July 29, 2025 • 49 mins
Big Ben talks about Bryce Harper cussing out MLB commish Rob Manfred over salary cap discussions, Guardians closer Emmanuel Clase being dragged into the gambling scandal, Maller to the Third Degree, Maller's Mountain of Money: Lori Loughlin Edition, and more!
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for listening to the best of the Ben Mahler
Show podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weeknight
from two to six Eastern eleven pm to three am
Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and to find your local
station for the Benmatlers Show at Foxsports Radio dot com.
You can find it there or stream us live every
night on the iHeartRadio app by searching FSR.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
This is the best of the Ben Mahler Show on
Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Messing with the Boss and I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Welcome in the beginning of another night of the Benmahlor Show.
Speaker 4 (00:46):
We are in the air evywhere literally everywhere we could
possibly be, as we are right on your doorstep, talking
and rocking the night away.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
It's the coast, void, the mooter and beyond on the
mast and breath takingly powerful microphones of FSR am monating
live good law from the Circle, the Squared Circle of
audio Pugilism from the Fox Sports Radio studios, as approved
by Malaprop Guy, Random, Ryan and Fats in Philadelphia. They
(01:23):
all approved that. For over forty years, tire Iraq has
been helping customers find the right tires for how, what
and where they drive. Ship fast and free back by
free road hazard protection with convenient installation options. I see it.
Nod in your head over there for dog yep and
Alfie Alien of Pinter loves the mobile tire installation tire
(01:43):
i raq dot com the way tire buying should be.
So lot going on. We are back at it and
I love this story. I absolutely love this story from Philadelphia,
and it involves someone we talk a lot about on
this show, and we talk talked about this person for
many many years. We are in the doghouse with this
(02:05):
sport because of this particular person. But we'll go to
the locker room drama ol rama in the Delaware Valley.
As we have learned through various reports that the Philadelphia
Phillies YouTube kid, he was originally the YouTube kid. I
remember seeing clips on the Internet of this guy when
(02:26):
he was in high school in Vegas. But Bryce Harper
stood nose to nows, belly to belly with the clown
Commissioner of Major League Baseball, Rob Manfraud. Now this is
during a meeting between the Commissioner of Major League Baseball,
that would be Manfraud and the team last week. Now,
(02:46):
if you didn't see this or hear about him. Maybe
you missed it. We're told that Bryce Harper ended up
getting in the face of Rob Manford and telling him
to get the f out. E's a Peter saf he said. Now,
he did not say f he said the fun He's
a grown up. He said the fault. We're on radio
after I got kids F word. He said, get the
(03:07):
f out of our clubhouse. He said, if Manford wanted
to talk about the implication of a salary cap, ooh
the boogeyman. Now that confrontation came in a meeting. We
are told that the slimy commissioner of Major League Baseball
is going around trying to improve communication relationships with every
(03:29):
team and all the players. And the meeting lasted an hour.
Must have been very boring. My god, must have that
been boring? Anyway, they talked for an hour. Manford never
said the words salary cap in quotes. He never said that.
The discussion was about the economics. And that is what
(03:50):
raised the dander of one Bryce Harper, who loves the
Philly fanatic. And I love the Philly fanatics, so I
have that in common with Bryce Harper. So let us
discuss the question. Philly star a multi time MVP Bryce
Harper going I the eye Mono a mono with Commissioner
(04:11):
Rob Manford over the salary cap. Who's side of you on?
I am in the side now, I'm gonna tell you
who I think you know who's side I'm on. I've
got dog whistle, art of the Covenant and sopranos, and
we'll put all these things together and we are gonna
make the gobba gool is what we're gonna make. We're
gonna make the gobbagool all right, So hey, listen, I
(04:33):
am on the side of truth, justice and the sports
talk Way, Bryce Harper, Here we go, Pricee, here we go. Yeah,
come on now, I love it. I love the visual
in the cartoon bubble over my head. It's great. That
little clown weasel, your little weasel, Rob Manford, all right,
little clown commissioner Major League Baseball. There he goes down
(04:57):
sash chase his way into the Phillies Clubhouse, thinking, oh man,
I'm just gonna go in there and blow smoke in
that clubhouse and boom boom boom boom boom boom, nose
to nose with Bryce Harper. So good, so good, Bravo
Encore Encore. I say someone had to say, now I
(05:19):
love that. It's Bryce Harper. Rice Harper doesn't need to
do this. He's already got his money. He's already got
the three hundred million dollar contract. Why is he what's
he care? He got his right. Normally, the way this
works is if you get the bag, you don't care
about anyone else. You got yours. You don't go to
(05:40):
each their own, screw everyone else. Right, you got paid.
That's it. Do you know how rare it is that
someone gets that kind of wealth to play baseball and
is still out there screaming and barking and saying, no,
we're not doing a salarycap. Normally, you know this, When
you get the bag, you stop caring about the other players.
(06:02):
Anyone who understands basic math, by the way, not just
Mallard mat basic math, understands the cap is cramp like.
No one that knows economics wants the salary cap, and
baseball is the worst thing in the world. Right, you're
just announcing you're an idiot if you say I want
a salary cap, I want the owners to make more money.
(06:23):
That's what you're saying. You're moron, Your dummy is what
you're saying. The salary cap talk is always a dog whistle,
all right, It's a dog whistle for how can we
keep salaries down from the ownership side, but yet convince
dumb people, the fans, the idiots, that we're doing the
right thing for competitive bounds. You realize, with no salary cap,
(06:44):
baseball has more of a competitive bounce than any of
those sports that have salary caps. Hello, what does that say?
Speaker 2 (06:51):
What?
Speaker 1 (06:52):
The teams that actually try end up winning have success
in baseball. The problem is not the salary cap. The
problem is the team tams that don't give a crap
about winning. Sacramento or Sacramento of the A. Is that
scumbag John Fisher, the Marlins in Miami, the Pirates, teams
like that. That's the problem. You can win the Tampa
(07:12):
Bay they don't spend any real money playing a minor
league ballpark now because the hurricane took out of their stadium.
And I know they're having the greatest year, but considering
the amount of money they spend, they find ways. The
Milwaukee Brewers have been wonderful in recent years. A consistent
playoff contender or playoff team over the last decade or
(07:34):
so they don't spend a ton of money. It can
be done right, and you're not. Really the issue is
like teams that don't want to win, that's the problem.
It's not the salarycap. The salary CAP's not going to
fix anything in terms of well competitive bounds. You already
have that right. And the dirty little secret in Major
(07:57):
League Baseball is that you look around and you see
that the teams that actually put an effort into it
generally find some success. But you can make a lot
of money and have a baseball team that is just
a golden goose without even There's like seven people that
go to Marlins games, and I know one of them,
(08:18):
Marlin's man, and even he doesn't go to many Marlins games,
and he lives in Miami, but he'd rather travel around
the United States and see games in other stadiums that
don't involve the Marlins because the Marlins blow. And yet
the Marlins make money. And you know, the Athletics left Oakland.
They made money in Oakland. Nobody went to the games
in Oakland. Nobody's you know, the Sacramento a minor league ballpark,
(08:40):
it's not anyone there. They're making money because you get
the TV money, you get the national revenue, and in addition,
you get the teams that spend a lot, like the
Dodgers and the Mets and teams like that. They cut
your check for not even trying. Right, you can draw
seven hundred and seven thousand whatever, it doesn't matter. Put
(09:01):
a crap product, garbage at first base, trash at second,
feces at shortstop, and do do it third and you
will make money. You will absolutely make money. And while
teams that try to win, I think the Dodgers, the Mets,
the Yankees, teams like that, they have to pay a
penalty for these other teams and then they just pocket
(09:22):
the money. That's the dirty little secret in baseball. I'm
Rob Manford. He's never going to address that. Why would he?
All right, why would he?
Speaker 5 (09:30):
So?
Speaker 1 (09:30):
I love the fact that Bryce Harper got right in
the face of Rob Manford and just threw it down
right and should have tossed him right out there on
Broad Street is what he should have done. Now, the
second page on this why is the salary cap chatter
which is being cranked up. The labor negotiations will take
place in twenty twenty six, so it's not that far
(09:52):
away the end of the twenty twenty six season, which
means they could be there could be a workstoppas prior
to that, many in baseball are preparing for the nuclear winter.
But why is this salarycab, the chatter in Major League
Baseball ultimately a nothing burger. Let me explain this to
you like you're five years old. The reason that this
(10:15):
is a nothing burger. In order for there to be
a seracab, you would have to have support of the players.
There is not support of the players. But even if
you could get support of the players, in order for
this to realistically work, you would have to do something
that you will not do. Something you cannot do, something
that you will not do no matter what happens, you
won't do it. And what is that? If you want
(10:37):
to have an honest conversation about a salary cap in
Major League Baseball, the owners would have to open the bucks.
They'd have to open the bucks, the bean counters. That's
never gonna happen, never ever, ever, never. And here's why.
The reason why, and most of us know this, they
are every team in baseball is making a profit. Now,
(10:58):
not every team makes a big profit, Not every team
makes a big profit, but they're making money, boat loads
of money in Major League Baseball. And these owners who
are making money hand over fist while at the same
time pretending like they're bleeding cash and morons. Oh, these
poor teams are losing money. No they're not dummy, No
they're not right. And the books are the holy grip.
(11:21):
I've heard some stuff that I'm not allowed to say
because I don't want to get in trouble with certain people.
But I've heard things over the years involving the books
and the lengths that Major League Baseball has gone to
to make sure the financials don't get out. Some mind
blowing things have passed through my head from people who
work in baseball, the efforts that they have gone to
(11:42):
avoid opening the books. Right, Like, imagine if you peeked
inside John Fisher's financials and realized the Athletics didn't have
to leave Oakland, he was making a lot of money.
He just wants to make more money, and so it's
that whole thing. Right, You're more likely to see the
arc of the covenant than you are the financials of
these these owners that cry they don't have any money.
(12:03):
They treat the financials in baseball like the nuclear launch codes. Okay,
that's what they treat it like. And it is such
a scam. It is such a scam. We need a
cap for parody. We want to have every tream. How
about chance to win. It reminds me of that used
car salesman Bud Selik was going around in the early
(12:26):
two thousands, in the nineties and saying, well, we need
new stadiums in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, so we gonna have
good teams on the field. These teams can win the
World Series if they get those stadiums. They built new stadiums.
Guess what, spoiler alert, The teams blow chunks in Pittsburgh
and Cincinnati. Right, they suck And they were taught, all
(12:47):
you need is a new stadium. This is the magic
the magic pill. That's all you need, right, that's all
you need. And so come on, it's nonsense. You don't
have it. You don't have it right now. And yet
more teams if you try, if the Reds and Pirates
actually tried, they would actually find a way to make
the postseason. And we know in baseball, just making the
(13:07):
postseasons all you have to do. It's one of those
things It's not like basketball where or even football, where
if you're like a one or two seed, you have
a very good chance of going to the NBA finals
of the Super Bowl. In baseball, it doesn't work that way.
But again, it all goes back. You're not going to
open the books. So no matter how much you said,
we need a show recap and you try to get
the dumb fans behind it, morons, all right, people with
(13:28):
IQ's below thirty, and you say, okay, it doesn't matter, right,
they're sitting on gold mines, these owners and crying poverty. Now,
I don't doubt that Scott Boris was behind this leak
of the Bryce Harper story that Scott my opinion. Can't
sue me for my opinion that Scott Boris and his
team leaked that story, because why would Major League Baseball
(13:49):
leak a story about rob Manford getting into a confrontation
with one of the star players in baseball would never
do that. So it had to come from Bryce Harper's camp,
and Scott Morris is his guy. So it makes a
lot of sense. But you look at everything. I mean,
they make so much money in baseball, owning the stadium,
the parking lots. A lot of these teams have their
(14:11):
own TV channels. They've monetized everything. Remember, I went to
Wrigley Field when I was doing stuff in another life,
when I did stuff with the Dodgers. We went there
in the nineties, and it was still had the charm
of the old Wrigley Field, the way it had always been.
I went there a couple of years ago, and it
was like downtown Disney. The Cubs had bought all the
(14:32):
property around Wrigley Field, the Cub ownership, and they had
put their own branding on everything and all that, and
so it was a much different experience than it had
been in the mom and pop days. Now final fun
so after the Bryce Harper rob Manford confrontation took place.
After that, a former big league player and now turned
(14:54):
gas bag and shill for Major League Baseball, Mark de Rosa,
who works for Major League Baseball. According to a story
on The Athletic buried behind a paywall, the Old Gray
Lady The New York Times owns The Athletic anyway, Mark
de Rosa, I was reading this story earlier. I just
saw it. So the story says that he warned Mark
(15:18):
de Rosa warned the Philadelphia Phillies players of the commissioner's power.
He warned them. Now, this was taken as a threat,
according to the way the story was reported by Evan Drelik,
who I briefly did a radio show with years ago.
So is that how it sounds to you? Mark de
(15:39):
ross According to this story, Mark de Rosa, who works
for MLB, he warned the players that essentially they're messing
with the wrong guy. You're messing with Rummanford. What are
you doing? All right? So the answer to this, how
does Yes, it sounds like a threat. I would absolutely
take that as a threat. This is Sopranos style, is
(16:00):
what it is. It's organized baseball crime. If you will.
Manford is the mob boss. How long have we talked
about Rob Manford essentially being a mob boss of organized baseball? Right?
And there you've got Mark de Rosa. Where is he
at here? So you've got Mark de Rosa, who played
a Major League baseball career, now he works from Major
(16:21):
League Baseball. He's the conciliary, right, He's the fixer, he's
the whisper in this right, and he goes in there
he delivers the message for the mob boss. Is what
he does and he gets his hands dirty and all that,
but not too dirty. Right, Let's not forget who we're
dealing with here, all right, And what kind of power
Rob Manford has. This is the same Rob Manford, if
(16:42):
I'm wrong, correct me, who shielded the cheating Astros after
the biggest cheating scandal in modern times. A team cheated
in the World Series, not just to get to the
World chairs in the world. It was in the MLB
video highlighting the World Series. And what did Rob Manford do?
(17:05):
He let the players walk free? Altboove that punk Bregman
Now with the Red Sox Springer, there's still a few left.
He's in Toronto. I let them all walk free. And
why is that? There's a theory that baseball needed the
business partners in Houston to be happy, and they would
have been upset if those guys had been suspended. There's
(17:25):
one theory that's out there. So if Manford likes you,
if he likes you, he'll protect you like family, just
like a good mob movie, right, your family. Now, if
you cross him, what happens if you're crossing Let's see here, Oh,
I have an example. Trevor Bauer. Remember Trevor Bauer, Cy
(17:47):
Young winning pitcher Trevor Bauer. Yeah, Trevor Bauer, who I
think right now is sipping some saki in Japan rather
than pitching in Major League Baseball. When starting pitching blows
Rob Manford, commissioner. Now, technically Bauer is allowed back, but
he Bauer did something you're not supposed to do. He
trashed Trevor. Trevor r trashed Rob man for every chance
(18:10):
he got. So now he's in Japan, he's pitching on
dusty mounds in Mexico. He's probably trying to get a
work visa to pitch in Afghanistan at this particular point.
And that's because he messed with Rob Manford. No one
will touch him because Manford don't want him in baseball.
That's the theory, right, And so Manford plays favorites. And
as far as this other guy de Rosa, he doesn't
(18:31):
work for the players anymore. He's a former player. He's
on the payroll for Major League Baseball. Right He's sitting
there at the MLB Network commentating and apparently giving friendly
warnings wink wink, nod nod, like he's reading some kind
of bedtime story, while the message is rather loud and clear.
(18:52):
I think the message is rather loud and clear here
that you don't talk back to the boss where the
boss will get you. Right, you'll be sleeping with the baseballs.
If you talk to the boss that strikes on. We
can still we can still manipulate the strikes on. We can.
You know, next year we can't do it. But this
year we can still manipulate it. You know, fifty to
fifty calls something of the Empires might be going going
(19:13):
away from Bryce Harper. You're not gonna get those calls anymore. Right,
I'm just saying, you come at the King, you come
at the King, and they say your best not miss.
It is the Ben Mahlor Show. What do you think
about all that? We'll take your thoughts eight seven seven
ninety nine on Fox is the number eight seven seven
(19:34):
nine nine six six three sixty nine. Also on X
at Ben Mahlord. If you'd like to be part of
the program, we'll talk a lot about this sort. It's
a good story. Got one of the highest paid people
in baseball, Bryce Harper, going after Rob man for giving
him a dirty word. Dirty word and Rob Manford lives
(19:54):
in a bubble there. He's this guy you know he
was a labor lawyer that was hired in a labor
in the negotiation as outside council and he just never left.
And he rows up the ranks to become the commissioner
of Major League Baseball and has been uh poop pooing
and spitting loogi's all over the game ever since.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
Then, be sure to catch live editions of The Ben
Meller Show weekdays at two am Eastern eleven pm Pacific
on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 6 (20:22):
Hey, we're Cavino and Rich Fox Sports Radio every day
five to seven pm Eastern. But here's the thing, we
never have enough time to get to everything we want
to get to.
Speaker 7 (20:31):
And that's why we have a brand new podcast called
over Promised. You see, we're having so much fun in
our two hour show. We never get to everything, honestly,
because this guy is over promising things we never have
time for. Yeah, you blubber list lame and me.
Speaker 6 (20:45):
Well, you know what it's called over promise. You should
be good at it because you've been over promising women
for years.
Speaker 7 (20:49):
Well, it's a Cavino and Rich after show and we
want you to be a part of it. We're gonna
be talking sports, of course, but we're also gonna talk
life and relationships. And if Rich and I are arguing
about something or we didn't have enough time, it will
continue on our after show called over Promised. Well, if
you don't get enough Covino and Rich, make sure you
check out over Promised and also Uncensored, by the way,
so maybe.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
We'll go at it even a little harder. It's gonna
be the best after show podcast of all time.
Speaker 7 (21:14):
There you go, over Promising. Remember you could see it
on YouTube, but definitely join us. Listen to over Promised
with Cavino and Rich on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
You can bet on it you're not supposed to welcome.
In the beginning of another hour of the Ben Mahlor Show.
We are in the air everywhere close together, I mean
your head right now. We are moving and grooving coast
to coast, border the border and beyond on the mast
(21:47):
and wondrously powerful microphones of fsre ammating live from the casino.
Life is a casino. How how do you play your chips? Well,
we do it from the Fox Sports Radio Studios, as
approved by mister nice guy and G Manage in Chicago.
(22:08):
They sign off on this and this portion of the
Ben Maler Show on Fox made possible in part by
our friends at ty Iraq. For over forty years, ty
Iraq has been helping customers find the right tires for how,
what and where they drive, ship fast and freeback by
free road hazard protection with convenient installation options like mobile
(22:29):
tire installation tire iraq dot Com The Way Tire Buying show'
be so our lead. This hour is from the Land
from Cleveland. One of the big names that is supposed
to be traded this week is off the trading block.
Today is the twenty ninth. The trade deadline is a
(22:51):
couple days away on July thirty first, so we're a
couple days away from that. I'm still upset that they
ruined our fun. All the trade deadlines used to be
at midnight Eastern Time, which meant a lot of trades
happened late at night. A lot of trades happened right
before we got on the air. And then there was
a woman with red hair named Rachel Nichols that complained
(23:14):
that she had to stay up late for the trade
deadline of the NBA. It wasn't fair. She needed a
beauty sleep. And so the NBA they said, okay, we'll
make the trade deadline the afternoon, and then every other
league followed suit, and so now we get crappy daytime
trade deadlines. But this is not about that. We can
rant about that later, but instead, if you did not
(23:35):
hear the news, and possibly not, it is a hum
dinger of a story. The All Star closed, not this year,
but in years past for the Cleveland Guardians. What a
dumb name that is? Manuel class A has been put
on time out by Major League Baseball for some funny
(23:56):
business turn If you believe the reporting, a class A
was placed on the non non disciplinary paid leave paid
leaf through August thirty, first part of the ongoing Major
League Baseball investigation into sports gambling. The plot thickens now
(24:19):
for Kimi's going home. The Cleveland Guardians lead Major League
Baseball in gambling. Congratulations boys, wow, So he's the second
Guardians pitcher to be caught in the ongoing investigation, which
who knows when this is going to end? The Cleveland
(24:41):
right hander, the great Luis Ortees so good you had
to look him up on Baseball Reference to find out
who he is. Anyway, he remains on the non disciplinary
paid leave naughty list now. He was originally placed there
at July third. That has been extended for orties as
well to August thirty first. Nowaday their statement vetted by
(25:01):
an army of lawyers. The Guardian said, among other things,
no additional players or club personnel are expected to be
impacted by the investigation. Keep in mind, if you know
your weasel words, look at page seventeen of the Weasel Handbook,
and the word expected is a weasel term because you
(25:22):
never expect one of your player to get in trouble
with gambling. Why would you expect that you never expect
a trade to happen? They're unexpected, all right, So let
us discuss The question is as follows. Keep this simple,
sports radio. So what is the most puzzling What is
the most puzzling thing about the Guardian's closer, Emmanuel class
(25:43):
A being dragged into the gambling web. So I've got
dance floor, Hansel and Gretel and Beg's and we will
combine all of these things together for an original Malard monologue,
which is as good as milk chocolate covered almonds. One
of my favorite snacks. When I don't eat much, but
when I do, I like to have a look a
(26:04):
few handful or so of those delicious milk chocolate covered almonds.
Manly good. All right, kurklum brain, by the way, I go,
kurklam brain. All right? So number what number? Number?
Speaker 3 (26:18):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (26:18):
This is not some flotsam and jetsam. This is this
is bigger, This is a bigger story here as a
Yogi bear taught me. Not Yogi bear. Yogi bear taught me,
you're supposed to be smarter than the average bear. Not
so much. We're not talking about some random middle relief
pitcher or some fourth or fifth starter. No, no, no,
(26:39):
no no. At one point in recent years, if you
were to pull the executives in Major League Baseball, they
would say the top closer in the entire American league,
Emmanuel Classe, top guy in the American league. Right, and
if not all of baseball was an all star multiple times.
Covet it around baseball. Expected to be traded this week,
(27:00):
not anymore, but was expected to be traded. The thing, though,
that's the most puzzling, is the money factor. Now he's
not the highest paid relief pitcher in baseball. However, Class
A is on a twenty million dollar contract. So if
you get a twenty million dollar contract, you're living pretty
(27:21):
high on the hog. Most would say, right. And this
is the biggest name that has been caught up in
this to this point. And make no mistake, make no mistake,
this is major League Baseball. They're hitting the dance floor.
They're out on the dance floor. They're doing a little
dance with a devil, is what they're doing. They tore
(27:41):
and let me tell you something, Baseball at this point
is tore up from the floor up. If you know
what I'm saying here, they signed these deals and listen,
I again, I love gambling. I'm a gambler, but even
I know you're you're messing with some really bad stuff here.
How far in they've gone. They didn't just go a
little bit in. They just put their toe in the water.
They are all in. Even I someone that bets, I
(28:03):
do bet. I'm like Pete Rose, I bet on baseball.
Even I'm when I'm watching him blown away by the
amount of advertising for the for gamming. Listen, I don't
mind it. I'm a little amazed that baseball is okay
with it. But here we are, and so they took
the money. And again I'm fine with it. Last a
couple of years I did a gambling show, and for
years on the radio we did Benny versus the Pennies
(28:25):
on TV the last couple of years. But now, of
course Baseball, well they're shocked, they're absolutely shocked that players
are messing around with prop bets. Give me a break. Well,
that's what this is about. So page two, So where
where did Emmanuel class cross the line with the guardians? See,
(28:46):
this is the part of the story which is almost
unbelievable when you think about how you can track something
like this. Now, now we think we know how this
was uncovered, but we don't know these cifix We don't
know all the intricate details. However, we know that there
was a line that was tossed out, unusual betting activity
(29:09):
around multiple pitches involving Emmanuel Classe. So Internet sluice have
done some digging and they've investigated this, Wes, this doesn't
come from baseball. Internet investigators have found what they believe
is the smoking gun. What is that? All right? What
is the smoking gun? I'm glad you asked. So class
A has entered the ninth inning forty times this season,
(29:31):
forty times. And you know what his waist pitch rate
is on first pitches, it's almost twenty percent. According to
stat cast, it's seventeen and a half percent. Well, who
cares about that, you're a nerd. Let me explain. So
seventeen and a half percent of the time Class A
comes in and throws garbage, a non competitive pitch, no
(29:56):
chance of being a strike, non competitive, not eyhere close
to the strike zone. And that is something that stands out.
I mean, one of these things is not like the other.
The rest of the pitches, the non competitive pitch rate
is like around five percent. The first pitch is close
to twenty percent, So you can do the mat. It's
(30:17):
like it stands out like glitter at a funeral. You
don't often see glitter at a funeral, right, and you
smell that it's not with the rocks cooking. That would
be in game live betting.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Now.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
I don't do the in game live betting. I don't.
I just yeah, it's not. I think I have some
friends of mine that are really invested in in game
live betting, and they think I am a donkey for
not getting involved in it. They love it like they
love having action on multiple pitches or what a batter
(30:51):
is going to do a ground ball, fly ball. There's
all kinds of different props in game betting that you
can do, and if you're unfamiliar with it, if you're
not a game live betting has been around for you know, forever.
Now it's mainstream. But you can bet whether a pitch
is going to be a ball or a strike in
real time, in real time? Now, is it true that
(31:14):
the wise guys had inside information on the pattern from
Emmanuel Class so when he came in out of a bullpen,
they knew chut chang chut ching to ching. Free money,
free money, free money, come on down, free money. Now,
(31:36):
little Birdie tells me that may or may not have
inside information. There's a lot of blood at the crime scene,
if you know what I'm saying. Here a lot of blood.
And now I'm in the in the old days, back
when the mob was involved in this kind of stuff.
Straight up, what they would do is it'd be a
phone call to Rodney Dangerfield, the old comedian would say
(31:56):
Vinnie Boombots. So they'd call Vinnie Boombots and say, hey,
I'd like to bet on that first pitch being a
ball These days because of technology, what do you think
there is? You think there's text message chains, you think
there's social media change, you think there's Venmo transactions, burner
phones that aren't really burning, and all that. Major League
(32:19):
Baseball and the sportsbooks. From what we're hearing, and who
knows if we're right, we're hearing that they have the receipts.
And this again ties back to the original Toronto Raptor
player that got banned for life from the NBA because
he was futzing around with prop bets, and so they
fell down this rabbit hole. They follow the digital paper
(32:41):
trail like it's Hansel and Gretel and it's the cost
of doing business in Major League Baseball and who's next, Right,
they let the genie out of the bottle and the
second they agreed to go down this avenue and so
paid leave pay leave means Major League Baseball is not
(33:02):
ready to completely drop the hammer, and they're likely trying
to decide, like what is the punishment on this because
you're not it's this weird gray area, like you can
come in and proy a non competitive pitch if you're
a manual Class A and be really good. I mean,
he's been one of the top pitchers in baseball. He's
not as good this year. But the argument could be
(33:23):
listening is it's not affecting the outcome of the game.
You're not throwing the game. This is not the Chicago
Black Sox back in the day. You're just throwing one pitch,
but you're hurting the gambles. And we always know about gambling.
They don't mind if you lose money in gambling. If
you win money, that's a problem. They'd all like, if
you win money, if you lose, they never investigate losers. No, no, no,
(33:47):
they give you free steak dinners if you lose. If
you win, then they start snooping around. They put limits
on how much you can win. That's all. It's always men.
That's all back in the old days. They just take
you under the casino with baseball bats and you know,
so what's going on here. But we'll see how deep
the rabbit hole goes here, and we're not quite there yet.
(34:08):
A Class A being on the list that is a
pretty large bombshell. It's a high leverage reliever. But again,
he's not throwing games. The argument at this point from
what we've heard, is not that he's throwing games. He's
just throwing random prop bets. And you don't bet that
much on a prop bet. But if you think it
ends with the two Cleveland Guardian pitchers, I have some
beachfront property in beautiful Des Moines, Iowa. I would like
(34:32):
to sell you. Yeah, and my realtor there. I have
a couple of realtors. In the morning, they'll show you
around and the yeah, do a good job. Sure? Why not?
I mean, if you have not been paying attention major
League Baseball. They are in bed, and they're in bed
with the books, and now there are bed bugs starting
to bite. The bed bugs are out there biting right now.
Final point where to turn the page? Turn the page?
(34:55):
Another melancholy goodbye, we go to Chicago. News came out
on Monday night. The news came out that Major League
Baseball the Cubs announcing the Hall of Famer Ryan Sandberg dead.
Died on Monday, age of sixty five. So I want
(35:16):
to spend a couple of minutes talking about Ryan Sandberg.
So what are what are your reflections on the Hall
of Famer remembered mostly for the Cubs, right It didn't
start with the Cubs. But you remember Ryan Sambery, So
what are your reflections on Ryan Sambury. So my memories
get I'm not a Cub fan, not a Cup fan,
but my reflections on Ryan Sandberg. I will remember being
(35:38):
a child, a little boy, and turning on WGN, the superstation,
and being taken to another world like I was, Oh
my god. That was back when this thing called cable
television was seen as an exotic thing. It's oh man,
it's crazy. And you'd sit there and there on your
(36:00):
or your television was the Cub Baseball Chicago Cub Baseball
just appeared right there in your living room. And I
lived on the West Coast, so the Cubs games would
have to go pretty long, and in those days they did.
I mean these baseball games a go four hours. So
I'd see the end of the Cub games. If I
went to school, if I ditch school, I'd watch the
whole Cub game. I watched the whole Cub game. So
(36:23):
I'd sit there and watch. And it didn't matter where
you lived in those days. You didn't ask to watch
the Cubs. You likely were not a Cub fan. I wasn't,
but there they were. You had the Cubs and then
you had the Braves on TBS, but you had the
Cubs on WGN, and every afternoon you'd sit there. If
you love baseball growing up and being right in there,
(36:45):
you'd watch it and you'd see the ivy on the
outfield walls at Wrigley, the lunatics and the bleachers. You'd
see Harry Carey in the booth with Steve Stone calling
Cubs Baseballccasionally Harry would even be lucid. He was always sauced,
always completely sauce, and he had just like this haze
(37:08):
of Budweiser. Even as a kid. I like that guy
looks drunk and then and then he had that it's
like the Beg song. The man in the middle of
all that was Ryan Samberg. He was the man in
the middle, slim. He had the sleeves rolled up out
there playing second base and just wasn't about the glitz
(37:28):
and glamour and all that stuff. And he had the
eye black smudged across his face and the cheek bones
and he'd be standing out there at second base, digging
in to the batter's box and hitting under the gap
and was not flashing. I didn't stand out and to
stand out from the crowd, didn't do the things like
(37:48):
Ricky Henderson some of the other guys in that era did,
But he didn't need to be Ryan Sanmdberg was efficient
and he played a stoic stoic baseball for the for
the Cubs there and fundamentals. Remember the Sandberg game against
Bruce Souiter in nineteen eighty four, But that whole nineteen
eighty four season for the Cubs, if you're old enough
(38:10):
to remember, that was Cub That was the year of
destiny for the Chicago Cubs until Leon Durham got involved.
But it was the year of destiny for the Chicago Cubs.
It just that was their time. They won the division.
Sandberg was the MVP of that Cub team and for
the first time any very long time, I think it
was a generation. The Chicago Cubs at that point were
(38:32):
not seen as lovable losers. The Chicago Cubs were contenders.
This was going to be the year they were going
to end the curse of the Billy Goat. And Sandberg
was there, as we said, the man in the middle.
He was quiet, he was study for the Chicago Cubs,
and it wasn't all about the show biz. And uh,
you know there's other players were better. Mike Schmidt. You
(38:56):
think of the home runs, he had a little bit
of flare to him, the craziest well, Ricky Henders. But
in the National League, I guess Ozzie Smith doing the
backflips the Wizard of Oz for the Cardinals. But Samberg
was just always there. I remember as a kidd he
what a bunch of gold gloves, and he won ten
gold gloves and was an All Star a bunch of times.
And I don't know, maybe one who knows a bunch
(39:18):
of All Star games, bunch of gold gloves, I don't
remember the exact numbers. But he was always there and
had big power and would steal bases, and in that era,
normally he didn't have too much of those kind of
players where they would do both, and so he did both.
And that was a position in the nineteen eighties where
you were supposed to slap singles if you were a
second baseman and just turned double plays, that was it.
(39:41):
And Sandberg be out there hitting home runs and stealing
bases and doing all that. And then you got the
name not Ryan Ryan, Ryn E, not r Y a n,
and he was named after a legendary pitcher who was
before my time, who pitched for or the I think
it was the Cincinnati Reds named Ryan Dern, who was
(40:05):
the original wild Thing. This guy throw really hard, he
wore coke bottled glasses, and nobody knew where the pitch
was going. In fact, one of the iconic baseball characters
was named and was not named after him, but was
honored with his legacy. That was Ricky wild Thing Vaughn
in the movie Major League. They actually patterned that character
(40:25):
after Ryan Duran, who Ryan Sandberg was named after. And
we'd go on and play in the major leagues and
all that stuff. So dead at age sixty five, way
too young for Ryan Sandberg from cancer. So rest in peace,
Ryan Sandberg as he leaves this mortal coil. Another little
brick if you're around my age, another brick of your child.
(40:48):
We have a lost hulkg and Ozzy Osbourne, the kid
from the Cosby Family. Now Samberg, I thought it was
only supposed to go in threes. We're getting more here,
We're getting more than threes? Is it a six pack?
Speaker 6 (40:58):
Like?
Speaker 1 (40:58):
Where are we at on this? My god? Anyway, rest
in PC.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Ben Mellor
Show weekdays at two am Eastern eleven pm Pacific.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Here we go, it's maller. How about that? To the
third degree?
Speaker 2 (41:13):
This is one Big Ben gets.
Speaker 5 (41:15):
Grilled kupel with Matthew Stafford week to week with back problems.
Sean McVay recently told reporters that he thinks Jimmy Garoppolo
is a starting quarterback. Yeah, Ben, Let's assume the worst
and say Jimmy G has to start a number of
games for the Rams. How much does that hurt their
chances at winning the NFC West.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
Well, he has started seven games since the end of
the twenty two season for the Raiders, and you did
start one game for the Rams. Listen, the Rams are
supposed to be more of a defensive team so they
can get by in the regular season to ultimately get
where they want to go and get to the Super Bowl,
win the NFC, which they were close to doing last year.
(41:52):
They have very little chance with Garoppolo. Very little chance
with Jimmy G. The Prince Aladdin of the Great Garoppolo. Next.
Speaker 5 (42:01):
Billy Donovan has a losing record in five seasons with
the Bulls and has led them to the playoffs one time.
Yet the team just signed him to a multi year extension.
Are you surprised by this?
Speaker 1 (42:11):
No? And the rumor for a long time was that
Donovan was going to go back to college, but they
college basketball is so effed up and so messed up
right now, he's changed his mind. The thing about the
bullzelt for a couple of years, they weren't even trying
to win. They were fielding non competitive teams, and Billy
Donovan was coaching teams that they knew going into the year,
we're going to be terrible. Miss I went with a
(42:32):
great college basketball coaches for the Florida Gators back and
the day. But he likes the NBA lifestyle. They like him.
He's considered one of the least the mid mid tier
to a little bit better than that NBA coach. And
you know he's not going anyway. He's been there. He
was in Oklahoma City for five years now, he's been
in Chicago. He's been an NBA coach for ten years now,
(42:53):
I believe, So he's not he's settled into that life. Next.
Speaker 5 (42:56):
The Texas Rangers are in third place in the Al West,
but have been on a tear in July and they
actually have the second best run differential in all of
the American League. Ben eddin Arlington alluded to it last night. Yeah,
do you think the Rangers are being slept on?
Speaker 1 (43:09):
Well, I'm not sleeping on the Rangers because they would
die if I slept on them. But no, the Rangers
are one of those teams in the American League. I
don't see anybody invincible. I don't even nationally for that matter.
To me, it's wide open. Just getting the playoffs and
with Bruce Bochie one of the better managers in playoffs,
they've got absolutely got shot. How do we do pass
this edition? Put it on the ball? Oh yeah?
Speaker 2 (43:35):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app search FSR to
listen live now Malor's Mountain of Money? Do you have
what it takes to get to the top? Probably not,
(43:57):
Let's do it quickly.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
Jacob in Delaware, who do you want to partner up with? Jake?
Have you got me?
Speaker 6 (44:01):
Or?
Speaker 1 (44:01):
Coop? Who do you want? You're a loser? And Jay
in Cincinnati, Jay, who do you want to partner up
with Jay? Okay, you ain't Loraina? Good, you don't want
to team up with Loraina?
Speaker 2 (44:16):
I was practicing in the break.
Speaker 1 (44:18):
It's bad. It would be entertaining, but unfortunately I'm told
you have to play with me. We'd have you play
with Eddie, but the company whacked him, so he's not here.
All right, let's do it. Here we go. One of
the categories quick, all right.
Speaker 5 (44:33):
This is the Lori Laughlin edition. She turned sixty one
years old today. The categories are the new Kids, Full House,
Hudson Street, and Critical Mass. Jacob, which category do you want?
Speaker 2 (44:43):
Full House?
Speaker 1 (44:44):
Full House? All right? And Jay? How about you pull out?
Speaker 3 (44:49):
Or do I pick a different one? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (44:51):
Hudson Street, Critical Mass are the new Kids?
Speaker 1 (44:55):
Critical Mass? All right? Okay, go ahead, you're up well
forty five seconds on the clock, right, yes.
Speaker 5 (45:00):
Yes, forty five seconds. I need the first and last name, Jacob.
These athletes have lots of children. Forty five seconds. Let's begin.
Current wide receiver for the Dolphins. Yes, this guy was
the quarterback for the Rams when they won the Super
Bowl in Saint Louis.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
Kurt Warner.
Speaker 5 (45:16):
Yes, this guy was the running back for those teams. Yes,
this guy is the current head coach of Michigan basketball.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
Okay, Uh.
Speaker 5 (45:27):
This guy was an MVP for the Angels. His son
is now in the Toronto Blue Jays.
Speaker 1 (45:34):
Yes. Uh, this guy had like fourteen children. He couldn't
even remember all their names. He was a cornerback for
the Jets. Uarda Yes.
Speaker 7 (45:42):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (45:42):
This guy has the NBA record for most assists in
a game. He was also a head coach. All right,
we're better.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
No, all right, all right, you didn't get by the way.
Joant Howard no longer the coach of Michigan's No, he's.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
No.
Speaker 1 (45:58):
Yes, and Scott Sky the all right, here we go,
Jay forty, you picked the critical mass. These are big fatties, okay,
people out of shape? Yes, you ready, Jay, first and
last name, all right. I came to the Lakers from
the Mavericks in the trade this year, Luca don Yes,
the big Diesel he's on TNT. Was with Kobe with
(46:18):
the Lakers. Yes, the Bambino for the Yankees. Yesh, he
just got in the Hall of Fame African American picture
for the Yankees. Played with the Cleveland Indians as well. Yes,
fat quarterback for the Raiders out of ls. You threw
the ball really far? Didn't watch film? Yes, fat running
(46:40):
back for the Green Bay Packers bowling ball guy in
the two thousands. Last name is like a girl's name. Okay.
The panda for the Giants third baseman when they were
when they're winning the world panda.
Speaker 5 (47:00):
That Eddie Lacy was the running back that you missed.
And Pablo Sandoval the panda.
Speaker 1 (47:06):
What's the score? Sixty? All right?
Speaker 5 (47:08):
So you're back up, Jay and Ben? Do you want
the new kids or Hudson Street?
Speaker 1 (47:14):
Jay kid? All right? These athletes all won Rookie of
the Year. You know what that award is? Jay? Yes, sir, okay,
let's go forty five second on o'clock. We're on our
way go. Current running back for the New Orleans Saints
right now. He got in a bar fight in Vegas
at a casino. Yes, Philadelphia, Philly Starr got into it
(47:36):
with with the commissioner of Major League Baseball. We talked
about him. Yes, he won a championship with the Celtics,
but he came over from the Oh no, that's what incorrect.
He's currently playing for the Rockets. He starred with Golden State,
played in Oklahoma City with the Sonics star forward well
catcher for the Giants when they won the World Series
(47:58):
all those years ago. Yes, Japanese pitcher for the Dodgers
in the nineties started a mania with the Well no
different first name, a white guy, three point shooter for
the Mia Yeah, you got it right, that's good, he
got it. All right, we'll give you a Dale Melmo
now it counts. Yeah, I don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 6 (48:18):
So he got three of them, right, he got Bryce Harper, Alvanning.
Speaker 5 (48:21):
That's three seventy. All right, let's let's go Jacob. We've
got Hudson Street. These athletes were all born in New Jersey.
Are you ready? Let's begin. All right, he's in the
star for the Angels. He's like native to the playoffs.
Speaker 1 (48:32):
Ones. Yes, this guy is a star on the Knicks.
Speaker 5 (48:34):
Not Jalen Brunson, the other guy down. Yes, this guy
was a quarterback for the Ravens. He won a Super Bowl.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
But he's not that good. No more recently. Yes, uh,
this guy's a running back for the Colts. Right now.
He was a bonkers.
Speaker 5 (48:56):
Yes, this guy was forward for the war years back
in the day.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
He shot a free throw underhanded?
Speaker 3 (49:05):
Is that enough?
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Did I get it? Lorena, I count it. Loreda, she
always even keeping score.
Speaker 3 (49:11):
What are you doing.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
Doing one job to keep scoring? Lorena I count.
Speaker 3 (49:18):
Then I win.
Speaker 1 (49:18):
If she didn't keep scoring, I won. That's a win
for us.
Thanks for listening to the best of the Ben Mahler
Show podcast. Be sure to catch us live every weeknight
from two to six Eastern eleven pm to three am
Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and to find your local
station for the Benmatlers Show at Foxsports Radio dot com.
You can find it there or stream us live every
night on the iHeartRadio app by searching FSR.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
This is the best of the Ben Mahler Show on
Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Messing with the Boss and I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Welcome in the beginning of another night of the Benmahlor Show.
Speaker 4 (00:46):
We are in the air evywhere literally everywhere we could
possibly be, as we are right on your doorstep, talking
and rocking the night away.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
It's the coast, void, the mooter and beyond on the
mast and breath takingly powerful microphones of FSR am monating
live good law from the Circle, the Squared Circle of
audio Pugilism from the Fox Sports Radio studios, as approved
by Malaprop Guy, Random, Ryan and Fats in Philadelphia. They
(01:23):
all approved that. For over forty years, tire Iraq has
been helping customers find the right tires for how, what
and where they drive. Ship fast and free back by
free road hazard protection with convenient installation options. I see it.
Nod in your head over there for dog yep and
Alfie Alien of Pinter loves the mobile tire installation tire
(01:43):
i raq dot com the way tire buying should be.
So lot going on. We are back at it and
I love this story. I absolutely love this story from Philadelphia,
and it involves someone we talk a lot about on
this show, and we talk talked about this person for
many many years. We are in the doghouse with this
(02:05):
sport because of this particular person. But we'll go to
the locker room drama ol rama in the Delaware Valley.
As we have learned through various reports that the Philadelphia
Phillies YouTube kid, he was originally the YouTube kid. I
remember seeing clips on the Internet of this guy when
(02:26):
he was in high school in Vegas. But Bryce Harper
stood nose to nows, belly to belly with the clown
Commissioner of Major League Baseball, Rob Manfraud. Now this is
during a meeting between the Commissioner of Major League Baseball,
that would be Manfraud and the team last week. Now,
(02:46):
if you didn't see this or hear about him. Maybe
you missed it. We're told that Bryce Harper ended up
getting in the face of Rob Manford and telling him
to get the f out. E's a Peter saf he said. Now,
he did not say f he said the fun He's
a grown up. He said the fault. We're on radio
after I got kids F word. He said, get the
(03:07):
f out of our clubhouse. He said, if Manford wanted
to talk about the implication of a salary cap, ooh
the boogeyman. Now that confrontation came in a meeting. We
are told that the slimy commissioner of Major League Baseball
is going around trying to improve communication relationships with every
(03:29):
team and all the players. And the meeting lasted an hour.
Must have been very boring. My god, must have that
been boring? Anyway, they talked for an hour. Manford never
said the words salary cap in quotes. He never said that.
The discussion was about the economics. And that is what
(03:50):
raised the dander of one Bryce Harper, who loves the
Philly fanatic. And I love the Philly fanatics, so I
have that in common with Bryce Harper. So let us
discuss the question. Philly star a multi time MVP Bryce
Harper going I the eye Mono a mono with Commissioner
(04:11):
Rob Manford over the salary cap. Who's side of you on?
I am in the side now, I'm gonna tell you
who I think you know who's side I'm on. I've
got dog whistle, art of the Covenant and sopranos, and
we'll put all these things together and we are gonna
make the gobba gool is what we're gonna make. We're
gonna make the gobbagool all right, So hey, listen, I
(04:33):
am on the side of truth, justice and the sports
talk Way, Bryce Harper, Here we go, Pricee, here we go. Yeah,
come on now, I love it. I love the visual
in the cartoon bubble over my head. It's great. That
little clown weasel, your little weasel, Rob Manford, all right,
little clown commissioner Major League Baseball. There he goes down
(04:57):
sash chase his way into the Phillies Clubhouse, thinking, oh man,
I'm just gonna go in there and blow smoke in
that clubhouse and boom boom boom boom boom boom, nose
to nose with Bryce Harper. So good, so good, Bravo
Encore Encore. I say someone had to say, now I
(05:19):
love that. It's Bryce Harper. Rice Harper doesn't need to
do this. He's already got his money. He's already got
the three hundred million dollar contract. Why is he what's
he care? He got his right. Normally, the way this
works is if you get the bag, you don't care
about anyone else. You got yours. You don't go to
(05:40):
each their own, screw everyone else. Right, you got paid.
That's it. Do you know how rare it is that
someone gets that kind of wealth to play baseball and
is still out there screaming and barking and saying, no,
we're not doing a salarycap. Normally, you know this, When
you get the bag, you stop caring about the other players.
(06:02):
Anyone who understands basic math, by the way, not just
Mallard mat basic math, understands the cap is cramp like.
No one that knows economics wants the salary cap, and
baseball is the worst thing in the world. Right, you're
just announcing you're an idiot if you say I want
a salary cap, I want the owners to make more money.
(06:23):
That's what you're saying. You're moron, Your dummy is what
you're saying. The salary cap talk is always a dog whistle,
all right, It's a dog whistle for how can we
keep salaries down from the ownership side, but yet convince
dumb people, the fans, the idiots, that we're doing the
right thing for competitive bounds. You realize, with no salary cap,
(06:44):
baseball has more of a competitive bounce than any of
those sports that have salary caps. Hello, what does that say?
Speaker 2 (06:51):
What?
Speaker 1 (06:52):
The teams that actually try end up winning have success
in baseball. The problem is not the salary cap. The
problem is the team tams that don't give a crap
about winning. Sacramento or Sacramento of the A. Is that
scumbag John Fisher, the Marlins in Miami, the Pirates, teams
like that. That's the problem. You can win the Tampa
(07:12):
Bay they don't spend any real money playing a minor
league ballpark now because the hurricane took out of their stadium.
And I know they're having the greatest year, but considering
the amount of money they spend, they find ways. The
Milwaukee Brewers have been wonderful in recent years. A consistent
playoff contender or playoff team over the last decade or
(07:34):
so they don't spend a ton of money. It can
be done right, and you're not. Really the issue is
like teams that don't want to win, that's the problem.
It's not the salarycap. The salary CAP's not going to
fix anything in terms of well competitive bounds. You already
have that right. And the dirty little secret in Major
(07:57):
League Baseball is that you look around and you see
that the teams that actually put an effort into it
generally find some success. But you can make a lot
of money and have a baseball team that is just
a golden goose without even There's like seven people that
go to Marlins games, and I know one of them,
(08:18):
Marlin's man, and even he doesn't go to many Marlins games,
and he lives in Miami, but he'd rather travel around
the United States and see games in other stadiums that
don't involve the Marlins because the Marlins blow. And yet
the Marlins make money. And you know, the Athletics left Oakland.
They made money in Oakland. Nobody went to the games
in Oakland. Nobody's you know, the Sacramento a minor league ballpark,
(08:40):
it's not anyone there. They're making money because you get
the TV money, you get the national revenue, and in addition,
you get the teams that spend a lot, like the
Dodgers and the Mets and teams like that. They cut
your check for not even trying. Right, you can draw
seven hundred and seven thousand whatever, it doesn't matter. Put
(09:01):
a crap product, garbage at first base, trash at second,
feces at shortstop, and do do it third and you
will make money. You will absolutely make money. And while
teams that try to win, I think the Dodgers, the Mets,
the Yankees, teams like that, they have to pay a
penalty for these other teams and then they just pocket
(09:22):
the money. That's the dirty little secret in baseball. I'm
Rob Manford. He's never going to address that. Why would he?
All right, why would he?
Speaker 5 (09:30):
So?
Speaker 1 (09:30):
I love the fact that Bryce Harper got right in
the face of Rob Manford and just threw it down
right and should have tossed him right out there on
Broad Street is what he should have done. Now, the
second page on this why is the salary cap chatter
which is being cranked up. The labor negotiations will take
place in twenty twenty six, so it's not that far
(09:52):
away the end of the twenty twenty six season, which
means they could be there could be a workstoppas prior
to that, many in baseball are preparing for the nuclear winter.
But why is this salarycab, the chatter in Major League
Baseball ultimately a nothing burger. Let me explain this to
you like you're five years old. The reason that this
(10:15):
is a nothing burger. In order for there to be
a seracab, you would have to have support of the players.
There is not support of the players. But even if
you could get support of the players, in order for
this to realistically work, you would have to do something
that you will not do. Something you cannot do, something
that you will not do no matter what happens, you
won't do it. And what is that? If you want
(10:37):
to have an honest conversation about a salary cap in
Major League Baseball, the owners would have to open the bucks.
They'd have to open the bucks, the bean counters. That's
never gonna happen, never ever, ever, never. And here's why.
The reason why, and most of us know this, they
are every team in baseball is making a profit. Now,
(10:58):
not every team makes a big profit, Not every team
makes a big profit, but they're making money, boat loads
of money in Major League Baseball. And these owners who
are making money hand over fist while at the same
time pretending like they're bleeding cash and morons. Oh, these
poor teams are losing money. No they're not dummy, No
they're not right. And the books are the holy grip.
(11:21):
I've heard some stuff that I'm not allowed to say
because I don't want to get in trouble with certain people.
But I've heard things over the years involving the books
and the lengths that Major League Baseball has gone to
to make sure the financials don't get out. Some mind
blowing things have passed through my head from people who
work in baseball, the efforts that they have gone to
(11:42):
avoid opening the books. Right, Like, imagine if you peeked
inside John Fisher's financials and realized the Athletics didn't have
to leave Oakland, he was making a lot of money.
He just wants to make more money, and so it's
that whole thing. Right, You're more likely to see the
arc of the covenant than you are the financials of
these these owners that cry they don't have any money.
(12:03):
They treat the financials in baseball like the nuclear launch codes. Okay,
that's what they treat it like. And it is such
a scam. It is such a scam. We need a
cap for parody. We want to have every tream. How
about chance to win. It reminds me of that used
car salesman Bud Selik was going around in the early
(12:26):
two thousands, in the nineties and saying, well, we need
new stadiums in Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, so we gonna have
good teams on the field. These teams can win the
World Series if they get those stadiums. They built new stadiums.
Guess what, spoiler alert, The teams blow chunks in Pittsburgh
and Cincinnati. Right, they suck And they were taught, all
(12:47):
you need is a new stadium. This is the magic
the magic pill. That's all you need, right, that's all
you need. And so come on, it's nonsense. You don't
have it. You don't have it right now. And yet
more teams if you try, if the Reds and Pirates
actually tried, they would actually find a way to make
the postseason. And we know in baseball, just making the
(13:07):
postseasons all you have to do. It's one of those
things It's not like basketball where or even football, where
if you're like a one or two seed, you have
a very good chance of going to the NBA finals
of the Super Bowl. In baseball, it doesn't work that way.
But again, it all goes back. You're not going to
open the books. So no matter how much you said,
we need a show recap and you try to get
the dumb fans behind it, morons, all right, people with
(13:28):
IQ's below thirty, and you say, okay, it doesn't matter, right,
they're sitting on gold mines, these owners and crying poverty. Now,
I don't doubt that Scott Boris was behind this leak
of the Bryce Harper story that Scott my opinion. Can't
sue me for my opinion that Scott Boris and his
team leaked that story, because why would Major League Baseball
(13:49):
leak a story about rob Manford getting into a confrontation
with one of the star players in baseball would never
do that. So it had to come from Bryce Harper's camp,
and Scott Morris is his guy. So it makes a
lot of sense. But you look at everything. I mean,
they make so much money in baseball, owning the stadium,
the parking lots. A lot of these teams have their
(14:11):
own TV channels. They've monetized everything. Remember, I went to
Wrigley Field when I was doing stuff in another life,
when I did stuff with the Dodgers. We went there
in the nineties, and it was still had the charm
of the old Wrigley Field, the way it had always been.
I went there a couple of years ago, and it
was like downtown Disney. The Cubs had bought all the
(14:32):
property around Wrigley Field, the Cub ownership, and they had
put their own branding on everything and all that, and
so it was a much different experience than it had
been in the mom and pop days. Now final fun
so after the Bryce Harper rob Manford confrontation took place.
After that, a former big league player and now turned
(14:54):
gas bag and shill for Major League Baseball, Mark de Rosa,
who works for Major League Baseball. According to a story
on The Athletic buried behind a paywall, the Old Gray
Lady The New York Times owns The Athletic anyway, Mark
de Rosa, I was reading this story earlier. I just
saw it. So the story says that he warned Mark
(15:18):
de Rosa warned the Philadelphia Phillies players of the commissioner's power.
He warned them. Now, this was taken as a threat,
according to the way the story was reported by Evan Drelik,
who I briefly did a radio show with years ago.
So is that how it sounds to you? Mark de
(15:39):
ross According to this story, Mark de Rosa, who works
for MLB, he warned the players that essentially they're messing
with the wrong guy. You're messing with Rummanford. What are
you doing? All right? So the answer to this, how
does Yes, it sounds like a threat. I would absolutely
take that as a threat. This is Sopranos style, is
(16:00):
what it is. It's organized baseball crime. If you will.
Manford is the mob boss. How long have we talked
about Rob Manford essentially being a mob boss of organized baseball? Right?
And there you've got Mark de Rosa. Where is he
at here? So you've got Mark de Rosa, who played
a Major League baseball career, now he works from Major
(16:21):
League Baseball. He's the conciliary, right, He's the fixer, he's
the whisper in this right, and he goes in there
he delivers the message for the mob boss. Is what
he does and he gets his hands dirty and all that,
but not too dirty. Right, Let's not forget who we're
dealing with here, all right, And what kind of power
Rob Manford has. This is the same Rob Manford, if
(16:42):
I'm wrong, correct me, who shielded the cheating Astros after
the biggest cheating scandal in modern times. A team cheated
in the World Series, not just to get to the
World chairs in the world. It was in the MLB
video highlighting the World Series. And what did Rob Manford do?
(17:05):
He let the players walk free? Altboove that punk Bregman
Now with the Red Sox Springer, there's still a few left.
He's in Toronto. I let them all walk free. And
why is that? There's a theory that baseball needed the
business partners in Houston to be happy, and they would
have been upset if those guys had been suspended. There's
(17:25):
one theory that's out there. So if Manford likes you,
if he likes you, he'll protect you like family, just
like a good mob movie, right, your family. Now, if
you cross him, what happens if you're crossing Let's see here, Oh,
I have an example. Trevor Bauer. Remember Trevor Bauer, Cy
(17:47):
Young winning pitcher Trevor Bauer. Yeah, Trevor Bauer, who I
think right now is sipping some saki in Japan rather
than pitching in Major League Baseball. When starting pitching blows
Rob Manford, commissioner. Now, technically Bauer is allowed back, but
he Bauer did something you're not supposed to do. He
trashed Trevor. Trevor r trashed Rob man for every chance
(18:10):
he got. So now he's in Japan, he's pitching on
dusty mounds in Mexico. He's probably trying to get a
work visa to pitch in Afghanistan at this particular point.
And that's because he messed with Rob Manford. No one
will touch him because Manford don't want him in baseball.
That's the theory, right, And so Manford plays favorites. And
as far as this other guy de Rosa, he doesn't
(18:31):
work for the players anymore. He's a former player. He's
on the payroll for Major League Baseball. Right He's sitting
there at the MLB Network commentating and apparently giving friendly
warnings wink wink, nod nod, like he's reading some kind
of bedtime story, while the message is rather loud and clear.
(18:52):
I think the message is rather loud and clear here
that you don't talk back to the boss where the
boss will get you. Right, you'll be sleeping with the baseballs.
If you talk to the boss that strikes on. We
can still we can still manipulate the strikes on. We can.
You know, next year we can't do it. But this
year we can still manipulate it. You know, fifty to
fifty calls something of the Empires might be going going
(19:13):
away from Bryce Harper. You're not gonna get those calls anymore. Right,
I'm just saying, you come at the King, you come
at the King, and they say your best not miss.
It is the Ben Mahlor Show. What do you think
about all that? We'll take your thoughts eight seven seven
ninety nine on Fox is the number eight seven seven
(19:34):
nine nine six six three sixty nine. Also on X
at Ben Mahlord. If you'd like to be part of
the program, we'll talk a lot about this sort. It's
a good story. Got one of the highest paid people
in baseball, Bryce Harper, going after Rob man for giving
him a dirty word. Dirty word and Rob Manford lives
(19:54):
in a bubble there. He's this guy you know he
was a labor lawyer that was hired in a labor
in the negotiation as outside council and he just never left.
And he rows up the ranks to become the commissioner
of Major League Baseball and has been uh poop pooing
and spitting loogi's all over the game ever since.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
Then, be sure to catch live editions of The Ben
Meller Show weekdays at two am Eastern eleven pm Pacific
on Fox Sports Radio and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 6 (20:22):
Hey, we're Cavino and Rich Fox Sports Radio every day
five to seven pm Eastern. But here's the thing, we
never have enough time to get to everything we want
to get to.
Speaker 7 (20:31):
And that's why we have a brand new podcast called
over Promised. You see, we're having so much fun in
our two hour show. We never get to everything, honestly,
because this guy is over promising things we never have
time for. Yeah, you blubber list lame and me.
Speaker 6 (20:45):
Well, you know what it's called over promise. You should
be good at it because you've been over promising women
for years.
Speaker 7 (20:49):
Well, it's a Cavino and Rich after show and we
want you to be a part of it. We're gonna
be talking sports, of course, but we're also gonna talk
life and relationships. And if Rich and I are arguing
about something or we didn't have enough time, it will
continue on our after show called over Promised. Well, if
you don't get enough Covino and Rich, make sure you
check out over Promised and also Uncensored, by the way,
so maybe.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
We'll go at it even a little harder. It's gonna
be the best after show podcast of all time.
Speaker 7 (21:14):
There you go, over Promising. Remember you could see it
on YouTube, but definitely join us. Listen to over Promised
with Cavino and Rich on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (21:25):
You can bet on it you're not supposed to welcome.
In the beginning of another hour of the Ben Mahlor Show.
We are in the air everywhere close together, I mean
your head right now. We are moving and grooving coast
to coast, border the border and beyond on the mast
(21:47):
and wondrously powerful microphones of fsre ammating live from the casino.
Life is a casino. How how do you play your chips? Well,
we do it from the Fox Sports Radio Studios, as
approved by mister nice guy and G Manage in Chicago.
(22:08):
They sign off on this and this portion of the
Ben Maler Show on Fox made possible in part by
our friends at ty Iraq. For over forty years, ty
Iraq has been helping customers find the right tires for how,
what and where they drive, ship fast and freeback by
free road hazard protection with convenient installation options like mobile
(22:29):
tire installation tire iraq dot Com The Way Tire Buying show'
be so our lead. This hour is from the Land
from Cleveland. One of the big names that is supposed
to be traded this week is off the trading block.
Today is the twenty ninth. The trade deadline is a
(22:51):
couple days away on July thirty first, so we're a
couple days away from that. I'm still upset that they
ruined our fun. All the trade deadlines used to be
at midnight Eastern Time, which meant a lot of trades
happened late at night. A lot of trades happened right
before we got on the air. And then there was
a woman with red hair named Rachel Nichols that complained
(23:14):
that she had to stay up late for the trade
deadline of the NBA. It wasn't fair. She needed a
beauty sleep. And so the NBA they said, okay, we'll
make the trade deadline the afternoon, and then every other
league followed suit, and so now we get crappy daytime
trade deadlines. But this is not about that. We can
rant about that later, but instead, if you did not
(23:35):
hear the news, and possibly not, it is a hum
dinger of a story. The All Star closed, not this year,
but in years past for the Cleveland Guardians. What a
dumb name that is? Manuel class A has been put
on time out by Major League Baseball for some funny
(23:56):
business turn If you believe the reporting, a class A
was placed on the non non disciplinary paid leave paid
leaf through August thirty, first part of the ongoing Major
League Baseball investigation into sports gambling. The plot thickens now
(24:19):
for Kimi's going home. The Cleveland Guardians lead Major League
Baseball in gambling. Congratulations boys, wow, So he's the second
Guardians pitcher to be caught in the ongoing investigation, which
who knows when this is going to end? The Cleveland
(24:41):
right hander, the great Luis Ortees so good you had
to look him up on Baseball Reference to find out
who he is. Anyway, he remains on the non disciplinary
paid leave naughty list now. He was originally placed there
at July third. That has been extended for orties as
well to August thirty first. Nowaday their statement vetted by
(25:01):
an army of lawyers. The Guardian said, among other things,
no additional players or club personnel are expected to be
impacted by the investigation. Keep in mind, if you know
your weasel words, look at page seventeen of the Weasel Handbook,
and the word expected is a weasel term because you
(25:22):
never expect one of your player to get in trouble
with gambling. Why would you expect that you never expect
a trade to happen? They're unexpected, all right, So let
us discuss The question is as follows. Keep this simple,
sports radio. So what is the most puzzling What is
the most puzzling thing about the Guardian's closer, Emmanuel class
(25:43):
A being dragged into the gambling web. So I've got
dance floor, Hansel and Gretel and Beg's and we will
combine all of these things together for an original Malard monologue,
which is as good as milk chocolate covered almonds. One
of my favorite snacks. When I don't eat much, but
when I do, I like to have a look a
(26:04):
few handful or so of those delicious milk chocolate covered almonds.
Manly good. All right, kurklum brain, by the way, I go,
kurklam brain. All right? So number what number? Number?
Speaker 3 (26:18):
Uh?
Speaker 1 (26:18):
This is not some flotsam and jetsam. This is this
is bigger, This is a bigger story here as a
Yogi bear taught me. Not Yogi bear. Yogi bear taught me,
you're supposed to be smarter than the average bear. Not
so much. We're not talking about some random middle relief
pitcher or some fourth or fifth starter. No, no, no,
(26:39):
no no. At one point in recent years, if you
were to pull the executives in Major League Baseball, they
would say the top closer in the entire American league,
Emmanuel Classe, top guy in the American league. Right, and
if not all of baseball was an all star multiple times.
Covet it around baseball. Expected to be traded this week,
(27:00):
not anymore, but was expected to be traded. The thing, though,
that's the most puzzling, is the money factor. Now he's
not the highest paid relief pitcher in baseball. However, Class
A is on a twenty million dollar contract. So if
you get a twenty million dollar contract, you're living pretty
(27:21):
high on the hog. Most would say, right. And this
is the biggest name that has been caught up in
this to this point. And make no mistake, make no mistake,
this is major League Baseball. They're hitting the dance floor.
They're out on the dance floor. They're doing a little
dance with a devil, is what they're doing. They tore
(27:41):
and let me tell you something, Baseball at this point
is tore up from the floor up. If you know
what I'm saying here, they signed these deals and listen,
I again, I love gambling. I'm a gambler, but even
I know you're you're messing with some really bad stuff here.
How far in they've gone. They didn't just go a
little bit in. They just put their toe in the water.
They are all in. Even I someone that bets, I
(28:03):
do bet. I'm like Pete Rose, I bet on baseball.
Even I'm when I'm watching him blown away by the
amount of advertising for the for gamming. Listen, I don't
mind it. I'm a little amazed that baseball is okay
with it. But here we are, and so they took
the money. And again I'm fine with it. Last a
couple of years I did a gambling show, and for
years on the radio we did Benny versus the Pennies
(28:25):
on TV the last couple of years. But now, of
course Baseball, well they're shocked, they're absolutely shocked that players
are messing around with prop bets. Give me a break. Well,
that's what this is about. So page two, So where
where did Emmanuel class cross the line with the guardians? See,
(28:46):
this is the part of the story which is almost
unbelievable when you think about how you can track something
like this. Now, now we think we know how this
was uncovered, but we don't know these cifix We don't
know all the intricate details. However, we know that there
was a line that was tossed out, unusual betting activity
(29:09):
around multiple pitches involving Emmanuel Classe. So Internet sluice have
done some digging and they've investigated this, Wes, this doesn't
come from baseball. Internet investigators have found what they believe
is the smoking gun. What is that? All right? What
is the smoking gun? I'm glad you asked. So class
A has entered the ninth inning forty times this season,
(29:31):
forty times. And you know what his waist pitch rate
is on first pitches, it's almost twenty percent. According to
stat cast, it's seventeen and a half percent. Well, who
cares about that, you're a nerd. Let me explain. So
seventeen and a half percent of the time Class A
comes in and throws garbage, a non competitive pitch, no
(29:56):
chance of being a strike, non competitive, not eyhere close
to the strike zone. And that is something that stands out.
I mean, one of these things is not like the other.
The rest of the pitches, the non competitive pitch rate
is like around five percent. The first pitch is close
to twenty percent, So you can do the mat. It's
(30:17):
like it stands out like glitter at a funeral. You
don't often see glitter at a funeral, right, and you
smell that it's not with the rocks cooking. That would
be in game live betting.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Now.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
I don't do the in game live betting. I don't.
I just yeah, it's not. I think I have some
friends of mine that are really invested in in game
live betting, and they think I am a donkey for
not getting involved in it. They love it like they
love having action on multiple pitches or what a batter
(30:51):
is going to do a ground ball, fly ball. There's
all kinds of different props in game betting that you
can do, and if you're unfamiliar with it, if you're
not a game live betting has been around for you know, forever.
Now it's mainstream. But you can bet whether a pitch
is going to be a ball or a strike in
real time, in real time? Now, is it true that
(31:14):
the wise guys had inside information on the pattern from
Emmanuel Class so when he came in out of a bullpen,
they knew chut chang chut ching to ching. Free money,
free money, free money, come on down, free money. Now,
(31:36):
little Birdie tells me that may or may not have
inside information. There's a lot of blood at the crime scene,
if you know what I'm saying. Here a lot of blood.
And now I'm in the in the old days, back
when the mob was involved in this kind of stuff.
Straight up, what they would do is it'd be a
phone call to Rodney Dangerfield, the old comedian would say
(31:56):
Vinnie Boombots. So they'd call Vinnie Boombots and say, hey,
I'd like to bet on that first pitch being a
ball These days because of technology, what do you think
there is? You think there's text message chains, you think
there's social media change, you think there's Venmo transactions, burner
phones that aren't really burning, and all that. Major League
(32:19):
Baseball and the sportsbooks. From what we're hearing, and who
knows if we're right, we're hearing that they have the receipts.
And this again ties back to the original Toronto Raptor
player that got banned for life from the NBA because
he was futzing around with prop bets, and so they
fell down this rabbit hole. They follow the digital paper
(32:41):
trail like it's Hansel and Gretel and it's the cost
of doing business in Major League Baseball and who's next, Right,
they let the genie out of the bottle and the
second they agreed to go down this avenue and so
paid leave pay leave means Major League Baseball is not
(33:02):
ready to completely drop the hammer, and they're likely trying
to decide, like what is the punishment on this because
you're not it's this weird gray area, like you can
come in and proy a non competitive pitch if you're
a manual Class A and be really good. I mean,
he's been one of the top pitchers in baseball. He's
not as good this year. But the argument could be
(33:23):
listening is it's not affecting the outcome of the game.
You're not throwing the game. This is not the Chicago
Black Sox back in the day. You're just throwing one pitch,
but you're hurting the gambles. And we always know about gambling.
They don't mind if you lose money in gambling. If
you win money, that's a problem. They'd all like, if
you win money, if you lose, they never investigate losers. No, no, no,
(33:47):
they give you free steak dinners if you lose. If
you win, then they start snooping around. They put limits
on how much you can win. That's all. It's always men.
That's all back in the old days. They just take
you under the casino with baseball bats and you know,
so what's going on here. But we'll see how deep
the rabbit hole goes here, and we're not quite there yet.
(34:08):
A Class A being on the list that is a
pretty large bombshell. It's a high leverage reliever. But again,
he's not throwing games. The argument at this point from
what we've heard, is not that he's throwing games. He's
just throwing random prop bets. And you don't bet that
much on a prop bet. But if you think it
ends with the two Cleveland Guardian pitchers, I have some
beachfront property in beautiful Des Moines, Iowa. I would like
(34:32):
to sell you. Yeah, and my realtor there. I have
a couple of realtors. In the morning, they'll show you
around and the yeah, do a good job. Sure? Why not?
I mean, if you have not been paying attention major
League Baseball. They are in bed, and they're in bed
with the books, and now there are bed bugs starting
to bite. The bed bugs are out there biting right now.
Final point where to turn the page? Turn the page?
(34:55):
Another melancholy goodbye, we go to Chicago. News came out
on Monday night. The news came out that Major League
Baseball the Cubs announcing the Hall of Famer Ryan Sandberg dead.
Died on Monday, age of sixty five. So I want
(35:16):
to spend a couple of minutes talking about Ryan Sandberg.
So what are what are your reflections on the Hall
of Famer remembered mostly for the Cubs, right It didn't
start with the Cubs. But you remember Ryan Sambery, So
what are your reflections on Ryan Sambury. So my memories
get I'm not a Cub fan, not a Cup fan,
but my reflections on Ryan Sandberg. I will remember being
(35:38):
a child, a little boy, and turning on WGN, the superstation,
and being taken to another world like I was, Oh
my god. That was back when this thing called cable
television was seen as an exotic thing. It's oh man,
it's crazy. And you'd sit there and there on your
(36:00):
or your television was the Cub Baseball Chicago Cub Baseball
just appeared right there in your living room. And I
lived on the West Coast, so the Cubs games would
have to go pretty long, and in those days they did.
I mean these baseball games a go four hours. So
I'd see the end of the Cub games. If I
went to school, if I ditch school, I'd watch the
whole Cub game. I watched the whole Cub game. So
(36:23):
I'd sit there and watch. And it didn't matter where
you lived in those days. You didn't ask to watch
the Cubs. You likely were not a Cub fan. I wasn't,
but there they were. You had the Cubs and then
you had the Braves on TBS, but you had the
Cubs on WGN, and every afternoon you'd sit there. If
you love baseball growing up and being right in there,
(36:45):
you'd watch it and you'd see the ivy on the
outfield walls at Wrigley, the lunatics and the bleachers. You'd
see Harry Carey in the booth with Steve Stone calling
Cubs Baseballccasionally Harry would even be lucid. He was always sauced,
always completely sauce, and he had just like this haze
(37:08):
of Budweiser. Even as a kid. I like that guy
looks drunk and then and then he had that it's
like the Beg song. The man in the middle of
all that was Ryan Samberg. He was the man in
the middle, slim. He had the sleeves rolled up out
there playing second base and just wasn't about the glitz
(37:28):
and glamour and all that stuff. And he had the
eye black smudged across his face and the cheek bones
and he'd be standing out there at second base, digging
in to the batter's box and hitting under the gap
and was not flashing. I didn't stand out and to
stand out from the crowd, didn't do the things like
(37:48):
Ricky Henderson some of the other guys in that era did,
But he didn't need to be Ryan Sanmdberg was efficient
and he played a stoic stoic baseball for the for
the Cubs there and fundamentals. Remember the Sandberg game against
Bruce Souiter in nineteen eighty four, But that whole nineteen
eighty four season for the Cubs, if you're old enough
(38:10):
to remember, that was Cub That was the year of
destiny for the Chicago Cubs until Leon Durham got involved.
But it was the year of destiny for the Chicago Cubs.
It just that was their time. They won the division.
Sandberg was the MVP of that Cub team and for
the first time any very long time, I think it
was a generation. The Chicago Cubs at that point were
(38:32):
not seen as lovable losers. The Chicago Cubs were contenders.
This was going to be the year they were going
to end the curse of the Billy Goat. And Sandberg
was there, as we said, the man in the middle.
He was quiet, he was study for the Chicago Cubs,
and it wasn't all about the show biz. And uh,
you know there's other players were better. Mike Schmidt. You
(38:56):
think of the home runs, he had a little bit
of flare to him, the craziest well, Ricky Henders. But
in the National League, I guess Ozzie Smith doing the
backflips the Wizard of Oz for the Cardinals. But Samberg
was just always there. I remember as a kidd he
what a bunch of gold gloves, and he won ten
gold gloves and was an All Star a bunch of times.
And I don't know, maybe one who knows a bunch
(39:18):
of All Star games, bunch of gold gloves, I don't
remember the exact numbers. But he was always there and
had big power and would steal bases, and in that era,
normally he didn't have too much of those kind of
players where they would do both, and so he did both.
And that was a position in the nineteen eighties where
you were supposed to slap singles if you were a
second baseman and just turned double plays, that was it.
(39:41):
And Sandberg be out there hitting home runs and stealing
bases and doing all that. And then you got the
name not Ryan Ryan, Ryn E, not r Y a n,
and he was named after a legendary pitcher who was
before my time, who pitched for or the I think
it was the Cincinnati Reds named Ryan Dern, who was
(40:05):
the original wild Thing. This guy throw really hard, he
wore coke bottled glasses, and nobody knew where the pitch
was going. In fact, one of the iconic baseball characters
was named and was not named after him, but was
honored with his legacy. That was Ricky wild Thing Vaughn
in the movie Major League. They actually patterned that character
(40:25):
after Ryan Duran, who Ryan Sandberg was named after. And
we'd go on and play in the major leagues and
all that stuff. So dead at age sixty five, way
too young for Ryan Sandberg from cancer. So rest in peace,
Ryan Sandberg as he leaves this mortal coil. Another little
brick if you're around my age, another brick of your child.
(40:48):
We have a lost hulkg and Ozzy Osbourne, the kid
from the Cosby Family. Now Samberg, I thought it was
only supposed to go in threes. We're getting more here,
We're getting more than threes? Is it a six pack?
Speaker 6 (40:58):
Like?
Speaker 1 (40:58):
Where are we at on this? My god? Anyway, rest
in PC.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Ben Mellor
Show weekdays at two am Eastern eleven pm Pacific.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Here we go, it's maller. How about that? To the
third degree?
Speaker 2 (41:13):
This is one Big Ben gets.
Speaker 5 (41:15):
Grilled kupel with Matthew Stafford week to week with back problems.
Sean McVay recently told reporters that he thinks Jimmy Garoppolo
is a starting quarterback. Yeah, Ben, Let's assume the worst
and say Jimmy G has to start a number of
games for the Rams. How much does that hurt their
chances at winning the NFC West.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
Well, he has started seven games since the end of
the twenty two season for the Raiders, and you did
start one game for the Rams. Listen, the Rams are
supposed to be more of a defensive team so they
can get by in the regular season to ultimately get
where they want to go and get to the Super Bowl,
win the NFC, which they were close to doing last year.
(41:52):
They have very little chance with Garoppolo. Very little chance
with Jimmy G. The Prince Aladdin of the Great Garoppolo. Next.
Speaker 5 (42:01):
Billy Donovan has a losing record in five seasons with
the Bulls and has led them to the playoffs one time.
Yet the team just signed him to a multi year extension.
Are you surprised by this?
Speaker 1 (42:11):
No? And the rumor for a long time was that
Donovan was going to go back to college, but they
college basketball is so effed up and so messed up
right now, he's changed his mind. The thing about the
bullzelt for a couple of years, they weren't even trying
to win. They were fielding non competitive teams, and Billy
Donovan was coaching teams that they knew going into the year,
we're going to be terrible. Miss I went with a
(42:32):
great college basketball coaches for the Florida Gators back and
the day. But he likes the NBA lifestyle. They like him.
He's considered one of the least the mid mid tier
to a little bit better than that NBA coach. And
you know he's not going anyway. He's been there. He
was in Oklahoma City for five years now, he's been
in Chicago. He's been an NBA coach for ten years now,
(42:53):
I believe, So he's not he's settled into that life. Next.
Speaker 5 (42:56):
The Texas Rangers are in third place in the Al West,
but have been on a tear in July and they
actually have the second best run differential in all of
the American League. Ben eddin Arlington alluded to it last night. Yeah,
do you think the Rangers are being slept on?
Speaker 1 (43:09):
Well, I'm not sleeping on the Rangers because they would
die if I slept on them. But no, the Rangers
are one of those teams in the American League. I
don't see anybody invincible. I don't even nationally for that matter.
To me, it's wide open. Just getting the playoffs and
with Bruce Bochie one of the better managers in playoffs,
they've got absolutely got shot. How do we do pass
this edition? Put it on the ball? Oh yeah?
Speaker 2 (43:35):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app search FSR to
listen live now Malor's Mountain of Money? Do you have
what it takes to get to the top? Probably not,
(43:57):
Let's do it quickly.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
Jacob in Delaware, who do you want to partner up with? Jake?
Have you got me?
Speaker 6 (44:01):
Or?
Speaker 1 (44:01):
Coop? Who do you want? You're a loser? And Jay
in Cincinnati, Jay, who do you want to partner up
with Jay? Okay, you ain't Loraina? Good, you don't want
to team up with Loraina?
Speaker 2 (44:16):
I was practicing in the break.
Speaker 1 (44:18):
It's bad. It would be entertaining, but unfortunately I'm told
you have to play with me. We'd have you play
with Eddie, but the company whacked him, so he's not here.
All right, let's do it. Here we go. One of
the categories quick, all right.
Speaker 5 (44:33):
This is the Lori Laughlin edition. She turned sixty one
years old today. The categories are the new Kids, Full House,
Hudson Street, and Critical Mass. Jacob, which category do you want?
Speaker 2 (44:43):
Full House?
Speaker 1 (44:44):
Full House? All right? And Jay? How about you pull out?
Speaker 3 (44:49):
Or do I pick a different one? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (44:51):
Hudson Street, Critical Mass are the new Kids?
Speaker 1 (44:55):
Critical Mass? All right? Okay, go ahead, you're up well
forty five seconds on the clock, right, yes.
Speaker 5 (45:00):
Yes, forty five seconds. I need the first and last name, Jacob.
These athletes have lots of children. Forty five seconds. Let's begin.
Current wide receiver for the Dolphins. Yes, this guy was
the quarterback for the Rams when they won the Super
Bowl in Saint Louis.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
Kurt Warner.
Speaker 5 (45:16):
Yes, this guy was the running back for those teams. Yes,
this guy is the current head coach of Michigan basketball.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
Okay, Uh.
Speaker 5 (45:27):
This guy was an MVP for the Angels. His son
is now in the Toronto Blue Jays.
Speaker 1 (45:34):
Yes. Uh, this guy had like fourteen children. He couldn't
even remember all their names. He was a cornerback for
the Jets. Uarda Yes.
Speaker 7 (45:42):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (45:42):
This guy has the NBA record for most assists in
a game. He was also a head coach. All right,
we're better.
Speaker 1 (45:51):
No, all right, all right, you didn't get by the way.
Joant Howard no longer the coach of Michigan's No, he's.
Speaker 2 (45:58):
No.
Speaker 1 (45:58):
Yes, and Scott Sky the all right, here we go,
Jay forty, you picked the critical mass. These are big fatties, okay,
people out of shape? Yes, you ready, Jay, first and
last name, all right. I came to the Lakers from
the Mavericks in the trade this year, Luca don Yes,
the big Diesel he's on TNT. Was with Kobe with
(46:18):
the Lakers. Yes, the Bambino for the Yankees. Yesh, he
just got in the Hall of Fame African American picture
for the Yankees. Played with the Cleveland Indians as well. Yes,
fat quarterback for the Raiders out of ls. You threw
the ball really far? Didn't watch film? Yes, fat running
(46:40):
back for the Green Bay Packers bowling ball guy in
the two thousands. Last name is like a girl's name. Okay.
The panda for the Giants third baseman when they were
when they're winning the world panda.
Speaker 5 (47:00):
That Eddie Lacy was the running back that you missed.
And Pablo Sandoval the panda.
Speaker 1 (47:06):
What's the score? Sixty? All right?
Speaker 5 (47:08):
So you're back up, Jay and Ben? Do you want
the new kids or Hudson Street?
Speaker 1 (47:14):
Jay kid? All right? These athletes all won Rookie of
the Year. You know what that award is? Jay? Yes, sir, okay,
let's go forty five second on o'clock. We're on our
way go. Current running back for the New Orleans Saints
right now. He got in a bar fight in Vegas
at a casino. Yes, Philadelphia, Philly Starr got into it
(47:36):
with with the commissioner of Major League Baseball. We talked
about him. Yes, he won a championship with the Celtics,
but he came over from the Oh no, that's what incorrect.
He's currently playing for the Rockets. He starred with Golden State,
played in Oklahoma City with the Sonics star forward well
catcher for the Giants when they won the World Series
(47:58):
all those years ago. Yes, Japanese pitcher for the Dodgers
in the nineties started a mania with the Well no
different first name, a white guy, three point shooter for
the Mia Yeah, you got it right, that's good, he
got it. All right, we'll give you a Dale Melmo
now it counts. Yeah, I don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 6 (48:18):
So he got three of them, right, he got Bryce Harper, Alvanning.
Speaker 5 (48:21):
That's three seventy. All right, let's let's go Jacob. We've
got Hudson Street. These athletes were all born in New Jersey.
Are you ready? Let's begin. All right, he's in the
star for the Angels. He's like native to the playoffs.
Speaker 1 (48:32):
Ones. Yes, this guy is a star on the Knicks.
Speaker 5 (48:34):
Not Jalen Brunson, the other guy down. Yes, this guy
was a quarterback for the Ravens. He won a Super Bowl.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
But he's not that good. No more recently. Yes, uh,
this guy's a running back for the Colts. Right now.
He was a bonkers.
Speaker 5 (48:56):
Yes, this guy was forward for the war years back
in the day.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
He shot a free throw underhanded?
Speaker 3 (49:05):
Is that enough?
Speaker 1 (49:06):
Did I get it? Lorena, I count it. Loreda, she
always even keeping score.
Speaker 3 (49:11):
What are you doing.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
Doing one job to keep scoring? Lorena I count.
Speaker 3 (49:18):
Then I win.
Speaker 1 (49:18):
If she didn't keep scoring, I won. That's a win
for us.
Host
Ben Maller
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.