One-on-one with Wade Miley

I caught up with Wade Miley earlier this week, during the
Diamondbacks’ series with the Dodgers. We talked pressure pitching,
Braves baseball, throwing strikes, college football, and Twitter.

Where is Wade’s World? What is it?

“The best I can figure, they think I’m in my own world. I think Gibby called
it ‘Wade’s World’ one day and now everything someone tweets to me has
got #WadesWorld at the end of it.”

What about ‘Words with Wade’?

“That was something they did this spring to work on my knowledge, I
guess. Every morning we had a meeting and right before the meeting
ended, they called me up to the front and put a word on the board. I’d have
to spell it, pronounce it properly and give a definition for it.”

What kind of words?

“Hardest words you can think of. I don’t even know what they were. Ninety-
five percent of the people in the room didn’t know what they were. I
swear.”

Give me an example of one.

“Uhhh…” (12 seconds later) “I don’t know, I’m gonna have to ask –”
(another pause) “J.J. would know. I can’t think of what it’s called… They
were hard, man. They were like — they were ridiculous. And the definition
of each one of them was like something to do with like a, I guess a
redneck.”

Qualifying ‘redneck’:

“Kind of like a guy sitting by a truck with no teeth, long hair, mullet, Joe
Dirt look. They all had something to do with that.”

Tell me about your debut last year in Atlanta.

“[Atlanta’s] like a five or six-hour drive from my house, so a lot of people
showed up. I mean, it was good. I wasn’t exactly happy with the outing, but
I was just glad to get it behind me. It was a special moment for it to happen
in Atlanta. I was a huge Braves fan growing up. The only team we could
watch on the TBS Superstation was the Braves. I mean, if you’re from
Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Arkansas, you’re a Braves fan.”

You haven’t had the best run support this year and you were put into
some tough situations early on. How do you deal with pressure situations
on the mound?

“There’s nothing really to deal with. You’ve just gotta keep competing, you
know? I mean, things are gonna happen. Guys are gonna make mistakes.
I’m gonna make mistakes. Everyone out here makes mistakes. And my job,
I guess, when a position player makes a mistake, I can’t get caught up in it,
like, ‘Dang, I wish that wouldn’t have happened.’ I’ve gotta erase that
mistake. So that’s my thought process.

“If I can do what I can do on the mound to erase that mistake to where it
doesn’t even matter, that’s kind of what I shoot for. And it doesn’t always
work out that way [like it did April 8 versus the Giants]. I mean, I was
fortunate that day to get some outs and dodge those mistakes. I mean,
when I make mistakes and give up liners and [the defense] dives up the
middle, you know, and saves them, they’re taking care of me, so I’m gonna
do the same for them.”

When you’re coming in that Sunday game against the Giants, though,
didn’t you already feel a little bit defeated? What’s the best-case scenario in
your mind when you’re facing a situation like that?

“It’s so easy to let yourself think, ‘Dang, it’s 6-0, I’m kind of the garbage
can clean-up guy coming in here.’ But you’ve just gotta stay away from
that. My thought is, ‘I’ve gotta keep them at six runs.’ If I throw three, four
innings, whatever it is, and keep the Giants at six runs, then I had success.
I did my job. But the offense came in and we exploded and it was 6-2, 6-3,
6-4. I just wanted to keep it at six. No more than six. Keep the momentum
on our side.”

Gibby has mentioned a change in your approach this season. You’re
attacking the strike zone a lot more, nibbling a lot less. Talk about that.

“Yeah, I’m just throwing strikes. Just going after guys, where as last year I
gave the hitters a lot of credit and I thought anything over the plate was
gonna get hit. But I talked to some guys, Joe Saunders, Ian [Kennedy], and
being able to talk to those guys helped me to mature a little bit and figure
out how to get more batters out, the same way I got guys out in the minor
leagues. That’s kind of what stuck with me all offseason. I realized I just
gotta pitch. Just gotta throw strikes. You know, make guys put the bat on
the ball, rather than walking four guys a game and having to deal with that.
I just wanna pound the strike zone with all four pitches.”

Tell me about your hometown, Loranger, and your high school,
Loranger High.

“Loranger. It’s tiny. Our high school was best at women’s basketball, believe
it or not. I mean, I guess you could say it’s a football town now, but when I
was there, we were terrible. Most people went out to the women’s
basketball games and our baseball games. That’s what got the big crowds.”

Is your wife, Katy, from Loranger, too?

“Yep. High school sweetheart.”

Are you an LSU fan?

“I watch them. I pull for them. But I grew up a Florida Gators fan, as weird
as that sounds.”

Well, I’m a Georgia Bulldog, so that’s bad news.

“Huh. I mean, I loved Danny Wuerrfel and those years.”

Ugh, I hate Steve Spurrier. Can’t stand him.

“I was a huge Spurrier fan.”

Clearly no common ground there. Moving on. Do you hunt?

“Yeah, I spend a lot of time hunting. I hunt and fish. At the end of hunting
season, I do some fishing, some bass fishing. Get in the water a little bit
and have a good time. But I primarily hunt. I spend most of my offseason
somewhere in a deer stand.”

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