Kenny Lofton Breaks Down Hall of Fame SNUB, 90's Indians UNTOLD STORIES, Arizona Hoops

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Welcome back to all the smoke dugout here with my co host. See why good to see me. He appreciate it was good, good, nice and easy.

00:00:09
Speaker 2: Man.

00:00:09
Speaker 1: Today we have a legend someone I've actually been chasing. I've been chasing him down for a minute. You know, he's still fast as a little older, but he's still fast. One of the best athletes in MLB history, should be a Hall of Famer. We're going to get into that. One of the greatest leadoff hitters in Major League Baseball history also played a little bit of hoop. We're gonna get into that.

00:00:28
Speaker 2: True icon.

00:00:29
Speaker 1: Six time All Star, five time stolen base chant, four time Gold Glove winner.

00:00:33
Speaker 2: Welcome to the show, Kenny Loft.

00:00:35
Speaker 3: Thank you, Thank you, Ron.

00:00:36
Speaker 2: Welcome Kenny.

00:00:39
Speaker 1: See why what's this man meaning to the game?

00:00:42
Speaker 2: Oh man? When I think of nineties, that's when you think about the era of your sport.

00:00:47
Speaker 4: You think about when when you were a kid growing up, and when you're picking your grades, you normally go to that time in your life. You normally in going to when you was playing, you going to when you were a fan of the game growing up, and for me, when you go into the nineties, talking about leadoff hitters. Two names come up, Ricky, Ricky Henderson, Kenny lofton very different styles of play. But I really believe that one player got their flowers and the other player never got their flowers. I'm so excited to have you on the show today, k Low, because I want to dig into it. It's so much even prepper for this that I didn't know about you. You feel like you know the OG's in the game, you feel like you know all the stories, and you start to dig into it a little bit and you be like, Man, I've been kicking it with.

00:01:36
Speaker 2: Kenny for years and I never knew.

00:01:38
Speaker 4: This, this or that. But man, first of all, I appreciate you joining us here today.

00:01:43
Speaker 3: Thank you. Thanks for having me.

00:01:44
Speaker 5: Man.

00:01:44
Speaker 3: I appreciate you. Guys and Matt been trying to get me in this for for a while now, and like you said, I finally slowed down for a second.

00:01:51
Speaker 2: You call I guess I think we gotta get right into it.

00:01:56
Speaker 4: Because this may be a strong statement for some, but I feel like you're the biggest nub of all time, of all time. When I think of players who should be in the Hall, there's a few guys that come to mind some guys have, you know, it may be some tithes the steroids, It may be some tithes to not being good with the media, whatever it may be. I understand some of those stories, but for yours, I can't make it make sense. I can't make it make sense when you look at the numbers, look at your contributions to the game. If you had to put your finger on one thing that didn't get you to vote, I mean us talking about one year in you got less than five percent to where you were one and done in twenty thirteen on the ballot. What's the one thing that stood out to you on why you feel like you didn't pass that threshold.

00:02:42
Speaker 3: For me, I just believe it was the game became all about home runs. So I think if I was a home run hitter, they would have looked at me different. Because I don't hit home runs. They kind of push you aside and they put you as an afterthought. And I learned that trying to get a contract in the game, you know, trying to get contract, they compare me to Berry Bonds, you know, and Sammy Sosa. I'm like, how can you compare me to these guys? Because that was what they were looking for, and they didn't look at RBI's. They didn't look at a guy getting on base creating havoc. I mean, I was a guy who had Carlos Bierger, Albert Bell, Jim Tomay, Maddy Ramirez on you know Eddie Murray hitting behind you know, hitting behind me, And they always talk about Jim Tommy. They always talk about RBI's. You can't get an RBI by solo. You have this called runs back it in And I felt like they kind of took that and pushed it aside, but gave them glory for their home res and and their RBIs, but they didn't say, well, how did you get those RBIs? Somebody had to be on base.

00:03:49
Speaker 4: Even though you didn't drive the ball out the yard, there were still so many contributions. You're talking about Godbluff center fielder. You're talking about multiple time leading the league and stolen bases. Do you feel like there wasn't a trade off that the league appreciated at the times where it's like, Okay.

00:04:05
Speaker 2: He doesn't do this, but he's the best at doing this.

00:04:09
Speaker 3: No, they didn't look at it that way. They only looked at it as this is what we're looking at home runs and RBIs, And that's the sad part for me. I had to deal with that. I had to look at myself. Do I want to be selfish or do I want to take one for the team? And I felt like I took it for the team instead of being selfish and looking back at it, I should have been selfish. To be honest, I should have got on base and stored every base I can and didn't try to work to count as a leadoff hitter. They tell you want to be a leadoff hitter, but when you come to Hall of Fame, they don't say we got to look at the best leadoff hitters. No, they say, did you get three thousand hits? Did he have so many RBIs? Did he have five hundred home runs? That's kind of how they look at it. And I'm just gotta sit back and say, well, I'm sorry, I wasn't that guy.

00:04:58
Speaker 4: And as you're looking at the game now, now the game has gone back to a more athletic play. You see guys being valued that are putting a bat on the ball. You see guys getting their flowers for going out there and being able to steal fifty bases in the season. These are things that you've been doing. But under the curtain, what really was going on, which everybody knows. The nineties it was a steroid era, and you were playing in the midst in the height of the steroid era, to where every number that was happening around you was inflated. So that leads me to ask for you to say that you wish you would have been selfish. Did you ever have a moment that you thought, Man, these guys doing it. I ain't getting my flowers like I should be. Is this something I should dabble in? Is this something that maybe I should consider doing as well and trying to become a power hitter.

00:05:48
Speaker 3: No, I never thought about that because I knew the long term effect, I knew the outcome that it could. It was not good, But I think the only thing I could have done, because in my position, for what I did in the game, only one way you can get it to the Hall of Fame. It's three thousand hits. That's it. All the other stuff around the game that you did, they push it aside. They don't even really talk like you said, you talk about all the things you were talking about. They don't really talk about that. They only talk about if you got three hundred hits, I mean three thousand hits or five hundred home runs. And for me, like I said, as a lead off hitter, I'll say, I'll use a guy like no more Goarshia Park. That dude swung at every first pitch that looked good to him and he got hits. De Jeter did the same thing. So for me, if I would have looked at it as because again you know, as a leader leader off hitter, that first pitch, they threw it right down the middle, and a lot of like show hell tiny that first pitch he hits it out the ballpark because it's right down the middle. So for me, I'm taking that pitch for the team. I could have said, you know what, that first pitch that I.

00:06:56
Speaker 4: Like, I'm taking it, And then just to give some color to what you're saying, because I know exactly what you're talking about it and what he's saying, Matt is it was so much strategy within the game of baseball to where if you're a lead off hitter, unless say you're the home team, the other your picture that's out there on the mound, he goes out there he throws thirty pitches that in you, the leadoff hitter, it was almost mandatory that you take that first pitch to give that picture who's now sitting on the bench a little extra time to get hisself together, to rest or. You may be thinking about that number two hit in the lineup to where you're leading off. You're like, all right, let me take a few pitches so I can let the second guy be ready to hit, or I can gain information and I can go back into the dugout and tell everybody else what this guy has. Because if I go out there swinging first pitch in the time, it was looked at as being selfish. So in your mind you feel like you're being an unselfish player.

00:07:46
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was unselfish, but I looked at it at the end. Unselfish in the game of baseball. Didn't get you nowhere?

00:07:53
Speaker 2: All right?

00:07:54
Speaker 4: Well, I think when you're saying get getting nowhere, it's not so much that that you didn't get into the hall the.

00:08:01
Speaker 3: Well ill said this way. The players respected what I did, oh, absolutely for sure, But outsiders they just look at your numbers.

00:08:10
Speaker 4: Game recognized game. And when you're talking about the players like I was saying. It didn't stand out to me that you didn't get in the first year. It's the fact of what the voting was.

00:08:19
Speaker 3: Like.

00:08:20
Speaker 4: I saw a clip that popped up my social media one day and it was a side by side of you and each row, and if we could pull that up here, this is it right here, Matt. So check this out when you're looking at it, side by side careers. And to be clear, as I'm asking this question, this is not to put a knock on each row in any form or fashion. It's more to just look at the comparisons of a career. Kenny Lofton is on the right right here, and you're looking at all the things that he excelled at.

00:08:53
Speaker 2: Arguably even more so than each row.

00:08:55
Speaker 4: And one guy, Matt is one vote away from being unanimous, which is each row to where he's Hall of Fame first ballot should have been unanimous. People are upset at the one person that didn't vote for him, to where each roll even says in his speech to who that one person is that didn't vote for me, like, shame on you. And then the guy on the right side who has that career is one and done and not even able to be on the ballot next year. When you saw that, and I know you saw this exact same clip right here, what went through your mind.

00:09:27
Speaker 3: It's not fair. That's the first thing that came up to me. This is not fair. But you can't.

00:09:34
Speaker 2: You know.

00:09:34
Speaker 3: I'm one of those guys that you know what you put your chin up, you keep it moving. But I felt like I did what I had to do on the field, and I put up those numbers, so all I could do is look at it and say wow. But also, and the good thing that makes me feel good about it every time I look at that, and all the time, players who played the game, they all tell me, Kenny, you should be in the Hall of Fame without a doubt. I mean guys who are in the Hall of Fame now, guys who are played against. And there's one thing that always pops up to my mind when I think about what I felt I did for the game or so we're playing the nineteen ninety five World Series. David Justice came in to me. He said, Kenny, we had a meeting. It was one of the quickest meetings we had in the game. They said, if we keep Kenny Lofton off the base, We're going to win the World Series. So he said that was their plan. That he said, he ain't cap on nobody else. If you keep him off the base, we win the World Series. He said that was their strategy. So I felt good that I had that much impact to an opposing team, that that was their strategy.

00:10:53
Speaker 1: Can you guys break down, because obviously there's a new space I'm stepping in as much as I love the game. How so he didn't get the five percent vote. Is there a way for him to get back on the ballot now or is he out for good?

00:11:04
Speaker 3: Well that's another thing behind that. So the thing, but what happens here the media picks who who gets you know.

00:11:13
Speaker 1: So guys that can't Tiger chew gum. And at the same time, well, no.

00:11:19
Speaker 3: I'm gonna give them a little bit of credit. When I came in. The year I came out was the year of the guys who were potentially in the steroids situation. So just say you had eight to nine guys in the steroid situation, right you had the media had ten votes, So each media had ten votes. And the guys who put up numbers on the steroid, they put up the numbers because they put up those numbers and they were kind of caught up in that steroid situation. So each one of those guys had to vote, and because they didn't know how to go about the steroid situation, those guys gave them a vote, and then they only had so many votes. For guys who were on their way up the scale of getting in, they had to figure out how to vote for them as well. So you had potential steroid situation plus guys who were working their way up to get in, they had to vote for them. So that believes myself, I'm just kind of stuck in their vote pattern because they had to make sure that situation with the steroid guys, they had to put them in. They had to keep voting for them somehow.

00:12:37
Speaker 1: Can we agree although it was the steroid era, that that was the greatest era of baseball, do you guys feel that way as players or one of the greatest eras that's's what I grew up.

00:12:49
Speaker 4: Original introduction to the game as a as a fan of the game was the Mark McGuire and Samue Seosa battle to where that was the only battle that I remember to where they would break away from or television.

00:13:02
Speaker 1: Yeah, to go to it was also must watch TV, Like I don't recall respectfully, you know, a time where we're hurrying home from school or whatever the situation may be, and we got to watch these games. I mean, the games were electrifying, exciting. I mean, and you were right in the mix. Although you weren't hitting.

00:13:20
Speaker 2: Home runs, your name was still right in the mix.

00:13:23
Speaker 1: And as you just pointed out, I mean, a team strategy to win the World Series was to keep to shut you down.

00:13:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I just feel like, and that's what I was saying before. For me, how I'm looking at the game of baseball, I'll say in the Hall of Fame or how they kind of looked at baseball as you know what, it's about home runs.

00:13:42
Speaker 2: So and that's what gets me. Get pushed, push the way.

00:13:46
Speaker 3: Down the side, get down the line. Because when you talk about baseball, they talk about home runs. They don't say them want the guy know how to bunt and whenever he wants to back the bun up, he can steal the bas's second third home They don't talk about that. They don't always talk about guys. Because again, I felt like for me as a guy in the outfield, if I didn't get a hit or you ain't getting a hit. That's what my mindset was. So my outfield play was stopping them from getting a hit. But people didn't look at that. But for me, the good thing that feel good about me when they start calculating the war and see how my numbers was. And they even showed a thing this year about the guys who they put in the Hall of Fame, and they talked about the guys who were on the list, and they put me on the list where the list of would have beens or whatever. They had two players in front of me, Barry Bonds and Roger Clements. I was third behind those two in war of people they're trying to decide, they'll say, veterans of coming into the Hall of Fame, I was number three.

00:15:01
Speaker 2: Is there a way to get back?

00:15:02
Speaker 1: So you're saying that it's up to the media to be able to get you back on the ballot.

00:15:06
Speaker 3: So the tough part about it, they keep changing the situation.

00:15:11
Speaker 2: Moving the goal post. You got the Executive Committee.

00:15:14
Speaker 3: Now well no, it's it's a Veterans committee. Veterans Committee and the Veterans Committee. They used to do it every year now is every three years. So like I didn't get in this past year, I gotta wait three more years for me to even get on. It's a board, an eight panel board that they put eight players that the media chooses to put on that board. So once they get on that board, then that committee votes on that. So and I think it's twelve players, two executives, and two media.

00:15:48
Speaker 4: And that's the hope is that you have this board that's not just the writers, Barnesy. You have players, you have coaches, you have a former front office executive that'll all be on that board to where you hope to try to get the people in, get the players in through that they felt missed, because what it comes down to is Klo getting knocked out on that first ballot, especially with the way that players are analyzed. Now, if you just get through the first hit that threshold, hit that five percent, you start to see those percentages rise. You're in and year out because some guys start falling off the ballot, you start to make more room to where is you start to look at the grouping of players. Now all of a sudden, Klo is not getting compared to all the guys that he was originally getting compared to, which improves his chances of being in. But hopefully, you know, as we close out the hall conversation, hopefully you get your flowers. You deserve it. It keeps the conversations going to where people will start to look at the numbers. But to leadoff hitters of today's game, I guess we'll roll it into that. Nobody always try to find players that I would compare to you on who is the player in today's game that you would compare to yourself?

00:17:04
Speaker 2: I literally can't think of one.

00:17:05
Speaker 4: I think of Stephen Kwan with the Guardians, but he has the gold gloves, but not the bat that you had, and definitely not the stolen base threat that you were. So guys, they talk about Luis or Ritz getting on base, but he doesn't steal the bases like he doesn't play the defense.

00:17:22
Speaker 2: Like you do.

00:17:22
Speaker 4: So you were a guy who did everything but to leadoff hitters in today's game. What are you liking about what you're seeing or not liking about what you're seeing? Because some teams are putting power hitters in the leadoff spot now and other teams are allowing the true leadoff hitter to return what would you like to see in the game.

00:17:40
Speaker 3: I would like to see in the game somebody see the problem is what? So I'll use the Dodgers example, show Hey. Why do you leave show Hey off? That doesn't make any damn sense. It doesn't because his first a bat, he has a chance to get one hit, one run, one are ya, that's it. You put him in the two or three hole. You have a chance for the leadoff hitter who's supposed to get on second. Guy that can do those. Basically, the one and two are kind of one is you know they're there. They're kind of the same, but they're different. One or two get a chance to get on. Now you get a chance to get a three run homer with show Hey coming up third than having a one because he leads off with a home run, that's only one round. So now you have that opportunity for him to get on, have someone on base in front of him to add more runs to the board. But they saying that the analytics or something is saying that he comes up more. It's only once. I mean out of a whole month, he might come up extra five times a back.

00:18:40
Speaker 4: Okay, okay, Well, Devi's advocate so would you have not led Ricky off because okay, but Ricky was a little different and show Hay stole fifty two.

00:18:49
Speaker 3: Okay, okay, okay, So I understand where you want to go with this, but there's a difference between Okay, show Hey, he's not a true What I'm saying is that Ricky will take pictures, show Hey, don't take pictures. You want to also work as a team game. If you're an individual, yes, you lead him off, but again, you got to have understanding that there are more strategy behind this than just that first at bat. Think about it. It's more to it than just that first at bat. And then if you think about somebody like share Hey, now you got the eight and nine hitters coming up in front of him, He's still not gonna have the opportunity to always get those runners on show Hey, if he was hitting third, he would have a chance. He hit one hundred and fifty RBIs he don't get that. He gets one hundred probably or a little bit more than that. That's it. But again, because the eight to nine hitters are not your true best hitters, so you put them at the bottom of the order. So that means that show Hay's chances as your best hitter, his RB highs, his RBI chances are not there anymore. He never had chances to hit a grams here. I'm trying to figure out how many gram SAMs have you hit.

00:20:00
Speaker 2: I feel you as that type of a hitter.

00:20:02
Speaker 3: You that type of a hitter, and an opportunity to multiple runs with your good, your better hitters in front of him.

00:20:10
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think I think he's more of a product of like an excessive riches. You know, if he was with another another organization that didn't have five great hitters to lead at all, then okay, maybe you can move around. But when you got Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman and now Kyle Tucker, you got all these guys, they should be in.

00:20:27
Speaker 3: Front of him. Hello, you just you basically you just said it right, All those hitters are in front of him, So then why don't they put him in front of him and that and that'll increased your chances. Other teams don't have that. And remember they were leading off Judd. I'm trying to understand, so basically they so basically this is what they're saying. Again, there's no more leadof hitters. We don't need them. So that's where my part of the game. And they would have probably hit me eighth ninth now because of Showhy, because of Judd. You get what I'm saying. If I was on the Dodger, would they leave me off, No, they'll party put me behind him.

00:21:04
Speaker 1: I mean I compare this, I mean the crossoverder me and you were someone who played basketball. Is the point guard? They say that, the traditional point guard, the Chris Pauls. Those guys are dying out now to set the guys up and working pitches, setting guys up, setting the table for the team is kind of this new way of just the word. The way we're looking at numbers and analytics is kind of out across the board in sports.

00:21:25
Speaker 3: You are exactly right, because again because we don't have them no more. The John Stockton's anymore. He's thinking about scoring point guards now, yeah, you know so because the point guard that was his job.

00:21:37
Speaker 2: Job.

00:21:38
Speaker 3: Now they're throwing that away because again always say when I say point guards and myself, it's the little guys. They taking the little guys and throwing this society. We don't need you. We got the big guys. Now, That's how they're looking at you know, they got the big guys doing the point guard job. Joker from Animver do we go on load, take it, take your butt, download where you.

00:21:58
Speaker 2: Belong across the bard. That's how you feel all sports, bro, Yeah, I feel you.

00:22:04
Speaker 3: Keep your You know, there's a role in the game, that's what it is. They're trying to reinvent the wheel. You can't. The wheel is made there for a reason, but they're trying to create because of what. I don't know how. It's analytics or whatever, but they saying, boy, chance, you got a chance to hit a three or whatever. But now you gotta everybody trying to hit a three. You gotta everybody trying to hit a home run because it's about money.

00:22:25
Speaker 2: All right. Now.

00:22:27
Speaker 4: I feel you on that, and I think what it comes down to is having an appreciation for what every different type of person brings to the table and not thinking that we can have one person who can do everything. There's a specialty to that that comes along with every sport and something that you had to do from a child growing up East side of Chicago. I think of like how you made your own path. When I look into your story and I want you to tell your story a little bit. Mother had you extremely young father not in the picture, raised by your grandmother who blind. Legally, I'm not sure. Tell us give us a little more clarity about Kenny Loughton as a kid growing up on the East Side of Chicago.

00:23:13
Speaker 3: I mean, I grew up very poor. We was on food stamps and all of that. I grew up. I grew up, Like I said, my mom had me young, and my grandmother said, he's not going into no system. I'm going to take him. So she ended up taking me under her wing. And like I said, probably when I was four or five, she ended up going completely blind. But she was doing everything before. But I think it progressed over the years because she just kind of was doing things and all of a sudden we started seeing her doing things with the ice clothes, like what are you doing? And then we figured out she was becoming blind. So but she did everything. But again, it taught me, I'll say for me, it taught me when they talk about all the censes, that you don't have to have all your senses to be great. And she passed away in twenty fourteen, But it was it was it was a learning. It was good. It was a good learning curve for me to understand. I think organization wise, it taught me a lot because person being blind, you have to put things back in order. Sugarcane, flour, cane, the corn, the rice. It had to be in order because that's what they knew and they got. And it breaks my heart when she gets frustrated when something's out of order because she can't see it. She can't see it to put it back in order. She only knows that the table, the chairs goes up against the table, so when she touched the table, she knows the chairs are going to be along that side. And that's how and that's how she made her way around the tables, the kitchen. Everything for me had to be in order. That's how it was raised. So now in my life when people look at my house, it's like dude, I said, dude, I know that's all I know. You know, And she taught me a lot about I mean again, she taught me so much about about life and about growing up and making great decisions, doing things the right way, and a lot of things scared me at times. You know, I'm like, whoa, you know, this is how life's supposed to be. And I grew up around you know, gang shooting killing. We used to hear shots outside and it didn't phase her. After a while, It's like, Oh, they're just them on the street, they shooting over here, you know. With me, I'm like, whoa. So I learned to understand that a lot of that stuff. You grew up around it, it didn't phase you. But for me, that's all I knew. How I knew to be able to take care of someone because I was in the house with her, and I became this I'm not gonna say nerd or whatever, but very because I was always concerned about her. And then when I ended up. The toughest part is when I decided to go to college. She said, Kenny, I want you to go. Please go. You know I want you to get she said, but can you promise me you will get your degree. That's all I want you to do is make sure you get to a degree. Because she always says, what's the word? You always got to get your lesson, get your lesson, you know. So that's something that stuck with me. And when she passed away, we will have this things. I could have my bracelet right here or whatever, and inside this inside the bracelet, it says, made the work I've done speak for me. So what she's done for all the family. She had seven kids and I was considered the eighth child, and but she was just letting people know the work i'm doing, the work i'm showing for you speak for who I am. You know, That's what when she said that, we ended up putting it on the bracelet after you passed way. That's something she stuck by. So basically, the way the work you do speak for who you are. So do your work the right way because it's gonna speak for you when you're gone. Man.

00:27:11
Speaker 4: And I'm assuming that that had to translate to everything that you did that that helps mold you to become the player that you end up becoming.

00:27:19
Speaker 3: Yeah, and just knowing she had an obstacle that she had to overcome. So whatever happened out there, if she can live the life that she did being blind, nothing else out here is gonna face me if you're gonna tell me. I mean, one thing you always said, if somebody tell you you can't, tell them you can't, and you go out there and do it because you will. That was the attitude I had. So when they say you can't do this, you can't do that, you're gonna be able to play no baseball. You don't play no basketball, watch me. And that's the mindset I had, And that's the work you put.

00:27:53
Speaker 4: In, man, that's why you that's why you got to hear people's stories, like when you're trying to something that comes with any sport and being in the clubhouse and gaining relationships with people around you is like I always got along with my teammates because you take time to understand that they don't have to act just like you act. You don't have to all be the same type of people. You all have different stories. And you are the story of coming up without much but but turning that into a basketball career, a baseball career. You fulfill your grandmother's dream going to the University of Arizona. I don't know if you were recruited by lout Olsen and did you just walk on, like, tell us a story about how you end up fulfilling that dream going to U of AB and hooping there.

00:28:40
Speaker 3: Well, it started because I played basketball and baseball in high school or your first love baseball was my first love. But you're good, but growing up one where I grew up in East Side Chicago and Indiana, it was it was who's your basketball? So you know when you guys growing up, you know you got all the girls or what the girls basketball? They didn't like baseball too much, you know, but you get caught up in the hoop, the hoops of Hoosier and I ended up doing both, but basketball was my I felt like it was going to get me to where I needed to go. And at that time, you have baseball and basketball. Baseball never gave full scholarships. Basketball only did so for me to go to college and fulfill that dream. And I couldn't afford to do a partial or any kind of partial stot we do on food steps. So we had some some teams that played in our area. I end up I played against Weston Garland and and Uh I played against him in high school. And some schools out there knew loud Osen coaches and they said, we need a fast point guard that can be able to come to Arizona and be a leader. And they end up telling him, he said, you need to go to Eachicago, Washington, Kenny Lofton. So look up we in the in the regional looking final for I look up in the stand there's Ludolson. So I ended up getting recruited. He came there and another recruiting guy, Kenny Burmeister, pretty wild guy whatever. He came to the house and he was like talk to my Grandma's like is he okay? Okay? But but yeah, so that's kind of how. And then I ended up looking at I think it was Louisville, Arizona, Purdue, and West Virginia. Those were the schools I was looking at. And then once I took my recruit and visit to Arizona.

00:30:39
Speaker 2: Game time, he was a rap Tucson.

00:30:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I was there.

00:30:46
Speaker 3: I got there and you know, I got I got off the plane that took my jacket. They said, youin't gonna need that. I got there and they said we get back to you when you get back on the plane. And yeah, it was nice. I went there. I met some of the guys on the team, and then we went to a couple of little parties and I'm like, ooh.

00:31:03
Speaker 2: I'm sold.

00:31:04
Speaker 3: It's a wrap.

00:31:05
Speaker 2: It's a different world.

00:31:06
Speaker 3: It is.

00:31:06
Speaker 1: It's a different world. Five ten point guard with hops.

00:31:10
Speaker 3: I had a little bit.

00:31:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, how are.

00:31:11
Speaker 3: You YEA I was like ten and a half. Yeah, well almost six foot. Yeah, what happened, Well, I got shorter. That's what happened. When you get older, get shorter, you know.

00:31:22
Speaker 1: So but yeah, some some some teammates and made the league. Sean Elliott be in. One coach cursed someone, I got a chance to play for. What was it like in those locker rooms, during those practices, in those games, you guys had a really competitive team and one of the greatest coaches of all time.

00:31:37
Speaker 3: Yeah, we had Sean Elliott, Steve Kerr, Tom Tobert, Jeff Butchler, Sewn Rooks, Harvey, Mason, Matt Arthink, Matt millboch We became a family, and I think a lot of guys, majority of them, didn't have father figures, and they looked at you Nelsen as the father figure on that team. You know, he was very disciplined, he was very hard nosed, and he was Judas priest. You know, he didn't curse, you know, so that was his main curse word, Judas Priest. So we just we just felt this bond and we had we all these guys we had coming up and I came up. It was five freshmans and Sean Elliet was a freshman with me, and it was five of us and two of them transferred. But yeah, it was, you know, and Arizona was not on the map, and we we put Arizona on the map. We called Sean Elliott mini magic. He was. And then Steve Curry shoots the lights out. So I mean it was, it was and Steve was a you know, we looked at it as you know, the coach never caught a lot of timeouts because he felt like Steve was the coach on the floor and we felt that way. He was going to little little team huddles. Steve started talking and doing all this, doing all that, and you know, it was, it was. It was fun to be a part of that. In I was. I became the defensive specialist. I didn't shoot a whole lot because again it was like the black hole when you stow with Tom Tobert, you wasn't getting it back.

00:33:02
Speaker 1: Well, the first five guys you mentioned all were pro Rooks. Tobert, Butler, Bucheler, Elliott and the courage that you were playing with.

00:33:10
Speaker 3: Yeah, so if people asked me, he said why, I said, you know what, Then I named the guys. I'm like being again being the point guard. You delivered the ball. I never got a.

00:33:18
Speaker 2: Back so pretty much, so it was like you couldn't.

00:33:22
Speaker 3: So it's almost like you passed the ball cross court and I stepped back over and wait to play defense. I ain't getting that ball back.

00:33:29
Speaker 1: And this is also a time where guys weren't leaving early, so you guys got guys are staying three or four years. I was the same thing in UCLA, And I tell people, I mean, fifteen years championship kids, My college experience is right at the top of the best time of my life.

00:33:43
Speaker 2: And similar for you.

00:33:44
Speaker 3: Yeah, when we got I mean and getting to the final four, Yeah, that was that was like unbelievable. And I tell people, they say, what's more excited World Series of the Final four? I said that final four some special?

00:33:57
Speaker 2: I said.

00:33:58
Speaker 3: People don't know that final four is some special. Like you get all of the school and the state and.

00:34:04
Speaker 2: Everybody is there behind you.

00:34:06
Speaker 3: You know, you get all those teams and coaches that were coaching in March Madness, they all at the Final Four. They're watching you on the main court right there.

00:34:16
Speaker 2: You know.

00:34:17
Speaker 3: It was Kipper Arena in Kansas. It was the year that Danny Manny went off doing that that March Madness. It was Arizona, Oklahoma and then it was Kansas against Duke.

00:34:28
Speaker 1: You guys ran into a tough Molkie Blaylock Stacey King of Oklahoma team.

00:34:32
Speaker 2: That was tough.

00:34:33
Speaker 3: Harvey Grant was there and man they they were Yeah they got us, they got us. But yeah, but that was it was just a fun moment, just being a part of that and learning a lot. And we're still are friends with those guys. We have our Wildcat chat.

00:34:49
Speaker 2: To this day, to this day that we had that chat.

00:34:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, what was the one thing you took away from college as a man?

00:34:55
Speaker 3: You know what I learned as a man, You got to be accountable for your actions. You know, you gotta admit when you're wrong.

00:35:04
Speaker 2: The sooner you learn that, the better.

00:35:06
Speaker 3: And then I think I learned that early on and it it progressed my life of knowing, you know, be accountable for your actions because there are consequences. And once I felt like I understood that as a man, I think I finally became a man.

00:35:25
Speaker 2: Now you think you could have handled going straight to probile from high school? No, no, no chance. No. When you see because you know in baseball, you see that a lot. You see guys.

00:35:34
Speaker 1: Mentally physically, No, I couldn't. You got to be special across the board, do you guys see it a lot more in your sport because I think there's more time to groom and grow in the miners going straight to the pros, and the NBA is straight to the you know what I mean. So if there's no buffer, there's no And I kind of thought that college was kind of like my last little bubble where I was still able to kind of somewhat be a kid as I'm coming into a man and be able to do some kid shit I knew I probably shouldn't be doing, but okay, play for UCLA basketball you can kind of. So it's kind of like that last buffer and Kenny, and to Kenny's point, is just understanding, you know, the should I do, I'm gonna have to be held accountable for if it's the wrong kind of stuff.

00:36:10
Speaker 2: So how long in college did it take you to get that? To get that lesson? I probably said a couple years.

00:36:15
Speaker 1: In the NBA, I it took me a little longer than just college to get that.

00:36:21
Speaker 3: But I'm gonna tell you something in baseball, that minor league.

00:36:24
Speaker 2: It humbles you quickly extreame humbler.

00:36:28
Speaker 3: Though, yea, luckily I got for somehow, you know, probably God had the census on me or whatever. But I went from basketball, where we flew all the time or whatever, and then I went from there to the minor leagues. So I went from good thing. I went from low A middleway. I skipped double A. So I played well enough. The guy they signed me in Willie Ainsley. He was a number one draft picks centerfielder. They signed him in front of me. He was a number one pick and he never made it to the big leagues. But he couldn't even make it out of double A. So I was I was moving up the ladder quick and fast. Got to hy A ball, start playing. We went to spring training and moved to spring training. He was in Double A spring training and it was like, uh, what do we do here because Kenny's balling. This guy's our number one pick. So they test him out at you know, Triple A. The first couple of weeks terrible. So and then from there they said, Kenny, we want to try you in Triple A. So spring training, once you gave me a shot, it was A rap to Triple A. I was balling. They kept me there and all of a sudden, the in the camp they said, uh, you going to Triple A. You know, I'm like wow, But again, all you had to do is give me that opportunity, and I took advantage of it. And you can't tell me. No, you can't tell me I can't because I'm gonna tell you I can't and I will, you know. And I think once I had, so I ended up skipping the long road trips. The bus rides, I freak out. I would have freaked out. So I think something the universe, god or whatever it said Kenny can't be in double A because riding in those buses he freaks out. So I wasn't. I think I had. The longest one I had was probably ten hours. I think it's still long. But no, yeah, something belonging than that.

00:38:21
Speaker 2: Oh yeah I did. I'm sixteen sixteen.

00:38:24
Speaker 3: Yeah that was a double A. They were.

00:38:27
Speaker 2: You're trying to decide who's sleep on the long side. Always cold because they ain't pumping down there between the seats. You get the spot.

00:38:38
Speaker 3: Everything hurts so and it's like luckily something said Kenny Ken he would freak out on them.

00:38:44
Speaker 1: You had to step down from Arizona basketball togs a step down that it was.

00:38:50
Speaker 3: A step down already, and how long could I It was like, how long is this man going to be able to to deal with this? This kind of type of travel He ain't used to, you know?

00:39:00
Speaker 2: And huh, God, had you he knew?

00:39:04
Speaker 1: What do you remember about the foot locker slammed down you Bury Dion, Mike Conley Sr. I think Mike Conley wanted didn't he.

00:39:12
Speaker 3: Yeah, he wanted it, But I'm you know what he wanted. But I'm the raining champ.

00:39:16
Speaker 2: Talk to him.

00:39:16
Speaker 3: Better put it up, better tell him? You know, they got me the first year? What a second year? I'm like, okay, but I had to think about what I had to do. I said, you know, I'm better than this.

00:39:24
Speaker 2: Tell us how this all came together right here?

00:39:26
Speaker 3: Well, again, that's what was happening. You know. They were talking about the foot Locker and that was the big thing back then in the off season or whatever for us. It was the foot Locker and they all talked about it, and foot Locker always wanted to put on some type of show, and that's what they did. The Duncan in Phoenix. That was in Phoenix. Yah, yeah, so yeah it was, uh, what was.

00:39:51
Speaker 2: Your winning done? Flat Kenny? Flat Kenny?

00:40:00
Speaker 3: Which one is this one?

00:40:01
Speaker 2: O double?

00:40:03
Speaker 3: You know that was the beginning. You gotta you gotta be something like.

00:40:06
Speaker 2: You are you five ten here? Six foot here?

00:40:08
Speaker 3: I'm five to eleven and a half there okay, oh yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. It was a Phoenix, so yeah, it was. It was good to have the crowd support behind me there as well being in the back.

00:40:21
Speaker 2: That was.

00:40:22
Speaker 1: But compare obviously playoff baseball is incredible, but compare the energy from a basketball crowd to a baseball crowd, it's a lot different.

00:40:30
Speaker 2: I would guess.

00:40:31
Speaker 3: Well, the thing about basketball and baseball the crowd is closer up on you. Okay, so that's the difference.

00:40:37
Speaker 2: And okay back real quick. Okay, that was easy too, you know, yeah, nothing, you know it was.

00:40:49
Speaker 3: It was forty four. Yeah, I had forty four.

00:40:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, vert huh yeah, give me one more to take us down right here, I'll take you home. Yeah.

00:41:05
Speaker 1: He kept that short mustache to keep him up in the air.

00:41:08
Speaker 2: Aero dynamic.

00:41:09
Speaker 3: Yeah, I like it, but yeah, it was, it was. It was fun. It was fun. Doing that. We had a We had a good time. And again you only again you have to make sure you make your dunks and you have to try to practice your dunks and do all that. But back then we didn't have the crazy thought process. I did a couple in high school. I jumped off a bicycle in high school and all that. But it was it was different, able the more trying to be a little bit more careful. Back then, you didn't care what huh, free shoes, fifty baby.

00:41:44
Speaker 2: Racks. Hell, yeah, that was a big I need that. I need that, Yeah, question real quick. The flat top you had.

00:41:56
Speaker 1: But there was an urban legend that used to race people outside the barbershop. Thought they was faster than you. Truth any truth to that.

00:42:02
Speaker 3: Yeah, they always tried to.

00:42:04
Speaker 2: When I was you couldn't even get your hair cutting.

00:42:06
Speaker 3: Peace. No, they always thought they could beat me. And and after a while and I'm like, I can't.

00:42:10
Speaker 1: Be racing for free, come on, money on that.

00:42:13
Speaker 3: He even happened at the I was playing in the Taihoe event. Some of the dudes tried to I'm like, are you serious? I said, I don't race for free.

00:42:21
Speaker 2: Racing turned on the dice game.

00:42:24
Speaker 3: I said, it's gonna cost you shoes on, your shoes.

00:42:27
Speaker 2: Off when you're racing, and tell me a lot about shoes on.

00:42:32
Speaker 3: That.

00:42:33
Speaker 1: That's how we played in the street when we were young.

00:42:35
Speaker 3: Shoes your feet started to get all that crazy. All this to come up.

00:42:40
Speaker 2: My ship stayed all right.

00:42:42
Speaker 3: But the thing about it, he probably grew up what he had. He didn't have to wear those Walmart shoes.

00:42:46
Speaker 2: We had pay Less, not Walmart, we remember they had.

00:42:50
Speaker 3: We had pay Less.

00:42:51
Speaker 2: They didn't have the Jordan's.

00:42:52
Speaker 1: They had the Jordan ash looked just like motherfuckers making fun of me all the time, because that's wh I started fighting that and racism made me start make fun of my shoes.

00:43:00
Speaker 2: We had to fight.

00:43:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, back then, the shoes are tough.

00:43:03
Speaker 2: Man.

00:43:03
Speaker 4: We're sitting here and it's nothing but basketball highlights that we're looking at, and that reminds me it's no highlights from U of A baseball, But you end up having a baseball career, get drafted out of U of A with one at back to your name.

00:43:21
Speaker 2: How is that possible? That's crazy work.

00:43:25
Speaker 3: It was after the Final four. We played in the Final four, and again me passing abou to everybody I'm like, you know what, I gotta start thinking about my funure well next, you know, if I still have my senior year coming up. But I'm like, wow, seeing how this is and see the accolades that the guys that played with. Anthony Cook was another guy who went to the end we played in the league. We played with Orlando He was on that team as well, so and he made the league.

00:43:56
Speaker 2: So for me to.

00:43:59
Speaker 3: Feel like, Okay, I'm not getting a chance to to let people see me. And I said, you know what, baseball, I'm gonna come up to the bat the first thirds, I mean the first inn and third in and seventh inn, fifthen and ninth in it. You're gonna see me, you know. And I felt like baseball. I started missing baseball again because I'm like, you know.

00:44:22
Speaker 2: What, because you're playing in high school, then you're not playing at all in college.

00:44:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I said I'm missing baseball. I said, you know what, I was pretty good at baseball, so let me go out there and you know, and work out. So that the coach called the Jerry Kindoz, the baseball coach, Ludosen called him and said, hey, I got a player, Cando. He wants to come out in and work out with the team. He said, oh, he can come and work out because they already had the season, because you know Arizona, they started in probably in November playing baseball, and it was it was probably end of March, probably the first of April. So I just went out there and work out with a team. I got a glove and you know, some shoes and just start you know, out there and practice taking batting, practice hitting.

00:45:04
Speaker 1: And that was the first time since high school. Correct, Yeah, like riding the bike.

00:45:08
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was. And I knew once I got out there, I'm like, wow, it's coming natural. You know. I was a little rusty, but so I was out there hitting and doing things. And one thing I always tell people, one thing I could always do was bunt. I always could bunt. So when they saw me bun and they saw me hit and swing, and I think they then they tried to go me to go to home the first and they kept talking.

00:45:30
Speaker 2: About clock is messed up, you know, and then also.

00:45:34
Speaker 3: They's day was trying that and they said this ain't right, and they tried to have me to go first to third, and and I think one thing that got I think this one scout still friend of mine, Clark Christ he was a scout for the Houston Nationals at the time. I was I was taking some shag balls in the outfield and I was talking to somebody and I was in the right center. They hit a ball to left center and I went and caught it.

00:46:00
Speaker 4: Then while you're doing all this, you're thinking about pro baseball. You're thinking, I want to get drafted. I'm out here doing these workouts like your teammates around you got to be looking like.

00:46:13
Speaker 2: Exactly.

00:46:13
Speaker 3: But again, they knew that I wasn't a threat because it's my junior year. I'm going to be playing basketball again, so they you know, just he's out here just working out and whatever. I think I did some JV games or whatever, but for the University of Arizona basketball player on the thing. He suited me up for varsity a couple of times and ended up getting into bad and that was kind of it. And then came up the guy Clark Chris ended up finally getting touch me. He going to Babcock while we were staying in the dorm or whatever and trying to find me. He say, hey, you want to play baseball. Say, well, I'm playing basketball right now. He said, oh, he said, I think you should try baseball, and I was like, I don't know. Maybe I don't know, So I kind of kicked into the curve and whatever, and then all of a sudden, I got I left home. I went to go home, and all of a sudden, I get this phone call. He's my grandmother said, Hey, some guy keeps calling me, calling here for you from the Astros or some baseball team or what. Yeah, I think she said, he keeps calling. He keeps calling him like what. She said, Yeah, he said something about he wants to draft you.

00:47:18
Speaker 1: What.

00:47:19
Speaker 3: So I finally got home because you do have the phones, you know, I ain't had the cell phones or whatever. So we end up I ended up calling, he ended up calling. I am talking to him, and I had another friend of mine to talk to him as well about what we're trying to do. I said, well, I can probably do that, but I got my last year of basketball, so I have to go back. They said, oh, no, that's no problem. You can. You can go back and you know, you can play during the summer and then when the when this when this when the when it's time for you to go back to school. You leave and go back to school and you do your baseball, I mean your basketball. So I end up so he ended up working out to where they said I can go play that summer and then go back and play back basketball and then come back that summer. But I said, and my grandmother said, you know what, Mays, you gotta finish college now. So that was another sticking point, and I told them, I said, okay, I will do this, but I have to graduate weight first, and then I can't do all baseball. So after I finished that first minor league season, I went back to play basketball. But during that season I was able to shoot around stay fresh, yeah, stay fresh in some courts they had they had escort and it was in Auburn, New York. That was my first minor league season. Then in one of the gyms they were able to, you know, one of the coaches talk to the people in the gyms and they were able to let me shoot around and I'll do some drills myself or whatever in the gym, and then doing some of the morning time because we play night games, so the morning I used to go and shoot and try to keep myself fresh that way. And then after that season was all I did terrible. I went back and played basketball, and then I came back. Since I was so terrible, they sent me back to that place again, barbar So I went back there and then from there, I went back and I played better, so they moved me up to Middleway. So they moved me up to Middleways in Asheville, North Carolina. So I went there and I played decent there and they said, oh, man, you're playing good. I said, oh, I gotta go back to school. He said, what you were finished? Basketball? Said? What did I tell you, guys?

00:49:18
Speaker 2: Graduate?

00:49:19
Speaker 3: I got three classes left. They said, no, we can do this. You're gonna look at how you're improving. You're gonna But they they were trying me to do winter ball, all kind of ball, extended spring, all that kind of stuff they were trying to get me to do. And I said, what didn't I tell you? Guys?

00:49:34
Speaker 2: I think that says a lot about your character.

00:49:35
Speaker 1: Though not to interrupt, because nine out of nine and a half out of ten kids are gonna stick with the sport. But you made a promise to your grandmother that as great as you think I can be, or I'm doing right now, I got something to go do.

00:49:46
Speaker 3: That was my heart, man, So she was my heart and whatever she said, I did so. She said, Kenny graduate, And I told him, I said, I'm sorry, Oh you we think you go to go to You're gonna get you to these you know, the leagues. You can go to win the ball and you can be a partner the big leagues. Next year, I said, next year the year after I can still be there too, right he said, well, we don't know it.

00:50:11
Speaker 2: I'll go wing to the school.

00:50:12
Speaker 3: So boom I left.

00:50:13
Speaker 4: Why did you feel like you had the power to be that demanding as a seventeenth rounder, because normally, as a lower round draft pick, you feel like, I gotta do what they say. I gotta do what they say. I mean, first rounders can come out and start making there now, I gotta do this, I gotta do this. I do this, or I won't sign with you. But as a seventeenth round the teams you'd be like, sorry, either you with us or you're not. And also, secondly, the trust that you had in yourself to say I can be there this year, I can be there next year either way. I know myself and I know that I'm gonna make it anyway.

00:50:44
Speaker 3: Because after that, you know, I went from that one A ball to the higher A ball and I did better at the higher A ball, and I knew. And then you could hear the talk and the chatter what he keeps talking about, and you hear that's what they were they was talking about. You know, this guy, he's proven, he's fast, he can bunt. A lot of people can do that. So certain things that I was doing they couldn't do, or that they didn't see it in other players. So I knew just listen to the chatter. I said, you know what, but I said, it's gonna take me just this off season, So you got this smarter time for me to go ahead him because it was it was one uh it was one semester, semester, last semester, school, last semester. So that's all it was that that one semester I had to do. I graduated. I said, you know what, so either you're gonna do this, you said you can come back and finish that. I'm like, that's not a guarantee. So right now I am on a roll. I'm gonna go back and get my degree. Like I told my grandmother, I was were.

00:51:42
Speaker 1: You when you went back to school for that last semester retraining for baseball or just strictly school.

00:51:48
Speaker 3: Oh, I went to the batting cages. Yeah, I was doing bating because my again, my good friend of mine, Clark Curris, was a scout. He ended up he lived in Tucson, so he and I worked out while there was that time. And after I did that, after I whatever, I walked walk across the stage and I said, Hey, I'm all y'alls, Now I got my degree. I'm all, y'alls.

00:52:09
Speaker 4: That's amazing that you was able to write your own story like that, because a lot a lot of players wouldn't even have the confidence to feel like they had the power to write their own story like that. But you trusted the process and you knew you knew you had this superpower. You mentioned it a couple times of you had the superpower to be able to get the butt down better than anybody in baseball and one hundred and ninety nine bun base hits over your career. What stands out to me is, I know you had to have some crazy matchups with third basements. It's not picture batter matchups. Is batter third basem matchups because it's similar to Steph Curry. If you're trying to stop the three point line, he gonna get his, he gonna get there, he gonna get a shot off.

00:52:49
Speaker 1: For you.

00:52:49
Speaker 4: The entire stadium knows that what you want to do is get this butt down. So every team is guarding against you getting the butt down. Yes, who are the matchups that stand out to you to where it's like, I don't care if you're right on top of me. I'm still gonna get this down. I'm still gonna be safe.

00:53:04
Speaker 3: Who was pretty good at that? Matt Williams.

00:53:07
Speaker 2: Matt Williams, Okay.

00:53:09
Speaker 3: Well something about him getting Matt Williams was one of them. One I can tell you a story he was talking about that, Matt Williams. One but one scary incident I had in my career is with Cal Ripkin. So because Cal wrent from short to third playing third base. You know what I do here, But good thing about me about what made it better for me? I was able to slap the ball hard down the left field because before they kept saying, oh, he's a slapping judy hitter. I went from slapping judy hitter to hitting balls in the gap and hard to the left side, you know the field. So there's one story where we were playing against Baltimore and it was doing cal Ripkin's streak. So they told him to bunt. They said he's coming, he's gonna bunt, come in, so they moved Cal in. They told him more. So cal came in and I pulled it back and I hit a line drive and it went It went right by his ear. He did not move because he didn't see it, and I'm saying to myself, I hit it. I ended up stealing second and cat him the third. It's freaking crazy, I said.

00:54:21
Speaker 2: Bro, I am so sorry.

00:54:25
Speaker 3: I apologize, you know, and I'm like, dude, so ever since then, with cal Ripken, he came, I said, blue.

00:54:33
Speaker 2: Go back.

00:54:34
Speaker 3: I am not button.

00:54:36
Speaker 2: Oh dang, no spec factor.

00:54:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, do that streak.

00:54:40
Speaker 2: Bro.

00:54:41
Speaker 3: It was in Baltimore they would have killed out. So when I did it, I'm like, oh shoot, and.

00:54:49
Speaker 2: He didn't even move.

00:54:50
Speaker 3: He was like, oh dude, that would have hit him right in the head. So that part, yeah, dude, just imagine how I'm feeling. And he got third base and he was like doing stuff to talking. I'm like, dude, I'm sorry. I didn't know what it was going to be. It was like a perfect pitch to it, like.

00:55:07
Speaker 2: That could be scary. You got in to the Oh yeah you got yeah it was so it was actually was on this side of it, okay side.

00:55:15
Speaker 3: But he still he didn't get it. He didn't get his glove.

00:55:17
Speaker 2: Up, not even fast enough. Yeah, that's how they caught the.

00:55:20
Speaker 3: Right. He was trying to stay so he can get his movement, so his glove was down his running position trying to come in. But I faked it and boom.

00:55:28
Speaker 1: So we're you're a professional baseball player now. And something I think we all grew up doing was playing multiple sports and it all added to our final destination. How much did basketball help you on the baseball field?

00:55:41
Speaker 3: Well, I say, with me, with instincts and be able to be quick on your feet and time in because basketball you got to get in that position and that guy got on the direction and I felt change the direction was was easy for me, you know. And then the funny thing in the minor leagues I would want to coach Reggie Waller, we was he was say, Kenny, you play basketball. If the ball goes out and it goes out of over your head, you gotta go get it. What do you do? I said, I'll jump and get it. So the ball hit, I want the ball hitting the outfield. I'm running. I'm like, oh, she's over my head. So I jumped, jumped up and caught it. He said, Kenny, you can't be doing that. He said, you gotta go and take the route. And I'm like, I cut it off. I try to go in the air and get.

00:56:25
Speaker 2: It direct line.

00:56:26
Speaker 3: You can't do that. So I knew, and then I'll tell people catching the balls over the wall. It was easy for me. It was easy because the timing because again played in Arizona and being the slam dunker, I was they had to play for me that they throw me alot, lobster.

00:56:41
Speaker 2: Me body awareness in the air, I mean, it's just in the air.

00:56:45
Speaker 3: So that's the same thing with baseball. You looking at the timing, the balls in the air, go get it. So that's how I thought about in the outfield, was just going to get it. And it was like I said, and in this age is different than back then. A little bit I probably had about wheny of them they can't they can't find them all. They can show them all because it ain't like the social media and the thing that it is now. But I have a lot.

00:57:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, early days in the MLB clubhouse, What do you remember the most when you first got there.

00:57:13
Speaker 3: Well, my first when I was with Houston, I was scared. Boy, I was scared shitless. Yeah, because you know, being a rookie and the things they do to rookies. I was scared. And I was in my first clubhouse was Casey Kendell, Jerald Young, Kevin Bass. You know all these names. Um Canzealosi know Casey Candell. So it's just little things you just didn't know. So I was kind of quiet, you know. I ended up ended up getting caught up and going in my first game, uh in my career, I went three for four.

00:57:50
Speaker 2: Wow.

00:57:51
Speaker 3: So it was I was like, oh, dang, leadoff, yeah, you know I So the first my first hit was against Randy Myers, lefty pull them up the middle base it. My second hit was a too hop of the short Barry Larkin, oh shooting throw it and he he's like, damn, I knew he was fast, but fast, he said, he said, He's only two people that made him think that way, he said, myself and Dion. But you were three three flat to first. The timing was different on a or swing or whatever. But I think I was the fastest, was three five or something, but but again it was it was one of the fastest. And Barry Larkton said that you were the only two people that scared the hell out of me, You and Dion. He said, I don't know who's faster, but y'all neck and neck. And after that, every time the ball hit the short he didn't give it. He got that ball out, he saying, so quick after he's seen that. So being a rookie, I was just nervous, you know, And as a rookie I end up being in the Not was because Houston we were terrible. But what what made me feel good about trying to succeed in being the playoffs. We were the last game of the season playing I forgot who were playing against, and it was the Giants and the Braves going for being the playoffs. Yeah, they both like winning a hundred games or something. It was crazy. And I was in the dugout and they were showing it because it was showing the clips because it was just one of those games were we were playing and they were on the I think they were on the the West Coast. I'm not sure, but after the game I ended up what they were showing it on the screen because it was a big game and it was showing it. So I ended up sitting there watching this like, Wow, this is some excitement. I was like, this is what I want to be a part of. Then I ended up getting traded in Cleveland. But yeah, what was that?

00:59:42
Speaker 1: Like, what's your first impressions of Cleveland and who were some of your vets in that locker room?

00:59:47
Speaker 3: Well, you know, going from a last place team to another last place team at that time, we had a lot of young guys coming up, so it wasn't you know, it was Albert Bell, it was Sandy A. Lamar, Carlos by Erga. But then it happened in ninety four we end up starting that that team in Cleveland when we started because that when the new stadium came and we ended up getting so Eddie Murray was a he's still a good friend of mine. He was a good mentor. Dave Winfield, Dennis Martinez or Herscheizer was on that team. Those are the vets that you talked to when you wanted to understand what pitching did and what idiot, did you know? And then think about it is Eddie Murray. We will talk about Eddie Murray and not talking to the media or whatever. Eddie Murray talks all the time almost goodness. But Eddie was like he's almost like Ef Hutton and he talked you listen, listen. And I got so much knowledge from Eddie just learning about the game. And we called Eddie he was a professional hitter. Eddie Murray, boy will run his on base. He taught Albert Bell so much stuff that people don't really talk about. And Albert smart guy was smart and he watched almost Eddie's every movement. People don't don't know that, but he did. He watched Eddie's approach. Eddie had the best approach both sides of the plate too, both he had the best approach of the game. And just listen to his thinking and Alberts act like he wasn't listening. He was listening.

01:01:19
Speaker 2: He was.

01:01:20
Speaker 1: He was an intimidating figure from a from Afar. I can imagine imagine that.

01:01:27
Speaker 3: Was very smart, was he? Oh? He was like thirdy fourth in his class and l s U I love you know that those us a day. You know USA today crossborry puzzles. Everybody's going to the Albert's locker.

01:01:40
Speaker 4: I love That's what everybody's coming to my locker for. When I was playing, y'all know, But I mean in all serious that team y'all had some monsters on that squad. I mean, I think, would you say that's the best team asseymbol that never won? Yeah, I mean, let's go go through the guys I had.

01:01:58
Speaker 3: Myself was leading off New had Omrvis Scale, Carlos by Erga, Albert Bell, Eddie Murray, Jim tomay Manny Ramirez, All Sorrento and Sandy A. Lamar. That was the lineup, bro.

01:02:14
Speaker 2: It was. I forgot what the baseball game was called, but that was. It wasn't MLB.

01:02:20
Speaker 3: What was it?

01:02:20
Speaker 2: Damn.

01:02:21
Speaker 1: I've been trying to about the back no no no on the video game system. I forgot because I used to use you guys in our baseball wasn't after RBI.

01:02:31
Speaker 4: Wasn't that after before the lineup? I think another game you're talking about it.

01:02:37
Speaker 3: Was?

01:02:37
Speaker 1: It was when it was when the baseball RBI was kind of like it was dope, but it was kind of like it wasn't really didn't half the graphics that we needed. But the one that I remember, that's why I was just trying to look up. But go ahead, that was incredible.

01:02:48
Speaker 2: Team squad, y'all, y'all go to the World Series?

01:02:52
Speaker 4: Yeah, like it has to be one of them teams because because we all have those teams where you look at this clubhouse and you're looking around and you say, this is the one we got, we got everything we need, this is the one.

01:03:03
Speaker 2: Or do you not feel like you had the season?

01:03:05
Speaker 3: We had all? We had all the offensive categories, every single one. We had it. On base percentage, RBIs, hits runs average, we did it all. So we went to the World Series knowing we had the most walks in the game, we had the highest on base percentage because we knew the strike zone. And then we get to the World Series.

01:03:26
Speaker 2: Who's that with Braves?

01:03:28
Speaker 3: That with the Braves?

01:03:29
Speaker 4: So that's where does good pitching beat good hitting? Because now y'all going, well, it's mad X and Glavin And when you.

01:03:35
Speaker 3: Think about it, good pitching is only going to be as good as how the umpire is called the game.

01:03:42
Speaker 2: To be honest, magis got a big strike zone.

01:03:44
Speaker 3: Or maxic glabing, They all did. They all did. To be honest, you know, they all had a strike zone. And it's funny, you know ninety seven I played with the with the Braves. I used to talk to Barry Largen all the time. I said, when they come in town, I'm like, y'all ain't got a chance. We got glavining Maddox smokes pitching, and look who the umpires are. You ain't got a chance.

01:04:05
Speaker 4: That that is changing the game a lot with the whole you know, a BS system and everything else.

01:04:11
Speaker 2: Like veteran guys got better strike zones.

01:04:15
Speaker 3: Had been throwing the game one time with Learry Young's Empire and Roger Clemens on the mound. He caught the ball just that far off de pleate, Like, dude, what the hell was that? He said, that's a Hall of Fame bullshit. Excuse mind, I said it just like that kicked me out the game. Sorry, Wayne Kirby, he was on the toilet the other comings.

01:04:37
Speaker 2: So how was that experience for you?

01:04:39
Speaker 4: You're going from Cleveland, go to the World Series, you get traded to the Braves for Marquis Christom, David Justice, and then you end up going back to Cleveland again. So it wasn't any bad blood with Cleveland when they traded you.

01:04:53
Speaker 3: Well, no, because again you had you had the assistant GM and you had the GM. You know, we tried to figure out because what happened was Albert bailed the year before, became a free agent and left and went to the White Sox. Okay, so instead of from I'm you know, instead of the GM comeing and talked to me and saying, hey, Kenny, we got to figure out something because Albert left, we don't want you to leave. That wasn't told to me.

01:05:18
Speaker 2: You know.

01:05:18
Speaker 3: So all of a sudden, I spring training and I get there. One of the rest in Peace, David Nelson comes to me, is, Kenny, they want to see you in your office, Like damn, saying thing, what did I do last night? You know, I do something to make there.

01:05:30
Speaker 2: You know.

01:05:31
Speaker 3: He called me in the office and he had his head down. I'm like, it's not good. And when they said you've been traded, I'm like what I was part broken? I'm like traded. Yeah. Well, we feel like because you become a free agent and we think that you're gonna be well, we did it last year Albert left and we think that you're gonna be doing the same thing and to go for the money, blah blah blah.

01:05:55
Speaker 2: And I'm like, wow, did they offer you a deal? No, they didn't offer you a deal.

01:06:01
Speaker 3: So that's what that's made.

01:06:02
Speaker 1: Even more so, they had that fear that you were going to leave for nothing, so they had to get something for you instead of having a conversation with you.

01:06:08
Speaker 3: Yeah, there you go. And I ended giving traded and then played in Atlanta. I played very well. And this is where I think baseball gets in that thing where they can make up a story about you to make you look bad so they can't resign you. That happened with the Braves. It was saying that I was bad for the clubhouse and music. I said, wait a minute, y'all don't have music in the clubhouse, so don't use the music as because I stole seventy five bases the year before. And then in Braids, I ended up pulling pulling my growing and I wasn't the same guy because they were trying to force me to get back and I'm trying to hurry up and show this team become a free agent. I'm a freegent, so you know I wanted to try to get back and I wasn't you know, I wasn't one hundred percent, but I still hit three thirty something or what up?

01:06:58
Speaker 2: Made the All Star Game that year. Right back to the first part of my Yeah, and you went back, what was that like?

01:07:03
Speaker 1: Not to cut your story off, but was the bittersweet going back to Cleveland as a brave as an All Star?

01:07:07
Speaker 3: No? I mean no, when I went there, I got the highest ovation. I love that I got the highest ovation of anyone there going back to Cleveland.

01:07:16
Speaker 1: Now back to what you were saying before. This is obviously pre what the media puts is the gospel. Now this is pre social media. This is pre players really having a voice to Hey, that's not what's really going on. So you kind of have to stick with it.

01:07:27
Speaker 3: And that's what happened. I didn't have a chance to have my voice once I found out he say, wait, he's a bad guy, and all the players it's like, wait a minute, can't he mind his own business? And that's where the confusing part make it seem like I was this bad guy. I was bad with the media. I'm like, wait a minute, can you guys give me some clips or something that showed that I was something the media something. So it became behind me that was on attack on my back. I'm like, wait a minute, how was I bad? It started that with the brakes, I'm like, how is that bad with the media? And I had no clips or something. So now they're saying, what the reason why you probably did the Hall of Fame bye bye? Because of the media. They tried to use that you wasn't good. I said, okay, what so? I said, okay, can you give me an example? Okay, I'm gonna give you. Can you give me examples of what I was bad at? And nobody gave. There's nothing in the media and the papers or anything that.

01:08:21
Speaker 2: Showed a lot of the people that you say are bad with the media clips. Yeah, there's a lot of clips.

01:08:28
Speaker 1: Say it, yeah, say it because they you know, because they know it was clips there.

01:08:31
Speaker 3: You know, there was nothing. So and they said, that's probably the reason why the Hall of Famer said, So, I'm I'm gonna throw you one name out there. Fred McGriff crammed dog. Fred McGriff got five percent or whatever. He was on the ballot. He was there for ten years. He got off the ballot. His numbers were there. His numbers were way better than back whales. It was there, he didn't get in. So when y'all say players don't get in because of media, and why didn't Fred McGriff get in there? Exactly so so when they check to use me and what they say about the media, and that's probably the reason why Fred McGriff was. He was the darling whatever for everybody, media, everybody, but somehow the ten year span he couldn't get into the Hall of Fame. And his numbers were way better than people they were there. But again the vetters he got to the Vetters Committee his first year boom, he got in perfectly. But again, so when you use the word bad for the media is the reason why. And he was a guy that didn't have nothing with the media and he didn't get in. So don't don't don't put that towards.

01:09:49
Speaker 2: Me moving the gold posts.

01:09:51
Speaker 3: You're moving the gold posts. It's all about the numbers.

01:09:53
Speaker 1: You played in a special era of outfielders multi sports stars uh incredible play such as Barry Bonds, Griffy, but Dion and Bow. What was that era like as just kind of the competitive nature amongst those guys, even when you weren't playing against it, were you kind of seeing what they were still doing and kind of keeping an eye on some of those guys.

01:10:12
Speaker 3: I think the fun part about that is seeing seeing real athletes what I call real athletes on the field. If you could play multiple sports, that's showing that you are a real athlete and you can do multiple things. Just seeing I wasn't the only one, it was probably kind of cool because people can talk about it and it could be the talk, you know, you had Tony Gwen. He've also played two sport as well, and just the opportunity to seeing when people say what's the toughest sport, you got to be baseball, you know, And that's one of the toughest parts to sports to play and to maintain, you know. And I feel good about myself playing seventeen years and be able to maintain what I did. But I think because of what I did lead off outfield, raise havoc on the field, I think teams needed that. And then and then they talk about I'm not sure we're gonna talk about the stretch run. While I got traded, people didn't do what I did. So when they come to the playoffs first and they say, we need somebody to get on base, We need somebody to the table set, we need somebody to craze, create havoc in the playoffs because again, you know, playoffs, it isn't about everybody hitting home runs. It's about getting on base. You gotta you gotta manufacture runs in the playoffs, you know. And that's where I felt pretty good about people wanting me, because, in a sense, like you said myself, Ricky, we were rarities in the game. It wasn't a lot, It was a few, but it wasn't a lot of us that as a leadoff hitter wanted to be there. Some guys didn't want to be there. They didn't want that stress. They didn't want they didn't want that. Yeah, they didn't want that pressure. I didn't mind it. A lot of people didn't want that pressure.

01:11:59
Speaker 4: Just let's let's get into that a little bit, because that's something that we all have in common. A lot of guys can't just play for one team.

01:12:05
Speaker 2: They whole career. All of us bounced around a lot.

01:12:08
Speaker 4: And some people look at it as a bad thing that you bounced around so much and you play with eleven eleven different teams, but you seem to have a different look on that when you're bouncing around from clubhouse to clubhouse, understanding that you're being brought in for a reason, for a reason to help them win a World Series, to help them get to a World Series because you have this special skill set. How much of a process was it for you mentally just getting acclimated in a different clubhouse every single year and still trying to be a team guy when you know you're somewhat of a one year guy there.

01:12:40
Speaker 3: Well, for me, you know, you get acclimated. I'm a lead off hitter, so you just jumping from one clubhouse to another clubhouse. You have to just have your mindset to where once I get between the lines, I got to do my job, no matter what team it is, I got to be the lead off hitter. I got to get on base. Because basically I didn't try to change what I did. People needed me there because of what I did, so and like you said, the pressure of me is that I had to keep doing it. I had to consistently do it, you know, because I went to the first went to the to the to the Giants, and they were back in the standings, but they needed that push I got there, We got to the World Series, went to the Cubs back in the standings. Needed that push. I did that push, and we got to the League Championship series.

01:13:40
Speaker 2: That's the Bartman game.

01:13:41
Speaker 3: That's the Bartman you know, we were I was there and people understanding of Moyses and left. I was in center and Sammy was in right.

01:13:48
Speaker 1: Taught to us about that though that was coming up. But since you brought it up, talked to us about that game.

01:13:51
Speaker 3: Well, the game again, I feel like the game had nothing to do with Bartman.

01:13:58
Speaker 4: You know.

01:13:59
Speaker 3: Again, we had to score runs no matter what. And after the Bartman play, there was a perfect too hop to Gonzalez, Alex Gonzalez, perfect two double play hop and he booted it. If he gets that ball, we out of that any the Bartman situation would have never came up. It would have never been talked about, and we would won that series. But because of that play, they blame it on the Bartman. And I'm like, dude, moys Is people people go into the stands all the time and try to catch the balls, and fans.

01:14:35
Speaker 2: They trying to catch a ball. You see a ball coming at you, so and I.

01:14:40
Speaker 3: Think Moyses made a bigger, a bigger antic about it that he needed to Okay, you didn't catch the ball. Okay, let's get back on the field, bro next play, next play. But then the next play was a perfect two hopper to the shortstop for double play, and he bobbled it and then all, yeah, all the mess happened.

01:15:05
Speaker 2: So but that was then.

01:15:07
Speaker 3: But I again, I played with a lot of a lot of players. Interesting and me samuelmos got into a fight too.

01:15:13
Speaker 2: But oh cool, what happened.

01:15:16
Speaker 3: Well, they would to bring it up, he says, we want to come to that point, so we wouldn't, you know, because again you know, as in the playoffs, every every situation is going to count, every play, every hit, every you know, it was big because there was no there was no going back. So and it was men on first and second I think, and Sammy had just got a home round or hit or something. It was a quite tight game, and you know he always doing so Pitcher comes up, you know, in a tough situation. So so he's doing his kissing to the crowd, he's playing back. Pitcher hit the ball blooped in front of him. I was pissed. I said some words or whatever, whatever the other d We got to the dugout and I was still going off. He said, if you can't, if you and I chased him up the ding thing, and I was, I've never got so heat. Because again, I know what playoff ball is about. He didn't know. He didn't play many. I played a lot of playoff games, so I know how important every little out everything is gonna be.

01:16:23
Speaker 2: So he was going on.

01:16:24
Speaker 3: He started, he said, I forget you whenever, and he said get you. I chased him up the thing and I took like five steps and somebody grabbed me. It was Carrie Wood. He grabbed you to ask him about it. He grabbed me, big boy. Oh yeah, big boy boy. He grabbed me because he saw hot I was, and I was going after Sam in the clubhouse. And then we had a thing. After the game. Dusty called us in the office and had or whatever, and I was and I told Dusty about it. Dusty understood. But Dusty was a manager. I mean he was a player, so he know how to he knows how to work it. But I was still hot, and we end up, you know, say, making up. But because it it didn't affect the out, but it could have and that was my thing. It could have affected the outcome, but I just don't want you to do it once. You could probably do it again. But everybody know when the pictures hit, you don't play deep.

01:17:14
Speaker 4: And you know what, somebody got to say something, because when you talk about a superstar player, a lot of times people be like, I want to say something, but his thing. But you always got somebody in the clubhouse that you can trust don't say something or something need to be said.

01:17:29
Speaker 3: I happened to be that guy because I didn't. I didn't back down for none of them. Frank Thomas Berry, you had a chip pur the ship, was a cool guy. He was kind of he was laid back or whatever. But if some needed to be said, they looked at me, and I'm like, I don't care.

01:17:45
Speaker 2: I'm gonna say it.

01:17:46
Speaker 3: I'll say it to the manager, I'll say it to the players. I don't care.

01:17:49
Speaker 2: But I think too it.

01:17:51
Speaker 1: You were respected for saying that and allowed to do that because you led by example. Yea, your play on the field gave you the I was the same way in the locker rooms. I played with the stars. I played with being able to deliver that message to the star because you know what's coming from a genuine place, and I'm gonna get my life out there on that field, on that court.

01:18:07
Speaker 2: So that's where my you know, and.

01:18:09
Speaker 3: What pet peevem. Guy's not running out the ball, hitting the ball to pop up or what I not running out? I've seen too many times where a guy not running it out and to catcher bottle, but the first baseman bobbled it and you tagging it down the line because you thought it wasn't out and he bobbled it and you could have been safe.

01:18:26
Speaker 1: The nineties and in Nike's imprint on shoes, the air Klo ninety sixes and then the air Zoom Diamonds ninety seven dealing and pull them up, let me see what those are looking like. What was it like to be able to be in that elite class of players that have their shoe?

01:18:43
Speaker 3: It was It was pretty It was kind of an honor, you know, And that's what I felt like. Nike was looking at the speed and what I did was was was on that level and for you to get your.

01:18:53
Speaker 2: Own signals shoe look at them things.

01:18:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, you get your own signals.

01:18:57
Speaker 2: Shoe e right there.

01:19:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, I felt very good about it, and and they fly you up to to Portland, Oregon, and you go in and they put your molde in their foot and you get some some little tweaks about the design, but they have their way of how they want to do it. Yeah. So I just felt like you felt like, you know, you made it.

01:19:22
Speaker 1: Nike, you too, You still huh.

01:19:26
Speaker 2: You got a pa Oh yeah, a pair got twelve?

01:19:30
Speaker 1: Oh no, sorry, are you still having the Nike family?

01:19:34
Speaker 2: You still have a connection over there.

01:19:35
Speaker 3: I do have a connection, but I'm not you know, what have you done for me lately? You know? So I'm trying to, you know, hopefully because they keep bringing back, you know, different guys shoes again, and you know, hopefully I was hoping that the Hall of Fame can help them bring that, you know, the opportunity from to bring that back, to put that back. But hopefully one day they'll they'll they'll bring it back.

01:19:58
Speaker 4: K Low's about some of your your signature moments, your crazy playoff runs.

01:20:04
Speaker 2: We went through the Giants, we went through your time with the Cubs.

01:20:08
Speaker 4: Also the historic Yankees. Oh where y'all lost the three to zero lead to the Red Sox.

01:20:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I.

01:20:15
Speaker 3: Mean, I was upset with that because I felt I should have been playing more. I didn't play. And those pictures that they they had on the mound with Boston, I crushed them all. I'm like, why am I not in the game? And me and Sheffield talked about all the time. He said, man, don't worry about if it won for Sheffield, have went off more about it. You know, he kept me He can't Sheffield the one keeping you, so he kept me cool because I was going off and I just felt like, why am I not out here? Especially especially when Schilling had that so called bloody out of Buner on him four times. Get him off the mound. That's people understand stuff like that. If he's so called that hurt, you get him butter.

01:21:00
Speaker 1: Of the month.

01:21:01
Speaker 3: And I didn't play that. I'm like, wow, I should be playing that game. But again, Joe Torrey set the lineup he wanted. There was another story about the Steinbrenner tory. I caught up in that situation where Steinbrenner knew I was kicking the Yankees, but I was a Yankee killer. I kicked it butts all the time. So Steinbrenner said, you know what, I have a chance to get this guy, I'm gonna get him. So I ended up getting me over there. He wanted me to play center field. They wanted Bernie to DH, but Bernie wasn't comfortable with d achent So and that was Toy was his guy. He felt like, I'm not comfortable with Dching. I got to play center field, but Bernie was on his way out. You know, he wasn't the gold glove as you know center field I was. So I felt I should have been the outfielder and Bernie, but Bernie like the agent. So they end up putting Reuben Sierra to DH and Bernie played out there. So that kind of left me out. So I didn't play a whole lot of games there during that time as a Yankee, and I felt I should have been playing more. And I think that was Bernie's last year. I think I played three more years after that.

01:22:02
Speaker 2: And yeah, because you went to Cleveland, I went back to Cleveland.

01:22:05
Speaker 3: No, I went from there. I had a two year contract. Somewhere in this situation, they traded.

01:22:09
Speaker 2: Me, okay to UH my second year.

01:22:12
Speaker 3: I had a two year contract with the Yankees, but they ended up my second year, they end up trading me to the Phillies. I hit three thirty five over there the Phillies from the Phillies, I know, and then the Phillies to the Dodgers. I think I had three old six of the Dodgers. And then from there I ended up signing a free agent with Texas, and then that's when I ended up in two thousand and seven, I ended up starting with Texas and Cleveland. He did that, and I went back to Cleveland.

01:22:37
Speaker 4: And that was a three to one lead to Red Sox and alcyes CC has sent me a video of you base running.

01:22:44
Speaker 2: Oh, and he.

01:22:46
Speaker 4: It was, I don't know if we could pull the play up, but you were on second base base hit the left field, third base coach holds you up and you give you give third base coach.

01:22:56
Speaker 2: You gotta see the video. Oh get the third base coach look.

01:22:59
Speaker 3: Like, what the hell? Yeah, But he said he thought the ball. The play was off.

01:23:06
Speaker 5: This game seven, check this out by Donald Line. I'm going I'm flying flying, Oh got it?

01:23:17
Speaker 2: What are you doing here? And he tried to explain his ball.

01:23:22
Speaker 3: Dude, the boy, Okay, the boy's gonna come this way.

01:23:24
Speaker 2: Is this the one you felt? I got away. Yeah, this is the one. This is the one that got away, bro, And you had a good jump too. Yeah, look at the look back right here? Oh what?

01:23:38
Speaker 3: Oh? Yeah, I was hot, Bro. It's like, dude, how can you stop me? Right there? I'm the fastest down.

01:23:44
Speaker 1: The team To ricochet off the side, He's gonna have to set his feet and try to He probably won't even throw it.

01:23:49
Speaker 3: Just the second he had to run in and fill the ball and try to throw it.

01:23:54
Speaker 2: That was Manny too.

01:23:56
Speaker 3: Come on, I swore you know what I thought, ricochet into Manny's hand mm hmm.

01:24:02
Speaker 2: Oh, that's why he probably held the.

01:24:05
Speaker 3: Look I'm looking, I'm like, the ball's right hit. So when I look back at the ball.

01:24:11
Speaker 1: So obviously they felt this way too, because they're showing the angles, Like why would you not send them look at that? They don't know to get two different angles on a play like this, you know what I mean? Like obviously he should have scored.

01:24:22
Speaker 2: What was Manny like?

01:24:23
Speaker 3: Manny?

01:24:24
Speaker 2: He never?

01:24:24
Speaker 3: He never? He always forgot his wallet so went up to dinner. So I give him that. That was the you always, But Manny can hit. I mean sad for Manny. He did the juicing and get caught. He didn't have to great hit her. But again it was I'm not sure if it's part of that culture at that time for him and probably in Boston or what was going on there. But as you get older, our body's going to do what it does. It's gonna go in the downward spiral, you know. And some people again it was it was about making money. You know, you keep hitting home runs because they started getting giving contracts to guys hitting home runs. So and if you felt like you was on your way down, you wanted that big payday. Guys did something to help them hit more home runs over consecutive years because you get paid for that.

01:25:27
Speaker 2: You didn't have a long time with them with bonds.

01:25:29
Speaker 3: It was a specimen. I mean it was. It was weird seeing him in the clubhouse and walking around. You're like, dude, this dude is a specimen. And seeing Barry, I've never seen a guy let the ball get right here before you swing the back. That's that's uncalled for. That's just unseen. And me and I still remember this play. We were playing the playoffs. It was against no. I was thinking it was the last series of the year and we were playing against We were playing against the Braves. Smokes was pitching. So the day before we were running the outfield the game or whatever, and Smost was out there doing stuff and he told Barry, I'm gonna come right at you brain. He's like, bring it on, bring it out. I'm like, oh, she's in the next day and all of a sudden they came warming up and I'm like, and then Barry hollered out and said, yeah, bring it. He said, I'm gonna bring it. We got to the game, right, So we end up at the first pitch, Smokes through ninety eight right there, and Barry jumped back, got back in the battlest box right. Barry looked at it. Right the next pitch, she threw ninety eight again, almost in the same spot, put a little over the plate. Berry hit that team rose up line Dry and me and me and Regie Sanders, and the dugout was like, did you just see that? He knocked him, not knocked him down, but he's just him think about it, didn't even think about. The next pitch was almost the same height, just a little bit over the plate, going, light work going, and we look up. Why we look at Redgie. He was like, did you just see that? So I'm like, yeah, I just saw that. That's not human. Every redgie is like, that's not human. You can't do that, bro. It was and just seeing the discipline he had at the plate man, it's like and the tough part about it, they didn't want to throw him a strike and they did they want strike that through. It was at the seats well the stadium.

01:27:39
Speaker 4: The only guy played against where we played it. It was a T and T park at the time in San Francisco, and we would play a couple of feet in front of the warning track and San Francisco at night, which one of the biggest big baseball and we were we were positioned correctly because it was either a walker or stopping.

01:27:58
Speaker 2: You catch it at the wall, gonna be oh, it is gone. And it wasn't nothing. But it wasn't no limitators, wouldn't no like not broken bat, base hits, was none of that.

01:28:06
Speaker 3: It was just this or that.

01:28:07
Speaker 4: And I would go out early every day and watch Barry hit like this is when I'm twenty two years old and you just watching this dude, like the man incredible and he looked out for me too.

01:28:15
Speaker 2: That's dope.

01:28:16
Speaker 1: I asked Barry this, and I want to ask you this as as one of the greatest leadoff batters of all time.

01:28:21
Speaker 2: Walk us through the process.

01:28:22
Speaker 1: As soon as you're you're digging in the to the batter's box, what are you looking when you're thinking.

01:28:27
Speaker 3: Well, again, I already have my game plan set already before I even got there. I got my game plan what I'm gonna do. But then you got to think about the adjustments. So a lot of guys don't have that secondary adjustment in their mind going on. Because I always with study pictures, I understood what their strengths, and I knew what my strength was, and I knew who my weakness was, so I kind of calculated that all together before I went in there. But I got tow and say, okay, Kenny, you know what this guy does, and you got to make an adjustment to where the infielders play, if they playing over here, if I gotta look to pull the ball, if I got look to hit the other way. But I knew my strength was the other way, so I tried to figure out where, So in a sense, I was sometime I would try to do I would if I wasn't bunning they didn't know I was bunny. I think like I was bunny to make sure I get this infielders in a certain position, so I know, if I get him to move in a little bit, me slapping that thing by him was a lot easier. Or if I knew this guy slowing his feet, I'm gonna bun it right in front of him. Or if they say this guy, come try to pitch me in, I back off the plate, and I said, if you come in and I'm gonna look for it. You know, I went deep a few times now, so but I didn't. You know, it wasn't like I couldn't do it, but I wasn't trying to do it. But if I had to, if you keep busting me and busting me in, I'm gonna back off turn a little bit. But I always looked at it as if I got off the plate, I still was comfortable away. If I wasn't as comfortable in. When you bag up, there is no more end now that when you back up, it's considered down in.

01:30:06
Speaker 2: The middle when they throw it in.

01:30:08
Speaker 3: So if you throw it in, you're gonna throw that pitch down the middle. To me, got to do it and That's kind of how my mindset is. I knew what I wanted to do. I knew with the picture, I knew the situation, so I already had that calculated in my head, knowing that there's a secondary you get two strikes, I just protect put it in play at that point.

01:30:26
Speaker 1: Quick hitters. First thing to come to mind. Let us know, favorite ballparkland the.

01:30:29
Speaker 2: Words ball park.

01:30:30
Speaker 3: Oh it was Milwaukee.

01:30:34
Speaker 2: Toughest picture you faced.

01:30:35
Speaker 3: Toughest always say out lighter, interesting do a cutter and a sinker? Lefty. I didn't know which way. I mean, I got off the plate and I just got one.

01:30:45
Speaker 2: So is he going to fall into the nastiest single pitch you've ever faced?

01:30:48
Speaker 3: The nastiest single pitch. Probably Mariano bro right there in the last minute. The hell that broke my back. It was right down the middle.

01:31:02
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the nastiest, funniest teammate.

01:31:05
Speaker 3: Probably Alvaro Espinosa. He was a due all kind of like the people's fire, putting bubble gum on him like they shoe strings on. Oh, he's been everything.

01:31:16
Speaker 2: We've been doing that for years.

01:31:17
Speaker 3: Yeah.

01:31:18
Speaker 4: All the big guys you're playing with, or scrappy guys bitch, Claren bra Who you want on your side?

01:31:25
Speaker 3: I got three guys, Oh, I got three. First one probably uh Kyle Farnes for Farnsworth the Cups. The next one probably jose Mesa.

01:31:39
Speaker 2: He's fighting dirty, oh, bringing somethings.

01:31:44
Speaker 3: The third one probably Sheffield Sheffield. Yeah, I give Chef. I give Chefy at Tampa.

01:31:50
Speaker 4: At Tampa he was, yeah, and you're right there with him, though when they go down, you're not. You're not sitting behind him.

01:31:57
Speaker 3: I'm gonna be. I'm gonna be on the on the side behind Chef a little bit because then know you can.

01:32:03
Speaker 2: But yeah, favorite baseball movie probably Jackie Robinson story.

01:32:07
Speaker 4: That's a great one. Great clubhouse playlist. Who who making the cut? Probably Biggie right there and this is not on here.

01:32:14
Speaker 2: I just was curious. It just came in mind.

01:32:17
Speaker 1: What was it like facing as a lefty Randy Johnson in his prime?

01:32:21
Speaker 3: So you know, there's a whole lot of stories about Randy and me. He was wild and as a lefty, I was probably one of the few lefties that actually faced him all the time. I think myself and move on with the two lefty that for everybody else. David Justice said. He always said he come up with an ailment.

01:32:38
Speaker 2: I'm good he come up with you know, but least he's honest about it.

01:32:42
Speaker 1: It was.

01:32:42
Speaker 3: It was tough because what pisses me off about facing Randy He always wants a game. I got one thrown at my head, so so in that mindset that one is coming at your head, anything that starts at your head, you're thinking, here it is again. And I still face them. But I knew if I got on base, I'm still a second and third. It was stolen bases, you know, all the time. And I got my doubles, my triples off of him still or whatever. But I was one of those guys that I'm not gonna back down, you know. I played. I played against him all the time, and I think he hit me once and hit me once. And it was in San Francisco and I told Dusty, I said, Dusty, if he hits me, I'm gonna go get it. I said to many times. And Duchy said, come on, kyload, don't do it. So all this stuff, but he threw a slider and they kind of hit me, and I was like, I heard Dusty callow little good bag out. I was like, all right for you, Dusty, I want it wasn't at my head or whatever. It was kind of like kind of hit me here or whatever. So I was like, all right, Dusty, I won't go get it. And I was like, I'm fed up, I said, Dusky before the game, I said, get me, go get it.

01:33:54
Speaker 2: I appreciate this, k This keeps the conversation going for you.

01:33:59
Speaker 3: I really do.

01:34:00
Speaker 1: Let's let's let's let's put something together. We're gonna figure out some song now, because now you've got the platforms and social media behind you. We're gonna figure out some kind of campaign man to put you back in their minds and and and give you your flyer with the different you definitely deserve.

01:34:12
Speaker 3: But thank you, thank you for having the little all the smoke. I can keep going to blow the smoke out. We can, we keep doing it.

01:34:18
Speaker 2: We thank you, Kenny.

01:34:19
Speaker 1: See why, man, we had a great time today to wrap all the smoke.

01:34:22
Speaker 2: Dugout.

01:34:23
Speaker 1: Shout out to the player's house out here in Arizona. We'll catch you guys next week.