The MeatEater Podcast - Ep. 375: At Bat and Behind the Levee with Austin Riley

Episode Date: October 10, 2022

Steven Rinella talks with Austin Riley, Sean Weaver, Spencer Neuharth, Phil Taylor, and Corinne Schneider.  Topics discussed: How Steve doesn't feel an emotional connection to "Take Me Out to the Ballgame"; Austin breaking down baseball for Steve; Albert Von Tilzer's greatest hits; two seasons; canceling hunting trips to play pro ball; mistaking a husky puppy for a wolf; stripping away the passion; MeatEater's Whitetail Week is here; read Sean's article on how Roosevelt's first waterfowl refugs has gone bone dry; stuffing walleyes with lead weights and walleye filets; tournaments and the worst cheating you've ever done; going pro when you're young; Austin's great love of whitetail hunting; all the little analytical details; when it comes down to a few pitches; player cards; beating the freeze; when your finances are public and everyone knows your contract amount; behind the levee; hunting property dreams; MLB's paternity leave policy and missing your son's birth; Austin's quote that he didn't actually say; an epic walk up song; and more. Connect with Steve and MeatEater Steve on Instagram and Twitter MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube Shop MeatEater Merch See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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First Light. Go farther, stay longer. with the singing of Take Me Out to the Ballgame. I don't have a strong emotional connection to this song. I don't have a strong emotional connection to this song. No, no, no. I don't have a strong emotional connection to this song. All right, everybody, we're in Atlanta, Georgia, joined by Austin Riley, third baseman for the Atlanta Braves. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

You guys beat our man Pete last night bad. I felt all bad. It seemed like you just parked your car and came in there and got a nice hit. Yeah, I mean, we needed that one. I mean, the race is tough. They've, you know, the Mets are a really good squad. They've had a really good season. And, you know, we're trying to win a division.

And, you know, this is what September baseball is all about. I mean, it's about those fights within the division. And, you know, last night was, luckily it was on our side but we got two more against them and you know anything can happen explain to me like um explain me like i'm five years old which is about where i'm at with baseball knowledge for sure what okay so last night you guys won handily well i mean in the, in the end, someone could have like. Last inning was a little hairy, but you guys pulled it. And just the, I can't remember.

We just met him. Tyler. Tyler. Dude, he was milking it out at the plate. Bases were loaded. I was like, wow, this is like, you know. It could change in a heartbeat. Oh, yeah.

Like one hit could have been that you guys would have been you guys would have been losing all yeah yeah what are you doing when that's going on you do you look i mean oh yeah you definitely you gotta you gotta play the whole situations um in your head i mean you know that's yeah you know bases loaded up by three you know one like i said one swing of the bat could put us down by one. But having Kenley up there, the career that he's had, he's one of the best closers in the game in baseball that's been around. So you definitely have a trust in him, no doubt.

And luckily he was able to slam the door. So now here's the part where you got to explain to slam the door. Yeah. So now here's the part where you got to explain to me like I'm five. Okay, you guys are both, you both head to the playoffs. Right. But you have a three-game series. Correct. So whoever would win, the advantage of winning the series is just that you get a break.

Correct. So right now, obviously, it's tied now, but say if the Mets were to win the division, they would get a, you basically miss the wild, whoever wins the division, you miss the wild card. Okay. So say if we were to lose, we would uh in the season in miami on wednesday have an off day on thursday and then we play the wild card friday saturday sunday and then if whoever wins uh the division that you would get like that five day break and there's and then you have fewer games separating you from the finality of it all separating you from the championship you have

you have fewer opportunities to get knocked out correct so it's like you got the wild card nlds nlcs and then the the world series so you know if you make it all the way to the world series you're playing till november 7th um so it's it actually is a there a lot of downtime, but at the same time it, like, flies. But going through it last year, the playoffs fly by. But it's just like right now, so we're tied right now. Say if we were to – so we got three games after these two games. And say if we tie, then it goes to the best record against each other. So say if we were to tie, to tie straight up to end the season,

and then it would go, but who won the most games between us and the Mets out of the whole season? And then that's how you decide the division. So it gets a little complicated at times. Yeah, I was wishing it would be more clean. Oh, yeah. You wish you could... Like the Super Bowl is clean. Right.

It's just like even you got the minor leagues. I went through six systems before I got to the big leagues. It's like you play for six years before you even get the opportunity at the big leagues. It's just baseball is complicated. That's the only way to put it. It's a beautiful game, but it's like you play for six years before you even get the opportunity at the big leagues it's just baseball is complicated that's the only way to put it yeah you came up with a game but it's complicated you came up like through the ranks so man i i you know was fortunate enough to to kind of go through pretty quick um you know and and just like i said i had a lot of the

organization gave me every opportunity in the books to to grow my game and and succeed so I mean like I said I was been been very fortunate no and Austin played for one of the best minor league team names he played for the javelinas for a little bit so that's the fall league that's another like and so there's a league that that they do that's not affiliated with any organization. So they call it the Arizona Fall League. It happens the month of November. It's in Arizona at the Spring Training Complex is out there. And each team sends like two or three guys from each squad,

and they go play together. And, you know, you play like, I think it's like 30 games, super laid back. But, yeah, it's not an affiliate or anything, but it's a different type of league, but it's fun. You know what we were talking about last night? Do you get, when you hear Take Me Out to the Ballpark, what's that song? How's it go? Close. Take Me Out to the Ballpark hear take me out to the ballpark or what's that song how's it go take it off the ball game yeah okay i'll give five bucks anyone in this room to tell me who wrote that oh i don't even know it okay keep your five dollars when you hear it do you get stirred up i think you it gets played so much and just kind of

tune it out a little bit white noise see that thing is everybody got up to sing and corinne was like why aren't you singing i just don't have an emotional yeah it's like seventh inning stretch that's what they play um you hear it for 162 day or games it's like all right nice it was it's good today thinning albert von albert von tilzer yep wrote many hit songs let me tell you something i'm a big von tilzner head let me tell you something here's some more of his hits you ready for this put on your slippers and fill your pipe you're not going bye-bye tonight that's the eric von tilt that that was a Von Tilt song.

He's got some. Here's another one of his hits. Oh, how she could yacky hacky wicky wacky woo. This is a family show, Steve. Here's another one of his hits. My cuties do at 2 to 2. So at 1.58, I don't know if that's a.m. or p.m., his cutie is due at 1.58. Another one of his hits is,

wait till you get them up in the air, boys. That's some interesting ones. Prolific. boys it's some interesting ones boy prolific but take me out to the ball game was listed as number eight on the list of songs of the century so corinne next time you see me not singing take me out the ball game it's just uh you know i'll sing some fogarty. You're wishing it was the, what was it? Yakety-wacky. Whatever that was. I was hoping that they would play, oh, how she could yakky-hacky. Wicky-wacky move.

But there's some people in this room for whom Take Me Out to the Ball Game tugs on the heartstrings a bit yeah sure definitely did for me hey let me ask you let me ask you another question then we're gonna we got to cover off awesome stuff but you so with the whole scene do you ever feel like it's a it's a it's a um it's like a slap in the face of a deer hunter such as yourself that everything ends on november 7th yeah like you could be like let's start a week earlier we'll start everything a week earlier right and then i'll hunt the first week in november for whitetails and then you know yeah it's it's tough like last year um even like you know because our regular season ends october 3rd. And last year before we went to the playoffs,

like if we like won, we were not even above 500 at the break. Like it was, it was a rough season last year. And like, we just got hot at the right time, like took off. So I had like three hunts planned in October.

Did you really? That I was just like with my buddy Tyler and like, it was just like one after other. I was having like, I am canceling this one. We made it another week. Cancel this one. We made another week. Cancel that one.

Made another week. All worth it. Wouldn't change it for the world. Totally worth it. Throw that out there so no one's mad at me um but no it's um you know as much as i want to you know be there for opening day i i got the best of both worlds it's like as soon as baseball ends i go right in the hunting season just in it and i'm in it until it's time to go back to baseball but but for for uh you like to hunt turkeys yeah i mean

you gotta be totally boned on turkey hunting right yeah that's hard i've never never killed an eastern i've killed uh two osceolas uh all during spring training oh i got you so well played right yeah so it's like all my buddies back home give me give me crap from like you didn't even kill an eastern i'm like i don't get the chance like yeah give me a break but you're out uh when you are when you talk about when you when you're you have a hunt plan and obviously you want to you know you want to win no doubt but do you um is there ever any part of your head right that's like man i was really looking forward to going on that trip i mean yeah of course like you know my passion i absolutely love to hunt whitetails um so anytime especially like never been much out of the state uh growing up so i've killed you know i've killed

a deer in texas nebraska and louisiana and one of those trips that i had to cancel was at the grigsby's in illinois and that was like growing up that was like my dream to go to illinois yeah so that that one hurt a little bit um but like i said there's there's always other opportunities um for you oh good for growing up in mississippi was that like the holy land of deer hunting was looking at Illinois? Illinois, Kansas, just going up there. That's my bucket list is to go up there and chase some big white tails. So how old are you right now? 25.

So in 15 years, you're an old-ass ball player at 40, right? Oh, yeah. Most guys are out 35 ish so um side note as soon as i'm done with that i'm chasing elk in september so when they're bugling so that's that's another bucket list so but as but there's light at the end of the tunnel i mean not that the tunnel is that dark but i'm just saying yeah yeah like the way the whole thing that's why i don't complain i got plenty opportunity yeah because you were you were on a professional track in your teens right so it's like you've had a career right and you'll still be unless you do something horrible to your knees

right i'll be able to just tear it up yeah i'll be able to hunt as much as i want so that's like i said you don't not every day you get to go chase a world series so i'm i'm taking taking no it is not yeah yeah not every day so like i said as as much as i love hunting i wouldn't would not trade and change that for the world yeah i got it okay austin's got uh he's got limited time he's got stuff going on he's got a big game tonight we're gonna get into some other stuff and then we're going to get back in with him in a little bit. All right.

Here's, here's the thing we got to talk about. And sometimes something gets so talked about. I don't want to talk about it. Cause what's there to say? The, who, like the fact that,

that, that, that I'm trying to put this here. Corinne, why did you determine that we didn't need to talk about it? Because everyone's already talked about it. So exactly as you said, it's true. But what more is there to say? I just felt like the news would make its rounds in all of the various circles that it's flying around.

And that's it. We didn't need to touch on it. Well, I didn't want to talk about it. But now you really do. But then it came to be that I realized I had a dissenting view. I had a dissenting view from the rest of America and I wanted to talk about it. When you Google this story the first results are npr tmz la times so when you say everyone's talked about it i mean literally

everyone's oh i don't mean like everyone that i hang out with yeah i mean like america yeah okay tell tell us just to bring people up to speed spencer do you mind telling the story sure this uh this sort of like entered our radar about a week ago where screenshots started floating around every piece of social media from facebook to reddit to instagram twitter etc where it was a woman who posted on facebook uh five photos holding a skinned out critter and this is what the facebook post says it says so this morning i set out for a solo predator hunt for a fall black bear however i got the opportunity to take another predator wolf pup 2022 was a great feeling to text my man and say i just smoked a

wolf pup hashtag first wolf hashtag one less predator, Montana. Okay. Can you back up and give it to me a sentence at a time? Here's the problem. There's no punctuation. Okay, break it up. If that sounded clunky, it's because I don't know where one thought ends. Break it up in the same fashion and hit me with not a sentence, but a thought at a time.

All right, let me try here. So this morning I set out for a solo predator hunt for a fall black bear. Great. However. Great. I've done the same thing. Okay.

However, I got the opportunity to take another predator wolf pup. Okay. Here's where things start. Okay. Great. Great. She's where things start. Okay. Great. Great. She lives in a state where she lives in a state that has a long wolf season. And I'll point out has wolf quotas.

The state's divided into seven regions. Each region has its own quota. There's a total statewide quota uh she has uh the necessary permit okay nothing a foul now the pup part um um might be on the nose hits it on the nose but so okay great okay go on and uh the last thing says 2022 was a great feeling to text my man and say i just smoked a wolf pup okay so has a great relationship with her boyfriend excited to share details of her life with him use they use the word choice the a euphemism for killed but let's say she had said got text my man i got my first wolf pup okay and then that's followed by hashtag first wolf hashtag one last predator montana yeah okay i don't know that the motivation is one last predator

i think the motive you know the motivation is one less predator. I think the motive, you know, the motivation is like, you want to go hunting. You want to get a wolf. I don't know that people really, if you wanted to wake up any, at any given day and do something for wildlife in your state.

Okay. And in your, in Okay? And your sole goal is to benefit wildlife in your state. Or benefit ungulates in your state. I don't think that hunting predators is the best

I don't think that hunting wolves is the best use of your time. I think it would be that you would volunteer for the day for Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. You'd volunteer for the day for Mule Deer Foundation you would go to work that day and take all the money you made at work that day and give it to a habitat organization it's similar to I think it's similar like let's say you wanted to go shoot prairie dogs um but then you say like oh i'm going to help the rancher out you know i think it's mostly you want to go shoot prairie dogs if you went to a ranch

yeah if you went to a rancher's house and said you know today i woke up and i just wanted to help you out what what is the thing i could do most to help you out i don't think that's what he's gonna say he'd say fix fence yeah i don't think that's what he's gonna say stretch a wire he's gonna say like oh dude you know what i'm dreading you know what i don't want to do throw square bales yeah it's just yeah so i think there's a little bit of um there's a little bit of mental masturbation that happens with people where you are you get into where you're there's a thing you want to do and you have perfectly legitimate reasons to do it but you dress it up as though

it's like somewhat altruistic you know altruistic would be that you went that you had the day off, went to your boss and says, I want to work today. I want to do overtime today, whatever. And then I'm going to take the entire pay for today and donate it to a wildlife habitat organization. It's a little fishy. I mean, this story gets a lot more fishy. But up to this point, I'm just laying out like what, okay, the parts. Now here's the plot twist. So far, maybe a little bit of mental masturbation, but not offensive.

Yeah. Here's the plot twist and why TMZ and NPR are talking about this. The five photos she posted are not with a wolf. They're with a husky. Yeah. A dead husky. That's where you enter into a problem. A dead husky and wolf or with a husky. Yeah, that's where you enter into a problem. A dead husky and a skinned out husky. She rugged it out.

Yes. Now, if it was a lab or a beagle or a hound, I would be more inclined to be like what though right more inclined you're you're already giving her too much credit listen it's not as i understand it as i understand it she was way back in the mountains and someone had dumped a pack so to speak someone had dumped a pack of like sled dogs right had dumped a pack of sled dogs out in the middle of nowhere just to get just to get rid of them and dump them so that that facebook post was on saturday and it had done its thing. It was all over by Sunday, and I feel like we were all getting texts of it like, is this real? This is a joke, right? And things like that.

Well, I think on Mondays when the sheriff's office for Flathead County put out a statement, that's when they gave those extra details that a pack of dogs were dumped in the wilderness, and I think up until that point, 11 of those dogs had been recovered. And it was like, what, 19 or something had got dumped? Well, a different Facebook post from this woman who shot the husky, she said that there were 19 dogs that were dropped off and that she was 11 miles in the back country.

So people had already kind of like formed their opinions by this point, by like the three days, two days later, you know, when the sheriff's office has a statement. I think that you could, you know, when you go to get, if you go to bear hunt in a state that has black bears and grizzlies in the lower 48, your state agency is probably going to make you go do a thing where you have to look at pictures of you have to look at pictures of bears in various contexts.

And pass a test about how well you can distinguish a black bear from a grizzly. It is not an easy test. I'm not saying I'm not even kind of saying it's the same thing with a husky and a wolf, but placed in a certain context where the last thing on your mind is one thing, I think that it would be, let me tell you a story. Years ago, we went down, when I was in school,

me and some, me and my, when I was in school in Montana, my brother Danny was in school at Auburn. We went down to hunt the Tuskegee National Forest. Okay? And it was a great time. We just hunted public land, had really no idea what we're doing. Everybody got a buck.

I got a buck who's a spike that was so small, we laughed because I cut cut it off with a hacksaw and i was able to carry its rack around in my shirt pocket cut a real thin little slice you still have that rack no i wish i did man i literally went home with that rack in my shirt pocket but it was a legal buck either way i remember one point when i was walking down this road through tuskegee national forest and looked down a cut line and hit the deck because there's a deer but once i looked through my scope it was some damn big dog but if i was walking down a street or a sidewalk through a neighborhood and i saw an object step into a cut line i wouldn't have thought or step into an alley i wouldn't have thought there's a deer yeah you'd think there's because the context of where you're at influences what you see and according to this

woman she was 11 miles in the back country which i don't know what that means maybe 11 she might have been 10 miles up a logging road and hiked i don't really know what that means i i absolutely understand that but i think one thing we should talk about is that there is no like so this was a domesticated dog who was dumped into the woods and she rugged it out well here's the thing what do you there's no way this this dog probably saw a human for the first time and however and was probably probably ran up super friendly like oh my god i don't know man you don't think so she says it ran up in in like growling and snarling okay i've been out coyote hunting before and called in dogs with a collar on but when they hear that coyote fight sound playing they come running in ready to you know fuck something up they're ready

to fight and i mean i have like personally called in a husky while coyote hunting and in that context i can oh yeah yeah with a collar on yeah yeah i called in a neighbor's german shepherd one time coyote hunting yeah it can happen definitely i didn't shoot it no i did not a neighbor's german shepherd one time kyle huntin yeah it can happen definitely i didn't shoot it no i did not shoot it i am not in any way i'm not in any way i'm not in any ways saying it could have happened to anyone i don't think it could have happened to anyone i i i just think that the the criticism um is a little carried away and i think that it's not it doesn't strike me as like this horror it doesn't strike me as this horribly negligent egregious thing it was like it was a mistake but it wasn't if it was a lab like i said if it was a

lab or a beagle you'd be what but there are black wolves there are white wolves there are mixed color wolves we recently saw a pack of hunting alaska we saw a pack of 14 all black wolves i didn't even know that could happen dang 14 solid black wolves and when you're looking at them from a long ways way through a spotting scope you would be like holy shit there's a bunch of black dogs running along because they're just black so it just it doesn't strike me it just doesn't strike me as insane as it's striking everybody else and i think there's a lot on people's behalf there's like a shitload of moral posturing and i think the most people that are most mad would have been just as mad if it had been a wolf. And somehow, weirdly, when a woman does something, it pisses people off more than when a guy does it.

That's true. And even though she's not going to face any legal trouble, this is going to follow her around for the rest of her life. She's going to have that stigma. If a woman does something, there's something about it that just makes even women hate them more. You know, women are not given because it's like because she did this awful thing and tried to thought she killed a wolf, tried to kill a wolf. It was a dog. It's like they're going to pile on to her harder. Yeah, I think it's the

sheer just brazen confidence of that facebook post too that's it's adding a lot of fuel but see and my but my context there would be then that it is a genuine mistake right that it's just an individual made a mistake yeah and a lot of people have like Disneyfication of what a wolf would look like. Right? I don't think people even always really know exactly what they should be looking at. The people that are pissed would have been pissed if it was a wolf. Yeah, totally. The news coverage you see of this, this always, this is now like a launching pad

to talk about like the delisting of wolves and things like that. You see that in all these news sources that are covering this story. It becomes not that a woman shot a husky. It talks about like the protection of wolves in the Rocky Mountains. It's a referendum.

It becomes a referendum on whether the state should be allowed to manage the resource yeah so it's like we shouldn't have wolves delisted because otherwise huskies are getting shot husky can get shot we need to add some more clarity make a shirt need to add some more clarity to the story though so she had posted that like on the weekend right and the the sheriff's office releases a statement a few days later um and then she puts a follow-up post on Facebook. And you had talked about how she had shot it because it was like barking at her or whatever. Here's what her post says.

This is just part of it. It says, I would still have shot it because it was aggressive and coming directly for me. So that was part of her story that came out later that the husky was posturing as though it was going to attack her. I mean... I can't buy that. I don't have a problem with that.

Intention matters. It's like dogs, we call it burger barking. Coyotes do it. Dogs do it when they first see a stranger. Hell, my dog does it through the window of the truck. Like she sees someone walking in the dark, right? Hackles go up, she barks.

It's like you're out there by yourself. It is convenient. It's a convenient detail. It's highly convenient. It's a convenient detail. I don't know if it's true. I could see why someone in this situation would feel the need to um try to get themselves out of the death threats yeah and like right like i could

see why someone under great duress might stretch the truth but in and of itself that is not an outrageous claim no it's not if someone told me if if my wife was on a hike with the kids and she came back and said we were way up so such and such place and some damn dog comes out of nowhere barking and growling at us would i be like you lying right no it's like okay that's like i can imagine that happening there's a lot of places that i've hunted in south dakota wyoming it's like you have a random stray dog come through your decoy spread yeah while you're out there and it's like oh that's that's not anybody's pet that's just a dog out roaming doing its thing we were turkey hunting in a in a remote

area of montana i mean as remote as you can get and be hunting turkeys turkey hunting remote area of montana at one point i looked out across this large patch of open ground and i'm like what in the world is that because i couldn't tell what was going on as we got closer and investigated it was a domestic dog dragging a deer there was a domestic dog dragging a dead deer through the fields yep very similar story me and you remember danny morrison old two toes oh yeah yeah yeah um me and danny were we're turkey hunting in south dakota and uh danny was trying to get on this one gobbler and then this thing just disappeared. It seemed wasn't out in the field anymore.

And, uh, he pops up over this little Ridge to get a glimpse, put binos up and there's a stray dog that had killed this Turkey just out in an open field. Oh really? Yep. Eating on a Turkey out in the middle of grass pasture. Yeah. Here's another quote from her follow-up facebook post it says my safety was top priority this animal was growling howling and coming at me like it was

going to eat me okay i don't know i've never met the individual i don't know that that's true but that is not outrageous yeah and even if it's not true like like you say someone told outrageous lie that might be a lie but it's not an outrageous lie well i mean either way like you you can see how she's just trying to not completely completely understandable it's just yeah i and you've you've kind of pulled me over to the other side steve but it's just the the facebook the the complete kind of her first post was like i smoked i smoked this wolf i'm gonna tell my husband and the next post was like it was growling and snarling and charging at me i had no other choice you know it's just kind of it's convenient yeah she's under tremendous duress sure yeah yeah um and again just we're not summed up yet because i want we need to hear the

what her boyfriend had to say yep and i and here i respect the um you know you know that tammy want toup facebook post by the husband and in that facebook post one of the details that he says is that she has not been filed for any charges well they just read the whole thing she will not be filed for any charges but the sheriff's office says that they are investigating the thing. She's not going to get in trouble. She shouldn't, man. There were other claims, which I don't know how people came upon these, that she addressed in the Facebook post that she didn't have a wolf tag. She did have a wolf tag.

She says she has a wolf tag, but I don't see anything in the sheriff's office statement saying that she did. It just says it's under investigation. No, I think it was clarified that she had a wolf tag but i don't see anything in the sheriff's office statement saying that she did it just says it's under investigation i thought it was clear no i think it was clarified that she had a wolf tag okay well and it kind of doesn't matter you know it's like a lot of this shit is like a lot of this stuff is this a lot of it's like hate the game not the player do you know i'm saying people are mad because they would have been mad if she shot the damn wolf uh phil you know what I'm saying? People are mad because they would have been mad if she shot the damn wolf. Phil, you know, you have a little machine that bleeps out obscenities. Yeah. You're going to need to get a new one because the one you got now is going to be worn out.

It's going to be worn out. But I want you to very carefully. Spencer's going to read it. And I want you to very carefully bleep the obscenities out. And I think this would make a phenomenal T-shirt. This is going to make me blush. And like our last email t-shirt, this one lacks punctuation. But don't worry about it because Phil's going to bleep it all out.

No one will know what it was that you said. That's right. Yeah, this is going to sound like a Mad Lib when we're done. Where it's like, insert. If we do a t-shirt of it, I don't know if we can. Check copyright. Maybe the individual. when we're done where it's like uh insert if we do a t-shirt of it i don't know if we can't check copyright maybe the individual but um it would be with all the like dollar signs and asterisks and stuff for when you do a lot like a lot of swear words when you're texting yeah but here's an

individual whose girlfriend is getting death threats and here's his response yeah i don't even fault them for this we're talking about making a template that other people could use this for ready yeah any you mother talk all that you cause not one of you mother are tough enough to act on any of your bullshit said if so come to my place and i'll beat your ass myself yeah my girlfriend was out hunting and shot a dog that was dumped out in the woods no charges have been filed or will be filed because no laws were broke it was a deer chasing feral dog on the wrong place at the wrong time so if you want to be a bunch of crybaby ass f***ing sheep, keep going because we really don't give two f***s about what's going on or what's being said.

Mistakes happen, big f***ing deal. You crybaby motherf***ers and for any other hunters who want to talk s*** saying it looks bad, well f***ing s*** it does you stupid mother but mistakes happen so like i said any you want to act on any of these threats and come up because i got one for you sure i love how i totally understand i totally understand yeah uh my favorite part is like you all you have to say it looks bad well yeah it does okay so they're owning their shit okay and intention matters and intent their intention was not to do what ended up being done strip away strip away the passion strip away the passion what what what is what is left when you strip away the passion? Well, we have... My girlfriend made a mistake.

She shot a dog. It was a dog out in the wild. It was a deer-eating dog. It was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sure, it looks bad. Mistakes happen. And no laws are broken. No laws are broken.

That's his post. Okay, strip away the passion. And it's like you just aren't dealing with people who are that. It's not like you're dealing with irrational people. It was a mistake. This sounds kind of irrational. Well, it's because it's infused with passion. He's pumped up, you know?

Talking about infused with passion. Sean's duck report. Yeah, exactly. We spent like 25 minutes on that. Time to move on. You are right in that you are one of the only people i've seen take this stance on the internet whether they're in the hunting community or not that uh this was kosher no no i want you to now i want you to do this i want you to tell me what my stance is because i

want to make sure you're paying attention to what i'm saying okay i'm now not being fair your stance is that she made a mistake and that it could happen to folks and that that i think that much of the anger is coming from people who have a problem with something put in place by the state where she lives and they're deflecting that honor and in a big way you know earlier i was saying is because it's a girl but if it was a dude to be bad i take that back i take that part back they'd be pissed at a dude oh yeah were you saying oh yeah i was saying that like oh people kind of what a woman does like if a woman goes to africa and gets it's almost a little it's like in a way it's a people experience it different it's that whole kendall jones thing it's like because they're just like you know it just people feel it in a different way no i agree as a woman it takes on us it takes on like

a sexual the hatred takes on like a sexual violence kind of thing i think some incel creeping in there a little bit i think if it were a dude they probably would have well i don't know how do i quantify or qualify like worse but i think the follow-up like a rabid dog and her dog was barking or i felt intimidated i was you know protecting myself i feel like something about that would not go over as much if it were a dude oh yeah you're right there's something there's something about that i don't know if i had a harder time a dude would have had a harder time going down that path no something you can't argue with though is, is that it appears, though, she did a very good job of skinning out this husky.

Great job. Yeah, what's great? Like, it would have made for a very nice rug. I mean, I would get it if, I don't know if John Hayes would do it, but I would foot the bill to have it done. And just be like, hey, remember that whole deal? Well, there's that. And I don't think it's gonna happen you know how many people death threat how many death threats are gonna come

i think you're underestimating how passionate dog i would i would if i could get it no matter what if i could get it i would put it in the i would get it rugged i would get it rugged and I would sell it in the Auction House of Oddities. That's a sure oddity. I think it would fetch a lot of money for conservation. It would fetch a generous bid. And let's see if those folks

would, I don't know, appreciate it differently. That Auction House of Oddities item, instead of that money going to the land access initiative of our own, I would take the money from that bid and give that money to the Mule Deer Foundation. And I would say, in the end, in the end, it was good for deer. Just bring it all home. I think this won't be the last update we have on this story

and here's why the sheriff's office said that they recovered 11 of the dogs and they are currently at the animal shelter but they're not up for adoption at this time what what if we find out in like a week they're like yay come get yourself an adult husky they're super friendly great family dogs uh we feel very good about their prospects of going to a home i am not saying that it could have happened to anybody i am saying that when you strip the parts out it's not as insane it's not as egregious as it's being portrayed fair agreed and also people just like stop with the death threats like just stop oh yeah like the threat of violence over just a dog in the wild that's just the internet though, recently we had the guy. There's been three guys that have brought llamas to check stations thinking they had cow elk. Okay?

Do they all get death threats? They mistook an animal. There was a guy in Colorado who shot someone's mule. Thought he shot a cow elk. Should they be put to death? They shot something thinking it was something that it wasn't. Yeah, people just need to calm down and stop it. Just stop it.

No justification for threatening violence. Some people take that real seriously. I don't think the hunter would want to do this at all, but if she came on the show, I would love to have her on the show. How about her husband? Sure. Boyfriend.

I would love to have him on the show. I don't think they'd want to do it, but if they wanted to come and tell the story, I would love to have him on the show. i bet they come out of this with a renewed fervor in their relationship seems like they have a good relationship passionate well listen she was excited to share she was like again let's say it had been a wolf she was excited to share he. He's defensive of her. It's not like he didn't cut and run. Yeah, no. He's standing by her.

Hey, folks. Exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada. And boy, my goodness, do we hear from the Canadians whenever we do a raffle or a sweepstakes. And our raffle and sweepstakes law makes it that they can't join. Our northern brothers get

irritated. Well, if you're sick of you know, sucking high and titty there, OnX is now in Canada. The great features that you love in OnX are available for your hunts this season. The Hunt app is a fully functioning GPS with hunting maps that include public and crown land, hunting zones, aerial imagery, 24K topo maps, waypoints, and tracking.

That's right. We're always talking about OnX here on the Meat Eater Podcast. Now you guys in the Great White North can be part of it. Be part of the excitement. You can even use offline maps to see where you are without cell phone service. That's a sweet function. As part of your membership, you'll

gain access to exclusive pricing on products and services hand-picked by the OnX Hunt team. Some of our favorites are First Light, Schnee's, Vortex Federal, and more. As a special offer, you can get a free three months to try OnX out if you visit onxmaps.com slash meet. onxmaps.com slash meet.

Welcome to the OnX Club, y'all. Before we get to the show and start the report, we've got a couple of announcements to make. Now, at TheMeatEater.com, we have a big, giant whitetail week running from October 9th to 16th.

During that, for most of it, huge first light sale happening from October 9th to 16th. During that, for most of it, huge First Light sale happening from October 10th to the 16th. So all kinds of sweet deals at our store. Deals from Tethered, Timber Ninja, First Light's first Whitetail sale, which puts 20% off all Spectre Camo, all solid base layer bottoms, all Hunter's Orange. Starts today, October 10. You can find it there.

Something very exciting too, a new product launch from Phelps Game Calls. Tomorrow, or depending on when you're listening to this, October 11, Phelps is launching the Phelps Deer Call. Later this week, FHF has its 24-hour only one-shot deal. So that's bundles of FHF gear you'll get with your First Light purchase. Like get a free chest rig with purchase of a First Light Source Puffy. Or get a free E3 pouch with purchase of the First Light Transfer Pack. So check out all that stuff. BigWeek at TheMeatEater.com.

Now, moving on to Sean. All right. We're tackling kind of a big one in the waterfowl community space right now. When I called John Devaney from delta waterfowl asking for an interview on this subject his exact answer was so you want to write an article on the most difficult waterfowl issue in the western hemisphere so to which you said by god yes yes i do and i i bit off a lot here it's taken me quite a bit of time to uh write this article write this duck report on this and the subject is the klamath basin in the oregon california border um for a little context the kath Basin is like Upper Klamath, Klamath Lake, then Lower Klamath Refuge, and Tule Lake Refuge that drains down the Klamath River.

The Lower Klamath Refuge was Teddy Roosevelt's first waterfowl refuge. And it really surprises me that he got to that before he got to, oh yeah, because the waterfowl refuge might be different. But you know, like that real urgency around the shorebirds, they were shooting for the plenary trade. Yeah. I would have thought that that would have been one of his first things when they were trying to save all the egrets and stuff. Yeah. From commercial slaughter. Well, and there's so much, right?

There's so much waterfowl habitat and like the east and the south you even think about chesapeake bay yeah like during his time chesapeake bay is getting just raped and pillaged for better lack of words and and he goes and picks the klamath all the way over on the west coast but uh the lower klamath and tule lake refuges at their peak during the late 1950s were holding four to five million water birds. 200,000 would migrate to the refuge to molt in the summer. 80% of all Pacific Flyway water birds would stage here. It had more pintails in just the Klamath basin that occurred continentally like this place is one of the most vital as as dr chris nickley from delta waterfowl put it he says this is the second

most important refuge system in in the entire refuge system what being number one yukon delta oh yeah i thought it was gonna be some stuff around the gulf really yeah yep um and so all that is to say the refuge is now bone dry i mean not a drop of water in the whole thing and they've canceled the hunting season for it uh which is no surprise because there's no ducks there anyway and if you go down here to the next kind of page you'll see a picture from brian huber he's a waterfowl biologist out there in california and uh the pictures are pretty grim and unfortunate because it's just a whole beautiful oasis just cracked dirt and dry. Cracked, baked, rock hard, cracked up, dried mud, man. Yeah. And a lot of skulls. you know it's important to note like we are all very aware of the drought that's just

persisted across california and oregon and made you know wetlands having a real hard time in the west anyway california just shut down like three more refuges hunting seasons in central valley but um there's more to the story with klamath and i'll try to not get too deep into the weeds here because it's a huge thing to tackle but one of the biggest problems that klamath has faced specifically is uh according, according to Ron Cole, the former manager of the Klamath basin, uh, the, the, the complex, the refuge complex, he really just has a problem with what the ESA has done with the water. Um, they discovered two suckers there, the, the lost river sucker and the shortnose sucker in the complex there that now with the ESA

a ton of the water allocation from the Bureau of Reclamation project there has gone to recovering these two suckers as well as of course the threatened Southern Oregon, Northern California coastal coho salmon and the threatened uh southern oregon northern california coastal coho salmon salmon and uh you know the esa has so much power right that like it kind of trump it's the trump card

that the water all goes to recovering these these species and uh in the early 2000s 2006 ron cole had kind of helped bring all the partners to the table all the stakeholders so to speak california oregon a bunch of indian tribes uh four counties individual farmers companies irrigation districts seven ngos he kind of got them all on one agreement that was the klamath basin restoration agreement and they all they all signed on with it and congress never got it passed uh just it kind of went to the hill to die so to speak and so now everyone's kind of fragmented not all on the same page anymore and not really getting along like they had before and uh you know the refuge specifically lower klamath and tule lake don't have a real water right they have one that's for agricultural use

for 35 000 acre feet and the fish and wildlife hasn't, like, they haven't kind of demanded that water from the Bureau of Reclamation. They haven't exercised that water right. And so what you have now is one of the most vital waterfowl habitats in the country going bone dry and really no obvious way out in the short term um you know it's it's it's sad it's sickening uh you know ron cole predicted it when they didn't get the restoration agreement passed that the refuge would go dry eight out of 10 years and really and you just start sterilizing soil right like you're you're baking what's wetland soil you're you're pretty much cooking organic material and you know they only had 120 nesting ducks on this whole place this year um it's a sad deal and you know hopefully hopefully kind of wake some people up to the water situation in the west as a whole

and like kind of the importance of some nuance here i don't think anyone really has um like the end all be all answer, but you know, Ron call Ron Cole put it really interestingly to me. He said the Pacific flyway is like a three-legged stool. You have the Klamath basin, you have the central Valley in California, and you have the bear river watershed, right? Salt Lake in Utah. And those three, um,

those three places are kind of what props up and holds up the Pacific flyways ability to have ducks and central Valley in California is that like, you know, 95% wetland loss and hardly any water salt Lake is going dry. So one's bone dry, one's 95% wetland loss and hardly any water. Salt Lake is going dry. So one's bone dry. One's 95% dry. And then Salt Lake is like, you know, everyone's predicting five years type thing. And so, yeah, you kind of just have this pervasive problem that hopefully, it sucks that it has to get this bad for

people to wake up to it but you hope it's actually at this point like a wake-up call we got to do something with i was gonna ask an ignorant question about like well they're birds like can they not like fly to some other habitat in the area but it sounds like all the habitat is gone yeah some some inevitably will but you're not gonna yeah right it's it's yeah for sure in the short term right they can go to other places the the problem is just uh when you look landscape wide when you have a net habitat loss right eventually a carrying capacity of the flyway just continues to decrease and you have um you know 80 90 of all of california nesting mallards california used to nest a lot of mallards in the central valley 80 to 90 of those would all fly to the klamath for their summer molt and now it's like they're gonna fly there and find what

bear dirt um some will figure something out but you'll have just a massive net loss of birds man yeah and i think one of the interesting questions it brings up is you know there's no such thing as a free lunch right how how far can you take it when you are pushing water downstream for the salmon to keep the water cooler before they eventually take out these Klamath dams. As they allocate, you know, 40,000 acre feet of water for these suckers. As they allocate water, the little water they do have to these other things like how far do you pursue you know the the esa right before before it's like at the expense of everything else there yeah you have some conservation

dependent species right they're hanging on by a thread yep and someone might ask is it worth losing 90 95 of our ducks to save a conservation dependent species that is almost certainly doomed anyway yeah and you know the extinction's forever man yeah it's it's well yeah there's no i'm not saying that like i have no i it's a tough one because you could also be like we you know maybe we'll get some great wet years and it won't be an issue anymore but that's not what uh climate models are showing no climate models are showing that this is the new norm yeah yeah totally and you just have you know you have more development you have more egg like you have so many more things demanding water yeah in a time of less water i can see someone saying like is there a sophie's choice to be made here that you'd say um

that you'd say that that it's too bad it's heartbreaking but some of these things are gonna some of these things that are are uh gonna have to step aside to make way for the longevity of things that have a greater a greater capacity to hang on right yeah i mean the klamath basin used to be 400 000 acres of wetland habitat yeah and then it's now like it's zero right it's things can this isn't going to be but things can turn with with with impounded water with watersheds things can turn around so fast but this is this is turning into a long long issue yeah yeah it's not like a freakish year no it's the new norm yep especially in the west you know there's oh god what was that it's like malakaluga there's a lake that sits right above pyramid lake um that's like a playa

right over the hill from pyramid lake that was the dr chris nickel i explained this to me it was our first it has the distinction of being our first national wildlife refuge to be sold because it just went dry and was never gonna have water again hasn't had a duck on it in 80 years oh really yeah it's just like it's a dry playa and they just put the money into something else yeah they sold it off man turned it into blm ground and you know that's it sucks to say but that's where you see some of these other things going unless i i guess hopefully um if anything there's kind of a there's kind of a new spirit of the, the actual current refuge man, manager, John Brandenburg. He, he said to me, he said, I have hope that this is what brings everyone back to the table

and gets everyone to like agree, Hey, we need clean water going down the river for the salmon. How do you get clean water? You put it through a wetland, right? Um, you know, we need clean water going down the river for the salmon. How do you get clean water? You put it through a wetland, right? Um, you know, we need a little bit more equity because what we're doing is not working. And, you know, he, he also said, how beautiful would it be right to, to have like Teddy Roosevelt's first waterfowl refuge be kind of the pivotal moment of wetlands in the west like we find a way to get through this and and create a solution together and our generation be like the ones that like save the klamath for the long haul yeah yeah which would be cool but yeah it's interesting ordeal you know pacific flyway's got

like the most liberal limits they can shoot seven ducks a person out there they have the longest days um but that's not gonna last long if you keep losing all your wetlands yeah and all your water you hope waterfowl hunters in the area will step up yeah totally the part of the problem that happened with the different sucker species is you didn't have a huge advocacy advocacy group arguing on their behalf the whole time yeah you know no one was no people weren't watching people weren't yelling right and it winds up in a situation where it becomes a federal esa issue right and hunters winds up in a situation where it becomes a federal esa issue right and hunters you know hunters and anglers get criticized

for being overly focused on the stuff they're uh being overly focused on trying to conserve the resources that they like to go after but it's like at least someone's doing it yeah be like oh yeah you just because you want to shoot them it's like well first it's more complicated than that and second wouldn't it be great if every species had an advocacy group like this yeah yeah most people don't advocate on behalf of any species right so to to knock on hunters for advocating on behalf of the ones they like it's like great buddy go advocate on the behalf of the ones you like yeah or have you never done that right yeah and now you have right you have even birders like pissed off in the pacific flyway because all of a sudden now what they you know kind of had they were able to kind of take for granted right was all these beautiful refuges that they could go bird at now all of a sudden they can't

uh an interesting thing about the the advocacy thing you know obviously i have a bias of wetlands right like there's a reason i love wetlands involving duck hunting but i think one of the things here is you can't ever deny the importance of a wetland on a landscape. No. I mean, they are just. For everything. They're just essential for everything. And, you know, at the same time that the salmon down river are facing like slow, warm water, dirty water, and they've got these like parasite issues in this salmon population. And they're pushing more water down river to try to speed up the water and make the water cooler at the same time they're like neglecting the most easy obvious filter for that water which is the wetland right but hopefully hopefully something

changes you know there's at least a lot of attention on it now yep so if you want to find out more and look at some pictures and stuff uh about the the the klamath basin and the whole situation with pacific flyway waterfowl check out sean's big article at the meter.com what are you going to call it uh yeah i'm not i don't know the exact title yet but it'll involve the klamath it's there right now go to the meter.com and you'll find Sean's article. And we got Austin Riley back with us here, so we're going to get into talking about him now. Oh, so hey, this is an interesting thing.

I mean, this just happened. This will help get us into sports talk. So we've covered, if you listen to the show, you've become somewhat of a subject matter expert on walleye tournaments because of our very own seth and chester engaging in the montana walleye tour so we've learned all about walleye tours and bags and all that well yesterday i get a text seth yesterday set Seth's not with us right now, but Seth yesterday text me a YouTube video titled walleye cheaters busted. We got weights and fish. So this is a walleye tournament in Cleveland, Ohio. And two anglers, Jake Runyon and Chase Comiskey weighed in a five fish limit that went just over 33 pounds. This is yesterday, so it says like 13, this is posted 13 hours ago.

After being announced winners and also team of the year, the tournament master, like the tournament director, cut open their fish, found eight pounds of lead sinkers and five fish. Also, I just talked to Seth this morning, also the fish were stuffed full of walleye flays. Whoa. Which is smart because some of these things, they had like four-ounce lead sinkers in them. So how,

how no one ever just palpated. Oh, that's, do you know what I mean? Like, like if you ran your hand over the, if you just ran your hand over a fish, you know,

it's not normal to find a rock hard hunk of lead in there. Can you explain how egregious this is like just well yeah because there's there's like other stuff they've won i mean you know these guys might win 16 grand 20 grand in a tournament and these are just small you know these are hobby anglers well you're gonna hear how pissed off people are when we're gonna to play this little bit of this YouTube clip. But yeah, it had a pair of fishing pliers, walleye flays, all kinds of lead weights. And what's weird about this tournament is the fish are dead. You know, like normally at tournaments they're always working to keep the fish alive. On the big tournaments, they put them in these

holding tanks and the holding tanks have earth magnets in them to search for stuff and they're scanning fish but seth says apparently these guys last year after winning failed a polygraph but uh failed a polygraph but the evidence had already been destroyed so this has been long suspected and in this this video on youtube is 15 minutes long but in it you see all the guys coming away in and we're sean we're gonna play the clip where where the the discovery happens but you can hear there's a lot of grumbling where guys are like but my fish are bigger than that you can hear people be like i don't

understand there's no way he's like let me this guy's like let me see those fish we had fish that were bigger that there's no way those fish weigh that and things quiet down and then and then here here's what happens in the youtube clip we got weights and fish there we go i love that everybody's like cheering after the fact oh it was like brewing man like people knew something was up yeah people knew and people yeah so you were you were getting on the fact that so they had weights but then they also were stuffing them with walleye fillets so apparently at first like the first thing they were they cut one he cuts one fish open you see a guy just down there fiddling with the fish and he cuts one open and screams that out and the and the announcer the announcer cocks back basically is because the guy is standing right there like people are braiding the guy he's just standing there with staring at the ground like he's there's nothing he can do

right he's so busted but the first thing on the announcer, the first impulse the announcer has is he cocks back like he's going to give that dude the biggest haymaker, but just does an air punch instead next to his head. I think he was throwing him out like a baseball umpire throws out a manager who's arguing. That's what he did. He threw him out of there. Oh, you think that's what that art is?

Yeah, he's like, you're out of here. That's what the art thing was. See, I thought he was like, I'm going to hit him in the face, but then changed his mind to the air punch that's how you read it yeah austin have you been thrown out of a game before show him the video and then and then he can decide yeah one time rookie ball um that's the only time i've ever been thrown out other than that um i drew a line a ball was like it wasn't even close like and I was 18.

I was stupid. And that's like the last thing you can do. And I tried to discreetly, as I'm walking across the plate, I kind of like behind my back, like draw a line. And I ended up getting tossed. Explain draw a line. So like obviously you got the plate and balls got to cross it. And anyway, it was like in the other, pretty much in the other batter's box.

And I was just showing the umpire where it came across. Oh, you were saying just in case you missed. In case you missed it. This is actually where it crossed. If you really want to know where it was, here's where it was. Now you decide if this is an air punch or if he's getting thrown out like an umpire would. So the announcer's on the... It's that guy.

The guy that's cutting? Yep. You hear him? He said, get the F out of here. So yeah, I think he was like giving him one of those. Well, I was trying to dramatize. I was trying to dramatize it. We can make it that way for the tv miniseries yeah when they make a netflix movie out of it it'll be that he just he just gives

them a hey how many pounds of fish like coming at the weigh-in where you like look at a small fish and like what it or a small a pile of small fish and you you like eyeball what approximately that should weigh and then it's like seven times more with the way these fish that are known so it's not like a 300 pound shark where you're like i don't know yeah that's what i was gonna say i was gonna ask also it was like was there a big difference in like first and second? Yeah. No, no. It's close. Oh, okay. Yeah. Okay.

So it's not like it was just like, well, maybe not in that one, right? Because of eight pounds of lead probably made a little bit of a gap. Well, no, because people have to watch the whole thing. Yeah. It was like, there was another team that had over 31 pounds. Oh, man. Right? So it was definitely definitely they put it now uh apparently 48 states have just

like flat out rule against cheating in any tournament so these guys it's probably criminal oh yeah oh very criminal most places there's an article here from 2021 that talks about how the two angler team had won $300,000 in victories. Wow. That's all going to be under scrutiny now. Holy cow. Those guys had won $300,000 in terms. This is an article from almost a year ago. Real money.

They were prolific anglers in this area. Oh, man. It's beyond mischievous. This is like felony. Stealing money. All this to say, what's the worst cheating you've ever done? Awesome. I'm like mischievous. This is like felony. Stealing money. What's the worst cheating you've ever done? Awesome.

I grew up loving baseball in the late 90s. It's hard to talk about cheating with a baseball player without talking about steroids, man. Just like the height of all the crazy shit. Oh, yeah, people would watch. You could not miss the Cardinals play when Mark McGuire was chasing that record.

And no one, I mean, maybe people were thinking that. I was pretty young at the time, but no one was looking at this guy thinking, why does he look like he just got stung by 100 bees? No man should look like this. Yeah. And then the effect that that had on the league for a few years was was massive i don't know from someone who's like now a professional baseball player do you that is that you still kind of feel that kind of that

that with the weight of the steroid no it's pretty i mean it's pretty gone yeah i mean with testing now it's like you can't yeah yeah i mean we're getting we've had uh cdt there like which are guys that drug test is i mean starting it's been like they've been there like every day for the last like two weeks and like random drug test whether it's blood tests uh or you know urine so it's like they've cracked down on it so hard it's like guys aren't yeah guys aren't getting away with it those days just over they're just over yeah and sophisticated beyond like it's like guys aren't yeah guys aren't getting away with it those days just over they're just over yeah and sophisticated beyond like it's not just anabolic steroids they're looking for anymore there's like a thousand things yeah they're looking for every

and like i said it's like though they're taking blood it's like you just can't can't get away with Hey folks, exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada. And boy, my goodness do we hear from the Canadians whenever we do a raffle or a sweepstakes. And our raffle and sweepstakes law makes it that they can't join. Our northern brothers get irritated. Well, if you're sick of, you know, sucking high and titty there, OnX is now in Canada. The great features that you love in OnX are available for your hunts this season. The Hunt app is a fully functioning GPS with hunting maps

that include public and crown land, hunting zones, aerial imagery, 24K topo maps, waypoints, and tracking. That's right, we're always talking about OnX here on the Meat Eater Podcast. Now you guys in the Great White North can be part of it, be part of the excitement. You can even use offline maps to see where you are without cell phone service. That's a sweet function. As part of your membership, you'll gain access to exclusive pricing on products and services handpicked by the OnX Hunt team.

Some of our favorites are First Light, Schnee's, Vortex Federal, and more. As a special offer, you can get a free three months to try OnX out if you visit onxmaps.com slash meet. OnXMaps.com slash meet. Welcome to the OnX Club, y'all. When did you guys, you were born in Tennessee, but moved to Mississippi, right? Yeah, so I lived in, yeah, I've never lived tennessee like physically lived in tennessee um um i've lived in hernando mississippi which is 20 minutes from memphis so it's like memphis was the closest

hospital so that's that's the reason oh that's why yeah oh yeah it's like that's the only place to go um my my buddy's buddies always, especially on the team, are like, you're not from Mississippi. You're from Tennessee. I'm like, whatever. That's why I was always like, from Mississippi, from Mississippi, from Mississippi. Then I saw like born in Memphis, Tennessee.

Someone needs to correct that. Just because your parents drove over there to go to that hospital. Yeah, that's the only way. But birth certificate says Memphis, Tennessee. Does it really? Yeah, can't argue with it. He could still help out with the squirrel cook-off, though. Oh, yeah. We should talk to you about this.

How connected to Tennessee do you feel? Like a super strong connection? Not really, to be honest. To Memphis area, though, right? I went up there one time this off-season for Luke Combs' concert. That's the only time I went. Oh, yeah? Well, hey.

So I don't. Hey, there's a connection there. I just don't go there. Like I said, I get enough of somewhat of a big city, so I stay secluded as possible. Have you ever gotten to meet Luke? Oh, yeah. Yeah. He came into the locker room about a little over a month ago.

Oh, he did? Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Well, he's got a great singing song. He doesn't know about this either, but so. We're going to ramp it up. Well, here's the thing we're trying to work on

let's see you might you might have to come up because it's if you can make it we're trying to work on this thing where uh there's we're trying to get there's some people that wanted to move the national squirrel cook-off or what's that yeah the world squirrel world squirrel cook-off has always been in Arkansas. And they wanted to bring it to Tennessee, but the animal rights people got onto it and they lost their venue.

So we're trying to bring it back with a bang. To Tennessee. Yeah, so you might need to bring up a squirrel dish. I can do that. Just let me know. And you can revisit

your birthplace. There we go. And kill a mess of squirrels one morning. So when you were growing up there, what was the – how did you get introduced to hunting and fishing? So got introduced really by my uncle, like bow hunting. My dad hunted. My dad grew up in Dumas, Arkansasansas small town um diehard duck hunter yeah that's good duck hunting country right there um diehard duck hunter like he tells me stories all

the time this is when to me he said when ducks were around he doesn't think ducks ducks are around anymore that's a that's a common malady that happens yeah when you get old yeah um they're not around as perhaps where you hunted them you know or they turned it into a walmart or something you know and it just seems like the whole world ended yeah so he's you know he said he they used to wake up in the morning kill lemon and mallard go to class like every morning so it's like and then kind of as you know my sister came around i came around my brother came around he just kind of stopped hunting uh he's more of a camp guy loves to cook uh have a have a cocktail uh along with it um but really my uncle heath

introduced me to to deer hunting um one out of mississippi every weekend i got the chance to i was going down there um and and just spending the weekend with him hunting killed my first actually killed my first deer with my rifle there killed my first bow or deer with the bow there um and ever since then in what area was that uh winona mississippi not not far from uh startville mississippi state about an hour west of there so did uh where'd you end up going to so what high school did you go to des DeSoto Central in South Haven, Mississippi. And by that point, you were hardcore baseball. Yeah, at that point.

I mean, as soon as I could pick up a bat, I was swinging a baseball bat and just fell in love with it. My dad was a sports guy. He punted at Mississippi State, played baseball there for his freshman year, and then just went to football only. So we were always doing sports and just gravitated towards baseball versus football or basketball. There had to have been, though, man. There had to have been an either or. Or a this or that moment.

There's this quote by Jim Harrison harrison i wish i had it with me the writer jim harrison has this quote where tom boat where he grew up he said that at some age it was either there's kids that had a baseball bat when they're riding their bike down the road or there's kids that had a fishing pole yeah and he said they might intermix a little bit but their destinies were set yeah you know but that didn't happen to you what like how was the sort of you know what i mean when you how was it figuring that out like from hunting just like when you were young yeah no i mean to be involved in something that would be if if you're good at it you have promise at it it requires unbelievable dedication you can't be distracted right and then you have to be looking at the

stuff you're not going to do yeah right yeah no i mean i remember growing up and and in the summers it was like you know all my buddies were going to the lake all my buddies were going to the pool they were going on vacation and i was going to play baseball um and it was just you know, all my buddies were going to the lake. All my buddies were going to the pool. They were going on vacation. And I was going to play baseball. And it was just, you know, one of those things that I love so much. And it just, like I said, kind of what I was saying back earlier is, like, I get the best of both worlds. Like, that's how it was even, you know, growing up. It's like summers were baseball. Winners were hunting.

And it's just like that's what I did. And for me, it was an easy choice between baseball and football. I liked football, but I knew just the – I think the attention, the small details that the game of baseball, you have to understand and focus on the mental side of the game. Like, I think that was what, you know, attracted me so much. There was so much, uh, little side, you know, the little things that the side of the, you know, baseball that, that I think attracted me more. Um, and like I said, just being able to do baseball and then winners were, were my

hunting season. Yeah. I was thinking about that earlier when we were talking about your last five games. After 162 games that it can come down to like a few pitches. Right. You know, that level of detail and statistical anomaly in baseball, like this is not football. No, and that's what I think some fans get so bored with it and they you know baseball is boring it's like but when you really dive into it it's like you know there's so like the attention to detail is so huge in the game like you know it's like you know if i say

there's a guy on first and you know somewhat of a slow runner and I have an opportunity to turn double play, I don't. That guy ends up staying on first or second or whatever may happen. It's like that guy ends up base hit, scoring a run. It's like looking back at the end of the game, it's like if I were to turn that double play, we might be winning by one versus losing by one. So it's like that small stuff to me is what I think I love so much of it. And you have that level of knowledge about all the players.

You know that someone's a slow runner. Oh, yeah, yeah. And part of it, like analytically, is taking over the game so much. It's like, I don't know if you noticed last night, it's like between every batter I was pulling out this card in my back pocket. And it shows like where you know it kind of gives us an idea where to play you know it has you know how fast the guy like plus minus like where the guy runs fast like so okay you know what's funny is i kept saying i

was saying to someone's like that dude just pulled a phone out of his pocket he's like there's no way i was like what the hell from the the hell did y'all see that happen yeah the guy yeah yeah that's what he's saying that's why he said there's no way he had a phone no no no no it's like a we have like a little card they do all like their their you know analytical work we get it um and it kind of helps us you know you know we still play like the the eye test of you know we can make adjustments if we want to, but it's very helpful. Is that kind of what you're referencing when you start mixing up how you guys are shifting, the infields lining up?

Yeah, that's where we get our information. Are you happy or disappointed that the shift is going away? Happy in a way because I don't have to run the right field. You potentially were shifting all the way to right oh yeah oh yeah wow yeah I don't know if I went I went out to shallow right field yesterday a couple times um you know I'm I'm excited that I don't have to do that next year but at the same time like the rule is is you have to have two position players on each bag or each side of the bag next year of second base. My thought process was as long as you have a foot in the dirt,

I was just like take away the extremes, like the guys that go all the way out to right field. But it is what it is. And I think it'll, you know, it'll help some guys from a hitting standpoint. And it takes, you know, it then shows the value of, you know, a true defender, like the range. You've got to that that side of it next year so it'll be cool how i know you probably can't get into too much detail but how um

how specific is the card i mean you don't have a card on every player right oh yeah or not a card on every player but like we have every player um and then i mean it's pretty basic it's just you know it's you just whether we're shifting or not. And like I said, that just tells me if I'm going to right field or not. And then if he's a speed guy or if he's a slower guy, that just kind of helps us tell how much that game clock in our mind of how much time I have to get the guy out. Man, that hurt to find someone's card and find your name on it. It says slow guy.

That's me. I'm that guy on someone's card that's like, hey, all the time in the world, just get it over there. Can you tell us what he might say about Pete Alonzo? Like what a few things, maybe details about him? He's straight up, which that's kudos to him. He hits the ball. You've seen it. He hits the the ball power all sides of the field um i want to say he's an equal

like what we call an equal guy like he he gets down the line pretty pretty fine so um nothing nothing bad to say about pete hey you know speaking of running fast, who was it that found – what's the dude that has the race, like the seventh inning race? Oh, I was hoping that the Freeze would be there last night. I know. I'm very shocked. He's normally there every day. I checked.

Explain this to me now. You've seen it a bunch. Yeah, so what they do is – And this is exclusive to Braves games. Right, right. So they start on one side of the foul pole in the warning track, and they pick a random person in the fans. It's like, hey, do you want to beat the freeze?

What do they try to find, like a fast-looking dude? Because the dude that they had last night who gets to do the run to get the base. Oh, that guy. He looked like he went and found like a pretty – I mean, that wasn't just a random dude. There's been guys that have beat the freeze. Oh, they have? Yeah, and there's been guys that have beat the frees. Oh, they have. Yeah, and there's been guys that have pulled hammies. There's been guys that have ate dirt, that have tripped.

So I think they just go pretty random. But we get a nice little kick out of it, especially, like I said, the guy that's not stretched and he's about halfway there and he checks up because his hamstring is pulled. And it's like John Colter's run, run right like the guy gets a head start yeah yeah guy gets like a 15 you know yard 15 20 yard head start and you know he normally he can he can roll he's blown yeah i was they should have chose you yesterday what's that they should have chose you for that yes i was hoping to see it come tonight we'll make it happen to me man yeah it goes viral a few times a year because somebody trips and

falls or like you said gets a serious injury yeah it's entertaining stuff what uh do you have like a home hunting setup or is that just out of the question because you can't do all you can't keep track of this so i'm in a hunting club you club okay on the mississippi river in tunica um it's it's 4 000 acres uh just just west of tunica mississippi uh i think it's like 12 of us in it you know um and that that's what that's why you know when i'm home that's where i hunt so you got a spot where even though you can't pay any attention to that stuff because you got to focus you got a spot that your friends and partners and stuff right you just roll right into it yeah yeah so um the way it works is um like i said there's 12 of us one of my my best friends is in it um

will craft and his dad are in it so they you know with this new spartan you know the cellular cameras are awesome this time of year like i'm sitting in my locker i'm glued to it um because i'm you know i'm checking them oh really oh yeah uh so they like i said they they fortunate enough they they kind of set everything up you know feed um whatever it may be you know hang some stands move some cameras around so that like i said whenever i do get home you know i can i can roll right into it how do you uh when you talk about all the analytics and all the stuff to keep track of and all the studying what's your when when and how do you just zone out i mean during season like as far as just that you i don't know watch some dudes

getting in a fight at a walleye tournament on youtube or whatever you're talking about during like before games no i mean just like in your schedule i'm pretty low-key i'm not gonna lie like i don't like to i'm not one of those guys that's sitting you know in my hotel room and like i'm studying film or um you know i'm gonna check on like the next next day starter um but you know to me it's like over 162 games if if you can't like you got to step away from it um or you know i like to play golf uh on the on the road if if i get an off day you know i'll try to hit the links just to do something different it's like like i said you're we may have like two to three days off in a month and it it's just like I said, it's so repetitive every day.

It's like hotel, field, home, field, hotel, field, home, field. So it's like doing something different I think is huge from the mental side of it. So I lock in. Once I get to the yard, like I said, I'll figure out who's pitching that night. Once I get to the yard, I'll go in and do some homework. We have an app on our phone that we're able to log in and kind of, like I said, do your homework, so to speak, of what that pitcher's going to try to do to you that night.

But like I said, at the same time, there is some definitely got to step away at points. You've also always been a part of like competitive teams in the majors and i imagine you know people who play for a club that is eliminated from playoff contention by july they like do feel that lull more than you do it's probably a lot easier to stay engaged when you're like always in the hunt oh yeah no doubt i mean like i said it's like you're always looking you know even like this year it's like you're always looking, you know, even like this year, it's like you're always watching the box scores of the Mets. You're seeing how they're doing.

And I think that's the beauty of it. Like I said, you're playing for something. You're not just out there, you know, trying to, you know, whatever it may be for teams that, you know, aren't in a playoff contingent. But like I said, being fortunate enough to be on a team that, you know aren't aren't in a playoff contingent but like i said being able being fortunate enough to be on a team that you know competes every year it definitely makes it you know a lot easier to to go out there every day and and like i said you're you're playing for something uh you know at the end of the year you know how the the president has an intelligence briefing where people come in they right break it all down for you right you have to do your own

like do you have does someone present to you about what's going on or you have to do your own research you have to you have to go over the materials yourself uh no i like said that's like analytical side of the game has like grown so much in the last three or four years um so like we get we have we have hitters meetings like we go over a scouting report. Like I said, I just said it. We get a scouting report on the pitcher. So someone presents the information. Someone verbally presents the information to you. Verbally, and we get paperwork on it at the field,

and we can go over it, take as much or as little information as we want, and like I said, form a game plan. Yeah. take as much or as little information as we want and like i said form form a game plan yeah who who uh so it's probably the most demanding for the pitcher i would say so um just because they're seeing so many different guys like me and all this personality yeah right right so it's like for me it's like i may see you know i may say one guy one knife guy's really good um that night or i may see four four guys um so but you know they're seeing you know for sure nine you know pinch hitting you may see 10 or 11 uh so i think it's definitely more and more important for for them what's it like to have all your um all your finances just become like national news story

we're paying you know i mean like yeah yeah right to be like he will get this much money in this 10 years and all of a sudden do you i mean it's just there's no sort of like politeness about like i don't know what he actually you know what bob makes you know um it's gotta be like you gotta feel early on you know early on in my career i was you know a little about it but then it's like you know i'll i'm not gonna step away from it because of that reason so you just kind of embrace it yeah i mean it's i've decided not to sign the contract i just don't want everybody to know so yeah it's one of those things you embrace

you just kind of get over it it is what it is Sean and I were talking about it there was a player last night that had a couple rough plays and the guy in front of us just yelled out his contract amount you know it was the weirdest thing his insult at the player

was to yell out his contract amount. Was it Eddie Rosario? Yeah. Is that okay? Yep. Yeah, which was a weird, weird thing to witness. I can imagine. So you signed a contract with the Braves that hadn't been done before,

like a length of time. Yeah. Thank you, Braves. No, very fortunate. It made sense to me to just be here hopefully for the rest of my career. My family's five hours from here, you know, in Mississippi. My wife, Anna, has some family that lives here. You know, the organization's great.

You know, the family relations are great. You know, having a little one, it just, you know, it made too much sense for me not to, you know, to sign something that was long-term here. So when you did that was it just kind of like a um in terms of aspiration and career when you got to that point is just like a sigh of relief yeah or is it like holy cow man now i really gotta like perform for a long time or else i'm gonna feel like dirt you know um it definitely was a sigh of relief just because you know up until that point

you know the i could have been traded you know the next day or or you know i you know a career injury that could happen i could you know not know what was my next move um so you know like i said it was just you know that that right there alone i think took a lot of weight off my shoulders just knowing that you know my family's set up for the for the you know the rest of your life i you know don't have to worry about college for for little man like any of those things all the financial side of it was taken care of but at the same time it's like okay now you know i expect more out of myself fans expect expect more out of me um so that that definitely you know plays and and i could picture that just being a huge you know because then there's sort of

this uh it's like the fans everyone they've bought something and now it better turn out yeah now they want the value better turn out as expected um and and to, that's like another thing that I love. It's just like, hey, I got just another reason to work harder and try to perform better. Just try to be that guy that fans can rely on, my teammates can rely on. And that's the beauty of it to me. I spend a silly amount of time fantasizing about the deer hunting property I'd buy if I were to win the lottery or something. Now that you signed this contract, is that on your radar that you're going to get a farm? For sure.

Where at? How many states? In Mississippi. In Mississippi? I would love to own some land behind the levee by the Mississippi River. Growing up hunting in the hills of Mississippi, deer aren't as big. Being in this camp that I am in now,

behind the levee, there's some giants that walk around there. Sneaky giants. Swamp donkeys. Yeah, there you go. No, so that's definitely in the works, hopefully in the next couple of years. What about when Farm 2 comes around?

Is that going to be Mississippi as well, or are you thinking somewhere else? If I were to ever purchase another piece out of state, Illinois. I'd love to be able to, because I could be there in five or six hours, not far. Like I said, I would love a piece up there somewhere. Are you actively looking for stuff um always even before i i signed the contract like i said it was a dream like i've always

dreamed of owning my own land and and um you know building it for the better for for wildlife my grandfather farmed um so i was you know on a tractor riding around oh really yeah so as um you know whether it's owning a piece you know that's you know half of it's we call it like the wet side which is on the the mississippi side of the levee or the dry side um you know whether it's half and half farming a little bit you know definitely want to want to do something just for people who aren't familiar can you explain when you when you talk about below the levee or what so there's a huge levee yeah there's a huge levee that runs down the mississippi river um and it's just you know a flood flood you know flood levee um so just

on the other side like on the wet we call it the wet side which is is the side closest to the river, just is something about the just huge old oak trees. I mean, just trees are huge. I mean, it's just different. That's old forest. Yeah. It's like a wilderness down there. Yeah, it's like you go on the other side, it's just like completely different.

It's crazy. It's like when you go over there, it's like to me, you're in a whole other world. Well, it hasn't been so manipulated by man yeah right and then like you said you're right there on the delta so it's like on the other dry side it's like straight flat pretty much all farmland um so it's uh i love spending time behind behind the levee yeah that's a good term yeah so that's good so what are your uh what are your plans this year when you get done with your season? Going to lay low.

You know, we had a little man, my son, Easton, April. So going to lay low this offseason because I haven't got to spend a whole lot of time with him. I know I'm going to Nebraska to hunt up there. It's kind of like my yearly thing that I do. But other than that, I'm going to stay around the house and just spend as much time with him as possible. Do you got any trips you'll have to cancel if things go good? No.

That's the only one I got planned this year. Did you name your kid after the baseball bat company? No. No, no. A lot of people. It's E-C-N-C. No T. Oh, okay.

Or the arrow company. There you go. Even better. Is it true that you got that? So your son was born during season. Yeah. You guys get like a three-day paternity leave or how's that work? Yeah.

So three days is, I mean, obviously if you need more, they, they do, you know, Alex is as good about it. Um,

were you playing on birth night? Oh yeah. So listen to this. So we were in LA, um, and Anna was, you know, call, she called me a couple of times like, Hey, I'm having these weird was you know call she called me a couple times like hey i'm having these weird

you know pains and it's just you know it's like every 15 minutes like i was like maybe you know call um oh what's what's the term it's she's not that's not the like the doctor doula uh midwife midwife um there it is so i was like call her and just like see if you need to come in or whatever and she's like they're called her and doctor was like oh they're probably just braxton hicks like you know drink a bunch of water put your feet up blah blah so um this was like 20 minutes for game time so i was like i told our trainer george um i was like hey will you call anna just to make sure she knows knows if anything goes on to call you. That way I can get on a plane and go.

Middle of the game, you know. Middle of the game, George gets a call. Anna's going to the hospital. And at this point, I think we're in like the seventh or eighth inning they start looking at flights there's no you know no private flights that are going to get me in here any earlier uh you know commercial flights there was like the red eye was like the only thing I could take at this point because you know the time change and stuff um so and you're in you say you're in Los Angeles yeah in LA she's here so her her aunt ends up

coming get to her take her to the hospital you know this is you know she's going she's getting ready um as soon as the game's over with george is like hey you gotta fly you gotta leave so like i'm like straight panic mode go get in the shower they get me a car send me to the airport did you have to bat while this is going on well they didn't they get me a car send me to the airport did you have to bat while this is going on well they didn't they luckily they didn't tell me um because like they well there was no there was like there was no reason to because the only flight i could take was at midnight oh i got like so they weren't pulling me out like there's no sense of pulling me out of the game um so but they're working on it yeah they're they're all behind talking to my agent, trying to get everything ready.

So as soon as the game's over, I shower, rush to the airport, take the red eye. And like 7.30, I get a text from Anna's sister, you're a dad, and I'm on the dang flight. Oh, really? Yeah, I end up missing it it which crushed me uh that was tough got like no sleep on the flight because i'm sitting here like you know thinking what you know what you know what all is going on um land at sahib you know born at seven there's like 7 35 i land at like eight and end up getting up there like 9 30 hit traffic and everything and just it was a long couple days but

anyway so we had an off day the the next day um and you know at that point you know i can only do so much so i end up you know having the off day and and just missing the missing the one one game uh but no i normally you can like i said you get three days of maternity leave. But it was a good little ride. But I tell Anna, I was like, it may be a blessing in disguise because they waited so long to give her the epidural that my aunt ended up having to step in and being a little mean, which I'm like, I don't know if I could have done that. So it may have been a blessing in disguise.

You might not have been as good of an advocate. Yeah. So all things work out for a reason so that's great man do you guys desire to have more kids um i i would i think she would too you know we've talked i don't think anytime soon um but i think yeah a couple minutes think about it yeah but i think there's definitely hopefully another one in the in the future what you need to do is get yourself a little calculator or a calendar and figure out oh yeah we've i've already talked about it plan it in the off season love it yeah man we're gonna do this january february man i'm gonna be there yeah i'll drive you down to the house yeah i can be there for the whole shindig be like well i thought, I thought I was going to be that way,

but we're kind of on to this really nice box, so it's going to be... So you have to go alone again. Well, the funny thing is, I could have been anywhere else, and I'd make it on time. We happened to just be in the West Coast, happened to be playing in L.A.,

and I just couldn't have been playing Washington or Philly or New York where I'm an hour or two away. I'd have been five and a half hour flight. Talk to us about your quote that went viral earlier this year that I think was popular among a lot of outdoorsmen. Oh, it was. I'll go ahead and say I didn't say that. You didn't say that?

Oh. Where did this come from? So's someone made I guess it was an account let me say the quality real quick it says I crushed the ball and hunt deer and it ain't deer season is that like the actual like it's yeah that's like I made a graphic someone made that about you the very small print oh no it's like sports or something well no so it says Austin Riley didn't say this something like that so this account that's crazy I know like it funny funny quote great quote but yeah so it says they like to say count made all this stuff so it says a like a bunch of random stuff like from players and they didn't say this, but it's kind of funny.

Oh, yeah. It says, Austin Riley did not say this about his recent hot streak. Even though they literally put it in quotes. I mean, but it's like font number three. I'm about to tell a couple people that. Yeah, it's a very small, giant red quote mark around it. Can you just go around saying that now? Like, you should make that yours.

I know. I hadn't, but it's a hilarious. I've gotten so much. When it came out, like, all my buddies, like, everybody was sending it to me. It was good. Did that, like, introduce a lot of opposing players that would come up and talk to you? Like, oh, you like deer hunting too? I think everyone, I mean, really, if you look at my Instagram account, it's got the hunting.

Yeah, it's not a secret. Not everyone knows. Yeah, so everyone pretty much knew that. I was being from Mississippi. Oh, you're a big redneck hunter, aren't you? I was like, yeah, I guess. Well, all right, man. I know you got to get out of here, but good luck with the family, first and foremost.

Appreciate that. Congratulations on your kid. Yeah, thank you. And good luck with the rest of the year. I appreciate it. And then when it's done, good luck with the hunting. Appreciate it. I'll keep an eye on you on Instagram.

Make sure you get some good stuff. For sure. I appreciate you guys having me on. Oh, no, it's great, man. I appreciate you coming down. Best walk-up song in baseball to you? Ooh. No, I'm saying you have it. Oh, no, it's great, man. Appreciate you coming down. Best walk-up song in baseball to you. Ooh. No, I'm saying you have it.

Oh, yeah, Stone Cold? Yeah, Steve was talking about how he doesn't have any connection to take me out to the ballgame, but when I heard the glass shatter for Stone Cold Steve Austin, I was like, oh, man. If I was an opposing pitcher, I'd be so intimidated at that moment. So real quick on how that came out. So Nelly Hotten here

has been like my walk-up phone for like ever since I got into pro ball. But everybody on Twitter was like hammering me. It was like, you got to change it. You got to change it.

You got to change it. And I think I went through like a little skid where I was struggling. I was like, I'm changing it. And ended up going off after it. So it stuck.

Love it. It's nice. And I got a, after winning the World Series, WWE sent me like an actual belt. It's my most prized possession. You got one of those huge ass belts. Those insane belts.

Yeah, it says like WWE World Series champs on it. It's got the Atlanta emblem on it. It's nasty. Yeah, I bet Nelly never sent you like a face band. No, no. I got a huge belt. It's going to my man cave. came shows you who your real friends are right all right man thanks thanks for coming on the show Hey folks, exciting news for those who live or hunt in Canada.

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