Tucker Colton (Transcript)

Robby Incmikoski: My man Tucker Colton, interview number 71. First of all, how many years were you a bat boy for the Phillies? In what years?

Tucker Colton: Four years, from the 2013 season through the 2016 season.

Robby: People always wonder, how do you become a bat boy? I also know your history—you were a Sixers ball boy, and obviously your dad's been involved in sports since before you were born and everybody's involved in sports for a long time. But how did you kind of work your way into that as a young kid?

Tucker: It's actually kind of funny and simple. Not many people know this—as I was younger, my uncle was the equipment manager with the 76ers. He wound up working there for 50 years, Jeff Milman. So I was always around the Sixers, go to practices. When I would go to games, I could sit right there with the bench, hand out towels, stuff like that.

Then I went to high school in Philadelphia. When I was 16, which at the time was the legal age to be able to start working, I got a job with the Sixers in equipment, and ended up working there for 11 seasons. Had a great time there. But when I was 18, my third year there, we hired some guys from the Phillies, and it was actually the home and away bat boys with the Phillies at the time.

Baseball was probably my favorite sport, but I just had a little bit better connection with my uncle with the Sixers. So I would ask the Phillies guys, "Hey, how can I get in? How can I help? If you ever just need help, a day on one of those moving days, the getaway days, you could always use extra hands for that kind of stuff." They kind of wouldn't give me much, but they said, "Yeah, we'll let you know if anything happens."

So towards the end of the year of baseball is when basketball started. At the end of the 2012 baseball season, the guy who was the bat boy for the Phillies told me, "Hey, I think we're losing some people in the clubhouse. I'm actually going to move into the clubhouse. The bat boy role might be open." I said, "Hey, what can I do?" He said, "I just think they're going to post it like any other job."

Literally on the Phillies website, "bat boy position, apply here." So he kept me posted on the timing of everything, made sure to let me know when guys did formally leave. The posting went up in about early November. I interviewed twice like any other job. Went into the ballpark, met with Frank Coppenbarger, who was my boss for four years. He ran the home clubhouse. Met with the equipment manager, the head of umpire services.

Kind of just got the job like any other job and beat out other candidates. So it wasn't any sort of intricate connection. It was just kind of right time, knowing when there was a job posting and being able to get that job.

Robby: So if my math is correct, were you 19 at the time when you got it?

Tucker: I was 18. I turned 19 that May in my first year, and it was my four years of college. So I tell this all the time, it was the best college job ever. My routine—and I still graduated with a 3.8 GPA, so I was pretty good at school, it's not like I was slacking off at Drexel University—but I would go to class. I would have to make all my classes in the morning because games were at 7:00. I would have to be at the ballpark at noon.

We would have the jerseys washed from the previous night, hang them up overnight. They would dry that way—they don't shrink or anything. Put them around in all the lockers, sort all the other stuff, the socks, the t-shirts, the jock straps, all that kind of stuff. Someone's got to do it. And that was the equipment team.

So from about 12 to 2:30, it was just the equipment staff in the clubhouse. Guys would straggle in. Training staff comes in, chef comes in. Around 2:30, you'd really start to get a full clubhouse when stretch would be about 3:00 for the home batting practice stuff.

I'll take you through the whole day later, but from 12 to really midnight on those 7 o'clock games, I would be at the ballpark. Then go home, class would be 8 to 12, and I would either do homework really early in the morning or really late at night to kind of balance that out.

Robby: A lot of people don't realize how hard the job is. I do. I spent 16 years in a big league clubhouse, so I know what it's like. Can you explain to fans out there, when this is put in print, just what it is like for a bat boy who is a teenager trying to find their way in life? You're learning work ethic. You're learning relationships. You're probably hearing language you wouldn't hear anywhere else in a clubhouse. What does 30-year-old Tucker think of 19, 20, 21-year-old Tucker in those years? What was that like for you now looking at it a decade later?

Tucker: I'll always think it was the coolest thing ever. I'm someone who really prided myself on working hard and kind of showing up and being there. It's a client, it's a relationship business, and I'm sure many people have said that on here already, but you're trying to please everyone. Especially at that role, you're really the low man on the totem pole and you're always seen but kind of not really heard. So whatever someone directs you, you kind of got to find a way to do it.

With the language, whether it's curse words you've never heard before, or even languages you've never heard before—we had Venezuelans, Dominicans, and they all speak a different type of Spanish. I have a little bit of Spanish where I could understand basic stuff, but you got to know how to communicate with people.

Looking back, it was the coolest thing ever. Like Robby said, I'm the oldest of three brothers and I've always been kind of a guy's guy in locker rooms and clubhouses. What I will say, and I'm sure you hear this all the time with players and other people, there's a lot of work that goes into it. People see the glamorous side. I get to wear a uniform, which again, incredible experience. I'm in the dugout every night next to legends like Charlie Manuel—Ryan Sandberg was the manager for a little bit—just around great staff, great players. I mean, Jimmy Rollins, Ryan Howard, Cole Hamels, Roy Halladay, the list can go on and on.

But there's a lot of work from that time before the guys get there. You're scrubbing out dirt on guys' uniforms. You're carrying waters across the field to the bullpen to stock that. You're brewing up coffee to make sure it's fresh. There are a lot of simple kind of delicacies to the clubhouse life, and Robby got to see it firsthand, but someone's got to do that stuff and get it in order so the guys are ready to perform at the highest level and really only worry about playing baseball.

Robby: What I'm trying to illustrate when I ask this question is the term people say "big league." Yes, that is the level at which they're playing and we all know that, but there are so many other things that need to be big league. You talk about don't let the coffee get stale. After games, clubhouse attendants are scrubbing dirt out of cleats and using the foam cleaner to get the cleats back in the stalls and ready for the next day. And then you got to go do uniforms and all that kind of stuff. You have to make everything big league. Can you just explain what that means when you say "big league" in every sense of that term?

Tucker: It's really not an exaggeration—the first thing that comes to mind, every getaway day, so the day the team travels, I know the dress code's a little more lax now. When I started, it was suit and tie, at least for the Phillies. If you're home for six days, you're probably not, at the big league level, going to a dry cleaner, maybe hanging stuff properly. They would bring in their suits. They'd be in bags, and we would literally at 7:00 a.m. on a Sunday morning be steaming these suits and dress shirts to make sure they're fresh pressed when they walk out that gate. There are either fans to sign for, maybe it was early social media days, but social media is filming them getting on the plane—everything looks clean, top tier.

With the cleats you mentioned, a big thing was gum. This is actually a funny prank that Cliff Lee got me early on in my days there in the dugout. As a bat boy, everyone else gets their position first and you kind of got to figure out where to sit. So you try to be by the steps. Cliff Lee did this thing where he would chew gum and throw it right before I sat, and I was so caught up with everything else, trying to make sure everything else was good. By the end of the game, I had maybe four really sticky flat pieces of gum, and I had to scrub for quite a bit of time. Cliff was always a prankster like that.

But really, just back to the question, the big league stuff, just everything at the highest tier. Even the way we folded towels, everything had to be perfect, and if it wasn't, we would redo it. Cleaning helmets was a big thing that was difficult because guys like Chase Utley would come in and smash the helmets. And now they have the ones with the flap that don't break. He would break helmets. We would have to have a lineup of new helmets because everything's fitted. So if you were a seven and an eighth, we need to have another left-handed seven and eighth helmet right there—clean, numbered. That was a big thing because everything has the logos and the numbers.

The TV stuff, as Robby, I'm sure, has either heard it on this or said himself, they catch everything. So you need to make sure that everything at the highest level is neat, organized, and ready to go at all times.

Robby: In the minor leagues, guys come up and these guys have had maybe a couple cups of coffee in the big leagues and they get to live that life. How much do players, when they come up, Tuck, in your experience, do they talk about just how different and how much more elite the treatment is between the minor leagues and the big leagues when they get there?

Tucker: Definitely, you'll meet all types of people, and really the ones that I can relate most to are the ones that went to high school in America, maybe college for a few years at least, just because that was my background. They get there and it's like they get these things or they ask for stuff, and you almost laugh like, "I can get that for you" or "We have someone that does that."

Something as simple as ticket requests—"Hey, I'm at home, how much do I pay for tickets?" and it's like, "No, you get the tickets. Here's how you put it in." Or even something like a walk-up song. That was a big thing when I was working—guys didn't have their own walkup song, and I know that's come a long way now, but they were like, "Hey, how do I get my own song?" and I was like, "Hey, here's our video guy, he'll put it in. Tell us the time you want to start and all that."

But that really is the clubhouse staff's job—to make everything big league. I know Franco would do a great job of explaining that. Whether it's kind of personalized touches—I am a big numbers guy, and I love sports. So whenever something milestone would happen, obviously a first hit, but I would track if someone was coming up on 100 hits for a season or 20 doubles on a season. I would make sure I got that ball, got it to Frank, and he would have it framed and stored because that's a milestone at the big league level. And that's something that lasts forever with these guys.

Robby: Tell me about Josh Beckett's no-hitter. What do you remember from that day from the other dugout?

Tucker: I remember it was a Sunday day game. We were playing the Dodgers. They were great at the time and we were not as good. I think it was around the middle of my term there.

Robby: It was May of 2014.

Tucker: I remember that I think it was a massage therapist who's Japanese—he had these Japanese eye drops and he was giving them to some of the guys, and they burned. I don't know if you've ever tried them. In the dugout, it's like a clear bottle, and it was all staff. It wasn't players. Everyone was like, "I feel so good. I could see—it's like an early morning game—this is better than a cup of coffee."

Then the game goes on, and through I think it was like six innings, we look up—no hits. Obviously, you don't talk about it, even on the other side. That was cool for me because you always hear about the perspective from the no-hitter side, throwing side, but the guys that get no-hit, you don't really hear much. It's kind of the same thing—you don't talk about it, you kind of just go through your normal process, get ready to have the best at-bat you can.

Then that inning goes by, and I just remember in the ninth inning, we had a few of our coaches just being like, "F*** those eye drops"—and that's baseball, like you're trying to blame a superstition or a tradition and kind of pin it off on anything else.

One other thing I remember is we never made the playoffs during my time there, so I didn't get to see a lot of celebrations other than walk-off hits. I remember the Dodgers rushing out, and I've always been someone to kind of admire winning something or celebrating something. I mean, I'm right there—I'm picking up the bat on the field from the last out, and it might have been a strikeout, it might have been the on-deck circle.

Robby: Chase Utley, yeah.

Tucker: So I was on the on-deck circle picking up the stuff and just kind of watching them, and they were having a good time. But I remember that AJ Ellis rolled his ankle on, I think, it was Drew Butera's helmet. We traded for AJ the next year, and we—I mean, not really joked about it because I think he broke his foot on it, but a lot happened in that little moment of me kind of taking in their celebration.

One other thing with that—we have authenticators at every ballpark. They sell a lot of the merchandise, the game-used bats that are broken, baseballs. I get every baseball that comes off the field. So if a ball is scuffed, run to me, and in about the fifth inning, they're like, "Hey, no-hitter, keep it." I also kept some for Beckett on the side just to make sure, and ran it over to their clubhouse after. So that was a pretty cool moment to give him four game-used balls, which I'm sure he could have got from the MLB guys, but as the bat boy—to go back to your big league point—big league no-hitters are not that common. So to throw one is something you should be able to remember forever.

Robby: So did those balls get authenticated that you took over, or the ones that you grabbed them?

Tucker: I don't think so.

Robby: So you grabbed balls that were in play and got them to Beckett?

Tucker: Yeah, I kept them in the dugout in a little bucket.

Robby: That's a real classy move. Was it just something late in the game you just thought, or was it after the game, or did you realize during the game, "Hey, maybe I should save a few"? Or after the game was over, you just grabbed a couple game-used balls that were in the bucket?

Tucker: It was during the game. You never know—someone could hit a walk-off grand slam, and even just a ball from the third inning is something that could be a cool memory for them. So I kind of would do that throughout my time. There are so many balls they go through, there really are. You've been in the dugout, you see all the different buckets of balls and how they get rubbed. So a few balls that, once they're used, they're really not going back in for the most part. There are some occasions, but I kept them and was able to kind of hopefully benefit him in some way.

Robby: You got to think about it for six days before you play again. In hockey or basketball, you got to think sometimes you might be on a back-to-back, but more often than not, you got to wait a day or two and it kind of lingers. Baseball is an everyday sport. Can you just talk a little bit if you have any memory? And just be honest, if you don't, that's okay. Do you remember what the vibe was like? And is the vibe any different getting no-hit versus losing any other game in baseball?

Tucker: Honestly, like I said, it was a Sunday game. I think it was a getaway day, and I think it's just you get out a little bit quicker. You're never really joyful after any sort of loss. I know some losses hurt more than others, but it was kind of similar to any other loss. It's not like it was anything deeper just because they didn't get a hit. I mean, there's days where four guys go 0-for-4 and kind of the same thing. And if you win, you're on the other side of that, probably celebration, even if you don't get a lot of hits. So I don't remember anything specific from that day.

Robby: That was my point. I think people realize, they must be pissed off or they're angry because they got no-hit. No, they're just pissed off that they lost. They're not pissed because they didn't get a hit. They're pissed because they didn't win. Any normal competitor would be pissed that they didn't win, right?

Tucker: And kind of to your comment, it's the big league level. You're going to face big league talent every time at bat. There's not one easy out—that's just how MLB works. Especially at that level, in the minor leagues, you see these guys who are the top prospect and they know they can hit these two-pitch guys, but now you're facing four-pitch guys that have all sorts of arsenal and they could dot up wherever they need to and make whatever pitch in whatever count. It's not an easy sport to begin with. So I think there's definitely frustration, but these guys are pros. They don't let it show.

Robby: I know this question involves money, but were there any notorious big tippers that have come across and guys that treated you well? We're not talking about the guys that maybe were on the other side, because we're not here for that. But guys that looked out for you—anybody we can maybe put out there and be like, "Hey man, this guy was a good dude. He looked after people like 19-year-old Tucker Colton."

Tucker: I'm gonna give an anecdote on one guy that I'm grateful for forever because when I started, I had worked with the Sixers but didn't really have any sort of income. Now I was in college and kind of working to pay off—I took out loans, working to kind of pay for my own rent for the first time living at school and kind of my own expenses. I didn't live at home, meals were on my own. I had to have my own car because I had to go to and from Sixers and from the ballpark.

So at All-Star break, we had a guy on the Phillies, and I'll say his name eventually, but we had a guy on the Phillies, very well respected. He didn't really talk much. He was a kind of lead by example guy. You kind of saw him go in one door. If he needed you, he would let you know. If not, you kind of went out the other door and stayed in your lane. Very professional and later in his career.

Then one day, I think it was just before All-Star break, and he might have made the All-Star game that year. So I didn't even want to congratulate him—he was that serious about his routine, everything was to the minute in the dugout at the same time every day. Had his cup of coffee, same dinner at the same time every day.

He came into the room where I was cleaning helmets before the game. Just a t-shirt and his bottoms. It was maybe like 6 o'clock, just finished batting practice. Comes over, he goes, "Tucker, have a great All-Star break," shakes my hand, gives me a hug, hands me a check, and it was Chase Utley. Wrote him a nice thank you note, and then he did it again at the end of the year. Then again, next All-Star break. And then unfortunately he got traded. But he was someone who really looked out for me. And I bought the laptop I'm calling you guys on now from him. So he gave me the laptop that got me through school, helped with a bunch of car payments. And just something I'll always be grateful for is Chase Utley. He wasn't someone who on a relationship level we talked a lot—we didn't—but as someone who looked out for me, understood kind of where I was in life, he looked out for me.

On the flip side—and this is not on the flip side, but kind of more relationship-based, and you know this guy pretty well from being with him—AJ Burnett was someone that I'll always be grateful for working for. I had him for one year, and from the time he came in, he's a loud personality. When he's in the room, he'll want his music, he'll want his voice being heard. But he's always proper and always very respectful.

We had a younger team, and he kind of took a lot of guys under his wing, whether it was something as simple as when you're talking to media, make sure you stand up; when the national anthem plays, make sure you're in front of the dugout. He made sure everyone was kind of on the same page.

With that, that's something I'll always remember because at the end of the day, he would say, "Hey, Tuck, you want to grab lunch before a game?" I went to Anaheim with the team that year. We went to lunch before a game out there, and he was someone who would always look out for me. At the end of the year, he took care of me very graciously as well. But just throughout the year, just kind of checking in on how I am as a person. I was 21 at that time, so he was like, "Hey, how's school? How's girl stuff?" He's married with two kids, two boys, and we could just kind of chop it up. On a relationship level, he is someone I'm very appreciative for.

Robby: Yeah, I know AJ very well, and I still stay in touch with him. It's interesting—me and you have some parallels here. What I mean by that is that we learned at a young age—I was a ball boy for the Eagles and worked in the training room for the Eagles when I was your age or even before that—and the point I'm trying to illustrate is: How much further ahead do you think you are in terms of being a good teammate, whether that's at work in the business world, whether it's with your fiancée, or whether it's with your family and your friends? What kind of life lessons come out of a clubhouse at a young age?

Tucker: I probably would have played Division III baseball had I wanted to pursue it further. But between this opportunity and the Sixers, I wanted to stay in Philly. Drexel was a great school, but it's really just kind of that one heartbeat and you all got to be on the same page. We're about to have NFL playoffs. You look at some of the best teams—they're all on the same page. You really have to buy into the same principles and kind of understand what your standard is as a team, as far as both a performance standpoint and a culture standpoint.

I got three different managers, which was a really unique experience. I had Charlie Manuel, legendary Phillies manager, arguably the best ever to do it for the Phillies. Ryne Sandberg, who did not have the best managerial career, but he's a Hall of Fame player himself. So kind of to see that—and I'm literally on their hips during the game. So obviously, they're not saying everything out loud, but the conversations of the pitching coach, the questions of the hitting coach of, "Hey, who do you like against this guy?"—I get to hear that.

Really just kind of the transparency and communication, and you're all trying to achieve one goal. Whatever it takes to do that, you got to buy into it. Even if it's you taking a step back or changing what you're supposed to do to do that.

Robby: I've asked a broadcaster. I want to ask a bat boy. There is no right or wrong answer, but it's going to be a funny bit that I do more for the website than for the book. But I want your take on how you would define "the ass" and what is it like dealing with a player who has "the ass" on a given day? What is it first? What is your perception of what it is? We've gotten some hilarious answers, and I'm probably going to have about 15 people to describe it when it's done. But what is "the ass" and what's it like dealing with somebody that has it?

Tucker: You're saying just someone being a dick on a given day.

Robby: Just the ass. They just got the ass, they call it "the ass" just, whether it could be for so many reasons and they don't all have to do with baseball. You just never know.

Tucker: I mean, I'm not going to lie. I saw a few scuffles in the clubhouse and some things get broken. When you're in it, it's tough. One example of being in it was something as simple as I put bats in the wrong slot for a certain player. The player was injured, so I used his slot because there's only a limited number. This was late September back when you could bring up 40 guys. And the guy injured was a long-tenure veteran. He wasn't happy about it. He took the bats out of that slot and all the other bats and threw them on the dugout maybe 15 minutes before the game.

And here I am, 19-year-old Tucker, and I got to clean it up. It's a big league dugout. It's spotless before the game. Obviously, seeds and stuff come on during the game, but now there's bats and pine tar everywhere and not the best look. So I understood where I was in terms of the totem pole. I was on the bottom. I kind of had to make whatever the players wanted happen. I put the bats back and I didn't use that slot.

I have another example—all these big league ballparks have a batting cage before the dugout somewhere in the hallway or by the clubhouse, and they obviously use the clock to time stuff up. Everyone's very routine-oriented, down to the minute of when they take batting practice, when they do flips, when they do film, when they eat, warm up. One day our clock broke in the batting cage before the game. So me being in there, and the Phillies batting cage is pretty close to the dugout and video room: "Tuck, come fix this. We need this right now." And everything's like right now. "We need it. It's the most important thing ever."

That doesn't make it easy. But I went in, actually grabbed the clock from our clubby dressing room, put it in there for the day, time being, and then I got the ass from one of the clubhouse guys—"Hey, how are we going to know when we got to get ready, when the bus is leaving and all that?"

So I guess the best way to answer it is, in my position, I didn't really have much of a say to say anything back. You just kind of take it and choose your battles and try to make as many people happy as you can.

Robby: That's amazing. It's great, just describing the ass is hilarious. And that's a perfect example—like somebody would have the ass over you using their slot when they're not even playing in the game. Perfect example of somebody having the ass over something like that. Hey, Kyle, I want to do some more with you, but we'll do that for the site at a later time. I don't want to take up more time than we need to on this, but I'll be in touch with you in the future because I do want to follow up with you.

Tucker: I got two quick anecdotes if you want them. We don't have to.

Robby: I want a million anecdotes.

Tucker: So first one is a cool moment in Philly's history when Jimmy Rollins passed Mike Schmidt to become the Phillies hit king.

Robby: So go ahead. Yes.

Tucker: I was a bat boy for that, and they did a really cool ceremony or occasion—I don't know, really cool action, I guess—where Mike Schmidt actually was his bat boy for that. So if you watch the video of Jimmy getting the hit, it was just for Jimmy's at-bat and only if Jimmy got the hit. But when Jimmy got his hit to pass Mike Schmidt, Mike Schmidt comes out of the dugout, grabs his bat, meets him up the first baseline, and they hold each other's hand up like, "Congrats, passing of the torch" type. And I was there, top step of the dugout—I didn't run out. But just a really cool moment I'll never forget.

Robby: Was that J-Roll's first at-bat of the day?

Tucker: I think it was his second because I remember looking down to make sure he was there before, and he was.

Robby: I was wondering, was Schmitty just kind of waiting there, and does he disappear for two innings and come back? You know what I mean?

Tucker: So he was working as a radio guy at the time, so he was in the ballpark somewhere. I don't know where he was waiting. I was in the dugout for most of the games, but yeah, he was ready and he did a great job as a third baseman and Hall of Fame bat boy in my book.

Robby: And what's the other one?

Tucker: So I did have an impact on a game one time. Before the they had mound visit clocks, but it was a little more lax. It wasn't the same. They wouldn't give batters a strike or pitchers a ball. So I would strategically at certain points in the game when we needed to—and you didn't need to face three batters. So pitching changes were more common.

I would be able to time it, and this isn't even what I want to say, but when I give the umpires their balls because different guys want it in twos, fours, sixes, whatever it may be, maybe I stay out there a little longer. Maybe I'm quicker if our team's batting and they're making decisions. So I was always mindful of kind of the game inside the game with that.

But one time there was a guy batting on our team. I forget who it was. I think it was a lefty. But the rule used to be you always had to wear at least I think it was 50% of your team color. And we're obviously red. So we had red cleats. And with the cleaning of the cleats every night, sometimes the fabric or stuff would wear a little bit easier.

I'm not sure if they change that or anything, but pitcher throws a pitch. It's low and in. Our guy at his foot. He lifts his foot, but it's appeared to skim the top of the foot. Catcher misses it, umpire misses it, it goes to the back, they call it a ball. I grab the ball and I see it has the red mark from the toe, and the batter's like, "It hit my foot." And this was before you could replay hit by pitch.

So I go in the dugout and I go, "Hey, I think it hit his foot." And then our dugout: "Hey, hey!" And then the umpire looks over to me and I run out and I show him the ball and he sees the red and he rubs it on my helmet to make sure I didn't rub it, and nothing comes off. And he gave him first base based off of that because it did hit his foot.

Robby: Really? Was it your idea, and nobody knew you had the evidence in your hand?

Tucker: I saw the ball literally had the evidence of it hitting the foot, and then I showed the manager. He's like, "Yeah, it hit his foot." Because it seemed like it hit his foot. And the umpire was actually Angel Hernandez, who is known to not be the most visually accurate. Great guy though. He was the only umpire to tip me in the league, Angel Hernandez.

Robby: Really? How about that? I've heard what a good guy he is. Really?

Tucker: Some other guys did. He was the only guy to tip me with a bottle of wine. He would give me a bottle of wine every game I worked with him behind the plate.

Robby: Every game you worked with Angel behind the plate, he would give you a bottle of wine?

Tucker: Yeah, it's only once or twice a year, but I mean, for someone in college, that was the best thing ever. So Angel, a great, great human being.

Robby: Did you get a reaction when you got back to the dugout after you showed the ball?

Tucker: Yeah, you get a little pats on the back, smack on the butt, "Way to go, Tuck." And it feels good. It's not like I changed the outcome or anything of the final game or the season, but the call should have been the call, and I saw it, and he called me over and he made the call. So it felt pretty good to have that kind of impact, because the whole thing you're doing is for them to play the best they can, and you're not going to have any impact on the result. So to make some sort of impact is pretty cool.

Robby: It's unbelievable. Kyle, you got anything for Tucker?

Kyle Fager: Those are great stories. I wanted to ask about managing different personalities, but I think we've got a pretty good amount there. I wanted to follow up on the different languages issue, though. What's the interaction with translators and any players that don't speak English as a first language?

Tucker: So we didn't have any Japanese or Korean, so we didn't have to worry about that. I'm actually pretty good at speaking Spanish. My mother's father is from Panama, so I have some Hispanic heritage, and my whole life I've understood basic Spanish, obviously took it through school.

But that Dominican language is not Spanish. If Spanish, Dominicans speak a totally different language. So it really came down to simple words, and you're not saying sentences. You're saying "I need this, I need that." For pine tar, it was just "pega," stuff like that—as basic as it could get because these Latino guys, no disrespect, they don't put their best effort to learn English.

I remember talking to Robbie about this. He was trying to do Rosetta Stone to learn Spanish because for them, they see that we should be speaking Spanish to them instead of them learning English for us. And everyone's "Poppy"—"What's up, Poppy?"—the basic words. Then when you really need something, it's kind of either intuition or there's some sort of medium word that you find out.

I was fortunate enough to be able to communicate well enough with those guys where it wasn't an issue. One of my favorites ever is Freddy Galvis, and he was someone who was pretty good with English. So he was someone I wouldn't be afraid to say, "Hey, Freddy, this call-up from Venezuela, I don't know what he's saying. Can you translate?" And he would be like, "Yeah, he wants a ball to sign for his grandpa" or something like that. So the guys were very helpful, and I didn't have too many issues.

It was cool to see so many different cultures and stuff like that. And actually, another story of someone I became pretty close with and did not speak the same language at all with is when he was with the Phillies, his name was Roberto Hernandez, but previously he was Fausto Carmona. He was with the Phillies. He got his first hit with us off Nate Eovaldi. Didn't speak any English. It was either him or his wife would cook, and we would have lunches together in the clubhouse of this authentic Dominican rice and chicken dish. It's like "sancocho" or something. And it was something I'll never forget. Just little stuff like that.

Robby: Pedro Strop was a pitcher on the Cubs, and he was really close with Edinson Volquez who was on the Pirates, and those two are really good friends. When we would go to Wrigley, which was three times that year, Strop would send over what's called "mangú," which is a Dominican breakfast that the players love to have. Strop had somebody that made it, and I remember Gerrit Cole thought it was the greatest thing ever. He would make sure he sat with all the Dominican guys to have breakfast with them, and Volquez would say, "Come on, man, I'll make sure we have one for you," and Cole would sit and have breakfast with those guys all the time because he loved the Dominican breakfast that those guys would eat.

My point of saying this, Kyle, is that there are so many little anecdotes like this that fans would find fascinating. I have it from a TV perspective, and I'm only allowed in the clubhouse for two hours—I'm in the clubhouse maybe two hours a day. These guys are in the clubhouse for 12, and I'm in there once before the game and once after the game every day, and even I see a ton of these stories. So I don't know what it's like when we're not in there. There's got to be a ton of it. And I think that's another angle I can do with the website, but we want to get as many of these we can in the book, but we only have so much space.

Tucker: I have a good one to end it on just to kind of tie it back to something earlier.

Robby: Let's go.

Tucker: So Jorge Velandia, he's now the assistant GM with the Phillies. Played a little bit. He was like a utility guy.

Robby: Who? Okay.

Tucker: Jorge Velandia. Georgie Velandia.

Robby: I don't think I remember him. Okay.

Tucker: He was not a big role. Probably the late '90s or early 2000s. And then he was a GM of one of those Venezuelan league teams. He actually found Odubel Herrera for the Phillies.

Robby: Okay.

Tucker: Great guy. But I remember at the end of the year, they bring in extra coaches too, and he was like a middle infielder coach. He would help middle infielders and help the Latin guys. And he would always like spin cups on the floor, and then the young guys—and I should have said this earlier, it's just coming to me now—young guys would go pick it up and throw it out for him. He's like, "What are you doing? You're in the big leagues!"

And I'm sitting there on the bench knowing I gotta clean that up, and the players are picking it up. I'm like, "Thank God." And he's like, "What are you doing? You're in the big leagues! They pay someone to do that. You don't have to do that up here." And I'll never forget that: "They pay someone to do that." I'm like, "I guess they pay me to do that."

I have one more. Sorry, sorry, sorry. I have so many.

Robby: Dude, I want to hear all of them.

Tucker: But these go back to your questions. Here's a big league thing for a bat boy that no one thinks about: the batting practice bucket. So during batting practice in the minor leagues, the starting pitcher from last night's game does bucket duty where all the outfielders are obviously shagging, and they'll throw it to the net in shallow center field, and the pitcher will put it in the bucket.

Robby: Right.

Tucker: In the big leagues, the bat boy does that, and the pitchers are supposed to pay for it. They don't always, but it's included when you get a tip at the end of the year—that covers that. But when we would have to—you charge 20 bucks to do the bucket in the big leagues—

Robby: To pay for what?

Tucker: With Cole Hamels, I'm not going to say, "Hey, pay me." At the end of the year, I'll get a tip that covers all that.

Robby: Yeah, yeah. Okay. I got you. Yep.

Tucker: So we're good on that. But when we would have a rookie or a call-up, after their debut, they're still used to doing the bucket. So I hated doing the bucket. That was the one thing I hated about the job. It ruins your whole routine. You have to be out in center field for an hour and a half. Guys are trying pitches on you, hitting you in the foot, balls are coming all over from either hitting or throwing. It's just not a good spot to be in. It just really isn't.

So when there was a rookie pitcher, I wouldn't say anything. Unless he asked me, I wouldn't go out there. And then sometimes as we would get closer to BP starting, I would feel guilty about them standing there. I'll be like, "Hey, do you need help doing the bucket?" And they're like, "Yeah, do I pay you to do it?" And obviously I'm going to say, "Yeah, you pay me to do it."

So that was just something that's big league—like having someone do the bucket. Little stuff that people don't even understand as part of the day-to-day in the baseball world gets taken care of by someone.

Robby: It's amazing. It's amazing. I'm telling you, that's exactly my point. It's 1:17 right now. We could sit here until 5:17, and you wouldn't be done.

Tucker: We good.

Robby: That's what I'm saying. There are so many stories to be told if we sat here and did it, which is tremendous, which is exactly what we want. Tuck, you're the best, man. Kyle, I'm good on this.

Kyle Fager: This is great stuff. Honestly, one of my favorite interviews so far.

Tucker: Call me back for the website whenever. I'll talk as much as you got.

Robby: I guarantee you I will.

Tucker: I have a lot of stories. So perfect.

Robby: Because the website—Kyle's not going to be a part of that because once the book is completed, my work with him is going to be completed. But I'm going to have the website, I'm going to write on it, I'm going to post photos. What I'd love to do is at some point when we get down the road, I'm going to hit you up for a couple photos from your time as a bat boy and put those on the site as well, because the photos in the book are all going to be mine.

Tucker: Do we have one from Philly or no? We have to, right? Me and you have a photo.

Robby: I'm sure we do. We'd have to have photos of me and—

Tucker: I feel like we have to.

Robby: There has to be—between me and your dad, I mean, definitely from Pittsburgh when you guys stayed at my house and all that, but there definitely are... we'll have them.

Tucker: The last thing I would say is in the world of baseball, it's so competitive and everyone's trying to either get that next contract or get that next job, whatever, maybe get that record. But for the bat boy, everyone understood as long as I would show up, work hard, take care of guys, like they had my back. And that's something I'll always be grateful for. And it was a really nice role to be in for kind of my skill set and my personality. Really served me well.

Robby: It's the job of a lifetime. Believe me, I've got relationships now from the Eagles that will never go away. And that was 30 years ago. I mean, relationships will never end. They'll go forever till I die. So it's cool.