Mark Shapiro

Looking forward to that professionalism, though I think I missed a joke.

I don't know.

Half a good teammate, trying to be a good teammate, but he just didn't finish it.

Exactly.

Let me think about that for a minute.

Yeah, I mean, the opening ceremony, I don't know if you had a chance to watch that, the pregame.

It was 30 minutes long, so not the typical, you know.

Normally, I'm always kind of like, okay, let's just get past this.

Let's get past the intros.

You know, let's get started.

But it was a good...

opportunity to reflect and appreciate and really appreciate the fans and the players have a chance to do that and i think it was part of turning the page um and i think it's been a balance like that's that's the fact like there is a piece and part of last year that will always be part of this team and this group of guys which is largely the same and yet the nature of baseball with 162

ahead and how hard that journey is, particularly in the division we're in, we can't just run it back.

That's a popular fan refrain, but it just doesn't work.

This has to be organic.

Our guys have to take the good part of last year, what it means to be a good teammate like O-Dog was for you.

what it means to be a good teammate, you know, and how much they care about each other.

And you could see that in the dugout from Kaz's home run to the way, you know, Gause and Cease and Scherzer were on the top rail, you know, cheering on Lauer yesterday.

You could just see it.

These guys care about each other and are pulling for each other to the toughness and resilience that it requires to handle what will come.