 We're joined now by a guy who knows everything that's going on in the Yankees organization, right? It is Damon Oppenheimer, the VP of Domestic Gamma. You're scouting. First of all, I'm going to start off with congratulations. Just received the West Coast Scout of the Year Award. I'm going off a cheat sheet. In January, you'll get the PBSF Spirit of the Game Award, the Lifetime Achievement Award. You're up for a Nobel Prize. I don't know if you do that. But, I mean, that's got to mean a lot. A lot of that comes from your peers, too, right? Yeah. The voting on the Scout of the Year comes from my peers, which is really, it's really strong to me, because they know me as a scout, but they know me as a person. They know how I operate and work. So, that really means a lot. One of the players that you've scouted and had a long relationship with was the Yankee Third Basement this past year. Miguel Andujar finished second in the Rookie of the Year voting. The Yankees loved his offense. I want to ask you about the defensive side. What can he do to make strides defensively? Because that was obviously an area the Yankees wanted him to concentrate on. I think he can continue to work. You know, when I saw Nolan Aronado in high school, he wasn't the Nolan Aronado that we see now, and he's an absolute workaholic. And so, I think with Miggie, he can do the same thing. It's just work hard, you know, keep getting good advice and go at it. And, you know, he's got the athletic ability. He's got the tools to be really good over there. Now, it's just a matter of putting it together. You know, Damon, when we talk to you every year, you can tell that you're a scout at your foundation and see your face lights up when you talk about that or think about it. I'm around a lot of old-time scouts these days, and sometimes they complain about the analytics and all the computer and the metrics. How do you keep your guys out in the field motivated, you know, getting their eyes on the players? Well, I think what we've done here with the Yankees is just accept the blend. Okay? We know that there's what you see on the field with your eyes. We have a guy named Scott Benike, who does our amateur analytics, and he really has a great delivery on how to have our guys understand it, and they accept it. Right. So, it's really, you know, it's not like we haven't ever paid attention to stats. I mean, they've just grown to be a bigger part of the game, and they've grown to be more complex. And now our guys are learning a little bit more about that. Damon, you've been a part of this organization for a long time. How has your approach or process changed over the years as the game continues to evolve? Well, I think it still can, it still goes back to hard work and big in my role, a lot of quality leadership. And I have to, you know, lead by example, and I get out and I still scout. I'm out there visiting kids in the off season. And so, I don't, I just think that it's the whole blend of the analytics side. It's the only thing that's really changed. The work ethic is still the same. Going and getting to know what's in the kid's heart, that's still the same. And so, I think that that's the part that, you know, we just keep trying to put players in the system with that. I'm glad you brought that up because I always wonder about those visits. Like, we talk about ability and physical tools and what the kid can do, but how much of that is just getting to know him, seeing how he was brought up, what his background influences are? It's a really big part for us. And we try to get scouts on the other side of the fence. So, they're on the field with these guys in different situations, area code games, even in Cape Cod, where we really get to know what the kid's about, not what he's going on at his kitchen table. And you get, you know, that's the part that with our guys, they love doing that. And they love getting in there. And we've got our Chad Bowling that runs that department. And we got Lauren Abarca and Chris Passarella. And they're professionals at this. And they go visit these kids too. I mean, we're talking, we do probably 200, at least 200 visits on kids during the off season. Michael King is a very well thought of minor leager jump from single A to triple A last season for the Yankees. I wanted to ask you what you think about him as a pitcher, but you've got a little family connection with Michael King as well that goes back a little bit. If you could share that with us too. Yeah, it's a unique deal because my daughter really wanted to go to Boston College. And so, Matt Hyde, our scout, set it up for her to come up there and see the school. And he set it up for my king to be the one who took her around. So, it was really a neat deal. We got to another way of getting to know a guy. I mean, we got to know Mike by the way he treated my daughter, Sierra. And it was like, you got to learn a little bit more about his makeup. His stuff, he's a good pitcher, you know. And it looks to me like the guy's got a quality future in the big leagues, hopefully with us. Let's get to the most important position on the field that's behind the plate, the catcher's statement. You drafted a catcher number one last year and Anthony Siegler, switch hitter. Tell me about him. I know he just got his feet wet a little bit last year. Yeah, switch hitter and he's actually a switch thrower, which is unique, you know, but that's not going to come into play. He's really smart. He's a good receiver. He's got a plus arm. He knows how to handle a staff. This is the guy that caught the team USA guys when they won a gold medal. So, he's got that part of it, that special defensive part of it. And now you're talking about a switch hitter who can hit both left and right handed well. And he's got better left handed power right now. But normal strength, this guy should be able to have power from both sides and be a plus defender. Damon, there's no doubt about it. You've had some success stories that have come up through the system. Jack, you mentioned Miguel Andujar, Aaron Judge the year before. Can you describe the feeling amongst the staff when you have a guy like that that makes it to the next level and succeeds at the next level? Yeah, I mean, it's really exciting. You should see the text messages that flow. I mean, we the guy is just it's like it's their own kids making it because so many of us weren't good enough to make it. And but when we've put in the work and we've done so much research on these players, they get through play all the way through the minor leagues and then they're having success at the big league level. It's us. It's like our kids haven't success. The final thing, Damon, before we let you go again, to Meredith's point, 27 years in the organization, I was going to ask what motivates you still. But I would think it's that right, seeing these kids that you've maybe handpicked really grow in the organization. It doesn't seem like 27 years. It just seems like there's a way that an old scout talked to me about it. It's like you can do this job one year 27 times or you can learn and you can get experience. And I think I've gained experience over that time to be 27 years worth of experience. And that's what it is. It's trying to find that next Aaron Judge. It's going out there with with all your scouts and just seeing how much how hard they've worked. And now I get to come in and see and take a look at these kids. It's just an absolute blast. This is a great job. You were a ball player. You know what team's all about. It's just a different team you're kind of playing for, right? Your guys succeeding. Yeah, this is a this is definitely a we job. And when when these guys get to the big leagues, it's we. It's never me. And it's like the scout of the year thing. It's great. It's nice. But it's I'm representing all these guys that I've that I've got to work with. And they're the they're the reason that I'm getting this award. All right, Damon, great stuff. Thanks as always. Thank you.