GOODYEAR, Ariz. – The conversations started on a back field at the Reds’ spring training complex, several days before position players were required to report to camp.

Taylor Trammell, one of the top prospects in the minor leagues, just finished playing catch with outfielder T.J. Friedl when they walked over to ask Reds outfield coach Jeff Pickler a question. Pickler saw Yasiel Puig standing nearby and asked if he could relay advice.

For about an hour, the four of them stood together in the outfield listening to Puig. Trammell and Friedl said they didn’t even realize how long they were out there.

“Yasiel was great,” Pickler said. “At one point, he looked at me and said, ‘Come on, you’re the coach, say something.’ I said, ‘When? When would I step in? You haven’t stopped talking for an hour.’ ”

Puig is no longer in Hollywood, but he’s still one of the faces of baseball. Several national media outlets visited for interviews after his arrival in Goodyear. There are dozens of fans who wait outside the complex’s parking lot looking for autographs. Almost all of them are wearing Dodger blue or Puig jerseys.

As pitchers and catchers completed one of their first workouts, Puig transformed into Coach Puig with his younger teammates. After their hour-long conversation, Puig kept telling Trammell and Friedl to join him for drills. Puig gave them pointers on making throws to each base. He showed them how to approach ground balls in the outfield. He demonstrated how they could improve their footwork.

Last week, Pickler was hitting soft ground balls to the trio in the outfield. The players rotated after each one and Pickler usually had to stop each time it was Puig’s turn because Puig was showing the minor leaguers different techniques. He's a hands-on teacher. Friedl dragged his foot on some throws, so Puig demonstrated a different crow hop.

“If you would’ve asked me at the end of last season, ‘Hey, you’ll be in camp next year learning how to take a ground ball from Puig,’” Friedl said, “I’d be like, ‘No, what do you mean?’ Just to get that is like a surreal moment. I’m working out with Puig.”

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It’s the first time Trammell and Friedl were invited to big-league camp. Trammell is rated as the No. 2 prospect in the Reds’ farm system by MLB.com and Friedl is No. 13. They’ve played together since they entered the organization in 2016 and their lockers are next to each other in the clubhouse.

They told each other that they need to make the most of this experience. Take pieces of information and use it in their minor league seasons this year. But they had no idea Puig would turn into one of their mentors.

“We created this little bond where after we got done with outfield stuff, (Puig) was like, ‘Hey, let’s throw. Let’s do stuff,’ ” Friedl said. “(Last week) he was like, ‘Let’s work on ground balls. Let’s do stuff like that.’ It’s cool.

“For me, personally, my arm is not the best so anything that I can learn from Puig to help is going to be amazing. Yeah, it’s awesome.”

One of Puig’s main messages to Trammell and Friedl is take the best things from the best players, but don’t pick up their bad habits. Don’t be like him when he misses the cutoff man. In his chats, he went over some of the mistakes he made throughout his career.

“(Puig) just comes out here every day, does his job,” Trammell said. “He’s a very humble guy. He just goes out and just plays the game hard. That’s what I like. A guy like him, to come up to guys like me and T.J. and show us around the ropes is humbling and really great.”

When Puig entered the big leagues, he said he didn’t have a veteran pull him aside to teach him. He heard encouraging words from teammate Adrian Gonzalez, along with stars Albert Pujols and Robinson Cano, but it wasn’t one-on-one instruction.

Joining the Reds, this is a new phase of Puig’s career. Being one of the older players in the clubhouse makes him happy. He smiled when he was asked about his time as Coach Puig.

“This is the year that finally I understand that I can help a lot of people around me,” Puig said. “It’s not about yourself. It’s not what you do. If you don’t help nobody around you, you don’t do nothing in this life.”

Pickler later told Puig that he was “super grateful” he was sharing advice. Pickler spent the last two seasons as an outfield coach with the Minnesota Twins and he used Puig as the model example for throwing techniques with Twins outfielders.

Puig is known for his cannon arm, stunning runners with accurate throws from hundreds of feet away.

“It’s more than just his arm because you see for the most part when it’s time to throw somebody out, the throw is on the money,” Pickler said. “His time to release, technique, footwork and through the ball and all that, it’s really good.”

Puig told Trammell and Friedl to talk to him whenever they have any questions. If they want to work on their throwing or fielding, he’s willing to help.

"He loves to talk," Friedl said. "That’s what is great."