The Dodgers and White Sox getting said for game two of this three game series,
and yesterday Dave Roberts said Landon Neck is not going anywhere. He will
start Friday in San Francisco, and Young Neck is with us right now.
Thanks a lot for the time. Yeah, thanks for having me. I
feel like I got you away from bad influencer Austin Barnes. But a great
teammate, I would imagine. Oh yeah, absolutely, a great teammate.
Just likes the mess with some guys, kind of like get them off their
game and just kind of like get some genuine reactions out of them. But
yeah, no, he's a character man. I was telling Mark Priri yesterday
how much I enjoyed being around yourself, Gavin Stone and Bobby Miller and all
three of you seem to be very coachable. Yeah, we try to be.
Yeah. No, we all kind of came up together and kind of
fed off of a little bit of the culture that they've built down in the
minor league system here and really just kind of push it. Everybody kind of
pushes each other to kind of get the best version out of themselves. And
yeah, I mean it's been a great group and it feels like, like
you said, the culture down there is to be yourself. The way you
pitch is not the same way Bobby Miller pitches. Yeah. No, obviously
very different guys as far as what we do on the mound, but yeah,
no, everybody, Our entire minor league system is a lot of kind
of being yourself. They're gonna give you all of the tools to get to
that best version of yourself, but also just staying true to yourself because everybody's
different. They know not everything works for everybody. There's no cookie cutter way
to do things, and so they really are doing a really good job of
making sure that everybody has the tools to get to where they need to be.
But being themselves in this day and age of everybody looking at velocity,
how did you separate yourself to be recognized to be a pitcher? I think
I was always a guy who could just pitch. That was always kind of
my calling card for a long time, and then I never even learned velocity
until kind of later on. I was always a pitcher first, and so
I kind of learned how to throw with lesser velo early on in college and
then kind of kept on with that and really just learning how to switch speeds,
really play the front to back game and just keep people off balance.
And you also have four pitches. The way I understand it, is there
a temptation to try to use all four or how do you mix and match
when you have that many pitches in your back pocket. A lot of it
just kind of goes with the what the game's calling for, what the batter
calls for, just kind of like with the matchups, I usually try to
at least mix in a little bit of the four just because the more pitches
that they have in the back of their mind, the less they can actually
eliminate, and it just makes it just a little bit tougher. Even even
if it's something that they handle it well, if you just kind of give
them one look at it, it still has that in the back of their
mind. So we try to kind of mix things up as well as we
can just to kind of keep them off Landon Nak is our guest in front
of first pitch between the Dodgers and White Sox. I mentioned Bobby Miller.
He's on the mound tonight. What have you seen from Bobby being teammates with
him since the minor leagues and just his growth to where he's at right now.
Yeah, No, he has continued to tune things this like the longer
we've gone. Obviously got to see Bobby from the alt side all the way
through, played with him in Great Lakes and in Tulsa, and then kind
of getting to see him again here now has been pretty cool. The guy
has obviously, he's worked his butt off, He's continued to develop his off
speed pitches a lot, and he's really a much more complete pitcher than minor
league Bobby. You just mentioned the alternate site that was at USC during the
twenty twenty COVID season. It feels like the players that were there formed a
lifelong bond. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean it was something that not many
people kind of got to go through, and so the guys that did where
we were kind of all kind of just away from everything. It was just
hotel, field and back, and so it was just kind of those were
your only group of people you really got to be around during that time.
And so yeah, of course you kind of create a bond with those guys
and have that shared experiperience that you'll be able to remember for the rest of
your life. Do you feel like it helped your development or do you feel
like you were a year behind because of that. I think it helped a
lot. Just being able to be around some of the older guys. I
think it kind of got us a little bit more comfortable in kind of being
able to like talk with them and understand like professional hitters. Like obviously getting
to jump straight into facing really Triple A and big league hitters for your kind
of your first taste of professional baseball. It was a huge help just kind
of getting that step ahead of like what you're working towards, Like they immediately
show you where you're missing things and what you need to work on. It
feels like maybe the game slowed down a little bit where you know, during
a minor league season you're competing obviously against other teams and you're trying to impress.
Feels like that was somewhat of a controlled environment with competition, but also
giving yourself the grace to grow. Absolutely, yeah, it's all obviously it's
a different situation than most people get to go into, but of course,
yeah, the just kind of the being able to control the environment of like
how many innings you get, like kind of making it more of it's not
quite an inn squad, but it's like more just like an intersquad type fields
where they can control the game and really like let you work on different stuff
while still getting to compete against guys. Yeah, no, it was absolutely,
it was a It was a great experience. Landonnack is our guest,
and he will be introduced as a new character in the Dodger Giants rivalry.
He pitches Friday night in San Francisco. How much are you looking forward to,
obviously making another start, but getting your first taste of pitching in San
Francisco. Yeah, very excited. Yeah, I've always kind of growing up,
you always kind of hear about the Dodgers and Giants rivalry that they've always
had and kind of just how far that goes back, and so yeah,
getting to kind of get out there and pitch in enemy territory in San Francisco
and kind of getting to experience the energy from those fans as they get fired
up to play us. Yeah, no, I can't wait. That's gonna
be an awesome experience. And you're unflappable like Gavin Stone as well, So
I don't feel like that is any sort of intimidation. Especially Nac a lot
of Dodger fans show up in San Francisco. Now, yeah, absolutely,
Dodger fans travel really well, of course, and going to play a team
that your rivals with, of course they're gonna want to be up there to
experience it as well. And so yeah, no, absolutely, it's it's
something we all want to embrace. All right. Thanks a lot for the
time. Great to have you around again, and I feel like this is
only the beginning for landon NAC. Thank you, appreciate you having me