Inside the Mind of Trevor Bauer: Baseball, Pressure & Redemption
6/15/20261 hr 48 min
Trevor Bauer, 2020 Cy Young Award winner and former Los Angeles Dodger, joins The Determined Society for a raw conversation on baseball, pressure, public judgment, media narratives, and refusing to quit. Trevor opens up about his early obsession with the game, his engineering mindset, his rise from UCLA to the Major Leagues, winning the Cy Young, signing a historic Dodgers contract, and the moment his career changed. In this episode, Shawn French and Trevor discuss the controversy that pushed him out of MLB, the suspension and release that followed, his decision to keep competing in Japan, Mexico, and independent baseball, and the mindset that has kept him standing when most people would have walked away. This conversation is about resilience, reputation, competitiveness, and what it really means to keep going when the world expects you to stop. The Determined Society is hosted by Shawn French — a show for people who refuse to quit. Every episode goes beyond the highlight reel to explore the real stories behind resilience, reinvention, and the relentless pursuit of a life built on your own terms. Subscribe on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all others.. If this episode moved you, share it with someone who needs to hear it — and leave a review. It helps more than you know. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsTrevor Bauer· Guest0:00
That was in 2012, July, and for the rest of my time I've been, quote, bad teammate because of Montero's quotes about me.
Shawn French· Host0:07
This is the thing that I love about the game and the thing that I hate about the fucking game, is if you're a player and you go against the norms, then you're cooked. I mean, Pete Rose had to die before they let him into the Hall of Fame. A pitcher obsessed with perfection. A 2020 Cy Young winner. The first player in Cincinnati Reds history to earn the honor. More than 1,400 major league strikeouts. Over 10 professional seasons. Today, we're sitting down with Trevor Bauer.
Trevor Bauer· Guest0:31
It doesn't matter what you put me. I hate losing. I think that's what's really driven me in my baseball career is everyone else will quit, and I will be the best because I'm the only one left standing.
Shawn French· Host0:38
2020 Cy Young. You know, shortly after that you become the highest paid LA Dodger, and then 17 starts, gone. At what point when that happened did you realize and you're like, "Shit, this is not going away. This is a problem."
Trevor Bauer· Guest0:51
Um...
Shawn French· Host0:54
Imagine building yourself into the best pitcher in baseball, and then one day it's taken all away from you. See, my guest today isn't supposed to be where he's at right now. Let me take you back to North Hollywood. As a child, spending time after school throwing a tennis ball against a chain link fence on a tennis court just to get better, and often ridiculed by his peers for having too much focus on one sport, which is baseball. See, this, this guy right here has done some amazing things in his career and, uh, I