TOUGH TALKS: Garrett Richards, Converting Adversity Into Fuel

Here is an AI transcript of the whole episode:

[00:00:00] Garrett Richards: I think mental toughness is kind of controlling a game. Me being, I kind of look at it as me controlling the game. I, you know, I’m a starting pitcher so nothing happens until I make it happen. And, you know, I was told that when I was in little league, you know, or whatever. maybe my first year of kid pitch.

[00:00:16] Garrett Richards: Say it again. I mean that’s kind of like the first thing that the coaches tell you when you’re in little league. Nothing happens until you make it happen. Nothing happens until you make it happen. There’s no action until you want to throw the ball. The game is totally on you. Oh, right, right. And so from a starting pitching standpoint, or even a pitcher standpoint, you know, relief pitchers control the game as well.

[00:00:34] Garrett Richards: I just think that it’s, you know, unique that we, you know, you’re in a position to control the game. You know, position players, they’re at our mercy, you know. There’s guys that are doing different things with trying to disrupt timing and all kinds of different stuff. And that’s kind of become, you know, a major part of pitching now and, you know, it’s just crazy.

[00:00:53] Garrett Richards: So I look at it from a controlling the game standpoint. You know, when the game’s getting outta control. How do you get yourself to [00:01:00] a place where you can get back to controlling the game? Sometimes the game snowballs and controls you, but how do you get yourself back? How do you flip it back to the other way?

[00:01:09] Chris Dorris: Most of us never learned how to train our brains. Which is why most of us needlessly, settle, struggle, and worse suffer. My name is Chris Doris and I wanna make brain training mainstream. This is my series, tough Talks, conversations on Mental Toughness. I’m interviewing bad asses from all walks of life on what mental toughness means to them and their unique approaches to strengthening their minds.

[00:01:36] Garrett Richards: Hey

[00:01:36] Chris Dorris: everybody. Welcome back to Tuf Hawks, conversations on Mental Toughness. And I’m your host, Chris Doris. Thanks for joining today. Our guest is a major league baseball, superstar pitcher, Garrett Richards. Now, I’d known Garrett for the better part of a decade. I knew him before he threw his first Major League pitch, and we’re gonna talk about that first major League game.

[00:01:59] Chris Dorris: cuz it, [00:02:00] it was, it didn’t go the way he wanted it to. And I’m really interested in hearing, and I have a pretty reasonable idea of where I think he’s gonna go with it. In fact, I’m certain, although we haven’t talked about that, I promise you, we did not talk about that in advance. But I know him really well because I’ve, you know, I’ve been his friend for a while.

[00:02:16] Chris Dorris: I had the great privilege of attending his wedding in Cabo a few years ago, and it’s crazy that it was already that long ago. and so this, today, this is kind of cool. This is actually better than kind of cool. It’s extremely cool. This is

[00:02:29] Garrett Richards: our first ever,

[00:02:30] Chris Dorris: live tough talks, being filmed with a film crew in a public place.

[00:02:35] Chris Dorris: We’re going over to,a nearby my favorite watering hole, which is called The Hungry Monk here in Chandler, Arizona. And that was his idea. That’s where we met. he married, a friend of mine. And that’s how I know him. So, you know, we’ve been friends. I don’t think of Garrett as a famous pitcher. I think of him as a buddy, but he’s a famous pitcher.

[00:02:55] Chris Dorris: and that’s cool because that’s a unique perspective. I haven’t had any, active, I haven’t had any, [00:03:00] you know, starting pitchers, from Major League baseball. He’s a starter and he’s not starting right now. He plays for the, San Diego Padres, which is actually really cool because he just became a padre himself.

[00:03:09] Chris Dorris: He’s got a new kid. baby rigs, who’s adorable, and I think eight, seven or eight months old. And, anyway, he’s, he plays for the Padres, but he’s recovering from Tommy John’s surgery. And we’re gonna get into the details of that cuz it’s not just one, it’s not just one injury, it’s not just one armed surgery either.

[00:03:27] Chris Dorris: So he’s, you know, he’s had a long road here and I really want to get into his mind about, you know, the relationship between that and, And mental toughness. So he’s good. Not just that he’s gonna have plenty to say. I know he actually has, worked. I never coached Garrett. He has, however, been coached by the late great Dr.

[00:03:45] Chris Dorris: Ken Viza, who was a mentor of mine. And we never knew that, until after we got to know each other and, you know, started talking about it and that’s pretty cool. So anyway, with, no, I’m gonna go head over. I gotta bounce over across the street and go find him. He’s actually already over there. So, there’s a film crew setting [00:04:00] up and I gotta.

[00:04:01] Chris Dorris: I gotta hustle up. So let’s go find the dude. Here he is, folks, the man, the legend, G Rich, Gary Richards brother. Cheers. Cheers.

[00:04:09] Garrett Richards: Cheers. Here we are. Cheers. Cheers to you. Thanks for having me. And well, of course,

[00:04:13] Chris Dorris: thanks. This is actually on demand. we established this a very long time ago. It’s rude to tonight.

[00:04:17] Chris Dorris: Take a sip when you cheers. Absolutely. We are here. We have to give a shout out to our host, Jim Lolly, who’s the owner. Of this fabulous craft beer joint called The Hungry Monk here in Chand in Arizona where I actually met you the better part. Yeah, the better part of a decade ago, as a matter of fact coming up.

[00:04:40] Garrett Richards: So yeah,

[00:04:41] Chris Dorris: so, so I met you because you married a good friend of mine, a very good friend of mine, the daughter of one of my best friends in the

[00:04:50] Garrett Richards: world, Taylor. I am one of the few. tatter salad.

[00:04:53] Chris Dorris: She, your wife is not the daughter of

[00:04:55] Garrett Richards: Tatter salad. You know, you know how we look

[00:04:57] Chris Dorris: at that though. You know how we look at that, [00:05:00] Chris?

[00:05:00] Chris Dorris: So Jim Tate and, Dana Tate are two of my best friends in the world. Dana’s daughter is your wife? That’s correct. Who? I don’t know how many people in the world call her aj, but I have only ever called her

[00:05:12] Garrett Richards: that. You don’t call her that too. No, but I think

[00:05:14] Chris Dorris: Dan and her mom is one of them. But anyway, I call her AJ Alexis.

[00:05:19] Chris Dorris: And, so you started dating her a while ago in maybe

[00:05:22] Garrett Richards: 2010

[00:05:22] Chris Dorris: ish, maybe about nine years ago. And then we met like

[00:05:25] Garrett Richards: right over there. Since place hasn’t

[00:05:28] Chris Dorris: changed. Has not changed. Family has gotten better. So, but so since then, of course, since we met you, you’ve gotten married and of course brought baby rigs.

[00:05:37] Chris Dorris: Yes.

[00:05:38] Garrett Richards: Baby rigs into the world. Pride and joy. Yeah. Baby

[00:05:40] Chris Dorris: rigs with a great name for your boy

[00:05:43] Garrett Richards: who is how many months up. Seven and a half, about to be eight months, seven and a half months

[00:05:48] Chris Dorris: old, about almost eight months old. And I gotta tell, I gotta tell you, that kid is not only photogenic as hell, he’s like ridiculously video genic.

[00:05:57] Chris Dorris: That dude’s got a lot of personality for [00:06:00] like a human that is that new. He’s a good looking kid. He’s a good looking kid, but he’s also very active. I like the video of him putting

[00:06:06] Garrett Richards: Absolutely is now enjoy the flexibility now because it don’t that faucet’s already started dripping.

[00:06:13] Chris Dorris: So, so I’d love that you’ve made time, for this because you know we’re buds and, and you’re a famous professional athlete.

[00:06:23] Garrett Richards: You’re a pitcher for the, Padres, formerly of

[00:06:27] Chris Dorris: the Angels. I’ll explain this momentarily.

[00:06:31] Garrett Richards: Full custom. You were pitching for

[00:06:32] Chris Dorris: The Angels Went. We did customize this a little bit custom, actually, I might as well since it’s up. I’ll explain it now. this is Gareth’s Bobblehead, when he was playing for the Angels.

[00:06:39] Chris Dorris: He were traded this year to the, to the pods, to the to, which is actually really cool. Right.

[00:06:44] Garrett Richards: To the podres, the pod for agent deal.

[00:06:47] Chris Dorris: but yeah, my bad. That’s, thank you for correcting me.

[00:06:50] Garrett Richards: Right. So just go down,

[00:06:52] Chris Dorris: just down little south, just down the street. But, we’ve got your arm protected here. It’s on the man.

[00:06:58] Chris Dorris: So I, I’m a Philly fan. I’m a [00:07:00] Phillies fan. I

[00:07:01] Garrett Richards: really wanted you to

[00:07:02] Chris Dorris: go to Philly. I really wanted you and Trout to go to Philly. I am like beyond devastated right now, but I will use all of my skills, all of my mental toughness tools to get through this. But it’s not about me, it’s about you. So you are now a padre, which I love because you just became a padre.

[00:07:18] Chris Dorris: I am. And you’re right down the street. So we’re gonna go see you, but, You know a guy named Scott Wright? Scott Wright has a son named Garrett. Actually, I don’t know if it was Garrett. I don’t know which of his sons, but, this, do you know what this is? It’s a bozo nose. It’s, but it’s, guess where I got this?

[00:07:36] Garrett Richards: I couldn’t tell you. This is ama,

[00:07:37] Chris Dorris: right? Do you ever see the movie Patch Adams

[00:07:41] Garrett Richards: once? Yeah. With Robin Williams?

[00:07:42] Chris Dorris: Yes. This is actually from The Real Patch Adams. Come on from the Real Patch Adams. I met a guy that’s a doctor that worked for him, and I went to an event last year called A Fest in s Sarnia, and I met a guy that works For the Real Patch Adams.

[00:07:58] Chris Dorris: And he gave you this. [00:08:00] So Scott’s wow. One of Scott’s sons, I don’t know who did it, went up to my office and put this on your arm to

[00:08:05] Garrett Richards: protect you. It’s probably the cutest thing you could possibly do. How good is that?

[00:08:09] Chris Dorris: I did the artwork, I changed it to the films. I don’t know if you can say that, but I changed it.

[00:08:14] Chris Dorris: I had to do that because that

[00:08:15] Garrett Richards: was my, that’s just one of my things in sense. It looks a little like cartoony almost like, it’s a good job. Like Japanese league type. You have to get really close though. I don’t know that’s a word. Japanese league, but no, there’s a, no, there’s a league over like a Japanese league.

[00:08:27] Garrett Richards: Like their uniforms have like, kind of like more bubbly, creative words. Well, this is just me

[00:08:31] Chris Dorris: wanting to go. This is actually some of my best artwork. It didn’t work.

[00:08:34] Garrett Richards: But anyway, I’m protected though. I’m on the

[00:08:36] Chris Dorris: men. You are. And that’s how much people love you. I love that. Right? It’s, I think that’s great.

[00:08:40] Chris Dorris: That’s why I’m leaving it there. It’s not where it goes. Yes.

[00:08:42] Garrett Richards: But it does now after being a father in that office. Get that in my office and yeah. What’s that? After being a father. That’s awesome. That is pretty sweet. I understand that on a different level now. Yeah. Yep.

[00:08:51] Chris Dorris: So, so I talked a bit about in the introduction right before we started, I talked, I a bit about, your biography.

[00:08:58] Chris Dorris: By virtue of you being [00:09:00] a major league pitcher, you have to have a unique perspective on what mental toughness means. And I know you’ve done mental toughness

[00:09:07] Garrett Richards: work.

[00:09:08] Chris Dorris: so if you could just, and I make this so abundantly clear, right, in all these episodes that like the purpose of this tough talk series is to have the people who watch and or listen, just hear unique perspectives from people from all different walks of life on what mental toughness means.

[00:09:25] Chris Dorris: So, so let’s start with that. Okay. So, in your language, what is mental toughness and how does it play a role, even though that might sound like a duh obvious question. In your professional experience?

[00:09:40] Garrett Richards: I think mental toughness is kind of controlling a game. Me being, I kind of look at it as me controlling the game.

[00:09:47] Garrett Richards: I, you know, I’m a starting pitcher so nothing happens until I make it happen. And, you know, I was told that when I was in little league, you know, or whatever. Maybe my first year of kid pitch. Say it again. I mean that’s kind of like the first thing [00:10:00] that the coaches tell you when you’re in little league.

[00:10:01] Garrett Richards: Nothing happens until you make it happen. Nothing happens until you make it happen. There’s no action until you want to throw the ball. The game is totally on you. Oh, right, right. And so from a starting pitching standpoint or even a pitcher standpoint, you know, relief pitchers control the game as well. I just think that it’s, you know, unique that we, you know, you’re in a position to control the game.

[00:10:19] Garrett Richards: You know, position players, they’re at our mercy. You know, there’s guys that are doing different things with trying to disrupt timing and. And all kinds of different stuff. And that’s kind of become, you know, a major part of pitching now and, you know, it’s just crazy. So I look at it from a controlling the game standpoint.

[00:10:37] Garrett Richards: You know, when the game’s getting outta control, how do you get yourself to a place where you can get back to controlling the game? Sometimes the game snowballs and controls you, but how do you get yourself back? How do you flip it back to the other way? So can you answer that? I think breathing is huge.

[00:10:52] Garrett Richards: I mean, obviously you have breathing, you have to breathe like Roger to that, right on. Yeah. You’re in front of 35,000 people. You gotta breathe, you know, and controlling your [00:11:00] breathing, I think goes a long way. finding a visual that you can kind of look off to, to kind of get yourself back into the moment instead of letting the atmosphere take over.

[00:11:10] Garrett Richards: What’s going on? What do you mean? Like a visual weapon? You know, some guys will look at the top of the fly or the top of the foul pole, or some guys will look at, you know, a part of the scoreboard or a sign or wait. So you’re

[00:11:19] Chris Dorris: saying, you know, like the foul poles are

[00:11:21] Garrett Richards: behind you, right? Yeah, well, I mean, you have to, you know, you step off and you gather yourself.

[00:11:24] Garrett Richards: So you just, so

[00:11:25] Chris Dorris: you pick, so you actually do something like that. Like you pick a spot in the stadium

[00:11:29] Garrett Richards: to get your breathing back under

[00:11:30] Chris Dorris: control. Oh, interesting. That’s a really cool tool. That’s neat. So you pick a spot and that’s your spot, whether you’re

[00:11:35] Garrett Richards: home or away. Yeah. Right. And you go, when I look at that spot, that’s me reminding myself to breathe and chill.

[00:11:43] Garrett Richards: It gets you back into your game plan that you’ve already done. That’s cool. You’ve done all the work to get back to, huh? You’ve done all the work to prepare for this game. So I think by picking a spot to, to bring you back to the present, instead of letting the outside factors create a situation for you, [00:12:00] it brings you back to that game plan.

[00:12:01] Garrett Richards: When you kind of lose, when you lose it, because you know, We’re competing and you know, our brain’s going a million miles a minute and there’s a lot going on and yeah, you know, you’re having to deal with pitch to pitch thought processes and sometimes you need to take a step back and kind of, and you know, get back to the game where your freaking

[00:12:17] Chris Dorris: group, honestly speaking, do you get

[00:12:20] Garrett Richards: nervous before every game?

[00:12:22] Garrett Richards: I can barely eat on any days I pitch. You can barely eat

[00:12:24] Chris Dorris: on the days.

[00:12:25] Garrett Richards: I love that you’re saying that the days that I pitch before. I start getting ready, you know, start stretching and getting ready. I’ll always have like a peanut butter and jelly, a bag of chips, a string cheese. what?

[00:12:36] Chris Dorris: that’s like your deal.

[00:12:37] Chris Dorris: a bottle of water, a

[00:12:38] Garrett Richards: string cheese, maybe like a yogurt. I call it mom’s lunch. And I’ll always eat it. That’s awesome. I’ll eat it right before I go past a pbj and a string cheese yogurt. Keep it as basic as possible because I, you know, I, for one, I don’t want something that’s gonna bog me down out there, you know, I need something light, but I, you know, I need some, I need carbs, but I also need stuff that’s gonna be sitting light on my stomach.

[00:12:56] Garrett Richards: You know? I can’t be . Crushing a burrito or something before I go out there. It’d [00:13:00] be bad news, man. I don’t know. I don’t remember

[00:13:02] Chris Dorris: who it was, but the other day somebody was playing in Philly and it was like his first time as a pitcher playing in Philly and he actually, they said the commentators, I don’t know if it’s true or not, but they said that he ate a cheese steak pregame.

[00:13:12] Chris Dorris: A cheese steak that’s roll in the

[00:13:14] Garrett Richards: dice. Man, that’s a dicey movie. That’s a really movie right there.

[00:13:16] Chris Dorris: That’s it. So you do get, you know, so you’ve been a professional, well, you actually like, because you’ve been a professional for long on this, but your actual. M l b debut was in 2011, so it’s eight years ago.

[00:13:28] Chris Dorris: So you’re used to being pro, I, I assume you’re like, you take it for granted. How long was this your dream?

[00:13:36] Garrett Richards: I don’t think it was ever Not my dream. I don’t think I can ever remember not playing baseball. I think, you know, when I talked to my parents, you know, they, I was always a kid that had a ball in his hand.

[00:13:46] Garrett Richards: I was always, you know, trying to get my dad to take me outside and play whiffle ball with me and play catch, and, yeah. You know, I just, it was always a constant in my life. I never not played

[00:13:56] Chris Dorris: baseball. Yeah. But was it all, but can you remember when, was there [00:14:00] ever a day like where you’re like,

[00:14:03] Garrett Richards: yeah, I wanna go pro?

[00:14:06] Garrett Richards: I think, like I said, I think it’s just been a mindset ever since I’ve ever known. I mean, I pro though. Yeah. I don’t, there’s never been another thought. So you were a professional baseball fan as a kid. Absolutely. Used to watch. So who did you, like, who did you watch? Tv. I get home from school. you know, the bus would drop me off like 3, 3 30, and the Cubs always played day games, so I’d watch the Cubs on wgn, and then on tbs, the Braves would play.

[00:14:31] Garrett Richards: So I’d watch the Braves play, and that was when they were doing it, man, that was the like, yeah. You know, the nineties when they were killing it, bro. So, yeah. Yeah. that was kind of my thing, man. I don’t know, I just always watched baseball. I was always interested in baseball. My dad’s a huge baseball fan, so, you know, it was kind of a constant, you know, as far as.

[00:14:49] Garrett Richards: it wasn’t hard for me to love it, you know, it was just,

[00:14:51] Chris Dorris: well, no. So, okay, so, so basically you’re saying for as long as you’ve been in baseball, you’ve wanted to be pro, you did it. Yeah. You did it. That’s a really rare thing.

[00:14:59] Garrett Richards: Right?

[00:14:59] Chris Dorris: [00:15:00] And that’s, this is something I feel is important for like, for our audience is to slow down to talk about that.

[00:15:04] Chris Dorris: that’s actually amazing. Like very few people materialize that kind of goal or dream. Right now, I started this. By saying it’s, you’ve been professional for eight years. You’ve been in the major leagues for eight years. I guess maybe you’re professional a little bit longer than that, but you’re in major leagues, right?

[00:15:26] Chris Dorris: About 10. Yeah. Okay. So, right. You still appreciate it. Like, have you grown accustomed to it? Is it like, yeah. Yes. That’s cool. That’s amazing. But I got more shit

[00:15:36] Garrett Richards: to do now. I love baseball. I think I, I went through a period of time where I was injured a lot and I’m still going through injuries now, but, you know, there was definitely a part in a part where I probably re, I took the game for granted a little bit, you know, I took my health for granted.

[00:15:54] Garrett Richards: you took your health for granted, you know. I,

[00:15:57] Chris Dorris: were you ever injured as a, like a [00:16:00] junior athlete or a college athlete? Dude, I we’re gonna get to the injuries

[00:16:03] Garrett Richards: in a second. I had never broken a bone in my body up until Uhhuh, you know, I, I had, I blew out my knee. My knee. Yeah. You still have been broken a bone then.

[00:16:10] Chris Dorris: Look. Yeah. I don’t

[00:16:14] Garrett Richards: believe in that bullshit anyway, you know, but

[00:16:15] Chris Dorris: you hadn’t had a significant injury. Right. Okay. We’ll

[00:16:18] Garrett Richards: get to the injuries later. That was a Totally, but the question is like,

[00:16:20] Chris Dorris: are you still in appreciation? Do you,

[00:16:22] Garrett Richards: like now, I think more than ever, you know, I had. Obviously I’m going through this process and I can’t wait to get back, but I think going through all the injuries and kind of going through the ups and downs of it made me appreciate the game more and made me appreciate what I get to do on a day.

[00:16:38] Garrett Richards: I love this and I

[00:16:38] Chris Dorris: wanna really elaborate on that with you in a minute. Sure. Okay. We are absolutely, we have to talk about that cause there’s so much great value in that because you haven’t plagued. That’s sort of victimy term, but whatever. It’s true. You have had the string of injuries that are, that’s all that like, is like Jesus, are you like, what an unusual and what.

[00:16:57] Chris Dorris: Yeah. Right. So, but before we get to [00:17:00] that,

[00:17:00] Chris Dorris: I want to talk about your debut. Okay. And I knew you before your, you debuted in one of the most amazing iconic. Locations to play baseball to the mecca To start the Mecca, you called it. Yeah. Yankee Stadium. Which is cool. Yeah. Looking back on it, put it bluntly, you got Shell. Right. You gave up six earned runs and five innings, right?

[00:17:28] Chris Dorris: Yeah. Yeah. But at the end of the game, you know what your era A was?

[00:17:33] Garrett Richards: I couldn’t tell you. 10.8. I can tell you.

[00:17:35] Chris Dorris: Hey, 10.8 dude to making five innings in your debut, though. I’m not riffing. I’m just, I’m trying to paint it. I know. Cheers. Cheer. I’m not trying to be a dick over here. I think I’m just saying I’m setting this up because, like, there, cause I, it was not the what you wanted,

[00:17:51] Garrett Richards: but obviously not.

[00:17:53] Garrett Richards: No, of

[00:17:54] Chris Dorris: course. Right, right. it wasn’t the start that you wanted. I was sitting here, I was sitting here. I was [00:18:00] gonna say, I

[00:18:00] Garrett Richards: was sitting right over there with a whole bunch of all your, with your family. Right.

[00:18:04] Chris Dorris: And we’re like, oh, so let me ask you a few questions about that. Okay. How did you feel after you got pulled?

[00:18:15] Chris Dorris: Maybe that’s like a stupid question, but I want you to go back and like, really, cause what you’ve done with it is the point of all this line of questioning. By the way,

[00:18:22] Garrett Richards: I think I went and I sat on the bench obviously, and I had known that, you know, I had a super, not great start, but. You know, there were some shining moments.

[00:18:33] Garrett Richards: There were some cool things that happened. but obviously when you first come off the mound, you kind of are, you’re coming out with a, with, you’re coming out not with a lead, you know, you know that you just handed the bullpen four innings to swallow. Didn’t you also feel like

[00:18:48] Chris Dorris: you had, did you feel like you had something to prove, like, this is your debut dude, this is your debut.

[00:18:53] Chris Dorris: That is not,

[00:18:55] Garrett Richards: How I wanted that to go. I think you instantly think about going back down. You get getting sent back down to [00:19:00] aaa. I mean Oh, right, right, right. You know, so, right. Like,

[00:19:03] Chris Dorris: did I just blow it? Did you have that thought? Did I, that’s in your

[00:19:05] Garrett Richards: mind. Did I just fuck up my career? Did you think that No, not my career, but I was like, damn, I really, no, I ruined my first opportunity.

[00:19:12] Garrett Richards: Okay. You know, my first opportunity to shine. I feel like I didn’t get to, I didn’t answer the bell. You know what I’m saying? Well, that experience,

[00:19:20] Chris Dorris: I don’t know. Let me put this, I was gonna say a statement, but I wanna put this in question form him. Oh, the Yankees wrong right now. did it define you?

[00:19:27] Garrett Richards: No, I think it was, did it serve you? I took a lot of good from that. What? And it took me a while to, to look for the good and the bad They did. And that’s something that you have to, you know, as you go through this process of a career are gonna have plenty of ups and downs. But I feel like you. You until you learn how to benefit from the downs, the ups aren’t gonna be as, as up as they possibly can, you know?

[00:19:57] Garrett Richards: yeah. Of course. I think regardless, I got through [00:20:00] it and to me it was like, Hey, I can do this though. I just got the first one outta the way. I can do this. I just went out there on the biggest stage. yeah. And did it. Yeah. how many people could do that? You know what I’m saying?

[00:20:11] Garrett Richards: Yeah. So like, in my mind, like I still had confidence too.

[00:20:14] Chris Dorris: do you still think that, like, how many people could do, like, do you still remind yourself of the, like, the rarity of what you’re doing?

[00:20:21] Garrett Richards: No, because I think I just stay in, I stay in the moment. I surround myself with like, people, I have a lot of baseball friends, so like, you know, we talk about the same things.

[00:20:30] Garrett Richards: We share the same interests. Yeah. We have the same drives, we have the same goals. You know, it’s, I’m around a lot of like, Like me people, but let’s get Right,

[00:20:41] Chris Dorris: let’s go into like some real, so, I am assuming that in order to become, this is not an assumption, this is a fact. In order to become a professional athlete in any sport, you have to have some mental toughness.

[00:20:57] Chris Dorris: Shout it out. Yeah. So [00:21:00] you, when in your career, at what stage? Whether it’s Little League or at, Oklahoma. you’re a sooner, right? That’s pretty solid squad. How bad. Yeah. Or high school, Edmond. Right. I went to Edmond.

[00:21:20] Chris Dorris: when did, at what point in your career did mental health

[00:21:22] Garrett Richards: even become a thing?

[00:21:25] Garrett Richards: I think when you get to the point where you have to do things in order to. You have to do things that you don’t want to do to get to where you want to go. Okay. Like when’s that? Nobody likes to run. Nobody likes to lift. Nobody likes to make, it’s not little league prices. Huh? So it’s not little league?

[00:21:40] Garrett Richards: No. I would say in high school, I’d say once you got to high school, you know, you kind of gain a little bit of an edge. Your body starts to fill out a little bit. You start to kind of come into your own photograph. Oh yeah, of course I can. Right here? Absolutely.

[00:21:53] Chris Dorris: No, right here. Oh, okay.

[00:21:57] Garrett Richards: Good to see you, brother. [00:22:00] yeah, no, I, that’s the great guy issue, I think until you get to, you know, a more competitive stage. I don’t think the game’s still just fun. It’s just a game, you know, when you’re in middle school and when you’re playing on little league teams with your friends. I don’t, it was just a game that you played, you know, I don’t think it was, I didn’t treat it as seriously as I did when I got to high school.

[00:22:19] Garrett Richards: You know, cuz then the next step is college. You know? And I always worried about the next step. I never got too far ahead of myself. I just knew what the next step was. The next step was go to college. So I wanted to earn a scholarship so that, that was my goal in high school. So you work towards that, you make the sacrifices, you know, a lot of time spent doing, playing baseball versus, you know, doing what everybody else is doing, going to the lake, whatever, you know, during the summer we’re playing baseball.

[00:22:44] Garrett Richards: You know, and I think that’s something you either want to do. Or you don’t, you know? And I think the ones that stick with it and have a true passion for the game are the only, they’re the only ones that make it in the end, you know, it’s a lot of sacrifice. You

[00:22:59] Chris Dorris: and I have a, [00:23:00] a late great friend in common, Dr.

[00:23:05] Chris Dorris: Ken revisit. Dr. Ken. So he was a, I mean, would you say that he was your mental coach? He was the coach for the angels? Yeah. All right. And he was a mentor. I have told you this story a million times. It’s amazing. I’m not gonna tell the story here, but I’ll just summarize it by saying, what an amazing freaking human who stood up in a moment.

[00:23:25] Chris Dorris: And I don’t want to tell the whole story, but it’s like it was a moment at the beginning in my career where I was like embarrassed by

[00:23:32] Garrett Richards: somebody. It was a great first impression. It was the most amazing first impression where he like someone, a guy, a sports psychologist, sort of

[00:23:40] Chris Dorris: embarrassed me. Shamed me a little bit.

[00:23:42] Chris Dorris: When I was in graduate school, Ken overheard

[00:23:44] Garrett Richards: it and he said, come on man, come here. I’ll tell you everything you wanna know. And I’m like,

[00:23:47] Chris Dorris: wow. And I’ve, and I pledged and I’ve kept this pledge so far. I’m gonna be that guy. I’m gonna be like that. I’m always gonna be like that forward, man. I’m definitely, I thought of him this morning.

[00:23:57] Chris Dorris: Somebody sent me an email. So he’s a [00:24:00] student in Indiana. I haven’t even talked to him yet. Sent me an email. He’s like, I wanna learn more about, you know, sports psychology. Instantly thought of Ken. Yeah, so I’m

[00:24:08] Garrett Richards: totally talking. I’m calling this kid.

[00:24:10] Chris Dorris: That’s what Ken would do. That’s exactly what he did. So can you tell us about the work that you did with him?

[00:24:14] Garrett Richards: me and Ken did a lot of visualization. yeah, he’s bigger. That’s such a powerful freaking too visualization. Controlling the breathing, making sure that when you’re on the rubber, you know, you mean business. If you don’t mean business, get off the rubber. Speaking of the pitching rubber on the mount, of course, so, but me and Ken, you know, we would get together before my starts and, you know, in a conference room completely dark, and I’d lay on the ground and me and Ken would literally go through the first five innings of the game, five, six innings of the game.

[00:24:45] Garrett Richards: So he guide you through that, just vi visualizing everything happening before it even happened. He would create havoc, he would create success. He would create. Unfortunate. Yeah. Unfortunate, you know? Yeah. He would create [00:25:00] a game-like scenario that you could visualize before you even went out there and it made the game.

[00:25:05] Garrett Richards: Seemed like you had already done it, you know? yeah. And by controlling the breathing, you know, like I had mentioned, man, I just feel like if you can control that breathing, you can control your mind, you can control the way you think. So do

[00:25:16] Chris Dorris: you actually still, so you mentioned breathing, you obviously use that.

[00:25:20] Chris Dorris: I’m gonna watch you a little close. I want to see if I can see you breathing. You take big old, deep breaths or you just like, kinda just

[00:25:25] Garrett Richards: making sure you’re breathing. Some are more noticeable than others. Yeah. So,

[00:25:29] Chris Dorris: Do you use imagery? Still

[00:25:32] Garrett Richards: visualization? Yeah. Same thing. Yeah. No, I mean, I think we, I think I go to bed every night before my start, the day before my start kind of envisioning what I want to happen.

[00:25:44] Garrett Richards: You know, you play the same team three or four times, so if you’re not facing that team for the first game of the series, you get to watch a couple games before it’s your turn to pitch. So, I’ll go through the lineup and I’ll go through each hitter and kind of figure I’ll think [00:26:00] to myself, what do I want to throw ’em?

[00:26:01] Garrett Richards: And if I throw this, what am I gonna come back with? Or how do I want to attack him the first time through the order? And you’re doing all that the night before. I think it’s the only way I can go to sleep the night before I pitch. I, you know, you get nervous, man. I mean, it’s hard to sleep the night before you pitch.

[00:26:16] Garrett Richards: So I, that’s just a way that I’m able to kind of. Just use the nervous, just redirect it. Relax man. And just, you know, I’m doing work while I’m not doing work, you know? No. Just sitting there thinking You are doing work though. That is, well,

[00:26:31] Chris Dorris: it is work. do you have a pregame?

[00:26:34] Garrett Richards: Oddly enough, man, I, my every day is kind of different.

[00:26:37] Garrett Richards: I just go kind of based on how I feel. If I come in feeling great, you know, I’ll. I’ll stretch and do everything as much as I think need be, but some days are, you know,

[00:26:45] Chris Dorris: do you any, I should have been more specific though. Do you have, do, is there anything that you do before the games mentally to prepare yourself?

[00:26:54] Garrett Richards: Like I said, I mean, we go over the game plan and everything. I mean like the day up and I mean, like right up, I’m [00:27:00] talking right before I go out. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So I’ll sit down with the hitting coach or the pitching coach and the catcher that’s catching that date and we’ll make, we’ll go over the game plan.

[00:27:07] Garrett Richards: I’ll tell him what I want to do. He’ll, they’ll tell me what they see. We’ll kind of come up with something that we can take out there. Obviously, your game plan’s not always gonna be exactly what you want it to be. It’s never going to be exactly, well, actually maybe not never won. Talk about that. You could literally not have fastball command that day, but your slider, you can throw anywhere you want, so you use your slider to get you back.

[00:27:27] Garrett Richards: You know, it is just not every pitch is gonna be there every single time. So,

[00:27:32] Chris Dorris: But sometimes it will. And those are the magical things. 2000. Yeah. In fact, you could use the word immaculate.

[00:27:44] Chris Dorris: 2014 Astros.

[00:27:49] Garrett Richards: Yeah. Fascinating. I don’t even remember. I didn’t even know

[00:27:53] Chris Dorris: that I had done it. What is an immaculate? What is an immaculate

[00:27:56] Garrett Richards: inning? An immaculate inning is nine [00:28:00] pitches. Nine strikes. Three strikeouts. So literally exactly what you gotta do to get three strikeouts in the least amount of pitch as possible.

[00:28:09] Garrett Richards: Yeah, and I mean it’s happened a couple times this year already. It happens a couple times every year, but Oh really? I had no idea that I had even done it until after the game. The, what reporters had asked me, and I, cuz you’re so locked in, man, you got tunnel vision. You’re like, okay, cool. Really?

[00:28:24] Garrett Richards: You’re like, okay, that’s a 10 pitch inning. That’s great. That means that I, like, literally I get to save bullets and I can go deeper into the game. That’s how I was thinking, you know, I’m thinking about my save bullets. I like, that’s, I’m thinking about my pitch save bullets. I’m thinking about being, you know, pitch efficient.

[00:28:37] Garrett Richards: I’m trying to go as deep into this game as possible. if I throw a hundred pitches in five innings, I can’t make it till the seventh inning, the eighth

[00:28:43] Chris Dorris: inning. Yeah. And this is not really about metal top, it’s just kind of like your opinion on pitch count. Like, you know, do you think that it’s. Like cuz now when I grew up watching baseball, that wasn’t a thing.

[00:28:54] Chris Dorris: Like

[00:28:54] Garrett Richards: it wasn’t a thing. Throw hundred in it, 200 pitches, pitch, didn’t care. I think that the [00:29:00] evolution of baseball and the way guys are throwing now, and it’s not uncommon to have an entire bullpen that throws 95 plus. There’s nobody that throws 80 miles an hour anymore around, you know what I’m saying?

[00:29:13] Garrett Richards: The 88 to 91 mile an hour fastball, guys. Unless they have incredible spin rate now. I mean now they’re going off of these, you know, rap Soto numbers, you know, spin rate and all this other stuff. You actually have the highest

[00:29:25] Chris Dorris: spin rate right on curve

[00:29:27] Garrett Richards: ball. And it’s not, I know, anyway, you did

[00:29:32] Chris Dorris: spinning in all

[00:29:32] Garrett Richards: of major league baseball, spinning and baseball is not my issue, but I’m saying for that.

[00:29:35] Garrett Richards: I’m just trying to give you some

[00:29:36] Chris Dorris: props here, Brian.

[00:29:37] Garrett Richards: I know, but I don’t like that, you know, I. Same, same. But the guys that don’t necessarily throw really hard, they might have that super spin rate. You know, it plays really well. Guys are pitching up in the zone more now too, so that, you know, guys with spin rate are pitching more up in the zone.

[00:29:55] Garrett Richards: Yeah. So

[00:29:56] let’s

[00:29:56] Chris Dorris: change it up a little bit here. Can you think of a time [00:30:00] in your life, and this doesn’t have to be baseball related, but sure as hell can be where the absence of mental toughness affected you.

[00:30:10] Garrett Richards: Yeah.

[00:30:11] Chris Dorris: like when you look back, you’re like, man, it would’ve been really handy to be, you know,

[00:30:15] Garrett Richards: tougher there emotionally, to be more emotionally masterful.

[00:30:18] Garrett Richards: Sure. I mean, there’s plenty of games over the year. I mean, I think I’ve had three, three starts in my career maybe where I’ve gone like less than two innings, you know, didn’t even make it outta the second inning. Right. I think at Yankee Stadium I only went like an inning and a third. not your start.

[00:30:35] Garrett Richards: No. Five given as recent as last year. Oh really? Yeah. So I mean, it happens, you know, it does happen. It’s not uncommon, but the good ones don’t let it happen. You know what I’m saying? You gotta, I have to be able to mentally get myself under control. I think I led outside factors. It was kind of drizzling, it was raining.

[00:30:55] Garrett Richards: And you were complaining about that in your head? yeah. I mean, I just. You know, it’s hard to get a grip on the [00:31:00] ball. These are things that are going through your head. You know, I’m not thinking the way that I’m supposed to be thinking. Supposed to be overcoming adversity. Not acknowledging adversity.

[00:31:08] Garrett Richards: You know what I’m saying? Yeah. So looking back on, you know, shitty moments like that, you pull the good from stuff like that. And I know next time I’m in a situation like that, like I’m gonna bear down and get the job done. Yeah. You know, it’s just, I think you, you learn a lot, man, from failure and

[00:31:23] Chris Dorris: well, and that’s really important.

[00:31:24] Chris Dorris: Okay, so we’re gonna talk some more about that, because like for people listening or watching, you know, you’re this, you know, you’re on tv, you know, professional baseball, you’re a starter, you know, you get paid handsomely. You’re very successful. And what happens is people, you know, attribute power to you.

[00:31:42] Chris Dorris: But the truth is, or a lot of times in the attribution of power to you, what also happens is they, a lot of times people say . Well, he’s like an anomaly. He’s a, like an outlier on the normal curve. He’s not normal. And of course you have abnormal

[00:31:56] Garrett Richards: levels of talent. They think that we can’t relate to everybody else.

[00:31:59] Garrett Richards: Right. [00:32:00]

[00:32:00] Chris Dorris: Which is what I love. You know, when you talk about your vulnerability, like, and you talk about it openly and actually very creatively, you’re like, well, and you haven’t said this to me, but I hear this, is that it’s almost like thank God for it. So you have in the last three more than that years, You’ve been dealing with some serious freaking injuries.

[00:32:22] Chris Dorris: Right?

[00:32:23] Garrett Richards: Was it, when was the first 2000? 2014. 14

[00:32:26] Chris Dorris: was the knee deal. Got my knee. Just freaky weird as I was here watching you on TV and night crack, goddamn damn game

[00:32:32] Garrett Richards: too. Cover in first base, go park, going to

[00:32:35] Chris Dorris: cover first base and you went down and then you screamed. Bloody hell. You were screaming and we’re going, oh my God.

[00:32:43] Chris Dorris: Yeah. What the actual is happening to him? Yeah.

[00:32:47] Garrett Richards: Mr. Moore, and it was a patella tendon rupture freak. We were kind of, this is an abnormal thing. I was told that if I had tried to do that again, there’s no way I could, you know, so, so, so,

[00:32:57] Chris Dorris: so, so did you have a [00:33:00] f? Absolutely. You, absolutely. And

[00:33:03] Garrett Richards: like anytime you get hurt, the first thing you ask yourself is, why me?

[00:33:06] Garrett Richards: Why me? Why did this happen to me? Especially when it’s a freak thing like that. Because to be honest, I think you ask why me? But I don’t. Think for as an athlete, you, I don’t think as an athlete, you question that being like, you know, of an, of a higher being. I think you question, okay, what did I do to make this happen?

[00:33:23] Garrett Richards: Did somebody slide into me? Did something happen? But the, like mine, nobody, mine’s a non-contact man. I’m running over your first base, getting ready to square up for a backside, double play. You know, as soon as I started chopping my feet, you know, fell like, yeah, you know, I feel a pop and see you later. So, I guess it’s harder.

[00:33:42] Garrett Richards: I wouldn’t say it’s harder, but I think it’s more difficult to understand weird freakish stuff like that. So how’d you make sense out of that? I looked at it as an opportunity to get better

[00:33:53] Chris Dorris: mentally. Like how much time passed before

[00:33:54] Garrett Richards: you’re like, all right, we’re gonna something. You go through a, you go through a good, so I was in a [00:34:00] straight cast for about eight weeks.

[00:34:01] Garrett Richards: So two months. So you were locked up, locked in, and then you cut. At after eight weeks, they kind of started moving the degree on it. So you start working on the range of motion again. And that’s obviously not comfortable whatsoever. I mean, and how long were you out for that from that, that takes a little while.

[00:34:17] Garrett Richards: Another couple months. So I’m saying,

[00:34:19] Chris Dorris: and then when did, would you say your attitude turned on? It’s like, all right, enough pity fucking party over here. We’re gonna, we’re gonna use this.

[00:34:27] Garrett Richards: I, well, I think from the very, I think the first couple months you obviously are kind of, Out of it.

[00:34:34] Garrett Richards: you can’t really do much. No. You’re on a couch, you’re watching Netflix, you’re killing it. You know, that only lasts for so long before you’re just like, God, I gotta get moving again. You know? Yeah. Yeah. I think as athletes, you know, like breaking a sweat on a daily basis is like, kind of like second nature to us, and like if I go a day without like getting a sweat in or like, at least just feeling myself move a little bit, you know, you start to get a little bit, you know, agitated, I think.

[00:34:57] Garrett Richards: And you know, you go eight weeks without [00:35:00] moving. It sucks, man. You know, so you’re just, but you turned it around at some point? I looked at, well, I mean, from the get go they told me that it would be about eight months before I got back, you know, fully healthy. And so I blew out my knee in August, of 2014 and eight months from then was gonna be April.

[00:35:18] Garrett Richards: So I really worked my ass off this, that off season just to come back on that eight month mark and sure shit man, I only missed one. I missed the first, first go around of the year, but we had an off day, so it didn’t really, you know, it didn’t affect anything. Yeah, I ended up throwing like 32 starts that year, like 200 most innings I’ve ever thrown.

[00:35:38] Garrett Richards: 210 innings. you know, it was a little bit, I’m pitching on kind of one and a half legs, you know, it took a little while for that to kind of gain full strength and kind of come back to normal, but, I don’t know, man. I think I had such a great year in 2014. I just didn’t want to like lose that momentum, you know?

[00:35:54] Garrett Richards: So I really wanted to make sure that I was back for 2015 and I was, I did it, you know, [00:36:00] back in eight months

[00:36:01] Chris Dorris: That,

[00:36:02] Garrett Richards: and then 2016, 16 elbow, halfway through the year I first felt it on opening day Cubs were coming in town. Oh, wow. So I threw opening day against the Cubs and then, I. Bad night.

[00:36:16] Garrett Richards: You know, my elbow just, it felt really tight and abnormally weird. Like, it like uncomfortable, you know, like, like it hadn’t ever before. Next day it kind of calmed down. Were you scared? Were you like, sums up? What is this? I was definitely worried. I’m like, you know, this is abnormal big time. Like this isn’t, it isn’t right.

[00:36:32] Garrett Richards: did you ever think, I thought it was like a flexor tendon or something? I didn’t think it was necessarily my ucl. Okay. Come to find out, you know, when these other muscles start kind of acting up, it’s because that thing’s damaged so that yada, yada. I needed, I needed to get this thing fixed.

[00:36:50] Garrett Richards: Yeah, so I ended up doing a stem cell rehab for half the year. Came back at the end of the year. Everything was great. Was throwing hard, ev you know, didn’t skip a beat. Went into spring training the next [00:37:00] year. Everything was great. Everything was fine. 2017, opening day 2017, my nerve. I have a nerve in my bicep that shuts down.

[00:37:09] Garrett Richards: You know, I’ve only known two other people. There’s only two other people that have had this happen to them. One of ’em happens to be my good buddy, Michael Conn, who had happened to him and he came back from it. And then prior to that there was only, I think, Brad Penny and maybe one other guy, whoever had this happen to him.

[00:37:25] Garrett Richards: And it’s kind of something that just takes time. There’s nothing you can really do. Did you go back into the

[00:37:29] Chris Dorris: God,

[00:37:30] Garrett Richards: why? How can you not? When’s. You know, you get rid of one injury, another one flares up, and it’s just like on top of that, it took a while for us to kind of figure out what it was.

[00:37:40] Garrett Richards: So it was kind of in limbo as well. You know, it’s the uncertainty. What is this? Why is this not working? You know, going and doing tests all over the, you know, up and down the west coast trying to figure out what this thing is, and just happened to be a nerve that needed to regenerate at its own pace. So,

[00:37:56] Chris Dorris: so you can actually say at this point now, and oh, and by [00:38:00] the way, yesterday I read an article that you didn’t even know, came out that your recovery is going tremendously well and that there’s a just, at least even if it’s minuscule, a possibility to have to Padres make the playoffs.

[00:38:11] Chris Dorris: Maybe you could even make it back for the postseason, which is amazing cuz I think when they started, everyone’s like, all right, well I’m definitely out for the whole year. so that’s pretty kick out. Right. if you are going to, so, so you’re a veteran of injury. I know my way. You paid your dues. One or two, you paid your dues.

[00:38:30] Chris Dorris: Well, you have three in a row. Yeah. And the second was twice the same thing. Twice.

[00:38:34] Garrett Richards: Virtually things happen in threes. So hopefully I’m, you know, hopefully I’m moving forward. Okay. Yeah.

[00:38:39] Chris Dorris: So, if there happens to be anybody watching or listening who’s an athlete, Who is, having some, at any level, similar experience, what advice would you give them?

[00:38:52] Chris Dorris: Like injuries, dealing with injuries, it’s a huge thing, you know, and as when I was doing only sports psychology, like [00:39:00] exclusively coaching athletes, it was a big deal. I had a lot of people come with the singular intention of how do I deal with the injury, right? so, so I mean, cuz cause, cause it seems like the general, and I’m making this a really long question, but the general conception is that if it’s a big injury or if there’s a series of injuries, then maybe I’m just not cut out for this.

[00:39:20] Chris Dorris: You know, the thinking could go pretty dark.

[00:39:22] Garrett Richards: So, I think as soon as you realize that you’re not the only one who’s ever had to deal with that specific injury It’s easier to kind of accept it. It could happen to anybody. I mean, people deal with injuries all the time, especially in sports, you know?

[00:39:35] Garrett Richards: And to be honest with you, if you don’t look at it, if you don’t come out of that injury better than you went into it Uhhuh, I look at it as a wasted opportunity, I think. I think obviously injuries happen and they’re unfortunate, but I think if you spin ’em in a way that you can make ’em positive, not only does it make the time fly by a little bit faster.

[00:39:57] Garrett Richards: But the reward is so much, it’s so much more [00:40:00] gratifying. You know when you come out at the end of the tunnel and you’re back playing and you’re having success, it all makes it worth it, man. It makes it all worth it. Provided, of course it’s not a career ending injury, so obviously, I mean, but

[00:40:12] Chris Dorris: when it’s not, obviously Yeah, but I know cause there might be people listening like, yeah, well yeah, good for you, but mine’s career ending and I gotta, you know, be sensitive to that.

[00:40:19] Chris Dorris: Cause that’s possibility too. Yours had not be career ending unless you maybe thought

[00:40:22] Garrett Richards: they were. But I think you can apply that attitude to everyday life as well. Say more. So I don’t think necessarily it has to be sports related. Uhhuh, you know, You could make an injury, could be anything that happens to you in real life.

[00:40:37] Garrett Richards: Not necessarily an injury, but a, something going on. Unfortunate

[00:40:39] Chris Dorris: something, adversity to deal

[00:40:41] Garrett Richards: with. You have to overcome a shitty, I love that. A shitty hurdle in life, right? There’s, you always can spin in some positive way. I love that. I love

[00:40:51] Chris Dorris: a lot because I like to say that every set of circumstances can be leveraged for individual or collective gain.

[00:40:56] Chris Dorris: You can create excellence out of every circumstance. But [00:41:00] only if viewed masterfully. And that’s obviously how you’re doing that,

[00:41:05] Garrett Richards: right? with, it wasn’t always like that though. You know? You definitely have to, I feel like until you acknowledge it and you accept it, then I don’t think you’ll ever get to that mindset.

[00:41:16] Chris Dorris: No, I, yeah, I agree. Right? As long as I have a problem with the problem. Easy

[00:41:19] Garrett Richards: dwell to grow from the problem. It’s easy to dwell, you know, anybody can dwell. But to get over that and to move into a positive direction that’s going to benefit you. That’s not Ontop, dude. That’s it right there. Yeah. Right on.

[00:41:32] Garrett Richards: And how much more incentive, you know, like, dude, you get to better yourself. Yeah. You get to come out of this better than you went into it. I’m going to use this. Absolutely. Use it as a way to become better. Right, right, right. That’s what I do.

[00:41:47] Chris Dorris: And it’s not all good. Free cheers to you or not. So, next question is what are,and if this isn’t something that you want to say publicly, I totally appreciate that, but I am interested in it.

[00:41:57] Chris Dorris: So I gotta ask you, what [00:42:00] are some of your biggest goals for yourself right now as a pitcher? What do you like when you look forward to like, all this is what I really want to create with my career,

[00:42:11] Garrett Richards: like right now, like as of right now, in this very

[00:42:14] Chris Dorris: moment where we are,

[00:42:16] Garrett Richards: I mean, I think like, I think you get, when you get hurt, I think you get forgotten about, you know, I think you gotta disappear. You disappear like a ghost. You know, really, you’re still, people still know who you are and people know like that you’re, but they haven’t seen you on tv.

[00:42:33] Garrett Richards: You haven’t given a rotation from, while people know where you are and what you’re doing, but you’re not like in on anybody’s mind. You’re not in anybody’s mouth, nobody. People forget about you, you know? And I don’t even, interesting. I don’t even need that. To be, I don’t even like, that’s not like, I don’t need that self like gratification, you know what I’m saying?

[00:42:53] Garrett Richards: I don’t need to like hear people talking about me. But it also like is a motivational drive [00:43:00] and it kind of angers me that you just drop off that fast, you know, you could be so successful and then be totally forgotten about self film. Well,

[00:43:07] Chris Dorris: well that’s very interesting because you bring up the word success, so like to you.

[00:43:13] Chris Dorris: You know, as a professional pitcher, I mean, what’s, what is success to you? Like how do you define success

[00:43:19] Garrett Richards: for yourself being a good teammate? What’s that? Being a good teammate, being a guy, that, being a guy that you guys can depend on, man, you know, I don’t think, I don’t think I get more, I don’t think I get more hyped and more motivated to pitch a game than.

[00:43:38] Garrett Richards: When I come in the locker room that day and everybody’s excited because I’m pitching that day or the night before when people are like, Hey man, when are you pitching? I’m pitching tomorrow. And everybody’s like, hell yeah. Like that gets me going. You know, having the res, having the respect and having the confidence of your teammates is the ultimate dude.

[00:43:57] Garrett Richards: when people know that you’re pitching and then they know that [00:44:00] they got a great chance to win a ball game. Yeah. That fuels me. You know what I’m saying? And bad. Yeah. Yeah. That makes me want to be as good as I can be for them. You know what I’m saying? And I think if you, I think if you put it all on that, Then it kind of takes the pressure off a lot of the other stuff.

[00:44:18] Garrett Richards: You know what I’m saying? I think if you just make it about the team, make yourself accountable, man. You know, be a guy on your team that people can depend on. Sure. We’re gonna, I’ll tell you what, we’re gonna fail. We’re gonna fail. It happens. We’re gonna fail uhhuh. But you’re even in failure, if your team still has confidence in you, that speaks volumes.

[00:44:38] Garrett Richards: They see what you do behind the scenes. They see how hard you work. They know that you go about your business as a professional. Yeah. I think just having that respect of your teammates goes so much further than people think. You know, if a guy’s working really hard and he’s still failing, he still has the respect of his teammates.

[00:44:57] Garrett Richards: You know what I’m saying? When you’re not questioning yourself, it’s still [00:45:00] great. It’s so much, it’s so easy for, it’s so easy to blame failure on that because, Nine times outta 10. That’s the reason why. Yeah. Am I right? No. Well, you know, yeah, no, I love, there are a few outliers who can just like go out and do it.

[00:45:12] Garrett Richards: You know, they’re, there are those people out there too, but those are, yeah, I can think of a couple. Those are going talents well, well, that’s not where I was gonna go with that. I

[00:45:21] Chris Dorris: also, well, the ones I was thinking of weren’t very likable and what I love about your answer, Is, that it’s not about you.

[00:45:31] Chris Dorris: That’s really fascinating cuz it’s really, it’s us, you know? And you’re using the US as inspiration for you that it’s not all. I hope I do good. I hope I do good. That was learned. I

[00:45:43] Garrett Richards: hope I don’t, that was learned at the University of Oklahoma. Oh really? That’s when I learned, not. Obviously, like in high school, you’re cl you’re close with your team and you want to win and obviously you have the same common goal and your, you know, you’re your brothers.

[00:45:57] Garrett Richards: But the things that I went through at OU and the way that [00:46:00] we came together for like three years when we took that program for where it was when we first got there and how we left it. Yeah. Like that’s one of the more prouder accomplishments I have of your career. I love looking back on it.

[00:46:14] Garrett Richards: That’s amazing what we went through. Suck. The weight lifting, the early running, all the shit, all the study hall, all the everything. Man. Like a student athlete at a major division one, or even a college in general. It’s a, it’s so much added. So on top of just being a student, yeah, you gotta juggle a lot of stuff, right?

[00:46:31] Garrett Richards: So I think you learn how to be a man, you learn how to, you learn a lot of things in that period of time. And I think that got me ready for a professional baseball. If I would’ve signed outta high school or gotten drafted outta high school, I don’t think I’d still be playing baseball. I don’t think I would’ve been able to handle what.

[00:46:46] Garrett Richards: I wouldn’t have been able to hand, I don’t think I was mature enough to handle what it takes to be successful at this level. What I don’t think I was prepared to give the what it took to be what I wanted to be. Wow. [00:47:00] I think it took me going to college and making the sacrifices and going through the three years of hectic everything to where when I got to pro ball man, it was like all I have to do is worry about playing baseball.

[00:47:14] Garrett Richards: Tunnel vision. The goal is to get to the big leagues. Everybody get outta my way. It’s pretty much the mentality, man. Beautiful. Right

[00:47:21] Chris Dorris: on. Well, I think I speak for a lot of people when I say I cannot wait to sit here and watch you again on the big screen. Yeah. Well, hey, thank you. Well, first of all, a shout out to Jim Lolly and all the people at The Hungry Monk for hosting us today.

[00:47:40] Chris Dorris: if you happen to be in Arizona, come to the Hungry Month in Chandler. If you like crab beer, You need to check

[00:47:47] Garrett Richards: this place out. The food man. Talk about the food is legit as well. And we need to probably

[00:47:52] Chris Dorris: give Mr. The Beer Chef Giddy Goldberg a little shout out for that. Right? Phenomenal. So, so thank you guys for all that and thank you [00:48:00] for making time.

[00:48:00] Chris Dorris: This was actually your idea. It was my idea to ha to, to, it was, of course, I asked you to be on. It. Was your idea to demand that had occurred here in a fun place is the first time I’ve ever done, we’ve probably done 40 episodes of Top Talk. Over the last couple years, this is the first time we’ve ever done one in a public

[00:48:15] Garrett Richards: place.

[00:48:16] Garrett Richards: I think you can just this pretty cool, an excellent environment like this. And I think that’s what

[00:48:19] Chris Dorris: it, and this is where I know you people are, this is our comfort zone. This is

[00:48:23] Garrett Richards: a staple. It’s so, I appreciate you and I appreciate it all you’ve shared today and thank you for being a guest and I can’t wait to see you album Mound brother.

[00:48:30] Garrett Richards: Absolutely. Good, babe. Thanks man.

[00:48:33] Chris Dorris: Appreciate it.

[00:48:38] Chris Dorris: Well, here I am back in the captains quarters. That was pretty cool. That was really fun. That was actually his idea was to go over to the Hungry Monk. That is in fact where we met as we mentioned during the interview. So that was really cool, for us to go hang out over there and, do our first ever tough talks live, recording in a public place.

[00:48:57] Chris Dorris: It was pretty neat. And, [00:49:00] Easily my favorite takeaway from that conversation with him, and one of the reasons I really love G Rich so much is that it’s not like Jer jb it isn’t lip service. It is his truth. and this, and I’ve never coached him, like he’s never a client of mine. He’s always been a friend.

[00:49:18] Chris Dorris: and this is his subscription, is that, you know, I just convert adversity into fuel. That’s not his language, but that it should, it could be. Right. I mean, it’s what he is saying and he is had his damn share of it, that’s for sure. especially lately with the injuries. And I just love his attitude about that, you know, so, and I also love that he brought up the fact that it’s not just like the approach to not dealing with, but creating from growing is his language.

[00:49:43] Chris Dorris: Growing from the adversities is not limited. To injuries in life, and this certainly isn’t applicable only to athletes. So I’m sure, you’ve had no difficulty bridging the gap between his experience and his choice on how to utilize. [00:50:00] Right, quote, setbacks and, think about ways that, maybe you can strengthen your own ability to do that in your life as well.

[00:50:07] Chris Dorris: So I hope you really enjoyed it. I enjoyed him so much and I really can’t wait to get, you know, to see him back on the mount. So thanks for tuning in as always. And until next time, great miracles.