The veteran of the Red Sox shares the advice of the playoffs which he transmits to the Recruue Arms
New York – Of the 26 men of the active alignment of his team, only Garrett Whitlock can say that he has traveled the fascinating and intimidating October baseball glove as a recruit launcher of the Red Sox.
Its beginnings in the playoff series on October 5, 2021 were an event with high issues of a multilayer variety. Less than a year after New York has chosen not to protect it from the draft of Rule 5, allowing Boston to pick it up, Alex Cora used Whitlock to end the Yankees qualifying series.
Whitlock was also the last mound launcher in the last game in a single game in the American League, Winner-Takes-All. (Major League Baseball extended the Joker to three teams per league the following year.)
Almost exactly four years later, Whitlock and the Red Sox have been about to play October baseball for the first time since.
He is the veteran now, and it is a responsibility that he does not take lightly. Long before the Red Sox hit their eliminatory ticket on Friday, he was already trying to follow in the footsteps of the 2018 World Series hero Nathan Eovaldi, who became a mentor and friend in 21. This is why Whitlock was sitting at the back of the team bus with the recruits Connelly Early and Payton Tolle, and Kyle Harrison, who is not a recommence with the Red Sox in the trade of Rafael Devers of June.
“I sit there because that’s what Nate did with me,” Whitlock told Herald. “And if they have questions – most of the time, they ask questions. I never want to get into anything, so most of the time, these are questions. But I hope I tried to show them that I am open.”
Star Wars fans – and there are several on the Red Sox of this year – would say that Eovaldi was Yoda from Whitlock, he is Obi -Wan Kenobi, and these are his trio of Luke Skywalkers. Whitlock does not take care of the comparison. If he is invited, he can perfectly imitate Sir Alec Guinness’ Obi-Wan.
Conversations can be technical: routines, pitch handles or experience with a particular opponent. Whitlock’s advice on how to navigate in high stake situations come from another former Red Sox teammate.
“What I said to Tolle, and early, and Harry,” said Whitlock, using Harrison’s nickname, “when you enter the playoffs, there will be all this pressure, and you will feel it. But the greatest thing that Chris Dirty told me is that you do not focus.
“You have developed your tail, you have put in the process. Believe him, it will take care of himself … With this state of mind, you will be much more free. It’s like: “I can do it”. And then you live with the results after that.
The advice of veterans are a key element in the mentality of the TAGENCIAL staff team. Whether you are injured, in good health, from this day, when closed, available from the lift enclosure, you can contribute every day.
Liam Hendriks launched on May 27 last time before making the injured list with hip inflammation, but has always been at the stage every day. If his four years of experience in the playoff series (and 14 big league seasons) have taught him something, it is because the playoffs are a completely different animal.
“There is more pressure on each ground,” Hendriks said to Herald. “So there is more weight on each ground, there is more weight on each swing. Some guys thrive on it because they can either be locking this little more, or they can also keep it as it is. It depends on who you are.”
Hendriks underlined the Astros of Houston, whose eight-year mooring sequence in the playoffs ended during the last weekend of the regular season. Strolling for athletics from 2016 to 2010, he saw first -hand how they made things go by at the next level in October.
“What they have done in the last decade, they had a different level when they arrived at the playoffs,” said Hendriks. “Being with them for a long period of that moment, we would go against them in the season and we would do well against them, then the playoffs would come and they would simply be different. It was different. They stopped swinging on the grounds where they swung. They would start hitting our mistakes. Everything turned out to have been advanced.
“And from the back of this, with the A, we started to shoot the grounds before. We started too much of these two -strike terrains to put ourselves in bad counts, putting too much pressure on the situations. Like me in the Joker’s game in 2018, I was a little too amplified and I was trying to do too many means, and it is simply possible. You just need to find what works for you, and it just comes with experience. “”
“With the experience, you know, I have the impression that you continue to take more and more composure in the situations that require it the most,” said the left-hander Garrett Crochet.
Relying on the end of the regular part of the regular season of what he nicknamed his “Year of Health”, Whitlock understands more than ever than the seasons like this, the opportunities to acquire this very specific type of experience, are rare. He wants recruits to recognize this now, without having to undergo all injuries and setbacks as he did.
“I said to them:” The guys, you can’t put it in words “, said Whitlock.
Friday evening, a clubhouse full of champagne signaled, Whitlock and Crochet told them to stop and feel the roses of October because they do not flourish every year.
“I said to recruits when we celebrate the running-in, it could be the only time you can do this as a major feature,” recalls hook, “so let’s take advantage and feel good about our skin.”
“After having all the dogs and just like that, and we all returned to the clubhouse to celebrate, I stopped Tolle just behind the mound of the launcher,” said Whitlock, “and I said to myself:” Brother, just take a tour with your eyes. Look, because it doesn’t happen every day. “”
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