(uplifting music)

- Major League Baseball ishoping to make a comeback.

COVID-19 derailed April's opening day,

and since then, fans and players

have patiently awaited baseball's return.

Paul Byrd is a former MajorLeague All-Star pitcher

and a current Emmy Award-winningFox Sports broadcaster

with the Atlanta Braves.

He's been called thenicest guy in baseball

and is known for his sometimesself-deprecating humor.

Paul, I was looking atyour Twitter profile.

You're a great Twitter follow, by the way.

- Appreciate that.

- A recent tweet caught my eye.

It reads, "My wife informed me

"this look is totally unacceptable,

"even during a quarantine, hmm."

I wanted you to go on the record

and explain that fashion statement.

- You know, I live on afarm so I'm constantly

taking my shoes off 'cause they have mud

and other things on 'em.

So I wear flip-flops a lot and, you know,

I'm just like, "Hey, who cares.

"I'll wear socks and the flip-flops."

And my wife looks at me andgoes, "That is so hideous.

"You cannot wear socks andflip-flops at the same time."

And I said, "Hey, thiscoronavirus, like, who cares?"

and she's like, "I do, I'm your wife.

"It looks ridiculous."

- [Will] You see from the picture

that the dog agrees with her, too.

- Yeah, I know, it was really bad.

You know, Biblically,Song of Solomon, yeah.

- Right.- You wanna make sure

your wife actually likes you,so that's what I decided on

and so I've decided to listen

even though I don't agree with her.

- That's probably wiseand it's pretty clear

that we need to get you back

to the ballpark as soon as possible.

- Yes, absolutely, absolutely.

- Despite negotiations,Major League Baseball players

and owners can't seemto reach an agreement

to get this baseball season jump-started,

and that leaves the fanslocked out once again.

That's significant because40% of baseball's revenue

comes from ticket pricesand game day expenses.

One thing's for certain,

Paul Byrd says baseball needs its fans.

- As one of the ownerssaid, "That's our brand."

We want to be in our home stadiums,

we want to pay our employees,

we want the fans andour cities to come out

to watch the games.

I think you're finding out thata lot of fans love baseball,

they love going to thepark, they love trying

to catch a foul ball, having a hot dog,

hearing the crack of thebat, smelling the grass.

It's the national pastime for a reason

and baseball's important.

- We haven't seen the cancellation

of sports in this country inbaseball since World War II.

Obviously, we're talking aboutgames and not life and death,

but the absence of sportsis definitely felt.

Why do you think we love sports so much?

- Yeah, you know, I had a guy come in

when I was playing for the Indians

and he gave a brilliant speech.

And he goes, "You have to watch

"how somebody handlesfailure, which is about life.

"You have to watch howsomebody handles success,

"which is about life."

And so there is somethingmagical about watching

a gladiator of our time getout on a field and compete.

There's something insideof every man and woman

that resonates with thatwhen they get to see

that competition played out on a field,

and I think we miss that.

- [Will] Paul and his wife, Kim,

established ByrdhouseMinistries back in 2016,

serving those dealing with personal trauma

through equine therapy.

- And I just look atcounseling and things like that

as being coached.

That's probably frommy athletic background.

I would hate to take themound and never have a coach,

so in life, I want to have a coach,

I want to have a counselor.

One of the things I've learnedis it's okay to be in pain.

You don't need to have shame because

you're having a tough time struggling.

- Paul says to look for the blessings

during this time of trial.

- This is a forced Sabbath.

This is a reset button.

This is a, you know, whether

I don't wanna say,"Here's what God's doing,"

but I can say that what I'm learning is

what is important to me,

what are the things I wantto re-add back into my life

that were important,and what are the things

that I thought I lovedthat I really don't miss.

There's a lot of difficult, bad things

that are going on rightnow, because of this virus,

but there's also some blessings,

and look for thoseblessings, despite your pain.

One of those blessings isI see complete families

walking down the road.

And I'm like, "Why did theCoronavirus have to happen

"for families to connect?"

You know, this is interesting.

So I think those are one of the things,

the family time together, thatI would love to see more of

in our family and others,when this is over.