 We all know this guy John Flaherty dude. Thank you so much for hopping on the feed We got some of your best social media posts. Are you ready to check them out? I'm ready to check it out There are many posts out there, so I'm interested to see what you have. Well, we found them. All right, cool First off we're going to throw back off the bat So this is 1990 Pawtucket Red Sox mad and I actually went from single a ball all the way to triple a and When I look at this I'm like holy cow. What how young I look but also I had no idea what I was doing, right? I went from a ball where I thought I had a good year and then I got promoted to triple a Which you know triple a is a bunch of men right the guys who have had big league experience. They come back down I was totally overwhelmed by that level. I actually had to go back to double a in the next year So when I see that I look at and say, you know that kid thought he knew what was going on but he had no idea how to how to be a pro and it brought you to such a great career and You've gotten a chance to collect so many cool things and be a part of so many great Experiences in Major League Baseball and this is one of them. Give the backstory behind this baseball. This is one of my favorites I'm glad that you bring this up. This was a baseball that I was warming up Jose Contreras with in the bullpen When Aaron Boone hit the home run to send us to a world series my only world series my first world series and This baseball was left in my locker the day after that night and Mike Borzello Who was our bullpen catcher at the time who's still a good friend of mine? He wrote the the inscription on there that said this was the ball that Jose Contreras was throwing when Boone he hit the home run I got me to a world series and you know I have signed baseballs by Hall of Famers and all these great players that is a moment I'm never gonna forget a moment. I'm still getting a little I know I was about to say look at my arm I've seen mine too. I'm remembering it right now. It was a great moment and that World Series and 03 didn't work out But I'll never forget that moment. All right, like I said before we all know who this guy is You could see him on yes the yes app pre game show post game show doing commentary play-by-play all this stuff for yes And this is a post from Troy Benjamin one of our producers This is a final game of the season, but here you are with the entire yes network game cast crew So, you know I'm at the best part about retiring or I should say the worst part about retiring as a player Is you miss the team aspect right and then I see this video the best part of working for yes You get to be part of that team aspect again I mean when I see that video of all the great people that we work with it Yes, most of them are behind the scenes That doesn't take away from what they do to make us look good every night either in the studio Doing the game on the road whatever it is I love the team aspect of everything that I've ever done I love being on the road with the guys that we travel with with yes And you do the game and then you get to enjoy it afterwards and you break down what went well What didn't go well? I've been lucky enough that at the yes network I still get to enjoy that part of it Yeah, and you even still get to enjoy being on the actual field at Yankee Stadium, too You got probably one of like the like a dream all-access pass that every Yankee fan Yankee player Which is that they have between doing the stuff a yes network and still being involved with the Yankees? You know again the yes network has been great to me mad and that they let me enjoy that day And I'm actually proud of myself at 55 years old soon to be gonna be 56 I actually had to wear with all like I'm gonna take a video of this, right? I'm gonna get Mariano I'm gonna get Derek when they're walking To the to the Yankee wives Thurman Munson's wife Diana down there and they were saying hello And I actually I'm usually not very good at recognizing the moment I let it go by and I'm like I should have taken a video or a picture So I was proud of myself for getting a couple of videos and got a great selfie with Jorge and Derek that day, too Dude, I was about to say it's like you knew the next one that was coming again And this is one of those I am not very good at this right and Jorge is one of my favorites, right? I would say out of everybody that I played with in my 14 years Jorge and I were close, right? And I think I I told him when I made that team in 03. I said dude, I don't want your job I know how good you are. I want to be your backup and I want to give you one day off a week where you can Have a great year. So we were pretty tight. So I wanted a selfie with him I had no idea that Derek was gonna be behind us photobombing it It turned out to be a great picture a great moment. And yeah, that one's not gonna be erased from the phone for a long time I'm gonna keep going back to that one amazing. All right. How about this one? You tweeted this out a long time ago, and you said that kids who came through the house I guess probably your son or your daughter's friends came over and said that they really liked this photo Yeah, because you know that my my kids Friends knew me as Kristen, Brian and Logan's dad, right? They don't know me and they couldn't care less about being a player But when they saw Sandler there and you know, he threw out the first pitch and we had a great moment there They thought that was really cool. Like all of a sudden my my my cred rose a little bit With that younger generation and we had a really nice time before that game started and the pitch wasn't so bad either Amazing so cool. All right, so we're talking a lot about your baseball career your broadcast career And yes, you also give back so much and you're a fan favorite, but you're also a favorite in your community You do a lot of work around especially in New Jersey, but just give them back to the community These are tough, you know We're just talking about the other pictures and how great they were and you know part of what I think is your responsibility as you know an athlete or Public figure if somebody asks you to help out you go do it and those days aren't easy You know you come away or you go into with some nerves and anxiety and you know I don't know if these kids want to see me, right? You know and you know how is it going to be and then you get there and you experience it and maybe you put a Smile on somebody's face or maybe a parent comes up to you and says, you know, thank you You made my child forget about things for a few minutes. So thanks for sharing that one and here you are I think the caption was something like top gun style Going to Nantucket. Yeah, this was actually a fun day and we bid on this. It was a make-a-wish foundation event You know our boss John Philippellian is lovely wife Jenna throw a great make-a-wish event and one of the items was Go in a plane fly to wherever you want to fly to for the day and you get kind of a lesson from the pilot I look a lot more confident going into that plane map than when I was in there and the pilot actually said, okay Here's the stick you can fly this thing. It lasted about two seconds. I'm like I want no part of this And he was telling us like oh if the engine goes out, we'll be able to glide for like six miles So we'll be fine. It was a fun experience, but I have no desire to be a pilot You also spend some time at the golf course. This is a hole in one, huh? Yeah, this was at Atlantic City Country Club and that was on the 17th hole, which is ironic My number was 17 with the Yankees Hit an eight iron up the hill and it was funny because the head pro at Rockland Country Club is with us a Guy by the name of Bobby Everett and it was uphill over a bunker So you couldn't see the ball where it landed or if it went in and Bobby right away said it's either long or it's in And as we drove up to the green we didn't see a ball on the green He's looked at me said it's in the hole and as we walked over there Buddy mind picked out the stick and it was in there So one of those once-in-a-lifetime moments, you know probably a lot more luck than skill although I did hit that shot pretty well It was a it was a good strike and you know something that you can enjoy it with your buddies Which was the greatest part about it I love the selfie that you took with them, too You made sure that you got the witnesses in the in a photo dude you you after your playing days Even after catching all those innings you're doing triathlons. It's amazing. All right So there's a backstory to this right and and we talked about giving back There was a local charity in Pearl River, New York and it was to raise money for Huntington's disease which Had a few acquaintances who unfortunately had some relatives who were suffering from that disease and right away. I said, yeah Absolutely, I would love to do it the running part wasn't going to be a problem I figured I could bike 18 miles right but I never swam in my life ever you have to swim a half a mile in a Lake out to a buoy and then all the way back now You don't get to grab on to the side of a pool right and rest for a little bit So I jump in the water and I start doing my swim and after about 50 yards I'm like I'm in trouble. So I literally went on my back and did like a back stroke for a half a mile got out of the water started the The bike portion then finished the run portion and as I got through the finish line I said I am never doing that again never again. It was it was Great for the the cause, but it was so physically challenging. I said I'm never going to do it again. All right, so here we go Here's the last set Here you are fishing. Yeah, so I'm in I'm in West Palm Beach here Out on a charter boat with my girlfriend Kristen and she got this for me for a Christmas present And I've always been into fishing as a kid. I would do a lot of freshwater fishing now that I have a place in Florida I wanted to get into the saltwater fishing and this was fishing for what they call snuck down there Which are big during the summer a great day a great experience and I do a lot of beach fishing now in Florida Trying to teach myself how to how to bring in some of these snuck It's not going to be as big as that but I get into it, you know something to get out there to relax a little bit Kind of get away from the daily grind and get get with your thoughts and try to figure out What I'm doing. So that was a great day. It was a great present from my girlfriend and we had a great time I love how you just try to conquer everything and we're showing on the screen right now this photo because you did take a Picture of the Fisher at least one of the 40 that you caught. Yeah, we caught 40 But they they get the pictures out right away and those things were over 40 inches long They were a great fight and look at my girlfriend Kristen right there If I would have told her five years ago when we met she'd be wrestling these guys in and not only that holding it up And smiling for a picture. She's a trooper. She's a gamer We had a great and then maybe even jumping into water and going for a swim with her too You know what then after the fact we went home cleaned up and had a nice night on our beach A nice dinner. It was a great day all the way around So we see all these social media posts to do a great job of putting them up on on X But what would you say is your favorite part about social media when it does come to sharing these photos and videos? Well, I'm not very good at it. I should mention that I told you I'm very conservative about what I put out there I don't want a lot of personal stuff to be out there But there are a few moments that I'm proud of and I say, you know what? This is something I'm gonna try to share But you know there there's a lot of things in the position that we're in Matt You know like if I'm doing a game in the booth then you had there's access there to Yankee fans who want to let you know What they're thinking about the job that you're doing a lot of positive responses and you know, there's a bunch of negatives too So I think I've learned over the years to kind of realize what it is. It's a way to interact with the fans It's a way to to give something about what's going on in your personal life But you know when that when the critics and the comments come back I've learned to be able to laugh at it now I wasn't so great when Twitter came out early on actually deleted my account after a game one night Because I got so upset about what somebody was saying about me you learn as you get older It's just all part of it and to be able to interact with the fans is fantastic. All right Well now's the time for the plug where should everybody go to follow you and watch as they follow you well flash 17 I guess is gonna be my ex-handle. I just started a newsletter. I do have a website John dash Flaherty Dot com where you know I do some speaking engagements and things like that and try to make myself available to see what's out there and engage with some Of the fans so there are a few ways to get in touch with it. Awesome. My man flash a lot more great stuff on the way Thank you so much