Join right now by the busiest man at camel Back Ranch, and that is Dodger pitching coach Mark Pryor.
Mark, thanks a lot for the time, No problem anytime.
Let's just get everything out of the way that we need to get out of the way. Blake's now, go ahead, you geld roast me for that if you want, and then we'll get on.
We'll move on with the interview.
Bike Bike's Bike's been great. Uh, he's been He's been enjoyed to having camp and it's nice to have him on our side. Finally, all right.
The other thing that's been burning in my skull the entire offseason was getting your first hand account of Walker Buehler going out to the bullpen kind of on his own and then coming in in Game five of the World Series to close it out. Can you take us through those events?
Yeah, I mean I can take it through. I mean I can confirm, I can confirm what he said on some other platforms is pretty much true. I was unaware of a lot of those conversations that had happened throughout the Horse of the day and right around the fourth fish maybe fifth inning, I got a tap on the shoulder saying hey, Walker's walking down to the bullpen. And I was kind of like okay and called him and
called down and said what are you doing? And he kind of said, hey, well, you know they told me if it got you know, if I got squirrelier sideways, and I said, okay, I'll call you later. And and then obviously it got you know, got crazy, and uh called down again and said where are you at? And he's like, I'll let you know here in a minute, which for me was code of yeah, okay, he has no idea.
He hasn't thrown.
Yet, so knew where he was at. I mean I knew that, you know, if he was down there, he could pitch obviously, to to what extent. You know, those are always the you know, those questions of like is it is it ten pitches? Can he go twenty pitches? You know, you don't know. Fortunately we didn't need that many, so uh uh but he was yeah, so all, I mean, that's what it is. It was all true, like he had conversations. That's what Walker does, and you know, worked out well for everybody.
I'm just curious from your standpoint. You're the pitching coach.
You're not privy to whatever he told Andrew and Gomes on the bus, you hang up the phone to the bullpen after talking to him. What's going through your mind at that point in time in the game, do you what did you tell Dave Roberts just because of where the game was at after Jack didn't go very deep.
Yeah, I mean I basically told Doc like, he's you know, he's down there. He says he's available to pitch, and you know, I think we all were under the assumption it was probably you know, one, you know, he had one shot basically, whether that was one clean inning or to start the ending clean or if we had to bring him in the middle of an inning. I wasn't gonna be a situation where he sat back down and
probably went back out. So we just had to kind of see where we're at, and you know, Blake is what Blake did got us to the point where we can use him in that situation. I think if if Blake doesn't get as deep as he did, you know, then we're making a decision on reusing you know, Walker potentially in the eighth and then you know, we're pretty short at that point, so I'm not really sure what
we were going to do in the ninth. So I think a lot of the credit for Walker even pitching that game really goes to to Blake trying and and being able to get us get us through the eighth.
Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up. I've mentioned this to Dave a few times. I'm a firm believer that one of the great moments of that World Series run was Dave going out there without having his mind made up on whether he was going to take Trinon out of that game at that point in time. What did you think when Dave left the dugout and went out there to just check the temperature.
Yeah, I mean, it's one of those things where it's not an easy decision for a manager, any manager, And honestly, in you know, some of those decisions are easier than others when it's June second, you know, on a Tuesday night, but you know, in playoff baseball, they're not easy decisions. You're making a decision on what you're looking at, how he's been throwing the baseball, knowing your bullpen is down there with the guys who are on fumes, especially that
late in October. But you know, Ben and obviously just pitched Landon probably wasn't in a position to pitch. You have Walker who had pitched two days before that, so
you're dealing with a fatigued groups. You don't know what's coming out of that bullpen, and you know, I've never been in that situation as a manager, but you're going out there to figure out is the guy on the mound, you know, does he still have enough you know, energy and enough fuel in the tank to be able to compete at a high level.
Mark Pryor, Dodgers pitching coach, he is our guest.
The bullpen unprecedented, the way they kind of carriede you guys through with limited amount of starters. What's it like in spring training now? The residual effect of pitching longer and deeper than they ever have before and being leaned upon.
Yeah, yeah, no, I mean they're all those are all real things, you know. I think that's why there's always a uh, I guess, a championship hangover in all sports. You know, you're playing longer, guys are banged up when you're trying to win the thing. You know, we got some guys obviously that are still kind of nursing back from some of their injuries, you're trying to manage a little bit of rest and then a short offseason, even shorter going to Japan. You know, I think our guys
are in a good spot, you know right now. You know, we've got them going, you know, at a normal pace. I think we'll monitor kind of their worklad through spring training and through maybe the first week or two of the season. But they're all extremely professional. They know what they you know, they know what they're at, you know,
they know how to prepare. But what they did last year was again, it was unprecedented, and we knew we needed some we needed performances like that from individuals and then the staff collectively to put us in a position to strike. And we knew we were gonna take some take some lumps along the way, and fortunately we had some guys step up in those games that allowed us to do what we needed to do with our bullpenper.
Strike hard strike first.
Yeah.
Mark Pryor, Dodgers pitching coach, is our guest show.
Heyo Tani.
Mark is starting to experiment with pitching out of the wind up.
Where did that all come from?
I mean, that's something that he was looking to do, and like you said, I think he's mentioned he's always trying to get better and do some things, and he wanted to feel some energy. Wasn't something that you know necessarily, you know, I brought to the table something that he did, and I like it. I mean, I always like guys and deliveries. Sometimes you move guys to stretch only to simplify things, but I like when guys have some athleticism
and some rhythm in their delivery. I think it helps her timing, and so I think that's what he's messing around with right now.
Do you believe part of the equation is to try to take some stress off the elbow or the arm.
I think it can help with guys is sequencing and timing that ultimately will take some, hopefully some stress off an arm. To say that pitching out the wind up is less stressful than pitching out the stretches, No, but it's it's again, it's all about getting into certain positions for that individual. Some guys do it better with the help of the wind up and the timing. Some guys don't.
So it's you know, it's unique to that person. But again, I think for him right now, you know, trying to get a little bit more rhythm in than diming, and so it's not so choppy, so to speak, and make sure he's not in kind of rehab mode and he's in more of like I'm getting ready to pitch and compete in games.
Thanks a lot for the time, Mark, congratulations on being a two time World Series champion as the Dodgers pitching coach. And we look forward to what this staff has to bring for us.
Yeah, it's gonna be another fun year and we're all looking forward to it.
All right, the rest of your lab crew is waiting for you, so I'll let you go. Thanks a lot for the time, No problem, Thank you,