the mascot.
Speaker 3:That's the mascot. Yeah, that's our physical the mascot. That's the mascot, yeah, only since the team has started winning.
Speaker 1:No, no no, that's been for a while. They've predestined it. They just use that as an acronym now, yes, and it's not Predestined.
Speaker 3:It's funny now because now it's the University of Mount Union, so people are like, oh you know.
Speaker 2:But McCaw, yeah, that's hilarious.
Speaker 3:That's the parrot, that's we're the purple raiders. Yes, we're the purple raiders, but it's like the pirates and they have the pirate parrot Macaw is our pirate parrot.
Speaker 2:I go to MTSU, right, my mom and I. At MTSU we have a blue raider. It's a horse, it's a pegasus. Is it purple? No, it's blue. And he throws lightning bolts and he flies.
Speaker 1:It's not a purple horse or a blue dynamo.
Speaker 3:I did. I was the sports editor for the dynamo for three years what a great name.
Speaker 2:There's some good names. That's our school newspaper dynamo.
Speaker 3:Actually I found some old features. I wrote while I was moving stuff out of my dad's house.
Speaker 1:Where's the dynamo come from, I wonder? I don't know that one. I do not know the dynamo. I wrote the dynamo play by play.
Speaker 3:I did play by play um, and then were you ever a macaw once in a while did no, but but I was in a fraternity and one kid. There was a long line to get in a party we were throwing and he tried to use the flex. Well, I'm the mascot he should have shown up in the. I said if you come back here with a mascot head, you can come in Absolutely. And he came in. No way we were all trying to that's awesome.
Speaker 2:Hey, actually I've been starting this thing. I take pictures with mascot heads that are laying around.
Speaker 1:I'm up to like six or seven Next to Corso, you had some. I've got about six or seven. How'd you get them?
Speaker 2:If it's lying around and I'm at an event, I throw it on.
Speaker 1:You don't have them in your house.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, those things are huge, they're gross.
Speaker 1:Mark Farrocco is here on set. He was a former sales director for the Pirates and he and I.
Speaker 2:I heard he's great at the unicycle too.
Speaker 1:He's very good yeah, very good at that, but I don't know if he was with us one night. We were at old Frank and Wally's over at Duquesne, which is no longer there, but one night. So I we'll get into this later but I was a backup parrot and I used to have that thing in the back of my car and one night you drove around with it. Late at night I took that parrot costume head and put it on my head and started thumbing for rides. Midnight on Forbes, oh, people were honking their horn.
Speaker 2:I would have stopped come on in parrot.
Speaker 1:So statute of limitations, I can't get in trouble now. I don't think Anyhow. So you write for the paper. You do play-by-play.
Speaker 2:He's a bouncer, obviously, because he's letting people into a party.
Speaker 1:Bouncer, sometimes trying on the mascot head. But at what point did you really know that you had a shot at being a professional writer?
Speaker 3:So that actually came a lot more recently. When I graduated, I wanted to work more in radio.
Speaker 2:Which was when? When did you graduate?
Speaker 3:I graduated college in 2017. After I graduated, I had a couple of GA positions offered to me to be the head voice of colleges. One was Westminster, the other was Walsh. I had a couple of other schools, but I thought you know what? No, I need to get into the workforce, I need to get experience.
Speaker 3:So I accepted a part-time job at KDKA Radio right out of college and just said I'm going to build from here. And so that turned started at KDKA Radio. Then I started writing for the Beaver County Times part-time and freelance for the Trib. Then, by doing all that, my bosses at uh now odyssey made me the pre and post game show producer for 93.7 the fan, and that's where we saw each other in the press box uh in those days. So that was in 18 and 19. But my first two years out of college I had about eight or nine sources of income just to get by and I was just juggling podcasts.
Speaker 2:So you were just a straight freelancer?
Speaker 3:Yeah, production, writing, video, radio, anything, all three of these things, anything I could do.
Speaker 2:We found one Brownie, yes, a young hustler.
Speaker 3:A young hustler Did news for a year, came back, worked at an online site where I was doing more multimedia stuff, left that place to go full-. To the Beaver County times, their head sports writer retired. Um, and I just thought you know what it's time to get something, mike Byers was the guy's name. Um, and I went to the Beaver County times in the uh, winter of 20 or the actually, yeah, early spring of 2021. And that's when I discovered that writing was my greatest strength.
Speaker 3:That out of everything that I'd done in my career be it production, you know, running around to get people coffee, writing on the side, doing on-camera stuff I just realized that what it all came down to, what I love doing most, is telling stories, and so I figured out that if I take my time and construct it, I can really tell a special story. And at the Beaver County Times I told a lot of really, really cool stories and received some recognition and the Post-Gazette found me. I talked to them for a little bit and they brought me on. I covered Pitt for two seasons and then Jason Mackey got promoted. I filled his shoes. So that's how I got to the postseason.
Speaker 1:Beaver County Times. Is that Parado or Maino?
Speaker 3:Yes, Parado worked there A lot of. So the Beaver County Times, I think, is the AAA.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's good call For Pittsburgh media.
Speaker 3:If you look at all the people Ron Cook started there, parado started there. Who else? Mike Byers had a really good career. Chris harlan is a great high school reporter for the trib. Who's there? Um prosuda, who works a dve now. Uh, does all the stealer stuff?
Speaker 3:A lot of their, their, their list of alumni is very strong, and that's my dad recommended that to me when I was first looking to get there the first time in 2017. And it was a pointer I actually learned at the forum was look at places that A have a history of when you're young, giving young people opportunities, and see what those young people did with those opportunities. And so I looked at Beaver County Times and I just thought you know, this is a place that's very well respected, has a lot of readers, great area to cover high school sports, especially high school football, with Aliquippa being there and all these other great schools. And at that time they had just stopped covering pro sports. They'd been bought out and they're trying to reduce staff. So they were looking for a young, motivated person who can do multiple things, who could work on the desk but also cover games, who also could edit things, you know, multimedia, or just edit copy. Be a little Swiss, be the Jared Triolo you know yes.
Speaker 3:And my nickname when I went there at first was the Barnacle, because I took the bottom of the barrel stories. I started my career writing about high school girls, rugby, elementary school powerlifting, and I my mentality was if I can make these stories interesting wow then I'm gonna have no issue, probably learned a lot writing.
Speaker 3:I've learned so much and it makes me grateful now that you know where I started. Like going back, and I remember the first game I covered for the paper. It was a boys soccer game Swickly Academy versus Freedom Area 1A, which is the lowest classification in the state. It was a 1-0 game in the rain, boring. But my first story I wrote for a newspaper. I was an employee.
Speaker 3:I got a front page of the sports section and I kept that and I was like this is where you started Now remember how far you get to go, and so when I'm covering, you know, paul Skeen striking out Otani, it's like you know what Like we deserve to be here. We grinded it and we grinded through it and now you get to appreciate this because of you know, you're passionate about telling stories and you love sports and you trusted the process and this is what happened.
Speaker 1:Now have you reached the pinnacle.
Speaker 3:I don't know. I've never set my sights on a level or a title really just because this field, it's always evolving, especially now. You just look at the innovative things that exist, and especially in the baseball space, with all these new platforms, former players obviously getting involved in it as well. There's so many opportunities. So I don't know if beat reporting is something I want to do for 30, 40 years, you know, just because of the travel and everything.
Speaker 1:But guys have done that, haven't they?
Speaker 3:Yeah, guys have done that. My mentality is I want to tell stories, I want to talk about sports and I want to do that on platforms where my words can reach an audience.
Speaker 1:What's your favorite story so far?
Speaker 3:My favorite story I've written all time. There's a couple, so I'll go with two. My first one was these were both written at the Beaver County Times and I don't think I'd have my job now if I didn't write these. The first one was when I was growing up. There was a kid named Russell Schell who was a year older than me. He was a running back at Hopewell.
Speaker 3:This kid was the best for my money, the best high school football player that this area has ever had, and that's saying something. But he's the state's all-time leading rusher and he never even played in a state playoff game. So he ran for 10,000 plus yards despite having a short season. Every year He'd get 40 carries a game and he was 15 minutes down the road from where I grew up. So this kid was a legend and Alabama wanted him, ohio State wanted him, but his senior year he got. This kid was a legend and Alabama wanted him, ohio State wanted him, but his senior year he got his girlfriend pregnant with twins and so that kind of ruined his recruitment. He goes to Pitt. He gets in some issues off the field, leaves Pitt after a year, goes to WVU, plays there for three years but kind of fizzles out and no one had ever heard of him. So I found out where he was when I was at the beaver county times.
Speaker 3:I tracked him down, convinced him to meet up with me for lunch one day oh man I said hey, man, I just want to so many people it's been 10 years since you last played high school sports. People are wondering where what you're up to. You know like he was a huge name at this time when he was you know playing high school.
Speaker 1:What years of that event?
Speaker 3:it was 2012 was his senior year okay so 2010 through 2012, he was I mean espn. The magazine covered his now wife's baby shower when he was in high school. Jeez, that's how big of a deal. He was right. So I was like. Everyone has their you know assumptions of what you're up to in life. I want to tell him. So I followed him around for a month. I watched him play pickup basketball with his kids in their backyard. I went to work with him. I sat in his basement and drank whiskey and talked about high school football. We had a lot of mutual friends because we grew up super close to each other and I wrote this long form piece, and it's one that I'm very, very proud of.
Speaker 3:It's not a good one. Ran in USA Today, Wow. And then the other one was. I love sharing this story.
Speaker 2:That's really cool.
Speaker 3:The next year. Every when I was at the Beaver County Times once a quarter, I would try to do something like that, like a big, long form story. I wrote one piece on a kid who suffered an aneurysm and lost all control of his right arm so he learned how to play baseball one handed. He would catch the ball in his mitt, throw the mitt off, throw it in. It was incredible. I wrote about that. But my favorite one aside from Shell would be in the what would that have been? 2019. Or no, not 2019. 2022, excuse me, the spring of 2022,.
Speaker 3:There was this distance runner at Moon Area High School. Her name was Maya Cochran. She's one of the most accomplished high school athletes in the history of Pennsylvania. She was closing in on her final state championship and one of my coworkers tried to interview her and this girl had a little bit of an ego. She said interviews are boring. He was upset, you know. And I said you know what? Then? Make them fun? He goes. Well, how would you do that? I said well, what'd she like to do? She likes to run. Interview her while you go on a run together and he goes. Who's crazy enough to do that? So before I even pitched the story to her. Here comes Noah Hiles.
Speaker 3:I would go on three days a week out and I would talk on the phone with my friends or family while I would run. So I get used to having a conversation with my cardio and I lived in the north hills at the time, so I'm going up and down hills and everything, and it's in the winter time, so I had to build up the lung capacity just so I could hang with all leave writers fight baby, so that's great.
Speaker 3:by the time I pitched it to her, her mom had to sell her on the idea and when we did the story, when I would run with her, I got a quarterback wristband where they'd have the plays in there. I'd write my questions inside the wristband where the quarterback would see the plays and I'd hold up a tripod and she'd be running where Brownie was and I'd run next to her and I would be filming the interview and I would read off the questions while I was running. I love that he was running.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so great. Could have been on a bike, could have done a lot of things, but the man's running.
Speaker 3:Her cool-down mile pace was 5 minutes and 30 seconds. She did this with no shoes on and her socks just inside, and there was one time where my photographer was like I didn't get good shot, I need you to do another lap.
Speaker 1:I'm like you've got to be kidding me. I cannot do this. Yeah, can I get some roller?
Speaker 3:skates, so um, but I would take part in her stretching with her um, and so that's so cool, because that's how you really grasp exactly and you connect. You show an athlete, in my opinion, that I'm not just another guy sticking a recorder in your face I want to.
Speaker 3:I want to tell your story, and this girl I knew had something to say. I just had to dig it out of her and right toward. It takes time. I was having weekly meetings with the editors and how's this going? I'm lying to him. Oh, it's going great. She told me she was giving me nothing for a while and then, right before I had to submit my first draft, I broke through and we sat down in the bleachers and we talked for two hours. What was supposed to be a 20 minute chat was two hours and she gave me the best interview that I've ever had in my career and I wrote this story and it was. And it was cool because it's the only story I've ever really written in the first person where I was a character in it. Oh my god, and it was. It was cool because it's the only story I've ever really written in the first person where I was a character in it.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh.
Speaker 3:And it was something really special that I always cherish, that's cool. I've told some really cool ones, obviously about the Pirates, but access like that doesn't necessarily come when you're covering Major League.
Speaker 2:Baseball, which it should.
Speaker 3:And you know what? Here's my thing If you do a good enough job and you build relationships, it will and it's not going to come with one.
Speaker 2:It is harder now than ever.
Speaker 3:It is absolute, because guys have their own platform, and why should they trust you to tell their story when they can tell it?
Speaker 2:But a lot of times, guys don't understand how powerful the platform is. Yeah, they do have a platform, but they don't utilize it properly. Because they have an agent, they have a family. Because they have an agent, they have a family, they have an organization, a lot of things coming out of them when it's like, bro, this is your story to tell.
Speaker 3:And my message to those people is you do baseball better than anyone. You know you're in the 1% of baseball. I don't know what percentile I'm in, but I'm in a high percentile of storytellers and I want to tell your story. You need to tell your story to me, but and I want to tell your story you need to tell your story to me, but allow me to be the narrator and you're the character and allow me to help craft this with you. That's cool and that's my ultimate goal. So if I had to like pick a dream career just seeing, I think the ideal, the way we consume long form storytelling now more than anything else, is by sports documentaries. Tomorrow, netflix has a new series about the 04 alcs that I'm super excited to watch, um and stuff like that. So I think 20 years from now, if I'm sitting here making a document, making documentaries, while also getting to still write and do podcasts, that would be my ideal career is there.
Speaker 1:Do you have anybody yet in mind? Because again, you're the Pirates guy. Now that you're kind of thinking along those lines In the back of your mind, you think, boy, I'd like to really. Yeah, I guess you'd have to do guys like McCutcheon, cruz, reynolds, guys that are mainstays, skeens, of course, you know who would be a great one Daniel McCutcheon. His story. His story, he's a multi-millionaire.
Speaker 2:He built some car washes called Bigley Car Wash and I think his LLC is all washed up. I can't remember. But like huge personality. But like there's so much to a person Because he got hit in the face in baseball, right Failed a drug test. It was a giant mistake. But like there's so many dudes out there that have an incredible story.
Speaker 1:I wonder about that though, about the interest, the reader interest, and this is where you come in, you're. You're a Gen Z guy.
Speaker 3:I'm a millennial, right at the end right at the cut line.
Speaker 2:Hey, will you guys explain this Gen Z and millennial stuff?
Speaker 3:I think it's just if you're born after 1996, you're Gen Z. I'm a millennial. I was born in 1995.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So I'm right at the end. So what?
Speaker 1:am I 85?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you're a millennial, hey. There we go.
Speaker 1:I'm a Stone Age.
Speaker 3:You're a boomer.
Speaker 1:I'm a boomer. Yeah, you go, bushes, boomer. So comes to what, what michael's talking about. Where you would the general, you, as a writer, might want to dive into a former player like daniel mccutcheon, who happens to be the guy who was on the mound and one of the most historic yeah games in pirates history, the 19 inning game.
Speaker 1:He was on the mound, the losing pitcher, but that's just one of many, even though the Pirates aside from the 13, 14, 15 teams you mentioned Jack Wilson, jason Kendall Do you think there's enough interest out there where those stories could be told? Where are they now? Type deals.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we actually did a series like that at the Post-Gazette last year. It was called when Yen's Now and it won an award. We covered a whole bunch of different my contributions, my favorite. This is another really good story I did While I was in Charlotte. Jeff Reed, former Steelers kicker, owns a Steelers bar in Charlotte. And I had interviewed him previously, so I just happened to be there, and so, while Go ahead.
Speaker 1:We've got an audience here waving to us.
Speaker 3:While I was there I hit him up. I was like, hey, can I just come to your bar and see what it's like watching you run a business? And so I wrote that was like my story on Jeff Reed was just being a fly on the wall watching. Jeff Reed take selfies with fans during a.
Speaker 3:Steelers game and then also change kegs, bring bags of ice in from his truck. Jason wrote one on Turner Ward. That was one of the guys that we focused on I wrote. My other ones were Carl Krauser, former Pitt point guard. George LaRock was highlighted in the series, former defenseman for the Penguins. So yeah, I do think, think there are. I think the key is just finding something. It doesn't even have to be the most interesting star, it's just something interesting it's called, it's a human
Speaker 1:what you talk about by pulling a story out.
Speaker 3:Human interest, like I think the best story I told this year was about is Mattinson. I wrote about just kind of his journey and the adversity that he went through earlier in his career and I found this out by just talking to him at Curve Media Day I saw that he was a Pitt grad and I just got done covering Pitt. I was like this is just mutual interest that we can make small talk with and I found out his incredible adversity that he had gone through and I got to tell that story and then I had no idea that this guy was even going to make triple A, let alone, you know, come and pitch a little bit in the big leagues, make it back for the first time since 2021. It's stuff like that that sometimes you stumble into, sometimes someone leaks it to you, sometimes it just comes organically. You know to. Sometimes someone leaks it to you, sometimes it just comes organically. You just build relationships with people in an organization, in a clubhouse and they say, have you talked to him about this? And that's how it starts.
Speaker 3:It's true, everybody has a great story to tell Everybody every single human being has a great story to tell.
Speaker 1:We just happen to be in a high-profile sport that allows you, this platform, to tell incredible stories. Uh, that that allows you this, this platform, to tell incredible stories. Uh, in fact, that's one of the things I think I recall talking to you about that that wondering what you do if your team, in your case, wins too much.
Speaker 2:And he's got an opposite effect now, yeah, exactly so but but the the?
Speaker 1:the point is that, regardless of the team winning or losing, there are always stories to tell.
Speaker 3:There are always stories to tell. Sometimes you can't rush it and that's something you have to work with. Explain that a little bit more. Well, it's just sometimes you know there's more there and someone might not be comfortable telling you through 10 minutes in a clubhouse around their teammates. But if you can get them on the field when no one else is around and and you prove to them and I think in a lot of experiences, sometimes the stuff that's talked about off the record, and if you can keep that off the record and guys will say you know what I, I trust him, you know he's, he's not looking for something quick, it's.
Speaker 3:It's easy to just get something small immediately and run out there and you get that dopamine hit of okay turn it around quick, and all that is is just generic stuff, it's a title or or sometimes, you know, even if it is something worth it.
Speaker 3:You know, there's been times where I've done interviews with a guy and it's like, all right, I could turn this into something cool today and it would be a seven out of ten and my bosses would love a seven out of ten. Right, or I can hold on to it. I could really comb through it. I could. I could point out we need to hit more on this, this and this, and I want this outside perspective on that and another outside perspective on this, and I spend another month on it and we can make that a 10 out of 10 story.
Speaker 2:How do you spend a month on something and then turn it into, because it's really just a short form Sometimes? Sometimes you've got to let it play out as well. Another, just a short form, it's not sometimes.
Speaker 3:You know what I mean but I mean, what are you talking about? You got to let it play out uh as well, where um another?
Speaker 3:I'd be doing like seven parters brownie yeah sometimes that's the other challenge of it is there's a different way to tell stories like there's sometimes where you're a part of it. Like I said with the runner right, I didn't go into that knowing that I was going to be a part of it, but it kind of organically formed that way where it's like you should do that in baseball, by the way, I would. I would love to do that.
Speaker 2:I've always wanted to do it. I've tried. You're, you're out with uh, the network is. Go and train with the guys, yeah, or?
Speaker 3:just go on the field and show me like stand, stand at third base with ke Cabrian and say what are you looking at here? There's a left-handed hitter, there's a runner on first, there's two outs, but just standing there is different. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Right, like even when you watch A-Rod and those guys do it, I just whatever, like I'm a big belief of like let me catch your bullpen. Let me take the ground balls, you know, like those little things that go a little bit further to say I'm not just invested, I'm all in.
Speaker 3:And it's funny that this is connecting with you, fort, because I think that this resonates with players so much, when players get the sense that you're just genuinely interested in the game. Yeah Right, like Jason Kendall, the book that he wrote and, I apologize, the guy who co-wrote it with him um, the way that started was just a guy going up to kendall and being like you know more about baseball than me. I want you to explain it to me. Tell me how you see the game, because you get this. I love it like you love it. I can't love it exactly the way you love it from a different perspective.
Speaker 3:But like we both love this thing, it's just you love it. I can't love it exactly the way, you love it from a different perspective. But like we both love this thing, it's just you see it differently. And so, like there's been many times where, like I remember there were a couple of times where Paul would say one thing and a day later I'd pull him aside and be like, hey, this isn't for a story, I'm just I like baseball man, I want to. I want to know like why, why is that? Why do you do these things?
Speaker 3:Like you mentioned this and I didn't want to push back here because you know I'd already got my questions in and you're talking for seven minutes and we're ready to wrap this up. But, like, just out of curiosity, like what did you mean by this? Can you explain this in greater detail? And just the reception that that will get, not necessarily just from him, but from a lot of people, it's like, oh, you, like he didn't want anything from that. That's not from a story, that's just talking ball and players, regardless of how media accommodating they are and how friendly they are, they love the game, man, and if they find out that you love the game and want to talk about it, like they'll sit down and they'll explain things to you. Oh yeah, lee.
Speaker 1:Judge, by the way, is the guy that wrote it with throwback. Great book I cheat Throwback. A big league catcher tells how the game is really played. One of my playing books this year. Is that right?
Speaker 3:I have a list of playing books that I love. Being confined in an area with no Wi-Fi.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, Just walk in and read. Oh, you have to share that list with us.
Speaker 3:Yes, all right, yeah, okay, what are your type of books? Do you get all kinds? Um, I mean, obviously, sports. Um, one of the ones that I read this year I read is a tell all of the history of espn. It's called those guys have all the fun. Yeah, uh, that's a really good one. I've read some basketball ones. Um, I'm about to start. I came as a shadow. It's the biography of big john thompson, the georgetown men's basketball coach. I just like learning about things that I wasn't around for, you know, or stuff that, like, I mean obviously.
Speaker 2:You like to learn about the boomers?
Speaker 3:I just like learning about you. Know what are you looking at me?
Speaker 2:What do you mean, boomer?
Speaker 1:Hey, you just reminded me of a moment when you were interning Okay, doing the pre and post-game interviews in the clubhouse. I was always struck by the questions that you asked.
Speaker 3:Oh, is that right? How bad they were.
Speaker 1:No, I think there's a method to your madness, because I think that I get the impression you didn't care in a good way.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Like you, would ask questions that nobody. There seems to be decorums.
Speaker 2:That feels like it's kind of fallen off.
Speaker 1:Decorum makes it sound like you didn't have decorum. That's not what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:He had the cojones.
Speaker 3:I was too young and naive to know better.
Speaker 1:Exactly, I guess that's what I always wondered about you. When you're asked these questions, I'd be driving home listening to the postgame and I could hear you ask the question I'm going.
Speaker 2:yee, I can't believe you just asked that, do you think it's? I think it's a blessing, by the way.
Speaker 1:But then I wondered the more you go along, there's this innocence. When you enter this game, yes, that you can't help but get caught up in the rest of life around this game, and then you become what everybody else is.
Speaker 3:Well it's a balancing act, I think at that point in time I remember I was just a little soldier.
Speaker 1:That's what I was when I was young, but you got great answers that nobody else got Because you asked the questions in a different way, I know, but that's my point.
Speaker 3:I would go to my bosses who at the time were Jeff Hathorne, who's a great guy for 93.7 the Fan, and I would say what do you need from me? Because my job at that point in time was to set up the equipment and get sound and write stuff for the website that I could write about whatever. But I just would say what questions do you want me to ask? And I would ask that before and after every game, and whatever they told me I would go do, because that's what I was told to do.
Speaker 1:It was like Forrest Gump, because you told me to Drill Sergeant. Hey ask this question. Okay, Drill Sergeant.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and like that's how it was. And now you also have to have, as you you know, evolve into this. You have to have the, the, the ability to realize that your role is different. So at that point of time I was just some kid yeah, I was not on the road. They, these people, didn't know who I was and I was more just getting it for the place I worked for. Now I have to have the realization that it's like alright, I have a different role. I have a different role just in this whole ecosystem, and I have a different role as far as my profession.
Speaker 2:You have to show up every day.
Speaker 3:I have to show up every day. These guys know my name, they see what I write, they see what I post on social media, and it's also my first year.
Speaker 3:So if I come in guns a blazing in year one, then that might not rob everyone the right way, so you want to ease into it, you want to show people who you are, and then you can start doing a little bit more with story requests, with the way you question things, with the way you go about building sources, getting information everything you've got to lay the foundation before you start building your beautiful living room.
Speaker 2:You're a rookie In a way. Yeah, that's more about them than it is about you. That's playing the game.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's exactly it.
Speaker 2:It stinks, but it's real. That's the reality. That's life again, yeah, when you're young, that part.
Speaker 3:like what Brownie referenced, I was playing the game the way I was supposed to it was like I'm young, it doesn't matter, if I ask a stupid question. Guess what? Everyone expects this 22-year-old kid with braces to ask a stupid question. So that's what I'm going to do, and it's more relationships. So now, when I asked, you had 20.
Speaker 2:You, you had braces at 22.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a whole different, oh it was horrible yeah it was the worst thing I had later in life too.
Speaker 1:I did too, yeah I. Now they get the invisible line I was so mad yeah, stupid dentist.
Speaker 2:Yeah no, my best friends at dentist always, always make fun of him.
Speaker 3:But now it's more. I want to build relationships and really, really. And it sucked at the beginning of this season for me because I went from a beat at Pitt where I had a ton of sources. I knew some things before the coaches would know, knew some things before the coaches would know. And you go to that to this where you know some people tell you some stuff, but like you're kind of starting over from ground one and it's. I don't want to try. I don't want to come off like I'm trying too hard or doing too much in the first two, three months of the job, because this is a long-term game and you build your foundation and by the back end of the year I felt like I was able to ask some decent questions. And when people know who you are and respect you, they might not always react in the very instant well to what you ask, but they can appreciate that, hey, let me talk to them, see what's going on, and we can get more information that way. And so it's a long-term play.
Speaker 2:It took five months for you to ask me your first question.
Speaker 3:Is that right yeah?
Speaker 2:About hitting. I was like ah, there he is.
Speaker 3:Well, it was just more just.
Speaker 3:It's a respect thing and I appreciate it yeah you want to ease into it, and I always look at the offseason as a really good opportunity. I don't have an obligation to write 15 baseball stories a week, like I do when they're playing baseball games every day. So now the off season is a time to build relationships. It's a time to talk to everyone that I can, to learn more about this game, this team and just overall. Like sometimes I'm talking to people and it has nothing to do with the Pirates or baseball, it's just get to know me. I'm going to be around you more than I'm around my girlfriend, my best friends, my family. We probably should know each other, and so you don't want to be the guy who spills his life story on opening day and you're like you know this is a little bit overbearing. You want to ease into that.
Speaker 2:I kind of want to throw somebody in there just to do that see what happens.
Speaker 1:There are people who do that, I know. I know it's just funny to think about. Oh, it's good. How many years at pit two, two seasons.
Speaker 3:I covered football for two season, basketball for two seasons.
Speaker 1:Yes and um any memorable moment, I guess. Maybe I'll start with the most memorable moment of the year when it comes to post-game interviews. You were a local headliner.
Speaker 3:For Pitt. No, no this year. Oh, yeah, there was that. Yeah, there was that. What is this?
Speaker 1:This was the Derek Shelton moment. Yes, there was that. So Shelton's been the manager five years and in his fifth year it's the first time he and I think he knew it. Yeah. It was a tough time. He and I think he knew it. Yeah, it was a tough time, A lot of pressure.
Speaker 3:Pirates are losing. Did he get yelled at? Oh yeah, Big time.
Speaker 1:Actually, no, I'm going to go back. That's, relatively speaking, got yelled at. I mean, that was nothing compared to stuff over the years in other cities.
Speaker 3:Right, yeah, he got righteous I've never actually shared my experience on this.
Speaker 2:No, hey listen, I've seen a lot worse.
Speaker 3:Right, exactly Way worse.
Speaker 1:But I didn't know, because I could see it. It was unique to him. It was unique to him, yes, very unique to him.
Speaker 3:It was a big deal. So that instance, obviously it came.
Speaker 1:Well, let's go back because people who are watching or listening may not know the story. What was the?
Speaker 3:question. So the Pirates are playing in Wrigley Field. They're getting no hit. They're getting absolutely trounced by the Chicago Cubs. I remember that game. It's the top of the ninth inning and Rowdy Tellez is out to pitch and I remember seeing him out there and it was the third time he had pitched in 12 days.
Speaker 1:And we hadn't pitched a position player all year, all season.
Speaker 3:And then, all of a sudden, tellez is out on the mound and this is in September, where you know there's an expanded roster and everything, and there is no off day the next day and I just with Tellez and obviously the idea of a position player pitching robs certain people the wrong way.
Speaker 2:I have a theory behind that.
Speaker 3:You can have your opinion on it either way, but as just someone who's there, it's like okay, well, this has to be addressed and it's not the main story of the game. The main story of the game is they're getting no hit right. But this is another footnote from this event, that this is the third time this happened. So I had one inning to sit there and think, okay, well, let's view this from a wide lens. This guy's probably not in the best of moods.
Speaker 1:The season didn't. Good deduction there, yeah.
Speaker 2:We're also not playing well at this point the season has gone terribly.
Speaker 3:It fell off a cliff in August. They're getting no hit, they're getting outscored and I know that he gets Shelton. He hates putting a position player out there. It's something that he gets anxious from and I think every manager feels that way, because it's a health risk, it's a spectacle, it's a whole bunch of things. So it's like we've got to craft a way to construct this question and I tried to do that, but the reality was there probably wasn't a way to ask it, at least in my opinion, that's not going to upset someone, because that's the last thing that everyone wants to talk about. If you're a manager in that spot, you don't want to talk about that, and I get why he did it.
Speaker 1:What do you want to talk about? Right, nothing. What do you want to talk about? Hey, you guys are no ahead. Tell us about how you're not heading.
Speaker 3:So we go down there and I worked it in and I believe it. I tried to give him, I tried to basically, and I didn't expect him to take this olive branch, but my mentality was like throw in the fact that there's no off day tomorrow and maybe extend that olive branch, and I don't think he'll take it. But it's more of a fact, that olive branch and I don't think he'll take it, but it's more of a fact.
Speaker 1:It's like look man I'm not trying to be a jerk, but I have to ask about this.
Speaker 3:Give an escape hatch, if you need and like yeah, and again, I didn't expect, but I was hoping that it could be. Like you know, I have to ask about this. Here's me throwing this little caveat in here just to show that I'm not doing this maliciously, but it rubbed him the wrong way. He reacted the way he did. Um, and as soon as he did, the first thing that went in my head was well, this is going to be a thing, you know, it was like just that, and I was like you know and that, and I wasn't upset with how he reacted. There were emotional beings. So many people like reach out, are you OK? Are you OK? I'm like, yeah, dude, my coaches.
Speaker 3:Again, he did Growing up playing baseball, and football reamed me out 10 times harder than that.
Speaker 1:He didn't ream me out either. That's the thing about it.
Speaker 3:He disagreed. I looked at it like I was an umpire, he disagreed with something, a judgment that I made. He voiced his disagreement and I knew the next day that we would show up and we would be fine. However, I was like. You know what it was. Obviously talked about a lot the next day Again.
Speaker 1:Just so people know. What he said was basically come on, noah, yes, you're better than that.
Speaker 3:He said I was better than that, I could have asked a better question.
Speaker 1:And so you said I had to ask it. Yes, this is the exchange. You didn't say it loudly. You said well, I had to ask. I had to ask. No, you didn't.
Speaker 3:And so the next day a lot of people wanted me to come on the radio and talk about that. And my big thing that I've always tried to focus on is my job is to tell the story, not be the story. And if I went on the radio and talked about, you know, a verbal altercation or whatever with the manager of the team I cover, I'm becoming the story. So I said, no, I'm going to let you guys talk about it. You're free to talk about whatever you want on your show, but I'll sit out and I'm just going to lay low. The only person I wanted to talk to the next day was Shelty, and I went into his office and we had a really good discussion.
Speaker 3:I'll keep what we discussed between him and myself, but I think the grand scheme of things or the big takeaway was like he probably didn't interpret it exactly how I was trying to ask it and I maybe could have framed it differently. But it's a learning experience for me. I don't regret asking it, but it's more. Sometimes you could be a little bit more direct with what you're trying to get at and maybe I could have framed it differently, but it was cool to know that, like you know, part of me also thought it's like you know, if a different reporter asked that, he probably doesn't feel comfortable giving them that type of response. There is an element where it's like you know, if you have to have some sort of credibility to even get that type of reaction right.
Speaker 3:And then there is the other part of it was, if he truly thought I was some hack, he wouldn't have opened his office door up to me the next day and let me sit there and talk with them for 20 minutes and you know, just pick each other's brain. Like I said, look, this is where I was going. I wasn't trying to upset you. Obviously that didn't work. But you know, and we exchanged how we both felt about the situation and I think I grew from it. I think that he came to know me a little bit better from all of that and it was a valuable experience at the end of the day, how did you get along with the other coaches at Pitt?
Speaker 3:At Pitt. It's a totally different relationship than it is in professional sports. In college sports, especially in college football, it's very controlling.
Speaker 2:So what's different between Major League Baseball?
Speaker 3:In Major League Baseball you're dealing with adults who are making, and I guess in college sports some of these guys are making more money than their coaches are now. But in reality it's just a different. College football is so controlling they don't want information out there. And there was times where in my experience now, like just one small example, I remember in April someone being on the IL and being in the clubhouse and seeing another reporter go up to him and be like hey, how's the arm feeling? And I was like you cannot do that in college sports. Like the idea if you were to ask especially a college football coach about injuries, they would say we don't talk about injuries, that's, that's. We just don't do that. You think that's changed now? No, I mean, until they legally make you have an injury report, there will be no change in that. And I remember the, the hour, I mean you could go to the player now now I can, yeah now, or just like when a guy's on the il.
Speaker 3:But like they're in pittsburgh, it's like, hey, were you throwing a bullpen today? You know stuff like that. Hey, were you, were you doing running drills out there and like that could be on record. Like they, they treat you like an adult essentially where, uh, there, it's like they protect them a lot and and there's no open locker room. There's no. The access is so different. They decide with pit, football and basketball. They decide who we would talk to every week. They would just let us know 20 minutes beforehand hey, you're getting this receiver, this linebacker and this corner and you're like what?
Speaker 2:can I write with that? There's no continuity.
Speaker 1:It's a way to grow your brand right there.
Speaker 3:But that's not a jab at Pitt. That's how it works for a lot of places. I understand that Um and there, I think just in that realm too, their whole thing is they want to control the information. They don't want to ever look like they don't have all the power. There were instances where they knew I was on the cusp of breaking something, and so they would release a statement that was two sentences long, just so they could be the first ones to announce it, or I would break something and two minutes later a statement would come out.
Speaker 3:Where in professional sports, not just in baseball they understand that look, there's too many people involved for us to control every narrative. News is going to get broken, stories are going to get out there, and whenever it does, it's our job as a team to react accordingly, but we can't control it. Where in college sports, they wanted all the control, so that rubbed some people wrong. On the football side, um, I also think that just I happened to cover pit football in one of their worst seasons in the last 20 years, so everybody was a little bit on edge for that.
Speaker 3:For basketball, I thought I had a really good relationship with Capel. That actually started off rocky based off of some things one of his players did. My introduction to him was covering his team, was reporting on the highest recruit he'd ever recruited at Pitt, highest rated recruit he'd ever recruited at Pitt, like committing some seriously heinous crimes, and so that was our introductions. We didn't start off well, but I was able to build a relationship with him to a point where, like we still keep in contact, we were texting about Paul Skeens this summer and stuff like that. So I feel like both of them respected what I did. I was more friendly with Capel, but I think overall Pitt Athletics and I had a really good relationship and now I wish them nothing but the best. I'm going to the game Thursday. I'm excited to watch it Nice.
Speaker 2:I want to circle back, I want to throw out this thought with position players pitching. Okay, so this year I believe if I'm you guys correct me if I'm wrong the most position players through over the last what decade or so.
Speaker 1:Probably, so I believe it.
Speaker 2:My thought is, with pitch counts, them protecting young arms, young arms getting to big leagues faster than ever. Why not have an Ozuna type or someone that can fill up the drag zone with adequate stuff for bullpens once a week? Why not have that on board? Why does this?
Speaker 1:have to happen nowadays.
Speaker 2:If you're going to protect the ball schemes, the Chandler by the way Noah I understand.
Speaker 1:Noah says the position player.
Speaker 2:Listen, I hate it. I'm just saying I understand. Where are the games at?
Speaker 1:You brought it up, but you said about position player. Is it worried about that, worried about a position player getting hurt?
Speaker 3:No, it's more just the comebacker.
Speaker 1:It's terrifying.
Speaker 2:Yeah Listen, I played and I had a ball hit right at me. I had a ball hit 450 feet.
Speaker 1:I understand it's terrifying. I understand there's a risk. We're trying to take away the risk in everything in baseball and in life.
Speaker 2:I'm not saying take care of the risk. I'm saying if I would have been on the mound prior to 20 years.
Speaker 1:Prior to that, I may have not. It took me a minute to throw a strike because I was like they're going to hit this ball. I'm going to throw this ball away at hitting speed.
Speaker 2:I understand that so I tried to miss in and these guys took me 9,000 feet deep.
Speaker 3:I'm not advocating and it's why you see guys throwing low VLO now when positions players rather than trying to throw 80 because it's like then you have a chance to be ready.
Speaker 1:I'm not advocating for a position, I'm not advocating for it either.
Speaker 2:I'm just saying it's where the game is.
Speaker 1:We saw it a lot.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of guys playing. Another caveat could be a taxi squad exists for a reason.
Speaker 3:What if you just had one guy on taxi every series? This is like taxes on America.
Speaker 1:Once you enter this stuff in these games, it's going to just build and build. It's out of control.
Speaker 2:No, I'm not saying. I'm not saying it should be normal. I don't want taxi squads.
Speaker 1:I don't want anything else.
Speaker 3:Pitch the pitcher Play the game.
Speaker 1:Pitch the pitcher, play the game. I agree.
Speaker 2:And part of it is.
Speaker 1:oh, we're worried about a guy getting hurt, you know we did, I'm not worried about guys days, so then pitch somebody else and make the starter pitch longer.
Speaker 2:I agree, the starting pitcher goes six. I'm saying where it's at and you have no control over that.
Speaker 1:Yes, you do.
Speaker 2:Well, they put any you do have control over that innings in his last outing and he looked dominant. Make it make sense.
Speaker 1:But that's not true. I don't want a taxi squad because of that.
Speaker 2:No, but him being protected all year is reason why a row and Celeste why Jones are protected.
Speaker 1:And that's why we need to have taxi squads.
Speaker 2:No, I'm just saying, if you're going to protect these guys, you have to have the innings built in.
Speaker 1:If you're going to protect, what does that mean?
Speaker 2:I don't know If you're going to protect these guys.
Speaker 1:Nobody will talk about it. Nobody will tell you this game.
Speaker 2:I agree. I agree with everything you say. I don't believe in pitch counts to a certain extent. I do not believe in inning limits. I think you cannot put reins on a lion and say go run and see how far you can run if you never find a threshold. I agree with everything you're saying. I'm saying the way it is.
Speaker 1:The reason we changed the rule put a runner at second base in the 10th inning is because we didn't want another 19 inning game which is stupid because we didn't want another daniel mccutcheon. Oh, my goodness, we don't.
Speaker 2:We're our bullpens tired but yeah, crazy, what's going on. No more 19 and we just but yeah, we had the most position players throwing and we're all like, we're all like, we're all like lemmings in this game.
Speaker 1:I had this big discussion. Well, not big didn't turn out to be very big. Here comes the hot box folks With Hurdle one time Clint Hurdle about the DH and and and how people start talking about the designated hitter coming into the national league and everybody was silent about it.
Speaker 2:There's no national league.
Speaker 1:There is no, it's once. It's one big major league, there's no. You're right. They years ago they took away American League and National League umpires. They put it all in one umbrella. As soon as we started playing interleague games, this was inevitable. Bob Walk talked about that. It's inevitable and I said the reason it's inevitable. And I said this to Clint Hurdle. I said do you want this off the air? I said do you want the DH? He goes? No. I said why not? Because National League's a better game than fight. Yeah, but nobody did. We just rolled over Exactly.
Speaker 2:And this is again all this new stuff infiltrating? Who do you fight to? Nobody wants to listen Well here's a writer here we're talking about right now. I agree with what you're saying. Noah has not said a word in the last five minutes Because he's taking it in.
Speaker 1:I can lay on the case for the pitching stuff.
Speaker 2:It's not making sense. We have more injuries than ever before. The taxi squad's not working because we have more injuries than ever before. Everything doesn't make sense. There's also protection to the players like never before. It all starts prior to them getting the big leagues. You can see that very blatantly, but the fact is, once they get to big leagues, if you're going to have to throw a position player, why not have someone well-versed? Because most guys, most teams, have multiple guys, like we did when I played here. Mercer was a closer in college. There's no reason that guy couldn't throw one inning every now and then to save a bullpen and maybe get some out, because you know what will happen.
Speaker 2:It will go beyond now and then no, it's because it will cost money.
Speaker 1:No, well, maybe. Maybe money, no well maybe, so maybe and and oh, we don't want to get him hurt. It's just like it's always something, instead of like looking what you have once you open this pandora's box.
Speaker 2:But if you, if you're going to choose to do something, you're going to have consequences, no matter what good, bad or ugly. So you choose to protect, like next year we have. We have a giant elephant in the room. How far can skeins goes if we get the postseason?
Speaker 1:none of these guys have thrown in October. There's a bigger elephant in the room than that, and here it is. The Pirates are not talking about this. Nobody is. In fact, the last press conference, I recall somebody asked about the rotation next year. Five or six men Five days between starts. If the Pirates are going to win the division. Paul Skeens has to pitch every five days, not with days in between. I'm being naive. He and Jones and Keller have to pitch every.
Speaker 2:I'm being naive here. Has there ever been a six-man rotation that have made it to the playoffs?
Speaker 3:I mean a lot of rotations now are more like three guys. You start off with your five, but by the time it gets to August or September, you're just plug and play. Bullpens are winning baseball games in the playoffs right now. Personally, the reason I asked that question was because I was genuine. I think Keller was worse this year because he wasn't pitching on a five-day.
Speaker 2:I completely agree. I think that's what he was super used to.
Speaker 3:And I think that now, the way they've built skeins, they should be able to do that, and because of the depth.
Speaker 2:No, no, no hold on the way skeins has been built through.
Speaker 3:Well, yes, yeah, but I'm just saying they didn't build skeins. No, no, no, I'm saying the build-up innings-wise, with him finishing at 160 and a third.
Speaker 2:I have a deep question on that. Real quick, yeah, building up innings. Okay, you ran with, ran with.
Speaker 3:Maya Cochran. Yes, Maya.
Speaker 2:Cochran, could you run with her right now? No, you had to train for it. Yeah, right, yeah. I mean I'm still running, I'm still running, yeah, but what I'm saying is she's also like all SEC right now, but you built your innings up yeah. You built your innings up, yeah, but year to year it's always different. So you're saying because he threw what 160?
Speaker 3:whatever, he threw 160. He can throw 180 next year Says who?
Speaker 2:Where's the paper that says this works? There's no, I don't know. It's like the four-minute mile. We were talking about this off air. You can't run a four-minute. It can never happen.
Speaker 2:Somebody did it barefoot, yeah, and then what happened right after it? Multiple people did it. The bullpen's being used like it's never been used. Guys are getting hurt like they've never been hurt. The fact is, how did Garrett Cole pitch through his torn UCL and he's pitching the playoffs so in 98, 99, no one's asking that question he didn't go for eight to 16 month hiatus. He got back in and it's. We're not asking the right questions. How can we make sure this isn't happening and push these guys to a different place? One is a contract, because once you're under contract, they're willing to push a little farther. We saw that much killer. But the reality of it is, if you don't push him in the minor leagues, how can you ever push him in the big leagues? Because the anxiety, the stress, everything is such in higher demand and you're asking for them to do something never done and you're assuming something that you cannot assume.
Speaker 3:Skeens is also an interesting case to me, though, because I mean, if you think about it, he's going on his third year now as being a full-time pitcher. He pitched once as a full-time pitcher in college, and then this was his first time being a full-time pitcher as a pro, so I'm okay with them easing him in just because this is awesome.
Speaker 2:So he was throwing more prior to because he was doing both.
Speaker 3:Well, in a way, yes, but it's just totally different. This is so new to him where every other, most other professional baseball players they have some sort of routine or gradual progression into this, where he went from being a two-way player to the number one pitcher in college baseball to maybe the number one pitcher in Major League Baseball and it's okay to maybe just err on the side of caution just a little bit in year one. But what caution? What caution is just you? These are uncharted waters.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so what if he blows next year? Did they do something wrong? I don't know.
Speaker 3:I don't see wrongdoing. I hear what you're saying, but in the case of schemes, I see no issue with, but schemes is a different animal. I agree with Noah.
Speaker 1:I think the Pirates did a good job.
Speaker 2:I'm not saying they didn't do a good job.
Speaker 3:I know you're not, I'm just saying I think that. However, having said that, to me you take the reins off next year. I don't give a darn. He should be fine to be your horse. I don. They are going to win next year, you cannot do this again.
Speaker 1:You can't do the five-day between start deal.
Speaker 3:I thought it was necessary for this year, considering what they had. You had a guy in your rotation like Bailey Falter, who I think had only had 86 innings of Major League Baseball was his career high. He's in your starting rotation, you had Jared Jones.
Speaker 2:He had good Oviado the year before. He'd never been a starter in the major leagues.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, what happened to Oviado at the end of the season?
Speaker 2:Yeah, but why didn't they do the same thing with him?
Speaker 3:Yeah, but I can point to that I'm saying. Maybe they learned from that.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, but come on, we can point to guys on the side of rest.
Speaker 3:And that's why I asked the question was is next year— but what is defined rest? Rest is giving them an extra day.
Speaker 2:It's cutting down their workload. But you said, keller was worse.
Speaker 3:But Keller suffered because he was the outlier in that group. Everyone else was Luis Ortiz, bailey Falter, paul Skeens, jared Jones, I mean Martin Perez and Marco had I mean, marco had been dealing. You guys were going through injury. It was just. I think this was if this was a one-off thing where they recognized big picture, we're ushering in a whole bunch of new arms and we're going to have to do it this way for this year.
Speaker 2:So it wasn't a successful season then no, it wasn't.
Speaker 3:But if next year they have it in a place where they can go with a five standard, five-man rotation, like Brownie pointed out, and allow Paul to pitch once every five days, you know you're getting the best pitcher in baseball twice a week but say Chandler's coming up, you're not protecting him.
Speaker 3:But because they have the depth, it could still be once every five days and it's just maybe it's not Chandler every five days or Jones every five days, but you can get Paul every five days, mitch every five days and the guys that are comfortable getting to that point, and then you can also build it up.
Speaker 3:It was just this point this year there were so many guys who weren't at that rate that you had to sacrifice the one that was built up, Mitch, to have. He had to play the kid way this year and they had to kind of for lack of a better word baby him a little bit, just because they are babying everyone else. But now for this upcoming year, I don't think you have to do that with everyone. You might have to do it a little bit with Chandler. You might have to do it a little bit with Chandler. You might have to do it a little bit with Jones, just because of his workload and everything with the injury. I don't know what their goal as far as usage is with him this year. But I think you're in a better spot where you can get more usage out of those guys and because of the depth that you have with Burroughs, with Ashcraft, with Chandler, with Oviedo coming back. There's so many other guys.
Speaker 2:Everything you just said makes complete sense. It hasn't worked Yet.
Speaker 3:Yet, but they haven't been in this spot yet.
Speaker 2:I'm talking about anywhere. It hasn't worked Right.
Speaker 3:And that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:Right, wrong or different. They have a lot of reason and they have a lot of information to say why.
Speaker 3:Who's doing it right in your opinion? Who's doing it right in your opinion? Who's doing it right? Starting pitching? Because if you look at the teams in the world series right now, the dodgers don't have. But who's that? The only guy that they have they can rely on six innings is a guy they acquired at the deadline, but they're in the world series I agree is not. Is that because of their pitching? It's because they're a bullpen? It's because of their team?
Speaker 2:It's because of their team their offense and everything Milwaukee was because of their bullpen.
Speaker 3:But I'm just saying the strength of this team is starting pitching Cleveland is because of their bullpen. So who's doing starting pitching the best right now in baseball?
Speaker 2:I think it's all a mess, unless you become an actual signed free agent and you kind of write your own narrative, because that's when you really have control. Because that's when you really have control, I mean you could say Yankees are maybe the best at it right now.
Speaker 3:Yankees have a good rotation.
Speaker 2:But it's all about you sign him. And you're talking about Mitch Keller. He took the brunt of it. He literally just signed a deal and you made him take the brunt of it. That's tough, because you're saying and I agree.
Speaker 2:I don't disagree with what they did. I'm just bringing up a question, because what if? And it hasn't worked, because next year we're going to say Ortiz hasn't touched this many innings, oviedo is coming back from injury, burrow's never touched this many innings, chandler Jones, mitch Keller's coming on a bounce back. It's still the same questions. It's just a new year because there's no number. You're actually talking about hitting, you're not saying 200 innings.
Speaker 3:You're not talking about 30 starts.
Speaker 2:You're not talking about 30 starts. You're not talking about anything other than we need to protect them From what?
Speaker 3:200 innings, 225?. If you have two guys that you're comfortable getting you 200 plus innings in a year, then this can work. You feel great about it, but if they're not going to allow it, I don't think they have at least two of those guys this year Going into 2025.
Speaker 2:But that's why they signed Perez, that's why they signed.
Speaker 3:They didn't expect Perez.
Speaker 2:They got to get somebody, because that's what other teams do you? Look at Chicago. They really had no injuries outside of Hendricks. He doesn't throw very hard, but those guys don't necessarily blow up the gun.
Speaker 3:I think the reality was that this year they entered the season hoping that this could be their 2015 Cubs type year, where they peaked a year early. I think that it was always clear to them that this upcoming season, where they wanted to get Paul acclimated, they wanted to get Jared acclimated, and their mentality was if we can win by doing it this way, that's great. If it doesn't work, so be it. And that's why the manager's back and that's why the general manager's back Now be a fan.
Speaker 2:I get that and that's all I'm trying to say is because I get this question a lot and it's the understanding of, like I don't know, because there really is no answer, and there's no answer around the league because there isn't a typical guy out there that's throwing 200 innings Like we're not going for that threshold anymore. We for that threshold anymore. We're not being what we used to be in baseball and baseball is going to come back around. Starting pitchers are going to become more valuable because you can't keep rotating bullpen guys in and out, in and out, in and out, unless you're, like Tampa Bay, willing to just throw these guys left right up down.
Speaker 3:I mean everyone's doing that now.
Speaker 2:Not as much as Tampa.
Speaker 3:Bay, tampa Bay, yeah, but I mean you look at the Guardians, but yeah, but I mean you look at the Guardians, but you have to do that if that's what you're going to do. I don't know. I think that you look at this team next year. You've got two guys who could probably get to 200 innings easily. I think Skeens can reach 200.
Speaker 2:But is that the goal that should be?
Speaker 3:I mean, I think your goal is you look at it, we've got a one and two that we know can pitch on four days rest.
Speaker 2:If we make the I'll say half the 200 innings, correct.
Speaker 3:And then after that you assume some combination of Jones, oviedo, falter, chandler, all these other guys are going to be able to cover the rest of that, and you know how many years has any team had where their 1 through 5 are completely healthy, right? I?
Speaker 3:completely agree, and that's where you plug and play, and that's where you can get Jones to 160, and that's where you can get Chandler to 140, and that's where you can get all of these guys and that's why they built this depth. I just think that this year a lot of people assumed that you would have that expectation, that what you listed where, yeah, they would have been a better team this year if Paul would have pitched once every five days. But they wanted to get him acclimated and they looked at this year as this is your freshman orientation year, essentially, and that's very frustrating.
Speaker 3:That's very frustrating for fans. That's a tough pill to swallow. But if it progresses the way they want it to and so far they've done a lot of things wrong this regime regime I don't think you can really criticize they have not made a lot of missteps with how they've developed paul, how they progressed paul I I don't know how much development there was, he's kind of just who he is. But if, if this continues on this track where you, you use 2024 as a year where we can just let everyone get acclimated, dip their toes in the water and now you can take the chain off of them and say go run, now you're a better team, and I think that that's you're going to see more of that. I think, ideally, you see more of that this upcoming season.
Speaker 1:If you like this episode, check out the next one with Noah Hiles, this one coming up. The next one is even better, I promise. On Hold my Cutter.
