“Every day, [Venable] comes in with a goal in mind, and he’s really helping us stay focused on the process and not really – I don’t see him as emotional during these losses and tough stretches,” Taylor said. “He’s very focused on the process.”

Walker McKinven, bench coach

“It’s relentless positivity from Will and I’ve really come to appreciate that,” McKinven said. “He is just relentless with it. He’s a great person. He’s fun to be around and he’s just kind to everyone. That really is the culture that’s been set here and all of us appreciate it: players, coaches, support staff members.”

“Being around someone that positive with that much energy and such a great communicator has built this really nice culture and speaks to what I said earlier. We have a great group of guys and that’s the core of it.”

Cam Booser, pitcher

“[Venable] is a great guy to play for. He’s always optimistic, always positive, always trying to instill that positivity in us. So it’s great, it’s great to play for a guy like that. You never feel like you’re out of it, so it’s great to have him around,” Booser said.

“I think if you have a slow start, maybe like we have, it’s very easy to kind of just accept it and maybe think that’s the way the season’s gonna go. But when you have a guy like Will in charge, it’s like you don’t really accept it. You understand we have a great group of guys in this clubhouse, and we have a lot of talent here. We’re just kind of starting to figure out how to play together and Will’s starting to understand all that too. I think he’s starting to really understand how much talent we have here. A lot of the games we’re in are really close, and I think that speaks to his managerial skill set and the way he manages games and the way he pinch hits or pinch runs or brings in a certain guy in from the bullpen, I think it really speaks to his skill set as a manager with how close all of our games are and I think it speaks to the group of guys in this room as well.”

Brandon Eisert, pitcher

“I think he always keep positivity around the clubhouse, never too down,” Eisert said. “Obviously we wish we’d win more games, have a better record, but he looks at it just kind of the progress we’ve made, how we’re playing, that kind of stuff. So he’s always been positive, and that kind of helps us not get down on ourselves. If you have a bad outing or whatnot, him smiling, being still positive and encouraging you makes it a little bit easier to kind of get over those roadblocks.”

“It’s 162 games, if there’s from the top to the bottom, negative energy’s never gonna help. So when the head guy’s being positive, it helps other guys be positive and you can kind of just get through those days. It just makes the days more enjoyable too and you enjoy coming to the clubhouse because it’s not a negative energy type thing. Everything’s positive, so yeah, it’s great, especially for a long season. We’re still in the early stages of it so we got a long way to go, so it’s helpful.”

Grady Sizemore, offensive coordinator