Ned Yost and Jeff Foxworthy Are “Killbillies”

Aug 18, 2013; Detroit, MI, USA; Kansas City Royals manager Ned Yost (3) watches from the dugout during the sixth inning against the Detroit Tigers at Comerica Park. Detroit won 6-3. Mandatory Credit: Rick Osentoski-USA TODAY Sports

How does Ned Yost spend his offseason? You probably never would have guessed (or cared probably), but he spends it in the wilds of Western Georgia hunting deer with Jeff Foxworthy, J.D. Drew, Kevin Millwood and Jon Lester.

All the rich baseball players and comedians around those parts get together and kill deer on their privately-owned hunting grounds. They’re so into this, they’ve even divided themselves into teams, the “Killbillies” and the “Thump Monkeys.” They compete to see who can bag the most herbivores.

It’s like Call of Duty only real. And with a lot less swearing.

Yost and Foxworthy have been hanging out doing outdoorsy manly stuff since the nineties when Yost was a Braves coach and Foxworthy was a baseball groupie. One of their favorite things is to name the giant bucks they stalk through the wilderness with their bows and arrows. One buck was christened Bo Jr. after Bo Jackson. Another was called Bullwinkle after the famous moose (I guess this deer was really big, like moose-sized, and extra-ornery, like moose-ornery).

Another was named Wil Myers after former Royals pitcher Wil Myers. “I named him that because I thought that buck had a lot of potential to grow into something special, just like Wil,” Yost explained.

Another was named Herschel Walker. They traded him to Minnesota for three prized bucks, and Herschel was never heard from again.

Yost realizes how country all this probably sounds to the many millions of people who try to avoid nature entirely and would definitely prefer not to encounter their meat before it’s been properly killed, cooked, seasoned and presented to them on a plate in some schmancy restaurant.

“Royals manager Ned Yost laughs when he says that he could be the punch line of a joke told by one of his best buddies, comedian Jeff Foxworthy,” Brent Frazee writes in his KC Star piece. “It would go something like this: ‘When you name the deer you are hunting, you just might be a redneck.'”

Oh Jeff Foxworthy. Telling those jokes made you enough money to buy your own private hunting ground. I guess that means the joke’s really on us.

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