The Mental Side of Scouting with Toronto Blue Jays Ryan Mittlemen

Matt Cundill  0:01  
Todd, this is the mental approach where we discuss mindfulness, mental performance and the tools available for coping in a high performance world. Here's Todd Arkell, 

Todd Arkell  0:11  
welcome to the mental approach. I'm your host. Todd Arkell, and today my guest is Ryan middleman. Brian middleman is the vice president of pro scouting for the Toronto Blue Jays, a role he's held as part of the team's front office, contributing significantly to their scouting and player acquisition strategies. Ryan, as as it says on the internet, is a native of Providence, Rhode Island. However, moved to Canada when he was at a young age, and as you'll find, this is a rather interesting journey somebody in baseball operations with a long, illustrious career, but had a notable athletic background where he won silver medals with Team USA in hockey and played collegiate hockey at Boston College. So welcome to the show, Ryan. Thanks Todd. I don't know about illustrious, but I appreciate them. Thank you. Well, hey, you know anybody else that's one world metals, playing hockey? Yeah, you might know a few, but most people haven't, right? I think that's illustrious. There you go. 

Ryan Mittlemen  1:11  
I, yeah, when, when I was a teenager, play like, was able to make a couple of those, like, under 17, under 18 teams, but I still had like, a US passport, so I had to try out for us team in Lake Placid, actually. So my dad and I just drove over, did it, then went back to Toronto, got lucky enough, made the team, and then would like go to the workout camps or whatever. But the whole time I was living in Toronto, so it was a bit of a weird experience, because even in the when we when we played the Canadian teams, I was kind of just playing against my friends in the, you know, guys that I would play against or with in the winter, but we were wearing different jerseys for the for that world tournament. 

Todd Arkell  1:54  
So it's kind of like a reverse Thomas Harley, same thing. Played for Canada, but he grew up mostly in America. So that's kind of that's kind of funny. So take me through how, how a hockey player from America ends up in Canada and accepting a job as a scout in baseball. How did that work?

Ryan Mittlemen  1:54  
 Yeah, strange. It's a strange one. But towards the end of my playing time, like after college, I was finishing up school, and I knew, like, hockey was clearly, like my number one sport, but like a lot of people from the Northeast or, you know, even in Canada, like baseball is kind of the summer sport, so I was doing both until I was In just hitting high school. I think I was about 13 or 14, and, you know, I had to drop baseball, hockey was clearly what I was, was gonna be, where I could achieve something. But I never lost the love for it, like watching it in the summer. Like a lot of you know, a lot of us are, like, involved in in hockey or the winter sports. But just as I was finishing school, I think, yeah, I loved just eating up everything on the internet with baseball, and was kind of the time of like Peter Gammons and a lot of that stuff started developing when I was done playing, like working in hockey was definitely an option. But there was sort of this build of executives in baseball that had come from non playing background, like Theo Epstein, John Daniels, like these guys are way, way better than I am, but at least it was some, I guess, motivation to say, like, you could maybe start at the bottom, and like you didn't have to play to, like, work your way up. And obviously, like Moneyball wasn't a big factor for me, but it certainly led to, like that book, but it certainly led to an explosion of of people being interested in working in baseball operations that didn't have playing background so but in between there, I was working at TSN for a few years, was just kind of like getting my feet back into the sports world and and working there. And that was that was great. I was in my early 20s, but was sending resumes out and trying to email executives with in baseball and hockey. But what happened was I, because of the time I spent at TSN, I got to know people in sort of the media in that world. And when something came open, I think at the end of 04 with the Blue Jays in their media department, I was able to get it. So even though I because of my US citizenship, I was sending resumes all over, something landed with the Blue Jays in media. So the 2000 that was really the big break for me to get in the organization, like any business, like, once you're in, there's different types of opportunities for you. So I did a year in the media department, 2005 we were okay. We were like a 500 team, but I, I got to travel with the team and.

Ryan Mittlemen  4:59  
On, you know, maybe 30 or 40 games. And I got to know JP, richardi, Alex anthropoulos, Andrew tennish, through that. So when something, I think the next year or something, became available in the scouting department, just as a coordinator, helping out with the amateur draft, I was able to get it, so it's your classic, like, foot in the door, and then was able to to get into baseball side. So from oh six on, I've been in different roles in baseball operations, but really it was sort of like the TSN thing helped me network on the in the media side of it, get the role with the Blue Jays, and then move into baseball ops, and I've been there ever since.

Todd Arkell  5:43  
That's a great work. Work up from the work up from the bottom, start in the mail room. Story, right? Can you explain the difference between and I know you've held jobs in amateur scouting and pro scouting, maybe explain a little bit some of the nuances for people that are listening what the differences between that because I think people think, well, scouts, a scout, but there's really kind of a couple of different areas that you guys work on.

Ryan Mittlemen  6:07  
Yeah, you know the amateur draft, which is going on, I think starts on Sunday. That's really like at the root of this whole thing, both in like the International Space, which is like Dominican, Venezuela, all those countries, but also in in the draft, it's the high schools, it's the college stuff, and it's, it's a different form of scouting, I think, and just that, like, it's more, it's all about the upside of the player and the you know you're, you're sort of like Living in a world of like, total optimism and dreaming what these players could be. That's a little easier if the guy is 21 years old and at LSU than if he's, you know, a 17 or 18 year old high school kid. But it's all projection. As players get in the pro world, there starts to be this sliding scale of, like, you know, performance and upside, or tools, or, you know, some of the subjective stuff with body, because we've seen lots of players in the big leagues, of course, that are like, may not look the way they're supposed to and and be the swing or the delivery isn't like, how you draw it up, but they're performing. So in the pro world, you're sort of, like, it's a bit of a sliding scale with like they're performing. Is there upside still? Are there things we can do to help this player? And then you know, to honestly, like stating the obvious. In the pro world, every transaction begins with like money and how many years you control the player, the talent is one big piece of it in a pro move or pro scouting, whereas an amateur, you know, they're sort of all available in that draft. So you're you're trying to shoot a little more for projection and upside, and they've got so far to go. That's what's different with the other sports like, there's so far to go for these players to go that you're really trying to project sometimes six, seven years down the road. It's so it's just a different lens. Both really fun, both involve different types of evaluation, but the amateur side is you're starting from, like, just the body of the player and the raw ability, because the performance side hasn't really set in yet. So I did the amateur draft and worked in that department for, I think, six or seven years, and then moved over into pro

Todd Arkell  8:37  
Well, and, you know? And that's one thing I think some of us probably forget. You know, if you're a sports fan, I mean, if you're really into it, you probably you understand. But it's almost like you need accountants to also be part of it, because it's like, what's the cockpit? What's the this? You know, you know, how does this fit into the that particular there's a lot of financial decisions that go along with the talent,

Ryan Mittlemen  9:01  
for sure. I mean, like every player in the big leagues, like, you know, their salary and years of control are totally public, right? Like everybody can. Anybody that follows this stuff knows, like, okay, you know, well, I'm getting this player, but he makes this much money, and I'm only gonna have him for a half a year, or a year, or whatever it all, it all weighs into it. The draft, it's more of just a it's a rounds market, right? So, like, you could think the guy's a bench player, I could think he's a starter, but we'd probably both take them. Want to have them. It's just a matter of which round you're you're going to take them in. So yeah, the pro world, it's the money and the years of control, kind of just do a sliding scale with the talent, and then, like the other stuff in the pro world becomes like playing time and roster spots, and when they're amateurs, like you can you have 20 rounds, you can draft, you can have, I think, 165 players in your minor league system. But I. As they get up to the higher levels in the big leagues, it's like we have to weigh Well, if we trade or sign this player, what's the playing time? Are they going to be able to maximize their talent? Because, you know, you've got a 40 man roster and a 26 and there's players all around the big leagues that flourish with another team because of opportunity and playing time.

Todd Arkell  10:24  
And how would you say, like, if somebody is out there and they go, hey, I want to get into the baseball world, How's it changed since when you broke in in the early 2000s to today, for somebody wanting to get into the get into that business?

Ryan Mittlemen  10:39  
Well, the big change is I would have no chance getting a job today. So that's something I don't underestimate. But the amount of opportunity is greater than it's ever been. There are more jobs for biomechanists and coding and all kinds of different things we didn't have when I started in 04 So the opportunity is much greater than it was when, like, I think our our baseball Operations office in 2006 was probably it was under 10 people. You know now it's probably closer to 100 The opportunity is greater. But as I mentioned, with like that early 2000s era of of younger executives. People have watched this now for 20 years, so the competition is fierce to get these jobs. Talking to job seekers. We see them a lot at the winter meetings or just through emails or whatever is the think that thing is like separating yourself. Finding a way to separate yourself is is really like sometimes that involves, you know, if you're in school, working as a volunteer for that school's baseball team, if you're not a player you know, or something like that, or or we've seen applicants like go shoot their own video at minor league affiliates and write scouting reports on their own and send them in things like that, because it's just become a fierce, really competitive industry for people to try to get into. It's always been that way, but the profile of the people that are getting the jobs now has changed. You know for sure, like by and large, there's still a ton of scouting jobs, but the office jobs, I think are, are seem to be headed towards more of the tech side of things as that continues to explode. Well, it'll be interesting. How's, how's a the AI work into anything you guys are doing yet? Yeah, you know we've, I that's way over my head. We certainly we started to explore that for sure, like we've had some meetings with people, just like, seeing how those opportunities are. It's a little tougher on the baseball side, I think on the business side, they're starting to make some gains there, but it's starting to be a conversation that I'm sure will grow. But nothing like, I can't point to something that we're like leveraging right now that so far, but it's gonna happen. It's gonna it's gonna continue to be a part of our industry. For sure. 

Todd Arkell  13:12  
Yeah, I mean, I think of at the college level in the States, yeah, I'm using synergy right to and recording all the games, and then being able to pull all kinds of metrics out on players. So it's almost no longer an eye test. It is a little but you've got all these metrics you can point to. 

Ryan Mittlemen  13:29  
Yeah, well, we, yeah, we've had that that's grown. I mean, one thing in our department in pro scouting that's changed so much is the access to video. You know, I think people analytics have grown, you know, to evaluate players, but videos exploded like even five years ago. I don't think every minor league game was accessible on video. Now it is, and from like, multiple angles. So pro scouting was a pretty tough role on family life, I think. But you know, maybe even 15 years ago, you you would have, I did it in 2012 and it's probably in a hotel. 22 to 25 nights a month. You're just getting back home for a reset, and you'd have a good off season, but you on the road now, our scouts, like they can do half their job from home, like watching on video and evaluating. So we sort of tell them, like, go to the field. When you feel like this is you think there's value in being there, and the other stuff you can, you can do on video if you feel like the angle, like you have enough from the angles and stuff like that. So that's exploded like at the college level too, that just every year seems to be more and more to the point to where, like a game in Japan or Korea or in Taiwan, I could watch any of them, like the next day at my computer, you know. So, yeah. That's had a major effect on signings. And you know, all over the world is the access to video, multi camera shoots, like we're seeing this in youth hockey with, I forget the name of that app, barn, something? Barn, open.

Todd Arkell  15:16  
Oh, live. Barn. Trust me, nobody's I gotta tell you something. I couldn't even tell which kid was mine watching on live bar, and it's so terrible. But there are serious I mean, the camera angles are horrifying. But, I mean, if you just want to kind of see what's going on, I guess it's cool. But I think, you know, with hockey, there's, and I want to say it might be, might be vivo. Shout out to vivo, if you're the right one. But there's literally a camera system at you talkie, the coach can set up in the stands, and it does like follow, and it counts all their shots. It Wow, ice time by players like and, you know, it's not outrageous. I mean, I think if you were a coach at a on an eight you team, and you were going to move up with a team, you know, it's 1500 or $2,000 and you're going to get that back if you have that team for 567, years. But yeah, it's an app. They can sit down and watch, watch their watch their games, and kind of know what's going on, and it gets all kinds of breakdown. So, yeah, it's interesting. I would imagine, obviously, at the pro level, it would would have been there based on just the basic stuff. You can get it at a young level. Even youth baseball, the big, the big app really is game changer. Yeah, and, you know, I was able to watch my son play in Texas yesterday afternoon. You know, again, it's not amazing, like, I don't think you could scout from it, but you can see the outcome, and it's, you know, it's good enough. Yeah, to watch. But that that in itself. Shout out to Dick sports, who created that app and now owns the data of every sports athlete, parent who's ever signed up. Smart, smart so it's a it's a great app for all those users, and good marketing ploy as well. Let's talk about you come up in the organization under, under Alex Anthopoulos, suddenly he exits. You have a new you have new bosses in ROSS Atkins and Mark Shapiro. You know, in any job, there's certainly some worry when you get a new boss or there's new management. And you know, like, from a mental perspective, how did that affect you at that time? And, you know, how was navigating that, when there was a, now, a new vision for the team, and kind of just pulling together into that, into that new environment,

Ryan Mittlemen  17:29  
yeah, it was, yeah, kind of a an interesting time. But really I have to speak to like Tony Lacava was, you know, a mentor of mine. He was sort of the constant of that time, and I think he became the interim General Manager under Alex, still with us in a bunch of draft meetings right now, but, you know, he kind of took the role on an interim basis when Alex departed. And you know, I just spent so much time with him. Whatever it was, it was, you know, kind of just continuing on with him, and you know him, and then eventually him supporting Ross. Yeah, didn't know Ross and Mark, other than just the things they had done in Cleveland, but they've been great to me. Been great to work for, great for the culture of the Blue Jays. But I think the constant in those two eras. Was, was Tony, you know, I know a lot of blue jays fans, people have heard that name, but he's been sort of a constant now for 25 years. And at that time, yeah, it was, it was a little turbulent, I guess. But he was that, you know, things kept moving with him. And, yeah, I think, like any and I, you know, I work for JP, richardi too. It's always takes a little time to learn, like, value system and pace of a new boss, like in any business, I think, like, it's been great for me. One thing I would say with Mark and Ross, like, I hadn't really worked for someone that that had come from outside the Blue Jays, you know, because, Alex would took over for JP, and that was, that was all great, but it was learning. I've learned so much under, you know, Mark and Ross and some other guys that have joined our, our group from other organizations that I just, you know, it's, I've been really lucky to be with the Blue Jays. This is season 21 for me. But, you know, it's nice to kind of hear different perspectives from other teams. We did this this way. We, you know, like so the time with the Blue Jays is, is, you know, it's been an incredible run for me, but that period in at the end of 2015 it did kind of open me up to some new forms of evaluating or leadership or whatever, and and so. So it's been great. And there's other people like Andrew tennish and Charlie Wilson, and some of that kind of went through that transition, and I think would say similar things, that it's worked out really well. But like I said, I think it was kind of the biggest thing. For me was I got the had the loyalty piece from Tony Lacava. But, you know, was exposed to some new ways of doing things with the with Mark and Ross. So it all went really well.

Todd Arkell  20:12  
I'd like to maybe try to get into, since this is the mental approach, I'd like to get in a little bit about, how do you, how do you mentally prepare yourself for what is probably a very long scouting season and balancing the demands of travel and evaluating numerous games like, how do you how do you kind of get yourself set up for that?

Ryan Mittlemen  20:33  
Yeah, it's a good question. Todd, I it starts. I would say at this point in my career, the off season is just as busy like that. Our group is responsible, you know, kind of coordinating meetings and strategy sessions and talking to a lot of agents. And you know that, obviously there aren't games going on at night, but you can, you can have a day where you you are on six, like seven, one hour phone calls that feels draining, even though you didn't really move, sure, and get up much. But once that's all over, and we get to February, and the teams, you know, by and large, built spring training is, is sort of the beginning, is a long stretch. And I was super lucky to be able to go down to Florida for like, six, seven weeks to do that. It's, you know, it's a good atmosphere because, you know you're, you can still evaluate, but the games obviously don't count, but it's a long run down there. You're, you're there for like, six, seven weeks, and you're watching minor league spring training, Major League spring training, you're still trying to acquire players. So it is a busy time for me when, when I get home from there, they're usually like, just to kind of watch the team and evaluate, like, maybe three, four weeks into April, just to see what we got, you know, like, what's what's going on here? Get a little rest at home. Usually for me, late April, early May, is a trip to Japan, Korea, Taiwan, that it's the the Major League season, and minor league season is kind of early, so it's a good opportunity to go over there and just see a lot of players. When I get back from that, there's certainly like a Times, Time Zone reset that like, hang over, I guess, for a little while, and then in June, in late May, early June, I'm probably more on like watching our affiliates a little bit, or sort of evaluating where our scouts have lists of their organization. And we'll have some meetings in Toronto, in there, usually I'll do a trip or two with the major league team. You know, we kind of split those trips up. There's always a baseball ops member with the with the team. I'll usually like, I'm not involved in the draft much anymore, so, and a lot of those guys are so usually in late June, early July, like this, I'll, I'll take a trip or two with the team. Then we're into trade deadline. And then once the trade deadline is over, the scouting world, pro scouting world, probably for first like week or two of August, kind of take a bit of a breather, and then we'll get into some meetings in late August. Usually we find a destination. Last year, we went to Montreal, which was fun, just to sit down evaluate what we did some of the free agents for next year. And then in September, I'll do another long trip to Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and then hopefully, like the last couple weeks of the season, you're starting to do some like advanced scouting for the playoffs. Probably start that in mid September, where myself and a group of other scouts and analysts in our office will start to look at the other teams we could play when you're not a playoff team, you probably have a little more time in September to devote to, like free agency, minor league free agency, preparing. So that's sort of the year in this role.

Todd Arkell  23:56  
Well, currently it looks like the Jays fingers crossed, could be a playoff team. So just like anything with baseball, it didn't start off the way everybody thought it would be, but it's been, it's been a good run as of late. We'll see when this episode comes out, where everybody sits. You know, we always record a little in advance, but it's definitely baseball fever has hit the city of Toronto once again. So which is, which is always good. I think the atmosphere in a city is always better. When one of their sports teams are winning certainly creates a better environment. People seem happier. So, you know, just like any sport you know, like if you grew up playing hockey or, you know, playing baseball, there's obviously failure that kind of goes in with things, and you have to build in a bit of a emotional resilience for these things. So how do you deal with, you know, missing out on a, you know, a promising player. How do you manage that, you know, disappointment or self doubt, or, you know, did you guys do everything you could? Obviously, I know there's one no. Notable one, which you know, that everybody talks about as of recent but you know how to, you know, it's, it's not just the notable ones, either. There's a lot of parts that go into it. So, you know, how do you guys deal with that when you're when you kind of don't get your man?

Ryan Mittlemen  25:12  
Yeah, that's a great question. I mentioned being in the amateur draft. I think I was in my 20s, late 20s, and that actually taught me, at an age where you're probably a little more emotional, it can go up in smoke, like you're literally about to take the guy, he's two picks away, and the team pickpockets you right before that, that's I could talk about. That happened with Travis darneau. It happened with some other players. So you work the whole year, you're about to get the player you one of the players you really liked, and he's gone in an instant, and his whole career could be in another play, like it's so now you're who's next, right, right? With like, a minute of time to recover. That puts a bit of a like, hard bark on you. I think to like, one of the things in amateur Scouting is the area scouts who do a great job for us, like, the draft doesn't like the cookie doesn't always crumble for them, regardless of how good a job they do. So you have to just kind of like, it's a draft, right? Like, it just, it doesn't go your way all the time, but, but earlier in my career, that developed like, I guess, maybe just not riding an emotional roller coaster for that type of stuff. It's the same way in the pro world with signings and trades, they can be gone in an instant. It's almost a miracle when they work, they work out for you, you know, something like yario Rodriguez was something our group pursued quite a bit that worked out. Roki Sasaki, obviously it didn't. So, you know, it's just, it's tough. The longer you work in a business, I think you're able to, kind of, if you can avoid an emotional roller coaster as much as possible, you'll be able to, like, just turn the page on the ones that don't go your way and move on to the next thing. But it's a great question. It's I definitely dealt with that a little better as I got older. But they heard like they in the moment you think the world's caught like you know that that this is gonna be the the end of you and the franchise and and then, like, you just recover, right? You know, it's, it's the same way in the draft. But, you know, when you start your first four or five years being in the amateur draft room, that kind of exposed me to, like, how, you know, just the tides can turn so quickly.

Todd Arkell  27:43  
And actually had a little question about, about Rodriguez, how long, you know, how long did that kind of, that pursuit happen? And that was super complicated, too. Like, yeah, when you go back, there was, Hey, you, you owe us money, this contract. There was all kinds of people pointing fingers and wanting, how did you how did you navigate that? How long did it take? Was it? Was it difficult? One of the more difficult ones you've been able to pull off,

Ryan Mittlemen  28:09  
yeah, oh, yeah. I think probably the most difficult, I really unique situation. It starts with liking the player, right? Like that's we had watched him pitch in Japan and for the Cuban team in the Olympic trials. This was before the covid Olympics in Tokyo. They didn't, Cuba didn't make it to the Olympics, but they were in. There's actually, yeah, there's a great game against Team Canada on YouTube, if anyone wants to watch where he was a starter, which really, I've done a couple interviews on this, like when we first signed yario, was something that a couple scouts and I were there in Port St Lucie, where really once, you never gonna go off one outing. But it definitely was, was something impressive. But So it starts with that, and then it just gets into pursuit of the player. What was unique with him was leaving Japan in the middle of his contract caused him to go on the restricted list and have to sit the season in the Dominican. And then eventually he showcased for teams. But I think, like you know, us being persistent with his his representation and stuff from the beginning, back when he was a player in Japan, that's what got us there. So it's a lot of like getting there first, being persistent, not quitting, and then it towards the end. It becomes about, you know, can we get the money and years and agree on something? But his agent, Brian manidi, and I knew each other for 20 years. That helped. I thought, because it was a unique transaction, just to know you were dealing with kind of like a friend or someone who had been in the industry about the same time as me, yeah, but, but unique, and then it was like just a lot of the this thing didn't officially get done until right before spring. Training in 24 so getting him to Florida, Visa stuff, then, obviously, like his role, we wanted to try him as a starter. First he had to go to Buffalo. He hurt his back in spring training. So there was, you know, I'd feel like last year, with everything going on in his life, just, you know, leaving Cuba, all that stuff, and his family, there was a lot going on with him off the field, and we kind of, I didn't expect him, I guess, to get that much of an opportunity for innings in the in the major leagues. Unfortunately, we struggled last year. Lot of playing time and innings became available, which I think helped him. He's been, he's been really helpful to this team. But this group, I think, like, it's really been amazing to see like 2526 guys all contributing, you know, it's, it's, obviously, we have star players that are leading it, but you know, yario and a bunch of other guys have contributed to make this team successful in the first half of the season. So, yeah, but for sure, like, I think complicated transaction, Todd, I think, but the relationship and the, you know, the just the desire to get the player is, it starts there.

Todd Arkell  31:17  
Okay, so even, even this is kind of playing off of that, when you discover what you kind of think is a diamond in the rough, obviously you're excited, but then you can risk probably becoming a little too attached to what you found and like, how do you manage that emotional roller coaster of, you know, you're championing a player, but you want to stay objective, like you Know, especially if their path, you know, might not align with your vision, or you've got other people that don't see it, like, how do you kind of manage all of that? How does it come together?

Ryan Mittlemen  31:49  
Good, good question. I in that, in that case, one thing we did, because I had to just being honest, like, remove myself a little from it, because I had been doing the meetings and the pursuit of, you know, talking to yario, talking to his his representation, and whatever, and we kind of put a little group together in our baseball Operations Office to sort of evaluate them outside of myself and Andrew tennish and hide Sato, who's our Director of Pac rim operations. He had seen them in Japan. So we kind of got, like, more of a, you know, objective view of him to kind of build some boundaries on what we were willing to pay when he did become a free agent. So that was helpful. So I kind of went from scouting him and meeting him and trying to recruit him to say, like, you know, okay, we really like this guy, and we think we've done the work where we're an option for him, because he did have options other teams that were interested. Okay, so now we're going to a group outside of that to maybe form a bit of a sandbox for negotiations. And then I kind of took it after that, obviously, you know, going back and forth with Ross and mark on where negotiations would would be, and where it was able to get it done. So yeah, for sure, though, like, it can get emotional. We don't we do anything we do is like we're trying to remove bias, and we're trying to make the most objective decisions we can. And in that case, being kind of the recruiter, I had to, like, remove myself from it a little bit. Okay, what are we willing somebody else? Yeah, what are we willing to do contract wise? Now, let me try to get it done.

Todd Arkell  33:33  
I love that answer, because, you know, you wonder sometimes, like you get all in on somebody, and then, you know, do you? Do you pay too much? We can go back to recent contracts with the Toronto Maple Leaf, where people think certain individuals may be overpaid for other individuals, and don't know whether that's factual or not. I mean, it's, you know, it's the one, the one great thing about sports is everybody's got an opinion, and it means they're going to be talking about it for a long time. I mean, I think you guys were at the time of this recording, the winning streak stopped. I think it was 10 games. Was it 10 games? And, you know, I'm reading people online going, man, Vladi has got to pull his weight. And I'm thinking, other people are getting it done. That's awesome. And the fact that Vladi is so skilled also leads to the fact that they gotta, you know, they can't make a mistake with him when they're pitching to him. So other guys getting it done makes puts even more pressure just his presence, I think, makes pressure. And I just, I just kind of laugh. You see it? No, it seems like nobody's ever happy, regardless of what a team's doing 10 in a row, and people are calling for the franchise, the face of the franchise, to get off his ass. So anyways, I thought that was pretty funny.

Matt Cundill  34:52  
Now, more of the mental approach with Todd Arkell

Todd Arkell  34:56  
scouting, at least from my perspective, I would think that it requires. Yeah, you know, especially modern day, you're balancing kind of intuition and a lot of data driven stuff, right? And I think, I think, honestly, it'd probably be hard to to really fall either side, to be really more favoring one or the other. How do you kind of manage that sort of tension between, you know, gut eyes and and metrics. And how do you put that all together?

Ryan Mittlemen  35:27  
Yeah, it's, it takes good leadership, obviously, to kind of steer like these, you know, baseball operations departments that I mentioned with, like the, you know, for job seekers or whatever, have grown larger so there's more people weighing in on decisions than, like, when I work for JP or Alex, so I get that stuff's grown. So it takes leadership. And then I think we have a really good, like, you know, respect for both sides of it. I think it's, there's, you know, sometimes it becomes like, sort of just getting to the best group decision you can, you know, like it's, it's kind of like being like members of a band, you know, where, like the, you know, the drummer wants his song on the album. And, you know, like it's, it's sort of like that.

Todd Arkell  36:16  
Sometimes that usually means there's going to be a new drummer. That's what that usually means

Ryan Mittlemen  36:20  
anything. No, it's well, like the thing in in sports is like, there's a decision every day on who to bring up and who which minor leaguer to move to a different level and like, so, you know, it becomes about just making, like, trying to remove bias as much as you can, make the best group decision as best you can. But sometimes you you struggle with that, and there's a bit of a hung jury, and that's where, like, leadership has to, you know, sometimes, like, just kind of steer the boat a little bit, and, and, but it's, I think, the thing that is challenging for, I bet, all 30 teams, is like, this explosion in data analytics technology innovation is, like, it doesn't stop, like, it just keeps going. So it's not like you can take, catch your breath and say, Okay, we've got the right amount of people to synthesize all this information. Like, next year there's going to be another thing, and there's now, like, swing metrics have become really popular. So it's a it's, we're lucky with the Blue Jays that I think, you know, Mark and Ross and ownership are been like, helped us kind of evolve with that, all that stuff moving so fast. Because there are some other places, some other franchises where like that. Just kind of, you know, they kind of go with what they have. And, you know, you maybe not evolving as quickly. So long answer, but group decisions that you're trying to even we have one person that works in our group that really studies like decision making sciences like in all fields on, like, how to, you know, like, data would tell you, like, people weighing in here over met, you know, isn't a great idea, whatever. So there's just so many decisions, like data on making decisions like, like, what would that would tell you over time? And so, because the number of players and the number of games in baseball, like, something comes up every day, you know, multiple times a day. So, and now we're dealing with huge data sets and evolving analytics every year that a lot of people are needed to synthesize this stuff. So it's, it's a lot, it's, it's our sport, just like, I think the batter, pitcher matchup, just like, begins a whole set of data every pitch, and a lot of people need to, you know, sort of be part of that. But we're lucky. Like we've our group has been given everything we need to continue evolving and make the best decisions we can for the franchise.

Todd Arkell  39:07  
It, as I speak, more and more like I had, you know, I guess, a rudimentary understanding that it would be complicated, but it sounds like it's even infinitely more complicated than most outsiders would would expect, that's for sure. I mean, I even just think about, you know, being a kid and going to bed and listening to a transistor radio to try to catch parts of games. And then, you know, as a we'll call it middle aged person at one point when middle when MLB TV came out, and I could literally watch every game on my iPad. I was like, I was like a kid in a candy store every night with headphones on in bed, going from this game to that game to this and, you know, all the different metrics you could find. And it's just for somebody who's a fan of the sport, there's just, there's so much that you can, you can kind of take in and. And evaluate, and as somebody who I'm a fan of an out of market team from where I live, you know, I'm able to watch games, yeah, and and catch up on the local news and everything else. So it's really has changed where makes it obviously a lot more of a global game. So obviously, the scouting world is highly competitive. Often, many teams, you know, I'm gonna guess. There's probably not a lot of secrets. As far as, hey, this is the next guy coming up, or whatever it is, right? Like most people, have got somebody you know, as they say, if you're good enough, they'll find you. Meaning, there's enough people you know out there, and I know enough about, you know, things in the Dominican, where kids are being evaluated at 1213, years old, and kind of being committed air quotes to teams, and there's a there's a lot of stuff that goes on in other countries as well, trying to identify that talent as early as possible. But So how do you how do you handle the I guess maybe mental strains, the right word, how do you handle the mental strain of secrecy, you know, keeping things secret. And then also, you know, because if things get out, you might have a, you know, maybe an in Division team that says, oh, we can't let them get that guy. We're, we're going to get in on there. We're going to make it hard on them. Like, how do you manage all that stuff?

Ryan Mittlemen  41:21  
Yeah, the the, as I was starting to do, amateur scouting, like perfect games a company, you know that, like, centralized a lot of amateur baseball in the United States and and, and even had some some teams from other countries come in like, so it started to be less like, I think, when I started an amateur, there was still, like, scouts could have players at the high school level that were maybe just unknown to other scouts, and they try to keep it quiet or whatever. Now it feels like we're a little past that where, like, like, you said, like, if a player is good enough, like that there's video everywhere, where there's Twitter, all these things like, so it's harder. It's it's, I think it's become a little more of like, we like this guy better than you, but we both know about him. In the in international scouting, in the in Latin America and stuff, there is still a bit of that where you just can't see everybody and know every player down there. And so it ends up being like the scouts down there, relationships with some of the agents and the coaches and being able to get deals done. But, yeah, I think, I think, like nowadays, our database, like anything we talk about in the office, or conversations with other teams, or it's all documented. So like, that wasn't the case when I started, you know, we were just sort of doing it, and, you know, maybe would send an email to other people on how it goes. So like, you know, our database and level of information is strong now where so, so that thing is super valuable to us, but I think in the scouting world, like the it's harder to there's just, there's not a lot of secrets, as far as, like the player pool, like who's out there, or whatever, I think in the pro world, especially at the big league level, like makeup information and sort of like, so when a player is an amateur, usually the scouts are getting to meet with the parents and the family. Like to do what they call an in home visit where so the player is trying to market themselves for the draft, and they're they'll give you all the information they can to to sort of get themselves in a higher position in the pro world, it's they nobody talks to you so and you're not allowed to really talk to those players. So you have to find ways to scrape information on potential acquisitions. So that becomes about like network. And you know, finding people you know that you can talk to, but it it's at the major league level, we have so much information. Like you said, that information on the person, the player in the clubhouse, are super valuable, because that is, you know, not available to the public, like a lot of the other stuff is so that information is king. If you can get it, it's just difficult. Whereas in the amateur world, like, like I said, the agent, the player, the family, they're trying to amplify their standing. And, yeah, it's definitely evolved. It's, I think, for the families and the players in the amateur world, I think at the end of the day, this is a good thing. Like, there's just so much like, the teams are getting, they know the showcases and the tournaments and the websites and all this stuff to go to to analyze these players. There used to be, like a bit of a if a player was from like Brandon Nimmo with the Mets, I think is from white Wyoming, like players in those like non. Traditional base players could maybe slip through the cracks. Not that they wouldn't get drafted if they were talented, but they would maybe get, like, put on the back burner a little bit, or they're like, because they weren't playing against the competition. Now, I think like, that type of player will be at a bunch of showcases that you'll see him play against players from California or Texas or whatever. So ultimately, I think this is good for both sides. The teams have better information, and there's less players and families that can say, my kid didn't get exposure, you know, so, but that's a lot of that's changed in the last 1015, years. For sure?

Todd Arkell  45:42  
Yeah, I can imagine it'd probably be, you know, guys driving out into the middle of farm country to find some kid that somebody told them about. And then they're like, Okay, yeah, everybody, keep this one under wraps for six months. Yeah, don't talk to anybody. I want to sign you, yeah, I mean, and you're right. I mean, just everything out there, social media wise. And I know one of our past guests, Cooper Davis, who was a Canadian kid from Mississauga. He was actually drafted by the Jays, trying to remember what year he might have actually still been working there at the time. Probably was, anyways, but it was like a late, late round, when they used to have still lots of rounds, because he was committed to Vanderbilt. But he had said to me, you know, he his dream school was LSU, that's where he wanted to go. And he was at some tournament, and, you know, somewhere in the Boston area, and the LSU coach was there, and he said, I went off. I was like unconscious the whole tournament. And the coach said to him, he goes, You know, I thought you played great, but I didn't think the competition was great. So it's really interesting in how people are, you know, just because you did great doesn't necessarily mean anything to to people who are evaluating talent, because it's like if you're playing substandard. So like you said, playing against kids from California, Texas, Georgia. You know, you go to, you go to East Cobb in Georgia, and you can't swing a bat without hitting a pretty good baseball player. I mean, there's, there's a lot of really good kids, and I know even my son playing against again, remember he was like, he was one of the top, top ranked players in at the time. I think he could have, think he probably committed to a school in grade 10 when you could do that, because you can't do that anymore. But I remember my son hitting an absolute missile up the middle, and the kid took two steps like 48 inch vertical, snags the snags the thing. And you're like, Oh man, right. So that's a hit in every other league, except against a kid who's one of the top players in the country, right? So it's until you go play against those players you don't really know. I think a lot of you know a lot of people coming up in the sport, they think their kid's good. I think you can really find out how good they are by putting them against top level competition, because it certainly shows up and there, there it is. A game that definitely shows it from that perspective. So, yeah, I think it is. It's probably a lot easier from a scouting perspective. I think in the end of the day, I don't think it's any different at college either. Everybody's trying to find good players, but good people as well.

Ryan Mittlemen  48:19  
Yeah, one thing too. Like, I think, on the in the information era, like we have here, like the exit V lows and some of these, like physical measurements can a little bit, definitely at the pro level, but an amateur to, like, cut through, like the luck piece. Like, you know, if your son hits a ball, 105 wouldn't, regardless of who it's against or whatever, like, it's impressive, you know. So yes, these type of things, like, you know, are growing at the amateur level, and rap Soto and TrackMan, all this stuff and and it'll probably help, like, kind of, you know, bucket players at whatever talent level they should be at. But I think some, there's probably a group of scouts that you know, do miss, like the times where it was like the information wasn't as prevalent to everybody and they could but I think the challenge now for scouts is, is the you know, like, obviously, this nil thing is, has changed college sports, for sure. But I think at the root of, like, our area scouts who are, who are like, sort of the lifeblood of that department, is getting to know the player, the talent and the person as well as you can that has not changed. That has not changed, no matter what video analytics, anything you have that hasn't changed the doing that part of the job well can get you out in front of the competition. Doing that part of the job poorly will get you behind. So that speaks to hiring. You know. And getting the right people in these roles that can begin the nobody know, like most high school players in the draft, like the scouts in those areas, like I don't know who they are, but these scouts in the areas know they who they are was when they're like freshmen or soft they see it. They see it coming. So the earlier there, you're there, and can build relationship with the family or the player and evaluate the talent like that's going to help. That hasn't changed. So some things change, like a lot of the information and the factors into it, that has has evolved, for sure, but that being there at the beginning hasn't you know that that never changes in any sport, like the scouts with the best information on and off the field or court or ice, they're ahead, and they help their make their org, their organization, make better decisions by doing that. So continually try to continuously try to hire the best scouts you can to lead that stuff. Because, you know, in baseball operations, we're not always in the field, like we're up in the office, like we're not watching this high school kid when he's in grade 10 or 11 sometimes, so that the scout in that area has to lead it. And you know, like one that sticks out to me was when we when we drafted Aaron Sanchez was Blake Crosby, who believes with the Phillies now, but was an amateur Scout first for a while. He was Bobby Crosby's brother, who played for the A's for a while. He knew Aaron Sanchez better than anybody like he went to every one of his starts. He knew the family. They were from a small town in California, you know, Aaron's had a solid career. Maybe, you know, had some injuries and didn't, maybe evolve like, you know, maybe the ceiling wasn't as high as some people thought. But at the amateur level, he was a star, and Blake knew him better than anybody, and was able to, you know, help us make a really good pick. So, yeah, and there's, there's, there's a lot of other Manoa, there's a lot of other cases like that, but speaks to the hiring of of those guys and getting the right people doing those jobs.

Todd Arkell  52:17  
Yeah, I guess, you know, you know, obviously, if a kid gets drafted, you know, there's not too many instances where I think they don't sign. Maybe they don't sign because they're going to go to college, and that's their deal, and that's where, and I L plays into it as well. I mean, you know, you're competing against, you know, somebody says, you know, you get a late round pick and his slot money, maybe not as good what he might get going to college. And they, they think maybe I'll go to college, you know, I don't know. I think if you want to be a professional baseball player, in my mind, all things considered, you take the pro route and give it a shot, especially if you're a high school kid being drafted. I mean, it's different being drafted as a college kid, but I think coming out of high school, you get drafted. So now you go, you know, that kid's in the system for 567, years, and then it lands in your lap. Yeah, you want to have the insight from somebody who knew that kid when he was a teenager, and kind of coming up, if he wasn't somebody you guys drafted, makes, makes total sense. How do you, how do you kind of manage, I was going to say, like, you talked about going to Asia a lot, and I, I kind of thought about that, like, from a cultural and a language difference, like, how do you, how do you kind of navigate that? Do you have to take a translator with you along the way? Or, how does that? How does that work?

Ryan Mittlemen  53:36  
Yeah, so I think the most depth as far as talent would be in Japan. So our our director of pack ring, pack rim operations, hide Sato, he was, he started, he worked in the in the Japanese League. He was also you darvish, his translator when he was with the rangers and Rogers. So we hired him in 2018 game changer for our organization. You know, like he had experience working in Major League clubhouses with a star Japanese player, that to me, like in hiring him, was a was a separator. He played in college. He so he had been on the field a little bit anyway, but he's been, His names come up and seeing things through like Roki and Ohtani and some of those pursuits, and you say Kikuchi, and he's done at some of the press conferences when we signed those players and and he really just puts on a T for me. I gotta tell you, he's, he's like, I go over there, and he's, there's not a detailed miss. Speaks English, Japanese and some Spanish. Really impressive person who has lifted our organization to a level I couldn't have imagined. I think fans, you know, like, clearly, we've, we've missed out on some, some really big players. From, from the Pacific Rim, but, you know, we weren't really in those conversations until we had he day, you know, so he's, he's been a star for us, and continues to be. But I, I wish I could tell you Todd that I've, like, you know, done this stuff to to do really well over there and to but he really makes it easy. But it's, it's a gift to be able to go to those countries and see, I mean, their love for baseball is just, it's, it's, it's kind of like us with hockey, you know, like it's, it really is incredible to see that. And when you go to the Dominican, it's kind of the same that, the same love where, where baseball is, you know, clearly, like the number one sport, so, but so now, like, I think I've been going over there since 2017 it's, it's, you know, obviously I know how to get around and and I'm experienced, But it's, it's all because of him. He's really helped the Blue Jays rise in that market and will continue to. And, yeah, we're, you know, we're kind of the international team, right, like we we should be in these markets as hard as we can, and we are, but it does take, you know, buy in from ownership and management, to hire like, there are plenty of teams that don't even have a scout over there. You know, we're able to have, we have a couple Korean staff members. One works our office, Brian Lee. One lives in LA, Steven Yu that help us in the Korean market. We got a guy named Tony Cho that helps us in Taiwan. So it's really hard to succeed in that market without people on the ground. And we have that. And so they're, they put it on a T for me to come in and, you know, watch the games and eat sushi. And, yeah, it gets there. They're awesome, and have really helped the organization. You know

Todd Arkell  57:04  
how much goes into like, we talk about, okay, we're moving bias, and I'm on on this, or somebody's in on it. Like, when it comes down to at the end of the day, you guys go to Ross and Mark and you say, Hey, we think this is a guy like, are they just taking the group's word for it, or are they? Are they weighing in and maybe challenging? Hey, why would we want that player those types of things like talk about how that whole process works with kind of baseball ops doing these work ups on players. And obviously, look at you guys are in. You're in the thick of things right now. You may need to add a piece or not. I'm going to say you're not going to be sellers. You might be buyers. You might stand pat. You might have people down below. But how do you, kind of, how do you go through all those conversations, and is it sort of, you guys can say, No, I don't like this. And Ross says, No, I do. Or how does it? How does it work?

Ryan Mittlemen  58:01  
Yeah, I think, like we're, we're trying to make the best group decisions possible. You know, obviously Ross and Mark are the leaders of that, but we just, we try to talk things through as a group to get to the best decision we can, which involves, like, so many layers of information now, but, you know, some of it also becomes, like, what's your value system? What's the winning cycle of the team on, like, last year, you know, we had to, we made a decision. You know, this is we all know this now, but like, we had to, like, Detroit Tigers, sold at the deadline, ended up being a playoff team, you know, we decided to, yeah, I sometimes don't love using the Buy Sell thing, but we, we made a decision that we were going to trade players off our major league team to take a bit of a step back. So the direction is obviously led by leadership, of course, and then it's up to us to execute it and get the most value we can. So if we make a decision that we're gonna trade, you say Kikuchi or Jimmy Garcia when he was with us previously, or Justin Turner, like that's up to leadership, you know, and then it's up to people in baseball operations to execute the best moves you can, through negotiation, through evaluation, through valuation, through medical people, the makeup stuff I talked about, like using every lever you can to make the best decision you can. But like those high level like sort of direction things, and, you know, extensions for players and like that comes from leadership. But those things are discussed all the time. And, you know, clearly, like, like, so far, you know, with I think that we got three games to go at the end of the first half. Like, we've put ourselves in a good position. Ross has mentioned that, you know, publicly, but each day you're evaluating like, you know. You have to keep one eye on, like, what if, you know, like the like, for example, the game, like, Dalton Varsha had the hamstring injury going for like, change, like, very quickly. I mean, luckily, we've been able to kind of weather that for now. But like, in the moment, it felt, you know, like a, like, a, he definitely hurt for him, literally, but hurt for the team. And so, so you can obviously like that in that moment and later on that night, you're thinking of, like, Okay, we need to think about the next step here, even though the team's doing well, like, what are we? So, you know it's, it's, there's so many decisions it takes a wide group of people and data to make them. You got to just try to stick to your process and your people that are, you know, devoted to these areas, to come up with the best decisions you can. But it's fun when you know, the teams playing well like this to think about, you know, you know, the a winning team and trying to build the best group we can. You know, last year, obviously, like, we had clarity on because we were not doing well in the standings of what we wanted to do. Thought we pulled it off pretty well. You know, the mood, but obviously, like, you don't want to be in that position. But you know, at some point, leadership has to say, like, we, we're going in this direction, and we, we now we need you guys to kind of buy in and execute that so, so yeah, the teams that are sort of in the middle, that are in the 500 area, or, like, just outside the playoffs, but they've got to, we've been in that position too, that you have a you know, you're trying to straddle the future and the present and not give up on the season, that those are that's where it gets it gets hard, and you maybe have to look at the future commitments and the contracts and stuff to decide what you want to do, I think with the extra playoff spots, which I think is a great thing, it's sort of a great thing, just for the for the sport, those teams that are a little lower down in the standings, it's really difficult, because they may not be far away from competing, but is it based On our contracts and our roster structures, the best thing to move forward with this group, or to pull back a little bit like Devers, is the most recent example of that, where, you know, they made a decision to kind of allow younger players to play. They're they're actually, like, on a pretty good winning streak right now, but like, shocking in the moment, you know, and for a team that wasn't, you know, was an out of playoff contention to do something like that, but yeah, so it was a lot more, I think, in the years, like I'm old enough where think it was like one wild card on each side, like the haves and have nots were pretty clear, yeah, But you had a lot of cities and fan bases that were kind of like, knew they were toast by June 1 or whatever, and that wasn't a very good thing for the industry. So, you know, it's, it's, I think the extra playoff spots are good, but it does cause teams to that are sort of in that middle ground, like to pause and really think through what they're what they're going to execute in the next few weeks here,

Todd Arkell  1:03:24  
yeah, and I think you know what culture brings a lot into it, because I was watching an interview with Colt Keith of the Tigers last night, and he said, you know, hey, we, we traded all these people away last year, and Then we just basically started to have fun, and then that's they went on that crazy run at the end of the season, and he said it just kind of carried into this year as well. Because if you look at that team on paper, I mean, they have some decent young talent, but I would argue they're overachieving, based on what most people would think. There's no There's some good players, but there's no superstars. And, you know, even look at, you know, Javi Baez is a guy who did not live up to his contract, but this year has been, you know, absolutely living up to it. So it's kind of like, you know, he was hurt. So you kind of, you know, you don't know everything that's going on in the background, as a fan on the outside looking in, but all of a sudden there's a, it feels like there's a culture shift there. Feels like that, watching your team as well that there, there's a bunch of joy on the field, right? Like, and I think that's part, it's a game, it's a kid's game. They got to go out and have fun and play loose. And it's, there's a lot of pressure, it's hard to deal with.

Ryan Mittlemen  1:04:39  
Yeah, I think you know, one of the unique things, I guess, with us was, like we were struggled last year, and a lot of younger players were given playing playing time in the second half of the season, is that the reason they've been more successful this year? I mean, it couldn't hurt, right? Like they're getting experience at the major league level. Yeah. So that was probably one of the benefits of, like, the playing time given to those guys last year, Barger class, a low perfido Schneider. We could go on and on, but Luke Lucas was hurt for a lot of it, but he did get in a little bit. So the Tigers have had a little bit of that, you know, where, like, they were sort of a struggling team where guys, younger guys, were given a chance to play. And now they've sort of risen up together with the, you know, obviously schools the biggest part of it, but a ton of young players that are sort of entering their prime, and you go add, like a gleyber Torres and some pieces around that, and now they're, they're doing, I think, have the best record in the league right now. So, yeah, it's, it's been fun. It's been, you know, certainly like, our work's not done. We got a long way to go. But it's the the group of 26 like, and I would even say more than that, because guys have might be even 30 or 40 that have come up from Buffalo to help, you know, or from other organizations that we've brought in, it's really been a full effort. And the Tigers seem to have something like that too, where, like, I don't want to compare us to them yet. I mean, they're, they're really rolling, but like, they have a there's almost like that roster just fits perfectly, like they all kind of contribute, and we're getting that right now. Hopefully it continues. They've been doing it all season, really, you know, we've sort of, the first month and a half struggled a little bit, and have really gotten hot, but the Tigers have been doing that all year, and it's sort of a similar thing, like the there aren't like, dead spots on the roster, you know, they're, they're all contributing to that, to that group,

Todd Arkell  1:06:45  
yeah, well, it seems like with you guys, everybody you plug in. Ernie Clement, oh, you play third base, maybe you play center field, maybe you play first base, you know, like, it same with Barger, yeah, go play in the right field. The guy throws 106 mile an hour seed to throw a guy out at second or, Oh, go play third base. And, you know, it's, it seems like you've got a bunch of gamers, right? I love Addison Barger. Had the opportunity to be kind of down on the field a little while ago, and could not believe how jacked he was. Like, he is a huge human and, and and I haven't even mentioned yet, you haven't even had Santander for most of the year. He's been hurt for, you know, you get him back, and what does that lead into the lineup? So, I mean, yeah, it's, it's got to be interesting, because you're like, going, okay, When's he coming back? When's this happening? Whatever. And for those listening, you know, the reason Ryan joined me is because he knew I wouldn't ask him if they were signing boba shet. So just so you know, I won't be asking that question. Anyways, I gotta wrap it at that. I My wish is tigers, Blue Jays, ALCS. Could that happen? I don't know. Maybe I'm not sure. It depends on where everybody finishes, but I like to see that as a playoff series. I could make that run up and down the 401. That would be fun. Ryan, I love, love, love the conversation. Thank you for giving us lots of insight into, kind of, some of the, some of the behind the scenes stuff in the sport. Good luck the rest of the way. And I do mean it. You know, the deal I have with my son when he was very young was, you know, if the Tigers weren't playing the Jays. I had to cheer for the Jays. So we appreciate you. Go. It's it's one A and 1b Perfect. Thanks, Ryan, thanks.

Matt Cundill  1:08:28  
Tom, thanks for listening, for more, including resources and more about the show. Go to the mental approach.com.

Tara Sands (Voiceover)  1:08:38  
A production of the sound off media company.