Sean Casey talks Bleav MLB Postseason shows

Ahead of the MLB Postseason’s start Tuesday, podcast network Bleav is tabbing ex-MLB player and coach and current MLB Network analyst Sean Casey to enhance its baseball coverage.

Casey’s going to get even busier during this time: his The Mayor’s Office podcast is already with Bleav, and he’ll continue doing that each morning. But he’ll also be hosting a live nightly show that will whip around to all kinds of league-wide coverage with Bleav team show hosts and other high-profile guests.

Casey spoke to AA last week about this move and the upcoming playoffs. There, he said he’s thrilled to be back in a full-time media role this year after spending much of last season as the New York Yankees’ hitting coach, and he’s excited for this new live show (beginning at 9 p.m. ET each night on the Bleav YouTube channe l).

“I’m really enjoying it,” he said. “I’m really, really enjoying being with Bleav, and I think we’ll have some great coverage of the postseason. And I think it’s the greatest game on the face of the planet. So I’m just looking forward to it being another outlet for fans to come to and enjoy some coverage.”

Casey said he’s enjoyed working with Bleav on his podcast so far, and he’s looking forward to working other Bleav hosts into the nightly show.

“They’ve got a lot of great people at Bleav,” he said. “And I think it’s fun to partner up with them and really see how we all can bring our opinions and bring our views of the sport together, where fans can come watch and enjoy.”

He added that the nightly show in particular will provide a good chance to look at all of the previous and ongoing games and track overall playoff storylines.

“I think it’s just going to be great to recap the games or even be on when some of the games are going on, just kind of recapping the games and taking a look at what were the biggest storylines and how the postseason is shaping up,” he said. “It will be just leaning into the shows and being able to really, as things are happening, to be able to give the analysis for the games and really kind of go deep.”

Casey’s a media veteran at this point, and he said all the experience he’s piled up with both MLB Network and The Mayor’s Office has been very helpful for him.

“You learn a lot over the years. I’ve been with MLB Network for 16 years. We’ve been doing our podcast, we’re over 600 episodes on that, we’ve been doing that for almost four years. You just learn how to tell a good story, how to look at the teams and the players.”

Casey said he’s always brought what he learned during his 12 seasons as a MLB first baseman to his media work, but he got a particularly new perspective from taking on that Yankees’ coaching role last year.

“Going back into the dugout last year with the New York Yankees I think really also helped me look at the game a lot differently,” he said. It helped me look at the game that’s going on now in 2024, what’s going on with the analytics, how they look at it, how they use bullpens, how the rotations are used, how a lineup is constructed, all that kind of stuff.”

He said it was fascinating to get an inside look on how teams approach information and analytics in 2024.

“There’s more information. There’s no stones left unturned, everywhere, from the pitching coach to the hitting coach to the manager to the front office. Everything that they do is calculated. And I just think it’s great. It’s great for the game, to be able to blend the new school, old school, whatever you want to say.

“But at the end of the day in baseball, if you’re not speaking that language of 2024, then you’ll get left behind,” he said. So you’ve got to be able to speak the language that’s going on now, especially with the players. The players want some of the new analytics and some of the new stuff that can that can help them create their game plan.”

As for the Yankees, Casey said working with the franchise was excellent, and he only left coaching after the season so he could spend more time with his family. But he said he’s open to maybe jumping back into coaching down the road once his kids get older.

“It was such an incredible experience with the Yankees, because I really did have the best time ever,” he said. “It was just really great to be a part of that organization. I think if anybody had the opportunity to coach the Yankees or play for the Yankees, they would jump at it.

“It was just the best thing for me at the time; I have two young daughters that are still at home, and I just for the next couple of years want to make sure that I’m here with them. And then, if the time is right again and I have an opportunity to get back in the game, I’ll do that.”

Casey said he thinks his overall variety of past MLB roles gives him a different perspective than many.

“You can’t teach experience,” he said. “I think all the experience that I’ve had in the game, as a player, as a coach, as an analyst, as a podcaster, all that stuff, it’s just really helped me bring a bring a point of view that I think is one of the best in the game.”

And he said he’s thrilled to get to stay involved with the sport through media roles.

“Oh man, I just love the game of baseball. I love telling stories. I love the players in the game, I enjoy just so much about it. I enjoy being able to talk baseball for a living. I think it’s such an incredible gift. What I’ve been doing for the last 16 years with MLB Network is the greatest job in the world. I’m so grateful I get a chance to do that.

“And then on the days I’m not with the network, to be able to do the podcast from my home with [co-host and producer] Rich Ciancimino has been just a true gift and I’ve just really enjoyed it. So anytime I can talk baseball, whether it’s at the network or on my podcast, I just really enjoy it, and I’m so grateful.”

Casey said the key to his podcast’s success to date has been his focus on doing it day-after-day.

“I think one of the biggest things is just the consistency of it. Doing the podcast is almost like being a Major League Baseball player, you’ve just got to grind. We do it every day for the Mayor’s Office podcast, we bring a lot of baseball information, a lot of baseball analysis, every single day to the listener.

“Doing that, we know that you’ve got to show up and be consistent,” he said. “You’ve got to show up with big energy. And you’ve got to show up with some great information.”

He said working with Ciancimino has helped a lot as well, both from a content perspective and from making the podcast fun to do.

“I’ve just really enjoyed doing it every day with Rich, and Rich is one of my really good friends, and I’ve enjoyed doing it with him too,” he said. “So, you know, it’s been one of those things where it’s the same mentality as a player: you know you want to deliver great content, you want to do it every day, you have to be able to show up and be consistent.”

Casey said the podcast has seen major change since its debut, with them always striving to improve.

“We’ve really evolved it, even from the beginning of getting the right microphones, trying to figure out who we are as a podcast, trying to.
figure out how we do things. At the beginning ,we were doing once a week and we had guests, now we do it every day and but we still have guests.

“But it’s which guests to come on, and how long to do it. We’ve realized sometimes when you do it every day, you know, 15 to 30 minutes is the sweet spot, but if you have a guest on, you hope to have them on for like an hour or something like that. The camera’s evolved, the audio’s evolved, the platforms have evolved.”

He said all their experiences have been useful to building the podcast into where it’s at now.

“Like I said with baseball, you can’t teach experience, and it’s the same thing with podcasting. You really have to go through the ups and the downs. And I would say failure is information, failure is feedback, so anything we weren’t good at the beginning, we use those mistakes or that failure to really learn how to to be one of the better podcasts out there talking baseball.”

For these particular MLB playoffs, one team to watch is the Detroit Tigers. Their hot streak over the last two months saw them earn the AL’s sixth seed this week. Casey said he’s loved watching what the young team there is doing

“It’s incredible because even where they were at the beginning of August, they weren’t really in the race. And now you look at it and you’re like, ‘Wow, they made a run.’ And they’ve really done it with the youth movement, with Riley Green, and Kerry Carpenter, and Colt Keith, and Tarik Skubal, and Spencer Torkelson coming back up after going back down and being a bat they can trust. There’s so many young kids in that lineup.”

He attributes a lot of the Tigers’ run to veteran manager A.J. Hinch.

“I think A.J. Hinch has done a great job with that bullpen, that bullpen’s the most used in baseball. They have one of the best starters in [Tarik] Skubal, who’s probably going to win the Cy Young. But the bullpen, the way they match that bullpen and the way A.J. Hinch has used this roster, I think he has to get a lot of credit, too.

Casey played for the Tigers in 2006 and 2007, and said he loved his time in that city and loves seeing those fans have something like this to celebrate.

“It’s just been a fun team to watch. Any time you can get a team that’s young like that, it’s really fun to see them winning ball games. And I’ll tell you what too, being fortunate enough to play with the Tigers in 2006 and go to the World Series with them, there’s not a better city in the world when you’re winning out there. It’s such a blue-collar city, and to see those fans excited that like they are now has just been really cool.”

Not all of Casey’s former teams are doing as well, though. His longest big-league stint with any team was with the Cincinnati Reds, who he played for from 1998-2005. That team finished 77-85 this year and fired manager David Bell last week. Casey said he thinks many of their current struggles are injury-related, though, and there is some hope there.

“I think losing Matt McLain at the beginning of the year was definitely a big hit to that team. And I also think David Bell did a good job over the last few years, and I think they just felt like they needed to go in a different direction, [president of baseball operations] Nick Krall and [owner] Bob Castellini.

“But I feel like they have a ton of talent there, with Hunter Greene in that rotation and [Andrew] Abbott and [Nick] Lodolo staying healthy. I think they had a lot of injuries this year and weren’t able to stay healthy, especially Matt McLain. But I think that team is underachieving, I think they they have a shot to be a really good team in the next few years.”

On the overall postseason, Casey said there should be a lot to look forward to, with some NL highlights including the San Diego Padres and Los Angeles Dodgers.

“I’m just looking forward to the teams that are going to be in it. You look at the Padres and how well they’ve played, and it’ll be interesting to see if the Dodgers can get by that first round.

“And I’m really looking forward to Shohei Ohtani: we haven’t seen him in the postseason ever, so that’s exciting. You’re starting to see down the stretch here, him getting hot, coming up with some big hits for the Dodgers. It’s going to be even more exciting to watch him come postseason time to see if he’s really writing this storybook career for himself. And we’re finally going to see him with the Dodgers in the postseason.”

On the AL side, Casey’s also impressed by the teams that are in.

“I’m really looking forward to seeing the Yankees too: Aaron Judge is having a historic season, I think he’s the best player in baseball, as far as the best hitter goes. And we’re going to be able to see him on stage with [Juan] Soto. There’s just a lot of good teams, including the Guardians. There’s a lot of star power in the postseason, and I think that’s one of the things I’m really looking forward to. And Jose Ramirez and the team in Houston, and the Baltimore team getting their young guys getting healthy at the right time.”

Back on the NL, Casey’s interested to see if the Philadelphia Phillies (who put up a 95-67 mark this year, tops in MLB) finally break through in the postseason, and to see which two of the three remaining contenders (the Arizona Diamondbacks, New York Mets, and Atlanta Braves) will get in from Monday’s delayed Mets-Braves doubleheader.

“The Phillies, are they going to finally win the World Series this year? They’re the best team in baseball as far as record. And it’s just going be fun to see who gets in with Arizona, the Mets, the Braves.”

He said it should be a postseason to remember, between team storylines and individual stars.

“There’s so many great storylines, and I think there’s much star power in this postseason.”

Casey’s The Mayor’s Office podcast can be found here . His nightly show during the postseason can be found on the Bleav YouTube channel here .

The post Sean Casey talks nightly Bleav MLB Postseason shows, daily podcast: ‘I just love the game’ appeared first on Awful Announcing .