 Meredith Marokovits if you can unmute you can certainly ask a couple questions of James Paxton. Do I look at the big screen? You're gonna see her popping. Okay. Hi James hope you're well. I hope you're well too. You were out there today throwing a simulated game. What did you take away from that? It felt good to get back on a dirt mound. You know I've been thrown on a turf mound and running shoes for the last little while. So getting back on the dirt with the guys and facing some of our hitters it was it was great. Felt felt good felt healthy. It was a good first step for me. Last I spoke to you you said the back wasn't an issue. Did you do anything differently today to prepare knowing that you're coming off of a back surgery or is it all like it used to be? I've got like a little bit of a new routine you know new stretches and stuff just to make sure everything's warm and ready to go. A couple of different exercises activation-wise just to make sure that that core is activated and fired up but everything else was normal. Throwing was normal and I had no problem with the back. Everything felt really good. You had talked about changing the grip a little bit on your fastball in hopes of increasing the spin rate. How is that progressing? I think today they still are looking at the numbers. After that I think they're gonna look at them tonight and meet with me about it tomorrow but the initial kind of look I think was it was up a little bit. Not a ton but it was up a little bit so something we'll continue to watch and work on over these next few weeks. Thank you. Take the next question from Kristi Ackert daily news. Go ahead Kristi and unmute. Hey James. Hi. I was just wondering you know you get to face some of your own players and it sounds like it's going to be a very limited exhibition you know schedule. How hard is that going to be for pitchers to prepare without facing hitters from other teams? Well I think we're pretty lucky. We've got some really good hitters and facing those guys is tough you know and they know our stuff so if anything I think that'll be more challenging and help us get ready. We'll be able to talk to them about what our stuff looks like coming out and they'll be able to tell us what they see which I think will help help me and help other guys so I'm looking forward to hearing from our hitters and what they're seeing and stuff like that to help me prepare to get ready. Thank you. We can take the next question from Brendan Cutty nj.com. James it's good to see you. I hope you're well. Hope you're well too. Thank you. You threw today with the screen in front of you. Was that a conscious decision? Was that with what happened with Math to Hero in mind or was that something you were going to do either way? You know after yesterday seeing that happen I mean I just wanted to play it safe especially first time out there. Just kind of wanted to see how I felt kind of getting things going a little bit. You know what happened yesterday was so scary and luckily it doesn't happen very often but just wanted to play it safe first time out. Next time I think it'll be more of a sim game setting so that the screen won't be out there but yeah especially after yesterday it was a conscious decision just to have it out there for safety. Right is that I thought behind not having fielding your position in X amount of months is that like one of the big drivers? Part of it you know and the ball comes back at you that hard I mean there's really not much you can do. You kind of just get lucky if you put your glove in the right spot. I mean that ball came back I think they said 112 and there's really nothing you can do about that. It's just something that happens here and there and you just pray that it doesn't happen. But you know going forward I think seeing it again and kind of having the ball coming back at you having those types of hitters swinging the bat kind of gets you ready for that. So I think that next time after throwing those guys and having the feel of being on the baseball field again you know we'll all get used to like you said fielding our position again and kind of being ready for that as ready as we can be for something like that. Thank you James. Thanks. Lindsey Adler from the Athletic Lindsey if you can unmute. Hi Lindsey. You've been thinking about that and kind of what you've been learning in the last four six weeks or so. Well you know I've just been trying to learn you know it's something that I haven't paid a lot of attention to. I've been pretty ignorant to it up until now and I've been reading articles and following different people trying to get information, watching different things on Netflix and other streaming services to get more information about it, listening to different podcasts. I'm not at a point where I feel comfortable like speaking too much about it but I'm just trying to soak up and learn as much as I can right now so that I can be more educated and become an ally and do things. You know my wife and I have donated to a couple different organizations and we plan on doing more in that area. We can take the next question from Sweeney Murdy. Sweeney go ahead and unmute. Hi Pax. Hi. How difficult is it to just to be your free agent here and have to take whatever happens this season and go into the market and you guys work your whole lives in the system to get to this point? What's this part of it like for you? Well you know it's obviously not ideal but it is what it is and I can't control the things that have happened so I'm just going to go out there and try to control what I can control and do the best that I possibly can with the time that we have and see what happens. Thank you. Thanks. Next question from Andy Martino, SNY. Hey James, do you hear me okay? Yes. Okay so you were obviously on the executive subcommittee deeply involved in the negotiations to return to play and your experience now what did you take away and what did you learn about labor relations in the game and did it leave you feeling optimistic that conflict might be avoided with the next CBA or did it leave you feeling concerned about the state of labor relations? I mean we'll see how things go you know I think that we stood our ground and we fought for what we believed in and we ended up where we are right now and we feel like we did a good job of sticking together we felt like our group was very united and we yeah we we knew what we wanted we knew what we thought was fair and we stuck to that. For you personally as somebody who we know is being very pleasant not someone we've seen in a lot of conflict was it an education for you or was it unpleasant at all to be involved in a situation that became kind of a conflict? It was very educational for me it was my first time going through something being on the subcommittee so I learned a lot and you know I think it was very valuable very valuable information to learn and especially getting ready for a CBA coming up you know just knowing what to what to expect and kind of what happens in in those negotiations and how things go it was it was I think helpful for me to go through something like that even though we'd wish that we hadn't had to go through what we went through but it'll it's going to prepare me for the negotiations coming up in the future. Thank you. We'll take a few more. Bob Clapish nj.com if you can unmute. James can you hear me okay? Yes. I'm curious what your your impression was of fishing in an empty stadium and what do you think it's going to be like and see what happens when the season starts and not only will the stadium be empty but it'll be in quieter today you know quieter than today we don't use it home but somebody these you've made an entire career out of pitch from a bunch of crowds especially here in the stadium beating off that energy you think it's going to be much an adjustment pitching in silence? I think it will be a bit of an adjustment for sure you know it's going to be different I think that we're all used to having that buzz of fans and the stadium and the energy and everything but I think it's going to be a unique experience it's going to be a little nostalgic being able to hear all the baseball sounds we used to hear when we were kids and you know for me when I'm out there I've got a job to do and I'm focused on what I'm trying to accomplish and that's 60 feet six inches away you know and I'm doing the same thing every pitch and giving it everything I have and that's not going to change next question from Marley Rivera Marley go ahead and unmute how are you all right good how are you so the the thing that I wanted to ask you is the fact that you are Canadian and and we know there's going to be a lot of travel involved right this season I mean a lot less with the security and season but you guys are going to feel you know traveled to Toronto it's international travel you may travel to Florida how comfortable do you feel you know during this situation with the track well I feel like we're doing everything we can to be as safe as possible the Yankees here doing a fantastic job of keeping us safe and doing following the protocols and you know doing everything we can to mitigate the risk and and keeping us all healthy I feel very safe with this group and feel like we everyone's being responsible doing the best they can to stay stay healthy and stay safe so the travel I mean I think that are the way that we have it set up it's going to be as safe as it can be and I feel pretty comfortable I'm going to do the best job I can to stay healthy and you know keep others safe as well I think it's all it's going to be the players kind of holding each other accountable and really just being as safe as we possibly can but I feel like it's going to be okay next question from Dave Lennon Dave if you can unmute hey James how are you good how are you good um there's been a couple players James in addition to the ones that have already opted out you know someone suggested like Andrew Miller and a couple other guys have said you know this isn't a slam dunk we kind of have to see how things go um whether or not the regular season is going to be possible I was curious had you got that sense too James and talking to players that this spring while the summer camp is kind of important to figure out if this can work from what you guys are trying to do yeah absolutely you know we're we're testing out the protocols and you know we're doing everything we can to mitigate the risk but there's obviously still a risk and uh we have to see if what we're doing um is going to work and to a degree that we're going to be able to play and keep it safe enough for people to feel okay about traveling and playing against against other teams and keeping our guys and everyone all the staff and everyone healthy so this is something James that I guess the players association will kind of continue to talk about internally with you guys to check up on each other and see how all the teams are doing yeah I think it will be something that's continually checked on um I think that everyone's staying very connected and letting them know like what's going on and how people are feeling about it and you know the numbers are coming in we're doing testing every other day and uh we're keeping an eye on that and if we see any spikes you know we'll have to address that but um I think so far it's been going okay thanks thanks last one from Greg Joyce New York Post Greg go ahead and unmute you can't no we can't hear you Greg but I mean can you hear him at all no no great uh a little better a little better what was the thought process like for you in terms of deciding to play this year was there any ever has any hesitation for you um you know I really I wanted to play you know I think that uh the health and safety obviously is very important and we needed to get to a point where we could get the protocols to a level where we felt like the risk was um lessened enough to where we felt safe and I feel like we have set up some really good protocols and I feel safe coming in here um being amongst the guys and the staff everyone here is being very responsible and doing everything they can do to stop the spread and stay healthy um coming into this thing I I felt pretty confident about it and feeling that I could do what I needed to do to stay healthy um and we'll see how how things go you know if it gets really bad it will have to it's just a thing that you're constantly having to weigh you know how how good it's going so it's something that work that everyone I think has their own level of where they feel comfortable uh with it and those constantly have to kind of see how they feel about that