I've gotten to visit all the parks and put my name inside the Fenway wall.

That's why you went to school, because you realize that, being a professional athlete, there's a good chance you're not going to make it. You need an education, that's why for me, it was such an important decision to go to college and further my education to provide me a safety net in case this didn't work out.

Push yourself every single day to continue to work at yourself. And I feel like that's the reason why I made it.

Turning 30, life has definitely changed - it's changed for the better.

The expectations and pressure doesn't mean you change. That's something that's always been instilled in me, and doesn't matter what the situation or what the game means, I'm always going to approach the game the same way.

Fenway Park is a fun place to pitch in. You've got 38,000 fans all cheering against you. It's an intense atmosphere.

The game can come down to one pitch. But when you're actually out there on the mound and when you're pitching, you can't be worrying about the margin of error or whatnot. You have to go with your strengths and what you believe is the right pitch and keep executing pitches.

You have to have the ultimate faith and belief in what you do.

I know how to pitch.

Being in the clubhouse, talking to the veterans, talking to guys who have been here, getting to know everybody, getting the personalities, you can actually learn a lot from the other players in the league.

Put as much pressure on me as possible. I have no qualms handling that, because I expect that out of myself.

I relish pitching underneath pressure.

I expect to pitch well and pitch efficiently.

It's my goal every single year. That's the only goal I really set for myself is to make sure I'm better every single year.

I've had a better 2017 than I've had 2016, just like a better '16 than '15 and '14.

Sometimes you have to throw 120 pitches to figure yourself out.

My slider's been very, very good to me.

I understand what sabermetrics get across, and what they're getting across is to keep it simple. Especially for me, as a pitcher, that's something that helps me - finding ways to keep it simple. Numbers can only tell so much.

I don't worry about infield shifts at all - you play where you're gonna play. I'm just gonna pitch my game.

When you allow stolen bases, that changes the game.

There's so many great things I learned at Mizzou. I took a sports psychology class. It was kind of eye-opening on certain different ways to look at things.

I need to eat a large meal before I play, and the one thing that was kind of consistent in every single clubhouse at least in the minors was a roast beef sandwich. So that kind of stuck there, and it just kind of stuck in the big leagues as well.

I grew up with dogs. My wife really loves dogs.

I take a great deal of pride in pitching deep into ballgames.

That's been kinda my secret. You use everything off the field to help make you better on the field.

Look, the umpires behind the plate? They're human. They're doing the best they can to try to call balls and strikes. I understand that there's a lot of calls that kinda are 50-50. They can go either way. And as a starting pitcher, you try to manage, 'Alright, if you didn't get that call, maybe you'll get it again here a few innings later.'

You've got to get better every single year, it doesn't matter.

You have to look back on everything that you've done and critique yourself and find the holes in your game that you can continue to get better.

You have to find a way to improve yourself.

I really wanted to go to college.

If I got hurt or anything, I was going to need a college degree. Nothing was going to stop me from getting that.

Strikeouts are part of my game.

I'm looking to generate strikeouts in every way I can.

For me, it's all about winning.

I've got a high-school swing. I know that. But you know what? It's good enough to get a ball in play.

For me, I'm not going to be hitting the ball out of the ballpark. I know that.

The business part of the game is ugly.

I've seen so many of my friends get cut and released and all taken advantage of because at the end of the day, we say it's the business part of the game.

When I can buy strikes with that curveball, that just lets everything else play up.

I never want the ball above my shoulders until I'm really firing. I feel like I can generate more velocity with my arm path. The way my arm works, there's so many benefits to it - from a health standpoint, as well.

There's so much information now, and that even goes down to the college game. You have so much video, you can watch every YouTube video of guys and mechanics, and so I just feel like the younger generation's more educated than ever before.

I'm trying to make sure that I get to my 0-2, 1-2 counts. That's really how I would rather phrase it: I'm trying to make sure that I can drive the count into my favor.

Who would people rather see, a real hitter hitting home runs or a pitcher swinging a wet newspaper?

When there's too many teams that are not trying to win, that poisons the game, poisons the fan experience, and it creates bandwagon fans.

If you're constantly just trying to go in this win-loss cycle that MLB is pushing, you are creating bandwagon fans, and that's not the type of fans you want to create.

You want to create the fans that are following the team year in, year out.

You worry about how you're throwing the ball, how you're executing your pitches.

All of the off-field stuff, I can promise you, it doesn't even register with me.

There's more to pitching than just striking guys out, but also it is a big reason why you can have success.

When you look at starting pitchers, once they make it through year four, then - knock on wood - you see a lot of injury risk go down.