 So Poppy, we're talking about the transformation of David Ortiz in Minnesota Twins versus Big Poppy in the birth of Babe Ruth essentially in Boston. You know, I know Tom Kelly really wanted you to spread the ball around. It seemed to me that when you got to Boston, you changed not only your approach but your demeanor. Tell us about the approach and kind of some of the coverage in the plate. Okay, basically when I was in Minnesota, my stand got me in trouble from the very beginning. You know, like my front leg was close to the plate and my first move to attack the ball was basically stepping out. So now once you do that, I don't really like seeing player hitting close like that because it gives me the idea that they are trying to basically cover the outside part of the play. Their instinct is not that, it's basically going the opposite way because because your clothes, you feel like you have to open up. Open up. And then when you open up, you leave yourself outside of a weak spot right here. Definitely. And then you feel like you have to open up to give yourself some room to hit this pitch right here. You know what I'm saying? So I basically, that was one of the things that I thought it was giving me interest to try to cover everything around the plate of 11 inches. So it feels like the minute I do this, right away my back come out of the strike zone and this is how much I cover. You know what I'm saying? So you can only cover the inside part because you will get open facing to right center. Yeah. And instead of covering 11 inches, I was covering three inches. So everything from there to now there, I was having issues trying to hit that. And then if I hit it, it was with no power. It was basically. Yeah. Almost chicken winging it out there. You know what I'm saying? Flares. So once I came to Boston. You and Manny got together. Me and Manny got together. My name was one of the greatest hit I have ever seen. He was on top of his game and Manny used to work so much on his swing that he was ridiculous at some point. I mean, Manny was like 24 seven trying to get better and better and better. I start chasing Manny because we pretty much had basically the same mechanic, the late kick, you know, and then I kind of learned with him about, you know, being able to balance yourself because that's another thing that I learned from Manny. It was, you don't want to land it too heavy in your front leg because this is what you had normally do when you land it too heavy. You have moved and then the ball moved. That's problem. You know that. So basically everything we work on was stay balanced, stay calm, balance, stay calm. So once you do this, you take absolutely control of everything that is coming. Get prepared early. And another thing that I got a point to, instead of hitting with my front foot close, I was more open. So instead of walking away from the ball, I was going to the pitch. So now that was my play cover. I got full coverage. I got full coverage. So now, and I also realized that I was one of the tall guys in the game that was really quick with my hand inside the ball. So I don't feel like I had to shoot it to hit the inside pitch. You didn't have to cheat to get to the inside pitch. So Papi, tell the folks at home, when you're in the batter's box, take us inside of that brain of yours. Tell us, where are you looking for, let's just say you have a guy like Roger Clements, a guy that throws 95 miles an hour. Where are you looking for the pitch location and what pitch are you looking for? To go there, I got to tell you, I started learning with experience about pitch your sequence. Okay, the sequences, yeah. The sequences. And then I also used to track what they were trying to do, what kind of weapon they want to use against me. If I'm facing a guy that throws 95 plus, I know that we're going to try to elevate their fastball, now let me stand it. And then after that, a guy like Roger Clements will go to the split. Fastball up? He will overpower you and then go to the split. That was his secret weapon. You know, I hit pretty good I think against Roger because I was looking for the fastball early in the count. What location? One location. Where? Right here. Clements likes to overpower you. He used to love overpower you and show you his fastball. He located the fastball away really well. But when he was feeling good, he would let just that fastball fly and trying to elevate it up in the straight zone. So he would let it eat? Yeah. So where were you trying to hit the baseball? Say you were in a fastball count and you wanted to elevate the ball, maybe hit a home run to center field. What location are you looking for the ball? I'm trying to hit the ball right here in front of the plate. And right down the middle? Exactly. Okay. This was my approach right here, boom. Yeah, I know I saw it too much. Don't remind me. Tell me, people at home don't know how hard man and remarriage work 24-7. He would get to the stadium sometimes at 10 a.m. hit all by himself, go back home lunch and come back early. What were the lessons that you learned from him that made you even a better hitter? Many many was the type of hitter that incredibly he want to be perfect with his approach at the play. This guy, he would work on his hands so much. Like many of some time he wouldn't even go outside and he bite in practice. All he needed was the cage to make sure that he get his he get his hands working. Many would tell me, okay, we're going to hit Landrye right here in the cage. We're going to hit Landrye to the middle. He loved, he used to love, he's working on the opposite field, opposite field, because he feels like the pitch away is the one that you got to reach out for. The pitch middle in, they come to you. So you don't have to go and chase it, you know. So I want to work with the one that I think it can give me in trouble. It can give me in trouble. What she was, the pitch middle away. Take away the pitch of strength. Exactly. I played so many games against you. I almost knew when you were feeling good, bad and different, right. And I knew when you were on fire, which was very often. But we always knew where you were in the lineup. And the minute you popped out of that dugout from the Red Sox, point number 34 with all your gear, it felt like it was a game changer. For me, I want to know, take me, take the fans at home. What the hell you were thinking about when you would go, walk us through that because when you weren't doing that, I felt really good because that means you weren't feeling it. The minute you start spitting, I will look at Jeter and go, oh, shit. Here we go. There we go. What were you thinking about? Reality. That's part of your routine and rhythm. Reality is that when I was on the on deck, I was turning out of the picture, just, just trying to get on his head, just, just watching the sequence. Because remember, the good thing about hitting what I was hitting was that I was surrounded by good hitters. I had many red meter hitting behind me. And then I have a second hole hitter that definitely was on fire. I mean, Bill Mueller, Johnny Damon, Peter, I mean, I have always, I was surrounded by good hitters. So I know that the guy, he was trying to use his best stuff against this guy. And I know he was going to come to me the same way. It was going to approach me the same way. I started, I noticed that I used to spit on my glove after people started pulling at it. But reality is, or reality was that I wasn't thinking about that. I was thinking about what the guy was going to attack me with. What was the history between the two of us? What did he give me before? Those are the things that were going through my head while I was doing all the stuff right here. I wasn't even thinking. I wasn't there feeling this. I was just spitting out my mind because you know, you only have seconds to go back into that. And I was doing that while I was in the box almost, you know what I'm saying? So you are not allowed, you guys, you folks at home, you're not allowed to play baseball with the anti mind. Your mind got to be busy the other time. Regardless of what you think of both of us. You mind how to stay busy because the only advantage that you have in baseball is what you think ahead. So we used to go back to the history. The guy strike me out with a bat ball. Don't over think basically. Exactly. Don't over think. You make your game plan before you get in here and then you go with your game plan once you get here. You can be just thinking boy are you here because that guy over there will kill you. Hey Poppy, you know one of the things that the folks at home don't know is, you know, we played for almost 15 years against each other. We had some major battles. I mean, we had fights. We had wars. We had ALCS battles. But with real competition, real competition, but there was so much respect. I told you about how much Mariano and Jeter and how much respect you guys. But what people don't know is in my toughest times in my career, it was guys like you and Manny, you would take me to your house. Tiffany will cook us a nice meal and we will stay up to three, four o'clock in the morning, having a few drinks, having a cigar, but really breaking down how difficult this game is. I mean, this game, I know personally, brought me to my knees, brought me to tears many times. Me too. Me too. And I remember the one time. That was again to play. When you felt like you were getting a little bit out of shape and we spoke, and then you got in tremendous shape. And then obviously the rest is history. So even though we're battling out there, I mean, the love and just the collaboration between players is pretty awesome. It goes beyond. It goes beyond. I mean, we, we, we battled on the field, but we feel, we feel it shorter. We do things. I remember one time we went to New York to play and you were going through hell at the time. And I remember me on the on the circle, I look at you and I was like, breathe, breathe, because I was feeling bad though, because I don't like to see my boy, you know, feeling all the heat, all the pressure. You know what I'm saying? Because you're talking about one of the greatest players that ever played the game and you want to watch him performing at the highest level. So all those kids out there can learn from watching him. So that those are the things that happen behind the scene that people don't know sometime. Yeah. And I couldn't tell you how much that meant to me. How much that meant to me at the time. And it was funny because what's interesting is it's funny because sometimes after games, you would text me and say, call me number 13. And you would say, Hey, what I saw out there today wasn't you. I want to see better body language. You're not taking your A swing. Come on. You're better than that. I mean, there's no doubt that he wanted to beat the brains out of me between the nine innings and I did to him. But when it once it was over, we wanted to see big poppy. We wanted to see Manny, Pedro, the great players of our game do well regardless of his great rivalry. And I just want to tell you that I'm very thankful to you and Manny. If you was here, we'll tell him as well of how much that meant to me. Me as well, brother. All right. Hey, you guys.