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To the rescue again Andy McCullough from
The Athletic and also a great author of

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a brand new book out there about
Clayton Kershaw, the last of his kind.

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Andy, thanks a lot for the
time. Appreciate it. David,

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this is great. My publisher wanted
me to keep doing media interviews and no

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players will talk to you. So
here we are great combination today in New

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York with a doubleheader. How has
the response to the book been positive so

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far? You know, it's been
really fun to uh, you know,

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see the book out in the world. We're still doing your books are still

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available, you know, we're still
signing book plates if people want to send

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me an email. But yeah,
it's been cool. It's been a unique

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experience and you only get to,
you know, do it for the first

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time once. So it's been it's
been great. Yeah. I've been around

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Kershaw a lot since the book came
out, and he really hasn't talked about

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it too much. What's has been
what's been his reaction to the finished product?

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Yeah, he's selling that that meat
package. Yeah, what's going on

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with hershaw beef? But no talk
about the book, right, he's a

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lefties not trying to be Nolan Ryan, I don't get it. You know,

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Clayton has been I think, very
gracious about what for him. I

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don't just assume he said, it's
kind of a strange experience, right,

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Like, he didn't ask for this
book to be written. He was very

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cooperative and generous his time, with
his time during the process, but it

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wasn't something that he was necessarily like
looking forward to. And you know it

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when we've spoken about it, he
says he hasn't read it, which is

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totally fine. I think it would
be very strange to write a or to

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read a four hundred page book about
yourself, you know. But he's been,

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yeah, very gracious and polite,
and you know, has told me

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like he hopes the thing does well
and passes along when people tell him they

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like it and so. But yeah, it sounds like he's more probably focused

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on what's more important, which is
spending time with his family, getting his

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shoulder right and you know, selling
that beef package. Yeah, no doubt

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beef and getting that shoulder right.
He feels like it's starting to come around.

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Did you do you believe that he
expected to be a Dodger this season?

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I think it was definitely up in
the air, you know, coming

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into the offseason. He kind of
wrote about this in the last chapter of

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the book that he was more open
to going to Texas and probably he ever

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had been, and the way it
worked out with Texas' finances, they weren't

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particularly aggressive and going after him,
and the Dodgers, you know, were

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probably more patient in terms of letting
him figure out what it was it was

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important to him, and it worked
out that, you know, they were

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able to get him on a pretty
decent guarantee for this year with a player

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option for next season, which was
very important because I think one of the

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things that you know, he expressed
to me that he really wanted was not

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just to make comeback for twenty twenty
four, you know, come back mid

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season coming off surgery. He wanted
to if he was gonna keep going,

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to at least do another full season
or a full offseason where he could come

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in sort of normal and healthy and
you know in twenty twenty five, which

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could be you know, theoretically could
be a Swan song. Who can say.

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But the Dodgers willing to provide that
player option I think really helped.

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Andy McCullough is our guest you can
find his new book anywhere they sell it,

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the last of his kind, a
biography on Clayton Kershaw. And here's

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a question for you, Andy,
And I feel like this is a question

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that would fall in the same category
for Walker Bueller because the team and the

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personnel and the faces have changed so
much the last two years. Do you

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believe when Khrushaw comes back he's kind
of an outsider on his own team?

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I mean, I think that the
hope for the Dodgers and for him is

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that he's around enough during the you
know, when the team is at home,

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that he has relationships and things like
that. But it's definitely not his

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team anymore. I don't think that's
breaking news. I mean, you know,

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remember when when I was a beat
writer, you know at the Times

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from sixteen to eighteen and even in
nineteen, you know, when I was

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transitioning out of that role, Like
it was his clubhouse, right, Like

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he set the tone for for everyone
and through the combination of just kind of

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the passage of time and obviously injury, Like the room belongs to other people,

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not belongs to but it's just like
this, the tone is set by

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other people. It's you know,
this is Showo Tony seeing Mookie Bats,

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Freddie Freeman there clearly you know the
dominant personalities in the room. And so

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yeah, I mean there is a
bit of an outsider this to that which

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I think there is an adjustment,
but it also like it's not gonna affect

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the way he works. It seems
like, you know, on a day

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to day basis, it's not gonna
affect the intensity he brings. But it

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certainly is, like you know,
from my perspective, not being around the

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team every day and then coming back
into that environment, you see some familiar

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faces, but it's very clearly a
different group and a different vibe than it

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was all those years ago. Andy
McCullough is our guest, and speaking of

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the time that you did cover the
Dodgers, they not only had their best

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players be leaders, whether that was
Justin Turner or even Chase Suttley David Freese

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back in eighteen and nineteen obviously set
a lot of the tone and lead.

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Do you believe this Dodger team is
missing the their two best players are not

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really vocal leaders. Yeah, that's
a great question. I mean, as

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someone who's not around every day,
it's harder for me to say, and

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I think that it's something that you
know, we'll know more as this year

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goes along. I mean, Dave
Roberts has always talked about how it's important

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to have your best players be leaders. You know, that makes everyone's job

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easier when it's Clayton Kershaw and Justin
Turner and ken Lee Janssen providing those sort

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of examples. But like Kershaw was
never a particularly vocal sort of guy.

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I mean, Justin Turner, you
know, I mean maybe ken Lee was

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the most vocal of those three,
but like Turner was not a big raw

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ra speech sort of guy. Utley
certainly wasn't. I think it is interesting,

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you know, it's a challenge for
someone like Otani to be the leader

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given that one like he doesn't you
know, English isn't his native language,

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and so there's challenges there. He's
had obviously a you know, tumultuous start

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to his Dodgers career with the scandal, and you know, I was thinking

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more Mookie and Freddie and that's not
them. Yeah, I guess the issue

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with Mookie and Freddy is is it
leadership or is it just like get a

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hit in the playoffs? A little
bit of both right, Like, like

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would anyone you know, would it
be an issue if they hit three hundred

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in the postseason? Probably not.
Now, how much does that affect,

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you know, the vibes and all
that stuff coming in? I don't know.

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I just think so much of what
has been rendered a judgment about this

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team is just based on the fact
that those two guys didn't really play well

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in the postseason the last couple of
years, which, like you know,

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it goes on their record for it. But yeah, I don't know.

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I mean it's it is definitely easier
for a manager, for a team,

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for a clubhouse when the best players
set the example for sure. All right,

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Andy, thanks a lot for the
insight. I don't buy everything you

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just said, but I did buy
your book for other people in my family,

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trying to help the McCullough household.
There last of his kind, The

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Biography of Clayton Kerrshot's a great book. Find it now. Thanks a lot

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for the time. My insight is
worth what I charge for it. But

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the book is on discount at ashet
dot com. Okay, that's enough.