 There's a lot of you that covered us and spent the majority of your springs and summers and part of the fall covering this team. And you serve as a really important bridge between our players and the organization and the fans, so just want to acknowledge that. Tried to do that individually with people, but for those of those of you who are not, hopefully they're going to watch this, the James Wagner's and the George King's and the like. Just wanted to give a shout out, so thanks everybody. Questions for Booney, Jack to the right. Aaron, when you lose a series in the way that you did in the abrupt fashion that you did, there is naturally going to be a lot of what ifs. What if this happened this way? What if this didn't happen that way? I wondered across the last few days if you could share what some of your what if questions have been in your head. I mean, you do that a little bit. I mean, it's hard to ever get over the sting of losing, especially when you feel like you're with a special group of guys that's certainly of championship caliber and knowing that you're really close. So you think of the ball that bounces off Altuve that spins and stays in the infield, a couple of there where I feel like we really did a good job of limiting them and keeping a great offense and check a couple of their big home runs came in big spots with runners on base. But you respect that as all part of it. So I think in just reflecting on it, it's kind of just trying to get over it and move past it as best you can, knowing that it's something that you're going to drag with you for the rest of your life. When you get close and you have a special group like that, the ending hurts a lot. But it also is, again, not that you need a lot of fuel moving forward, but it is something that you desperately want to move on and try and get back to that point and push through. So that's where the work almost immediately starts and that's where the focus is. Andy and then Ed. And Brian said that his role as a GM, it's important to not be emotional, be objective, just to look ahead and do what he has to do in the clubhouse and your job and for the players. Is it healthy to keep some of that sting with you and be a little emotional about it, moving forward and have that memory? Or is it best to just flush it? I think it is because I think it can be one of the things that becomes a little bit of a powerful motivator for me, for our guys. You know, one of the things I talked about our club this year is their hunger and how hungry they were. And and that that's something I thought they had really going for them. And part of that, I think, is some of the, you know, the post seasons past coming up short. And this is another one of those where, you know, I think guys understood, again, how good of a team we had, how close of a team we had. And this is something that you take with you in the off season, because we have a number of those guys in that clubhouse that, you know, desperately want to climb to the top of the mountain. And, you know, as a professional athlete, there's lots of motivators and it shouldn't take a loss to have to motivate you, but it's definitely something that I think can make you hyper focused on that moving forward. And to the right against the wall, Aaron, was there any point in time during the season where you just said to yourself and you may not have told us as the injuries continued to mount and mount and mount? This this is ridiculous. And were you surprised at how well those that so many people had never heard of performed? I wasn't, you know, as we started, you know, with some of the injuries that obviously started as early as spring training and right away started to get some meaningful contributions from people. And some guys that, you know, hadn't been proven certainly at the big league level yet and were immediately stepping in and and having an impact. You know, I think that only strengthened the belief in a lot of people. We had kind of waiting in the wings and, you know, to the guy's credit, that they never never used anything as an excuse. And anyone that came into that room, there was an expectation of going out and performing and helping us win games. And, you know, one of the things I'm most proud of is is how guys walked in that room with that that focus and that expectation. Was there ever a point where I threw my I mean, there's certain moments you have in the season like, man, you know, that one, you know, I remember talk walking off the field in Boston when he when he hurt his calf. You know, it's just like, you know, you have split second momentary reactions to things, but you also understand that right away, you've got to move on and and and, you know, credit to our organization and the people that they brought in over and over again as reinforcements and as depth to be able to step in and continue to impact us. And that was always the focus and always the mindset. But sure, you have those moments of a guy getting hurt where you're, man. But to everyone's credit, they were able to really press on, sweetie. Aaron, one of the things that Brian said was that your team had serious struggles or runners in scoring position that ultimately decided the series. You had been the best in the league in that all year long. Understanding you were facing Lee pitching and understanding that swinging the first pitch is not always indicative of a bad approach. But did your team get away from any of the things that made them successful during those situations of the regular season? Yeah, I don't think so. I thought approach wise, we were consistent. You know, I thought game plan wise were consistent. The reality is, you know, sometimes that runners in scoring position, especially in series and short series and short little samples can be a little bit fickle. And, you know, ultimately, you know, a lot of times the team that moves on gets those big hits. And even though, you know, I think in our series, Houston struggled just kind of similar to us, but they had a couple of those, you know, there, you know, I feel like they had a few three run homers and some really big spots. And obviously out to base Homer that were just a little more time at right timing, you know, and then we, you know, we obviously had our struggles in some certain spots, but I thought overall, you know, kind of our blueprint of trying to get guys on base and trying to create traffic to give ourselves opportunities were there. And we weren't able to capitalize enough. Randy here. Second row. Zack Britton said after game six that the bullpen was on fumes there at the end. Do you look at that as that could have been different if you had a Hermon and a Britansis, or do you look at it as we need to get some pictures that can go six and seven innings. Paxton's a big guy, but he didn't last that long in the playoffs. So one time he did. But do you view you need to get starting pitching that can go deeper or just more reliable pin guys? Well, first, there's no question losing Domingo and not getting down and back certainly, you know, affect the equation a little bit. I mean, those are impactful pitchers and important pitchers with how we probably could have deployed in the post season. You know, as far as I think when you look at our staff as a whole, we had a really good staff this year. And and we we we had a staff that, frankly, pitched very well in the post season as a whole. We did a good job of, you know, kind of run prevention as a whole. You're always constantly and, you know, looking at where you can get better in different ways. And, you know, I think there's a lot of different ways to to be successful. And I know that as an organization, we're always exploring those things. And, you know, the availability of people out there that, you know, inevitably in an offseason, you're going to you're going to lose some guys. You're going to acquire some guys. But there's so many factors that go into putting that all together. You can't just push a button and have this guy in and it changes your team a little bit. So I think there's a lot of ways to be elite and to be great and to make it work. And we'll continue to try and improve in in every which way we can. Neftoli back middle. Adam, how do you define the 2019 success or failure? I always find that an interesting question. You know, I know from my point of view and I feel like from an organization's point of view and from our players mindset point of view, we are desperately chasing a championship and we are relentlessly in pursuit of that. And that's our goal. And we feel like we have a core of players and a team that's probably on a very short list of truly capable of going out and doing that. So that's the focus. We fell short of that this year because we certainly felt like we had a team capable of possibly doing that. Failure success. I mean, that's for people to define. I mean, we did a lot of amazing things this year. Some some guys came of age this year. You know, but ultimately, you know, we wanted to be holding that trophy up here in the next week or so. And we didn't get there. So, you know, that's that's something you take with you and you got to live with. But I think there's a lot of really special things that happen with our group this year. Clap against the wall on the right and then Bruce. When are you do you still relive out to vase home run or are you over? No, I mean, I walk away when that that comes on. That's probably not something I'll I'll see a lot of. You know, it's it's the reality. It certainly was a tough way to end. And something you got to you got to deal with and move on from. So, you know, such a sport sometimes. Bruce, Aaron, your this team reached the ALCS in two of the last three years. What in your mind will it take for this team to get to the World Series? We just got to keep putting ourselves in that position. And in the bottom line is, you know, one hit this way, one bounce that way. And maybe it's a different conversation. So we get, you know, you got to just put yourself in position. And and, you know, I talked about kind of relentlessly pursuing a championship. We're relentlessly pursuing getting better in every facet we possibly can. And for us right now, with a team that I feel like is as potentially good as we are, you know, that that comes at the margins, you know, we're going to try and improve and tighten up in every which way we can and put ourselves in that position again and hopefully be able to break through. But, you know, the the margin between winning and losing when you get down to the wire, you know, sometimes it's just razor thin. And, you know, it didn't go our way this year. Dan, Aaron, I don't think you address us after the game. The having the infield back on that Bergman grounder. Is that something that you look at at all? Not really. I felt like being kind of up against it there kind of felt like we had to we had to lay back there. If it was something that brought us moving towards the plate, it would have been a situation where we could have gone home there. But I think we kind of had to play it with no outs in that situation. And the guy, the caliber of Bergman, I felt like we had to we had to lay back there. And if something took us home, then so be it. That's kind of how I looked at that. And and any and if we if you go in there with no outs, you know, you know, best case scenario, maybe you're setting yourselves up for a first and second, a first and third again with one out or a second and third situation. So no, I'm pretty I feel pretty good about the decision. Back to the right. Aaron to build up excuse me to build off a collapse question just a little bit. I mean, I could be wrong on this. But I think you're probably the only guy in baseball history who's been so closely associated with two series ending walk off home runs. Have you been able to think about that even a little bit, even in passing, even in, you know, just a thought you want to get your mind because you're not ready to deal with that at all. I actually I actually thought about it when clap asked. I was like, well, I've been on the other side of that, too. The other side's better. So, yeah, you know, you know, ultimately, it's one of the things that does make sports great, though, is that you have and certainly baseball great is you have. Chances for those moments, you know, when you're intimately a part of them, they can they can cause the ultimate pain and in the ultimate joy, depending on what side you are of it. But it's also one of the things that I respect about sports that that make them so great. Dave to the left, Aaron, you've you've had 200 win seasons that you've led led the team on, despite having no manager experience going into this. I mean, what has been the keys to that to that success from your perspective? What's been the biggest parts to it? You know what? I feel honestly so blessed to have walked into this situation, this organization, you know, to have an ownership like the Steinbrenners that. You know, set a great tone to. You want to come to work here and in cash in the front office on down to my staff and our players. You know, we have a lot of really talented people that do amazing work to put us in this position. And I've just felt blessed to walk in and be a part of that. And and it's a place that. I honestly love coming to every single day I walk in here, you know, whether we're dealing with some some stuff, some rough, a rough patch, a tough decision. Or whether we're in the midst of a great little run or things are going well. It's a place you want to come to work. It's it's a group of people that you want to come to work with. And and honestly, in in kind of reflecting back now and being here a couple of years, I think that's been the the greatest part that I I don't know that I necessarily expected or knew that it would be a. A group of people. A large group of people that I love working with and love being a part of this with and that have that similar drive to me to want to climb to the top of the mountain. And I think that's been the best part of this. Bradford in the second row on the right. Hey, Aaron, earlier, you mentioned that, like, you know, the unfortunate the fortunate, you know, situation might be like, you know, bad breaks, you know, one missed hit here or there. But you also talked about the drive to to win everything. Would you say it's primary that that the loss was primarily due to just kind of misfortune or was it, you know, execution based? And the second, the follow up question that is also what do you, you know, you mentioned tightening things up and, you know, in the offseason guys trying to get better. What are you specifically trying to tighten up? Well, when I say misfortune, I mean, there's always things in the course of a game in the course of a series that, you know, the bounce of the ball going one way or the other. But in the end, too, it comes down to execution. And I feel like the difference probably in our series with the Astros is they had a couple more impactful plays at bats, whatever you want to call it, than us. And they they moved on because of it. You know, as far as tightening up, I think we're it's something that since I've got here has never stopped, you know, whether it's tightening up, you know, how we coach guys up and how we try and impact and get our guys to be a little bit better in every facet of the game, whether it's defensively and in the things we work through the drills, the communication we have offensively approach game plan, all those things from a pitching standpoint, you know, how we're attacking. I mean, those things are things we work through and talk about and try and get better at all the time. And again, I feel like we made major strides on the margins this year in being a little better than we were the previous year. And hopefully, you know, we can do that again. If we do that, we put ourselves in an even stronger position to continue to move on. And that's that's kind of my focus now and will be the focus of our of our entire staff. And I know the front office now moving forward. We had Hokey. Did you have one? Yeah. Hi, I was just wondering if you had any issue with the bad quality during the ALCS seemed like there was a lot of first pitch swinging and we didn't really see that all that much during the season. Yeah. No, I didn't have an issue with that. I feel like, you know, some of the first pitch swinging, you know, when you're up against a caliber of opponent as as as the Astros and you're talking about, you know, Cole and Verlander, two guys you don't want to be behind in the count. And those are as good as pitchers there are at getting ahead in the count. So you've got to be able to have you know, and I talk about those two guys specifically, you know, feel like we gave ourselves a chance against them. And, you know, specifically the Cole game where I thought we're aggressive, we also made him work really hard. You know, he was up close to 100 pitches, I think in the sixth inning with five walks. And our approach was to be aggressive. We put a lot of traffic out there on on the base against, you know, as hot a pitcher as there is. In the end, we couldn't push through. And that's kind of the difference. But as far as approach, I think we had the right one. Anybody? We'll take a couple more here, Jack and Clap. Aaron, I know you didn't have Severino for most of the year. Lost Hermon at the end of the year. I know the way you feel about Pax then in Tanaka, Montgomery's in play next year. With all that being said, is your belief that the Yankees need to add an ace type starting pitcher to that mix? Look, I think we pitched great this year. You know, I know now as we head into the off season, the work become, how do we improve our club? And that'll be, you know, what Brian and his staff are obviously focused on. I'll be here certainly adding my input where it's needed. You know, is that, do we have to do that to make the next step? No, not necessarily. I mean, the bottom line is we're a player two away from still playing right now. So there's so many factors that go in now into the winter into how your club shakes out that you got to let it play out, you know? I think as Cash says a lot, you got to dance the dance now. I mean, there's, you know, a lot of people that factor into decisions of where guys end up and how rosters shake out. So I know as an organization, we'll do everything we can to try and make smart decisions that put us in a better position moving forward, but where, how that ends up, I don't know. I feel pretty confident that, you know, heading into next spring, we'll have a team that's, as I would say on that short list of teams that can truly say we're a championship contender. Clap to the right. Aaron, I just wanted to follow up on one of the announcements that Brian made earlier about Tanaka's surgery. Was it your understanding at any point this year that he had, you know, some issue with his elbow and it was start to start. Some days he felt great. Some days it wasn't great, which may explain why some days he was unhittable and other days he would just get lit up. No, no, he was pretty good overall. I felt like, you know, I think he made all his starts up until we skipped him that last go-around. So, you know, I'm sure there's levels of fatigue or things that you deal with, certainly the rigors of being a starting pitcher, but I think overall, you know, Masa was fairly sound physically and put forth a really good season for us. Masa, do you have one? We'll take one more. Aaron, your dad had talked about the awkwardness of scouting you guys, you know, potentially to play. I'm just kind of curious what he said to you after, you know, your season ended. Not much. I mean, you know, I think probably just a little sad for his kid that we didn't get to move on. So nothing, nothing unusual after the fact, you know, he's on his way to DC right now. So, you know, happy for him and how long he's been with that organization now to get a chance to make it all the way. Aaron, thanks for the time, everybody. Thanks again for your coverage. Shout out to Eric Boland, who I forgot to mention, who's somewhere out there grinding.