 Mary Barakam, it's alongside Brian Cashman. Brian, baseball is coming back in 2020. Was there a point in time when you thought you would never hear those words? Of course. I mean, you follow how the negotiations were going and as well as the pandemic. And there's a lot of question marks along the way. And unless you were in the negotiating room, you had no idea if there was really something that was going to play out or not. What are some of the protocols that are in place right now to try to keep people as safe as possible? Wow, there's a ton of them. More than we have probably to talk through on this Zoom call. Major League Baseball has implemented a hundred and some team page protocol agreement where, you know, clearly social distancing and testing and intake testing and is vitally important. You know, you're transforming a large facility in our case, Yankee Stadium now into a much larger clubhouse, a much larger training room and utilizing the entire facility to ensure the safety of all personnel, players, staff members and support personnel. And so it's based, it's definitely going to be a challenge for a lot of people. Doug B. Hart, who runs our facility, has been doing a Yeoman's job of trying to make sure this all works. As you know, we tried to make Tampa our home for Spring Training 2.0 until the COVID outbreak hit in Florida. So we had to transition up to Yankee Stadium last second. So once you got the two facilities in Florida ready, now you got that practice in so he's doing New York as we speak. Brad, how will it work? What are some of the logistical challenges involved in making this work for the players? Well, I mean, it's the biggest thing is to try to people, you know, make sure that you're in a position to stay COVID free, or as COVID free as you possibly can in a pandemic environment, you know, because you're going to have people that will test positive, regardless. And then, you know, being in a position to contain and protect and take, you know, the proper medical measures, you know, to support the athlete or the coach or the staff member that actually, you know, does contract COVID, you know, you know, making sure that they're in a position that, you know, they get isolated and the medical care necessary. Clearly, thankfully, in almost all cases that we've experienced thus far, the symptoms have been really mild. You know, and so we've been able to thankfully avoid something severe that you've seen in the public arena throughout the world at times. And we're very thankful for that. But, you know, but yeah, our medical crew, whether it's Mike Shucker and Tim Lentech along with, you know, Dr. Lee from New York Presbyterian, you know, they're really doing an amazing job of trying to make sure that the facility is clean, ready to go, and the safety standards are in place that will protect all. Brian, what will the schedule be moving forward? They're coming in understanding on Wednesday to get tested. What will you do thereafter? Well, we essentially we started our intake testing protocols. And so, you know, I got mine, and much of our staff members on Saturday. And then they have continued yesterday, which was Monday at Yankee Stadium, and they'll continue throughout the rest remainder of the week because trying to get people from all over the world back to New York, and then get through the intake testing procedures that Major League Baseball has set up. You know, where there's a saliva test and a, and an antibody test, for instance, and then they send all those results out to Utah and then the lab, which is I'm sure slammed currently right now as they process all these teams is consistently coming FedEx packages of samples, you know, it takes about 48 hours minimum, if not longer. And then once you're clear, you're in. So thankfully, I can report unclear. And, and so far so good on on our testing, but we, we still have a, you know, the player population, most of which have to have to get their clearances, a lot of them have taken their tests, but we're still waiting for the end results on those. Has anybody in New York, New York so far that you know of in the organization tested positive? We have COVID positive tests, you know, since, you know, the pandemic hit, obviously, whether it's through our minor league player pool, our major league player pool or staff player pool and other ends front office so we've experienced like I think every walk of life, you know, positive COVID tests but thankfully from that we've really only had and it was back in spring training we really only had one employee, for instance, it was one employee that really was struggling for a good 10 days with it and needed some hospitalization that was back in March. But everybody else that has tested positive for COVID, their symptoms are extremely mild or, or really no symptoms at all and more of a surprise they actually tested positive. And, and sometimes you're testing because you get in contact others who had COVID and to some sums dismay the test results have come back which is why you have COVID or you've been exposed to COVID so. Yeah, we've we've experienced positive COVID tested throughout the organization. When do you expect the workouts to begin. I think on a limited basis we could have something as early as Thursday you know people, you know, who have passed and get some some limited workouts in at the facilities as we're continuing to try to get up and running but either the official day will be Friday or Saturday we're still letting stadium ops do their walk through and finish off the sterilization of the stadium and all that and all avenues so certain certain parts of the park will be more ready than others but I think come Saturday at the latest and maybe Friday at the earliest would be the first official. But again the question mark is how many of our personnel will have gotten the test results back to have full intake. And those results allow us to have a you know as close to the full squad as we possibly can. I imagine the workouts are going to be a little bit different than they were in the regular spring training so Brian what will be different about what you guys are able to do when everyone is in fact clear. Well, you know, because we had to pivot, you know, last second from our player development facility at Himes and the major league facility at GMS field. Those are going to be our two locations initially but then when the outbreak rage rage the way it did down in Florida. We pivoted last second so we're going to utilize Yankee Stadium for the entire unit to start out because Granton which will be our alternative facility will not be ready for a good seven to 10 days or more. So we'll utilize the busy clubhouse the auxiliary auxiliary clubhouse and the home clubhouse will utilize the concourses and the seating and the dugouts. You know, in every aspect we possibly can to, to, you know, allow our players to have a free safe social distancing zone. So we're going to maximize the footprint of Yankee Stadium to the benefit of our players health as we move forward and manage this, you know, large contingent that is going to experience spring training 2.0. Guys have been working out but it's not the same as being on the field and competitive play what's your level of concern about additional injuries because guys were ramped up stopped and are now starting again in a quick fashion. Well it's of course it's going to be a concern. I mean obviously a smaller and there's a reason we've had a six week or more spring training forever and and you know there isn't a custom level of ramping players up and and and so players have in most cases I think done as good a job as a possibly in their isolated environments to just try to stay as close to physically ready as they possibly can but you can substitute that for game reps. And so I think Aaron Boone and our, our staff are going to try to, you know, get as close as they possibly can to simulate some game actions over the course of this three week period and, and that's going to, you know, put a stress on, on all aspects of the body. Obviously designed to get them ready, but it also expose those who might not be ready and, you know, we're certainly going to try to do everything our power to avoid the injuries that will come but they will be coming no matter what for all franchises. In a smaller work, we zone of three weeks and getting ready for a 60 game sprint schedule over I think it's like 66 days and so it's, it's going to be a challenge. Our medical team and training staff obviously are, you know, looking forward to meeting that challenge the best of their ability but, but it's definitely last time we did this was, you know, obviously in the strike short the season, and there was some high level of injuries getting out of the game in season because of it. Do you anticipate intra squad games and competition against other teams in the area prior to the first game of the season or will it simply be your guys playing against each other. I think definitely inner squad games. That's not a medic without a doubt and then from a baseball operation standpoint we are open to doing, you know, taking advantage of the three exhibition games that we have the ability to play if we can find a partner, and I have to say just, you know, the northeastern GMs about those possibilities but at the same time I don't have clearance yet from ownership and or our stadium ops. I think it's a great opportunity for a walk through for a stadium ops if we can play some exhibition games. So I think there's check boxes that can be checked in a positive way for preparing, you know, for a real, you know, you know, competition, you know when the season starts and so our stadium ops would get ready and go through a walk through that way and I think it's from the baseball standpoint. Any games we can play against an opponent prior to the lights camera action starts would benefit us from a baseball standpoint because inner squad can only take yourself so far, but the actual opponent, you know, that's not yourself. You know, that's where you're really going to, you know, get some growth I think going to benefit from it and so obviously when our season starts I want to hit the ground running and be 100% certain that we are as ready as we can be. Not that anybody's going to be as ready as they can be but but I think those exhibitions would be important to do so but we're still talking through that matter. The news trickled out the other day that Aaron Judge had been swinging a little bit. Can you update us on his status? Where is he at right now? Is he ready to play in games? Well, I think the next coming weeks will determine that. Where he's at physically is he feels good. You know, he's done, you know, some throwing program and he's done, you know, he's swinging the bat against the machine, for instance, which is as close to live game actions as you can get without an arm being cocked against you. And so I think, you know, this next three week period you'll see him right away being dropped in the deep end of the pool and facing live pitching and seeing where that takes us. So, there's a great deal of optimism that as long as there's no setbacks that he showed at this early point, you know, prior to spring training 2.0 starting it appears that, you know, we can dream that he, his words will ring true when he said that he would be ready for opening day, despite this injury. And because of COVID and the delayed of our season that that that looks like it is a real possibility and hopefully it can be. Will John Carlos Stanton, Aaron Hicks, James Paxton said he had been throwing some bullpens. Do you expect those guys to be ready to go at the start of this new season? Again, without setbacks, I think there's a lot of optimism of Paxton appears to be fully healthy and his workload and rehabbing from his off season surgery that happened late and and and in terms of Aaron Hicks, his reconstruction of this Tommy John I don't think as much of an issue as as evaluating over the coming three weeks where he's at the physical condition standpoint because again these game reps, same with Gene Colestanton, these game reps he's I stand I believe is is healthy and you know, probably definitely DH consideration, you know, as long as the next three weeks go well, but in terms of Hicks in terms of Stanton in terms of judge in terms of all these players I think that the bigger area of concern or issue would be where they at in their physical conditioning side. And, you know, with the stop and start type sport sporting activity baseball promotes on the defensive end on the on the offensive end, you know, you know, where all of a sudden you got to kick it in the gear and from a stagnant position and how your body reacts to that on a day in and day out I think that's going to really tell us a lot so I think there's optimism that all those players and all of our players for the most part should be, you know, knocking on that door is being game ready by by the bell ringing but I think the three week period that we have will be taken advantage of evaluating if that's truly the case. Brian, this is going to be a season like we have never seen before, knowing that it's more of a sprint as opposed to a marathon. How does that change your job right now. I mean, the biggest thing was how we constructed the current, you know, initial 60 man roster. We didn't approach, you know, we're in this thing to win it. We didn't approach it from a development standpoint for prospects other than we do have prospects on our 40 man roster that, you know, you know, still have some growth side and development side as they come up through the minor league system, but we didn't add any non roster high end prospects that were either coming right out of the draft or, or, you know, recent signs there was a lot of speculation players like a Jason Dominguez or things of that nature we didn't do any of that because ultimately the eyes on the prize which is we have a 60 game sprint in a COVID environment to try to qualify for the playoffs and take a shot at, at a 2020 World Championship title and, and we felt it was best served by, by, you know, hoarding as many players that are in a position to contribute at the major league level now. And, and because of the anticipation of injuries the anticipation of, you know, being exposed to COVID from time to time and that we're going to have to adjust on the run that this roster would be best set for, you know, people that can, can hopefully hit that as much as we possibly can rather than, you know, try to develop talent that, that we're harnessing for the future so that's how that's basically how I think from the front office standpoint we've approached this thing. You're ready to go? I mean we're trying to be, we're trying to think of everything that we possibly can, and we're trying to stay connected to, to the other clubs, to kind of cross check what they're doing versus what we're doing and, and keeping our ears to the ground, whether it's scout on scout or, you know, GM to GM or manager or coaches to manager and coaches on the, in the other environments to find out to make sure that there isn't any stone we haven't unturned and, and if somebody's got a better idea or a good idea or a good practice that we have utilized to this stage that we can quickly adopt it to so we're going to be as ready as we possibly can and we're looking forward to testing the waters. Brian, thank you so much for the time. I look forward to seeing you at the ballpark, even if it is from six plus feet away. Same here.