TMLR Week 10: Tigers Caught Fire In June

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I don't have to do a game this game rightcap.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Oh, I'm sorry that.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
What a difference a week makes. Honestly, folks, we were
here last week. It was kind of doom and gloom.
Tigers came off a excuse me, a series where they
look like absolutely feed against the White Sox, and now
a week later they're five and one. They have the
best OLPs of the month of June. Kevin McGonagall had

(01:08):
its first walk off hit. It's all crazy stuff here.
Welcome to another episode of the Tiger Mile Report podcast.
Here at Tigers Amount Reports dot com, I am head steal.
Alongside me is Chris Brown and Brandon Day and you
can find Brandon days stuff over at Bussy Boys. You
find Chris over here Tigers on the Reports where we
just put on our patreoon our top forty six right
up and podcasts. So if you're a Patreon subscriber, remember

(01:32):
check it out and then I'll be dropping the YouTube
podcast probably the next couple of days for everybody else.
But if you're a Patreon remember you got it early,
so please sign up. It's pretty simple and the paid
membership stuff goes along the way, especially helps us with
going for example, go to in Toledo this weekend at
some point. But yeah, it was a fun week for
Tigers baseball. I'm asked Brandon and Chris what their projected

(01:57):
rotation is going to look like here with Justin Verlander
and Casey Mice who set the pitch tomorrow in clear
Water for the Flying Tigers, and Verlanders set the pitch
for the mud Hens on Wednesday in Toledo. So mud
Hens are getting that additional gate money. So that's I
thought that maybe he wouldn't pitch in Toledo, but he
did pitch in Iowa, so Iowa that also got some

(02:21):
of that nice gate money. Speaking of gate money, by
the way, Derek Scougble the Scalpy market yesterday, whoever made
out of scalboarders? First of all, your scum, I mean,
like honestly, like you're gonna charge like six hundred bucks
for ticket. I mean, I get it, you know, make money,
what have you. But I mean, whoever paid that kind
of money to go see him out there? I don't know, Like.

Speaker 3 (02:44):
I get I guess if you put it in the
context of you think he's gonna get traded in a month,
like well, it's your last time to see him kind of,
you know, in a Tiger's context at least, I guess.
But yeah, though some of those prices were nuts.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
By the way, Charles giving you a compliment there about
your article about by Jones and I, which I checked
out before, and that is an excellent article worth checking out.
That there is a expiration date and it's gonna go
spoiled soon. It's a guy asked that question yesterday, and
I still think. I still I'm gonna sill rally around
Bell melt Jerry see what he has? Why not I don't.

(03:18):
I don't if you're gonna, like, I understand why he's
down Toledo, but if he's hitting velocity at ninety five plus,
he's hidden breaking balls and the data shows, and this
is what the Tigers look at, why not give him
an opportunity?

Speaker 3 (03:31):
And he's a better defender. I mean, obviously he's a
lot better defender than you know, Jami Jones is. He
could play a little bit of center field if you
needed it. I mean, I don't really hate that idea either.
You know, who knows how much longer the Tigers are
going to give Jami.

Speaker 1 (03:44):
Jones some leash?

Speaker 3 (03:45):
Right Like, it's I don't even know what how many
played appearances. It's like seventy seventy five to eighty something
like that. You know, you'd like to have more of
a sample, but he's a pinch hitter. That's just how
it is. And you know, at this point, you know,
they've just kind of started to stay lies things and yeah,
I mean they can't really have that black hole in
the in the lineup because not only you know, not

(04:06):
only is he not getting the job done, but you're
still he's there, so you kind of have to try
to use him and get him going the way you
normally would. And then you have you know, Carpenter or
Keith or somebody else coming out of the game who
maybe you would want up in the ninth you know,
when they put in their right handed closer. So it's
a it's a tough situation. I know they want to
get you know, Jamia Jones going. He was such a big,

(04:26):
you know, piece for them, but yeah, as I wrote,
he's you know, the Tigers love this idea of versatility, right,
they want flexibility in their roster, and he's the furthest
thing from it. You know, he can only do the
one thing and when he's not doing the one thing.
You know, you have a dead roster spot on a
team that certainly can't afford it right now.

Speaker 4 (04:44):
So I don't know that there's a good solution.

Speaker 3 (04:46):
I mentioned Trey Cruz just because I think, you know,
if Trey Cruse is healthy and they're comfortable with him
playing center field right now and doing fine out there,
that kind of opened some options up, because you could
dfa Jones, and you could dfa short and let Cruse
fill in at shortstop here and there to ge mcgonag
will break, And then that gives you the option of
bringing up you know how you Lee or Max Anderson
to platoon with Keith, and then they can be your.

Speaker 4 (05:08):
You know, maybe maybe your lefty Masher and uh.

Speaker 3 (05:12):
And you can also put Veeling and Wenzel Perez one
of the two of them or both on the bench
if you wanted to. And you know, and then both
of those guys have been hitting left handers pretty well.
Wenzel's kind of always hit left handers well, and that
might work. I mean, he's not going to give you,
like Jamai Jones four hundred and fifty foot home run
type power, but he does a lot more things for you, so, yeah,

(05:33):
I don't know. I don't know how much longer the
leash is going to be, but yeah, something something needs
to change here because we all know the Tigers rely
on that bench and that those those last four spots
in the lineup, and they've got to get as much
out of it as they can, you know, possible.

Speaker 5 (05:47):
Right now?

Speaker 1 (05:48):
What about you, Chris, I mean, do you think they
how long do you give him a leash for?

Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, I've been done with Jones for a little bit,
but this this weekend was definitely kind of the line
straw for me. Uh And I have nothing against him,
like I'm thankful for what he provided for the team
last year, but yeah, it's it's it's just a waste
of a roster spot for one very specific task, and
it's I understand it's it's a tough job, but it

(06:14):
doesn't feel like the hardest job in the world to replace. Like,
if you want just somebody who can be a righty
bench bat, you could go with how you lead again
and again he would have more versatility and provide more
than just because with Jones you bring him in to
take one swing maybe, and then you have to replace
them because you don't trust him in the field, and
depending on who you brought him in for, so it's

(06:35):
like you're you're killing two players.

Speaker 1 (06:37):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (06:38):
And and as Brandon said, you know, they brought him
in to pinch it for was it Keith or Carpenter,
I don't remember, but then they you know, they brought
in a pitcher or for Carpenter too, and then later
in the game it's like, boy, sure would be my
step crepert er right now, but you know it worked
out for the best. But it's just like I don't know,
like I think, ideally, yeah, Cruises a good option. Now,

(07:00):
Jerry's a good option. I think winssel Perez has started
to hit a little bit. He would be a nice
bench bat, Like that's kind of his ideal role, right
because he's also a switch hitter. So you bring him
in to face you know, one and lefty or one righty,
and then he can later on he can help you
with another ab. But like, yeah, it's just it's it's
pastime I think for Jones to move on. And at
this point, like you know, they don't want to move

(07:22):
him right because he doesn't have any options. But who's
going to claim him right now? Yeah, maybe, but like
he's like over his last twenty two or something like that.

Speaker 3 (07:30):
Well, and he apparently loves it here, right, he's great
clubhouse guy. Maybe he likes it here and he just
accepts the assignment. Yeah, because I can't really imagine there's
going to be a throng of teams, you know, lining
up to claim him either.

Speaker 5 (07:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (07:41):
Yeah. And the thing that becomes an interesting thing about
Jones too is as far as like a clubhouse presidence,
go tickers, could whoever they bring in could do the
same thing. And so because the Tigers have this atmosphere
of that right now, and so it is, Yeah, Jones
does a dance. I know, he does, like some sort

(08:02):
of like dance to each player or not a handshake.
He has an individual handshake for each player. That's cool,
but doesn't win ball games. I mean it sounds I
don't sound callous like that, but.

Speaker 4 (08:12):
Yeah, not worth a roster spot.

Speaker 1 (08:14):
Probably probably if Tray Cruiz was healthy, he would have
been up here by now, you know. So, But yeah,
it's and I like what folks said here too. He
said most crazy amount Jones's fourteen at bats against right
hand pitchers, which is zero for fourteen Heath and Karp
has only nine at bats against left handed both. He
has had more opportunities against poor matchups too. That's a

(08:35):
that's a great point there.

Speaker 3 (08:37):
Yeah, yeah, because once you put him in, you can't
you know, you don't have necessarily someone else to replace
him with later.

Speaker 2 (08:43):
So you say, Chris, oh, just just we talked about
this a little bit before the show about this front
office slash manager. Really, they just they just like their guys, right,
and at some points, you know, they've given guys a
bunch of rope and they've turned around a little bit,
like whintle Bress is having a hot couple of weeks.
Jack Flaherty has really turned things around. But at a

(09:04):
certain point, like you gotta you gotta stop playing Jones
and like the Kinstrey every day when they're not performing,
and and you know, I don't know when that point is,
but it feels like, you know, they're they're climbing back
in or scrambling to get back into this this playoff chase,
and you can't really have that many empty at bats

(09:24):
and pull it off.

Speaker 4 (09:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (09:27):
Yeah, as far as timetable goes for Bias and Meadows,
Jacob No, No, timetable for Meadows. Bias is getting a
second opinion right now. His ankle's ankles still not one
hundred percent so Bias, as Chris and I and Brandon
were talking before the for the podcast, there's gonna have
to be a forty man roster move. And I think
it was Chris or Brandon said some of the suggestions

(09:49):
that maybe Bias gets moved to a sixty day. I
l because if he's not even running or doing anything
like that right now, you're looking at probably probably maybe
even early August at this point. Honestly, that ankle injury,
if you look at that ank like how bad that was. Yeah,
you know, I'm surprised he didn't break his ankle, I
really am.

Speaker 3 (10:07):
It starts to look like, yeah, at least all star break,
you know, like maybe that's that's about where he could
get back. But yeah, moving him to the sixty as
Chris suggested earlier, we would, yeah, would at least let
you let you do something.

Speaker 4 (10:18):
You know, you could try something.

Speaker 3 (10:20):
You could go claim somebody, you could Scott Harris, you
could go make a small trade.

Speaker 4 (10:24):
Bro. I don't know, just I'm talking crazy, I know,
but you.

Speaker 2 (10:29):
Know, yeah, I mean at this point, he's been out
since April twenty eighth, so it's I mean, it's getting
close to sixty days anyway, and you can always back
backdate those to when you put him on.

Speaker 5 (10:37):
The IL, I believe.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
Yeah, so they could do even if he was getting
close to a return and they're going to have to
make a room on the forty man for Justin Berlander.
He's on the sixty day himself, so they could just
swap those and that would be the most likely thing.
We you know, they never like to cut guys if
they don't have to. But yeah, we'll see what happens
when that when that day comes, which is I assume

(10:59):
later this.

Speaker 3 (11:00):
Yeah, but yeah, I mean, you know, people are kind
of like, you know, I mean, they're private and a
half games out of the you know, the final wild
card spot, like you know, there's there's still there's still
a chance it's not bad, but they don't have the
whole season, and I you know, we just keep needing
to make that point.

Speaker 4 (11:16):
Because they're gonna have to decide what they're doing. By
the end of August.

Speaker 3 (11:19):
They have I think forty seven games left until the
trade deadline, which is on August third, this year a
little bit, a little bit later. So they've got forty
seven games, and by then they've got to know what
they're doing. And maybe there's some scenarios where they trade schooble,
but they don't. They don't really like fire sale, and
they still try to get in. I mean, there's all
kinds of ways you could, you know, you could kind

(11:41):
of break it down, but one way or the other,
they've got forty seven games and they probably need to win,
like they probably need to go like thirty seventeen, you know,
something like that, which is not going to be easy.
And it's, yeah, you can't afford to be, you know,
wasting a roster spot right now. They've got to get
something out of every every spot they've got.

Speaker 1 (11:56):
Yeah, especially I mean you look at the series against Seattle.
Let's talk about that real quick. The man like the
in terms of just tension, you could tell these two
teams do not like each other at all. It was
just it was undantly clear. And let's we'll get to
Josh Naylor, you know, anti society. And second, because Seattle
Mariner fans came really hard at like somehow fremera Valdez

(12:16):
got involved in this because he apparently smiled and now
he like he's become like there's a this made the cut,
which is a guy who's a Tiger fan on YouTube
channel does a really good job. By the way, I
really really like his channel made this thing. How Valdez
made himself the enemy because what Naylor mentioned, and it's like,
man like, I just it was all unnecessary. A lot

(12:37):
of it was hard baseball players like borderline, Like, Okay,
Naylor is a pain in the ass. That's what he does,
That's what he is. But I mean the amount of
just the overall like the Seattle's bullpen looked unstoppable until yesterday,
and then when he got to when you knows was
able to walk when he walked in from I'm like, okay,

(12:58):
then they might have a chance here. But it was
the just even like the way they were just the
amount of times that Seattle was going first the third
the Tigers were trying to do the same thing. It
was a lot of back and forth between the two
managers of just who's trying to out Like I felt
like it was like a chess match too, with like
all these moves they were making off the bench. I'll
start with you Chris.

Speaker 2 (13:20):
I mean, it's it's it's fun. Those are two good teams.
Like the Tigers have a bad record obviously, but the
talent they're right there with the Mariners. It's just, you know,
sometimes weird things happen in baseball with injuries and malaise
that goes over the team. But these are two pretty
evenly matched teams. I think, you know, the Mariners have
better starting pitching rotation probably right now without schoolble. But yeah,

(13:44):
so they were close games and well played for the
most part, and yeah, it's just nice to like I
get really frustrated with Naylor watching because he just he
just is designed to get under your skin.

Speaker 5 (13:59):
But he's a good player.

Speaker 2 (14:00):
Hit a Grand Slam tonight, and you know, I I
give him credit for doing the job, for being a
public enemy. And you know, it wouldn't shock me if
from Berveldez was laughing and pointing at him, because that
seems kind of fraberveldsh like he might be the Tigers
Josh Naylor. But it's it's I think I said to

(14:22):
you Rogers that the way to beat Josh Naylor is
to win the game. And they did it, and and
we learned once again you're not throwing FASTBALLI by Kevin McGonagall.

Speaker 5 (14:31):
I don't care if it's one hundred and eight.

Speaker 3 (14:34):
He's happy to see you're super hot fastball because if
you're that type of reliever, you're probably gonna throw it.

Speaker 4 (14:39):
And he can he can handle it absolutely.

Speaker 1 (14:43):
By the way, you know, the way he hit that fact,
I mean that ball was like right here, he just
that was Yeah, it was so impressive a piece of hitting.
But the home run here earlier that that was a
foreigner and ten foot blast that was I think it
was a warm I mean, of course, obviously it was
the bigger hit, was the one of the knife, but
that was the only offense that had Tigers had for

(15:03):
a while until they got things going. But Brandon, what
was your kind of takeaway from the series where Jack
Flaherty I was looking at his fip. His fip since
I think it was like last thirty innings is actually
like close to just two nine five or something like that.
Just a victim of some bad defense.

Speaker 3 (15:22):
Yeah, yeah, And he's just an infuriating pitcher. I mean
he always he strikes out a lot of guys, and
the Tigers don't have a whole lot of people who
do that.

Speaker 4 (15:30):
So you don't want to give up on a guy
like that.

Speaker 3 (15:32):
But you know, he does have this tendency to, you know,
to kind of spiral out of control when he starts
you know, losing his command a little bit, then he
starts steering it and then he's walked three guys. You know,
we've seen this time and time again, so it didn't
surprise me that they they hung in there and then
he's turned it around. The problem is that, you know,
it could he could go on a tear for a
month and look like one of the best starting pitchers

(15:52):
in baseball, or he could go right back in the tank.
So it's you know, it's just always sort of fraught
with peril there as.

Speaker 4 (15:59):
Far as far as the series goes.

Speaker 3 (16:00):
Yeah, I mean, you know, seeing McGonagall turn around one hundred,
you know, at the top of the zone, and we
saw him turn around what ninety nine from Severino in
the in the preseason, in the game in the Dominican Republic,
like you know, up and down at that velocity, straight pitches.

Speaker 4 (16:16):
He can do all the damage.

Speaker 3 (16:17):
You know, he wants the real the only thing, the
only like minor weakness. I think Kevin McGonagall has even
kind of leaked out a little bit. Is is just
off speed stuff, because you know, it looks the same
as the fastballs out of the hand, and it's just
harder to recognize. But he's made those adjustments there too,
And if you're gonna try to spam him off speed stuff,
he'll take.

Speaker 4 (16:35):
His walk, you know.

Speaker 3 (16:36):
So yeah, I mean, it's it's just been such an
impressive campaign from him already. And as far as Naylor,
you know, Josh Baylor likes to play like kind of
an old school style of baseball. And you know, if
you're gonna take every opportunity to body block a player
at first base when you didn't have to, you're gonna
slide in hard on glabor torres, You're gonna get hit
because you know, you play old school baseball, you win

(16:59):
old school baseball type prizes.

Speaker 5 (17:01):
You know.

Speaker 3 (17:01):
It's just, you know, I don't have a whole lot
of sympathy either way. I don't know for sure if
caateor hit him on purpose. I would would like to
think not, because it was up high, and you don't
you don't like to see that, no matter how you
feel about the guy.

Speaker 4 (17:13):
But you know, Josh Naylor is an irritant, he's reckless,
but he's also a pretty good player.

Speaker 3 (17:18):
I mean we were reading about him stabbing a teammate
in uh when he was in the minor leagues, you know,
with some prank you know. I mean, he has like
kind of a long history of you know, getting out
of control, you know, being being kind of the bowl
in the China shop type player. But yeah, I mean,
if he's on your team, you probably love it. And
I don't know, I saw some you know, some fairly
pathetic complaining from Mariners fans about this, and I generally

(17:40):
like the Mariners fan base, but you know, look, you
have Josh Naylor like he's he's going to cause some
incidents like that and flipping out at us, you know,
like cal him out. But yeah, so yeah, I mean
those are those are my kind of two takeaways there.
And then yeah, I mean you just see what happened
labor and carry Carpenter does for this lineup, you know,
against right handed pitching against left handed pitching.

Speaker 4 (18:00):
With with Torres.

Speaker 3 (18:02):
You're you know a batter, a good batter or two
longer in the lineup now, and that's kind of what
they needed.

Speaker 4 (18:07):
And if they can sort the bench out. You might
actually run out a fairly complete lineup, you know.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah that is by the way, Uh, we'll just stand
here in a second. I do anderson idea is good.
Young Sorry, Stan, I can't agree with you on the
young agree to disagree on that, my friend. Yeah, bring
back Lee please? Oh yeah yeah. Anderson's cool, Like, look,

(18:34):
but I would love to have Lee back on this team.
The other thing, you know, what's funny is uh talk
about uh Naylor sta like stabbing somebody or anything like that,
just or typical crazy Canadian behavior or Canadian. He's Canadian,
and that's not what we love. Canada. By the way,
it's our second highest audience because some of the trying

(18:55):
like trying to imply something about Canada. I'm like, god, no,
what is can I have to do with anything? A
It was the Cleveland site I sent you, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
the Cleveland site that was like a pall by the
Tiger's behavior. And I was like, what is s B
nation Cleveland site doing here? What the hell is going on?

Speaker 3 (19:12):
I really yeah, I don't know because they don't participate
in in our in our back channels. I don't even
know who runs that thing anymore. But yeah, I mean
that that was all pretty weak. I mean, you're the Guardians,
like this is how this is how you guys do things.

Speaker 1 (19:24):
You know, it was a soft thing. It was a
soft thing off to show you.

Speaker 5 (19:28):
To you afterwards.

Speaker 3 (19:28):
Yeah, do we have to bring up like Trevor Bauer
and Mike Clevenger and you're picking goes sexting the entire
league and you're like all the other nonsense that's got
that went on there when Frank ConA was there.

Speaker 4 (19:38):
Like come on, yeah, you.

Speaker 3 (19:40):
Know, whenever whenever you try to like get the other
team's goat, like you just end up looking bad. You know,
enjoy your team, for your team. You know, everybody has
some villains I guess here or there. But yeah, I
mean that was just some desperate attempt to score some
points with their with their readership apparently.

Speaker 1 (19:57):
So I did want to speaking of the rotation the
pictures and they want to mention So I wanted to
talk to you guys about the difficult decisions Tigers have
to make with their rotation coming up here. So we're
talking about this before the show, and the Tigers have
to decide between Flaerty School, Myze Valdez, Montaro and Milton

(20:21):
essentially and Troy Melton. So I wanted to propose to
you guys what your ideal five man rotation would be. Now,
mount Tarot pitched not too bad Saturday, a couple of pitches,
seattlest a good and aggressive first put first pitch strikes
and then some of the plates. The pitches too were
off the plate and they were drugs driving the right field,
just taking with them and with me at the mic,

(20:43):
like I just did. So I wanted to ask, I'll
start with you, Brandon, what is your ideal What do
you think the Tiger's rotation is going to look like
when all these pieces come back?

Speaker 3 (20:54):
Yeah, I mean, I mean obviously you know Schooble, Myze
and Valdez, like all those those three are going to
be your anchors for me. Like ideally it would be
jv and Melton for me. And then because Flarerty strikes
out a ton of dudes, I would I would be
perfectly comfortable moving him to the bullpen and trying that.

Speaker 4 (21:13):
But that's that's kind of how I think about it.

Speaker 3 (21:15):
I'm quite certain the Tigers will keep Jack Flarerty in
the rotation and you'll probably see Troy Milton and Kider
Montero either in the bullpen or maybe one of them
gets sent down. I would hope they don't do that,
but they could send one of them down to stay
stretched out. You know, you've got Jackson Joel Blake brewing
in maybe six to eight weeks. I don't know how

(21:35):
much you need necessarily someone to be stretched out. But
by the same token, the scary thing in this is
that they're going to put Justin Burlander back in the
rotation and we don't really have any you know, any
idea whether we're going to get like average pitching or
really bad pitching, and it could be kind of anywhere
in the spectrum, and that could end up raising, you know,
some pretty tough questions for the for the front office,

(21:57):
because you can't obviously let Justin Ferlander tank your season
just because you signed him in advance kind of his depth.
Like unfortunately, he was injured during the whole period where
you kind of had him to get you through the
early part of the season when most pitcher injuries occur,
and now he might become a bit of a problem.

Speaker 4 (22:13):
Which is which is unfortunate. But we'll just have to
see how it goes.

Speaker 3 (22:16):
I think the part of the reason they're giving him
a second start in Toledo is because they don't actually
want to do this yet and and they're kind of
hoping like a decision gets made for them a little
bit there and kind of kind of fudging it through.
But the reason I would I would keep Melting in
the in the rotation and send Montero down to the
bullpen is that Montero is giving up a lot of flyballs.
He's not striking out that many dudes. Neither is Melton

(22:38):
fair enough, But you know, Montero was throwing a ton
of fastballs. That's kind of you know, the revelation for
him this year was like, I can just throw a
lot of fastballs here and they're not going to do
that much damage, getting quick innings, moving things around. But
with his flyball profile, I don't really love him in
the summer months in the rotation. If there's a different option,
I'd rather let him just air it out ninety seven

(23:00):
ninety eight, which I think we'll, you know, protect him
from potentially giving up more dingers, and they could certainly
use that arm in the bullpen. So that's kind of
how I would light it up. I would put Melton.

Speaker 4 (23:11):
I would put Melton in the rotation myself and kind
of let him keep working it out. But I don't
think they're going to I tend to think the veterans.

Speaker 3 (23:17):
Are gonna hold sway as usual at least for a while,
and you know, probably Melton and Montero go to the pen.
Clarity getting traded would be nice if someone someone will
give you something.

Speaker 1 (23:28):
But I do like the idea for Mitchell that the
as far as like we're laying in Montero piggyback sturf,
that's actually what Seattle's doing right now. Siello's doing that
with their experientation and rotation. Yeah, and you know, I
school knows here on our chat says I agree with
about the second start. I think Jad's fist about it.
He probably yeah. Look, I mean he has to get

(23:49):
Tony Poco's, you know, and he's not probably excited about that.

Speaker 4 (23:52):
But you know that's the thing.

Speaker 3 (23:53):
You get those two guys in the in the bullpen,
and then you can do that, you know, maybe you
can jump right in on Flarty starts and get him
out of their asapp because now you've got you know,
you got vest you've got Finnegan, You've got Drew Anderson
kind of pitching.

Speaker 4 (24:05):
Okay, got Holton.

Speaker 3 (24:08):
I don't know what to expect from Drew Summers, but
if you put Montero down there with Melton, you can,
you know, you can yank a guy a little faster,
especially when you get Schoogle back. In theory, he and
Valdez should be going six, which kind of helps keep
the whole thing in order.

Speaker 1 (24:22):
And Madden too. Madden's also historic numbers actually better than
the league average, so that's also something to considered.

Speaker 4 (24:28):
Well, I could have left Madden out. He's been impressive.

Speaker 1 (24:30):
Yeah, yeah, it has been impressive.

Speaker 2 (24:31):
What about you, Chris, Yeah, I mean I think the
perfect world Jack Flaherty goes in the Hitches office and says, hey,
I'll be a reliever. But that's not gonna happen. He's
a depending free agent. Yeah, I mean, I tend to agree.
I think I would rather keep Maltain in the rotation,
but I also don't think that's gonna happen. I think,

(24:53):
and I think they're gonna one of those guys is
gonna go to Tleeto. I think Montero, Mountain or the
They just they need to keep somebody stretched out as
a starter. They could just do the tandem starts, like
you guys said, but that that kind of cripples your
broke bullpen at.

Speaker 4 (25:09):
A point could be Madden too, Yeah, Mad.

Speaker 2 (25:13):
They could send the Jesus down and have him starting.
I don't know if you want him coming up and
starting in the big leagues, but just to keep one
of those guys stretched out. And and I don't know,
I think I would. I think I might send Montero
town and keep melting, just because the higher octane stuff
might work better in the bullpen, although we've seen Montero

(25:35):
ramp it up at times till like ninety seven ninety eight.

Speaker 5 (25:38):
But yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (25:40):
It's it's a it's a good problem to have, but
it's gonna be it's gonna take some some delicate to
delicate work to make sure it happens. And yeah, it's
it is kind of silly that they have to make
room for Justin Verlander obviously franchise icon or whatever, but
it's probably not gonna go great. And then you have
to have to face the possibility of, like, eh, boy,

(26:01):
what do we do We put him on the eye
l again, we put this, you know, all time great
starter in the bullpen, what do we do?

Speaker 5 (26:08):
So, yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (26:10):
I think you are just kicking the can down the
road a little bit, like maybe maybe something goes wrong
in this Iowa start or this this Toledo start and
I don't know whatever.

Speaker 4 (26:18):
But yeah, it's awkward. It's gonna be awkward. There's a
there's an awkward situation of bruin.

Speaker 2 (26:23):
But maybe, yeah, I don't know, maybe he goes out
there and looks outstanding and he turns into the jbol.

Speaker 5 (26:29):
Seems unlikely, but.

Speaker 3 (26:31):
It seemed unlikely last year, and then he pitched great
once he was healthy. I don't know if there's like
any silver lining, it's that okay, they've given him so
long that he's actually like legitimately like feeling great.

Speaker 4 (26:41):
You know, like maybe that's the case.

Speaker 3 (26:43):
But if so, I would like to see, you know,
i'd like to see some ninety six ninety seven tomorrow,
you know, not a lot, but just I just like
to see that peak fastball, like, you know, not just
like one or two at ninety five.

Speaker 4 (26:55):
I'd like to see him like throwing well and looking
looking strong. So we'll see, we'll see what it looks like.

Speaker 1 (27:02):
And you know the by the way, in terms of
left handers or Brian Salmmon's who has been released by
the Tigers, we had arm injuries some sort. We don't
we still don't know exactly what happened, but that was
like I was considering that maybe as like a long
term option over Summers, but Summer, why Summers would stay
up here over perhaps somebody else. It's simple because the

(27:23):
fact that he's a lefty and Tyler Holten is you're
not sure what you're gonna get from Tyler Holten, but
then you have the hass too, so you could. Yeah,
de Hayes, who seems like they're using him more as
a as a starter piggyback guy or multiple innings. I'm
not sure. It's just really weird that, like, just what

(27:43):
are you gonna do if you're gonna have three, If
you're gonna have three lefties in your bullpen, you have
to really examine which one's gonna have the best. We
can miss stuff it give you the best possibility. And
I'm sorry, but Holden hasn't been it yet this year,
and I don't think he is. I just think he
the exit, you know, like you look at some like
the advanced numbers, the k rate for summers in a
very very short sample size is forty one percent. Great,

(28:06):
but he's still I mean, he's still will kind of
not the command's still not there, and you have to
kind of worry about that. And so as far as
my starting rotation goes, all right, I have to I
have to take away my feelings for this. And I
thought about this long and hard. I want Look, I
think kind of Montaro is a starter. I will always
stick by that. However, be that as it may. If

(28:27):
it means that he has to go down to Toledo
to start, then he has to go down to Twedo start.
I just don't think he's your bringing. You make a
point about him being a bullpen because the fly balls
are up, and then those balls will tend to go
out in a band box, like if they're down in Chicago,
for example, or whatever the case is. I would rather
Montero has earned his has earned its Botan's rotation. It

(28:50):
is clear to me. So if you can make him
a starter, make put him down as a starter in Toledo.
Slain simple, keep melting up here as you're bullpen guy,
Make him into what the what the Dodgers and A's
used to do, which is these guys would come out
of the bullpen as rookies and then they developing the starter.
David Stewart Welch come into mind. A lot of those

(29:12):
older pitchers did that. And so uh, hey, Julian, going
to see you here in the chat as well, go
to see Griffin Jackson. Griffin Jackson, we still see quite
a bit. Yeah, quite a bit of that that type
of thing. So yeah, and that wasn't a thing for
a while. Now I came back into uh fashion, if
you will. And then then then there's you know, schoogle

(29:33):
knows brings us up. A name that I was going
to bring up here in a second is bow Brisky.
Now Bow Brisky. His command has looked awful and he
is even like it's a mental thing. I'm not really sure,
but he didn't look well in Toledo. So they've not
even brought half him, even used him. You can't even
use him right now.

Speaker 4 (29:52):
That was a quick trip up and back up.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
So that's another that's a name to consider too at
this point. As far as trading for flirty those who
the question is who's gonna take them.

Speaker 3 (30:04):
That's the like, I mean, you could pay you know,
you could say you're paying ten million of his salary
and just give him away to somebody. But I'm not
really sure there's there's much point in doing that right now.
I mean, we are talking about you know, I guess
the thing we need to keep in mind again is
like forty seven games like this isn't the end of
Troy Milton as a starter, or Cater Montero as a starter,

(30:25):
or necessarily Ty Madden as a starter. This front office
will be depending on Lavil's pitchers for several more years.

Speaker 4 (30:32):
I'm gonna just keep taking them about that.

Speaker 3 (30:34):
But yeah, you know, it's it's just about like giving
themselves the best chance to win for you know, the
next month and a half or two months almost and
after that, you know, they can revert to development mode,
play all the kids, trade all the veterans if no
you know, improbable run to above five hundred baseball occurs,

(30:55):
and then you just season to taste then and and
do what you can. But yeah, I mean, for right now,
I I think that's probably you know, I think we're
we're pretty much in the in the rough agreement on
how they've got to kind of address this, but they
are gonna have to keep a short hook on JV.

Speaker 4 (31:08):
And it's it's gonna be awkward.

Speaker 3 (31:10):
It's there's just a lot of potential there for a bad,
bad look.

Speaker 1 (31:14):
Yeah, and that's gonna and that's JV is chasing a
three hundred wind mark and you have to give them
that veteran you know, tip of the cap kind of thing.
And I understand that, and the respects is there, by
the way, four hundred or four wins is I think
brand Herder leads the team and wins with four pretty sure.

Speaker 3 (31:32):
And I mean I haven't heard anything, but it seems
like brant Herder would likely be back in the next
like a week or two.

Speaker 5 (31:39):
They threw him on the sixty day.

Speaker 4 (31:41):
Oh they did see. I didn't see that.

Speaker 3 (31:43):
Okay, dang, it was that bad a I was hoping
just like lower backstort in well.

Speaker 1 (31:49):
Yeah, that was a look at some horrific kind of
it was a back injury or something like that or
something something.

Speaker 4 (31:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (31:55):
Lumbar yeah, lumbar thing, which was just speed of that
was Awesometon Wells has hit the aisle of the like
one bar headaches he's got these spinal headaches that are
getting the back of his head. Go back for him
doing time about the Yankee player. But AnyWho, Uh No,
it's to end things out the Tigers before we get
to the minor leagues. The other the other name I

(32:16):
wanted to address with you has been Curious Kids one
Seal Press because last week, the last two, you know,
two weeks ago, he's been subject of the ninety seven
one thing and the worst ward and blah blah blah
blah blah. Yeah, but yeah on Basic yesterday twice. And
I think it's just simply his role is when he's

(32:36):
a bench player, he's fine. He's a full time player
not so fine. But I just wanted to look. I
gotta get to the capitol win seal Press. Last couple
of weeks he's been He has come around since the
whole ninety seven one thing. Google knows and and I'm
happy for him because he's a guy who is a
hinge kind of guy.

Speaker 4 (32:55):
So yeah, and we've always liked him.

Speaker 3 (32:58):
I mean, you know, you can't help but have a
soft spot for him because we followed him all through
the you know, the minor leagues and didn't really think
he was gonna gonna get there and then found some
power and added some muscle and you know, switched to
the outfield and kind of carved himself out, you know,
a decent role. I mean, he's been an average hitter,
basically average major league hitter the last two seasons, so

(33:20):
it was surprising to see him struggle that much. I
just think, you know, he knew that was kind of
his opportunity to like seize a long term role and
maybe put too much pressure on himself because he's not
a very good outfielder, but he's not that bad. I mean,
it was like, what is going on? I mean, this
dude is in his head absolutely, So yeah, it's been
nice to see him kind of turn it around.

Speaker 2 (33:39):
He's been their second best hitter by WRC plus over
the last two weeks. It's it's Carpenter, Perez, then McGonagall
and Dingler, so like four homers.

Speaker 5 (33:47):
He's walking.

Speaker 2 (33:48):
He still has a crazy low babb up for whatever reason.
But yeah, I mean that was a huge two run
triple yesterday and infuriating inability to get him home with
the second straight game they couldn't get somebody home from
third with no outs, but but they pull it off
in the end, and so we free in about that.
But no, I mean, I think he's when he's hot

(34:09):
like this, he's he can help your offense a ton.
It's the problem is when those cold spells go like
at like the end of last year. I think he
went in a cold spell too, all the way into
the playoffs, I think until he got the big hit
against Cleveland. But yeah, yeah, he's he's a quality player
that gets a little bit exposed when he's playing too much.
But yeah, he helped the team certainly for the last

(34:30):
couple of weeks.

Speaker 1 (34:31):
Yeah, And that's it. And and again that's all that
matters is as far as Ways gets back to the bench,
that'll that will definitely help Tigers in the long run,
especially when they need a switch it or that they
can that's when Hinch can use his bench leverage. Well.
So it's going into the minor leagues and the this
week in transition, trans transactions, transitions, wow, and where the

(34:58):
Tigers are in terms of this has been a kind
of light week. The il the name though, that really sucks.
Right there is this one right there, Ladies's Home and
Calvin Salcedo back on the Ale.

Speaker 5 (35:13):
His VLO was down about two miles an hour in.

Speaker 1 (35:15):
That game, and it's like, damn it, man, it sucks.
It sucks really bad that he just he just we
just spoke to him too, and he was pretty optimistic
about everything. And yeah, so he's there, Diana Evans, so
can't stay healthy. I mentioned earlier Simmons Salmon's being released

(35:39):
and looks like Max Berts on the hot and ready
development list. So and then you forget about Patrick Lee.
So Tigers are trying to get the minor league turns
of outfielders getting some health, and and Dugan Darnell, who
never really pitched. I think he was handling a hip
injury or something like that. As far as Parker Metals
goes Tad, he's still being he has to start rehab

(36:05):
or anything. So he's still on the mend.

Speaker 3 (36:07):
Yeah, and it's really only been what like six seven weeks.
I mean that that might have been a complicated fracture.

Speaker 4 (36:13):
I don't really know, but you know, I'm with the
concussion on top of it. That was that was pretty bad.

Speaker 3 (36:17):
So I'm thinking after the All Star break, you know,
maybe he maybe we start to see and then hopefully
we'll hear something.

Speaker 4 (36:23):
Maybe by the end of the month though.

Speaker 1 (36:25):
Yeah, And speaking of good months to start right now,
Toledo just two games under five hundred, had a pretty
week in Iowa and the weather a shorten week. Max
Clark's come around three home runs the last eleven games. Uh, Chris,
Before we get to that, the other thing that stands
out out, Clark ask you guys both this.

Speaker 4 (36:42):
Is it just me?

Speaker 1 (36:43):
Or is he starting with you? Chris? Is it me?
Or is he just becoming more aggressive at the plate,
swinging earlier in counts.

Speaker 2 (36:49):
I think that's part of it for sure, and find
the pitches he can drive to the bullfield.

Speaker 1 (36:53):
Now.

Speaker 2 (36:53):
The first home run, not not the one eleven games ago,
but the one first one this week came off a
position player. It was like, whatever, but you get when
you can. And then he hit a four or twenty
foot bomb the next game. It was like, oh, it's
in there. So hopefully he starts turning on the balls more.
But yeah, it's it's it's a process for him sometimes
to get a little bit more aggressive, and and you know,

(37:15):
he's got kind of a leadoff hitter mentality, so he's
gonna work counts and slap the ball away the other
way when he can. But looking for pitchers to drive
is I think probably the last step for him this
year before he gets to the big leagues.

Speaker 1 (37:29):
Yeah, the Clark is I think, like you guys mentioned,
I think you guys mentioned this last week. How like
like clockwork starts coming around this time of year. So
as far as Valencia goes, which kind of leads into
Stans question about you see Jake Rogers get traded the
deadline duds are expiring contract it with Valencia hidden the

(37:51):
way he is depends on the interest of the team. Really,
I mean it would be considered for cash considerations because
he wants more, you know, like something like that. I
don't know, I don't but Valencia is a catching downgrade
because catching wise is not as strong a suit. He's
a He's a future d probably if he can work

(38:11):
on his first baseman side of things. I know he
prized himself as a catcher and and but he's still
I don't have to Tiger se him as a catcher.
I really don't.

Speaker 4 (38:19):
The Tigers have a pretty high bar, like a J.

Speaker 3 (38:21):
Hinch and Chris Fetter have a pretty high bar for
what they want in a defensive catcher.

Speaker 4 (38:25):
I mean, I don't.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
I don't know if this is like the switch, but
I mean they did keep Jake Rodgers over trying to
you know, trying to extend Carson Kelly. I mean, they
like Jake Rodgers because they feel like he's, you know,
kind of the captain of the ship as far as
the team goes, and they like his defense and his
game calling. I don't I'd be very surprised if they
turned many games over to Edward Ovalencia to catch. I

(38:47):
still think if if Jake Rogers got hurt right now,
do you think Valencia would come up or do you
think Nido would come up?

Speaker 4 (38:52):
Because I still think it would probably be Tomas Needo.

Speaker 1 (38:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (38:57):
Yeah, and.

Speaker 2 (39:00):
Yeah, I guess if they if things do fall apart
and they just trade everybody, then maybe maybe somebody wants
Jake Rogers. You're not probably gonna get a ton for him,
but yeah, it wouldn't shock me if they try to
resign him for next year as a you know, as
a free agent, cheap free agent, as a backup catcher.
Rogers may want to try to find a place where
he could start again, because he does have a twenty

(39:22):
home run season on his record, you know, he's never
hit much, but he's a good defender, so he might
be able to find a job somewhere. But I don't
think the Tigers necessarily have a backup plan for him
as a backup catcher just yet.

Speaker 1 (39:37):
Yeah, and v Onceia, I think he's been playing more first.
I think, let me out, I get set.

Speaker 2 (39:42):
He's played like a handful more games a catcher than first.
It's like twenty four and nineteen or something like that.

Speaker 1 (39:46):
It's like every other day, So he alternates every other
day between first and catching. And and Nato, by the way,
it has seemed like he's found a home here and
like with the Tiger organization, I was reading somewhere that
it seems like he's been really uncomfortable things. So, but
Nito is a guy defensively who is a really really
can He called the game and he offensively, he did

(40:09):
some stuff in Lakeland. But I'm with you, Jim, It's
it's kind of like a he he's hitting better as
of late, but you know, the splits exactly against lefties.
He's batt into eighteen and the Tigers want somebody that
can hit lefties. If you're a right handed bat so
that doesn't help us.

Speaker 3 (40:27):
And they've got Spencer turkles and who that's that's what
Spencer Torkleson kind of does. Now, yeah, you know, doesn't
hit right handers that well. But you know, I'd rather,
you know, I'd rather have Spencer Turckleson in there than
Edward of Valencia, even just for defensive reasons. You know,
Torkleson doesn't grade well, and everybody's always harping on the grades,
but first base grades don't kind of don't jibe that

(40:49):
well to me with the eye test compared to some
other most other positions. I mean, in general, I'm a
stats guy, but you know, they don't. They don't grade picking,
they don't. I don't think they give enough weight sometimes
till first baseman that throw down to second real well
Toorkoson is not good at picking ground balls and doesn't
have much range, but you know, you feel comfortable with
him there. EDWARDO Valencia is still learning to be a

(41:10):
first baseman. If somebody someone else is gonna play first base,
just play Keith there, like, just just see how it goes.
Keith is tall, he's big, He's played third base and
second base. I mean he should be able to catch
the ball. So it's easy, right, somebody ashwashed?

Speaker 5 (41:25):
What do you think it's incredibly hard?

Speaker 1 (41:27):
Yeah, but no, it's a I want to show the
fans something here that I wanted to as far as
like somebody was asking, Okay, who can who I'm gonna
just give a stat I'm gonna give a quick little
as you guys can teach Chris, you want to answer
the question about Soda gives some long being a reliever
or I'm not sure he's gonna be either or at

(41:48):
this point, you.

Speaker 2 (41:49):
Know, at this point he feels a little bit like
the pitching equivalent of Jayce Young, where he's just kind
of playing out the string in Toledo until they release
him or really because you know, they had so many
pitching injuries and he didn't really get a shot. Now
he was injured too, but he you know, he's he's
behind Madden in the pecking order for sure, and we're
about to have you know, Montero and Melton in front

(42:12):
of him again. So it's a yeah, it's it's a
tough road for him to get up to the big leagues.
Maybe maybe as a reliever, but you know, he doesn't
throw particularly hard. So I don't know, like I said,
it maybe getting later early for fbl.

Speaker 3 (42:29):
Yeah, I mean, the only thing he's got going for
him is that, you know, he didn't really come back
from Tommy John last year, you know, healthy, and then
he was banged up the spring. So I can understand
if they want to give him a little while. If
he could get back to ninety three ninety four with
good command, I would at least have some interest in him,
you know, like maybe being a useful pitcher. And so

(42:49):
maybe that's what they're just kind of waiting to see
as if, you know, once he gets enough reps in
a little bit of that that Jews comes back.

Speaker 4 (42:55):
But it's not. It's definitely not tracking very well, that's
for sure.

Speaker 1 (43:00):
By the way, somebody was talking about Liam Hick Charles
saying Lemhick's one point war still feels like a mismanagement
of talent at the front office. Rogers hasn't hit over
two hundred since twenty two three. Yeah, but he's one
of the top five defensive catchers in the American League
in terms of framing and what have you. And Hicks. Look, no, look, nobody, nobody,
nobody in the Tigers' front office expected the Marlins to

(43:23):
pick up Hicks and do what he's doing right now.
There was like he he was a very violent part
of that eerie second run championship. Don't get me wrong,
but nobody and nobody thought like that was only Marlins
moved that year the free agent wise, that was the
only they think they did even like picking up players.
So the Tigers may have thought that like keep up exposed,

(43:46):
like who often picks a catcher in Rule five draft?
I can't think, you know, I can't think of that.

Speaker 3 (43:51):
So I actually someone that can't really that you don't
really want to catch very much?

Speaker 4 (43:56):
Yeah, I know, yeah, so.

Speaker 1 (43:58):
You know Hicks was that. I'm sorry. I don't blame
the Tigers on that, Charles, I can't Belieme. I can't
blame the trod on that. And and you know, whoever
Scott and for Marlins give him, give him a bonus
for that.

Speaker 2 (44:10):
Well, yeah, the Marlins can do whatever the hell they want.
They could take guys in the Rule five but if
it doesn't work out, whatever, they're you know, they're not
under any pressure to win, No one ever expects them
to win. They're playing better. But yeah, I mean, I
don't think the Rangers thought Hicks was that good. He
was a ninth round pick who looks like a senior
sign I think, who got thirty grand as a Sigond bonus,
and they traded him to the Tigers with Tyler Owens

(44:32):
for Carson Kelly and inspiring Carson Kelly contract. So they
didn't think much of him, and then the Tigers I think
did like him a little bit. But yeah, we've talked
about it what Hinch really values in catching, and I
don't know how much say he has over the minor
league guys, but they have numbers that say how good
these defenders are, and I'm sure that played a part

(44:53):
in it, like can this guy catch?

Speaker 5 (44:55):
Not? Really? All right? Well, don't need to protect them.

Speaker 3 (44:58):
All I'll say is that it's it's not a huge
surprise that he's hitting like it's it's a surprise that
he's hitting for some power. And they protected a whole
bunch of guys that they didn't need to protect probably
and have cut all those guys. Yeah, so it was
still a mistake, you know, it's not like the not
the end of the world, not the worst mistake I've
ever seen. But because Liam Hicks could maybe play first
base right now, and then you'd be like, okay, you

(45:20):
know that we've got another option from from Torque. But yeah,
what happens with Liam Hicks is not a make or
break type item or a or a huge deal because
he was never going to catch for the Tigers.

Speaker 1 (45:31):
This is the only mistake that Brandon always talks about
all the time, which is Carstin Kelly. So Brandon will
be Brandon has been consistent since day one. The day
they let him go, you you were like, look, this
is going to come back to haunt the Tigers.

Speaker 4 (45:42):
Yeah, and it did so, and it did a little bit. Yeah, yeah,
it will love to have kept.

Speaker 1 (45:45):
Up the key the key sweat reference. Fantastic. We've we've
hit a new pop culture reference here on the show
thanks to Dylianinjevie's Yeah, the.

Speaker 2 (45:57):
Three guys they added to the forty Man when they
could have hadded Hicks. Where Chase Lee, Tyler Madison and
Tyler Owens.

Speaker 4 (46:04):
Mm hmm yeah yeah.

Speaker 5 (46:10):
Looking.

Speaker 1 (46:13):
But yeah, meanwhile, Dylan Smithson picked up his first Dave
from San Francisco yesterday.

Speaker 4 (46:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (46:18):
Time time Madison is just so so brutal because you know,
every time he has a couple of good games, I'm like, oh,
maybe maybe here we go, and then it just right
right back every time, Like, yeah, it's just not happening.

Speaker 1 (46:31):
We're just talking about.

Speaker 3 (46:32):
Would be so good if he, if he, you know,
consistently could command everything.

Speaker 4 (46:35):
I would love to see what it looked like.

Speaker 1 (46:36):
But you just see exactly what Chris and I would
talk about over the weekend. I was like, what the hell, Tyler?
And then then I saw the state lamp there it
is like right there. No, It's like, come on, man,
which which version are we going to get of him?

Speaker 3 (46:50):
We should say too, how you Lee went and got
sent back down probably was disappointed and absolutely mashed last week.

Speaker 4 (46:55):
So kudos to him for not not missing a not
missing a beat Lewis.

Speaker 2 (47:02):
I was just about to bring up Royce Lewis because
when this is like the difference, you know, people are like, oh,
it looks like he's a four A player. He's like, no,
he sucked as a big leaguer. But he went down
and hit ten home runs in fifteen games that minor
leaguers don't do that. That's a big leaguer in minor
league baseball, and that's what you'd like to see. I
always bring up the game where Ridley Green had a
rehab game in Toledo and hit like five balls one
hundred and ten miles an hour. I was like, Okay,

(47:22):
this guy, Yeah, this is a big leaguer.

Speaker 5 (47:24):
In the minors.

Speaker 2 (47:25):
Oh, I forgot about it, and I think, I think,
you know how how you le still has stuff to learn,
the hill stuff, stuff to prove. But if he goes
down there in mashes at triple A, which he hasn't
done yet, it's like, okay, like he learned something from
the big leagues and this is this is easy for
him now, which would be a great sign.

Speaker 1 (47:39):
Yeah, it's feeno. Good signs though. Brett Callahan continuing to
rate yet back to back days where he had home runs,
he's been walking in a higher clip. Uh, he's Brett
Callahan is the real deal in the coming in the
second half of the season. And Pacheco, by the way,
we were talking about this. Uh. Mark Gross text me

(48:00):
about the checko and he's been actually impressed with him,
even though he's not walking as much. But the rest
of the offense, it's even Aronzo six walks at eight shrecoffs.
He didn't hit the home runs that he was doing,
but still, nevertheless, it's still a good sign to see him.
He's catching very well, and I have to look up
the splits in terms of Callahan and Eta Jim, I

(48:23):
would say twenty twenty seven. Maybe maybe Lake twenty twenty seven.
You have to, Yeah, go ahead, Chris, what do you think?

Speaker 2 (48:30):
Well, we know that Scott Harris likes him. Yeah, but
he'll have to be added to the forty man this
this offseason, along with Peck and probably a couple of
maybe Persceno I think needs to get added. Yeah, but
just so once turn in the forty man, it could
be next year. But yeah, Like he's also I think
probably close to deserving promotion to Triple A Toledo. It's

(48:52):
just a matter of if there's space for him. You've
got melt Jerry, you got Gentry, you got Clark, you
get Jokes, all these guys up there that you don't
know if in cruise, I don't know if you give
him every day abs. But yeah, he's playing really well
and it's been a great development this year. We'll see you,
I mean, Triple A will be a good test for him.

Speaker 3 (49:08):
Yeah, maybe it'll just come down to when they decide
to promote Max Clark, you know, and how Max Clark
is doing. Callahan's not really a dedicated center fielder, but
he could play out there and that.

Speaker 4 (49:17):
Would give him a space. And we've all seen this
a lot.

Speaker 3 (49:20):
You know, teams will pick up these veteran major leaguers
or you know, veteran minor leaguers who you know are
just kind of stashed there like jokes or Kel Stevenson,
dudes like that, and then you start to finally let
those guys go, you know, in July, and you know,
cause you're kind of getting to the point where you're
ready to promote some people.

Speaker 4 (49:37):
So yeah, maybe Callahan will come up then.

Speaker 3 (49:39):
I mean, if Callahan doesn't play next year, it's probably
just not happening for him, or or yeah, maybe he
gets gets claimed or something. But yeah, I mean, if
everything goes to heck this year, I wouldn't mind seeing
Brett Callahan like get a look even this year since
you have to add him anyway.

Speaker 1 (49:56):
Comment here, comment like Kevin Peyton grounds wait to the
weekly chart to see close one hundred fifty pounds is getting's.

Speaker 4 (50:03):
Gonna steal hundred bases this year? And you know, hit
two home runs.

Speaker 5 (50:07):
Yeah he was.

Speaker 2 (50:07):
He's like top five and stolen bases in all of
minor league baseball. Part of that is the new rules
in Double A where you could just run with reckless
abandon because they can only disengage once yep.

Speaker 4 (50:17):
And also sets Stevenson miss some time. So yeah, Atingraham was.

Speaker 3 (50:20):
Able to build a little bit of a lead in
stolen bases, but they ain't gonna last.

Speaker 2 (50:23):
Stevenson actually got caught twice this week, the first two
times all year.

Speaker 5 (50:26):
But so now he's just twenty eight for thirty.

Speaker 2 (50:29):
But yeah, I did want to bring up the bummer
of Joe Miller, and you know, we don't get like
there was nothing very obvious that happened, but he got
hurt warming up before the second inning, and he looked
very dejected walking off the mound, which just you know,
I mean, any injury I guess could make you feel

(50:51):
that way, but you feel like it's probably an arm
thing unfortunately, which that really sucks.

Speaker 3 (50:57):
It does, because he was kind of like starting to
get in to where he might have, you know, might
have earned himself a cup of coffee sometime in the
next year.

Speaker 4 (51:04):
I mean, obviously he's a veteran minor league or not
not not.

Speaker 3 (51:07):
The type of guy who's like a big prospect and
going to do all kinds of stuff. But you know,
he he could have been a guy who comes up
and does some kind of a brand herder or Emmanuel
Dejesu's type thing for you for you know a period
of time, and maybe he gets maybe gets better. So
that's yeah, that's disappointing because he did, like you know,
like you just don't see that many guys his age

(51:27):
like suddenly take the leap that it looked like he
was taking there for a little while. So but unfortunately
we've also seen that too, where like a guy starts
to throw a bunch harder and then.

Speaker 2 (51:35):
Yeah, exactly, so that's pretty common. The old will Kel
her name does arm snap?

Speaker 3 (51:41):
Yeah, yeah, the ucl turns to turns to rubber and
then then finally snaps.

Speaker 5 (51:46):
Now yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (51:50):
The question, is he in Korea? I wonder.

Speaker 3 (51:54):
I hope so that'd that'd be the best thing for him,
Like doesn't go into play in Korea, seem like it
just fun like don't resist the guys out there.

Speaker 2 (52:03):
No, I mean, you're right, Yeah, he has a hand
Wi the Han White Eagles thirty eight strikeouts in twenty
two bucks and fifty four in still can't get the
swinging miss ye.

Speaker 5 (52:16):
But uh, who's asked the question there about McGonagall.

Speaker 1 (52:21):
Oh if google schooble nos was wondering if McGonagall been
called August twenty twenty five side in hindsight, I don't.
I'll say it once, I'll say it again. When I
saw him in Erie, he was not the same outfielder,
same fielder at all, not the same player. Whatever happened
between the last part of Erie in the Arizona fall

(52:42):
U till now until spring training, let's say in that
period of time, completely different player, completely different player he was.
He was there, but the fielding I was concerned about
with He's like, you know what, screw you, dude. That's fine.

Speaker 3 (52:57):
I would have liked to have seen the bat even
at the time, but I didn't. I wasn't going to
push for it either because he wasn't hot. If he
had been red hot, you know, at Eerie closing out
the year, I think it might have been a different story.
But like you said, like whatever he and Alan Trammell
did all off season turned him into a.

Speaker 4 (53:12):
Significantly better shortstop. I mean, and I don't think.

Speaker 3 (53:16):
I don't know if it was the ankle last year,
but you know I tied him a couple of times
last year. I'm Chris is probably better than this. You've
probably better than this.

Speaker 4 (53:22):
But I didn't. I didn't have him being this fast.

Speaker 3 (53:25):
I just don't just given um plus plus speed, but
it's it's like double plus speed.

Speaker 2 (53:29):
Really yeah. I mean I remember Jeff Ponce having him
as it's like, oh, a fifty five runner, like the
first time he saw him in pro ball, it's like, oh,
fifty five Greg speed to first base and you know,
faster than that underway.

Speaker 5 (53:40):
But we talked about it.

Speaker 2 (53:41):
We did see him at in Lansing a couple of times,
and it looked like it was just as fast as MATC.

Speaker 5 (53:47):
Clark were like, okay, that's true.

Speaker 2 (53:49):
But yeah, like I didn't have him this fast where
he's putting up like close to thirty feet per second
sprint speeds when he's running hardists.

Speaker 5 (53:57):
So hey, yeah, there's.

Speaker 3 (53:58):
A nice I think what we're saying is he put
in a ton of work this offseason. This is not
quite the player we were watching last year. We all
loved him. We all thought he was going to be good.
We all, I think, you know, we're pretty convinced he
should make the team even before camp started. But he's
he's a lot better player than he was last year
in just about every facet.

Speaker 4 (54:15):
Of the game. Is Yeah, Lewis, he's twenty one, so
that makes sense.

Speaker 1 (54:20):
Travel is rookie season seventy eight?

Speaker 5 (54:21):
That just great? But what the hell is that base
runner doing?

Speaker 4 (54:24):
Yeah? What are you doing? Bro? Leftfielder might have had
that anyway if he'd.

Speaker 2 (54:30):
Been Yeah, like I get I guess, you know, you
trust your eyes and say, oh that's dropping, but they.

Speaker 1 (54:37):
Were dealing, yeah, you know. And John Hiller was in
that highlight too. That was his last season as a.

Speaker 5 (54:41):
Tighter, by the way.

Speaker 2 (54:42):
With fun fact, he worked great for me as the
relief pitcher and one of the in that you know whatever,
the game that everybody's playing where you try to build
one hundred and thirty win team or whatever.

Speaker 1 (54:50):
Oh oh yeah, I just played that for the first time.
That is an addicting game. I do like the eighty two.
And oh that's also another fun one too. That's a
good way to cool time.

Speaker 5 (54:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (55:00):
The last thing I just wanted to touch on like
I think Brandon made a good point like if McGonagall
had been like scorching hot, I think they may have
called him up last year. I also think, uh, like
maybe they would have considered it after the minor league
season ended, but they were collapsing in a way that

(55:20):
was horrific. Of course, it was like last month, and
it's like, I don't think you want to bring a
prospect up into that because then they feel like they
have to fix it, or fans think they're gonna like, oh,
he'll he'll save us, Like that's why you know last month, No,
don't bring Max Clark up. You need you need a centerfielder.
But this is not gonna be good for anybody. So
I think that played into it. And also, you know,

(55:40):
like there was no pressing need to put him on
the forty man for like like literally not until after
this year. I think actually after next year, right, but
they have to join the forty so that's right. Yeah,
he's still he's got to the big leaguesrett quickly, and
he's good.

Speaker 3 (55:55):
Nice to see Moys Rodriguez pitched well, you know, throwing
more strike a little more consistently and throwing hard and
you know, kind of coming a little closer to our
like maybe this guy can Jason is fully his way
to a bullpen roll.

Speaker 2 (56:09):
Yeah, there were a couple of games at this weekend.
The one Wandason Charles pitch one inning and they came
out in the ninth. It was like seven to one
and he gave up six runs and they had to
bring in Andrew Jenkins to pitch because that was the
game that Joe Miller got hurt, so they ran out
of pitching and they lost. So they blew a you know,
a monumental lead at the end, but then they kind
of got Richmond back yesterday when Pacheco hit a two

(56:31):
runner with two outs. But yeah, Rodriguez in the game yesterday,
came in and he was throwing I don't remember him
throwing a hundred and one before, h so he was
like he's been up to one hundred before. But but
then yes, he had a throwing error. It was like
a soft chopper to him and he threw it twenty
feet over the first baseman's head. That led the guy

(56:52):
go in all the way to the third and it
was a sack fly and so that was set was
a bummer, But they came back and won and he
got the last three outs pretty easily.

Speaker 5 (56:58):
So yeah, still hope there.

Speaker 1 (57:00):
Yeah, and Rodrigez, by the way, is the fastest reliever
in the system truth velosity, the hardest throwing guy in
the Yeah.

Speaker 2 (57:07):
Easily, you know, especially with Marko Jmenez on the shelf,
there's nobody really even close.

Speaker 1 (57:11):
Yeah, and that's that's sad anyway. Yeah, because but yeah,
the the the a Jason fully fastball syndrome is there.
And I think didn't we cloud the pitch the spring
breakout game? Didn't he Chris? I thought that's what we got.

Speaker 2 (57:26):
Was in the spring breakout game, I believe, But I
think he only pitched what like one or two betters
at the very end.

Speaker 1 (57:31):
I think he had ninety nine. I think we got
I think we I think we got him. I'm pretty
sure we. I would have.

Speaker 5 (57:35):
Sworn we go back and take a look.

Speaker 2 (57:41):
Hey, right, white Caps win the series helps to have
helped to have a decent pitcher for free on Sunday.

Speaker 5 (57:47):
But they won four out of two, so I should say.

Speaker 4 (57:50):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (57:51):
Somebody was kind of commenting like, well, you know, the
white Caps, they perked up just like the Tigers did.
It was like, well they had Andrew, Andrew Sears and
Tark Schoogle starting games for them, had the that up.

Speaker 1 (58:00):
Yeah, and Luis Castille is pitching better as of late two.
As far as uh Rainer, yea, yeah, sorry, sorry we have.

Speaker 2 (58:09):
Who would I say, Louis Castille he was right on
your mind, Yeah he's not.

Speaker 1 (58:15):
But mint uh he Minton that that's a stat line, Chris, Yeah,
that's a statline.

Speaker 2 (58:21):
Like that was such a weird game, man. He started
that was he struck out the first five batters in
that game, but then gave up two homers in a
walk in that inning and then made it like a
couple of mornings and then give up a homer and
that was it.

Speaker 1 (58:33):
But I ended up going back and watching that. I
was wondering what. I'm like, what is this match?

Speaker 4 (58:38):
Like?

Speaker 1 (58:38):
What is he doing this? And yeah, I wasn't sure
what happened there? But no, it's uh Ricardo like we
were watching this game yesterday. We were watching the game.
Bryce Rayner made a couple of plays. He had that
one play where he got beat out there he kind
of like threw but he had a grounder a second
that was like one hundred and ten off the bat. Yeah,
the swing looks good. And then Jackson Strong. We were

(59:01):
re ranking our top forty five. It was funny. We're
like going, ah, you know Strong, it's falling off. No
sooner we say that it's a home run.

Speaker 5 (59:08):
Yeah, three state games straight.

Speaker 2 (59:10):
Yeah, he fell from I think we had him nineteenth
and he's now thirty fifth.

Speaker 5 (59:14):
So he fell.

Speaker 2 (59:15):
But you know, in our defense, he hadn't done much
of anything until like the last week.

Speaker 3 (59:19):
Yeah, I might have helped him to get a little
help help back around him because I don't know, maybe
maybe he was trying to do too much too because
he's he's hit okay, but yeah, we just haven't seen
much power. So yeah, that was nice because yeah, Ila
was feeling the same way, like, eh, Jackson's strong, kind
of kind of in downgrade territory here, but Nope, perked up,
perked up right away.

Speaker 1 (59:38):
As far as the rainer looks in the field, the
arm looks fine. I mean, just a couple of throws
where he kind of like the throws are strong.

Speaker 2 (59:45):
Yeah, that was just yeah, like you said, there was
an infield he there were a couple of infield hits
to them and to him in that game. And it's
just just the sort of stuff that you need to, like,
that's what you're in the minor leagues for, right, is
to refine your your internal clock. And no, you don't
have to like you can't take another step here, you
just have to fire it over and just small stuff
like that that he will improve on, because I'm sure
they talked.

Speaker 5 (01:00:05):
To him about it after the game.

Speaker 2 (01:00:07):
You know, you'll you'll two times saw young winner.

Speaker 5 (01:00:10):
You cost him a hit, so good.

Speaker 3 (01:00:12):
Yeah, no coffee for you, No coffee for you, said Scoob.

Speaker 4 (01:00:16):
Yeah, yeah, all right, so you get the hot dog.

Speaker 3 (01:00:18):
You get the hot dog, Kurt, not the not the
you know, the Tahas de Brazil platter or whatever.

Speaker 5 (01:00:23):
They Yeah, I'm sure that you know.

Speaker 2 (01:00:26):
Or so I'm looking at the and I remember this
now that the Spring Breakout game, how there were like,
out of like the top one hundred x or pitched velocities,
there were like six from the Tigers. The Pirates just
have this never ending grade of guys throwing ninety nine.
So Marco Jimenez through the hardest pitch for the Tigers,
and that ninety eight point one he had the next
four or five Rodriguez topped out a ninety six point six,

(01:00:48):
But I honestly, I don't think he threw more than
like three or four pitches in that game.

Speaker 1 (01:00:52):
Didn't come in. I thought he came in when they
had like two or three pitchers, you know, like row
or something.

Speaker 2 (01:00:57):
Yeah, and I think it was one of those things where, yeah,
they they want to get everybody game, so he came
in for like one batter. Dylan Smith was in that game.
I forgot about that. Oh yeah, we'll have through four pitches,
Rodriguez through four pitches, Trevin Michael through seven. So yeah, But.

Speaker 1 (01:01:12):
As far as the school situation goes, well the situation
plays out. Honestly, schoobl knows, I don't really right now.
The only answer we have and yes we do focus
in the minor leagues, but we do talk about Tigers
as in general just as a new listener. It really
depends on how they how much during contention. That's really

(01:01:33):
about it, as simple as its like they I think
the Tigers will They'll play everything close to the best.
That's how they are.

Speaker 3 (01:01:38):
The front offices and if you're us, we're kind of
roasting like the national media for just like pouncing on
this story and writing ten thousand trade Schooble articles over
two weeks since last freaking September or October. So everybody
just needs to chill. Well, you know, we'll see We're
just gonna have to see how it goes. I mean,
I assume they'll trade him if they're if they're well
out of it, and they'll probably do pretty well. But

(01:02:02):
you know, they shouldn't trade him if they're you know,
if they go on some crazy run here.

Speaker 4 (01:02:06):
But it's just too early to say anything.

Speaker 3 (01:02:08):
We need to see him come back, and we need
to see him beat Terrek schoolbl for a month and
then we'll go from there. But you know, we're just
gonna have to be patient and sit with us for
a while and see what they can do as a team,
not just him.

Speaker 1 (01:02:21):
So Jim wanted to know about Hayden and Chris and
I were talking about his afflet like he took one
off the foot and kept going. Yes, and his ability
to I think the one thing that has helped haiding
his defensive versatility to play the outfield too. But yeah,
I'm rooting for him ahead Chris.

Speaker 2 (01:02:39):
Now, there's a lot to like about what he hading
he's fast. He plays really good defense at second He's
made a couple of credible plays there. He can play
short stop, he can play center field. That's gonna get
you plenty of time. He's a switch hitter who puts
the bat on the ball, He takes his walk, does
and strike out of time power, I don't think so.
He's about the same size as Peyton Graham. He may

(01:03:00):
be able to lean into like, you know, pull pulling
the ball in the air at some point, but that's
not really his game, and I don't know how much.
He really only needs to be, like, you know, a
five to ten home run guy, and he could get there.

Speaker 5 (01:03:10):
He think he had four last year.

Speaker 4 (01:03:12):
Kind of a kind of a trade cruise type. Yeah, developing,
you know, basically.

Speaker 2 (01:03:16):
Yeah, Yeah, he's a good player. I think they're gonna
he's gonna be around for a while. And if he
does start hitting for power, that probably you know, makes
him a legitimate prospect. But even without it, he's going
to be a very helpful player, I think.

Speaker 1 (01:03:30):
Any way, Jacob saysn't Jacobs has been starting on a
regular basis.

Speaker 2 (01:03:33):
Right He's that was he he came out of the
bullpen in that game. I think that was the Seers start.

Speaker 4 (01:03:39):
Yeah, that's right, yep.

Speaker 2 (01:03:41):
And so it was like his roughest outing I think
at Hia yet, which is sometimes guys just don't feel
comfortable coming out of the bullpen. Maybe he just had
a rough start. He gave up a couple of home runs.
I think, you know, the fastball, the ninety three mile
an hour fastball at the top of his own isn't
getting by every bat like it did in Lakeland. There
are a couple of guys who could catch up to
it now, So gonna you alter the game.

Speaker 3 (01:03:59):
Plan most of most of you know, people listening to
this will already know too. But just to mention him,
like Andrews here is rehabing West Michigan. Should be back
in Erie, you know, in another week or two, and
he's probably your most advanced pitching prospect. We don't really
know where Jake Miller is going to be because he's been,
you know, banged up for so long. But he's rehabbing
as well. But you know, so I don't know. I

(01:04:21):
won't exactly call that like light at the end of
the tubble the tunnel for the upper upper level pitching,
but at least those two guys are are healthy. So
it was kind of a bummer that called the Salsado
goes down. But at the same time, you know, you're
seeing we're finally starting to see some of the pitching
prospects who've been missing an action for you know, two years,
start to finally get some work and at least emerge

(01:04:42):
from the darkness.

Speaker 2 (01:04:43):
Yeah, yeah, definitely.

Speaker 1 (01:04:45):
It's it's a welcome site, it really is. I can't
not stress to you enough how welcome was side that it,
especially with all the injuries that have been taking place. Yeah,
go ahead, Chris, with you want to lead the flying
Tigers of this week.

Speaker 2 (01:04:58):
Yeah, I mean it's it's been kind of a tough
couple weeks. I think they're three to nine in the
last two weeks, which is unfortunate. You know, they were
kind of the team holding it together for playoff hopes
in the first half, and it looks like nobody's gonna
make it now.

Speaker 5 (01:05:10):
But yeah, just kind of a mix of not a
ton on offense.

Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
And some some rough starting pitching performances that led to
some rough bullpen performances. You know, Malachai Wetherspoon, we talked
about it. He hit his thirty pitch limit in the
first inning and only got one out, so they pulled them.
I think, I mean, this is you know, it's professional baseball,
but at the same time, this is the minor leagues.
I think they should add that rule that they've added

(01:05:37):
to the lower levels. They probably should do it for
every level, honestly, because it's still trying to develop players. Yeah,
where the starting pitcher, you could pull them for one
inning and put them back in once. I think that
would be great for somebody like Malackai Wetherspoon, but it
didn't work out that way. And yeah, then you had
Jank Giaz just get absolutely murdered after that. So it
was it was a blowout there. And Rinsel it was

(01:06:00):
another situation where he came in in relief. I think
it was his first relief appearance or maybe his second
since the beginning of the year, and he just didn't
have it. He's another guy who I think hitters have
figured out what he's doing, which is like sixty percent
fastballs at the top of the zone and then a
change up. So you've got to fix some things there.
But yeah, I mean Christensen, we talked about it on

(01:06:21):
our separate podcast, The other day RODJ. But he's just
so much fun to watch. He's pitched so well. It's
crazy for a guy who had like a six and
a half ra in college and he's just out here
with a funky look and four legitimate pitches and nobody's
doing anything against them. So I would like to see
him get challenged a little bit move up too, But

(01:06:42):
you know, as a fifteenth rounder, I don't know, I
don't know if he's how high he's on the pecking
order or if they're really going to do it, you know,
a meritocracy where like this guy has earned it.

Speaker 3 (01:06:52):
Yeah, it's stuff to tell down there because I you know,
like I bet stuff. Plus doesn't exactly like love all
of his secondary pitches, but he can spot them all
and you just don't see that. So yeah, when he's
like putting cutters and sliders on the edge against these
guys and dropping change ups just off the edge, like
they they are overwhelmed. So yeah, I would I would
totally agree that, you know, challenging him at West Michigan

(01:07:12):
would be the way to go to and to really
like test what he's got. You know, you'd love to
see him, you know, develop a little more velocity over
the next couple of years and and see what he
turns into.

Speaker 4 (01:07:21):
But he's definitely been well worth the watch.

Speaker 1 (01:07:25):
No, and we're saying originally said Jeff Weaver or and
I was like, Chris meant Jared Weaver.

Speaker 2 (01:07:33):
So yeah, well just we looked at him side of aside,
and it's a little bit different, right, But there's just
like when you watch Christiansen throw, you get like it's
evocative of somebody, and it just jaredy were popped into
my head. It's not it's not the same delivery by
any means, but there's something too, like the you know,
the longer.

Speaker 5 (01:07:48):
Hair and the lower armslot.

Speaker 2 (01:07:49):
But yeah, yeah, I mean I like I said, I
don't think he's gonna be Jared Weaver.

Speaker 5 (01:07:53):
He throws hard.

Speaker 1 (01:07:53):
No, no, no, no, that was my no. I was saying,
that was my mistake. I was the one that made
a mistake. I was the one that said, yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:07:58):
No, it's fine.

Speaker 2 (01:07:59):
I'm just saying, like he just his delivery reminded me
of that. But yeah, one of the one of the
more enjoyable stories we've talked about.

Speaker 5 (01:08:05):
Ally Tanner a bunch.

Speaker 2 (01:08:06):
You don't need to keep harping on that, but he
had a decent start and uh, you know he's a
young kid.

Speaker 5 (01:08:12):
Just keep him healthy.

Speaker 1 (01:08:13):
Yeah, you're right, you want to see him. Not to
mention too if as far as like Christensen looking, I
would love to see him must Michigan. Similarly, youper, by
the way, is on Thursday's Vision. Youper is a Thursday
show or MOPS podcast.

Speaker 4 (01:08:29):
So sorry, stuck with me, buddy, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:08:33):
Charles says Chris Brown from Minor League Comissioner Rules Committee President.

Speaker 2 (01:08:36):
I don't think you want that because then you would
also get the warning track that's actually remote. My other
ridiculous ideas sand traps in the outfield.

Speaker 3 (01:08:46):
But yeah, occasionable, occasionable black mom o release into the field.

Speaker 5 (01:08:50):
Yeah, spice it up.

Speaker 2 (01:08:51):
But yeah, I mean you know f c L, same UL,
same old Chris Rodriguez striking out. We Yeah, Owen Hall,
that was another one where they actually pulled him right.
He could could only get one out, left the bases loaded,
and they brought in a catcher who gave up a
grand slam. So three of those are in runs are
because a catcher gave up a grand slam. Then Owen

(01:09:13):
Hall came back in and got nine in the next
ten guys out, So that was progress.

Speaker 4 (01:09:18):
I think it was wild early.

Speaker 3 (01:09:20):
So it just was like, yeah, yeah, he just settled
in and got his act together and became Owen Hall
again for a while.

Speaker 5 (01:09:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:09:26):
I don't know if he is on. I think he's
actually on the FCL roster rather than on the Tiger,
the Lakeland Flying Tiger's roster, doing a rehab, but Paul
Wilson is doing a rehab in the FCL. He threw
one inning Paul Wilson esque, and we said, you know,
hit a batter, walked, a guy got a double plane
a strikeout. Yeah, I mean after a few more of those,

(01:09:48):
you would think that, yeah, he might may go up
to Lakeland, in which case somebody from Lakeland's going to
go up to West Michigan. And Jake Miller actually pitched
today instead of you know, he did a rehab in
Lakeland and then I guess, for whatever reason, been on schedule.
He pitched today and it's you know, two and two thirds,
five strikeouts, very little damage against you know, what you
would expect, but good to see.

Speaker 5 (01:10:08):
No idea of what happened to Heisman, yeah or Ryan Hall.

Speaker 2 (01:10:13):
Oh yeah, yeah, I think the the general consensus or
a belief is that if you're a high school pitcher
and you were taken by the Tigers, you are doomed.

Speaker 4 (01:10:20):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, or check it on you in three years.

Speaker 1 (01:10:23):
Yeah, they're in the Bermuda triangle somewhere, because I mean
it was Ice was a ninth rounder and he hasn't
given meat appearance yet.

Speaker 2 (01:10:30):
We had we have video of him pitching in the
you know, sort of extended spring for the yeah training,
he's on the roster but is not injured or at
least not on the injured list, and he just hasn't pitched.
It's kind of like what happened with schofflbein last year,
where they didn't put him on the injured list, or
he didn't and maybe they did. It just hasn't been noted,
uh in the transactions, so it hasn't been reflected there.

Speaker 5 (01:10:52):
But yeah, I don't know, I don't know what's going
on there.

Speaker 4 (01:10:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:10:55):
Just good to see Paul Wilson. Just good to see
Owenhall pitching. Just just let him go. Yeah, Jake Miller back,
like okay, at least there's like some stuff to to
start working with here. Yeah, and then yeah, another good
outing for Jon and Koba, let's go your guy, When
is he gonna get promoted?

Speaker 4 (01:11:12):
Come on, Tigers.

Speaker 1 (01:11:14):
Two Fighters is one of the people that saw our videos,
so thank you totally. Yeah, it's just a no, it is.
It is extremely frustrating because we saw a lot of
a lot of the guys we saw. As I recall,
we're sitting there watching other pitchers pitch, and like, you know,
for example, Mike Matthews still has not have yet to

(01:11:35):
pitch a single game in a Tiger minor league camp.

Speaker 5 (01:11:39):
Mhm.

Speaker 3 (01:11:41):
But then we saw Jonathan Rodgers pitch this week, you know,
who had been released and then signed back still only
I think twenty one or two something like that.

Speaker 5 (01:11:51):
Yeah, he was, he was part of that twenty three class.

Speaker 4 (01:11:54):
Three class Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:11:55):
Yeah, so you know, you never know, like sometimes they
emerge out of you know, whatever repair shop. The Tigers
have trying to trying to get it together, but yeah,
I mean they really really need to get this together.
This is going to be an ongoing topic for years
beyond the season, because yeah, you know.

Speaker 4 (01:12:13):
The position player group might look really good.

Speaker 3 (01:12:14):
Max Clark comes up and Tyron Loronzo like develops as
a catcher, and however, much he hits, becomes the backup
to Dingler, who's now god teer Dylan Dingler, and then
yeah Brice and you know, maybe takes up her first space.
We can be all optimistic about that stuff, but yeah,
where the pitching is going to come from is pretty
hard to see.

Speaker 1 (01:12:32):
Yeah, I like what deadly needs to be said?

Speaker 2 (01:12:36):
Yeah, right, you know, no, I'm honestly, you know, Alan
Max said, you know what, whisk looked good once then
then he was hurt. But like, I'm good with them.
If you want to get those kind of younger arms
who have some some development, keep going to the Juco route.
That's where you get El Salt, That's where you got
with Whiska, That's where you got Cash Kuiper. They've done
some decent work there. Maybe it's a little bit harder

(01:12:59):
to find those guys, and those guys who look good
generally have offers to go play at like a four
year college, so maybe cost a little bit more, but
you're paying more for these high school guys anyway, So.

Speaker 3 (01:13:09):
Yeah, keep doing that, but maybe just less of it
and a little more Juco and you know college too.
Like they you know, series wasn't a like a big
time pick, and you know, neither was Jade and Ham
and mister Ham obviously has been injured. But yeah, yeah,
so they found you know, they found Arms out of
college and Juco. So yeah, maybe just a little just
season it a little more that way. And it feels
like they've tried to do that with the last draft,

(01:13:31):
like taking Jacobs, taking Witherspoon, it felt like kind of
like we're trying to balance this out a little bit.

Speaker 2 (01:13:36):
Yeah, and Jacobs was a third rounder, like, you know,
he's he looks good. One of the guys, Josh, pointed
out that Josh Randall, who was there. Was he their
third runner or fourth runner? Third rounder? A couple of
years ago they traded to the Nationals for Kyle Finnigan.
He he hasn't had great numbers, but he just was
the Eastern League pitcher of the week, got promoted to

(01:14:00):
right now, He's got a zero ERA in two starts
in double A.

Speaker 3 (01:14:04):
So somebody says, oh dead. They interbe his time as
a flat circle. So is this when I start like
carving this.

Speaker 4 (01:14:10):
Can into stick figures. I shouldn't have cut my hair.

Speaker 1 (01:14:16):
Yeah, no, it is. Look. The one thing I will
say before we got out of here that about the
minor league side of things and sorts of pitching on
our top forty five. He actually, you know what, I
want to show our top forty five because I've done
the I done. I haven't done this in the graphic yet,
but we do have the Excel sheet real quick because
I wanted to show for those who Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:14:35):
I did also create the DSL slide. We don't need
to talk about it. Really, there was not a whole
lot going on, but I will say, like Randy Santana,
the guy we thought was like super tooled up.

Speaker 5 (01:14:44):
It was like one for eleven but six walks.

Speaker 2 (01:14:46):
He's like, he's taking a ton of walks and stole
six bases, including five in one game, five and five
innings in one game.

Speaker 5 (01:14:51):
Which is fun.

Speaker 3 (01:14:52):
But it made a diving catch through the dude out
of first for a double play. Yeah, Like so definitely
athleticism is real.

Speaker 2 (01:15:00):
But yeah, our top forty five, and as usual, we
took like the you know, five different opinions and mashed
them together to come up with a consensus. And that
way nobody's happy. But I think it does get a
little closer to I think the truth generally speaking.

Speaker 1 (01:15:14):
Yeah, this is where Yeah, this is kind of separate
sort of thing. So our top here's our top forty
five right here. Clark, Rainer, Rasgno, Ronzo, Jacob's Salsato, Yost, Witherspoon,
Iriaz and Series are on our top ten. And then
like I said, uh, there's kind of drop off here

(01:15:36):
a little bit. And there were some people that for
the noble names. By the way, I was the only
exact Lee, so I thought that was interesting. Chris and
I were the only went with Miller, so we had
three the way it went down there, we have had
three in order for them to hit the list.

Speaker 2 (01:15:52):
Yeah, and so yeah, a bunch of guys like you know,
we we both had Woody Hayding, but nobody else did
so sorry Weddy. Yeah, so it goes like, if you know,
we ended up like seventy eight different names, so there's
still some interesting players. It's just like, yeah, how much
of a prospect is this guy over that guy?

Speaker 5 (01:16:11):
But yeah, it's we touched on it before.

Speaker 2 (01:16:13):
You know, losing McGonagall as a prospect and gaining him
is a great big leader. Is is a lot of fun,
but it does make the minor league system suddenly feel
a lot worse.

Speaker 3 (01:16:22):
Yeah, I'd feel really good about the minor league system
if they just had a couple of pitches, pitchers, you know,
breaking through into eerie, you know, if they were just
at that level, Like I think the position player group
is going to be pretty good, and there's a lot
less of the Okay, well, this guy's either got to
hit because he can't do anything else types like you.

Speaker 4 (01:16:40):
Know, I mean John Peck doesn't doesn't have to absolutely mash.

Speaker 3 (01:16:43):
He just has to clean up his defense, you know,
and you've got like a useful speedy player there.

Speaker 4 (01:16:48):
They've got guys like that, which which helps.

Speaker 3 (01:16:50):
But yeah, there's also obviously a lot of a lot
of risk with guys like the Moronzo and Rainer as well.

Speaker 2 (01:16:57):
And I think it would feel a little bit better
if percye know, we're healthy and putting up like a
one ad WRC plus like he's possible, like escape, Like, oh,
we've got a guy absolutely mashing a double A. It's possible.
Maybe it doesn't, but but it would feel a little
bit better even though he is one of those guys
that that's got a hit or it won't work, but yeah,
he's got a chance to hit, So yeah, anyway, fun
times in Cleveland.

Speaker 1 (01:17:18):
The game Cleveland, He's lost.

Speaker 5 (01:17:21):
So I felt like the.

Speaker 4 (01:17:25):
Jackson Jube graduated. Yeah already.

Speaker 3 (01:17:27):
Yeah, so he's he's just not a project anymore, just
because he's played enough in the big leagues.

Speaker 2 (01:17:32):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that last comment. Yeah, we didn't talk
about Eddie Ones final, but yeah, to me, he looks
like he can hit, like he looks like a legitimate hitter,
which is you know, I been paying attention because he
kept getting on base and kept getting hits and stuff
like that. And then yeah, when he turned around the
ninety nine mile hour fastball from from Charlie Soto said

(01:17:54):
his name right, got his name Charlie something. Now it's
you know, he doesn't have the world's best fastball. I
think it's got, you know, not a great shape, but
still it's ninety nine and that was a short, quick
swing and he hit really hard at the gap. And
he's a heady player. He's been stealing a bunch of bases.
It's uh, he's just a fun guy right now.

Speaker 1 (01:18:11):
He said, we have him highlighted on our Patreon. So
if you are the YouTube we did, excuse me for
those are on our Patreon. On the podcast. We did
meant we showed some of the clips of the of
him during that particular stretch too. So uh, like I said,
if you're if patriarch, remember you can find an early
paid or a free member there behind a paywall. And then,

(01:18:32):
like I said, and probably by Thursday or fighter, we'll
have that abouting YouTube for everybody else. So but yeah,
we did talk about Espinal. That was that that was
one that was the opposite fuel home run too. That
that was a blast to.

Speaker 5 (01:18:43):
Yeah, it was the field home run.

Speaker 2 (01:18:45):
Yeah, he's you know, hitting liners to the gaps, he's
hitting singles, he's taking his walks, he's uh, he's got
a strong arm. You showed a picture, you know, him
throwing a guy out a second. It's just like cleaning
up a little bit of the you know, the receiving
and the blocking and stuff like that. But you know,
really really fun prospect. If he keep sitting like this
and keep hitting, when he moves up, it's like, yeah,
he's gonna gonna move up list.

Speaker 1 (01:19:03):
So I think, mm hmm, yeah, it's a fun player
to watch. So, uh, Tigers this week take on the Twins.
Like we mentioned earlier, three game set starting tomorrow, and
then they are off to Cleveland this weekend. So it's
a big, big week for the Tigers. As far as
division to go. The schedule looks a little more favorable
hypothetically speaking, so we'll see how that goes. But we'll

(01:19:24):
keep you posting on everything going on. Check out Brandon
Day's article on Jami Jones. Really well done. Check out
everything over there. Bless you boys dot com. Is there
anything else you want to pimp about? Brandon?

Speaker 4 (01:19:33):
Uh No, that's about it for now.

Speaker 3 (01:19:35):
I'll be doing a little bit of a re rank
of the Tiger's farm system as well, but probably not
for another two weeks or so.

Speaker 4 (01:19:40):
I'm just too much else going on. But yeah, we're
talking about Dangler.

Speaker 3 (01:19:43):
We've got an article coming about you know him, like
taking over the league, and a few other things coming.

Speaker 4 (01:19:48):
So yeah, thanks for reading.

Speaker 1 (01:19:50):
Yeah, and I, like I said, I just did an
article on Roundtable Tigers on Kevin McDonald's Rookie of the
Year comparatively speaking to Blue Whitaker and Hardy Kem because
both those guys were the last the only two position
players ever to Tiger wise to win the Rookie of
the Year. So the Tigers have had quite a bit
of pitchers, but nothing like fid Rich Orlander former. So

(01:20:15):
they've the pitching wise, they have done that, but the
position white players, it's been since nineteen seventy eight since
the last time the Tigers have had a rookie year.
Right now, McGonagall is leading in terms of the odds
in that department right now. So again, just we're watching
a special player and he's already a three point five
war Winnker had a three point eight for the entire season,
and he's on pace to seven seven war season or

(01:20:38):
something like that. And then h just baseball had a
really good stat The only players at tweeny one younger
in the last three five years. They have sixty five
hits and thirty five walks in their first sixty three games.
Juan Soto and Kevin mcgonagalan.

Speaker 5 (01:20:52):
So short, there you go.

Speaker 1 (01:20:55):
Yeah, but thanks so much for watching, Thanks so much
for listening. Stay closs there, everybody. We'll see you next week.
For those who listen to us on a Thursday show, uh,
they'll be back on Thursday. I will more likely be
there as my week at work is finally coming down
to a I don't have any graduations, my boss actually
told me today and I quote, take a damn vacation.

(01:21:17):
So I'm going to do that. So she's telling me
to do that, then yeah, there's gonna be Yeah, once
this graduation thing happens, it'll be fine. It's no pressure
in the board, you know, board members who look at
us like, hey, we don't pictures and all that stuff.
But keep a cross.

Speaker 5 (01:21:31):
Everybody.

Speaker 1 (01:21:32):
Have a good evening. Mirror Comedy, by the way, second
in the odds, So all right, the last question. Have
a good night everybody but Clark and mc clark and

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