What’s the biggest challenge or adjustment going into professional baseball?
BD: The most important thing is being able to understand how to handle being a professional when you’re at the field six or seven days a week. In college, we play midweek and then three games on the weekend, so there is a lot of time in between to practice if you didn’t swing well or reset mentally if you didn’t have a good game. The biggest thing with pro ball is you’re living and breathing it every single day. Being able to mentally understand how you’re feeling, how your swing’s feeling, where you’re at physically; being able to play when you’re 100% and being able to play and still produce when you’re feeling 65, 70, 75%; those are some of the most challenging things for players when they get into pro ball. And finally, just staying healthy. That’s something I had this year, going through a whole season and mentally being able to be in the moment, enjoy where I was at and take advantage of the opportunity I was given.
JH: I think the biggest challenge isn’t anything physical, it’s a lot mental. You go from playing maybe every weekend and sprinkling in one or two games during the week to playing every day. You have to lock in every day to do your job which is help your team win baseball games. So while it’s nice to only focus on baseball, there’s also a give and take. That’s all you think about and you get really good at it, but it can start to drain you mentally if you think about it the wrong way. If you end up struggling, which happens to players at every level, you need to find a way to get out of that rut mentally so you can stay focused and come out of it on the other side.
What’s the most memorable experience of your pro career so far, or that moment you felt like you arrived or truly belonged in pro baseball?
BD: For me it was my first game of the season. I didn’t play the first two days and I got put in the third day. The first at-bat, I think I grounded out. I put together a tough second at-bat, and on a 3-2 count I was able to hit a curveball line drive over the second baseman’s head. The third at-bat I come up, we’re down by two or three and it was either a game-tying or go-ahead home run I was able to hit first pitch. It was one of those where I hit it and felt it right away. One of those moments where after not playing the first two days, it didn’t matter. I got an opportunity and took advantage. And I felt confident in the moment that all the work I put in through the offseason—Spring Training and even the days I wasn’t playing when I was still working on things and making sure I was ready for my chance—and just kind of took off from there and had the year that I did.
JH: Hitting my first home run was a big one. I never knew I had that in me because I hadn’t done it before. I hit my first one the last game of 2022 and then I came out this past year and hit five or six in the first two months. So that’s where I really started to get confidence in my game and compete with everybody else. That was the one thing I felt like I was missing from everybody else. Everybody else can hit a home run but I have yet to hit one. So as small as that sounds, getting that first one out of the way was a big weight off my shoulders. Now I’m at the point where I just want to try and consistently barrel up baseballs and if it happens to go over the fence, then great.
What are you looking forward to the most about your first big league camp?
BD: The thing I’m looking forward to most is being around the different players, guys like McLain who are still really young in the big leagues. Also being around guys like India, Stephenson and Friedl who have been in the big leagues a few years now and just picking the brains of everyone there. Everybody’s going to have different aspects or pieces of knowledge that I can take from them to help me become a better player. But I’m also really excited to blend in and mix myself into that group because I feel my style of play is very similar to what the Reds were preaching last year with the aggressiveness and hard-nosed ballplayers. That’s who I am and that’s what I’ll always be. And I think that’s something that will show in Spring Training when I get out on the field.
JH: The cool thing about this Spring Training and how the Reds system is pretty stacked right now is I’ve played with a lot of the guys that are already there. One of the guys I’m looking forward to learning from and playing with is TJ Friedl. I think we have a very similar game style. But what I’m looking forward to most is going out there, competing, and trying not to put a lot of pressure on myself going into my first Spring Training. Obviously, I want to do my best, compete and compete to win, but that’s not something I have to worry about. I think that competitive mode automatically flips on once you’re there, so it’ll be fun no matter how it turns out.
Do you set goals or expectations each year?
BD: I like to set goals. For me last year, my goal was to at least get to Double-A. Obviously, the higher up you go the better, so if it would have been possible to get to Triple-A then that would have been one of my goals as well. But I knew I was starting in High-A and know it’s very hard for guys to make multiple jumps to different levels in one season, so I at least wanted to get to Double-A and once I got there, take it wherever the season went. It was an awesome experience to finish the season in Double-A with that playoff atmosphere. I think that was really important for me and some of the guys who were there the whole season. So that was my big goal, but I also wanted to stay healthy all year. I had so many injuries in 2022, so I wanted to stay healthy and give myself a chance and let the numbers and play on the field speak for itself.
JH: I go in with a fresh mindset. I think the tough thing about goals, especially objective goals like trying to hit a certain number, is you can tell very quickly whether you’re going to hit that number. And then you start to press to try and reach a certain number when that’s not really what the game of baseball is about. I think there’s a lot of different ways you can impact a ballclub, so I try to think more about the intangibles: being a good teammate, being mentally locked in and focused, always ready to go. And if I’m able to take care of those things, the objective goals are going to take care of themselves.