Dan and Tony bring Dan’s daughter Kaia into the conversation, and she says she’s feeling much better after knee surgery - walking again, but not exactly sprinting up stairs yet. They riff on baseball cards (Kaia estimates tens of thousands total), Mike Trout’s home run numbers, and jokingly try to compare Trout to manufacturing leaders before Dan volunteers himself as the “fading legend”. The episode leans on a baseball-to-manufacturing analogy: small shops as the minors, big manufacturers as the majors, and AeroGrowth as the coaching staff helping teams level up. Kaia shares her Savannah Bananas experience (lots of dancing, cheering, and watching her uncle pitch), gives AS9100 a hard “no idea,” calls CNC machining “cool,” and explains why she stays positive - focusing on what she can improve and enjoying seeing her surgeons and PT team again.

00:00 Kaia Joins In

00:58 Baseball Cards and Mike Trout

02:30 Mike Trout as Business Analogy

03:40 Minors to Majors Framework

05:18 Savannah Bananas Talk

06:32 Nerves and Shop Talk

09:24 Resilience After Surgery

12:07 Physical Therapy

12:49 Podcast Wrap Up

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