October 30, 2024 • 22 mins
Doug unpacks the chaos of Game 4 in the World Series last night! From Freddie Freeman making history, to the two Yankee fans vying for Mookie Betts' ball, to Anthony Volpe's redeeming grand slam, tune in for Doug's takeaways and outlook for Game 5.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey, everybody, welcome back to the Dugout Podcast. I'm gonna
break down Game four last night, gonna give you a
little preview to Game five going on tonight later on tonight.
And for me, game fours are generally a little crazy,
right you get the fours and five starters the bullpen day,
(00:21):
it's usually more of an offensive minded baseball game, and
last night was no different. I never thought i'd see
a number ninety six start a World Series game, but
it happened last night. We'll start off with the first
at bat. Otani's up there. I know Gil has a
tendency to throw up and into lefties, but fat ball
(00:44):
is really close to his face, and the first thing
I thought of was, oh boy, here we go. I
texted friends and I was like, if I'm managing the Dodgers,
Stanton's gonna get one up around his hands, just to
let them know that I don't appreciate you throwing a
ball at my guy's face. Moved from the first to there.
All of a sudden, Freddie Freeman comes up and voila.
(01:06):
It's almost like you expect it now, which is crazy.
But Freddie goes ahead and breaks a World Series record
with a homer in six consecutive games. I felt going
into that game, everybody talks about you gotta score first,
not necessarily. You know you want to, but it doesn't
mean you have to. I know Boone talked about that
in his post game. I thought that was Dodgers kind
(01:29):
of throwing the first blow was huge moving forward. You
have a rookie out there who has faced a total
of thirty seven Major league hitters starting Game four in
the World Series, you just don't know what you're gonna get.
And all in all, I thought their arms did pretty
did pretty well considering the circumstances, so you got the
Dodgers up to nothing. I thought the Dodgers starter Ben
(01:50):
Capareus did a phenomenal job considering he's only face thirty
seven hitters. And this is kind of a prelude to
what the game was like. The Dodgers had. Their pitchers
did a good job of getting to two strikes. They
had a really hard time putting guys away, and that
usually comes with experience and just being around the game
(02:13):
and having trust. So a lot of these guys probably
haven't pitched in a while. So to get six innings
out of two rookies. It was pretty impressive. That being said,
you have the pop up down the right field line,
Mookie Bets makes one hell of a play and jumps
in the stands, and then you have two idiots who
are trying to yank the ball out of Mookie's glove
(02:37):
and throwing arm. Now I have a problem with this,
a severe problem with this. They were obviously escorted out
of the stadium. I saw some content creators. Won't mention names,
but they're in real time laughing at this. This is
not a laughing matter. Mooki goes into the stands, they
(02:58):
try to rip the ball from his glove and hang
on to his throwing arm with his feet off the ground.
In no way, shape or form. Should this be tolerated.
Should just be allowed. I heard the Yankees are letting
them come back to Game five, which is absolutely criminal.
These guys should not be allowed to step foot in
a live sporting event. Ever. Again, to the Yankee fans
(03:20):
who were high fiving these low lives and hugging them
on the way out, shame on you. That being said,
I will not let two idiots move the needle of
how I feel of true Yankee fans who are passionate,
and they care about their team, and they care about
their guys. They don't speak for all of them, but
that was beyond criminal. I got a message sent from
(03:41):
Tory Hunter and Tory said, if that was me in
my younger days, he would have been in the stands.
And my exact response was, Tory, if that was us
and back with the twins, you wouldn't have had to
have gone on the stands because half the team would
have been in the stands beating the everlasting shit out
of the two of those low leves. So that being so,
I thought Mookie handle it like, of course, like a
(04:03):
true pro. After the game, he was super calm, kind
of didn't move on, didn't say anything controversial to me.
Muki should press charges. That's just me. At some point
this has to stop. And if fans, if you don't
want the plexiglass, if you don't want the plexiglass on
the lines, stop being an idiot. News has come in
that MLB is trying to ban those two guys, which
(04:25):
is outstanding. They should have beat anybody to the punch
at that. It should have been the first thing that
they've talked about every spring training we go over security
meetings about how to act, how to respond, what's going
to happen to fans that run on the field, or
et cetera. So kudos to MLB for finally they're late there,
late to the dance, but at least they showed up.
(04:46):
Like flip the script for Yankee fans, if that's Soto
or Judge and they go in the stands and you
see two people hanging on them, you're gonna feel a
lot different than you do about what these two idiots
were doing. You can say it's a hopeful vantage all
you want. I get it, But there comes a point
in time where you've got to let the players play.
(05:06):
There's a reason why you're in the stands. It's because
you sucked at what you did and you wanted to
play baseball and you weren't good enough to be where
Mookie is. So keep your hands to yourself, Cheer Boo
whatever you want. I'm fine with it. Don't grab a player.
So for the bets play. Tweeting out some things last night,
I got a amazingly hilarious comment back, and I want
(05:30):
to make sure that I get this in here. His
name was Bob McGee, and we were talking about punishment
for the fans, whether it's band for life or obviously not,
you can kick out of the game, future games, whatever.
He had the best line out of all the comments
I got back, and I wanted to make sure I
got it in here. His punishment was make them a
(05:52):
tend every White Sox game for a year. And I
can't think of any more of a punishment than having
to suffer through that brand of baseball because it's absolutely
her so, Bob McGee, kudos to the best comment I've
read in probably three days on Twitter. Claps for you,
golf clap. Very nice, nice job. Moving on, we have
(06:12):
the Vulpe play at second base where he's got one out.
Well Sin it's a rock at the center. I tweeted out,
probably the worst base running I've ever seen in a
postseason game, and I was quickly reminded of Lonnie Smith.
This one's just as bad. You know one out, you're
taught to, you know you're almost halfway. There's no reason
to tag there, know the ball, know the flight, all
(06:34):
that stuff. He knows he messed up. He only got
the third. Verdugo does a good job of making sure
they get at least one there because that could have
been a huge momentum shift. The game was still I
think it was two to one at the time, could
have been two to two, big momentum shift. But what
you'll see is why baseball is just it's like a
romantic novel. You can't make this up. It has a
(06:57):
magical way of giving you opportunity needs to completely redeem yourself.
And you almost knew going into that at bat that
we're gonna see what his makeup really is. You know,
you know you want to do well, You want to
do something well for your team. Go back. Hudson's pitching
(07:17):
is having a hard time putting guys away a lot
of one to two counts. They fight back. He buzzes
the tower a few times he just couldn't quite get
and then he gets a huge out from Rizzo. Rizzo's
got bases loaded, one out. Oh oh, first pitch pop up,
So you're thinking you're almost out of it. And then
that's why every player and every catcher and every coach
(07:38):
has always screamed, we're not done yet. Still got a
big out to get. He leaves a slider kind of
armside Bulpig gets a chance to redeem himself. Gets out
in front, puts it in the stands and you know,
now the place is going nuts. Kudos to the kid
to be able to, you know, slow it down, compartmentalize
the mistake, don't make don't make one mistake, to stay
(08:01):
within yourself. And that's why baseball is the greatest sport
on earth because it's funny how when you make a
big mistake, you have a chance to redeem yourself. And
more times than not that if you pay attention to it,
that situation comes up so much, and you know, as
a baseball fan, it was really cool to see knowing
the backstory of Vulpe. He was at the nine World
(08:23):
Series parade. His family loves the Yankees, he's from that area.
All he wanted to do was be a Yankee. All
you want to do is make it to the big
leagues and play shortstop and then to hit a Grand
Slam in the World Series at twenty three years old.
It's just like I said, you can't if you were
to make this stuff up in Hollywood, I don't think
anybody would go watch it if you made a movie
because it's just not believable sometimes, and that's what makes
(08:45):
it so great. The vulpe grand slam makes it five
to two. Still early in the game, you're not quite sure.
The Dodgers go to another rookie. He ends up giving
you four strong innings. He helped you, kept you in there.
The Dodgers keep scratching and clawing to get back. They
make it five to four. And the one thing that
stood out to me which was amazing, was Doc's patience.
(09:08):
You know, he has a bullpen ya. You know, he's
trying to stay away from his high leverage guys and
five four, fifth, sixth inning is not exactly what he wanted.
You know, he either wanted to lead or to be
down five to nothing, and then the decision is really easy.
But I commend him for his patients. It's real. It
takes more savvy to trust the process when it's close
(09:33):
and you smell it, know that I'm only one run
away from putting the ring on my finger to hold off,
and we haven't quite had the lead yet. And you know,
five to four, I thought the Wells homer was a
big determining factor because now it's a two run game,
and now you're getting the Yankees high leverage guys, and
(09:53):
then Honeywell comes in it just exploded on him. A
play that should volpe it's a long single, turns it
into a double on a ball that he kind of
headbutted out of Lux's glove. Steel's third Lux has a bad,
some really bad fundamental footwork on an infield in play
(10:14):
that leads to a run, and then you can kind
of sense the wheels falling off. I think at the
end of the day, the Yankees did what they normally do.
They made mistakes, but they beat up on some lesser arms.
Nothing more, nothing less. If you were to tell me
that the Dodgers, that those four arms that Dodgers tried
(10:36):
it out there last night, if half the guys that
they had hurt are healthy, they don't sniff the playoff roster.
It's not being mean, it's just reality. They do have
good stuff, but stuff isn't everything. In October, I thought
the young kids did a really good job of getting
to two strikes. They had a really hard time putting
(10:57):
guys away. I think Judge was two one time, work
to walk, Stanton was one two worked to walk. They
just threw a lot of pitches with two strikes, trying to,
let's say, be perfect and afraid to make a mistake
that they threw a lot of let's just say, non
competitive out pitches to where the guy let the they
let the pitch go. As a hitter, you knew right
(11:18):
away that's a ball, you know. I just felt that
they had a chance to put them away, and it
was kind of even five to two. As a you know,
a fan of both teams, I'm thinking, they can't stop
here because the Dodgers keep pecking away. They keep they
keep one run here, one run there. They haven't popped
one yet, and all of a sudden boom, so uh, kudos.
(11:40):
You know, Weaver comes into the seventh. That shows you
everything about where we are. I thought the Dodgers at
bats after the Wells homer, they started to punch out
a lot. I won't see a lot, but they seven
I think they punched out seven times after the Wells omer.
It's almost like they flipped it on them. They became
more of the Yankees at bats than the Dodgers. I
(12:01):
thought there at bats could have been better to kind
of claw back into it. But he also had to
tip your cap to the pitchers. I mean, Luke Weaver's
been phenomenal from since he's getting to the closers role,
and I think the the you know, the Glaver Torres
obviously three run homer was you know, the icing on
the cake, and that allowed them to get Weaver out
of the game to have them send them back out
there for the ninth inning, which is something that shouldn't
(12:23):
be overlooked. I was texting guys about Judge when it
was whatever it was after the three run homer by Torres,
whatever that made, the score was already out of reach.
And I would say, if he goes deep here or
it gets a hit here, it's one thousand percent mental
what he's dealing with. And sure enough, he gets a
knock that tells you it's not mechanical, it's just stuff.
(12:46):
And what's between his ears, you know, I'm curious to
see how what transpires tonight. Now moving on to Game five,
Garrett Cole, this is why they brought you here, bub
And if you're a Yankee, you're a Yankee fan, you're
a Yankee player. You're walking to the stadium feeling really
good about where we are. Garrett Cole, you can earn
(13:07):
your pinstripes tonight and solidify yourself as a Yankee. If
you go out and dominate like you can in a
Yankee stadium in a World Series game with your back
against the wall. Dodgers. Yeah, you're up three to one.
Your bullpen is arrested. I am still I'm curious to
see how Flarity throws. If you look back at the
Mets series, he had a really quality start in Game
(13:29):
one against the Mets. His next start, it wasn't very good.
The velo dropped fast, which negates his breaking ball. So
I'm really curious to see how Flarity bounces back health
wise and what his velo looks like. I truly think
looking back at Game one, this, if Flarity gives Doc
(13:50):
five innings, he will not sniff the sixth. He's going
to go right to his high leverage guys and go
from there. I can see how if you're a Yankee,
you feel like if you win, you won Game four,
now you got Garrett Cole, Now I got rid On
and get the game seven. You never know. I can
see that. But still it goes back to this. What
the Yankees proved to me last night is exactly what
(14:13):
I thought. They beat up bad pitching, they don't beat
up they don't beat up quality arms. Yes, you can
tell me the Guardians have the best bullpen in baseball.
I'm not arguing that they didn't beat them up. They
beat them and when the Guardians, you can't tell me
that the Guardians offense even comes close to the Dodger offense.
So they had the Guardians gave them enough time to
(14:35):
go ahead and click one of the better relievers. The
Dodgers lineup is relentless. They keep coming. They're a baseball team.
I break it down this way. The Dodgers were built
to win baseball games. Well, that sounds simple, but baseball
games one run games, well pitched games, wins blowing in
and we don't survive and die, live and die by
(14:57):
the homer. We can sacrifice, squeeze safety squeeze. I mean,
we can sack bunts, we can steal, we can run,
we can grind you. I thought they kind of got
out of sink last night chasing a little bit. And
that's it's kind of easy to do when Clay Holmes
just throwing a ninety five mile an hour shot put sinker.
I get it, but I just feel like the Yankees
were built to bludging you, and they bludgeon mistakes. And
(15:21):
if you don't make them. They're not gonna score. They're
not gonna score a ton. You can live with one points.
One point homers don't kill you. Three run obviously, the
grand slams do. But if you can keep them off
the bases. And I've always said this when I played
for the Yankees in two thousand and seven, anybody that
is funny, how it still ranks true today. Anytime someone
(15:43):
came at us and attacked us with fastballs first time
through the order, didn't try to trick us, just came
right at us. Those guys survived into the fifth or
sixth inning. The guy that would come in and try
to put us away and trick us with breaking balls
and make us chase, they would just dig their own grave,
and eventually someone would get up the first and second
and pop one of the gap or lose one. And
(16:05):
that same thought is still there with the Yankees. If
you go right at them and attack them and get
them in swing mode, they can be had. And that's
exactly what you saw last night to where the young
guys just didn't have the put away pitch or the
feel of they're put away pitch, because again, these guys
haven't thrown and probably you know, they haven't thrown consistently
(16:27):
in over a month, so to do what they did,
I think if you ask any Dodger fan, if you'd
have told them before Game four, look, we're gonna throw
two rookies and a guy we picked up on waivers,
and they're gonna throw seven of the nine innings. Let's
just back out the ninth. Okay. If we're gonna tell
you we're throw two rookies and they're gonna go six
innings and when they come out, we're gonna be down two.
(16:47):
I think every Dodger fan, every Dodger player, would say,
we'll take that every day of the weekend, twice on Sunday. No, say,
I do not feel that Doc just gave the game away.
That's asked. I've read that in some places that's not
the case at all. You don't do that. But he
was waiting, he was waiting his turn to go ahead
(17:08):
and put his foot on the throat, and that opportunity
never never presented itself. So kudos a Doc for being patient.
Kudos to the Yankees and Boone for doing what they're
supposed to do against arms they're supposed to be better than.
So here we go. This is gonna be a real
game tonight. We'll see does offense carry over the Yankees continue,
they're good at bats, and can Garrett Cole earn his pinstripes.
(17:31):
I think I expect seven plus out of Garrett Cole
to night, and he's gonna be elite, and it's gonna
be hopefully a close game and we'll see what happens.
But to me, this is what the games. It's gonna
be just like Game one, and that's I think every
baseball fan will accept that. Just before I let you go,
I promised I wasn't gonna talk about this again. But
(17:53):
they find a way to find themselves in the middle
of just wrongdoing. The umpiring crew cow guys. How many
like thank God for replay because the guy at first
base last night literally missed every one of them that
weren't blatantly obvious. And the home plate guy goodness gracious
(18:15):
alive like good I mean, I again, I'm not a
fan of the white box they put up there because
I really don't feel that's a truthful strike zone. It's
not fair to them, meaning the umpires, It's not fair
to them either, But Goodness gracious alive. Like the reports
can't be good. It's been an you know, abysmal, Like
(18:38):
it's almost to the point where like, just give the
teams nine challenges because they've almost gotten every call wrong
at some point or another, like the one double play
ball or I think it was Freeman it was. Do
you really need to go to New York for that?
Just hey, man, you're right, I blew it. You got
me again, Like I might flip a coin, dude, Like
(19:00):
how bad. I understand it's not easy to do, but
you're supposed to be the best in the world. Like
my mom's eighty four years old. She can't see a lick.
She even texts me like, hey, this bad. I'm like, yeah,
that you're watching your this is truthful, Like that's just
that freaking bad. Also, one thing I'll say about Dave
(19:20):
Roberts and his managerial skills. I go back to a
story when we play together in Boston. I was struggling.
I think the whole time I was tear. I was struggling,
but offensively, and he brought up a good point he
talked to me about He talked to me about slow
everything down. You always hear hitters talk about well everything's
sped up, whether it's pitching, hitting, all the game's speeding
up on me. Right Well, he was like, well why
(19:43):
don't you start? He goes try this for me. He's like,
talk slower, walk slower, drive to the park slower. Everything
you do, do it slower. And I thought he was nuts,
and I was so bad that I was willing to
try anything at that point and I did it, and
it really made sense and it really worked. And I
(20:05):
feel like, no matter what you're in in your life,
like if you take this advice and you can see
like what Doc preaches, he's such a personable guy and
he really truly cares about each guy and he finds
a way to like every one of those guys, whether
it's a World Series game or of spring training game,
every guy that they bring into that culture, they find
(20:28):
a way, like they don't look overmatched. Might they don't
get the job the job done every time, but they
don't get out of the ordinary. They don't get out
of what they normally do. And I think that's a
telltale sign of when you see guys that struggle in
pressure situations, they do things that they normally don't do.
I feel like the Yankees fell into that a little bit. Jazz,
(20:50):
Jazz taking some big swings. He doesn't even to take
a big swing. He's got enough pop to clear the
seats to left to right to center. He doesn't need
to add I thought, Wells did it a lot. You know,
I get it that, you know, Jazz's first time in
the World Series, first time really going deep into October.
Wells is a rookie, But that I'm listening, and I
thought about listening to how these guys talk to Doc
(21:10):
and how Doc talks of his players in the post game.
And I'm not saying that Boone doesn't care, because he
obviously does. He does care about his players. I think
every manager cares about their players, whether they like him
or not, they care about him. You spend so much
time with him. But like you can really see since
Doc has taken over that like you can see more
of his who he is and his personality has taken over,
(21:33):
and you can see a little bit of every player
that's there. You can see his reflection and just being
around Doc and being around who he is and what
he stands for, you can see it in the way
they play. And that's going to do it here. For
episode two on the Dugout. Thanks for checking us out
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(21:54):
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know and until next time, thanks for checking that out
Hey, everybody, welcome back to the Dugout Podcast. I'm gonna
break down Game four last night, gonna give you a
little preview to Game five going on tonight later on tonight.
And for me, game fours are generally a little crazy,
right you get the fours and five starters the bullpen day,
(00:21):
it's usually more of an offensive minded baseball game, and
last night was no different. I never thought i'd see
a number ninety six start a World Series game, but
it happened last night. We'll start off with the first
at bat. Otani's up there. I know Gil has a
tendency to throw up and into lefties, but fat ball
(00:44):
is really close to his face, and the first thing
I thought of was, oh boy, here we go. I
texted friends and I was like, if I'm managing the Dodgers,
Stanton's gonna get one up around his hands, just to
let them know that I don't appreciate you throwing a
ball at my guy's face. Moved from the first to there.
All of a sudden, Freddie Freeman comes up and voila.
(01:06):
It's almost like you expect it now, which is crazy.
But Freddie goes ahead and breaks a World Series record
with a homer in six consecutive games. I felt going
into that game, everybody talks about you gotta score first,
not necessarily. You know you want to, but it doesn't
mean you have to. I know Boone talked about that
in his post game. I thought that was Dodgers kind
(01:29):
of throwing the first blow was huge moving forward. You
have a rookie out there who has faced a total
of thirty seven Major league hitters starting Game four in
the World Series, you just don't know what you're gonna get.
And all in all, I thought their arms did pretty
did pretty well considering the circumstances, so you got the
Dodgers up to nothing. I thought the Dodgers starter Ben
(01:50):
Capareus did a phenomenal job considering he's only face thirty
seven hitters. And this is kind of a prelude to
what the game was like. The Dodgers had. Their pitchers
did a good job of getting to two strikes. They
had a really hard time putting guys away, and that
usually comes with experience and just being around the game
(02:13):
and having trust. So a lot of these guys probably
haven't pitched in a while. So to get six innings
out of two rookies. It was pretty impressive. That being said,
you have the pop up down the right field line,
Mookie Bets makes one hell of a play and jumps
in the stands, and then you have two idiots who
are trying to yank the ball out of Mookie's glove
(02:37):
and throwing arm. Now I have a problem with this,
a severe problem with this. They were obviously escorted out
of the stadium. I saw some content creators. Won't mention names,
but they're in real time laughing at this. This is
not a laughing matter. Mooki goes into the stands, they
(02:58):
try to rip the ball from his glove and hang
on to his throwing arm with his feet off the ground.
In no way, shape or form. Should this be tolerated.
Should just be allowed. I heard the Yankees are letting
them come back to Game five, which is absolutely criminal.
These guys should not be allowed to step foot in
a live sporting event. Ever. Again, to the Yankee fans
(03:20):
who were high fiving these low lives and hugging them
on the way out, shame on you. That being said,
I will not let two idiots move the needle of
how I feel of true Yankee fans who are passionate,
and they care about their team, and they care about
their guys. They don't speak for all of them, but
that was beyond criminal. I got a message sent from
(03:41):
Tory Hunter and Tory said, if that was me in
my younger days, he would have been in the stands.
And my exact response was, Tory, if that was us
and back with the twins, you wouldn't have had to
have gone on the stands because half the team would
have been in the stands beating the everlasting shit out
of the two of those low leves. So that being so,
I thought Mookie handle it like, of course, like a
(04:03):
true pro. After the game, he was super calm, kind
of didn't move on, didn't say anything controversial to me.
Muki should press charges. That's just me. At some point
this has to stop. And if fans, if you don't
want the plexiglass, if you don't want the plexiglass on
the lines, stop being an idiot. News has come in
that MLB is trying to ban those two guys, which
(04:25):
is outstanding. They should have beat anybody to the punch
at that. It should have been the first thing that
they've talked about every spring training we go over security
meetings about how to act, how to respond, what's going
to happen to fans that run on the field, or
et cetera. So kudos to MLB for finally they're late there,
late to the dance, but at least they showed up.
(04:46):
Like flip the script for Yankee fans, if that's Soto
or Judge and they go in the stands and you
see two people hanging on them, you're gonna feel a
lot different than you do about what these two idiots
were doing. You can say it's a hopeful vantage all
you want. I get it, But there comes a point
in time where you've got to let the players play.
(05:06):
There's a reason why you're in the stands. It's because
you sucked at what you did and you wanted to
play baseball and you weren't good enough to be where
Mookie is. So keep your hands to yourself, Cheer Boo
whatever you want. I'm fine with it. Don't grab a player.
So for the bets play. Tweeting out some things last night,
I got a amazingly hilarious comment back, and I want
(05:30):
to make sure that I get this in here. His
name was Bob McGee, and we were talking about punishment
for the fans, whether it's band for life or obviously not,
you can kick out of the game, future games, whatever.
He had the best line out of all the comments
I got back, and I wanted to make sure I
got it in here. His punishment was make them a
(05:52):
tend every White Sox game for a year. And I
can't think of any more of a punishment than having
to suffer through that brand of baseball because it's absolutely
her so, Bob McGee, kudos to the best comment I've
read in probably three days on Twitter. Claps for you,
golf clap. Very nice, nice job. Moving on, we have
(06:12):
the Vulpe play at second base where he's got one out.
Well Sin it's a rock at the center. I tweeted out,
probably the worst base running I've ever seen in a
postseason game, and I was quickly reminded of Lonnie Smith.
This one's just as bad. You know one out, you're
taught to, you know you're almost halfway. There's no reason
to tag there, know the ball, know the flight, all
(06:34):
that stuff. He knows he messed up. He only got
the third. Verdugo does a good job of making sure
they get at least one there because that could have
been a huge momentum shift. The game was still I
think it was two to one at the time, could
have been two to two, big momentum shift. But what
you'll see is why baseball is just it's like a
romantic novel. You can't make this up. It has a
(06:57):
magical way of giving you opportunity needs to completely redeem yourself.
And you almost knew going into that at bat that
we're gonna see what his makeup really is. You know,
you know you want to do well, You want to
do something well for your team. Go back. Hudson's pitching
(07:17):
is having a hard time putting guys away a lot
of one to two counts. They fight back. He buzzes
the tower a few times he just couldn't quite get
and then he gets a huge out from Rizzo. Rizzo's
got bases loaded, one out. Oh oh, first pitch pop up,
So you're thinking you're almost out of it. And then
that's why every player and every catcher and every coach
(07:38):
has always screamed, we're not done yet. Still got a
big out to get. He leaves a slider kind of
armside Bulpig gets a chance to redeem himself. Gets out
in front, puts it in the stands and you know,
now the place is going nuts. Kudos to the kid
to be able to, you know, slow it down, compartmentalize
the mistake, don't make don't make one mistake, to stay
(08:01):
within yourself. And that's why baseball is the greatest sport
on earth because it's funny how when you make a
big mistake, you have a chance to redeem yourself. And
more times than not that if you pay attention to it,
that situation comes up so much, and you know, as
a baseball fan, it was really cool to see knowing
the backstory of Vulpe. He was at the nine World
(08:23):
Series parade. His family loves the Yankees, he's from that area.
All he wanted to do was be a Yankee. All
you want to do is make it to the big
leagues and play shortstop and then to hit a Grand
Slam in the World Series at twenty three years old.
It's just like I said, you can't if you were
to make this stuff up in Hollywood, I don't think
anybody would go watch it if you made a movie
because it's just not believable sometimes, and that's what makes
(08:45):
it so great. The vulpe grand slam makes it five
to two. Still early in the game, you're not quite sure.
The Dodgers go to another rookie. He ends up giving
you four strong innings. He helped you, kept you in there.
The Dodgers keep scratching and clawing to get back. They
make it five to four. And the one thing that
stood out to me which was amazing, was Doc's patience.
(09:08):
You know, he has a bullpen ya. You know, he's
trying to stay away from his high leverage guys and
five four, fifth, sixth inning is not exactly what he wanted.
You know, he either wanted to lead or to be
down five to nothing, and then the decision is really easy.
But I commend him for his patients. It's real. It
takes more savvy to trust the process when it's close
(09:33):
and you smell it, know that I'm only one run
away from putting the ring on my finger to hold off,
and we haven't quite had the lead yet. And you know,
five to four, I thought the Wells homer was a
big determining factor because now it's a two run game,
and now you're getting the Yankees high leverage guys, and
(09:53):
then Honeywell comes in it just exploded on him. A
play that should volpe it's a long single, turns it
into a double on a ball that he kind of
headbutted out of Lux's glove. Steel's third Lux has a bad,
some really bad fundamental footwork on an infield in play
(10:14):
that leads to a run, and then you can kind
of sense the wheels falling off. I think at the
end of the day, the Yankees did what they normally do.
They made mistakes, but they beat up on some lesser arms.
Nothing more, nothing less. If you were to tell me
that the Dodgers, that those four arms that Dodgers tried
(10:36):
it out there last night, if half the guys that
they had hurt are healthy, they don't sniff the playoff roster.
It's not being mean, it's just reality. They do have
good stuff, but stuff isn't everything. In October, I thought
the young kids did a really good job of getting
to two strikes. They had a really hard time putting
(10:57):
guys away. I think Judge was two one time, work
to walk, Stanton was one two worked to walk. They
just threw a lot of pitches with two strikes, trying to,
let's say, be perfect and afraid to make a mistake
that they threw a lot of let's just say, non
competitive out pitches to where the guy let the they
let the pitch go. As a hitter, you knew right
(11:18):
away that's a ball, you know. I just felt that
they had a chance to put them away, and it
was kind of even five to two. As a you know,
a fan of both teams, I'm thinking, they can't stop
here because the Dodgers keep pecking away. They keep they
keep one run here, one run there. They haven't popped
one yet, and all of a sudden boom, so uh, kudos.
(11:40):
You know, Weaver comes into the seventh. That shows you
everything about where we are. I thought the Dodgers at
bats after the Wells homer, they started to punch out
a lot. I won't see a lot, but they seven
I think they punched out seven times after the Wells omer.
It's almost like they flipped it on them. They became
more of the Yankees at bats than the Dodgers. I
(12:01):
thought there at bats could have been better to kind
of claw back into it. But he also had to
tip your cap to the pitchers. I mean, Luke Weaver's
been phenomenal from since he's getting to the closers role,
and I think the the you know, the Glaver Torres
obviously three run homer was you know, the icing on
the cake, and that allowed them to get Weaver out
of the game to have them send them back out
there for the ninth inning, which is something that shouldn't
(12:23):
be overlooked. I was texting guys about Judge when it
was whatever it was after the three run homer by Torres,
whatever that made, the score was already out of reach.
And I would say, if he goes deep here or
it gets a hit here, it's one thousand percent mental
what he's dealing with. And sure enough, he gets a
knock that tells you it's not mechanical, it's just stuff.
(12:46):
And what's between his ears, you know, I'm curious to
see how what transpires tonight. Now moving on to Game five,
Garrett Cole, this is why they brought you here, bub
And if you're a Yankee, you're a Yankee fan, you're
a Yankee player. You're walking to the stadium feeling really
good about where we are. Garrett Cole, you can earn
(13:07):
your pinstripes tonight and solidify yourself as a Yankee. If
you go out and dominate like you can in a
Yankee stadium in a World Series game with your back
against the wall. Dodgers. Yeah, you're up three to one.
Your bullpen is arrested. I am still I'm curious to
see how Flarity throws. If you look back at the
Mets series, he had a really quality start in Game
(13:29):
one against the Mets. His next start, it wasn't very good.
The velo dropped fast, which negates his breaking ball. So
I'm really curious to see how Flarity bounces back health
wise and what his velo looks like. I truly think
looking back at Game one, this, if Flarity gives Doc
(13:50):
five innings, he will not sniff the sixth. He's going
to go right to his high leverage guys and go
from there. I can see how if you're a Yankee,
you feel like if you win, you won Game four,
now you got Garrett Cole, Now I got rid On
and get the game seven. You never know. I can
see that. But still it goes back to this. What
the Yankees proved to me last night is exactly what
(14:13):
I thought. They beat up bad pitching, they don't beat
up they don't beat up quality arms. Yes, you can
tell me the Guardians have the best bullpen in baseball.
I'm not arguing that they didn't beat them up. They
beat them and when the Guardians, you can't tell me
that the Guardians offense even comes close to the Dodger offense.
So they had the Guardians gave them enough time to
(14:35):
go ahead and click one of the better relievers. The
Dodgers lineup is relentless. They keep coming. They're a baseball team.
I break it down this way. The Dodgers were built
to win baseball games. Well, that sounds simple, but baseball
games one run games, well pitched games, wins blowing in
and we don't survive and die, live and die by
(14:57):
the homer. We can sacrifice, squeeze safety squeeze. I mean,
we can sack bunts, we can steal, we can run,
we can grind you. I thought they kind of got
out of sink last night chasing a little bit. And
that's it's kind of easy to do when Clay Holmes
just throwing a ninety five mile an hour shot put sinker.
I get it, but I just feel like the Yankees
were built to bludging you, and they bludgeon mistakes. And
(15:21):
if you don't make them. They're not gonna score. They're
not gonna score a ton. You can live with one points.
One point homers don't kill you. Three run obviously, the
grand slams do. But if you can keep them off
the bases. And I've always said this when I played
for the Yankees in two thousand and seven, anybody that
is funny, how it still ranks true today. Anytime someone
(15:43):
came at us and attacked us with fastballs first time
through the order, didn't try to trick us, just came
right at us. Those guys survived into the fifth or
sixth inning. The guy that would come in and try
to put us away and trick us with breaking balls
and make us chase, they would just dig their own grave,
and eventually someone would get up the first and second
and pop one of the gap or lose one. And
(16:05):
that same thought is still there with the Yankees. If
you go right at them and attack them and get
them in swing mode, they can be had. And that's
exactly what you saw last night to where the young
guys just didn't have the put away pitch or the
feel of they're put away pitch, because again, these guys
haven't thrown and probably you know, they haven't thrown consistently
(16:27):
in over a month, so to do what they did,
I think if you ask any Dodger fan, if you'd
have told them before Game four, look, we're gonna throw
two rookies and a guy we picked up on waivers,
and they're gonna throw seven of the nine innings. Let's
just back out the ninth. Okay. If we're gonna tell
you we're throw two rookies and they're gonna go six
innings and when they come out, we're gonna be down two.
(16:47):
I think every Dodger fan, every Dodger player, would say,
we'll take that every day of the weekend, twice on Sunday. No, say,
I do not feel that Doc just gave the game away.
That's asked. I've read that in some places that's not
the case at all. You don't do that. But he
was waiting, he was waiting his turn to go ahead
(17:08):
and put his foot on the throat, and that opportunity
never never presented itself. So kudos a Doc for being patient.
Kudos to the Yankees and Boone for doing what they're
supposed to do against arms they're supposed to be better than.
So here we go. This is gonna be a real
game tonight. We'll see does offense carry over the Yankees continue,
they're good at bats, and can Garrett Cole earn his pinstripes.
(17:31):
I think I expect seven plus out of Garrett Cole
to night, and he's gonna be elite, and it's gonna
be hopefully a close game and we'll see what happens.
But to me, this is what the games. It's gonna
be just like Game one, and that's I think every
baseball fan will accept that. Just before I let you go,
I promised I wasn't gonna talk about this again. But
(17:53):
they find a way to find themselves in the middle
of just wrongdoing. The umpiring crew cow guys. How many
like thank God for replay because the guy at first
base last night literally missed every one of them that
weren't blatantly obvious. And the home plate guy goodness gracious
(18:15):
alive like good I mean, I again, I'm not a
fan of the white box they put up there because
I really don't feel that's a truthful strike zone. It's
not fair to them, meaning the umpires, It's not fair
to them either, But Goodness gracious alive. Like the reports
can't be good. It's been an you know, abysmal, Like
(18:38):
it's almost to the point where like, just give the
teams nine challenges because they've almost gotten every call wrong
at some point or another, like the one double play
ball or I think it was Freeman it was. Do
you really need to go to New York for that?
Just hey, man, you're right, I blew it. You got
me again, Like I might flip a coin, dude, Like
(19:00):
how bad. I understand it's not easy to do, but
you're supposed to be the best in the world. Like
my mom's eighty four years old. She can't see a lick.
She even texts me like, hey, this bad. I'm like, yeah,
that you're watching your this is truthful, Like that's just
that freaking bad. Also, one thing I'll say about Dave
(19:20):
Roberts and his managerial skills. I go back to a
story when we play together in Boston. I was struggling.
I think the whole time I was tear. I was struggling,
but offensively, and he brought up a good point he
talked to me about He talked to me about slow
everything down. You always hear hitters talk about well everything's
sped up, whether it's pitching, hitting, all the game's speeding
up on me. Right Well, he was like, well why
(19:43):
don't you start? He goes try this for me. He's like,
talk slower, walk slower, drive to the park slower. Everything
you do, do it slower. And I thought he was nuts,
and I was so bad that I was willing to
try anything at that point and I did it, and
it really made sense and it really worked. And I
(20:05):
feel like, no matter what you're in in your life,
like if you take this advice and you can see
like what Doc preaches, he's such a personable guy and
he really truly cares about each guy and he finds
a way to like every one of those guys, whether
it's a World Series game or of spring training game,
every guy that they bring into that culture, they find
(20:28):
a way, like they don't look overmatched. Might they don't
get the job the job done every time, but they
don't get out of the ordinary. They don't get out
of what they normally do. And I think that's a
telltale sign of when you see guys that struggle in
pressure situations, they do things that they normally don't do.
I feel like the Yankees fell into that a little bit. Jazz,
(20:50):
Jazz taking some big swings. He doesn't even to take
a big swing. He's got enough pop to clear the
seats to left to right to center. He doesn't need
to add I thought, Wells did it a lot. You know,
I get it that, you know, Jazz's first time in
the World Series, first time really going deep into October.
Wells is a rookie, But that I'm listening, and I
thought about listening to how these guys talk to Doc
(21:10):
and how Doc talks of his players in the post game.
And I'm not saying that Boone doesn't care, because he
obviously does. He does care about his players. I think
every manager cares about their players, whether they like him
or not, they care about him. You spend so much
time with him. But like you can really see since
Doc has taken over that like you can see more
of his who he is and his personality has taken over,
(21:33):
and you can see a little bit of every player
that's there. You can see his reflection and just being
around Doc and being around who he is and what
he stands for, you can see it in the way
they play. And that's going to do it here. For
episode two on the Dugout. Thanks for checking us out
anywhere you've listened to your favorite podcast, Apple, Spotify, check
(21:54):
me out on Instagram Doug mccavin sixteen X or Twitter
dmeas recruiting. Look forward to many more of these. Please Instagram, me, Twitter,
Meet Comment. Love to hear what you guys think. If
there's something you want to talk about, something you want
to hear, something you want to discuss, please let us
know and until next time, thanks for checking that out
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