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experience even better, if that’s possible. You get an opportunity to go in with two guys that, for me, were so instrumental in my career and influential in my career. Bobby, from a managerial standpoint, taught me more about the game and respecting the game than anybody else that I was around and Greg had an influence on me as a player. Him being my teammate made me a better player. To have the opportunity to go in with those guys, sharing all of this with them and sharing what it all represents, it’s something I’m looking forward to. GDHQ: Did you and Greg realize how dominant you were while you were playing? GLAVINE: Probably not. I think we knew what we brought to the table. Greg and I personally, but also our pitching staffs always knew what we meant in terms of the success of the team and how important it was that we do what everybody expected us to do. We just looked at it from the standpoint of we knew what our expectations were from year to year and then we were honestly just focused on things from start to start. We had that healthy competition between all of us and by that I mean nobody wanted to be a weak link in the chain. If one of us went out and pitched a good game then the guy that was going out the next night wanted to do as well or better. So there was always that kind of drive and if one of us had a bad game we wanted nothing more than to go out and pick that guy up and pick the team up the next day and get things going back in the right direction. I think all of that helped us all to be better and be more competitive and ultimately, it was an influence in what we were able to do and what we demanded of ourselves from year to year and start to start. GDHQ: What did you get from being around Maddux all those years? GLAVINE: It was his paying attention to detail. For so long, my game plan when I went out to pitch was based on what I wanted to do. I think you have to do that as a pitcher, obviously, but at times, I got a little tunnel-visioned in what I was trying to do. It was almost like I had all 110 pitches mapped out in my mind and I wasn’t going to do very much, if anything, to deviate from that. Then I started to be around Greg and started to see how he would pay attention to a hitter and pay attention to his approach to a pitch, whether it was how he took a pitch, how he swung at a pitch, if he fouled a pitch off, where did he foul it off? All those things were clues to Greg as to what the hitter was looking for and then he would adapt his game plan accordingly. I might throw a fastball inside 0-2 and miss right down the middle and see the guy move out of the way like it was six inches inside. I wouldn’t care. I’d go right back to my change-up away because that was what I did. Greg’s thinking was, ‘Look, you threw that 0-2 fastball, you tried to go in, you threw it down the middle and the guy jumped out of the way. You’ve got eight more inches that you can go in there. Go in there again.’ That was a thought process that was new to me but was really helpful. It was very helpful to have the foundation of my game plan but then make adjustments off of that based on the feedback the hitter was giving you. It ultimately made my job a little bit easier because I had more information at my disposal that I just never paid attention to. GDHQ: What do you think you gave to Greg? GLAVINE: I don’t know. I’ve heard him say that he learned how to go out there and pitch when he was less than 100 percent from me. We all had times in our career when something didn’t feel good or something hurt. My mentality was always: “It’s my job to go out there and pitch every fifth day,” and yes, there are going to be times where I don’t feel good or something hurts. But if I can go out there and pitch and I’m 75 percent, well, I’m still better than the guy that I’m getting ready to pitch against. So I’m going to take my chances. In hearing some of Greg’s comments, that’s what he took away from me, that ability to go out there and take the ball every fifth day even if he didn’t feel good and still go out there and compete and do what he’s capable of doing. JEFF HAYNES/AFP THE SPORTING NEWS


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