Astros Pitching Better But Can't Score, Lakers Swept, Patriots in Trouble

Tuesday on The A-Team, Adam Clanton and Adam Wexler discuss the Astros' relentless struggles, examine the Lakers getting swept, share their thoughts on the latest Patriots drama, and much more!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Come into a Tuesday edition of The A Team. It's
Sports Talk seven ninety. He's wex I may see. Josh
Jordan is our producer. I can tell you, without a
shadow of a doubt, wex I would highly, highly recommend
never getting food poisoning.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
That's it. That is a self diagnosis.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
I mean yeah, because it's I mean, you hear about
twenty four hour bugs AC's back today. Everybody, Well, I
just don't. I've never had food poisoning, so I don't.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Know for sure. I was just going with that.

Speaker 1 (00:30):
Well, I'm forty five years old. I haven't had it yet.
I was doing pretty well with a streak yet, so
I was like, Okay, I did a pretty good I mean,
it's totally a random, arbitrary thing, but I think that's
what I had.

Speaker 2 (00:41):
I'd added, like a mild case of it all better now.

Speaker 1 (00:44):
Well, because the reason I say mild is because everybody
I talked to, everybody has been like said that you like,
you're just non stop throwing up. That's not what happened
with me. I'm not gonna go into detail, all right, seck, well,
it was just once and then someone put in your
drink at dinner or No, it was not.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
A wedding crashers situation. But yeah, that was not.

Speaker 3 (01:07):
Funny forget to put mom to bed. No, no, I
talking about holy shirts and pants.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
No, it wasn't none of that. Okay, well then you're back.
All good, But nothing's changed since I left. The nothing's
changed the Astros for the first time all season.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
So that's changed.

Speaker 3 (01:25):
Are ten games under five hundred after last night's loss
to open up their seven game homestand with the Mariners
for three more, and then the Rangers over the weekend
Friday through Sunday. Not really truly any more important than
any other series, although it'd be pretty much of a
depressing vibe if the Astros lose more to teams that

(01:45):
they've been competing with the last couple of years, the Rangers,
who obviously ousted them for the playoffs a couple of
years ago, and the Mariners, who took the division last
season and ultimately a playoff berth which the Astros themselves
could not earn, partially because of it. On top of that,
the astros three to one loss last night made the
season series even more lopsided than it was before last night.

(02:06):
That's five games played against the Mariners. That's five losses
against the Mariners, three more opportunities this home stand, and
it's a pretty again. Are these games any more important
than any other? You have to ask ownership, You wonder
if they are. As this team continues to fall further
and further away from contention, contention for the division is
probably going to be there for a while considering what

(02:28):
it's like, and the contention for the wild Card similarly,
as we talked about at length yesterday, is probably going
to be there for a while because nobody in the
American League outside of two teams has done much of
anything this year. If you're having around five hundred, then
things look great because that's the entire American League outside
of the Yankees and the Rays. The big picture, much
much clearer picture for Houston, the big pictures, they're not

(02:49):
a good baseball team. There's nothing you can look at
and say but this or but that about how they're playing.
All the butts have to do with who's not on
the field for them. Should see some definitive new on
rehabits signments today for a couple of the everyday players,
Jake Myers and Jeremy Pania. Maybe beginning that today with
Corpus Christi the Space Cowboys. Well, they're already playing today

(03:11):
and they ain't nowhere near Houston, so none of the
rehabbers are going out to Tacoma to rehab with them,
but it is expected that those will begin, and clearly
those could help turn things in the right direction. Same
thing with tonight's starting pitcher. Tatsu Emi is not pitched
since April tenth, and is not pitched well in but
one of his three major league starts. The other two
weren't just poor, they were incredibly poor, the last one

(03:34):
lasting thirty seven pitches and one out, and then right
arm fatigue has had him sidelined since then. It's pretty
big for him individually, and certainly that goes into the
same thing with the team. I'm sure we're more than
a month out from seeing Hunter Brown pitch for the
Houston Astros.

Speaker 2 (03:49):
He's doing bullpens right now.

Speaker 3 (03:51):
Josh Haters in the midst of probably two more weeks
of his rehab assignment and then maybe he returns. But
the baseball is being played, and this team is definitely
among the worst teams in baseball any which way you
want to look at it, and falling ten games under
five hundred and having a very long stretch now where
they don't score. The pitching has actually been capable, helpful

(04:15):
games that you could win if you could score, but
they can't all of a sudden, their last day games.
They have that ten run outburst Friday night in Cincinnati.
They've scored twelve runs in the other seven games. They
don't have an extra base hit and didn't have any
extra base hits in each of their last two games,
including last night. So obviously many of the players that

(04:37):
are out there on a daily basis, and the top
four of which are all established Major leaguers, they're all
slumping together.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
What a team.

Speaker 3 (04:45):
So tonight Brian Wu and tatsu Emi will go to
the mound over at Dyke and Park will take you
into that as we always do. Ten first pitch, so
six o'clock coverage for the on Deck show yesterday. It's
almost as if I knew gotten word that our Astros
player guest would be two thirty today, and I did
still sneak in a I expect to have Mike Burrows

(05:08):
on with us tomorrow, and it was a nice expectation,
but unfortunately that will now happen on Wednesday through no
fault of Mike or the Astros's that's totally Hey, it's
all on my end here, trust me, it's all on
my end. Like the Bobs would say, it's all on
our side of the table. We'll lock back in with him.
We'll see if we can get Chandler roam here on

(05:30):
with us. At five o'clock. That's still a work in progress,
so definitely plenty to discuss on the Houston Astros. We
are down to six teams left in the NBA and
the fight for a championship. James Harden is on one
of those six teams. His team embroiled in a fairly
evenly matched series over in the Eastern Conference, where the

(05:50):
New York Knicks await either the Pistons or the Calves,
the three teams remaining in the Western Conference. It became
just three teams remaining with last night It's Oklahoma City
victory in LA over the Lakers. As expected, they played
four games, the Thunder one four games, and lebron and
Broni's season came to an end last night in LA.

(06:11):
We'll get game five of the other series between the
Minnesota Timberwolves and the San Antonio Spurs back in San
Antonio after the Wolves one game four with a great
fourth quarter. Obviously, that fourth quarter was played without the
tall Frenchmen, and tonight's game will be played with the
tall Frenchmen on both sides. Both Rudy and Victor Wembinyama

(06:32):
will be available for this game. All of the things
I just mentioned on the NBA have their own specific
talking points, but certainly today leading into that game five
in the West, there are a bunch that we will
get into here on the program this afternoon.

Speaker 1 (06:46):
You know what this reminds me of as far as
where things are going, with a lot of the teams
that are out there still remaining in the Rockets sitting
at home, it reminds me a lot of the pre
Yao Ming era of the Rockets, Which is funny because
the Rockets right now have Kevin Durant on their roster
and they would have killed for somebody of that talent.

Speaker 2 (07:08):
Back then.

Speaker 1 (07:08):
I only had Steve Frantis and Katino mobiling that kind
of stuff. But you know, a real, like true icon legend,
and you would just at least this is how I
was when I was in college when all this was happening.
We're talking late nineties, early two thousands before Yao got
there and then Tracy right behind him. Man, I've got that,
I've got that sports envy. I've got that jealous Look

(07:29):
at the Mavericks, look at the Spurs doing what they're doing,
and that'll be the Rockets before you know it. And
it was before you knew it they were back in
the thick of things. Dallas isn't there, but they are
a young and up and coming team. San Antonio is obviously,
I don't care what anybody says. They're so far ahead
of schedule for anybody's best prognostications for Wimby and anybody

(07:49):
else that's on that roster. And yet I just, of course,
I have lots of things to say about what happened
over the weekend that didn't get too yesterday, and it
all culminates in tonight's Game five, where as you said,
not one, but two French Sticks will be playing against
each other, and then that's definitely a talking point, just

(08:11):
the fact that there will be both of them out
there to begin with, let alone the series itself, which
I don't know. I don't know how people thought going in,
how close this would be, how competitive it would be.
You knew that once Anthony Edwards was playing, it was
going to be at least a series as opposed to
just you know, if he's not in there, I don't
give the Timberwolves much of a chance. He's so good.
He is absolutely so good. And for all the compliments

(08:33):
you want to give the San Antonio Spurs, the fact
that this series is tied at two games apiece, regardless
of who was or wasn't on the floor in Game four,
that's a testament to not only this series, but just
this entire postseason, in which I think Minnesota, in a
weird way, as exceeded expectations, even though they've gone pretty
far the last couple seasons.

Speaker 3 (08:53):
Yeah, that's a tough call when you consider who's there
two other teams we're going to join, Ok, I'm a
city in San Antonio in the second round, which two
obviously was up for debate, Denver, La, Houston and Minnesota.
I think clearly those are the only two teams that
are only of those four or two of them were

(09:13):
going to make it to the next round. Nobody expected
either the Thunder or the Spurs to get upset, and
they weren't. So two of those teams were going to
get there, and I don't think there was a tremendous
amount separating them, as evidenced by Minnesota beating Denver in
one case, and the fact that the Rockets were playing
without Kevin Durant and the Lakers were playing without Luca
and Austin Reeves.

Speaker 2 (09:33):
Additionally, for a chi goodschunk of.

Speaker 3 (09:35):
The series, that series could have easily turned on a
play here or there if the Rockets were doing things
a little bit more smartly, correctly, accurately, any number of things.
Not a whole lot of difference between the Rockets and
the Lakers, but somebody's going to win, and it was
La And as you've said, and I would agree, it
didn't look like either one of them would have much
to say about who won the next round because whoever

(09:56):
it was wasn't going to beat the Thunder and they didn't,
and the Thunder also playing without a former All NBA
player in Jalen Williams. I've said it during the regular
season because it seemed obvious, and it seems just as
obvious now, especially with the games meeting or I can't
imagine a team missing a player of that caliber less
than they have over.

Speaker 2 (10:16):
The course of the year skip a beat.

Speaker 3 (10:18):
They barely saw him during the regular season, and they
haven't seen him hardly at all here, and it just
doesn't even seem to matter, which is why I always
try to contain myself when we talk about Sam Presty.
For one egregiously bad move, in my opinion, it doesn't
really impact his ability to be graded out for the

(10:38):
most important thing a general manager can do in any sport,
and that is evaluate talent. He has no peers. He's
number one in the NBA. He is the best general
manager in the NBA in my opinion, on evaluating, finding
and procuring NBA talent. And that's why they don't skip
a beat. Deepest team in the NBA. They have the
most assets in the most important categories, shooting being one

(11:01):
of them, rebounding being another. They're a machine and they're
showing it. And that's why this other series has been
so awesome because it's not one sided. We've seen Minnesota
put up a great fight. Minnesota saw these Spurs get
better in Game four without Victor, and Anthony Edwards did
a great job describing it. He said, when players like

(11:21):
that go out, the other guys on the court, play free.
They're doing this. They know they've got to do more,
and they did. They had the lead, they had a
nice lead in the fourth quarter, and Minnesota was still
able to come back make a ton of plays down
the stretch, including Rudy Gobert and Anthony Edwards and Nas
Reed who had taken the elbow of this postseason, and
so they've made a series out of it. Game four
was wildly entertaining. This series has been wildly entertaining. I

(11:44):
don't know that everybody feels the same way about the
Eastern Conference series that's been extended, the Pistons and the Cavs,
but at least we have that. I wish there was
a little more of it because we're in the final
eight and two of the four series were totally noncompet.

Speaker 1 (12:00):
It is right, Whiteeps and the Calves better hope that
doesn't go to a seventh game because we know that
James isn't gonna show up in that game.

Speaker 3 (12:07):
The Cavs aren't undefeated at home, so that still could
play in their favor.

Speaker 2 (12:11):
Yeah, I take that back, and that they wouldn't have
that game at home, it would not play in their favor.
The opposite.

Speaker 1 (12:18):
I get where JV. Bickerstaff's coming from. In fact, he's
one of two coaches that will highlight in today's show,
one of which I agree with, the other which very
much do not agree with. So yeah, all of that
to come, and as it pertains to the Lakers getting swept.
Now the questions can persist yet again.

Speaker 2 (12:36):
Where will le Bronni James play next year?

Speaker 1 (12:38):
That's exactly where I was gonna go. We'll discuss that
next What part of Lebron James in the playoffs? A,
you're gonna miss the most?

Speaker 3 (12:48):
Wes Uh, I won't miss anything because he'll be in
the playoffs again.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
Next year, because he's gonna play again. I totally think
he's gonna play again.

Speaker 1 (12:57):
Yes, okay, I'm glad you said that, because do people
actually think I'm dead serious and this is not for effect?
Do people actually think that guy with that ego really
doesn't want a farewell tour. If Kareem got like rocking
chairs and all the other places that he got things
on his farewell tour at the end of his tenure

(13:19):
after twenty billion years that he played in the NBA,
there's no way Lebron is not going to want that
kind of attention lavished upon him.

Speaker 3 (13:29):
I mean as dumb as you guys might not think
I am. I am that thought totally. I forgot about
that completely.

Speaker 2 (13:36):
Well, the reason I bring it up is because he
said it.

Speaker 1 (13:39):
He's the one that said I don't want a farewell tour,
and he's the one that lied. Because if he really thinks,
we believe that having seen how we see how he really,
you know, he behaves, he carries himself, especially in these
last like four to five seasons.

Speaker 2 (13:54):
He mean his Lakers career.

Speaker 1 (13:55):
Basically, Yes, his Lakers career, it got like it was
bad and then he got to LA and it just
got like levels of nausea.

Speaker 3 (14:01):
One thing of about Kareem's farewell tour, he was on
a very significant and very steady decline for three or
four years. What was his last very unlike Lebron the
last last year in the eighties, eighty eight, eighty nine
was last year. It's forty one, and he played for

(14:22):
the Lakers in that year. He only played for two franchises.
For those that don't recall now, he still was an
All Star that year, but he averaged ten points per
game and grabbed almost five rebounds and he was an
All Star. He played twenty three minutes. Some of these
all star selections need a little bit of especially in
the NBA's there's nothing wrong with that. If you could

(14:43):
be voted in, you could be a commissioner selection. It's
an exhibition game. They're they're trying to have you apart.
It's a good thing. You want them there. This is
a league event, it's an exhibition game. It's for the fans.
You're begging people to waste their money on spending money
to attend these events, so you might as well give
them that, and they did. But no, he couldn't really
play anymore. He wasn't a big part of what they
were doing. And that's extremely different from Lebron. In my opinion,

(15:07):
if Lebron was contributing like that to any team, he
would have retired two or three years prior to that
ever happening. He's a huge contributor or what any team
he plays for. As he enters free agency, so we'll
talk about whether or not you think he should become
a rocket. But talking about Lebron and having another year,
he's too good. I wouldn't walk away. He's got two

(15:30):
or one son that's an adult. He plays with him
in LA. He's got another son who's a college basketball player.
And the idea that, well, you know, I've been at
it for this long, let's go home and spend time
with my family. I think it's spend time with some
of his family that's still at the house. But very
few players play their NBA career and have their kids

(15:51):
fully grown up and at adulthood with at least the
first two as he does, so that's not really something
he can decide. Well, I've been doing this long enough.
It's time for my family now. And the first thing
I mentioned, he's too good now, he's too good at
playing this game. Still, is it too much for him
to stay at this level health wise? Whatever it is

(16:12):
that he does to play in as many games as
he does and have the abilities at an advanced age,
which really we've never seen before. We've seen players play
into their forties, they're not usually contributing. None of them
are contributing like he has every game he's played this
year in this postseason. Well he just did this, that
and the other at age forty whatever. Now here's all
of the other players combined at this age, and none

(16:33):
of them combined have done what he's doing. So no,
I don't think he's done yet. I'm sure he'll take
his time, but he's also unlike Aaron Rodgers in this respect.
I think the Lakers or whomever else in the NBA
will know what his plans are long before we're like,
my god, make up your mind already, Aaron.

Speaker 1 (16:50):
Well, Rob Polinka has already gone on the record to
say that they would welcome him back, And I don't
know if he checked with Genie before he gave that
sound by it, because I definitely don't think that she
feels the same way.

Speaker 2 (17:00):
Well does he have to anymore?

Speaker 3 (17:02):
I know she holds the same position, but under new ownership,
which pushed out the rest of the buses, her request.

Speaker 2 (17:10):
Correct, I don't know.

Speaker 3 (17:12):
I'm not sure what her role will actually be moving forward.
All indications where nothing's going to change, and then it
sounded like maybe nothing's going to change, And as they
go through this offseason, I wouldn't be really surprised at
all if more change than we think. But you would
every jam with every gam would say what Rob said,
whether it's true or not. I mean, you're not gonna
say yeah, but I think it's time for us to

(17:34):
really launch the Luca Era because we've we've had enough
of Lebron.

Speaker 1 (17:37):
To me, though, even though everything that you're saying about
him is true from the standpoint if he's putting up
big numbers, big numbers and winning are two different things.
And I know what everybody's gonna say, Well, you're a
top four seed. They obviously ousted the Rockets and he
was the main reason all that kind of stuff is for.
Is true, but they whether they played the thunder or not.
To me, they warn't a championship contender this year. And

(18:00):
there is something to be said for leaning into the
Luca Era, because you can't fully do that, in my
opinion until forty one year old plus Lebron James is
off the roster. He's just too much of a thing.
He's too much of an albatross. He's too much of
a You have to give him as touches, you have
to cater to his you know, his off the court
needs all that kind of stuff. You there's a reason

(18:21):
that Luca is like, I don't want you to trade
Austin Reeves. He's saying anything about Lebron James, and I
get it. Lebron's a free agent, so there's a little
bit to that, so is Reefs. Yeah, but what I'm
saying is Reeves has a future in LA if they
want him to come back there and he wants.

Speaker 2 (18:37):
To be there, Reeves has a future period.

Speaker 1 (18:39):
Correct that I should have said. I should have stopped
the sentence right there. I think that Lebron and the
Lakers is as done as done committed.

Speaker 3 (18:49):
So it's funny you say it that way to me.
Of course, sitting in this room hosting a show with you,
which has never happened before.

Speaker 2 (18:55):
I think this week, all those.

Speaker 1 (18:57):
Things that you said, uh, you know, the in the
way needs his touches albatross, like I know, Lucas awesome
at all.

Speaker 2 (19:05):
It sounds like you're talking about him. Well yeah, because
that's why Dallas said get out of here. Well they
say you.

Speaker 1 (19:11):
Get out of here because their GM was an absolute lunatic.

Speaker 3 (19:14):
It's not so much like trading him seems crazy. I
still think trading him for what they got is actually
what's crazy.

Speaker 2 (19:24):
Because it was Anthony Davis. Because it was next to nothing. Yeah,
it was a poo poop platter. It was terrible for
a poop plotter.

Speaker 1 (19:30):
Good to give away, which is essentially what they did
moving on from a player of that talent, and it
takes some I'm going to get fired stones, so I'm
not absolving them for that ridiculous decision.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
His age is a huge.

Speaker 3 (19:43):
Factor of the likelihood that he's going to be playing
You into contention in the future is a given. You
talked about the Mavericks a few minutes ago opening segment.
You know about the Spurs, Rockets, and MAVs. You call
the MAVs an up and coming team. The MAVs are
one Oklahoma City Western Conference championship removed from being the
Western Conference champion. Yep, the MAVs were the Western Conference

(20:04):
champions two playoffs again.

Speaker 2 (20:06):
Because Luca was their best player.

Speaker 3 (20:09):
So it's it's nuts that still happened. It will be
this is It will definitely be the biggest story until
there's a tiny bit of knowledge about you know, what
his future plans are, because it's the biggest name in
the sport and has been for many, many years, and
he's clearly still helps He's still an extremely helpful player.
Ruy Hatcher Murray is probably the best example of this,

(20:29):
and Ruy had some pretty good playoff numbers in his
brief playoff appearance with Washington, and they've been unbelievable with
LA and they're one hundred percent because Lebron is his teammate.
One hundred percent of what he finds him, he finds him.
And they cannot possibly spend one second, even the Rockets
saying what do we need to do to stop Rui?

Speaker 2 (20:51):
They can't.

Speaker 3 (20:51):
Teams can't care because they have to care about everything else.
Did The Rockets put on the all time greatest three
point shooter in postseason history. And this is a fact
that I'm telling you one hundred and fifty three point
attempts or more in a postseason career, there's one player
in the history of the league that's shooting it at
better than fifty percent, and it's him. It's a Rycha Murray.

(21:12):
He's at fifty two percent. And the Rockets said, no problem, reed, Shepherd,
you check him. They put their worst defender on the
best three point shooter in NBA postseason history.

Speaker 2 (21:22):
I would take him in a heartbeat on the Rockets.

Speaker 1 (21:23):
He's the one thing that he does, the one thing
they don't have a consistent shooter.

Speaker 3 (21:28):
He is because partially he plays with Lebron what you
think you might have in Jabari Smith Junior, but he's
never shot at that level. I think Ruy was also
a much better all around player than people think. He
had two unbelievably productive, efficient, successful, shooting and everything else

(21:48):
series this postseason. Rui was insane. He was good against
the Rockets, really good. He was even better against the Thunder.
It just was to no avail. So the Lakers will
always be a huge, huge story. At some point they
will have gone from Magic our Kareem's team to Magic's team,
to Kobe and Shaq's team, to Kobe's team to Lebron's team,
and soon enough they will truly be Luca's team when

(22:10):
when Lebron isn't there, and it absolutely could be as
soon as this upcoming NBA season just a few months away.
Definitely get into what was said after last night's game.
We talked a little bit about what was said after
the fourth game of the Wolves Spurs series, but definitely
going to revisit that as we head into Game five
of that series. The NBA's Draft combine is ongoing. The

(22:34):
NBA's Draft lottery was just held on Sunday, so one
real weird look back at the NBA Draft lottery from
Sunday coming up in the Best of X. Halfway through
the first hour of the program, we'd like to hit
you with the best of social media, affectionately sung as
the Best of X. Plenty of places to go to,

(22:56):
whether it's on ig where people are shooting selfies in
their car after job interview's gone wrong for that guy
and the comp well, I mean again, the skeptic in
me wonders if it's real even happened, But it was
smart to do something that might in fact go virals.

Speaker 2 (23:15):
She has, so he accomplishes goal.

Speaker 1 (23:18):
Honestly, if you aren't aware of this, we do have
a Best of X basketball related story, but nonetheless it's
been viralating around social media recently.

Speaker 2 (23:27):
Job interview goes back to his car.

Speaker 3 (23:29):
Feels like he blew it because they asked a very
typical question when in the interview, what's what's your weakness?
And in true dunder Mifflin style, he said, well, I
kind of blacked out there and I said my weakness
was oreos. You know, whether it's one, twelve ten, if

(23:49):
I've still got milk in the glass, I just keep
eating oreos.

Speaker 2 (23:52):
So I blew it.

Speaker 3 (23:53):
So if I'm still looking for job, if anybody knows
of one, if you actually said that in a room
of one, two, five interviewers, I don't really think it
would be viewed that badly. You have a sense of humor.
You're trying to tell them a little bit about yourself.
You're going to be working with these people, They're gonna
be your bestest buddies moving forward, presuming the job's not remote.

(24:14):
So you just opened up a little bit. You made
a joke. Isn't that okay? You have some personality.

Speaker 1 (24:21):
Yeah, no, there's nothing wrong with that whatsoever, even if
it was fake.

Speaker 3 (24:25):
I mean, you could go about it a different way.
If mister David Wallace is interviewing you for Jan's job
and you say your strengths or weaknesses are actually your strengths.

Speaker 1 (24:35):
See, okay, the Dinner Party is probably still the best
episode pound for pound, But when he's doing the deposition
and they're reading back the transcript.

Speaker 3 (24:45):
Why would I say that so good? It's like totally
butchered it, and she reads it back to him.

Speaker 4 (24:51):
I know.

Speaker 2 (24:51):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (24:52):
The interview episode where Jim and Karen and Michael are
all interviewing for Jan's job while Jan's still there and
Michael and Jan are still dating. That's an all timer.
I would agree, the Dinner Parties an all timer, and
many others.

Speaker 2 (25:09):
That's why we reference that show as often as we do.

Speaker 3 (25:11):
Number one is just watching another thing on the Best
of looking for best of X out there, and someone
posted when Richard came by with the Idris Ilba. Mister
Wallace came by, David Wallace and he's talking to the crew,
and Kelly says hi, because she's in love with Idris,
and he goes hello, and then David continues and Kevin

(25:32):
says hi, and everybody can see that Iadris cannot stop
smiling and laughing, and they kept it in. They kept
the scene in because.

Speaker 2 (25:42):
It worked, because was wild, and he kept his okay.

Speaker 3 (25:45):
So back to the NBA Draft, you got fourteen teams
in it. You got fourteen teams sending representatives. A few
sent broadcasters from their team. In this case, it was
really a legend of their team. John wall who does
work with the on the broad cast side for Washington
Wizards broadcast and will moving forward, he was there representing
the Wizards. They ultimately won the number one overall pick

(26:07):
the Indiana Pacers sent TJ.

Speaker 2 (26:09):
McConnell.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
They ultimately not only did not win the top pick,
they didn't win one, two, three, or four, and they
won the right to lose their pick entirely, that pick
going to the La Clippers, which resulted in their general
managers you're going on a social media and interview spree
apologizing for the deal that is going to hurt their team.

Speaker 3 (26:28):
Dramatically. He says, Na, We'll be fine. Ty Reese will
come back, Everything will be fine. George was there representing
Utah and the other assorted representatives, some front office types,
and we've seen family members there as well. Saw Jamie
Gertz there a few years ago repping the Atlanta Hawks,
and people are like, I don't know. She was part
of the ownership group that was running the Hawks. I

(26:49):
thought she just was sad that Robert Downey Junior died
in less than zero right there in the car in
his sweet ride.

Speaker 2 (26:55):
It happened.

Speaker 3 (26:56):
And then many years ago, the Milwaukee Bucks real relatively
new ownership at the time, owner Wes Edens had his
daughter Valerie sitting up there representing the Bucks and they
won the number two overall selection. So she had already
been there before. She was chosen again by the organization

(27:17):
to represent them, and she's several years removed from her
first appearance, and so somebody posted a picture of her
there obviously an interview. Actually, she did an interview with
somebody from hoops Hype, and then she reposted said go bucks. Shockingly,
the interviewer in the interview goes, you were here before, right, like,

(27:41):
come on, man, are you covering the NBA or not.
Everybody knows she was there before. They were talking about
it when.

Speaker 1 (27:46):
She was there, and they were certainly talking about it
knowing that she was about to go back, but it
did elicit this response from someone on social media damn,
although it was spelled with just four letters.

Speaker 2 (27:58):
She aging fast.

Speaker 3 (28:00):
Remember she was a smoke show and the talk of
the draft lottery when she first appeared.

Speaker 2 (28:06):
A one point two million views of that particular post.

Speaker 3 (28:10):
There are two things in particular that show up most
often in the comments to that comment. One of them
would probably remind you of as Gary, so I'll leave
that one out. The other one is about it usually
was the shortened version of an obvious term calm down,

(28:32):
peto bear the letters peed o, show up in thirty
five percent of the posts that follow but I brought
it to best of x more for the fact that
she commented on it.

Speaker 2 (28:47):
She quoted it.

Speaker 3 (28:48):
She quote posted it and said, the first time I
did the lottery, I was in high school. I had
turned eighteen a few weeks beforehand, and every single one
of the photos of me in a bikini that went
viral on the internet in the aftermath, we'red take on
I was fifteen or sixteen years old.

Speaker 2 (29:02):
Of course I have aged I was a child.

Speaker 1 (29:05):
She goes on, I find it so strange that women
are asked to delay womanhood as long as possible in.

Speaker 2 (29:10):
Favor of some kind of eternal girlhood.

Speaker 3 (29:12):
I don't want to be a girl. I don't aspire
to look like a teenager. I'm very happy to be
a woman. If your beauty standard for me is to
look like a child, that's your problem, but not mine.
This is not the insult that you think. It is
hard emoji.

Speaker 1 (29:24):
I mean, I can't argue with any of what she said,
and it was so well put. Just gross. I get it,
we're all dudes like hot chicks. But like she's right
about the she's fifteen or sixteen and there's she was
eighteen at the time. But what happens when you are
the interpreter for a or for a foreign born player

(29:47):
who gets used at the draft lottery, When you're a
very young mom of a potential drafte, when you're a
sister of a potential draft d and you show up
during the broadcast, the scoundrels that we are Luca's mom
immediately travel to the Best of x Instagram. Yeah, they

(30:10):
go to there and her page.

Speaker 3 (30:11):
She's a model and so pictures of her like that
are on her She's not even she doesn't even post
all that often, to be honest with you, those pictures
are there.

Speaker 1 (30:21):
She has her Instagram listed there. Yeah, she's she runs
two businesses now.

Speaker 3 (30:27):
She's not truly involved with the Bucks anymore than just
it's part of her family's business now.

Speaker 2 (30:32):
But she does her own things. People do go and
look that stuff.

Speaker 1 (30:36):
Have hot offspring sometimes, I mean, look at the Hunts,
look at well, look.

Speaker 2 (30:42):
At the Hunts. You mean one of his daughters, the
soon to be miss Green.

Speaker 1 (30:48):
Yeah, that one. Her name's Gracie and she's not ugly.
And Jeanie Buss once posed for Playboy when Doctor Buss
was very much alive. Like this happens with owners. They
have a lot of money, which affords them very hot wives,
and then that gives them very hot offspring.

Speaker 2 (31:06):
I mean, this is not like a new thing.

Speaker 3 (31:09):
Yes, a very well thought out and crafted X account
response from.

Speaker 2 (31:14):
Meetens Edens that's her handle on X.

Speaker 3 (31:20):
Yeah, it did not work out for the Bucks, which
likely helps them decision make on what to do with
the honest this offseason, and we're every day that goes
by in the playoffs, every game that gets played, every
controversy we discussed, every retirement possibility from an aging superstar
gets us a day closer to the Bucks to the
twenty third or twenty fourth of June when they intend

(31:41):
on having their future in place, whether he's there that
decision or whether he's not that decision.

Speaker 2 (31:48):
That that part the last part there.

Speaker 1 (31:49):
Uh yeah, we're fielding offers for you, honest, no kidding,
you've been doing it for two years and trying to
deny it anyway, all right.

Speaker 3 (31:57):
I believe the term that they have a Shams to
use when he writes about it is they're open for business.

Speaker 1 (32:04):
Yeah, well, shams is making all sorts of people mad.
These days, including Luca speaking of being mad Astros fans are,
and well, let's see if ownership is because how is
going to be sitting in last place after getting wrecked
by both Seattle and Texas going to feel to Jim
Crane and company if that hypothetically speaking of course, yeah,

(32:27):
we will discuss that next.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
I said it earlier in the hour.

Speaker 1 (32:35):
First game, first time all season, the Astros have been
ten games one to five hundred, and you said basically
to the effect, you know, it doesn't necessarily matter that
it's against these two teams this week, even though it
does from the standpoint of they'd be even further behind
the eight ball in the division back Like, I don't
think anybody's like sitting there thinking about.

Speaker 2 (32:56):
Are the Astros going to be able to win this division?

Speaker 1 (32:58):
Like they're just trying to get over five hundred, like
you said, But it does feel heavier if you are
continuing to lose to the two teams that you use
to own, and in succession, as you mentioned, they have
gotten the better of you. First it was Texas ousting
you in the twenty twenty three ALCS, which still to
this day is just disgusting. What an absolute aberration Fluke

(33:22):
World Series Championship, and I'll never ever think anything otherwise,
especially when Routus Garcia did.

Speaker 2 (33:30):
What he did afterwards was is nothing.

Speaker 1 (33:32):
And then Seattle has come up and despite their best
player being a complete fraud, they're right there in the
thick of things to be leading the division right now.
And they started getting better the first time they swept
you this year, and they could very well sweep you
again as they're one down and three to go in
this series. And then you got Texas coming up this weekend.

(33:56):
I saw somewhere today where somebody said it'll be a
miracle of Joe Aspata makes it out of this week,
and I pretty much could see that. I could see
them firing him at the end of this week. Well,
you do have the minor issue.

Speaker 3 (34:11):
I suppose there aren't any They don't have any days
off until after the leave for the final three games
of this thirteenth straight days of baseball. So Sunday afternoon
you lose to the Rangers, You've brought all your stuff
for the flight.

Speaker 2 (34:26):
Joe, Yeah, you could tell him not to go, and
they do.

Speaker 3 (34:30):
I mean, it's I don't think ownership really cares a
whole lot sometimes when they make these moves, about what
options there are you can do something.

Speaker 2 (34:37):
Briefly, I mean the managers.

Speaker 3 (34:39):
For the two teams that have already had in season changes,
Don Matting Lou's already sitting on Philadelphia's bench and the
Boston Red Sox. Because it was more than just letting
Alex Korra go, they let four other coaches go and
reassigned another. So they told their TRIPAA manager, why don't
you come up and join our team and manage us
the rest of the way. I mean the Astros, if

(35:00):
we're really taking it that far, they do have options.
You know, one person sitting right next to Joe Aspata,
just one some amazing games in the World Baseball Classic,
has managerial experience and clearly is extremely well versed in
great relationships inside this organization in Omar Lopez. And the
latter of those two statements is definitely true about their

(35:23):
first base coach, Dave Clark. He's actually been the interim
manager of the Houston Astros already many many years ago,
late in the season when he took over those duties.
He has managerial experience, he has great relationships with the players.
He's certainly been in charge previously, so they could easily
go either one of those routes. But as we said

(35:44):
from day one, these losses could technically cost Joe his
job and could compel ownership to make a change. But
from my standpoint, that would strictly be as a means
to tell the players you're disappointed in them. It would
be a kick in the pants type of thing. That's
what I think Philadelphia and Boston did. I think in
their case is it made more sense though, because the

(36:04):
players that they have on their teams that are healthy
are the ones that have played poorly and have sent
their managers out the door. That's not what's happening here
in Houston. Joe Spotta is not managing his way through
handing the ball to Hunter Brown, and then handing the
ball to a successful tatsu Emi and then handing the
ball to Christian Javier while awaiting Jordan Alvarez to hit

(36:25):
behind Jeremy Pania and in front of Carlos Correa. None
of those guys are a part of what's happened this year,
certainly not anything good that's happened this year. The reason
they're losing because they're the players that have been healthy
have not been good enough, and most of them are
not major league caliber players because of all the injuries,
because some of the major leaguers that are good enough
are sitting there on the il, many of whom will

(36:45):
be playing for Corpus Christi tonight. Jeremy Pania and Jake
Myers will in fact, are expected to be in the
lineup tonight for the Hooks, where they begin their rehab assignment.
They have an evening game at home Tuesday Today. Josh
Hater is expected to make his third rehab appearance with
the Corpus Christy Hooks. If you want to fry Joe Spotta,
you're saying I'm disappointed in the product. It's virtually impossible

(37:08):
to look Joe in the face, I think, and say
you're doing a bad job with this team.

Speaker 1 (37:12):
Yeah, it has far more to do with the roster
that he's been given, not to mention the health or
lack thereof of that roster, and.

Speaker 2 (37:20):
In that vein, is he really on the hot seat? Well,
soundbites like the one we're gonna play in the next segment,
I would say don't exactly help his cause, although I
don't know what he's supposed to say, but we'll let
you hear from him as we start the simulcast in
three o'clock hour next the A.

Speaker 1 (37:39):
Welcome into our number two here on a Tuesday edition
of the program Sports Talk seven ninety sh N wex
AC with You.

Speaker 2 (37:48):
Josh Jordan is our producer.

Speaker 1 (37:50):
A lot of Astro's conversation in that first hour, along
with a little bit of NBA postseason simply because the
Lakers were swept out of the second round last night.
I'll be honest with you, I figure that's what would
have happened to either the Lakers or the Rockets, given
what the Thunder had been able to do all season long.

Speaker 3 (38:09):
Fully healthy Rockets team, they might have won a game.
Fully healthy Lakers team.

Speaker 2 (38:14):
They might have won a game. Gentlemen, sweep. I think
both series would have been more than that. Six games.
They definitely wouldn't have gone to seventh doesn't seem likely,
but you don't know.

Speaker 3 (38:25):
I mean, every additional game you play is another forty
eight minutes of something you didn't expect to happen happen,
an ankle being turned or the like.

Speaker 1 (38:33):
Who could turn their ankle on the Thunder that would
actually really affect them. I mean, you could say that
like fifty percent of the four games the Thunder played,
Shake Gildess, Alexander was just eh for his standards.

Speaker 3 (38:46):
He has unbelievable gravity, though the focus on him is
enormous and his ability to I mean, he still runs
their team.

Speaker 2 (38:53):
He's their point guard. Yeah, ball is always in his hands.

Speaker 3 (38:56):
It would be a pretty massive loss, even for them
who have talent for days, if he were not available.

Speaker 2 (39:03):
We'll get back to the NBA postseason in just a minute.

Speaker 1 (39:06):
I saw this SoundBite in quote quotation for Form first
and then I heard it, and there's two parts to this.
Joe Aspata speaking after the loss to the Seattle Mariners
last night. He's saying what needs to be said in
his position, but it also isn't going to go over

(39:29):
very well at all with anybody.

Speaker 2 (39:32):
Given where they are right now.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
The only game or the only team in the Majors
with a worse record than the Houston Astros are the
insanely expensive New York Mets, and they're like a disaster.
But the Astros aren't far behind them record wise. And
that's why when you hear this sound bite from Joe Aspata,
whether he intended it to or not, it's not a

(39:54):
kind of tone.

Speaker 4 (39:55):
Def we are definitely turning the corner. You know, our
starters are giving taking us deep in the game, a bullpen.
He's doing their job. We just haven't been able to
get that big hit. But our pitching has really come
around and they're starting to compete more in the zone,
trying to put people away, you know, really nice shot Basquets,

(40:16):
really trying to get into a rhythm here, trying to
get these guys through.

Speaker 2 (40:19):
It's been really good.

Speaker 1 (40:20):
Now, look everything you just said is true. The Peter
Lambert outing was another qual I mean, it was good.
It was good enough to win if you have any.

Speaker 2 (40:28):
Seven three runs is fantastic.

Speaker 1 (40:30):
Yeah, I'll take that anytime, especially with some of the
outings you've seen from other pitchers on this Astro staff.
The pitching in general has been better, that's what he's
talking about, and the hitting is kind of regressed to
the meme.

Speaker 3 (40:45):
They've gone way past that. Unfortunately, they suck. How's that
they had not an extra base hit since Saturday.

Speaker 2 (40:52):
So like but saying we're turning a corner.

Speaker 3 (40:55):
Saying the pitching is turning the corner, yeah, which is accurate.

Speaker 1 (40:59):
Okay, but it's not translating the wins, and that's not
what anybody wants to hear, least of all in my opinion.

Speaker 2 (41:06):
Jim Crane, Well, I mean I wish I could.

Speaker 3 (41:09):
I couldn't figure it out, and I didn't have a
chance to ask somebody if that was a specific response
to the pitching question. Do you feel like the pitching
has turned the corner? Because that certainly sounded like the
answer that he gave, and it's accurate. This pitching staff
is the worst in baseball. If the pitching staff has
turned the corner, you would hope that that's how you
start winning games.

Speaker 2 (41:27):
I certainly do.

Speaker 3 (41:28):
You've heard me borderline rant about it, like they're never
going to win any games, no matter how many yord
On alvarez'es they have, even the May version that stinks.
He sucks right now, you can't win baseball games at
the major league level if you can't pitch, and they
cannot pitch. They have the worst pitching staff in baseball,
and they're starting to close the enormous gap between being

(41:48):
thirtieth by a ton and flirting with getting to twenty
ninth or twenty eighth because they gave up three runs yesterday,
game before or five three before that, none before that
he gave up one run to the Yankees, or to
the Dodgers in the second game of that series. He
gave up one, three and three to the Red Sox
in that series. This is light years better than how

(42:10):
they pitched in April.

Speaker 2 (42:12):
If you get.

Speaker 1 (42:16):
March slash April al Player of the Month version of
your don you're at least going to ten Ing's last
night minimum.

Speaker 2 (42:23):
Right that last a bat. I mean he came up.

Speaker 3 (42:25):
He's come up in a lot of those situations throughout
the year and hasn't necessarily come through because earlier in
the game he'd already hit his home run, or earlier
in the game he'd already driven in a run, and
now he's not doing any of that. Andy's striking out
all the time. But my gosh, eight other hitters in
the order that should tell you that it's it's virtually
impossible for any Mike Trout to carry an entire offense,

(42:48):
which he had help in March April clearly, and he,
like everybody else, is in a massive tailspin. Cam Smith
can't hit, Altuve can't hit Christian Walker's nine to fifty
oh ps is now below eight fifty. Just run down
the list of who's out there, and that's why they're offense.
All those pitching results I just gave you, but they've

(43:08):
all happened while the Astros have scored one and zero
and one.

Speaker 2 (43:13):
And two and two and three and three and three.
Those are all results from just May and we're only
eleven days into May. Yes, they have the ten runout
burst against Cincinnati. Yeah, they scored six against Boston.

Speaker 3 (43:30):
All the other games are You're probably not winning today
unless your ace is spinning seven or eight shutout innings and.

Speaker 2 (43:37):
Your ace is on theil right now.

Speaker 3 (43:39):
So it's made it very difficult to They haven't been
able to combine the things very well. They hit really
really well last month and pitched extremely poorly. Now they're
pitching better. They should be in all these games, but
they're four and six because they aren't scoring any runs. Yeah,
it's completely flipped, well not completely.

Speaker 1 (43:58):
It's not like they were scoring six to seven runs
every night when the pitching was giving up seven, eight, nine.

Speaker 2 (44:03):
I ran through some of these numbers the other day.

Speaker 3 (44:05):
They were essentially first, second, maybe third across the board
offensively in the American League. Run scored ops ops plus
slugging on all those things. They're much more like barely
middle of the pack now over the last twenty five thirty.

Speaker 1 (44:21):
Days, which was what they were last year on the season,
or was it was even worse.

Speaker 2 (44:25):
They're always in that neighborhood different areas.

Speaker 3 (44:27):
They weren't quite as leveled off where all of the
things fell into place, Like right now, they're still hitting homers,
not the last two days, but they're still in the
top six and the majors and homers, but they're not
scoring any runs. All these offensive numbers that suggest they
should be scoring more, they're not. They're in the middle
of the pack again for about a month now scoring runs.
That's losing baseball. Yeah, you can't mean their pitching has

(44:47):
been better. Keep in mind where the bar was. They're
pitching better, that's nice. They're still not what anyone would
say is pitching great or pitching well, just significantly better
than disastrously.

Speaker 1 (45:01):
And again, I don't know where you go from here.
It's you can't you can get healthier. That's all they're doing.
It's only it's the only thing they're doing.

Speaker 3 (45:10):
Yeah, there's and I'm not saying that they're sitting around
and doing nothing. Would you like them to be the
team that's still getting nothing from Lucas Gilido because they
were the team that signed him. As he gets ready
to pitch, You got Eric Lauer, another DFA guy yesterday
Toronto dfade him. He actually used to be an astro.
He signed a minor league deal in twenty twenty four
and then when he didn't get called up, he said,

(45:32):
get me out of here, and he ended up pitching overseas.
Then he came back and pitched very well for the
Blue Jays last year, kind of resurrected things. Then he
lost his arbitration case to them and has had a
very bad twenty twenty six, so they let him go.
Do you take a chance on a player like that?
Do you even orchestrate a minor deal to make sure
you get him as a DFAID player, because he would

(45:55):
almost immediately be a better option than bullpen days every
five or six days. I know EMI's back, and there's
only some certain amount of time before Hunter Brown returns,
and then maybe so maybe there's not a spot necessarily
for him, But those are the only real options they have.
They can't bring up pitchers from Triple A anymore unless
it's finally the call for Uyola, because everybody else they've

(46:17):
tried is either here in the rotation Arrageddi and Lambert
or back down at Triple A because they can't get
major league hitters out. And that's Jason, Alexander and Colton Gordon. Yeah,
and those guys. Well, in the case of Alexander, he
was a godsend a year ago. He was winning you
games to spell insert player xyz, he was thwrowing my mind.

(46:40):
If you recall when he first came up. I'm sure
I have it somewhere that's deep in the recesses of
the unnecessarily kept text messages that I've sent way way down.
I'm sure it was something along the lines of there's
no way this guy's gonna get major league hitters out, not.

Speaker 2 (46:55):
With the stuff he has doing it.

Speaker 3 (46:57):
They kept winning his starts, and clearly he pitched well enough,
if I'm not trying to to mean him too much,
but I didn't know how he did it then, and
I'm not surprised that he isn't doing it now. He
throws hittable pitches, and Colton Gordon's even worse. He throws
more hitable pitches, they throw meatballs. They just don't Their
stuff's very good for a professional pitcher, but not good

(47:17):
enough to be a major league pitcher.

Speaker 2 (47:19):
So it's good enough for Japan. Is that what you're saying.

Speaker 3 (47:21):
I mean, they both had awesome numbers in Triple A
this year. Alexander's pitching today has already given up three runs,
five hits, two walks in five innings to Tacoma, and
Colton Gordon just had a miserable appearance earlier this week.
I mean, it's just who they are.

Speaker 2 (47:35):
I don't and when Colton Gordon was near the top
of the Astros prospect list, that's just unbelievable. He's got
nice minor league numbers, he has no good peripherals. There's
no way anybody could really look at that and say, yeah,
this guy. A prospect list should be a list of
players who you think are going to be good at
the next level.

Speaker 3 (47:54):
Why would anybody have thought that he throws strikes. That's
why he gets hit so much, because he throws hit
able pitches.

Speaker 1 (48:00):
You know what was funny is you hear people say
that all the time throw strikes, Well, you can also get.

Speaker 2 (48:05):
Hit when you do that. If you don't have major
league stuff.

Speaker 3 (48:08):
And I think most of the guys that are currently
here Logan Van, why, by the way, was the roster
move if you're not aware, made to get Emi on
tonight's roster? And I mentioned the rehab appearances. Corpus Christian
should have three astros playing for them tonight Hater's third
rehab appearance, and Jeremy Pany and Jake Myers will begin
their rehab assignments with them tonight. But most of the

(48:28):
guys that are now a part of the Astros, if
you give me Cody Bolton and the other that they
turned to, I think they have major league stuff. He's
like on the borderline, does he or does any We'll
find out over his next handful of appearances. But I
said it yesterday when you were out. I did not
like how they I don't like them attempting to stretch
Kaiwai tang Out. I would just he's our best lengthy

(48:50):
bullpen arm. Why mess with that.

Speaker 2 (48:52):
That's where it needs to be. So I would if
you wanted him to pitch as a starter, that's fine.

Speaker 3 (48:57):
Give him his thirty five forty pitches, his two to
free innings and move on, or just have Cody Boltons
to start the games if those games occur again.

Speaker 1 (49:06):
Yeah, I tend to agree with him in particular. It's
a mess and it will continue to be. Hey, but
there's good news. At least you're for a Mariner's hater
wants a fraud, always a fraud, which Seattle Mariner is
proving me right.

Speaker 2 (49:22):
We'll tell you about that next.

Speaker 1 (49:23):
I don't want to hurt myself patting myself on the back,
but I'm going to. I mean, the Mariners might be
better than the Houston Astros right now, but cal Rally
is a complete fraud.

Speaker 3 (49:35):
That and clean up tonight for the Seattle Mariners. One
of seven more left handed batters, he's a switch hitter.
The other six are true lefties. In the lineup tonight
against right handed Astros starter tatsu Emi, who makes his
return to the mound for the first time since April tenth,
Rally bets clean up. He has a second best home

(49:56):
run total on the team with seven. He has one
of the best totals on their team with two stolen bases.
He's hitting one fifty seven with a five point fifty
eight OPS.

Speaker 2 (50:05):
He's also best at one other thing, not getting hits. Yep,
the loggiest. Did you happen to see my latest Instagram story? No?
Could you check that out right? Quait? Second, let me
just browse on over to Adam J. Wesler's instagram real quick.

Speaker 3 (50:22):
So follow the query that I offer to the people
that look at it and see if you can in
fact spot the difference. Cal Rawley carried an eight game
hitless streak into last night, and it continued into a
nine game hitless streak now over his last thirty four abs.
What are we looking at there on ig story?

Speaker 1 (50:42):
Well, it looks like on the left we're looking at
cal That's correct, and then it looks like on the
right we're looking at the same picture.

Speaker 3 (50:49):
But it's Shane Gillis's face. Very hard to tell the difference.
I asked people to spot the difference between those two gentlemen.
But Shane Gillis in a Mariner's twenty nine year jersey
is about how Cal Raley in a twenty nine Mariners
jersey is performing this season, just after his sixty home
run campaign and a long battle deep into the voting

(51:12):
process for MVP of the American League, he is currently
basically the easiest hitter in baseball to retire.

Speaker 1 (51:20):
Let me ask you a serious question, who benefited more
from peds allegedly him or Fernando Tatist Junior, who is
completely a shell of his former self.

Speaker 3 (51:32):
Now, well, you actually made it very easy when you
brought Tattis into the conversation of those two players. Which
one has been suspended for using before?

Speaker 2 (51:41):
That's the one, Fernando.

Speaker 3 (51:42):
So Fernando is my answer there. How come Nick Castianos
can't stay out of the strays? Did you see the
stray this week?

Speaker 2 (51:51):
I don't think I saw this.

Speaker 3 (51:52):
So he used Fernando Tatis's bat in a game earlier
this week and he homered.

Speaker 2 (51:58):
Huh. And as his media session was ongoing after the game,
did anybody apologize during his home run trot?

Speaker 3 (52:04):
No, A reporter said something along the lines of will
you never let Fernando hear the end of it now
that you homered with his bat, because Fernando hasn't homered
this year? And Nick turned to his left, where the
reporter who was to his left almost behind him, and
he said, that's rude and just went on about listening
to other people's question as the reporter said, uh, huh,

(52:26):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 (52:26):
By the way, I know he's tied to Tom Brenneman's
unfortunate apology.

Speaker 2 (52:31):
All Nick did was Homer But Nick is kind of unlikable.

Speaker 3 (52:35):
You ever notice that that's long followed his career, There's
no question about it. But a little turnside the clubhouse
for some teams, a lot of his more recent teams,
it's been a totally different story. He's been in a
few places now. He's been a part of some very
good teams. He was obviously here, Yeah, he was here
a couple of years ago.

Speaker 1 (52:51):
Kyle Tucker caught so Cal Raley and whatever it is
you think helped him do what he did last year,
when you look at the numbers, Beyond the numbers, his
exit vellow is hard hit percentage, et cetera. His hard
hit percentage had steadily climbed his whole career, but it
was at forty eight in twenty twenty four.

Speaker 3 (53:11):
It was only at forty nine and a half last year.
His exit villo had barely changed it all. After his
rookie season, it was ninety point nine average exit velocity
as a second year twenty five year old in twenty
twenty two. Last year, as a sixty home run hitter.
It was at ninety one point three. The year before
it was at ninety one point zero. Those are virtually identical.
It's a little bit again because it's such a big

(53:33):
sample size, every little tickup is notable, but it's not
a crazy tickup. Well, this year it's eighty seven, by far,
the worst of his career, and it's probably one of
the biggest drop offs in Major League Baseball. His hard
hit percentage I mentioned in forty nine point six. Last
year it's twenty eight point seven. I've never seen a
drop like that before ever.

Speaker 2 (53:53):
That's my question, even though I'm kind of voice was
going through it? Adam? Is he he's going through it?
What's he going through that? Pause?

Speaker 3 (54:00):
That is the explanation. I mean, my god, simply going
through it. Look, do you feel good at the plate? No? A,
you're seeing the ball out of the pitcher's hands very well.

Speaker 5 (54:09):
No.

Speaker 2 (54:09):
Do you think you'll get it turned around? Absolutely? Win
because Seattle's playing not in the next three games. This
is like I said in the past, this is when
Seattle raises their banner every year. It's May. This is
their time to shine. Then they tank.

Speaker 3 (54:24):
They're two wins over the Astros away from winning the
season series.

Speaker 1 (54:29):
Yeah, well, the Astros aren't playing for anything this year.
They're just the only ones that don't know that yet.
But the Mariners certainly are only they're not gonna be
able to keep up with the Joneses, and by the Joneses,
I mean the A's of the division if cal Rawley
doesn't pull its head.

Speaker 2 (54:42):
Out of his Oh, because Rat's word is firmly planted
right now.

Speaker 3 (54:46):
Twenty seven thirty thirty four and last year's sixty home
runs hit by cal Raleigh in his four basic full
seasons as their primary catcher, and he's got seven through
thirty nine games roughly on a twenty six seven to
eight homer pace, which would be the worst season of

(55:07):
his career for his standards, half of the number he
hit last year.

Speaker 1 (55:11):
That's the thing, can't You can't go into the next
season after you finally crest the peak, get to the
top of the mountain, you know, win the division, and
then flame out spectacularly, which is what the Mariners playoff
runs usually consist of. But you can't do that and
then just fall off a cliff like he has.

Speaker 3 (55:30):
Yeah, Hulio Rodriguez got off to an incredibly poor start,
as did Josh Naylor. A nailer has come around a
little bit, and Julio has basically come around all the
way and last night was a good example of it.
He absolutely destroyed the first pitch he swung out from
Peter Lambert, but it was foul, thankfully. Then when he
faced him in his second at bat, he homered in

(55:51):
fair territory. He's had some really impressive series at Dyken
Minute May Park over his career.

Speaker 2 (55:58):
His most clutch playoff hit go.

Speaker 3 (56:00):
He did not have a good postseason last year. Ever,
that was really his first extended postseason.

Speaker 1 (56:06):
I'm just saying, like, and I don't I like Julio. Heck,
I like cal. I mean, he looks like Shane Gillis
what's not to like? But I just these.

Speaker 3 (56:14):
Guys loved to see him standing in for Shane at
the Kevin Hart roast, just to see if anybody noticed.

Speaker 2 (56:21):
Here's the thing and that was great. By the way,
we dropped it on Draymond yesterday during Best of X.
What did they What were they thinking? Is Kevin Hart?
Are they really that close him and Draymond? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (56:33):
You think he's really that close with Chelsea Handler Pete Davidson,
ryl Underwood, Tom Brad. I mean, this is who's you
think he's close with?

Speaker 2 (56:44):
Tony?

Speaker 1 (56:44):
Ah, didn't I hear him say that his one and
Kevin's wife or cousins.

Speaker 2 (56:48):
They could be.

Speaker 1 (56:48):
I mean, I'm not saying all of them are or aren't,
but this is your typical used to be on Comedy
Central and now it's on Netflix. For them, it's the
same they appeared all the roasts. It seems like the
same type there. Yeah, I didn't get that at all.
It was like, it's gonna be hard to ever top
Tom Brady.

Speaker 2 (57:05):
He was there. This is of course he was figure
next Jersey, I know, baby sized, perfect size, Yeah, exactly,
especially after they got swept.

Speaker 1 (57:15):
But but yeah, like whereas I'm fine with them, they're
not really like hate able guys. They're not fun to
watch like the A's are right now, Like the A's
are going to be a problem in this division for
a while in my opinion, and they're fun to watch.

Speaker 2 (57:30):
They just mash.

Speaker 3 (57:31):
Yeah they I said this last year and I didn't
know what the other teams in.

Speaker 2 (57:35):
The division will do. Dumb guys don't know any better.

Speaker 3 (57:37):
Well, they're talented, Yeah, They've done a good job of
finding players, and they've put a bunch of them already
under contract. I expected them to hit hit very well
this year. They've actually pitched a little bit better than
I thought they would have. I did if you told
me they were a couple games over five hundred a
quarter the way through the season. The A's always said,
that's that's great. They're probably in second or third place.
I've got there in the first.

Speaker 2 (57:58):
Place and the only team over five hundred in this division.

Speaker 1 (58:00):
Their first season is going to be their first season
in Vegas, and their new crib is going to be
in twenty twenty eight.

Speaker 2 (58:07):
They're gonna win the World Series that year. That's my prediction.

Speaker 3 (58:10):
They're going to be defending AL West champions. I would
say next year, at least in the year that they're
going there, they could be. Yeah, next year, they could
be defending. It's unfortunate.

Speaker 1 (58:20):
I'd like to say the Astros will keep Rally right
where he is, which is hitless for the last nine games.

Speaker 2 (58:25):
He'll try to make it. He'll try to make it ten.
Tonight was close in left field.

Speaker 3 (58:29):
Last night, it was, but Zach Cole was there to
flash a little bit of leather. It's a slump, but
his season has been awful. And this is this jot
just now, kind of.

Speaker 2 (58:39):
The I don't know the rotting icing on an upside
down cake. I don't know what's college.

Speaker 1 (58:45):
Saying, though we hear that all the time and a
lot of times its accurate. He's going through it. Fill
in the blank, guys going through it, But like Aaron Judge,
has never gone through it like this. This is the
second This is second in line for the MVP award
last year, right.

Speaker 3 (59:00):
And if you were ever, last year's question was who's
the MVP of the twenty twenty five season. It wasn't
who's better at baseball because there's no debate.

Speaker 1 (59:09):
That's true, But like Aaron Judge, if nothing else, and
really there is nothing else, because after the regular season's over,
he sucks. He's I've never questioned, Oh yeah, that guy
was the MVP of the regular season and this, that
and the other season. He always earns those accolades for
that regular season award.

Speaker 3 (59:27):
I'll tell you this about Kyle Rawley just to remind
you of the kind of a hitter that he is.
But we're talking about a hitless streak. He's hitt won
fifty seven this year. That is not one hundred point
drop off from his average last year. It's not a
seventy five point dropoff from his career average, which is
two twenty one. He's not a good bass hitter. He
hit a lot of homers last year. Yeah, No, that's true.

Speaker 1 (59:48):
He's not like you're non For example, people try to say
he's this home run hitter.

Speaker 2 (59:52):
No, he's a good hitter. And that's that's the difference
between those two. All Right, Why.

Speaker 1 (59:56):
In the wide world of hades is Victor Wimbinyama playing
in tonight's Game five? Seriously, we'll delve into that question
next the AE on Sports Talk seven ninety yesterday, I
was out experiencing the wonder that is food poisoning, and
so I didn't get to come in here and rant

(01:00:18):
and rave about what's going to happen tonight in the
Western Conference semifinal matchup still remaining as the Lakers were
rudely disposed of by the Oklahoma City Thunder. First father
son duo to be swept out of the postseason. Lebron
got another record last night.

Speaker 3 (01:00:36):
It will be a small category, probably unchallenged.

Speaker 2 (01:00:39):
Another first.

Speaker 1 (01:00:42):
So when you saw what happened with Victor, wimbin Yama
and nas Read in Game four.

Speaker 3 (01:00:46):
I feverishly went to the X platform to make sure
I had fired off my post before Zach Zarba had
given the result of their review, because I wanted people
to note that this has already happened to the post before.
An elbow from DeAndre Ayton struck Alprin Shingoon in the face.

Speaker 2 (01:01:07):
It was called a foul.

Speaker 3 (01:01:08):
It was reviewed, and with where the contact was and
the force of the contact, it resulted in an upgrade.
It upgraded to flagrant two, and a flagrant two comes
with an ejection. There's no additional penalty. It is an ejection.
Victor did not have any idea about any of this apparently,
which is wild, but yeah, you get a flagrant two
foul in a basketball game at the NBA level, that

(01:01:30):
means you are ejected. So I wanted to make sure
people realize what we just saw is absolutely that. It
was probably worse on top of it, but just literally,
there's no way they should be looking at this and
Victor staying in this game. And so I applauded them
on X and then I applauded them yesterday saying that
was a pretty simple call. I probably don't even need

(01:01:51):
a pat on the back from me because you should
get that.

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
Right. That was worthy of a flagrant tool too, and
the ejection that goes with it, and DeAndre and was
not suspended for the ensuing game after that. Right, But
there are two very different styles of elbowing a guy
in the face. Yeah, I think they were definitely different.

Speaker 3 (01:02:10):
I definitely thought it was exactly as the coach for
both teams, Alpren and DeAndre all explained, unintentional slippery, greasy
humans playing basketball sweaty maybe a better term to use.
His elbow was on Alpern or his Yeah, his elbow
was on Alpern's shoulder, and then it slid up towards
his neck and face and he smashed him with it,

(01:02:32):
and so they ejected him.

Speaker 2 (01:02:33):
This was very, very unlike that.

Speaker 3 (01:02:36):
This was I got a couple of players on the
other team slapping at the basketball, as I've secured it,
We're fifteen minutes into the game or thereabouts, and they've
been doing those things to me throughout the game, just
like they did in the previous games, just like the
Blazers did in those previous games.

Speaker 2 (01:02:55):
And just like the other.

Speaker 3 (01:02:56):
Twenty nine NBA teams did in all of the games
I've ever played in the end, and just maybe at
a higher level here now that I'm finally in the postseason,
playing his tenth ninth postseason game. But in this instance,
he decided, Okay, here's my reaction. I gotta protect myself.

Speaker 1 (01:03:13):
I'm going to wind up rear back and absolutely intentionally
elbow Nasried in the face, and he got a flagrant
two in a dejection. The most interesting paragraph of the
write up about this is as follows, wien ben Yama's
ejection with eight thirty nine left in the second quarter

(01:03:34):
is the earliest an All Star has been tossed from
a playoff game in the play by play era. That's
since nineteen ninety seven ninety eight according to ESPN research,
and teams have now gone one to eight when an
All Star is ejected from a playoff game before the
fourth quarter.

Speaker 2 (01:03:52):
You know what, that's interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:03:53):
They're going with the heartless factual posts story only very
much like what I do sometimes, thing about what actually happened.

Speaker 2 (01:04:01):
No nuance.

Speaker 3 (01:04:02):
Here are the cold hard truths about what we've clumped
together as similar events.

Speaker 1 (01:04:07):
Well, that was Game four was what night? That was Sunday?
M hm, that would have been the tenth of May.
I believe that's correct. I only bring that up because
way back on May ninth, the day before nineteen ninety five,
but many years ago, Jake O'Donnell ejected an All Star

(01:04:28):
with over ten minutes left.

Speaker 3 (01:04:30):
I've watched that ejac the second quarter with the within
the last five days, of course you have. I can't
remember why I didn't even throw an elbow. He did
come after Jake.

Speaker 2 (01:04:41):
He should have.

Speaker 1 (01:04:41):
He had several members of the organization in between him
and Jake.

Speaker 2 (01:04:45):
Just for vened, he asked you this question.

Speaker 1 (01:04:47):
How many games did Jake O'Donnell officiate after throwing out
Clyde Drexler in that series against the Suns.

Speaker 2 (01:04:52):
In nineteen ninety five. Zero? There you go. And I
don't believe the Rockets lost that game either. I think
they won. So that's the one. Huh.

Speaker 1 (01:05:02):
Well, it's before the Playboy play era by two years, okay.
I just thought that was interesting that that particular paragraph
almost to the quarter and.

Speaker 2 (01:05:11):
Almost to the day.

Speaker 3 (01:05:12):
There are so many I would hope there are many
many other articles written by that entity that at least
dive into the story that we're going to get into,
like should it have been more? I obviously addressed it yesterday,
and I don't think there's a definitive answer.

Speaker 2 (01:05:25):
I think we're going to disagree. I didn't.

Speaker 3 (01:05:28):
Well, it's different expecting in what they should do. I
definitely did not expect them to suspend him. I definitely
expected them to find him, but they didn't suspend him.
Now the real question isn't whether you expected them to
or not, it's should they have or not? I said
yesterday they should not have.

Speaker 1 (01:05:46):
Well, if they don't suspend him, they have to find him.
And they did either not suspend him and not find
him and then just go on like nothing ever happened
and have him play in game five.

Speaker 2 (01:05:58):
You just can't because if.

Speaker 1 (01:06:01):
You do that and you do it differently for literally
every other scenario that's just like this, and there are many,
one of which involved a Spurs Sun's playoff game. I
just I don't know what we're doing here. Oh yeah,
I do actually and want the Superstars to play. And
if we don't have him play in San Antonio in

(01:06:23):
game five of a series, it's tied to too.

Speaker 2 (01:06:25):
Well, that's gonna be bad for US, US being the NBA,
is there.

Speaker 3 (01:06:29):
I mean, I kept looking, and I know it's regular
season versus playoffs of bad comparison. The ar test elbow
to James Harden obviously popped up on everybody's timeline so
much for here recently, I don't know how many things
we could look at and say, well, it happened here,
and this was the result, and so this is what
they should have done. At the very least in this situation,

(01:06:49):
you're trying to grade out the severity of how intentional
was it, how hard was the contact? How much should
we punish this person for after we send him to
the sidelines because of what we made as the call
in the game.

Speaker 1 (01:07:02):
And the other thing I saw that's even more ludicrous
than everything we've already mentioned is that because he was
ejected from the game so early relatively speaking, well, that's
basically like the suspension he would have served.

Speaker 3 (01:07:14):
I understand that in college football because of some of
their rules, like when you've played through the first half
or you haven't been in the second half, you got
to miss the next half or the first half of
the next game. There is something there to that what
this is I'm one hundred percent with you on that.
He could have been suspended on the jump or ejected
for a flagrant tool on the jump, and it would

(01:07:35):
if I'm navigating the punishment for the future, it would
have zero impact on my decision. He clearly did something
because of what was taking place in the game, so
they had to have played some minutes in the game,
or what had taken place in the series, or what
had taken place in his whole career.

Speaker 2 (01:07:49):
I don't know how much of a frustration build up
there was, but there was some, but welcome when it
happened in the playing should be of virtually zero consequence.
It's about the play itself.

Speaker 1 (01:08:01):
Is so like that. Part of it was just ridiculous.
Of many levels of this that were ridiculous, And honestly,
I know some people, well by some people, I mean
basically Spurs fans and anyone in San Antonio and then
nobody else. We're all about how Mitch Johnson came out
and took up for his player.

Speaker 3 (01:08:20):
I mentioned what he said yesterday, but we're happy to
let you hear what he said yesterday shrivel today.

Speaker 1 (01:08:27):
Yeah, well, we'll let you hear that next and then
I'll make fun of him too. The eight Talk seven
ninety gueschn Tuesday edition of the program, as we are
winding down our number two of the program, talking about
the fact that Victor winbin Yama is going to play tonight,

(01:08:47):
I think it was it was somebody from the Athletic
I was talking about how this was a revenge game
for Victor winbin Yama tonight, a revenge game for what exactly?
That was my question, what's he getting revenge for? For
elbowing the guy in the head. He's getting revenge for
the like does nas Reed foul his elbow with his face?

Speaker 2 (01:09:09):
His revenge was for he got his revenge.

Speaker 3 (01:09:13):
You are playing NBA basketball in the playoffs and you're
playing very physically and fouling a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:09:19):
My revenge is elbowing you in the face. What's what's left? Kareem?

Speaker 1 (01:09:24):
I mean, I'll go him further back, will Bill Kareem,
Hakeem shack Ewing, David Robinson. All these guys got physicaled
at some point. All these guys had guys their size
trying to get in their head. Charles Oakley, the Enforces
of the World, Dennis Rodman, all these guys that are

(01:09:46):
they're out there to basically get under the more talented,
more skilled player's skin.

Speaker 2 (01:09:53):
So who's out throw him off his game? Who's doing
it now?

Speaker 1 (01:09:56):
Now it's nas Reed, It's not nas Reed, it's now
everybody who the other Uni Rubert, It's it's exactly, It
doesn't matter.

Speaker 3 (01:10:04):
There is nobody doing come to the playoffs exactly what
this is. It's amazing how they are acting and speaking,
but less amazing when you realize who they are, their kids,
they're on the playground for the first time. They don't
know what they're talking about because they haven't been here before.

Speaker 2 (01:10:21):
And by the way, this is it. It doesn't.

Speaker 1 (01:10:24):
I don't think the Spurs are well, okay, let me
let me separate this. I don't think the Spurs and
Mitch Johnson are entitled. I absolutely think Victor wimbin Yama
has acted entitled since the moment he got drafted down
to the point where when it was determined where he
was going, he was acting entitled.

Speaker 2 (01:10:42):
I e. He's not going to Houston and pumps his fist.
Don't act like that wasn't what it was.

Speaker 1 (01:10:46):
This guy has said and done things that make him
sound like the most entitled you know gen Z. Whatever
you want to call the stereotype, he fills all of
them out.

Speaker 2 (01:10:55):
I don't want to see Victor on your lawn. Well
he that's fine. Call me an old head, call me
what whatever you want to call me. I don't care.

Speaker 1 (01:11:01):
I've seen enough to know what I'm seeing when I
see it, and that's exactly what he is. But really,
Mitch Johnson, you're gonna lean into I mean well.

Speaker 5 (01:11:11):
I just think that the amount of physicality that people
play with him, at some level you.

Speaker 2 (01:11:17):
Have to protect yourself.

Speaker 5 (01:11:19):
Every single play, on every single part of the floor,
people are trying to impose their physicality on him.

Speaker 2 (01:11:25):
I get it, we get it.

Speaker 5 (01:11:26):
That's part of the game. But at some stage he's
gotten chucked, he's gotten pushed down in transition, running freely
all the stuff. Complain one time, we don't complain because
we're just gonna play. We don't really give a excuse
my language. But at some stage he should be protected
and if not, he's gonna have to protect himself. And unfortunately,

(01:11:49):
stuff like that happens.

Speaker 3 (01:11:50):
Okay, it really doesn't happen. It's pretty infrequent where a
player of that caliber earns a very well deserved flagrant too.

Speaker 2 (01:12:00):
In an NBA postseason, it.

Speaker 1 (01:12:01):
Is common that guys his size and smaller get beat
up on at this time of year because guess what,
that's all the opposing team can do a lot of
times to somebody who's that skilled. And if you're gonna
act like he doesn't complain, have you watched him. I
mean you see him more than we do. You're with
him every day. He complains all the time about much

(01:12:22):
less egregious physicality and that we don't go, we don't
give a bleep. Well, then what are you talking about it?
I think think a SoundBite about this spinning around and act.
Of course he should care. It's his player. He wants
to protect him with his words. He wants to protect
the leagues to do more.

Speaker 3 (01:12:39):
You can say all these things, but they don't really
measure up to what's truly happening. And it is new
to them. This clearly is. It's the first post He's
an experience for both of them. Mitch Johnson's been with
the Spurs for six years. If you are unaware, that's
how bad the Spurs have been. This is the first
season while an assistant coach with the Spurs and now
head coach with the Spurs that he's in the playoffs.

(01:13:00):
Obviously it's Victor's first postseason experience. They're into their second series.
By the way, this they're they're not used. It doesn't
matter who like Steph Curry a smaller player, Kevin Durant
a smaller player, all the bigs you just mentioned. This
is totally normal. This is how the best players are
attempted to be defended because there's not many ways to

(01:13:21):
stop them. They're talented.

Speaker 1 (01:13:22):
You want to know about a seven footer who gets
completely clawed at, grabbed, knocked off his game at the
top of the key like this kind of it wasn't
the top of the key.

Speaker 3 (01:13:30):
It was at the top of the elbow, just inside
the three. But he gets chucked when he's running free
down the court. I just heard Mitch tell me.

Speaker 1 (01:13:37):
Yeah, Mitch tells you that. You know who does that
and actually doesn't complain. Kevin Durant all the time. This
guy gets tugged at.

Speaker 2 (01:13:43):
Pulls a little technicals, yeah, I know.

Speaker 1 (01:13:45):
And it gets a lot of turnovers too, because a
lot a lot he talks to a lot, but he
actually he's having conversations with the officials and then he's
talking mess with fans and players constantly.

Speaker 2 (01:13:57):
Man, some of the things he says are just by
the way.

Speaker 3 (01:14:00):
As we head into tonight's game, that the very question
we have talked about for a bulk of our NBA
conversation was should he be suspended for the next game,
which is now tonight's game five, which he has not
been suspended for. But that question was asked of Mitch
during this series of was and you can just tell
them I can let him hear it.

Speaker 2 (01:14:17):
No, I don't think he should be suspended. No, see
and the rest of it.

Speaker 5 (01:14:23):
No, again I don't. I don't even know the leality
or the rules, but there was zero intent. They did
what they did because of the outcome of the play,
so so be it. But to have anything on top
of that, I think would be ridiculous.

Speaker 1 (01:14:38):
So he doesn't know the legality or the rules, but
because of.

Speaker 2 (01:14:42):
The outcome of the play.

Speaker 1 (01:14:43):
The outcome of the play was your guy elbowed another
guy after rearing back and just chucking him in the face.

Speaker 2 (01:14:49):
No intent, he just he was. He was sticking up
for his player and saying things that did not have
the that's so unlikable. And again winners usually are to
they haven't one. You almost made me cuss. They have
not won anything yet, and Mitch, I can bleep you out.
There's a dump button over there. It's tougher though it's live.
I just.

Speaker 1 (01:15:12):
He they are are acting in this case, very entitled,
very entitled. Why should you be any different? And yet
why wouldn't they? Adam Silver took a look at things
or whoever his henchmen in the league office on Fifth Avenue.
They all looked at the situation and they were like, no,
we will choose to do this differently than any other

(01:15:33):
person in this position.

Speaker 3 (01:15:34):
Well, that's why green, but that's not the same thing.
Why because history matters.

Speaker 2 (01:15:40):
Any player usual, I'm a track record, track record for sure. Okay,
well what if? Like that's why I said earlier. I
just don't.

Speaker 3 (01:15:49):
I don't think we I could be wrong, our listeners,
I'd love for your input if I am. I tried
and looked and was trying to recall I just postseason
intentional elbows to the face that we're probably assessed in
game flagrant two with the ejection that goes with it,
and then what happened.

Speaker 2 (01:16:06):
I couldn't come up with what if Lebron did this,
would he get suspended? I don't think so.

Speaker 3 (01:16:12):
And he doesn't have much history because obviously that's the
example you're giving me, because there's no history there.

Speaker 1 (01:16:16):
I mean, I'm just trying to think of a skilled
player that the suits would like to see on the
court versus not. I mean in its series that a
lot of people say Game five is the most important
game of a series, in any series that's seven games.

Speaker 2 (01:16:30):
If it's two to two, no, regardless of the situation.
Well what if it's four nothing, Well then it's over.
And I've heard that Luca was cleared for Game five.
It was fictionally.

Speaker 3 (01:16:40):
We got a couple more hours with you here we
will discuss the least important but oft constantly discussed topic
surrounding your Houston Astros and their latest awesome number forty four.

Speaker 2 (01:16:54):
That's next hour.

Speaker 1 (01:16:56):
Off and running here on a Tuesday edition of the program.
Welcome into the He's wex I may see. Josh Jordan
is our producers. We take you up until six o'clock tonight.
Astro's on deck as we will get you ready for
game two of this four game set between your hometown
nine and those stupid idiots from Seattle. The Mariners, I

(01:17:17):
mean the Seattle Mariners will be in town for the
second of four straight. I have seen this floating around
and now like entire articles are being written about it.
Stop trying to trade yord On Alvarez. You disgusting pigs. Now,
that's how I would phrase it. Wex is a little
bit more even keeled professional. All of these words apply

(01:17:41):
to you in this situation. But I look, I get it,
the season's not going great. At the end of this week,
if you've won like a game, probably somebody gets fired
and maybe you start thinking about selling off.

Speaker 2 (01:17:53):
But I don't. I don't think jord On Alvarez needs
to be going anywhere because you know another real reason. Yeah,
I'd love it. I'd think our listeners what too.

Speaker 1 (01:18:03):
I know people are saying you get a better haul
for him than generational talent Juan Soto and all this game.
I don't know that I trust anybody, let alone this
front office, to get the exact amount you should get
for a guy like him.

Speaker 3 (01:18:18):
Well, it's one of the things I brought up yesterday.
Because this has now come up almost every day. I'm
sure we'll talk about it again tomorrow when somebody else
writes about it and gives their reasoning why, and we
tell us if we agree or disagree. But you're heading
into the next four plus months, the final four plus
months of the contracted terms of both your manager and
general manager. Well, why is that in the case of

(01:18:39):
the person you're talking about, the general manager who's in
charge of talent acquisition with your strong guidance, Because Jim
Crane delivers very strong guidance on players that he'd like
to see here and for how much money he'd like
to see them here. He's negotiated deals before, and he's
made sure players stay or go before. But this is
general manager's job. Dana Brown's job is to add talent

(01:19:02):
through the draft, add talent and free agency, develop talent
within their system, and, in the case of dealing off
players in trade, acquire talent in trade, which is what
he thought he did with the Kyle Tucker trade, as
did we, adding Esach Perettis and Cam Smith at the
for the majority of that deal. Hayden was nesky also,

(01:19:23):
unfortunately he's been hurt for much of his time here
in Houston. But that's what you entrusted your general manager
to have the knowledge and the staff and the wherewithal
to make sure. If this is the decision we've made
a very, very talented but unlikely to re retained superstar,
then we need to go find the requisite return for him.

Speaker 2 (01:19:43):
So he trusted him to do that.

Speaker 3 (01:19:44):
And if you're making any kind of comparison to a
one Soto Megastar mega trade, even though they weren't, he
wasn't quite up against it yet. It was very similar
to Tucker, not Alvarez. Tucker was not going to be here,
and the astra knew it, and his agents knew it
because of what they felt like he would be after
and they knew they weren't going to offer.

Speaker 2 (01:20:04):
And so did any team that was looking at trade
for him know it? Knew it?

Speaker 3 (01:20:08):
Well, he was going to sign with somebody. How did
they know it wasn't going to be them? It depends
on which team you trade him.

Speaker 2 (01:20:13):
That's true.

Speaker 1 (01:20:14):
But what I'm saying is you already you're not it's
not pennies on the dollar.

Speaker 3 (01:20:19):
Well, I'm trying to paint the picture of how it's
different from Jordon. Jordon's here already, and he's there already.
He's under contract for next season and the year after that.
And the year after that, and a very reasonable total
control one. Soto's deal was for a player to the
Nationals and the Padres. The Nationals had already offered him

(01:20:42):
four hundred plus million. He said no, and he was
never going to re sign with them, right, so they knew.
This is a comparable similar situation of what the Astros
then faced with Kyl tar. He was never going to
resign with them, and they knew that, so they needed
to move on from him. They just had to decide
is it this offseason or does he pay here another
year and then it's the following off season, even though he's.

Speaker 2 (01:21:03):
Headed into free agency.

Speaker 3 (01:21:04):
We could lose it for nothing, which is why they
didn't wait till that point in time. That's really not
the way to do it. And so the Nationals didn't
or the Padre. Yeah, the Nationals didn't wait either, and
they traded him for what I think most believe was
an incredible hall, But it was for prospects. You don't
know what James Wood or cj Abrams are going to be.
Mackenzie Gore is now not with them anymore. He's now

(01:21:26):
pitching surprisingly poorly for the Texas Rangers. But Wood and
Abrams were essentially the best prospects I think they were offered,
and very very good ones within their system, and they
are supposed to be the cornerstones of the Nationals new
era of winning baseball because Wan Soto and Max Scherzer
and Steve Strasburg they helped him win a World Series title,

(01:21:50):
and so in order to make it worth their while
to move on from Juan Soto at the time they did,
they needed to land an incredible Hall, which on.

Speaker 1 (01:21:58):
Paper they absolutely the positively did. And what has it mattered,
not at all.

Speaker 3 (01:22:04):
They're one of the worst franchises in the majors, the
general managers not there anymore. They don't win, and these
two players are not stars borderline all star. Yes, had
a lot of homers if your James would and actually
having another pretty good season. Sure, they've had all sorts
of issues with cj Abrams sometimes has been really good,
sometimes he hasn't. Sometimes he's been doing what they wanted
to do. Another you don't know when your own when

(01:22:26):
you're trading for a massive prospect Hall, which is what
the Astros would get for jord On, and they should
get at least that much or more only because of
the contract situation.

Speaker 2 (01:22:37):
I just mentioned, the.

Speaker 1 (01:22:39):
Padres made this deal for Juan Soto and he immediately
left the Padres because they weren't the team that was
going to give him money. They traded him to the Yankees,
and then the Yankees didn't keep him, but they smartly
kept him long enough to lose in the playoffs again
with him.

Speaker 3 (01:22:57):
The Astros are not in that situation with jor Done
at all. He's that caliber player. I mean, I don't
even know which one of them is a better outfielder.
The askers are just smart enough not to put him
out there. So it was awful out there. But I
don't really think that is a big, big risk to
take versus trying to build around him while he's under contract.

(01:23:18):
I think it's less of a risk to do that.
You're just spending more money to do that. Maybe you
get two or three stars. But in the case of
the National did they get one. Maybe maybe James Wood
is that one star, So you traded US star for
US star.

Speaker 2 (01:23:32):
That's nice. That helps.

Speaker 3 (01:23:33):
He doesn't make any money yet, but you're not a
good team because you didn't get three stars or four,
which is what the intent of the deal was. Same
intent that Dana Brown would have. And to the original point, Currently,
Dana Brown is the outgoing GM until he signs another
contract the second one, he's the outgoing GM. You're telling

(01:23:54):
him and everybody else your belief in him is minimal.
You haven't been willing to extend him. You don't necessarily
you're not sold on what he's been doing, and whether
that's the draft picks, whether that's the team itself, where
the team is currently, it's probably all of those things.
So as you suggested, you're saying to him, I want you,
who I am not committed to, right to pull the

(01:24:17):
trigger on this deal. So when I get rid of you,
the next GM will be stuck with this or or bad.

Speaker 1 (01:24:24):
And I feel the same way about the draft upcoming.
Like you know, I'll put it this way. I'll just
be blunt. I'm very interested to see who Jim Crane
thinks is going to lead this team starting next season,
because I don't think it's going to be Dana Brown.
And in that vein, I did not like them firing
Jeff Luno. I made no bones about that.

Speaker 2 (01:24:45):
Over time.

Speaker 1 (01:24:45):
I thought it was an overreaction, even if behind the
scenes he was semi forced to do it. I still
I just if that were the case. For example, I
think he should have told them to go pound sand.

Speaker 2 (01:24:57):
But well, then here's your new punishment. Yeah, exactly, we're
taking the trophy back. Great, Fine, it's just a hunk
a metal, exactly, Rob, Why should you even care? I
watched the games. I know what happened. But here's the deal.

Speaker 1 (01:25:09):
Like, he fired Jeff Luno, so all of the blue
bloods and the powers that be in Major League Baseball
got what they wanted because he was running circles around
all of them.

Speaker 3 (01:25:20):
Brian cash Man, not the saying I wish they that
you were using. If you can't beat him, join him.
They went with if you can't beat him, make sure
to force him to fire him.

Speaker 1 (01:25:28):
That's what happened. People can say that that's not what happened,
but they're wrong. Then I don't know what the friction
was behind the scenes. But guess what he happened.

Speaker 2 (01:25:39):
To actually hire a really good replacement in James Click
and because of personality differences, I guess that's what we're
all led to believe. He's out the door.

Speaker 1 (01:25:48):
Like I don't. I don't think he's Jerry Jones. I don't,
but I understand why people do. Like I understand why
people look at Jim Crane and say he's kind of
Jerry jonesing this right.

Speaker 2 (01:25:59):
Now, except the most important part, which is what they win.
Jerry Jones won big the World Series, but Jerry Jones won,
and many people think that the second guy he brought
in to replace Jimmy, who also did personnel, was on
the strength of Jimmy's built in cores, which is exactly
That's where Jeff Luno comes. I mean, yes, so James

(01:26:21):
to a lesser extent because he made some deals that
attributed to the twenty two team.

Speaker 3 (01:26:24):
Jerry Jones won enormously with Jimmy Johnson. The best personnel
move that Jerry ever made was hiring Jimmy, not anybody
else he's had, and he is the general manager is
not and we're going on thirty years of meddling as
the owner, as the GM, we still call it meddaling

(01:26:44):
of nothingness.

Speaker 1 (01:26:45):
But all of the winning came at the beginning, and
we're still in the very beginning stages of Jim Crane's ownership.
The difference to me, and where I will give him
much more credit, is that Jerry didn't necessarily tear everything
down by design.

Speaker 2 (01:27:00):
I mean, they just sucked. They were just bad when
he bought them.

Speaker 1 (01:27:04):
And so because of those high draft picks you know,
you got now you had to make the picks, and
they had to work out and the Herschel Walker trade
and all that kind of stuff, Whereas Jim Crane was like,
I'm going to intentionally and purposefully tear this down with
the intention of winning, and I'm going to hire a
guy that is a outside the box at the time,
very much so analytics driven, you know, dea, da data dea.

(01:27:25):
We all know about Jeff Luno's mo by now, and
he's going to feed generations with what he does with
this roster.

Speaker 2 (01:27:32):
And he did.

Speaker 1 (01:27:33):
That's all credit to Jim Crane. Well, if you're Jim Crane,
and okay, say maybe Major League Baseball forced you into
getting rid of Jeff Luno. Okay, fine, what what was
the real reason behind Jim or James Click going away?
And I'm not just upset about it because people think
I look like him, like he was a good GM,
And I don't think you can say Dana Brown's a

(01:27:54):
good GM.

Speaker 2 (01:27:55):
On May twelfth, twenty twenty six, it's pretty tough.

Speaker 3 (01:27:58):
It's hard to have your draft picks pan out and order.
I do think this last draft class is very, very good.
We're also fifteen years in with Jim Crane. I don't
know when you moved past early in his ownership.

Speaker 1 (01:28:09):
That's true. I didn't realize that, but he was been
winning for so long that the.

Speaker 3 (01:28:13):
After the big, big, big losing at the onset. It's
an important series of weeks for both Joe Aespota and
Dana Brown. Obviously for the Astros themselves, and no more
important time than watching one of their biggest expenditures, Tatsuya
Emi take them ountd for the fourth time, only the
fourth time this season.

Speaker 2 (01:28:32):
He starts tonight the AED on Sports Talk seven ninety
Tuesday edition of the program. One thing that came out.

Speaker 1 (01:28:46):
Of last night's season ending loss by the Lakers, which
by the way, was I think.

Speaker 2 (01:28:53):
Probably the most competitive of the four games, I'd.

Speaker 3 (01:28:55):
Say I think there's a little doubt why you had
the lead in the final moments.

Speaker 1 (01:29:00):
I wanted to say there was one other game where
it was at least closer than a complete blowout, but
I don't think now that I'm thinking about it, it's
probably the case.

Speaker 3 (01:29:08):
They let a couple of games have the final margin
a little bit larger than maybe the course of the
game was. But they clabbered the Lakers eight times this
season or seven times before last night.

Speaker 2 (01:29:19):
There is several videos, several tweets that document this, but
probably my favorite was a video of a certain NBA
player sitting on the baseline court side seats as Lebron
is taking free throws and the caption reads, how all

(01:29:42):
of America felt watching the Lakers get swept tonight. He's
a former Rocket.

Speaker 1 (01:29:48):
He is absolutely a Lebron James nemesis, and his name
is Dylan Brooks. He actually gave a very complimentary quote
after the game, Lebron James and how he thinks there's
another season left in him. That was probably his nice
way of saying, there's no way this attention whore is
going to go out like that. I don't know if

(01:30:11):
that's gonna end up being the case, but yeah, I
don't know what the parameters were behind Dylan Brooks not
only being at a playoff game but getting the seats
that he got, and I mean, just it's so prominent.
Lebron absolutely saw him, everybody saw him. After the cameras
were put on him. But that is, like, if it's

(01:30:32):
what I think it is, where he just went out
of his way to get a seat right there, that
is so uber levels of petty, and I appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (01:30:41):
I mean, he's an NBA player you can probably request
and pay for if he'd like courtside seats to a
playoff game in Los Angeles.

Speaker 1 (01:30:50):
I mean, depending on who writes about it. You know,
all these sons fanboy accounts are saying, oh, look at
what you know.

Speaker 2 (01:30:56):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:30:57):
Again, I don't know how he got the seats or what,
but I just thought that was hilarious. It's in La too.
I saw one I think it was the NBA's official
Instagram account that was documenting all the star power that
was in the house last night for that game, and
a lot of the comments had some semblance of the effect,

(01:31:19):
you know, yeah, they all watched all that star power
to watch them get swept, that kind of thing.

Speaker 3 (01:31:24):
Well, or they could have said they all wanted to
be there for Lebron's last game, which again I don't
really think it's his last game. No, I'll take the
quote from Dylan Brooks. You were just mentioning, he actually said,
I don't think it's his last year. I think he
got one more in him. Uh, and you mentioned it
was complimentary. He went on to say, I watched him
when I was in the NBA, when I was a
kid in high school. He's got a phenomenal career, battle
everybody done at a high level throughout. It's been amazing

(01:31:45):
to watch overall, a pleasure to battle against him. Extremely
respectful of fellow NBA great.

Speaker 1 (01:31:51):
That's different from the quote he gave back in December
after Phoenix won one five oneh eight quote he likes
people that bow down. I don't bow down, So that
either entices him or it aggravates him either or.

Speaker 3 (01:32:04):
Yeah, of course he's going to say different things when
they're fotes each other in a series. I don't Yeah
he was, Yeah, I was. I'm sure it was intentional.
It's a very much two character Dylan. I mean, if
his name was Larry Brooks, I guess it would be
a little bit more difficult. But Dylan the villain is
so easy and he just absolutely buys into all of it,

(01:32:25):
lives up to it, plays into it. I mean, the
staring stuff he does before NBA games is wild. I
miss him so much here, but he's he's a part
of winning. They were a better organization, more capable of
winning in Memphis when he was there. You might be
able to say that here in Houston. Technically they were
almost identical. Fifty two wins and a first round disappointing

(01:32:47):
first round exit with him, and then they followed it
up with the exact same thing the next year, a phoenix.
It's I always hesitant to even say it. I can't
deny the cold hard facts. They were much better than
anybody expected, and they won a lot more games than
anybody expected. But they're stuck. They're not going to win.
They're not one of the top six teams in the West.

(01:33:08):
They're probably gonna be even worse next year. Dylan Brooks
is gonna have to be moved, or Jalen Green's gonna
have to be moved, or Devin Booker. They're gonna have
to decide to move on because there's not another I
don't think there's a way scenario where they add another
piece to them and advance in the West, because that

(01:33:28):
piece they have to add has to be definitely no
worse than the second best player.

Speaker 2 (01:33:33):
He's got to be way better than Brooks. He's got
to be way better than Jalen.

Speaker 3 (01:33:36):
He's got to be almost, if not better, then at
least as good as Devin Booker. I don't really know
how that's gonna happen there in Phoenix, but I'm just
in who Dylan Brooks has been as an NBA player.

Speaker 2 (01:33:47):
He's been good for his teams. That's what you want
your players to be.

Speaker 3 (01:33:49):
He's been very good for the teams that he has
played on, and he absolutely plays into all of what
people think he is. And that's as evidenced by him
just just being there. And I'm sure he wasn't smiling
like that the whole game, but you absolutely knew if
you were a photographer there obviously on the opposite baseline,
you're just I know there's game stuff, but I can't
wait for the next time out, so I can just

(01:34:10):
focus in on Dylan for the next two and a
half minutes and wait for the look I'm waiting for.

Speaker 2 (01:34:15):
And he gave it to him. Well, he wasn't hamming
it up with Lebron after the game. He was hamming
it up with SGA. Well they're teammates. Oh yeah, Canadians. Yes,
they've played together.

Speaker 1 (01:34:27):
That's that's interesting about how the Suns move forward because
he's under contract for this upcoming year. Man, I would
kill to have the Rockets have him back in the house.
I just he seems to be very happy there. But
you can go back to Memphis and the downfall of
the Grizzlies. It wasn't Desmond Baine being traded. It wasn't.

(01:34:50):
It wasn't Triple J being traded to the Jazz. It
goes back to Dylan Brooks. Yes, it does. I think
the real reason they're not winning. You should have been
able to contin and you winning with a core trio
of Morant, Jackson and Baine, no question about it. If
you can't win with that, if nothing else is wrong,
then your management's probably doing something wrong. Well, management had

(01:35:11):
nothing to do with them doing things wrong. They just
tried to as it looks today, they just tried to
get ahead of the inevitable. John Morant is not the
leader of this team that's going to do anything. He's
not the leader of any team that's going to do anything.
They had made that decision. I think it's the correct decision.

Speaker 3 (01:35:25):
I don't think he's playing any more games there, and
it's going to be difficult to move him, but they're
going to be determined to do it. And so once
they decided that they moved on from Desmond Bye, and
then in season, seeing how bad things were, if they
weren't already ready to, they moved on from Jaron Jackson Junior.
And they should be sitting there just hoping and at
any time before the draft probably that they can move

(01:35:45):
on from They're starting over, completely, starting over from scratch
when they move John Morant, They're they're a close to
talentless group.

Speaker 1 (01:35:54):
Who are they going to move Ja Morant to? Who's
going to take a great question, because I mean, the
talent is undoubtedly there, but it's the ultimate baggage outweighing
the talent or vice versa in any sport really, but
especially as you always point out, the NBA is where
you can get one guy on your team that completely

(01:36:15):
can change your fortunes. And so therefore outweighing the baggage
or weighing the baggage versus the talent has to come
into play, almost more so than in any other sport.
And I just I don't know that there's enough good
to outweigh. It always seems like it's something with him.

Speaker 3 (01:36:33):
Not only that he's on a very bad trajectory. He
was bad last year. Bad at basketball. Not a bad person,
he was bad at basketball relative to who he's been.
I mean, yeah, he scored twenty points a game and
had eight assist the night. He did it shooting forty
one percent from the floor. He did it shooting twenty
four percent from three.

Speaker 2 (01:36:53):
Point like Jalen Green.

Speaker 3 (01:36:54):
He did it with the a career low across the board,
shooting everywhere, effective, field goal percentage, you name it.

Speaker 2 (01:37:00):
It was the worst of his career.

Speaker 3 (01:37:02):
And this is from now four consecutive years of having
lesser numbers. From age twenty two to now twenty six,
he's been getting less and less successful as a basketball player.
In addition to the bag like his baggage is so
bad that you're concerned about his availability because a misstep
of the like that he's previously had is his season's over. Yeah,

(01:37:26):
the league will tell you he can't play this season
because of the latest transgression, because he's already been hit
with this suspension level. He's already guy suspension level. And
we're not talking about the flagrants and technical as we're
talking about his off court activities has made the league
tell him to quit playing basketball for a third of
the season a half.

Speaker 1 (01:37:46):
He's at a point where it's a huge, huge risk.
So all that being said, they're trading him at like
the worst possible everything on there, and he's on the dollar.
It's it's awful, I mean, a terrible thing to have happened,
and no good place to acknowledge it, but probably worth
acknowledging while we're talking about the Memphis Grizzlies. Is pretty
infrequent where an active NBA player passes away, But that's

(01:38:10):
what happened yesterday Brandon Clark, a teammate of John everybody
else there in Memphis, twenty nine year old player. Some
investigations ongoing about the exact cause. In Los Angeles when
a medical emergency. They respond to a medical emergency yesterday afternoon,
but he was pronounced dead upon their arrival at the scene.

(01:38:30):
His agency, the team, the league, the NBAPA president as well,
Fred Van Vliet, all issuing statements about the sadness of
what has happened here with Brandon Clark. Details not yet
fully known about what happened and why at such a
young age. He's passed away, so obviously we have the
same feelings most everybody else has acknowledged. There you're thinking

(01:38:52):
about him, his teammates, his family and everything like that.

Speaker 2 (01:38:55):
Just a very tough situation.

Speaker 1 (01:38:57):
Again, very infrequent that an active NBA player passes away.

Speaker 3 (01:39:02):
We continue here. Our usual signature segment is next, say what.

Speaker 2 (01:39:08):
The A team? Once day? Now say what signature segment?

Speaker 3 (01:39:15):
Time four thirty halfway through our number three on the
A team, mondays bring you the good, the bad, the ugly.
Wednesdays bring you Wednesday's bs, Thursdays.

Speaker 2 (01:39:25):
What's up with that?

Speaker 3 (01:39:26):
Today's Tuesday we bring you? Say what do you think that?

Speaker 1 (01:39:33):
Steve Sarkesian is one of the most cerebral trash talkers
in SEC coached them. That's a tough one when you
consider that we have what's his face going from Ole
miss to LSU.

Speaker 3 (01:39:48):
Well, yesterday when you were absent, we had the good,
the bad, and the ugly. Yeah, and half of the
morning Drive was in studio with us during the four
o'clock hour, so he participated, and he had the ugly.

Speaker 2 (01:40:03):
You would have had it, but Cole had it yesterday.

Speaker 3 (01:40:05):
And I believe that's when we got into the conversation,
he asked me, do you want this or college football
for the ugly? I said, college football, man, because you're here.
So we talked to ole Miss football yesterday too, as
we're about to today. They player. The man you are
talking about is Lane Kiffen. If you fire up the

(01:40:25):
search engine, that popular one with a couple of o's
in the name, and you search ole Miss, two top
stories come up with three entries, each one from a
day ago or forty two minutes ago. Lane Kiffen discusses
recruiting challenges at ole Miss, and the other one that
comes up, Steve Sarkisian criticizes ole Miss academic standards. These

(01:40:50):
are two SEC coaches, one of them just left Ole Miss.
Has not even coached a game. He's attended a game
for his new team. He was about three booths over
from me at the LSU Houston Texas Bowl here back
in December, when they played their bowl game after taking

(01:41:11):
Lane from ole Miss. He was very into the game
at his leather jacket on, gave a couple of sound bites,
did an interview, and then left the building.

Speaker 1 (01:41:20):
Did not stay for the game. Nonetheless, I believe he
had a fresh spray Tan too. He looks very sharp.
Looks matter if you're LSU coach. The last one always
red faced. The one before that also always red faced,
but super tan with a great accent and a national championship,
which was also preceded by two coaches that also won

(01:41:43):
national championships.

Speaker 2 (01:41:44):
That's the expectation there, Sarks Tan always looks legit. He's
an Austin dude. He looks like George Hamilton.

Speaker 3 (01:41:52):
So yesterday was Lane Kiffen talking about the difficulties of
recruiting to a place where players might not want to
be for the reasons that he described. It generated conversation
here on our program. I'm sure in every SEC city
and most everywhere else on social media.

Speaker 2 (01:42:09):
You don't buy that, do you?

Speaker 1 (01:42:10):
Since he was there for like six years dealing with
all of the racism supposedly that was there.

Speaker 3 (01:42:15):
I don't buy it. I mean, well, he's uney talks and.

Speaker 2 (01:42:20):
Why he left, which is nobody should be buying that.

Speaker 3 (01:42:23):
Well, the reason why he left is because he has
more money to spend on himself, because he's making more
money and more money to spend on his players.

Speaker 1 (01:42:33):
And a better, more successful program that he's going to and.

Speaker 3 (01:42:37):
He's going to a less successful program that he's intending
to make more successful. Ole Miss has been more successful
recently than LSU recently, though, the program that he had
at ole Miss was more successful than the program he's
taking over from Brian Kelly.

Speaker 1 (01:42:52):
But that's because Brian Kelly had the program. So it's
about he's getting more money. They can win big they weren't,
and he has more money to spend. That's that's why
he left. There's nothing more to it. You can describe
all these other reasons whether you want to believe him
or not. They're not really relevant because we know why
he left. Now let's talk about what sark said. What
is sark side.

Speaker 2 (01:43:12):
Well, he's talking about you know, nil and he's just
talking about the general.

Speaker 1 (01:43:20):
Status or I guess culture around college football.

Speaker 2 (01:43:25):
And he's he's talking about academics.

Speaker 3 (01:43:27):
Three headlines. Steve Sarkasian rips ole Miss academic standards yep,
Steve Sarkasian goes scorched earth on college football's wild West
culture or Steve Sarkisian's ole Miss rip is the sound
of a profession that winds like no other. All of
those are in some semblance or form accurate. I mean,

(01:43:49):
let's let's face it, and we're not. I don't think
any of us believe that Nick Saban got out of
things because he was tired of winning.

Speaker 2 (01:43:56):
So this is the quote. At Texas, we will only take.

Speaker 1 (01:44:01):
Fifty percent of a player's academic credit hours. You may
be a semester from graduating, but you're going all the
way back to fifty percent. If you play here and
want a degree but at all miss they can take you.
All you have to do is take basket weaving and
you can get an all missed degree. That's some grade

(01:44:22):
A level trash.

Speaker 2 (01:44:24):
Talk right there.

Speaker 3 (01:44:26):
I mean, of course, that is not offered, but is
well known as the course to go to when you're
trying to rip someone's curriculum.

Speaker 1 (01:44:34):
The committee doesn't have the bandwidth to watch that many games.
They see the media and coaches poles and they copy them.
You've got a twelve team playoff, and that means there
are at least thirty teams that impact it. Now, all
of a sudden, you want to go to twenty four.
Now the polls become an even greater factor because now
you're asking the committee to watch forty teams a week.
If not fifty. All of these quotes he's giving are

(01:44:59):
to me again. I just feel like college football, more
than any other sport, is scrutinized for the culture of
the actual games themselves and what surrounds the money surrounding
the games themselves. Like we talk about or I a
lot of times talk about the NBA has a very
very bad officiating problem.

Speaker 2 (01:45:18):
I just think they do.

Speaker 1 (01:45:19):
I think the NBA has a lot of problems right now,
but I think that's one of them. I think it's
what helps turn off casual viewers. I don't know that
this turns off casual viewers because football is.

Speaker 2 (01:45:30):
Just so king in this country, but there's a.

Speaker 3 (01:45:33):
Lot of just it may start curricular, but what they
have going for them is once the game is on.
Maybe you don't like how the targeting rule is officiated,
and maybe you don't like knowing as many of the
players for two and three years like you used to.
But the game is themselves, the actual product that you're
sitting down and viewing, or you're going to arena or
stadiums to view, or going to Big City Wings to watch,

(01:45:57):
are loved.

Speaker 1 (01:45:58):
They can't get enough. I can't wait to go back
up there. Go back to campus this weekend.

Speaker 3 (01:46:02):
One of them, Well, I'm just saying the product is
not scrutinized the right. Everything surrounding the product is currently scrutinized.

Speaker 1 (01:46:09):
A great deal, he said something and again. Maybe he's
saying this for show.

Speaker 3 (01:46:13):
I don't know, but he thinks the academics at Ole
Miss are lower than most places.

Speaker 1 (01:46:18):
But he's talking about the that product that you're that
very product we're discussing. I'm a football junkie. When we
don't play, I'm watching quad Box because it's what I love.
But I can't keep up. I don't vote anymore in
the Coach's Poll because it's not fair for me to vote.
I couldn't tell you how NC State played against Wake Forest.
How could I know? This goes back to something you

(01:46:40):
were ranting about during this last college football season. These
coaches don't watch enough to make an educated guess or
vote on any If you're a college football coach Coach's Poll,
if you're a college football writer who covers a team,
you're in the same voat You're at that team's game,
and you're working on that game for five hours. Why

(01:47:03):
I hate going at Texans games. I can't see all
the other stuff going on.

Speaker 3 (01:47:07):
But you can make it. We're not asked to vote
on it. We're just asked to criticize power rankings.

Speaker 2 (01:47:11):
That's true. That's different.

Speaker 1 (01:47:13):
So yeah, I thought Sarkesian as usual was a quote machine.
We need to get our good personal friend back on
the show again so I can discuss Lakers basketball with him.

Speaker 2 (01:47:22):
Looking forward to it.

Speaker 6 (01:47:26):
The eighteen.

Speaker 1 (01:47:30):
Winding down the four o'clock hour here on the A
Team Sports Talk seven to ninety. I was out for
four hours yesterday. All four hours in that time. How
many times did you talk about the story that won't
go away?

Speaker 3 (01:47:46):
I talked about it one time, and I did it
the proper way with you out, which is I refused
to talk about it when you weren't here, to deprive
you of the ability to enjoy it. The talk about
it today, So I saved it for what did you say?
I said, there's more. I don't know what you want
to call it. Photos out there now that will continue
to drive this story, and while I think they are

(01:48:10):
of no consequence, we'll find out tomorrow if that's how
the A Team feels about the latest photos involving Mike
Rossini and Diana av Abel.

Speaker 2 (01:48:21):
Do you know that dirty Diana is cheating on Mike Vrabel?

Speaker 1 (01:48:25):
Uh?

Speaker 3 (01:48:25):
Yeah, I saw that in the pictures with her husband.

Speaker 1 (01:48:30):
Where did you get your clothes at the toilet store?
That's what you sound like.

Speaker 3 (01:48:34):
They haven't been in hiding, and here are pictures of
them in public showing affection for one another the day
after the awful online social media X platform. I wonder
if they're happy on Mother's Day in this household jokes
that we're like that joke. So yes, pictures are on
not page five, not page seven. Page six. Photos of

(01:48:58):
the aforementioned shake show CEO Kevin g himself in an
embrace with a child holding wife of his Kevin and
Diana in a kiss.

Speaker 1 (01:49:10):
No in public confirmation as to whether or not the
particular child being held is Mikey or not. By the way,
that embrace you mentioned is described in this article as
a warm one, warmly embracing.

Speaker 3 (01:49:26):
By the way, URLs oftentimes include the lengthy headlines, So
that's what it's fired off as, and when you go
and search for it, that's what's sitting up in there,
and it reads as follows, Diana Rossini kisses husband on
Mother's day as pair scene for first time since Mike
rabel scandal. And now I'll tell you what I really

(01:49:47):
think about this particular item as it relates to this story. Yes,
this is a completely unimportant to any reasonable discussion you
would have about this topic because where I think we're
at the point, probably I've thought it longer than you,
But it doesn't I'm the Racinis can live their life

(01:50:09):
however they'd like, and it's of no consequence to me.
It really never was not looking for them to break up.
I'm not looking for them to stay together. I'm not
looking for anything from them because I don't really have
any interest in it. It's their own issues. They'll deal
with them how they see fit professionally. Maybe there's something
future to talk about with Rassini, But Diana and her

(01:50:29):
husband in a picture doing anything reasonable doesn't matter at
all to the only story about this We should still
be talking about whether or not Mike Vrabel continues to
coach the Patriots, because what she does in what now
might be a separate personal life isn't relevant to what

(01:50:50):
is happening with him.

Speaker 1 (01:50:51):
Well, she's no longer an NFL insider, right, but that
doesn't change anything. For me, No, never did. Now, what
about different executives saying what I've been saying, which is
that they are on a collision course for a down
year in New England?

Speaker 2 (01:51:10):
Over this, among those, over this, among others things. Okay,
rank them well.

Speaker 1 (01:51:16):
An unnamed high ranking AFC club official neither confirm nor
deny that it's uh Nick Cassario as a quote, I
was just looking at them last in sacks allowed Patriots.
I was just looking at them them is the football team?

Speaker 2 (01:51:34):
Yeah? Not not the pictures Dirtie Diana and Michael.

Speaker 3 (01:51:38):
Vrabel unnamed high ranking executive set the following as we
continue to talk about Dan or singing Mike Vrabel, I
was just looking at them.

Speaker 2 (01:51:46):
Way to start the clip, the quote with.

Speaker 1 (01:51:48):
That last in sacks allowed, Drake May gets hit one
hundred and twenty one times. That's the most left tackle
isn't a left tackle? I'm with you. The schedule is
much tougher with them winning a division. Now, see they
disagree with you, wex they think that it's more than
just three games that have changed on their schedule with
the first place. Put the Vrabel stuff aside. See he's

(01:52:10):
with you is on that as well. I think they're
in trouble. Didn't like their red zone offense. They rely
heavily on the run. The defense bad in the red zone.
They don't have enough impact defensive linemen. Look at their
sacks plus pressures plus quarterback hits. I've got them thirty
first in the league. I don't know who this high

(01:52:31):
ranking AFC club official is, but I like him a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:52:34):
So three games that do change.

Speaker 3 (01:52:36):
You play those first place teams, your swing game, and
any given year, you know there's seventeenth games, so to speak,
and be who knows what? There are four games that
do change every year. It's every four years you play
each of the four NFC divisions. Do you know who
they played last year? Do you know who they play

(01:52:58):
this year? From an NFC stand point.

Speaker 2 (01:53:00):
I bet you're gonna tell me. I'm just curious if
you think that might weigh into that at all. I'd
have to have their schedule in front of me, which
I don't at the moment. I'll tell you which NFC
division they played last year? Was it the NFC South.

Speaker 3 (01:53:13):
It's the one with teams in the South like Atlanta
and New Orleans and Carolina and Tampa. They sucked and
then who would you like to say it is this year?
If I'm going to tell you in my super condescending
sarcastic tone that I'm using very harshly here, which NFC
division do you think it is this year?

Speaker 2 (01:53:30):
Uh? NFC East?

Speaker 3 (01:53:32):
It is the NFC division that features the Packers, Vikings, Bears,
and Lions North. So that's a big difference. Now, they
didn't have an unbelievable year. Detroit obviously fell. The Vikings
had and will have question marks with Kyler murrayot quarterback.
The Packers were good, and the Bears were probably better
than people thought. But it's a lot better than four

(01:53:55):
games against whom they played last year. So now we're
talking about seven of their seventeen games. I'm in on that.
I'm in on acknowledging they have a tougher road ahead
of them. They also are seeing like just I'll tell
you who they have. These are the good teams. I
think these are good teams that they will play next year.
The Bills, Broncos, Steelers and Packers are going to Foxborough.

(01:54:20):
They obviously play at the Bills, Chiefs, Chargers, Jaguars, Bears, Lions, Seahawks.
I just gave you their entire road schedule except for
the Jets and Dolphins. Good luck Bill's Chiefs, Chargers, Jags, Bears, Lions, Seahawks.

Speaker 1 (01:54:35):
I mean, not all of those are murderers, row, but
half of them are els. Half of those are els.
They're going they have a great season. Half of those
are els. And the football that was mentioned there is
also accurate. Their offensive line was bad and does not
forecast to be significantly better, so they better do things differently.
And their quarterback got crushed all year, then played multiple

(01:55:00):
extra games, four of them and got crushed in those
games too.

Speaker 2 (01:55:04):
That's why he said, Mike's a great person. He said, already, Hey,
my shoulders fine, great human beings.

Speaker 3 (01:55:10):
Sorry, they do have to be better at a lot
of things. A lot of things fell into place for
them to pile up wins. It doesn't appear that those
things are just going to fall into place again in
twenty twenty six.

Speaker 1 (01:55:21):
This is another quote. There is nowhere for them to
go but down. Kansas City is going to be back.

Speaker 2 (01:55:27):
I don't know about that.

Speaker 1 (01:55:28):
Baltimore should be better, Cincinnati is better, don't know about that.
I don't think New England got better. And they could
go get aj Brown, but it doesn't matter if their
line sucks and Drake May's on the turf.

Speaker 2 (01:55:41):
Most likely not.

Speaker 3 (01:55:43):
We will get into more on Football at five games
that have already been announced on the schedule so far.
Have we finally heard about a Texans game definitively on
the standalone scheduled games that.

Speaker 2 (01:55:55):
Have been an ouse, We'll tell you about that next.

Speaker 3 (01:55:58):
They're very familiar Football at five music that I teased
into is not being played for a very good reason
because Chandlerome is set to join us with the Astros
getting ready for the second game of their series with
the Seattle Mariners, the second of their seven game homestand
and hopefully the first of their wins on this home stand.
Last night a three to one loss, despite the fact

(01:56:20):
that Peter Lambert followed his seven inning performance against the
Dodgers with a seven inning performance against the Mariners.

Speaker 2 (01:56:27):
A high pitch count early.

Speaker 3 (01:56:29):
In that game did not make it look like there
would be seven innings worth of Peter Lambert, but nonetheless,
he was able to rifle through their order most of
the middle portion of the game and did deliver seven innings,
just one walk, six strikeouts, gave up three runs which,
as the Astros offense has shown lately, is too much
for them to overcome. With that, we bring in chandlerome
from the ballpark, from the Athletic Beat, writer for the

(01:56:52):
Astros and MLB. I don't know if it's worth it
to bring it up because I'm sure something is not imminent,
but wow, Chandler, Major League Baseball and their Players Association
already talking about the CBA as of reports today.

Speaker 6 (01:57:11):
Yeah, but I think that was expected, right, Like, you
got to start somewhere, and I guess it's good that
they're starting now and not, you know, in November before
it expires in December. But yeah, they're gonna this is
gonna be a long drawn out process that we're not
gonna have really a resolution to anytime soon. But I
don't know how it went. I leave that to Evandralic

(01:57:32):
to tell me how it went. But they got to
start somewhere, and I guess today was the day they
were gonna start.

Speaker 3 (01:57:38):
Good vibes getting started very very early. How about the
vibes you expect to see at the ballpark sometime around
eight eight thirty eight forty five, And what information the
Astros have delivered about what their expectations are for the
fourth start and first since April tenth, tonight for totsu Emi.

Speaker 6 (01:57:59):
Yeah, I don't think anyone knows. I don't know what
to expect at all. This is I've probably not come
into a game in a very long time, just just apps.
Nothing would surprise me. He could get one out, he
could get twenty outs, nothing would surprise me tonight. You know,
I think the prevailing theme from when Joe a Spota

(01:58:20):
talked to us earlier was they have basically told Tatsu
he might just do whatever you want to do. Joe
a Spota essentially said today, like they didn't even give
him a scouting report for the Mariners, like they heat maps,
zone maps all that. So like, no, don't don't worry
about that.

Speaker 2 (01:58:37):
Tatsoo.

Speaker 6 (01:58:38):
He might said in sugar Land last week that the
scouting reports had been a thing that had been given
him problems. So they they literally are just like, you
attack the zone with what you want to throw, and
you do what you want to do. And they have
they are bending over backwards for this guy to make
him as comfortable as possible, to give him every ability

(01:58:59):
to be to do what is natural to him because
reading between the lines, it just seems like he has
struggled with a lot of the adjustments in terms of
things that take him out of his comfort zone. And
look coming over to the US and playing in MLB,
like inherently that was going to take him out of
his comfort zone from Japan. But I think on the field,

(01:59:22):
they're really giving him a lot of autonomy just to
do whatever you want, anything that they can do to
try to get him to throw the ball in the
strike zone.

Speaker 1 (01:59:30):
So obviously Astros fans are hoping that that works and
gets him to the best version of himself so that
he can start doing what they brought him over to do.
But let's just say for the sake of argument, it
doesn't go well for whatever reason, or maybe it's not him,
but the Astros lose this game. The Astros, you know,
have a very very poor week against two teams that
are ahead of them in the division.

Speaker 2 (01:59:51):
Are one or both of the brain.

Speaker 1 (01:59:53):
Trust you know at the at the top of the
food chain that aren't Jim Crane, ag Are they not
going to make it out of this week?

Speaker 2 (01:59:59):
Is there a where you see somebody get fired.

Speaker 6 (02:00:03):
I really don't know the answer to that, because There's
only one person that knows the answer to that, and
he ain't talking to me anytime soon.

Speaker 2 (02:00:10):
Sorry.

Speaker 6 (02:00:12):
You know, it's hard for me to look at this
and blame the manager, right Like the manager can only
run out the roster he has given and this roster
is injured beyond belief. The reason their lineup is struggling
right now is not because Christian Walker is two for
twenty five or Jordan Alvarez isn't a funk. It's because

(02:00:34):
they're five through nine hitters on most nights. Should not
be in a major league lineup, and they have to
do this because they have no other options. And you know,
they've got paying You on a rehab assignment. Now, they've
got Jake Myers on a rehab assignment. They've got Hater
closing in on coming back. I think the question that
Jim is going to have to ask himself if if

(02:00:56):
this week doesn't go well, He's going to have to
ask himself how much of a difference will getting these
guys back make? And does Joe Aspada or Dana Brown
deserve that chance to have a full complement of healthy players,
which they have not had since the first home stand
of the season. They have not had a completely healthy team.

(02:01:19):
Do they deserve that? Do they deserve, you know, a
month or so with a more representative roster of what
is available to them. Do they deserve that to try
to go on a run. But the problem is if
you go one and six this week, or if you
go two and five this week, and you find yourself,
I don't know, like nine or ten games back in

(02:01:39):
the division. I'm not saying it's impossible to come back.
The Al West is awful, but it makes it really difficult. So,
you know, I don't know that they're at that point
yet where it's just you know, if they don't do
well this week, then changes have to come. But it's
certainly something you can't rule out.

Speaker 3 (02:01:57):
When you consider any of those changes and what the
general manager's position is on most teams, how much is
true about this particular team the draft that comes up.
You're building the farm system while you're trying to win
at the major league level. The farm system was obviously
in a certain place when Dana Brown arrived. How do
you view their farm system with what he's been able

(02:02:19):
to do, and do you think there's any thought about
wanting him to continue through the draft because you like
what he's done talking about the organization's viewpoint, or is
there any element of maybe the opposite, Well.

Speaker 6 (02:02:31):
The farm system, you know, it's not. It's not in
a totally better place than when he got here. But
part of that is he's had to make some trades
to make the major league team better. Part of that
is just you know, player development is not linear. Player
development takes time. Xavier Nions and Kevin Alvarez are tearing
it up at Low A where they are they're faanfle

(02:02:52):
they're in Faithful, they're tearing it up and Fable they're great.
Ethan Fryes had a nice start to his year, but
then Walker y Onick, his first round pick from a
couple years has not played well in Double A and
is now on the injured list. Bryce Matthews has been
up here and you have seen flashes of him being
a guy, but I'm not sure you look at him
and say that's a big league regular. You know, it's

(02:03:14):
hard to judge drafts, and it's hard to judge farm
systems like immediately after drafts. So I think it's a
little unfair to just paint a broad brush for Dana
with that but you know, I talked about this on
Chrushitty Territory today. Like the question Jim's going to have
to ask is if they get to the trade deadline
and they are at a point where they have to

(02:03:36):
sell and they have to make very consequential decisions about
guys like Jeremy Pania, Josh Hater, Esak Paratus, Christian Walker.
Is Dana Brown the guy that you want making those decisions?
It is pretty clear that because they because Jim Crane
has had no extension talks with Dana Brown, because he

(02:03:57):
has not offered him a vote of confidence when asked,
it would seem to me that he because of that
lack of you know, voicing his support. Would it would
seem to me that he doesn't believe this guy is
maybe or he's uncertain that this is the guy he
wants to run this thing into the future. I'm not
sure why you would if you have that uncertainty and

(02:04:19):
you haven't decided full throat that this is the GM
I want for the future. I'm not sure why you
would let him have his fingerprints on so many consequential decisions.
And you know, the draft is three weeks before the
trade deadline, so are you gonna let him run the
draft and then the minute the drafts over make a
change two weeks before the deadline that I don't know
that that makes a ton of sense. So I don't know.

(02:04:40):
These are all questions that Jim Crane's gonna have to
ask himself. The answers may be a little bit easier
and could be a little more clear if the Astros
have a nice homestand if they can somehow go five
and two even you know, you know, maybe four and
three and they're still in it. There's still, you know,
have a fighting chance there within a four or five
games of a wild card spot. You get Payna back,

(02:05:01):
you get Meyers back, you get Hunter Brown back sometime
next month, and then you try to start to make
a run toward the middle of the.

Speaker 1 (02:05:07):
Season, regardless of who is or isn't making the decisions
as far as personnel. And I know you've seen this
kind of pick up traction just because people like to
write stuff this time of year. Is there any world
where there's a reality to the rumors that Jordan Alvarez
would be even shopped, much less traded.

Speaker 6 (02:05:30):
I would never say never, but I would also be
fall on the floor stunned if they trade. If they
trade Ord and Alvarez. Now, with that being said, it
would be malpractice for them not to listen. Now, listening
does not mean you do it, but you can pick
up the phone and you can listen to what other
teams would offer. Again, that does not mean you do it.

(02:05:52):
But I think I think any GM, any head of
Baseball operations, any person making decision to this magnitude, you're
doing a disservice if you don't listen to what's out there.
But I've not really asked around because I just, quite frankly,
I just don't think that's going to happen. But the
few people I have talked to just completely doused that idea.

(02:06:13):
So yeah, I would I would be pretty surprised if
that happens. But you know, again, I'll bring the I'll
bring the Detroit Tigers into this, like they listened on
Tarrek Scooble this past winter. Like I don't think they
were ever going to trade him, but they listened, and
as they should, and as you know, the Astros. I
don't think they're going to trade Ord and Alvarez, but

(02:06:35):
they should listen because what's the harm in listening. Just
because you listen doesn't mean you pull the trigger and
do it.

Speaker 3 (02:06:42):
Can you give us just thirty seconds on this since
you brought up the Tigers, what your thirty seconds worth
of thoughts were on the Framber Valdez experience that the
Tigers are now experiencing.

Speaker 6 (02:06:53):
Was anyone surprised? I don't even think I need thirty
seconds for that. Was anybody surprised?

Speaker 2 (02:07:00):
Really?

Speaker 3 (02:07:01):
It was wild to see exact watch it literally happen,
and no, I think you're right.

Speaker 2 (02:07:06):
I don't think anybody was truly surprised. Chandler.

Speaker 3 (02:07:08):
We appreciate the time as always, look forward to everything
you produce in the Athletic Crush Shitty territory as well.
Like you mentioned, we'll catch up with you again soon.
All right, Thanks guys, You got it. Chandler Roma of
the Athletic covering your Houston Astros and Major League Baseball
in advance of tonight's game against the Seattle Mays. Tats
to Emi returns for the mound to the for the Astros,

(02:07:29):
and it looks like he'll be pitching to Crash Davis.
He'll be behind the play and saying no, no, whatever
you want, just serve it up.

Speaker 2 (02:07:37):
It's all you dog looking forward to that.

Speaker 3 (02:07:39):
If you recollect what I'm talking about, we will hit
you with what I mentioned as are tees last go round,
because I forgot we're talking baseball when I thought it
was football at five.

Speaker 1 (02:07:52):
Thanks again to Chandler Rome of the.

Speaker 2 (02:07:55):
Athletic joining Us last segment.

Speaker 1 (02:07:59):
He wouldn't he'd said never say never about trading yourd
on Alvarez.

Speaker 2 (02:08:03):
Yeah, but he was very clear. As we have been.

Speaker 3 (02:08:05):
It seems incredibly unlikely that that's the direction the Astros
would go, and all things considered with who they have
in charge and the respective commitments that have been made
to both the manager but more specifically the general manager.
If you don't trust the general manager to do that
and you want to move on from him, I can't
mean I guess you could trust his lieutenants to do that.

(02:08:27):
Otherwise you're going outside the organization in season, in advance
of maybe the draft and or the trade deadline. None
of those seem likely to happen. And that's just the
way things are for a team that I do not
think expected to be sitting at sixteen and twenty six,
where the references to the twelve and twenty four start
of twenty twenty four have been made a lot, and

(02:08:48):
I've shot them down for a numerous reasons, because that
team and this team are only similar, and that they
did not start winning games at the beginning of the season.
I don't know that this team will ever start winning games.
That team one eight out of nine twice before the
midway point of the season, they were at thirty six games.
When they were twelve and twenty four. Before they hit

(02:09:08):
eighty one games, they had had two separate instances of
winning eight out of nine. I don't see how that's
even possible for this team. Maybe at any point this season,
let alone two times over their next thirty nine games,
that team was forty and forty and when they first
went over five hundred at forty two and forty one,
they never returned. They were the best team in baseball

(02:09:29):
if you remember, after they started twelve and twenty four
the best record. This team has the worst record in
the American League right now, and it is still missing
all those players we just ran through with Chandler and
has almost nothing offensively coming out of spots five through
nine right now. Isn't getting Carlos Korea back I just
can't envision a scenario where this run of unreal excellence

(02:09:52):
is about to happen for this team. Yeah, they're gonna
get better, Yes, they're gonna be more competitive, and no,
it probably doesn't require that for them to re reach
the postseason this year, potentially as they did that year
in twenty twenty four, the only postseason they've had so
far under Joe Aspata, which did not include any postseason wins.
They might be able to get there with eighty four wins.
They might be able to get there with eighty three wins.

(02:10:13):
It's also going to be very difficult to get to
those two totals when you're forty two games into the season,
you're ten games under five hundred, and you're playing bad
baseball still, which is what they're obviously doing heading into tonight.
Emi and Brian Wu the two pitching combatants set to
hit the field tonight. We've seen the NFL tell us
that Thursday, we'll have it all for you, all seventeen

(02:10:36):
games and the times and dates that go with them.
But we also knew leading into Thursday they would start
unveiling games that had not yet been announced that we're
kind of special event to Jewel games. If we were
talking Major League Baseball, standalone trips to Australia and Brazil
and Spain some if not all, by the time we
get there of the Thanksgiving games, etc.

Speaker 2 (02:10:56):
And we got a bunch more of those over the
last twenty four hours.

Speaker 3 (02:11:00):
A trip to Australia we knew was for the Rams
than the Niners. The two opening weekend Sunday and Monday
night games have been announced to Cowboys and Giants, Broncos
and Chiefs. Cowboys and Giants yesterday, Thursday Night Football in
week two, Lions, Bills, Ravens and Cowboys are going to

(02:11:22):
Brazil in week three. Bengals and Falcons are going to
Spain in week nine. And yesterday we talked quite a
bit about how the Cowboys game on Thanksgiving is obviously
a tradition, but the matchups they've had on Thanksgiving also
have been awesome. A lot of divisional matchups have been there.
They played the Chiefs last year, and the game this
year is Eagles Thanksgiving.

Speaker 2 (02:11:44):
That's awesome.

Speaker 3 (02:11:45):
I wouldn't be saying I can't wait because I eat
two meals that day anyway, but I can't wait. That's
a great matchup, and I tease you about the Texans.
There have been no announcements of any Texans games as
of yet. I said yesterday I'd be surprise if they
had less than four standalone primetime games or more than five.
So I guess it's going to be either four or five,

(02:12:08):
and I would include an overseas game.

Speaker 1 (02:12:10):
Quarterbacks getting killed. If you like that, then the Texans
should be on a lot of national television games.

Speaker 3 (02:12:16):
That's what I pointed out yesterday, that the games that
are Texans related, the execs, the suits, if you will,
If people still wear suits to work, that's what they're
looking at. We're not sure what their offense is going
to look like. We've been saying that for the last
three years and we'll say it again heading into this year.
But we know what their earth kicking defense is going

(02:12:37):
to look like, and we can't wait to put that
on TV. Obviously, the blood red Texans against the Bills
was a spectacular night of quarterback destruction this past season.

Speaker 2 (02:12:49):
I'm sure it will be the same.

Speaker 3 (02:12:50):
They'll get a Monday night game, obviously, they have the
Thursday night game. They probably will have two. They'll have
three total Monday and Sunday Night games. I would say
pretty confidently, at the bare minimum.

Speaker 1 (02:13:03):
You know how you're always mad about the whole Diana
Russini Mike Vrabel thing being talked about on the show,
like two segments ago. You remember that, I'm my brain's
still with me. What if I told you, because you're
always like, it doesn't matter. They had an affair, big deal,
it's not football. What if I told you that the
affair may have altered the course of modern AFC South history.

(02:13:26):
What if I could take the affair and tie it
to the Texans draft of C. J. Stroud, would you
then be a little more interested in it?

Speaker 3 (02:13:33):
If I could remember all the words you said, I
would say you had me at whatever word, Because I'm
in I can't wait to hear.

Speaker 2 (02:13:39):
The most well reported aspect of the story ties the
twenty twenty two NFL draft that was the year before,
of course, in which Russini, who was scheduled to be
in Indianapolis to cover the draft for ESPN, instead stayed
in Nashville. As you know, Vrabel was the head coach
of the Titans at the time.

Speaker 1 (02:14:02):
During this time, Russini broke the story of the Titans
blockbuster and unexpected trade of AJ Brown to the Eagles,
a franchise altering move that sent one of the best
receivers in the league to the opposite conference. And it's
alleged that Vrabel fed her the information. No way it's

(02:14:22):
written like that directly gave her fed her. He fed
her the information. The following year, it's reported that Russini
published a tweet, which she later deleted, in addition to
purging her entire x account and making her Instagram private,
claiming that the Titans had withdrawn their trade offer to

(02:14:44):
the Arizona Cardinals for the number three pick after C. J.
Stroud was taken number two by the Texans. The Texans,
seemingly reacting to Russini's report about Tennessee's interest in the
then Ohio state quarterback, traded back up to number three
to select Will Anderson Junior, surrendering further draft capital in

(02:15:08):
the process. Of course, we all know that Stroud was
the Pro Bowler Offensive Rookie of the Year three straight
postseason appearances. All that, if the reporting is accurate, that
means that Vrabel's alleged information leak didn't just tell Russini
break news, but it actively influenced the Texans' draft decisions.

Speaker 2 (02:15:29):
So at the time, what was what was Mike up to?

Speaker 3 (02:15:32):
He was coaching the Nashville Titans, who Nashville Oilers, who
had interest in CJ.

Speaker 2 (02:15:39):
Stroud at number three? Well, he wasn't available at number three.

Speaker 1 (02:15:44):
Well, oh, he wasn't available because the Texans took him
at number two. But apparently they were interested in trading
up to the Cardinals to get him at number three
if he was still there, which I don't get that,
because it was.

Speaker 2 (02:15:53):
All along pretty much known that it was going to
be CJ. Two. What's his face? Number one? You know,
the midget. What's his name?

Speaker 1 (02:16:02):
He was going to answer, I'm now a reluctant to
us quarterbacks for the Carolina Panthers. He does, he's small,
he's wee. I'm trying to remember what I'd read. It
was over the weekend about this very thing about what
really went on during the twenty twenty three draft and
what compelled the Texans to do this, and how far
along they were with you know, Monti, Austin Ford, the

(02:16:24):
Cardinals GM, and the days leading up to it, obviously
pretty far along to where they could pull the trigger
and the brief amount of time that they had to do.

Speaker 2 (02:16:30):
So, remember the Texans.

Speaker 3 (02:16:33):
I think this is all based on a scenario where
the Texans took somebody else at two and then traded
up to take C. J.

Speaker 2 (02:16:41):
Stroud at three. Three.

Speaker 3 (02:16:43):
Now, the Cardinals have long been tied to being in
love with Will Anderson. They would have taken him had
they not pulled the trigger on the deal. So essentially they.

Speaker 2 (02:16:50):
Were trading out of the opportunity to draft Will Anderson,
who would have been their pick if they didn't get
an offer that they thought was worth taking, And thankfully
for Houston they did.

Speaker 1 (02:16:59):
Why would they do if they were so interested in
him and he could take him right there, why would
they just wanted the draft capital.

Speaker 3 (02:17:04):
They wanted the draft capital They drafted a good player
with nine when they traded with Houston. That lineman I
think will help solidify their line if they ever have
the other pieces around him to do that quarterback, especially,
But I'd still wonder, like I brought it up, I've
brought it up every single time. The reporting angle the

(02:17:25):
Texans had just a hypothetical. The Texans have intel on
other teams from agents right from media people who have
connections inside the team and from the people literally that
are inside the team that they know. Whether they want
to trust the information from any of those people is
up to them, But that does put some weight behind
Could a report, a post, information that comes through from

(02:17:48):
a reporter really influence you on a decision like that.
It's pretty hard to say absolutely not. It doesn't seem
like it should or would, because who are you listening
to when you see that? But that's why people use media.
They use them. We talk about it all the time.
They're just hear feed this, write this, and they all
copy and paste the exact thing from the agent because
they believe there's value to it in many instances.

Speaker 2 (02:18:11):
So I can't dismiss any of this stuff. And it's football.

Speaker 1 (02:18:15):
I like that, not a fair stuff which you don't like,
but related to the affair. Nonetheless, we got in case
you missed it coming up next here on the A
Team the eightful Things to get to again or that
we have not gotten to at all via in case
you missed it, which we do each and every day,
final half hour of the show. Halfway through this final hour,

(02:18:37):
also want to mention we got more tickets to give
away a pair today to give away to an evening
with Jeff Foxworthy.

Speaker 2 (02:18:43):
It's this Sunday.

Speaker 3 (02:18:45):
So if you're available this Sunday to go visit Smart
Financial Center and Sugarland to go see Jeff Foxworthy.

Speaker 2 (02:18:51):
Well, listen up, you might be a redneck.

Speaker 3 (02:18:54):
Yes, you might be. I believe that's that's his stick
to anyway. But what we've been talking about the first
half hour and the next half fifteen minutes or so,
we'll ask you something about that in the final segment
and you can find your way to winning those tickets
in the final segment of the show. But in case
you missed it, plenty of NFL chatter to revisit or

(02:19:15):
introduce here.

Speaker 7 (02:19:15):
Josh, Absolutely, this kind of caught me off guard. You know,
this time of year, you see a lot of strength
the schedule stuff.

Speaker 2 (02:19:22):
It's kind of everywhere.

Speaker 7 (02:19:23):
Even though we don't know when the games are happening,
we know who the opponents are. So this, I don't
know if you guys noticed this. It's something I saw
saw a lot of the Texans have the seventh easiest
schedule this year, and I took a closer look. That's
based off of how teams finished last year. Now, Warren
Sharp put a strength to schedule together based on what

(02:19:43):
the odds makers say about the win totals for this
upcoming season. So instead of them having the seventh easiest
schedule based on last year, according to the lines for
this upcoming year, they actually have the seventh hardest schedule.

Speaker 3 (02:19:57):
So I'm glad you did that. You know was with
us yesterday, unlike somebody. We had a strength of scheduled
conversation yesterday, and obviously I semantically ranted about it. So
strength of schedule based on the records of the teams
that played football last year with totally different players and
sometimes coaches. So don't pay too much attention to it.

(02:20:18):
These aren't the teams they're playing this year. You're not
very relevant. But Josh takes us in a different path
that seems much more relevant, especially since we think Vegas
is smart. I actually saw a different one that says
very very similar things to what Josh is pointing out.
Strength of schedule adjusted over the odds on win.

Speaker 2 (02:20:38):
Totals, etc.

Speaker 3 (02:20:39):
Very similar to what you're talking about, And basically it
really just clumps together all the teams we think are
really good in the AFC are almost in exactly the
same boat. They've got a graph of good teams with
hard schedule up in the upper right quadrant, bad team's
hard schedule over to the left, and so on and
so forth. The Bills, Chiefs, Patriots, Broncos, Jags, Texans, and

(02:21:05):
Chargers very closely clumped together. And if I told you
those are the seven teams going to the playoffs out
of the AFC, you might believe me. Ravens have a
little bit different scenario where their schedules a little bit easier.
The Bengals have a much easier schedule. Most everybody else
is not a good enough team. Most people don't think

(02:21:27):
to have it be relevant. The Steelers, the Colts, the Titans, Browns, Jets, Raiders, Dolphins, etc.
But it doesn't, I don't think other than the Patriots,
like we brought up earlier, if you look at the
projected wager available win totals for all those teams that
are on the Patriots schedule this year and what we
anticipate them being, and again the win totals that have

(02:21:49):
been put out there because they're actually paying attention to
who's going to be on the team, and this is
what people actually want to lay their money down on.
I would still put the Patriots in a little different
position than most of these other AFC teams, and that
who we saw and how they played last year could
be a very very different story this year. The rest
of it, the good teams win because they're good.

Speaker 2 (02:22:10):
Well, there's another chart that I saw.

Speaker 1 (02:22:12):
It just shows the strength of schedule, and it's it's
differentiated by so little percentage points.

Speaker 2 (02:22:18):
Of course, so I you know, I don't.

Speaker 3 (02:22:21):
I mean the team with the hardest strength of schedule,
and it mounts to they play teams with a combined
fifty three point eight winning percentage or fifty four point two,
and you go down to the twentieth hardest schedule.

Speaker 1 (02:22:33):
Four's it's a couple teams that did this versus that.

Speaker 2 (02:22:38):
It is.

Speaker 3 (02:22:39):
We'll find out more about the Texans. Remember there was
one leaked game we talked about yesterday that suggested the
Texans would be the opponent for the Jacksonville Jaguars week six,
October eighteenth. I believe, and I mentioned yesterday, I thought
there was a pretty reputable source based on the information
they'd put out over the years with the leaks from

(02:23:01):
a schedule standpoint, and if it is, obviously that should
be one of the games that's announced prior to Thursday night,
being that it's an international game, so we shall see.

Speaker 7 (02:23:11):
What else do we have. Yeah, let's take a look
over here. I thought this was interesting. NFL dot Com
Top ten most complete rosters and guess what, no surprise
or Houston Texans did crack the top ten, finish at
number nine. And they say, like the Broncos, Texans received
the spot based on their defense. YadA, YadA, YadA. We

(02:23:31):
all know that that's no surprise. But I like the
end of it. It's basically, if the Texans do get
what they think they're gonna get with improving their offense,
they think this is a top five roster.

Speaker 1 (02:23:43):
Well, yeah, and there's all a bunch of if CJ
does this, If CJ does that, that is writing on
all this, which I agree with.

Speaker 2 (02:23:50):
That was interesting if they're one spot ahead of the Patriots.

Speaker 3 (02:23:52):
So if you're and we just laid out some of
the reasons why the Patriots can't even get to they
don't even know where the quarterback is most games, they
can't get to them. Roster is not nearly as strong
on paper as a bunch of teams that unfortunately won
a bunch of fewer games than they did. But if
the Texans come in at nine, I think we'd all
agree that nobody would rank the Texans defensive roster any

(02:24:15):
worse than two. Maybe one, maybe two? Could you say three? Denver, Seattle, Houston.
I don't even think so. I think they're no worse
than two. So if they're overall at nine, that puts
their offensive roster somewhere in the eighteen nineteen twenty range,
which is probably about right until otherwise. Yeah, and that's
even being kind potentially with who has been on the

(02:24:37):
roster in some of the movies that they've made to
obviously they were made in an attempt to upgrade the roster,
trying to bolster it. Since we're on it, I'll bring
up one more list that I saw, and it does
try to combine a bunch of different ratings. When putting
this together, they grabbed the five expected offensive line starters,
although in the Texans case, I think they don't have

(02:24:59):
the right five pass and run block win rate, pff grade,
how they're used, their pedigree, some all sorts of different things.
They combine them all together and come up with a
rating for each of the five linemen and thus compiling
those five a rating for the offensive line as a whole.
The Texans spent high draft capital on a new center,

(02:25:22):
we think, and Kiln Rutledge did acknowledge that's a position
he could play when we talked to him the other day,
and maybe where they will have him working. They obviously
resigned Ingram and brought in two new players potentially at
the guard and tackle position, and none of them rate
very highly, and combined a line which in this case
has rutlegit guard instead of Wyatt Teller, which is probably

(02:25:44):
not accurate. A line that grades out at thirty two
out of thirty two in the NFL, the worst their
new look line with a bunch of different factors there
and a likely mistake on whose action going to start
at left guard as the worst line in football, it
doesn't sound like they've done it right.

Speaker 1 (02:26:06):
I keep doing that sounds harsh exactly, that would be
the word.

Speaker 3 (02:26:10):
And you look at a bunch of individual numbers. Patrick
Paul stood out to a lot of people with a
very low rating. Is it very promising a young left
tackle who had a very good season. Urseries number looks
incredibly low. So I wouldn't put too much stock in it,
but think of where they're coming from. Think about the
fact they're signing two players that the teams that had

(02:26:30):
them did not want and did not have good line
play last year, and we're just supposed to believe they
got light years better. They're probably better. I don't know
about the light year's part of it. We got those
tickets to give away and a few items to finish
things off with.

Speaker 2 (02:26:45):
I mentioned yesterday.

Speaker 3 (02:26:46):
The Champions of college Football visited the lawn at the
White House yesterday. Maybe we'll hear from our president next.

Speaker 6 (02:26:59):
The eight.

Speaker 3 (02:27:00):
I may have been looking forward to hearing from Astros
starting pitcher Mike Burrows, but as we told you earlier,
we had some technical issues and we'd be pushing them
to tomorrow's program at two thirty, So looking forward to
that conversation. Those technical issues have been licked thanks to
the great people here at iHeartRadio. On the IT side,

(02:27:21):
what of tom and we're happy about that, which also
means it's very easy process for us to offer you
these tickets to go see Jeff Foxworthy. It's an evening
with Jeff Foxworthy. He's a comedian. May seventeenth, that is
this weekend Sunday, Smart Financial Center in Sugarland. Tickets are

(02:27:41):
on sale via smart financial center dot net. Let me
ask you this real quickly. I did this yesterday and
I've done it in the past. When I tell people
they can find tickets if they like to purchase them
for this event and any others that might be at
this venue, you go to smart Financialcenter dot net. Do
I need to tell them that center is spelled as
it is.

Speaker 2 (02:28:01):
Well, here's the thing. I think.

Speaker 1 (02:28:03):
If you type it in the American way, it's fine.
If you type it in the Canadian way, it's fine.

Speaker 3 (02:28:08):
Spar Financial centert net is where you can find tickets
should you not win them here. But if you've been
listening to the program, you'll know the answer to this
very simple question we're about to ask. And you can
call in at seven one three two one two five
seven ninety with the answer seven one three two one
two five seven ninety if you want to go see
Jeff entertain and make you hurt your sides when they

(02:28:29):
split with laughter.

Speaker 2 (02:28:30):
What's our question today?

Speaker 1 (02:28:32):
Well, I, as usual, as per usual, brought up the
dirty Diana saga yet again, because it's not a day
that goes by that, I don't want to bring it
up when I could.

Speaker 2 (02:28:44):
Get under the skin of my co host here. Okay,
so uh.

Speaker 1 (02:28:48):
One theory out there is that Diana Russini and her
reporting specifically quote altered the course of history for a
certain division in the NFL.

Speaker 2 (02:29:04):
This isn't hard.

Speaker 1 (02:29:07):
Just tell Josh the division that came up, the division
in question, that her reporting as she was allegedly having
an affair with head coach Mike Vrabel, which division was
potentially altered, Its history was potentially altered by her recording.

(02:29:30):
We cannot make this any more obvious. Yeah, back when
she was doing reporting, doing and having a social media
account where she could post things before she deleted it,
and a company who paid her to write things before
they fired her, took her resignation letter, they fired her,
accepted her beat it dirty, Diana Exit, Get out of here.

(02:29:52):
Scram seven one, three, two, five, seven ninety. You got
eight possible guesses. There are eight divisions in the NFL.

Speaker 2 (02:29:59):
Good luck.

Speaker 1 (02:30:01):
It's only one of them. Hey, he's only coached in two.

Speaker 3 (02:30:06):
Yesterday I mentioned that when you win titles, you get prizes,
and the prize in many cases as a trip to
the White House. The latest champion to visit was the
Indiana Hoosiers. They just won the football crown on the
college side, something they always do. Kurt Signetti and a
handful of Indiana Hoosiers visited the White House. I also

(02:30:28):
mentioned that it did not include quarterback Fernando Mendoza, and
it also didn't include a host of players just like him,
those that have exited Indiana with the NFL now employing them.

Speaker 2 (02:30:40):
A bunch of players that played last.

Speaker 3 (02:30:41):
Year for Indiana or in the NFL now and did
not attend, basically because they had work to do. They
were working in their new job in the NFL. I'll
ask you this and hope the answer is no. Do
you know what President Trump said about Fernando Mendoza, specifically
when he spoke about him like word for word.

Speaker 1 (02:31:01):
Yes, that's called him. It all act like, I don't
if it'll help you. What do you think he said
about Fernando?

Speaker 2 (02:31:06):
He called me the reason he didn't travel to the White.

Speaker 3 (02:31:10):
I don't want you to read it. I want you
to tell me what you think he said. And if
you already know what he said, I'll just play donald.
He was training during a season. Here's what Donald Trump
had to say about Fernando Mendoza not visiting the White
House with his championship football.

Speaker 8 (02:31:23):
Team starting quarterback Fernando Mendoza. Now, the reason he's not here,
he was so nice, he cold because he has Actually
JD's a big fan of ours. You wouldn't believe it
because he didn't show up. I'm not happy, but that's okay.
The reason he didn't because he's at spring training right, correct?
And I actually said, you really let him. He's got

(02:31:46):
to win, and I think he's going to.

Speaker 2 (02:31:47):
Win pretty early, coach, right, you think pretty good. Time
will tell he's going to be a good one.

Speaker 8 (02:31:54):
A lot of people said they're going to win, but
I think he will know he's been great. And he's
a spring training like first days up, you better go there.

Speaker 3 (02:32:02):
So there's more, but I'll leave it thereaying baseball, yep,
spring training. I'll give you the final twenty seconds because
he readdressed him not being there and why. But he
also moments before that, the team's all behind him, like
always they happen to be outside, so all the risers
behind him, and you know sometimes he'll turn and look

(02:32:24):
and say, where where's Steph?

Speaker 2 (02:32:26):
Come on up? Here, Where's Steve Kerr? Where's Deshaun? Come
on up here and the player will come down? Or
where where's Clayton? Whoever?

Speaker 6 (02:32:31):
Be well?

Speaker 3 (02:32:32):
In this case, he said, he turned over his right
shoulder and said, where's coach Signetti?

Speaker 2 (02:32:38):
Where's coach? He was in front next to Donald, He
was like five inches from him. These laser focused on
the camera in his own row. He had, he had,
he was all ready for. He never was with the
rest of the team. He was always right next to him.
You can see it in the picture. He's right next
to him or the jersey together at the time when
he said.

Speaker 1 (02:32:58):
It once they once he figured out where he was
and addressed him a few times like he's at.

Speaker 2 (02:33:02):
Time will tell he liked Kurtz being himself. Time will tell.
He wouldn't even acknowledge that he's pretty good in the
throwing his quarterback under the bus. This guy's no pro.

Speaker 3 (02:33:10):
But here's what he went on to say about Fernando's
willingness to forego the opportunity to visit the White House
and visit President Trump.

Speaker 2 (02:33:20):
But he became Indiana otherwise.

Speaker 8 (02:33:23):
If I didn't do that, I believe me, I wouldn't
have even talked about him. I would have not I
if for he was not here for other reasons like
he didn't like Trump or he didn't want to come,
I wouldn't even mentioned him. I go through the hole
and talk about how great I wouldn't even mention the
quarterbacks day.

Speaker 2 (02:33:40):
But he's a great.

Speaker 8 (02:33:40):
Guy actually, and he is actually a big fan of.

Speaker 2 (02:33:43):
What we're doing for a country. I love it.

Speaker 3 (02:33:47):
Had to get that in there as well. They got
their visit and many more will follow. He has several
more years to entertain our sporting champions.

Speaker 1 (02:33:56):
If you sit and think about, like taking someone from like,
when's the last time the Hoosiers.

Speaker 2 (02:34:02):
Won a championship in basketball? The eighties? Keith Smart? So
what year was that though? The eighties? Eighty seven?

Speaker 1 (02:34:09):
I believe, okay, and just take a fan from that era,
an old person exactly. Sorry, basketball program through and through
even after that when they weren't winning championships, are constantly
competing and say hey, twenty twenty six, you guys are
going to be the Kings of football.

Speaker 3 (02:34:28):
They wouldn't believe you, no way, And they were really
really bad at football A blink of an eye ago,
right before coach Signettey got there, and obviously when he
first got there, just really bad as they had been
for their entire existence essentially.

Speaker 1 (02:34:43):
And now half their rosters at spring training because they
were so good spring training. I mean technically he is
training for an NFL season in the middle of May,
which is still a spring month.

Speaker 2 (02:34:53):
He got it right.

Speaker 1 (02:34:54):
Yeah, every time he has one of these, you just
never know.

Speaker 3 (02:34:59):
Wait, we got a winner to go see, Jeff Foxworthy,
So why don't you tell them We've done a bad
job of asking questions and then not giving the answer
during the program.

Speaker 2 (02:35:07):
So we're going to try to be better at that.

Speaker 3 (02:35:09):
We get which one of the eighth divisions in the
NFL did. Was the course of history changed from a
post on social media report from Diana Rassini a couple
of years ago.

Speaker 2 (02:35:21):
When Dirty Diana reported that Mike Rabo had traded away
AJ Brown to the Eagles. It altered the course of
history in the AFC South.

Speaker 3 (02:35:30):
Believe me, the AFC South where in twenty twenty three,
on Draft night, a picks two and three went to
the AFC South.

Speaker 2 (02:35:38):
The Texans took both players C. J. Stradd and Will
Anderson Junior, but.

Speaker 1 (02:35:42):
It was two homes being ruined and wrecked meant that
the Texans got Will Anderson Junior.

Speaker 2 (02:35:47):
I'm fine with it. I mean that's terrible, isn't it.
Well they didn't.

Speaker 3 (02:35:50):
They could have had an affair and not had it
impact the NFL in any way.

Speaker 2 (02:35:57):
Well apparently not, since they were going around getting pictures
taken in themselves not intentional. Hey, we're not look any
such thing.

Speaker 3 (02:36:06):
Astros Baseball, we got four you again tonight, as we
will throughout the entire existence of the Astros, your home
for Astros Baseball. We've got the Astros on deck show
next Dike and Park, the host for the Astros, and
the Mariners who've got it all for you, and the
return of tatsia Emi to the mound for your Astros
all next here on Sports Talk seven ninety the eighteen