Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
Welcome to the Players Association Stitch by Stitch podcast where we talk to current and former players about union history, baseball and the bond that players share across generations.
[00:00:17] Speaker B: Mike Myers, a lone lefty out there in the bullpen, struck him out. And the Boston pen, the combination of Arroyo and Myers striking out the last three Yankee hitters.
[00:00:28] Speaker A: Our guest this episode is Mike Myers, who logged 883 career appearances as a reliever with nine teams over 13 major league seasons. When the affable Chicago native and Iowa State University product wasn't tasked with the thankless responsibility of facing Barry Bonds, David Ortiz, Jim Thome or Ken Griffey Jr. In a tight spot, he was navigating the uncertainty and constant change that were part of his life as a left handed, one out guy. Mike wears his loogie designation with pride.
[00:01:04] Speaker B: Friday night in Seattle you get Griffey. On Saturday night in Seattle you get Griffey. And on Sunday we'll throw you a bone, you get Joey Cora, Alex Rodriguez and Griffey. And Sundays in San Francisco is the same thing. It'd be you get Bonds on Friday, you get Bonds. On Saturday. If you do your job, you get Ray Durham, Rich Aurelia, and you get Barry. And then you're out of the game because then coming up is Kent and Santiago, right handers.
[00:01:24] Speaker A: He has also been a staunch advocate for the union since he jumped into the fray with the Detroit tigers in the mid-1990s.
In his current role as a special assistant for player services with the mlbpa, Mike visits a lot of clubhouses, talks to a lot of players and fields inquiries on everything from the pension and benefit plans to the whys and wherefores of moving expenses. If a player has a question, there's a 99.9% chance he's got the answer.
[00:01:56] Speaker C: Well, thanks for coming in, Mike.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: My pleasure. Glad to be here.
[00:01:59] Speaker C: So with a lot of players that we have here, we talk to them about their backgrounds in baseball. You're an Arlington Heights, Illinois kid, suburban Chicago.
[00:02:08] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:09] Speaker C: Cubs fan growing up.
What were your earliest baseball memories and how did you fall in love with the game?
[00:02:16] Speaker B: Fell in love with the game. Just playing it out in the yard with the neighbors, with my brothers, just playing all the time, non stop. But then falling in love with the Cubs. That was from my grandfather. We watched tv, listen to the radio, listen to Jack Brickhouse with the Cubs and then onto the Harry Carey era and stuff like that.
And then my uncle had season tickets for the Cubs, so he'd take me about six or eight games a year. And you can always just sit right behind there watching Larry Bittner and Dave Kingman and, you know, Steve Trout and all that. So it was great. I just absolutely loved going to the Cubs games. And Wrigley Field was very unique because back when I was growing up, sellouts did not happen unless the team was in the playoffs. And in the 70s, they were not in the playoffs, so always had great seats.
[00:03:03] Speaker C: So as a high school pitcher in suburban Chicago, do you remember the coldest game you ever pitched in in high school?
[00:03:10] Speaker B: The day I got recruited the most, There was about 12 or 14 colleges behind the backstop and it was about 35 degrees. Snow was blowing sideways, a little bit of mist in the air as well. A day that you should not be playing. I think I had about three or four sweatshirts on and then my baseball jersey and just.
I think that might have been the coldest game we ever played that I can recall. I'm sure I played something colder, similar. And I know I had a couple of those days in the big leagues, but that was pretty much the day I remember the most because that really was the start of the kicking off my baseball career.
[00:03:52] Speaker C: You probably can relate to a club of these. I'm from Maine, so I knew Billy Swift and Jim Beatty and those guys. But those guys who come from those cold weather climates who are pitchers, there's a bit of a bond between them, I think, isn't there?
[00:04:06] Speaker B: Oh, it's, you know, how to get yourself ready to play for the game. It's wearing wool sleeves that they don't really make anymore because all the technology with the under gear that they have, but you wore a T shirt then wool sleeves, so you didn't scratch up your chest and your back from the what you were wearing. And if you had them, you wore long johns underneath your baseball pants. And it was just. That's how you played baseball in the spring out in Illinois. And just looking forward to the. About May 15th when it started to get warm and you can start throwing on some short sleeves and go out and play that way.
[00:04:38] Speaker C: And then you went off to Iowa State. I think you're in the Iowa State hall of Fame, I am correct. Yeah. How important a formative experience was that for you?
[00:04:47] Speaker B: Bobby Randall, former Minnesota Twin second baseman, was my head coach there. And Lyle Smith was the gentleman that recruited me. He was the pitching coach. They really a transformation in my life. I was, I came in just reckless going out. Go out and play because you love the game. And all of a sudden I started learning about finer Techniques of why you do certain things within the game. How do you throw pitch sequences with that? Lyle helped me out with quite a bit.
There was a couple things going on with school that one of the assistant coaches, Mitch Sokol, that he went on to become a scout with the Nationals, he helped me out with some stuff. But Lyle taught me how to train, how to be tough, how to just go along, have a plan and have confidence in the pitch that you're going to throw at that given time.
[00:05:37] Speaker C: So you get drafted by the Giants. Correct.
What round was that and what do you recall about your draft experience?
[00:05:45] Speaker B: Got drafted by the Giants, fourth round in 1990.
And at the time I was out in Cape Cod getting ready for the Cape Cod League. We were going to open up the season a couple of days later, and all of a sudden I get a phone call at the house saying, hi, this is Tiny Tom, Todd Thomas. Tiny is his nickname. Todd Thomas. And we drafted you. I want to negotiate with you. Where you at? And I said, well, I'm out in Cape Cod. So he came out to Cape Cod and he arrived, we worked on a contract and started negotiating it out and came to an agreement on terms. And he goes, okay, the thing we can't do though, is we can't agree to it tonight.
I was like, well, how come? He goes, because we gotta go play golf tomorrow, otherwise the Giants are gonna put me on the plane first thing in the morning. So I said, okay, we won't agree until anything till I gotta talk to you tomorrow at 4 o'. Clock. So anyways, we golfed and got 18 holes in, had a nice lunch, talked about the contract a little bit more, talked about what minor league baseball would be like, because I don't have any relation from anybody of what that may be like. I never had talked to anybody about what professional ball was like. I just knew I wanted to advance and go try to get to the big leagues.
So he told me a little bit about that and then signed my contract and they shipped me off to Everett, Washington and started my pro career from there.
[00:07:01] Speaker C: So nowadays minor leaguers are unionized.
Back then they weren't. What do you recall about your minor league experience? Just in terms of conditions, bus rides, hotels.
What was it like?
[00:07:15] Speaker B: I would say, watch the movie Bull Durham. And if you see the movie Bull Durham, it has every possible thing I've seen in the minor leagues, from having a woman in the locker room to buses breaking down, to people having superstitions that are really weird. I don't think I ever Saw a garter belt, but you saw some other weird things going on. People get sent up, sent down, whether they're better or not than what you think your teammate might be. The organization has a plan, but they don't explain that to you when you get drafted.
And then going through and just dealing with the daily grind and working hard to move to the next step. So when you're in short season A, you're looking to go to the next level in the Midwest League. And then when I was in the Midwest League, I wanted to know what do I need to do to get to high A, which was in San Jose, California at the time. But I wanted to jump that and go to Shreveport right away because I wanted to make that step as fast as I possibly could. And I had a couple injuries along the way and then got Rule 5 in the minor leagues. The Marlins, when they were in the expansion draft going into the 93 season and then just worked my way from there and dealt with what it was like to be in aaa. And all of a sudden you're doing planes instead of long bus rides. And that was a little different because your plane leaves at 6 in the morning so you're having 4am wake up calls after a 7pm night game so you can get to the airport on time.
[00:08:30] Speaker C: Did it help you a little bit that you were a college kid as opposed to some of these kids who signed right out of high school? Do you feel a little bit more prepared for it?
[00:08:38] Speaker B: I don't know if I was more prepared for it.
Some people were prepared out of high school. I think they were groomed or they might have had the right agent. I really didn't have an agent when I was in the minor leagues. I was pitching well, negotiating my own deal. I pitched well and then got a bunch of phone calls from agents. And I'm just like, I don't even know who these people are or what an agent would do for me. I was just completely green when it came to the business of baseball.
And so I asked my roommate, I said, do you have an agent? He says, yeah. I said, who is he and where's he from? He told me who it is. He says, he's from Chicago. I said, I want to sign with them just so I could not get a phone call from anybody else. So I signed with them. And then when I actually was about to get to the big leagues and I was like, okay, now I need to really think about what's the interview process like in me interviewing an agent. Who do I talk to and how do I do things? And I got introduced to an agency when I was in the minor leagues and that's hit it off with the.
With a couple of guys in the agency and stayed with them my entire big league career.
[00:09:36] Speaker C: So as you said, you got rule fivedri you with the Marlins right at the beginning of the franchise.
And when I looked this up, I didn't actually realize this, but your major league debut, I believe, was April 25, 1995.
I said, wait, that was the day they returned from the strike.
So you were pitching in Edmonton, I think in 1994 with the trappers? Correct?
[00:10:02] Speaker B: I was with the Trappers that year, yeah.
[00:10:04] Speaker C: So while everything was going on in the big leagues with the strike and the cancellation of the World Series, what was your experience? Were you watching that as a guy who knew that he was going to be in the big league soon? And what do you remember about that period, which was a very contentious, fraught period in baseball history?
[00:10:23] Speaker B: So my introduction to the players association was get rule fived in on December 7th of 92, the 93. First big league camp. All right, geared up, ready to go. It's going to be great. Charlie Huff is there. Walt Weiss, former rookie of the year, is our shortstop.
You got all these different players that are coming in to go ahead, and it's going to be just fun, exciting. It's brand new baseball team, start from scratch, going to make a bunch of new friends, get to see a lot of new people.
And very first team meeting we have is Don Fear comes walking into our locker room because we're the first ones to have a union meeting that year. And he goes, all right, guys, we're going on strike next year.
I'm like, wait a second. I just got. This is big league camp. This is what it's all about.
So Brian Harvey was the player rep at the time, and then Walt Weiss is the assistant rep for the Marlins. And so I talked to Brian a little bit in camp. I'm like, what does this exactly mean? So in 94, they had told me a week or so before the strike was going to happen, said, hey, if there's not a strike, there's a good chance you're going to go to the big leagues and make your debut.
I was like, great, let's go, and went on strike. So I finished off the minor league season at the time and so then got married that winter and went to a couple meetings, sat on a couple of phone calls with our team where Brian Harvey would give us an update of what was going on. We didn't have Zoom back then or anything else. And so the true eye opening was when we had a huge meeting at a hotel in Orlando.
I was there for that. And it was roughly 200 ballplayers. Don Fear, Gene Orza came in the room, started explaining what was going on and wow, this is the business of baseball. I better understand what really is going on.
And so I really took a fast track educational class on what are we doing, why are we doing it and everything else.
Understood what was happening. I was going to stand by the guys and go from there. And ended up making the made the team out of camp in 1995. Came in blowout games. So I get mop up inning throw the top of the ninth inning with the against the Dodgers Mike Piazza still hit the hardest single off me. I think everybody evers hit off me. And then proceeded to get nobody scored. And then we almost had a chance to come back and win. And growing up A Cubs fan, 87 MVP Andre Dawson pinch hits for me. If he gets a base hit with a couple of guys on base, we win the game. And he ended up striking out. So that was the end of the game and it was a great debut. Just got married.
So we always said my wife was my good luck charm because I didn't get the big leagues without her. And then yeah, it was just a great night. Had family, flew in just for opening night. Never know if I'll ever pitch in a game or not. And they actually got to see me thrill. So it was pretty cool.
[00:13:14] Speaker C: Yeah, I actually looked that up. Mike, Mike Piazza, the first guy you face got a single. I think you walked Carrots and then you set him down in order.
[00:13:22] Speaker B: Yeah, there's a lot. Henry Rodriguez very hard line drive out that Rodriguez hit to Sheffield.
[00:13:28] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:13:28] Speaker B: And then a double play ball I believe. And that was, that was the inning. But at. I think it was Marlins Stadium and it wasn't Joe Rob might have been Joe Robbie. I forget in 95 what the name of the field was, but they had the manual scoreboard in left field and it was about 15, 20ft above the left field fence and it was part of the wall so you had to hit it over the wall like the Green Monster at Fenway and Piazza. The ball so hard two tiles fell down on that, on that wall. So it was a single but you know, thankfully it wasn't five feet higher. It would have been a home run.
[00:13:59] Speaker C: So I remember that time I was a baseball writer in Colorado and Don Baylor was the Manager and they brought in all these guys, they called them replacement players. And as a guy in the minors, did you get any pressure to play, you know, and cross the line?
[00:14:18] Speaker B: 40 man players with the Marlins were never asked.
So I was never asked to be a scab. I don't know how other organizations handled it, but I was on the 40 man protective roster at the time and it never was put on my plate.
[00:14:32] Speaker C: Just looking back at that time, did you feel like there were guys who were put in difficult positions?
It just seemed like an awfully tough, contentious Sparky Anderson wouldn't even manage the team and left.
[00:14:48] Speaker B: Well, there weren't cell phones back then, so it wasn't that off season. Communication with texting and email.
Nobody knew what an email was back then probably that I played with. So we basically there wasn't any outside pressure other than just I got married, I, I focused on getting ready for next season and went to Florida just to be there ready to go just in case the season was over. I didn't want a last minute pack from Arizona where we were living at the time and drive out to Florida in a day to open up camp. So we went out there early and I was just hanging out there and getting reports, got reports where I had Brian Harvey's home phone number. And so I'd call his home phone and every day or every other day and say, do we have any updates? Do we have any updates? What's going on? And he would let me know what's happening or not happening and I'd be like, all right, well I'll just keep on working out. And that was it. There wasn't any pressure for me. But I also didn't talk to a whole lot of people at that time that may have felt any type of pressure either.
[00:15:49] Speaker C: You mentioned that meeting in Orlando. Was that over the winter after the World Series was canceled or when was that meeting?
[00:15:56] Speaker B: That meeting was sometime the last week of January, first week of February. It was during the strike. Spring training was not to have taken. I think it might have been the start, the start weekend on the plan schedule. If we were going to open regular opening day like April 1st or 4th or whatever it might have been, but that's about when it was was beginning of February.
[00:16:22] Speaker C: I've heard you make comments where you said it's not the Major League Lawyers association, it's the Major League Baseball Players Association. You had an interview years ago where you said that, look, where are the bosses, where are the players?
And that meeting and those kinds of meetings. How did that enlighten you? Maybe in terms of players and their engagement and maybe sometimes they would disagree, but it would be contentious, but they would be unified.
How much of an education was it to go to a meeting like that and see 260 guys interacting?
[00:17:01] Speaker B: It was, I think 258 of the 260 were unified. There was one person that wanted to stand up and read something and he read it and he had another player there acting like his bodyguard. And I think most all the players that have been in the league for a while wanted to beat the tar out of both of these guys because they were spewing stuff out of their mouth that they really didn't know anything about. They didn't have the education about what they were talking about. They just wanted to talk and be heard and say, okay, well, I want to go make my money and I don't care about everybody else. Where the rest of those guys were not only were worried about what was happening with the other, with the 1200 guys on the 40 man or not, we had two teams late, so whatever that was.
1120 guys on the 40 man rosters at the time, they were worried. More worried about them and then more worried about what was coming in the next draft classes in the future and what the rights were going to be for the, for the players in the next couple of generations. So it almost came to a fistfight. And I would have been in awe because some of those names, it's like, wow, those guys been in how many World Series and this guy's been here and that guy's been there and there was a lot of talk and pretty much they got put in their place right away and they understood why they got put in their place. So they had a good learning lesson. Speaking up like that in front of so many people, did you dive into
[00:18:23] Speaker C: the history at all? Did you know about Curt Flood and Andy Messersmith and how did you learn about that?
[00:18:30] Speaker B: I learned about that organically through the number of years I just heard Don Fear speak in spring training and then also going to winter board meetings and having conversations with people. I never did a hard research, deep dive into who they were. You just sort of gradually learn a little bit more each year as Don Fear came in the locker rooms. Then when Michael Wiener and Tony Clark come in and they have talk about the start of it and why things happen. And then Marvin Miller and learning about him and just everything just sort of organically just was a learning process for me. It wasn't anything where I went out and outwardly did research, but if the name came up, I pull Don aside or pull Michael aside after a meeting. And I'd say, hey, you know, tell me a little bit more about the legal side of what was going on, and then everything else. And I did have an opportunity to meet Kurt Flood's widow one time, Judy, and that was pretty. That was pretty special. That was neat. She came to the office in New York for the Players association, and I just happened to be there on a rare whim because I'm rarely ever in New York, mostly on the West Coast. But I just met her, said hello, said hello, said hi, said thank you to what she had to endure of watching her husband go through that, and then she had to go do a bunch of other stuff. So it wasn't a long conversation. It was just a loan of thank you.
[00:19:54] Speaker A: Got him.
[00:19:55] Speaker C: That's a big strikeout for Mike Myers,
[00:19:58] Speaker A: really saving the Yankees bacon here in the eighth inning.
[00:20:01] Speaker C: When did you actually get involved in union leadership as a rep?
[00:20:05] Speaker B: When I was with the Tigers in 96 and 97. Travis Fryman was our player rep at the time. And I told Travis I was interested in everything going on. So if he could just give me the paperwork that would come in, because he'd get a package in the mail of papers he put out and or pamphlets from. Of numbers that he'd get from the pa and I'd get that information and just sort of try and learn and understand what it meant. And then in 90, I was an alternate rep with the Milwaukee Brewers.
Showed up to a board meeting that winter when we were in. I think we were in Las Vegas at the time, and there was an open pension rep spot of the four spots. And so I forget the person I was sitting next to, but I said, hey, why don't you just nominate me and I'll get to learn more and I'll do more. And he goes, you know, we nominate Mike. And there was nobody else to go against, so I got the vote. And from there, it was a lot of learning going on when you're a player, because you're really concentrating on your active career. You're not concentrating on a lot of other things that are going on. And then that's when I started to get involved. And so I'm still heavily involved the whole way through, as you know.
[00:21:14] Speaker C: How many hours of your life do you think you have spent reading about the MLV pension?
[00:21:21] Speaker B: Last week we have a pension meeting in about eight or ten days. Eight days.
And last week I got the materials, and so It'll be a good six hours of that, and that's four times a year, times 28 years, plus then conference calls, plus then the meetings themselves.
So whatever that amount adds up to, it's a lot. Plus then getting on planes to go to the meetings.
It's a lot.
[00:21:53] Speaker C: Nowadays when fans hear about negotiations, they hear about salaries and a salary cap and luxury taxes and that sort of thing.
I know you could probably talk for
[00:22:04] Speaker A: hours about this, but I guess if
[00:22:06] Speaker C: you were to explain to the uninitiated the importance of the pension as a foundational aspect of the union and what it's meant to players through the years, what have you learned just through all the hours you put in?
[00:22:23] Speaker B: The true education not only just comes in the materials that is there, but the education really comes from guys you run across that are still in the game, whether it be an old coach, a scout, somebody that you may meet at a alumni event.
They just come over and they say, hey, thanks for still fighting for our pension. You have no idea what that means. I was able to help me put my son and daughter through college that was able to pay my medical bills. Because as you get older, obviously healthcare keeps increasing by about 11 or 13% per year.
The pension dollars that you earn and having something there is very valuable. And not everybody makes the max pension. There's only about 7% of the players that'll ever make max pension.
So the rest of them, if you get a couple of years in the big leagues, are an average of two and a half years. Three years in the big leagues, you get something to fall back onto that you've earned in the past when Roth IRAs and weren't there 401ks weren't the fad and everything else with investments that these guys have something they can fall back on and go to when they need it and help pay enormous amount of bills. It's baseball players. Not all of them make the Shohei Ohtani money or the poster boy. Call it poster boy money, where you're making the huge dollars. A lot of them are as you're getting into the league, you'll make near the minimum for a couple of years. And then if you're a journeyman like myself, you made near the minimum for most of your career. And so having a pension that you've earned to go to eventually when you need it, it's super valuable. And the true thank yous from the old players is the true education of why we still need it.
[00:24:06] Speaker C: Do you think about this too when you look at society and you see, you know, people's parents work for companies where they had pensions. Now it seems like nobody does or very few companies do. What does that say about the PA through the years and all the battles it has, that it still has a pension when it's become, I don't want to say extinct, but more and more of a rare thing for people who work for companies.
[00:24:34] Speaker B: My true introduction to pensions was in 1985 or 86.
Eastern Airlines went away.
My best friend, his dad was a pilot for Eastern Airlines for 20 plus years and was going to fall back on his pension and all of a sudden they took it away and now he has no savings cause everything was just into the pension. And so he had to work an extra bunch of years where he had to find a different job, he had to do something else.
As he started to get older and his health started decrease, there wasn't the dollars there to go get specialty healthcare. And so that was my introduction to what a pension is and how valuable it is to have something like that.
[00:25:23] Speaker C: The other thing I think when I talk to people that they don't maybe quite understand how it works is dues. You know, union dues.
I mean, I've had people say to me, well, as a guy's dues contingent on how much money he makes, no, everybody pays the same dues, right?
[00:25:42] Speaker B: Every, every player, all the way from during my days, all the way from Alex Rodriguez with the biggest contract down to Mike Myers making minimaling salary was we all pay the same dues for the same day and that goes to pay due, have the office and the staff do their job back in New York, pay for all the expenses that go out to putting on the board meeting and doing different things within the players association to go ahead then and defend our rights.
[00:26:11] Speaker C: So you become pretty enmeshed in union leadership. And then you get to Arizona in 2002. I think Rick Helling was there, J. Bell was there. That's one where it got perilously close. It kind of fell through the cracks in terms of union history battles. But when I went back and read it was within hours, I think four hours away.
I believe they were going to talking about contracting two teams. There were luxury tax and competitive balance tax and revenue sharing.
[00:26:47] Speaker A: Questions.
[00:26:48] Speaker C: What do you remember about that negotiation and how tense was it before? I believe they negotiated the first CBA without a stoppage, right?
[00:26:57] Speaker B: That was the first CBA without a stoppage in a very long time. So I was on the phone quite a bit. There were midnight phone calls, 2am phone calls.
And it happened to be an off day. So I flew home from Arizona to Colorado to see my family. And so I'm taking phone calls and I was. It was basically a waste of the off day and seeing the family and trying to spend time with the kids. But it was more important about the business side at that time, just because we had less than 24 hours to get this deal done before we were going to go on strike.
And so get off the plane, go to the field. We're still not settled yet.
I want to say it was a Tuesday and I get to the field and I find out, get a phone call saying, okay, here's the. Here's the final deal. Do we want to accept it? And we accepted it. But it was, yeah, about three or four hours away from game time on the East Coast, I believe. But the player up for us at the time was Craig Counsel.
And so he was on phone calls. There was myself there.
Schilling was there, and he was a large, a large voice in the player association at the time.
Myself, Rick was there as well. So we did have really good union representatives. And it was also a very, very veteran heavy team that all but a couple of people would have been part of the 94, 95 strike. So they knew what, what was going on and why we need to continue keep fighting for our rights to advance and advance and enhance everything back to full.
[00:28:38] Speaker C: Red Sox fans have long to hear it.
[00:28:40] Speaker B: The Boston Red so Sox are world champions.
[00:28:44] Speaker C: Then you go to Boston in 2004 and you get a World Series ring.
What did that mean to you personally and where's the ring and do you ever wear it?
[00:28:53] Speaker B: Going to Boston. I got trade from Seattle to Boston a couple of days after the trade deadline. Get there through. And also we went on this. We went on a tear and just I think we won 25 games.
We were like 25 and eight or something, like 25 and 10 after I got there or something like that. It was just a great streak. We went on and carried that momentum in through the playoffs and got the greatest comeback ever against the Yankees that year, winning it in St. Louis, having a great party there and then on the plane and getting back and just all the people at Boston, it was really cool. A special time to be there.
That place is always hopping when they got a good team. And it's so much fun to be in Fenway and times that I will never forget. But I think that year was special for a few things. And that was, I think September 9th or 10th. That year, I accumulated 10 years in the big leagues. And then I went and we won the World Series. And afterwards, then, right after the World Series, my wife and I took off and went to Australia to celebrate 10 years of marriage. And I'm like, I don't need anything else. This is great. This is all I've ever wanted, is just get my 10 years in the big leagues, get that World Series ring. But it would be nice to get another one, and it was a special time.
[00:30:08] Speaker C: When I look at your career, 883 appearances, you had what, 12 years, I think you had an accomplished career, yet you moved around a lot. I mean, every year you're with a team, I mean, I could take the next three minutes and go through each step.
You know, trade rule 5, waivers, free agency.
What did maybe it mean to you to know that the union protections and things, that the union is there for moving expenses or moving your car, just helping your family.
How do those two things intertwine for you a little bit? Could you appreciate it a little bit more as a guy who, who did have this career? We moved around.
[00:30:59] Speaker B: One of the reasons I got involved and wanted to work for the Players association is I didn't know that moving expenses and everything were part of it. So I came out of my pocket for a lot and never asked for reimbursement. Nobody told me, you're reimbursed, and if you don't ask the clubs a lot of times back when I was playing, a lot of times, they wouldn't say, hey, give me your receipts and we'll reimburse you for this, that, or the other thing.
So I came out of pocket a lot. And then when I found out, oh, by the way, the clubs are supposed to do this, and I was like, oh, well, I need back pain. They're like, no, no, you need to expense it out in a certain. You only have a certain time frame to do it. And I was like, okay, I need to get more involved with this here, and I need to do some stuff.
But knowing that the protection rights of the uniform player contract were there, it was very important. And then understanding why you had the Rule 5 draft, why you, why trades work the way they do, why the waiver wire is what it is, why the trade deadlines at that time, if you have to go through waivers after the July 31, the trade deadline. So everybody was playing left field, GM and during batting practice, and every time you look up in the GM's booth, GM booth in the field to see if the phone is picking up the phone and then you start guessing who's getting trade or sent where, who's coming to our team. And those were. Those were actually fun times. It was really good. But having the collective bargaining rights with the CBA going on and having them protect us was very important and something I'll cherish forever.
[00:32:27] Speaker C: This is also an opportunity maybe for you to win a couple points at home, but I went to the park today and I think I had three players say to me, you know, we're doing this and we just had a baby, but the wives are the true heroes.
[00:32:41] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:32:42] Speaker C: Can you speak to that?
[00:32:44] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, that's. I've. We have three children and had our first kid after when I first full year in the big leagues in 96.
And our third one was born in 2000 when I was with the Rockies at the time. And that was my fourth organization.
Four years, five years, basically.
So it was having mama take care of the kids at home is a wonderful thing. And she was a trooper. She knew what she was getting into. She wanted to be a mom from the day I met her, and I couldn't wait to be a dad. So we made it work somehow, some way, with all the travel and all the moving around that I did. She enjoyed it because she got to meet a lot of new, different people and see different places and get to know when you visit Milwaukee. And I was a brewer for in 98, 99. When you get to go to visit Milwaukee, it's no offense to Milwaukee, but you can't wait to leave. But when you play in Milwaukee, you don't want to leave. It's such a great city. It's such a family friendly city. It's got Blueberry Fest, Music Fest, Rhubarb Festival next weekend, Bike Week, another music week. There's always something to do for the families when the players are on the road.
And that's the beauty of being able to go around and see in different places and doing different things as you have. You get to know different cities for a lot more than just three nights in a hotel and maybe one or two different restaurants you may go to. And then if you had a good meal, you're going to go back to it and you won't really discover anything else in the city. So playing in, playing in a lot of different places, that was. It was actually rewarding for us as a family.
[00:34:15] Speaker C: I want to talk to you just a little bit, and you've been gracious to go answer all these things, but about your, what you're doing now, but I did want to mention four people during your career quickly, just to get memories or how they influenced you. The first was a non union person, Al Kaline apparently had a big influence on your career.
[00:34:36] Speaker A: Correct.
[00:34:37] Speaker B: Al Kaline was there when the union started back in 66.
He was in the World Series in 68 with the Tigers. So Al was a big influence when I was with the Tigers at the time I was over the top, the three quarter angle, left hander, just fastball, slider. And my first couple of games when I got traded over to the Tigers, I got knocked around a little bit by Cleveland, Minnesota and Al and I had a conversation on the plane on the way to Toronto and he goes, how come you never decided to throw or how come you don't throw sidearm? Here's why I can't hit a sidearm. And this, that the other thing. He goes, you need some type of funkiness in order to have a career other than just a couple of months or maybe a year.
And so I went to the bullpen and Ralph Trul was the pitching coach at the time. Jeff Jones is the bullpen coach. And I'm throwing to Jeff and when I get done throwing, Ralph just looked at me and said, okay, it's a hundred dollar fine. Every time I see your hand above your shoulder, well, I guess I'm throwing sidearm. That was really, that was really what it amounted to. And then after first game I threw sidearm against the Orioles. Sparky Anderson just put his arm around me and said, kid, you can pitch for about 13 or 14 years in the big league's doing that.
And then I did it again the next day and then the next day. And when you're in the good graces of Sparky, you throw every day. And so I think I threw 13 games in 18 days or something like that. And I just worked and then have a couple left handers like yelling at me as they're. As I hit a weak ground ball, the second base or hit a weak pop up, they'd be like, get your arm up. And I was like, oh, that means it's working. So I stayed with it. So it was good.
[00:36:06] Speaker C: And obviously when you played the guys who were running the union at the time you mentioned Don Fear and Gene Orza, you were in the trenches with them a lot. Were there any things they imparted to you through the years, any memories you had, anything about their style that you remember made them successful and contributed to the success of the PA when they were in church?
[00:36:35] Speaker B: Don and Gene Spoke differently to you as a person.
Don used a little bit more of a softer voice and more of an educational type thing. And Gene was, here's what it is and here's why you need to have it. And you get more animated with certain things. But then you'd go into. And I was like, give me the explanations. Why? Because I think one of the biggest questions that people have a hard time answering is why no matter what you say.
And so Jean would give you a lot of why behind the questions. And then how the Domino affected from 10 year guys down to 6 year, 8 year to 6 year, to 4 year to 2 year guys to rookies. They really would give you.
If you do this for this group of players, then it affects that group of players. Because of this, you do everything for the whole.
And so it was a great education and talking with those guys and then carried over to Michael Wiener. And Michael Wiener was always about the hole as well. And.
[00:37:32] Speaker C: And Michael was the other person, obviously, that I did want to mention to you people who didn't know Michael. When you say, it's hard to describe him, but how would you describe him?
[00:37:42] Speaker B: Chuck Connor converse. That's the easiest way to say it.
Didn't care how he looked, didn't care about anything else other than his comfort of his feet and Chuck Connor Converse. And he was somebody that would always make you feel like your next door neighbor.
And then unfortunately, with what happened to him having brain cancer and everything else, I'd. The one question I remember asking him specifically, that's one of the only personal questions I've ever asked him is what do you miss the most going through the cancer treatment? He goes, I miss having a Miller Light.
[00:38:15] Speaker C: Really?
[00:38:16] Speaker B: So I was like, all right. So the day of his passing, I went and had a Miller Light for him.
[00:38:19] Speaker C: Oh, man.
[00:38:20] Speaker B: So I don't drink beer. Yeah.
[00:38:22] Speaker A: Geez, that's pretty.
That's.
[00:38:25] Speaker C: That's pretty poignant memory.
[00:38:26] Speaker A: Jeez.
Yeah.
[00:38:29] Speaker C: So you did go to work for the PA in 2009?
[00:38:32] Speaker B: I believe I got hired in 2009, yep.
[00:38:35] Speaker C: As a special assistant. You probably earn more clubhouses than anybody. Can you just describe your job a little bit?
What you do and the areas that you're entrusted with and your relationships to players?
[00:38:50] Speaker B: Easiest way to say it is educate the players on what they have, why they haven't, and how not to mess it up in the next cba. Bargaining in the next negotiation, but get involved with their career on a daily basis. I do anything and everything for the player except for negotiate their Actual uniform, player contract. So player gets called up, sent down, traded, released. We'll send them a quick, quick message. Here are your rights within that. Here's what the CBA has for you. Any questions, please let me know when, if I find out they're going to have a child, I'll be like, hey, make sure, you know, this is the timing. And when you want to put them on to the insurance, get them on right away. And then I deal with their pension, educate them on, you know, what the pension is, why they have it, what their 401k is, why they have it, how, what Certain guys know what's going on, other guys are leaving alone. Don't do it. And I'll try to wrap my arm around them somehow just so I can feed them information so they have it. Just in case something were to happen.
I will try to mentally help guys out through the arbitration process and what goes on there if they, if they do go to arbitration hearing or preparing for an off season of negotiation. If you're a free agent, hey, here's things you may want to think about. Ask, you know, ask your agent about, make sure you're involved.
Understand that I try to make the players bottom line is it's not the agent's career, it's your career. You should really know what's going on. You should understand everything that's happening. Then just go out and play ball. And if you got a question about anything that's happening in the business, ball, give me a call. I'm there for you.
[00:40:27] Speaker C: Finally. You know, when I look back at your career, I went into Baseball Reference and I actually looked up the term loogie L O G Y.
[00:40:35] Speaker B: Thanks to Jason Stark.
[00:40:37] Speaker C: Yeah. Was it Jason?
[00:40:38] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:40:39] Speaker C: And it says Jesse Orozco was sort of the patron saint, but they say other prominent guys were Mike Myers, you're the first one. Javier Lopez, Randy Choate, Trevor Miller and Will Omen. Those are five guys they mentioned.
[00:40:54] Speaker B: Well, they're doing that by age then, obviously.
[00:40:56] Speaker A: Yes. Right, but. But
[00:40:59] Speaker C: is that an area where you took pride in? You had a specialty and you did it so well. Like Sparky said, you can pitch this many years. When you look back at your career, being in 883 games, it was a special skill. What do you take the most pride in?
[00:41:18] Speaker B: I had from the time I made my major league debut to the last game I pitched in the big leagues, I had five games I wasn't available for. Other than that, I was right. I was considered myself an everyday pitcher. So it was. If you need me.
Managers use me in a lot of different ways. They'd use me, come in on one Friday night in Seattle you get Griffey. On Saturday night in Seattle you get Griffey. And on Sunday we'll throw you a bone. You get Joey Cora, Alex Rodriguez and Griffey.
And Sundays in San Francisco is the same thing. It'd be you get Bonds on Friday, you get Bonds on Saturday. If you do your job, you get Ray Durham, Rich Aurelia, and you get Barry and then you're out of the game because then coming up is Kent and Santiago, right handers. So I took pride in being and then if there was a blowout game, they'd be like, hey, suck up the last two innings because we know you can pitch again tomorrow and still be effective.
So it was an area I took pride in, is being ready to go every day pitching in different roles.
Longest I ever threw in my career was four and a third innings because we just needed somebody to throw the last four against Seattle when I was with the Yankees with Joe Torrey and But I throw every day, prepare my body physically, mentally prepare myself walking out of the stadium.
So in all respect and it's not blowing smoke to have your name in the same sentence as Jesse Orozco is pretty cool.
[00:42:43] Speaker A: Thanks to Mike Myers for sharing his insights and his personal story. This has been an episode of Stitch by Stitch, connecting players from the past, present and future. This episode was written and produced by Jerry Krasnick with research and production support from Pablo Okuriz, Pablo Bowser, Jordan Score, and Eva Amarez. This episode was edited and mixed by Mark Levine, with additional video editing from David Hattie and Michael Scribonia. Our supervising producer was Rachel Gross, Emily Kless provided art direction and media strategy, and our executive producers were Roz Guevara and Gretchen Mueller. The Stitch by Stitch podcast is an MLBPA Audio original.
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