April 26 — Brett Sears

Columbus Clingstones broadcaster Jack Johnson visited with pitcher Brett Sears at Regions Field in Birmingham, Alabama. 

Coming off a strong outing of 5.0 scoreless innings, Sears discussed how he approached sequencing his pitches against Birmingham, shared the story of a bench he built for his grandmother in high school woodshop class, reflected on his dominance at the ping pong table in Montgomery, and talked about his interest in hunting during the offseason.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Back on the Columbus Klingstones pregame show, joined by last night's charter Brett Sears. It's the Stones and the Barons in this series finale, and another great start for you at Regents Field. Two starts in your career here. You've gone 12 combined innings, just one run. You punched out seven last night. So, what was working for you that was able to get so many swings and misses against the Barons lineup that it had been pretty good to start the series?

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Yeah, I think the big thing for me was uh just staying in the zone. Um I threw the fastball a good bit. Um I wouldn't say I would say the changeup was okay. I threw a lot of curveballs. Uh slider and cutter were kind of hit or miss. So I think just the staying hard with the fastball and the sinker was able to keep them off bound, especially for righties with the sinker and then the forcing for the lefties. Um yeah, just staying in the zone, kind of suffocating the zone and daring them to hit it was kind of the thing for me.

SPEAKER_00 0:48

Working with Adam Zabrowski yesterday, guys work a lot on sequencing, and I know that's something that Zabrowski takes a lot of pride in in his own game. A lot of those two-strike pitches, fastballs at the top of the zone. How do you feel like you go about best setting that pitch up with two strikes?

SPEAKER_01 1:04

Yeah, I mean, I think it's no secret. I try to get to the fastball late. Um sometimes, like I know we had a sequence yesterday where we just went four straight heaters. Sometimes you have bats like that. Um sometimes pitch backwards. I like to be random. Um I'm feel confident throwing a strike with all my pitches, so I think the more random I can be, uh, the better off I am. But obviously getting to two strikes gives me a couple options once I get there.

SPEAKER_00 1:28

So okay, so you are without a doubt the best ping pong player in Columbus Klingstone's history. Uh short history, but you dominated on the road in Montgomery. Everyone told me I was watching work and playing Enlow duel, and they said, Well, you gotta see Sears. It's not like you were smashing it past work, it was just returning everything. So, how long have you been playing ping pong and when do you feel like you made the turn into a dominant player?

SPEAKER_01 1:53

Yeah, uh, you know, I let work and them play on the table for a while, let them kind of have their glory. Uh then I decided to get on on a Sunday game and kind of handle business. Uh I've been playing for a while. I think like fifth grade maybe we we got a ping pong table for Christmas, and me and my brother we played about every night, seven-game series. So yeah, we uh I mean we even let each other serve illegally, so we got pretty good at returning them. That's so yeah, it's you know, I think that's the saquia just been playing for a while.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

Where was the ping pong table? We had one growing up across the street at the pool. Was it in the garage, backyard, where was it?

SPEAKER_01 2:27

It's in the basement. We had a good good sized basement spot for it, so we played right in the basement and it got pretty competitive. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:34

So last year in Rocket City I asked you what's the best thing or the most memorable thing you've made in your life, and you were telling me the story about you're in wood shop class, I believe in high school, and you made a hanging bench that's still at your grandmother's house. And that was something when we talked about it, I could tell you take a lot of pride in. So, what's the story behind that?

SPEAKER_01 2:51

I was in shop's class, uh small town, you know, high school, so we had some random classes. Um, I was in woods class, had to make a project. Uh my grandma's bench was not looking great, it was like a hanging, swinging bench. So I just whipped one up. Me and the teacher, I mean I'm not gonna take all the credit, I had some help, but yeah, we it's still up there, looks pretty good. Looked better when it was first came out, but yeah, no, it's still still hanging, still doing good.

SPEAKER_00 3:17

Okay, you say uh you whip one up like it's that easy. I don't think a lot of people could do that. I know you got some help on it, but what is the process to build that?

SPEAKER_01 3:25

Well you gotta have some tools. Uh I think we took man, we had like 40 wood, like little slats, I guess, of wood. Um and then we just built the frame with uh with some with like uh I think we did a circle saw, something like that. Maybe a handsaw, I don't really know. Built the frame, which was pretty easy. It was like four four like base pieces. Um then we you know laid the other pieces of wood along it, and then the hardest part was the arms, probably because we had to have the the chain come down through the arms. Uh yeah, just a lot of glue, a lot of nails, um, a lot of time. But it wasn't too hard, it wasn't the world's hardest, but it looks good. I think she likes it, so it's good. And it's still there.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

Still there. So if I gave you the choice between you have some time to kill, you got a TV show, a documentary, or a movie to watch, which one are you picking? How much time?

SPEAKER_01 4:24

I'll give you three free hours, so you got plenty of time to see any of them. I'm probably just going with a movie because with a show, like I got a pretty bad attention span, so I think by the time I have to click play, I'm probably ready to do something else. But if I if I got free time for three hours and I'm kind of stuck inside, I'm probably going with a movie. What's a rewatchable movie for you that you put on? I like I like Disney movies, like the monsters movies I think are hilarious. Uh I've liked the Hunger Games, I don't know why I watched those, I know what's gonna happen, but um Yeah, I don't really watch a ton of movies, but those are good ones. Um yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 5:00

That's probably the two. You telling me in the off-season, you're trying to go hunting, get outdoors as much as possible. What are the off-season activities that really kind of get you away from the game and reset for another season?

SPEAKER_01 5:13

Yeah, I like I like to go bow hunting. I went this year, but I only went once because I shot it here the first time, so I guess I didn't get to do that that much. Um did a lot of coyote hunting, coyotes. Um we chased them down in trucks, which is pretty fun. Um so we did that a bunch. I didn't really go much much for bird hunting, but I like to go like goose hunting, um, sometimes duck hunting. I like turkey hunting, but it's like in the middle of the season, so I don't get to do that. But did you get to any Corn Husker football games last offseason? I did. I went to one. They lost. I think it was a USC game, is the one I went to. Um, yeah, my uncle has season tickets, so if he doesn't use them all, I go there. Um I don't know if I I I don't I'm I don't mind watching on TV, so if I I don't really try too hard to find tickets, but dominant stuff again yesterday here at Regents Field, a place that you're starting to take ownership of.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

You're off to a good start this year. Keep it up, man. Appreciate it, thank you.