Astros' Wild Comeback Win, Rockets Unveil New Logos, Jerseys, Go Knicks, Texans OTAs

Thursday on The A-Team, Adam Clanton and Adam Wexler react to the Astros' crazy comeback win over the Pirates, discuss new Rockets logos and gear, share the latest from Texans OTAs, and more!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Team Sports Talk seven to ninety Welcome into the program.
We are taking you up until six o'clock tonight, where
afterwards the Astros on Deck show will get under way
and they'll be looking to win the series against the
Pittsburgh Pirates. I would love to turn to my co

(00:20):
host Adam Wexler and ask him, with complete sincerity, at
what point did you turn off the game last night?
But I know better than that because this freak show
will watch every last second of everything having to do
with Houston Sports and will never let his emotions get
in the way and do something like that, like, for example,
I did when the.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Grand Slam went out. I was like, man, now I
should keep watching this. But the Grand Slam went out
with the Pirates still needing to record eighteen more outs.

Speaker 3 (00:52):
Yep.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
See, that's why I can't have these conversations with you,
because A, No, there's no doubt in my mind, I'm
not the only person that did that last night.

Speaker 2 (01:01):
A fourth inning Grand Slam that flipped a two run
lead into a two run deficit.

Speaker 4 (01:05):
This by a team hit me out of here.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
Yeah, because the Astros team that has a reasonably good
offense tell me they not scored just the night before.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Tell me about all of the times they had come
back from that kind of deficit this year before last.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Night, two run deficit before the fourth inning was over.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
No, the pylon that continued as I continued to monitor it.
You weren't you do that as a lie? You did monitor?

Speaker 4 (01:29):
I did too.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
You checked out. Listen, I turned it off and I
checked out.

Speaker 1 (01:33):
You weren't there. You don't know. Here's what happened. Okay,
God's honest, true, just.

Speaker 2 (01:37):
He just found out the astros one right before we
went on the air.

Speaker 4 (01:40):
That's not sure that I told it.

Speaker 2 (01:42):
I said, you see what happened last night. He goes, No,
are you prepared for the show? He goes, absolutely, that's
not true. You're just making things up that never happened.
Here's what I did last night. It's true to my word.
I did not watch a second of the NBA Finals. Ready,
we're off and running. Did you love it when I
admit to this stuff? No, I was keeping an I
on that on my phone. I mean, again, full disclosure.

(02:05):
I have a seven year old who's not in bed
when he normally would be.

Speaker 4 (02:08):
He is. He is dominating the summer right now.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
Let's just say, the wife and I may or may
not be counting down the days until he can get
into one of his twenty thousand camps that she signed
him up for because he's just bored. He just he
needs to do stuff. And it's almost that time. But
the first couple of weeks he's been out, he's staying.

Speaker 4 (02:26):
Up too late.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
He's like a feral cat. This is what happens with
him every summer. So I was after that happened, She's like,
are you done? She texted me from me there weren't room.
She goes, are you done with his TV? That's on
in here? It was such a mom thing to do.
I was like, yeah, turn it off. I was in
another room. I was keeping an eye on it, but
I wasn't still watching like I had been up until
that point, because Eric Getty was cruising. I mean, he

(02:49):
looked awesome and they had gotten some runs off of
Paul schemes and feeling good. And then that happened, and
I'm like, man, because it's the twenty six Astros. It's
not the twenty nineteen Astros. It's not even like the
twenty twenty four Astros. It's just different. And I'm like yeah, No,
I'm definitely gonna keep an eye on this. But am
I gonna commit, given what's going on around me, to

(03:10):
every single pitch right now?

Speaker 4 (03:13):
No, I'm not. I'm gonna.

Speaker 1 (03:14):
I'm gonna divide and conquer with my time, and that's
what I did, and then I kind of lost sight
of things. And this is where it really gets mad.
This is where I'm not mad. I'm just disappointed. Version
of WEX comes into play.

Speaker 5 (03:28):
You know.

Speaker 1 (03:29):
When I found out that they made the comeback, definitely
after the game was over. Definitely after the game was over,
I was I'd finally like the dust had settled on
the evening, and I saw Brian McTaggart's tweet. That's just
how I happened to find out.

Speaker 4 (03:45):
What did it say?

Speaker 2 (03:45):
I was there something about well, definitely said that, or
it will when they talk about this twenty years from now,
he'll say that, Yeah, my remote was getting a workout
last night. Yes, everyone will be happy to know. I
was watching the National Championship Series, first game of the
three game best of three between Texas and Texas Tech.

Speaker 4 (04:03):
What what kind of game is that? Again? Softball? Okay?

Speaker 1 (04:06):
And so that's women playing baseball with oversized baseballs.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
Just one ball, but yes, and it's yellow. And I
was also watching the NBA's NBA Finals what game one?
And obviously I was watching the Astros. What was on
your what was on your laptop monitor?

Speaker 4 (04:24):
I did?

Speaker 2 (04:24):
I wasn't using any that you were just I mean,
the softball game was moving along quickly as they do,
and started a little bit earlier, locked in on the
basketball game as soon as that ended, and stayed with
the Astros game obviously throughout. That was where my main
focus was, because, as I already knew heading in today,
talking about what actually took place in between the lines
and the NBA Finals game would be unnecessary.

Speaker 4 (04:46):
I'd love to, but unnecessary.

Speaker 2 (04:48):
But the game itself, it's so much focus, and deservedly so.
On the eighth inning, the fact that they had absolutely
nothing going batter one strikeout, batter two strikeout, and you're
down nine to five did not look good. Did not
look like they were gonna put anything together because batter
number three was your eight hole hitter, Nick Allen. Obviously,

(05:10):
Christian Vasquez is gonna come to the dish after that.
If anything happened with Alan, well, Alan doubled Vasquez doubled
and things just started to go from there. It did, though,
get started the inning prior. The two run homer from
east Sooc Perettis was humongous because you'd just given up
a three spot. The Aspers were down four to two
after the Grand Slam we were talking about moments ago.

(05:31):
They were down five to three after the bullpen gave
up another run after they'd closed within one, and then
the bullpen gave up three more runs, and all of
a sudden, now it's eight to three and you're in
the bottom of the seventh inning. It just did not
look like you were gonna get enough offense together, even
with an offense that at times has shown they can.
And Eastoc Perettis hit his two run homer. Okay, now
you're down a couple of runners on base. They gave

(05:53):
up another run in the eighth inning. Yes, and he
did interrupt and tell you the most important part. I
did go back and watch the DVR. I probably should
have said that at the top. Oh, Okay, I saw
what happened like I literally saw it. I saw it onfold.
I watched it so that I would be a little
bit But there's a lot of ways to do that.
You can literally watch it if you've dvrred it. It
is aired more than once, usually before we've come on the.

Speaker 4 (06:15):
Antil two am I had, and.

Speaker 2 (06:18):
There's plenty of online sources that highlight you to death,
so you can see all the highlights. And really there's
a mini game version of it through many outlets, So
I did not doubt that you had seen what happened.
But from Vasquez to Paena to Alvarez to Walker to Perettas,
all of those guys had something to do with the
Astros putting it all together. And then camp Smith was

(06:38):
batting with the go ahead runs on base, and he
ripped a ball down the first base line, easily got
past the first basement on into the corner, and he
sawed Perettis came all the way around from first Walker
in front of him, had scored the go ahead run.
And so on top of taking the lead, you actually
were able to hand Josh Hater a two run lead
when he obviously has not pitched this year, had not

(07:00):
pitched its August eleventh of last year, and they did
give him a safe situation. I was talking to my
co viewer last night, my daughter. Early in the game,
the Astros had taken the lead. He goes, you think
Hater will pitch tonight. I go, well, might big pitcher's dual.
The Astros have a two run lead, so yeah, I
think it's pretty likely that he does make his debut tonight.

(07:22):
As they got to the ninth inning, they had that
same two run lead. Both teams had scored the runs
to put them there, nine runs each twenty six combined hits.
Later crazy, but he came out. He looked good. He
obviously wasn't crazy sharp, but he only needed four batters
to get through his inning. He did, unfortunately, bring the
tying run to the plate after he did what many

(07:42):
Astros pitchers have done this year, So he's really one
of the guys. He walked a batter. They still walked
six batters in last night's game. Argetti hit a batter,
so you're gifting the other team seven runners, three of
whom came around to score. Let's tighten that up a
little bit.

Speaker 1 (08:00):
As and you said he didn't look completely I thought, actually,
Hater through the first two outs of his outing did.

Speaker 4 (08:07):
Look Yeah, during the good portion of his out, Well
that's what I'm saying. Like he did walk that batter
and but but then you know, he kind of recovered nicely,
not kind of. He did well after his pep talk
from Josh Miller was a good one. It was fast.

Speaker 2 (08:20):
Josh Miller's pep talk for Spencer Getty preceded the grand slam.

Speaker 4 (08:23):
That was a bad pep talk, not a good Yeah,
you're right, you're right.

Speaker 2 (08:27):
There's there's a little side note on that little grand slam.
We'll save that for a little bit later. One another
day of week two of Texans Ota took place earlier today,
and by now I'm sure you have heard. Even though
it's not it is huge news only in just the
detail of it. Tek Dell was on the field today
for the Texans on a limited basis. I was over
there for the media viewing portion of practice, which is

(08:48):
almost the entirety of practice, but as it usually gets
close to finishing up, so the people we are talking
to after don't have to wait for us to get there,
we usually are escorted to our designated tent media tent,
so we'll be prepared and set up audio, video, et
cetera for their arrival. We talked to the coordinators today,
so there probably were a handful of plays that took

(09:08):
place after we left, but before we did. Texans wearing
a team drill tank. Dell put his helmet on, blind
up out wide, took a few steps in his route,
put his foot in the ground, turned towards the sidelines.
There was the ball. He went up and he caught it,
kept his feet in bounds, and turned up field. There
may have been more, but I can tell you with
my own eyes I saw that happen. And I'm sure

(09:30):
you have heard the Texans viewpoint on this for a
long long time without anything truly definitive, but everything still
points to what we would hope would have happened after
we knew he was going to be out all year
last year. All signs point to him participating in some
kind of form or fashion during training camp and probably
with no setbacks between now and then, as soon as

(09:50):
they feel it necessary. Could he start on the pup list, Sure,
if they already, if their plan is for him not
to practice this day and that day and not until
this then sure. You say a raw spots, so to speak,
by doing certain things, so that may play into it.
But a little bit of discussion on that little aspect
of it, and a few other items that we saw
some more on what the offensive line might shape up

(10:10):
to be, and then, like I said, we talked to
the coordinator. So there were a few interesting things from
Nick Kyley in his second year, especially to me considering
how many of the players he will be working with
for a second year, the white Outs, especially at the
top of the list, including Tank, they've all been here
with him for the same amount of time. And then
Matt Burke talking about putting a governor on Will Anderson Junior.

Speaker 4 (10:36):
That ain't happening.

Speaker 2 (10:37):
And Frank Ross, who had some very interesting things to
say about the return game, and he acknowledged the obvious.
While unfortunate it may seem, it is obvious. They have
a punting competition, and it is between one of the
league's worst punters last year in his rookie season with
the Saints and a rookie punter who's never punted in
the NFL before. Currently, I'm taking the rookie, though you're

(10:59):
correct by the way he is. In my opinion, I
don't even think it'll be one. I think unless they
bring a veteran in at some point, or they're disgusted
with both of them and they have to at some point. Yes,
I think the rookie and will tell you who they
are as we can see. Yes, I think the rookie
will win that competition, but the return game commentary probably
even more interesting. And yes, the NBA Finals are underway.

(11:21):
The Knicks are only three wins away from saving us.
All go New York, Go, New York Go. So we'll
get at all those things as we continue. We will
also hear from Josh Reddick, who paid a visit to
the station this morning. He will pay a visit to
the airwaves for the third straight night as he is
filling in on the radio side for Astros Baseball alongside
Robert Ford in for Steve Sparks. So some interesting stuff

(11:41):
from Josh this morning, specifically on not only the comeback
and the vibes in the clubhouse because of it, but
his personal working relationship with the Astros right fielder, both
offensively and defensively, Cam Smith. Is all that and more,
of course, on a Thursday edition of The.

Speaker 6 (11:59):
A Team The Eight, Yes, we did not mention the
big news in the opening segment, what's up rockets have
new threads?

Speaker 4 (12:10):
Oh huge news? It is Uh, It's fantastic.

Speaker 2 (12:16):
Yeah, you guys certainly have had a chance, I would
imagine via our your socials, our website as well, and
obviously the Rockets to view all of the things that
go into a launch like this. It's much more than
just some new threads and gear, but that's a huge
part of it. New branding of all varieties, the logo

(12:36):
slightly altered with what they did tease yesterday, now here's
your follow through ketchup and mustard, it's back. Would seem
like from what we've heard from fans over the last
handful of years, with what they have seen with some
of the throwback looks that the Astros put Rockets put together,
and then additionally some of the City connect or City

(12:58):
addition the uniforms on the NBA side.

Speaker 4 (13:00):
I wasn't gonna help you. I was going to do it.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
There's little bits and pieces of things that clearly were
a huge, huge hit with the fans. The Dunkster not
for example, and as I mentioned to several people are
with the Rockets and other people around town. It seemed
like these are such important parts of anything they might
do in the future, because that's what the fans have
pretty loudly said, Well, this is what we would love

(13:24):
to be a part of it, and you've got to
go through every part of the make it happen process,
both internally and then alongside the uniform makers, the creative
design experts and crew, and the NBA because everything has
to follow along with exactly what you have to have.
But the a duncster not is part of the future

(13:44):
of Rockets, and so are the colors Championship colors of
ketchup and mustard championship yellow. Yeah, colors, I said, a
food item and a food item red and yellow.

Speaker 1 (13:57):
It's funny because one of the Rockets brass was talking
about this with us and said, you can't. You have
to submit an actual color name that you have to
register that name or whatever like. You know, it's like
the Texans have a deep steel blue for example, and
the you know, all the colors they.

Speaker 2 (14:13):
Do have a code name, right, your eps's, your panton,
all those things that they do have a numerica.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
You came you can't put ketchup or mustard for those, right,
even though they are the exact colors of both condiments.

Speaker 2 (14:27):
So we definitely welcome your thoughts on that, whether it's
via hitting us up on the socials or just firing
off a phone call into us this afternoon. We'd love
to hear what you think. And as we have said
throughout all Jersey reveals for all teams here in town,
and all of them have done it quite a few
times over the last couple of years. Not necessarily an
overall reband rebrand, but you know you're in the Nike

(14:48):
City Connect uniforms Part two for the Houston Astros. Those
have come out. They've done plenty of throwbacks, the rainbow uniforms,
et cetera. You know, the Texans color rush this and
update that their new uniform unveiling was just within the
last couple of years. Everybody has an opinion on it,
and none of it really truly is a direct link

(15:11):
to winning and losing. I think still above all of
those things, that's what the fans hope for the most
and hopefully this upcoming season, which is getting a little closer,
we have a maximum of only six games remaining in
the NBA season that a team that has been to
the playoffs the last two years but is without a
playoff series victory in either of those two years, which

(15:31):
runs their streak of not having a playoff series victory
far too long. Well that will change next year. Yeah,
and we'll get to some discussions understanding the players are
thumbed up in a big way.

Speaker 4 (15:43):
I mean for the jerseys.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
We saw Tari read Amen Jabbari, Kevin Durant as your
models in what they have sent out to everybody. I
believe the word fire as the kids say, as I
like to present it that way, will use.

Speaker 4 (15:56):
Another F word involved that will reveal next segment. As
a matter of.

Speaker 2 (15:59):
Fact, playing in the uniforms does actually matter, and that
really is part of the design of the uniforms making it.
Whether it's baseball with breatheability and not being see through
or basketball with tough not having it way you know,
you don't want this extra patch or this extra thing
that weighs down the uniform or does that. So there's
more to it than just the obvious and more than
what we've seen. Lots of details on it, many of

(16:23):
which you can read about, hear about, and we'll have
a lot more on that a little over twenty four
hours from now, with a visit from the crew that
helped make it all happen over at the Rockets.

Speaker 1 (16:32):
Absolutely including the guy most responsible for the very very
popular Dunkster, not logo design, but first thing's first insane
comeback last night, I would venture is the latest example
of what has increasingly been just a completely bipolar twenty
six astro season this team. And look, I know the

(16:54):
injuries factor into this thing, and I know they factored
into last night in both bad and good ways. You know,
Spencer Arraghetti was cruising until he wasn't and then Josh Hater.

Speaker 4 (17:07):
The best part of last.

Speaker 1 (17:08):
Night's broadcast, after I finally watched it was was Todd
Kallis talking about Josh Hater's night. I mean, thirty minutes ago, Blummer,
he didn't even think he was going to be pitching,
and then all of a sudden he's thrust into this save.
So like you know, and it's true, why would he
have thought he was going to be out there until
they put that insane rally together in the eighth inning.

Speaker 2 (17:27):
He was at work getting ready to come in before
they took the lead, right, you know, obviously you're gonna
have a little bit of time, not a whole lot
of time, but he was going to pitch if Cam
Smith had failed to.

Speaker 4 (17:40):
Provide the lead for him. It was only a game.

Speaker 2 (17:42):
Yeah, he had he had been getting in his work
prior to a lot of that unfolding.

Speaker 1 (17:47):
And then he got to play his intro. He got
to come out and by the way, credit to the
network that we are simulcast on every day most days,
schn didn't tear away and go to commercial as he
for the first time since he went on the shelf
in August of last year.

Speaker 4 (18:03):
I believe it was yep.

Speaker 1 (18:05):
They let everybody see that wasn't in attendance. What the
remaining people in attendance, all five thousand of them basically
got to see live. They kept it there. They need
to always do this. Did the finals show the starting
lineups last night? I didn't see that part either. Did

(18:26):
they broadcast the starting lineups in San Antonio?

Speaker 7 (18:29):
Guy?

Speaker 4 (18:29):
I don't know the answer. They should always do that
kind of stuff.

Speaker 1 (18:32):
That's what people like to see, and especially the ones
that can't afford seven thousand dollars tickets to sit in
the nosebleeds like they want to see that kind of stuff.
Last night, they could have torn away and gone a
commercial like they normally would when there's a pitching change,
But because it was Josh Hater, because it was his
first time back since August. Whoever's in charge of things,
technical director, guy on the truck whatever, kept it right

(18:54):
there and let you see that kind of thing. And
it was awesome because that's a big moment for him,
a guy that's never been on the IL.

Speaker 2 (19:00):
I still can't believe that hadn't ever been on the ice,
not like for some sort of extended Oh no, I'm
just what you're saying. This was an insane amount of
time that he had missed, and it's it's foreign territory
for people like that to then make their comeback. And
Jordon Alvarez is like, this is old hat. I do
this every other year. I've been out for a while

(19:21):
and then I come back and I hit a home run.
We all know the script for him. Same with jose
L Tuvay. It's going to be a site for sore
eyes when he gets out there. And that's what I
think Josh Hater was.

Speaker 1 (19:30):
But the the process to get to him doing that
was far more drawn out.

Speaker 4 (19:35):
And you mentioned it.

Speaker 1 (19:37):
Of all those guys that reached base in any way,
shape or form, I venture to say that Nick Allen
was the most unlikely all those guys we mentioned.

Speaker 2 (19:47):
I mean, he's had a pretty nice, shockingly nice season
at the plate.

Speaker 1 (19:50):
But you weren't expecting a fantastic double of that variety.
And I did think of you when Vasquez hit his
got his hit the women.

Speaker 2 (19:58):
He's had a very surprisingly successful, positive, very positive offensive season.

Speaker 1 (20:04):
Yeah, it was a lot of fun to see it unfold.
And we'll hear from some of the participants in that
comeback and actually one of the people that kind of
had a bad night until he didn't. We'll put it
that way as we continue here on a Thursday edition
of the program. But when we come back, it's the
Best of X. And because social media is really such

(20:24):
a huge part of things like today, no matter who
we're talking about, what team, what sport, figured, Best of
X would be a good spot to talk about the
new threads that we were just talking about a little
bit this segment.

Speaker 4 (20:36):
The Rocket's new look is here. What do you think?
Do you like? Do you like certain parts of it,
don't like others? What have you? We'll get to all
that next in the Best of X, the a team.

Speaker 8 (20:47):
On Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (20:51):
All right, this was an easy one.

Speaker 1 (20:52):
Today Rockets unveiling their new look, their.

Speaker 4 (21:00):
New logo.

Speaker 1 (21:02):
Just start right there if you were expecting some radical
change from the R. I think that's where a lot
of Rockets diehards were probably disappointed, just because they were
expecting something very very different. In which case, I mean,
the only thing logo wise that really really changed, in

(21:23):
my opinion, is the duncture not is permanent part of
things now, but it's not the primary logo. And you
had kind of the patch looking I'd call it kind
of like a NASA patch looking triangular shape around the
new font which is new. I mean, the lower case

(21:44):
T is kind of a nod to the nineties Championship
ketchup and Mustard era. But that R wasn't going to
go anywhere, as we were told, because of you know,
brand recognition and that sort of thing. Me personally, I
would have liked either the championship logo to come back
in some way, shape or form, which we were told

(22:04):
is kind of not possible for a variety of reasons.
The league offices don't let that happen. But also if
that wasn't the case, I would have like completely leaned
in heavily to the Dunkster NAZ situation. But all things considered,
we got to catch up with mustard back and that
was what was most important.

Speaker 2 (22:24):
I think that's what the grand overall vibe from this
will probably be. But yeah, there's always going to be everything.
Oh my gosh, every single person all across the planet,
and this is planetary, the rockets after all, they love
every part of it.

Speaker 4 (22:37):
It's unlikely.

Speaker 2 (22:38):
It's pretty much impossible, and definitely in social media age,
even if people out there on it are literally not
real bots and otherwise not just real trolls, but just
putting it out there because that's what people do on
social media, but there are going.

Speaker 4 (22:52):
To piece people as soon as you see it. I'm
no different.

Speaker 2 (22:55):
Every one of those jerseys I mentioned over the first
half hour of the show, there's a little part of
them said, well maybe this you could do that. You
hear some of the reasons why they weren't done in
the league. Being a part of all this is nearly
is definitely a huge part of it. And one comment
that I got when I posted some of the look
in the jersey and the players in them mostly is
pinstripes question mark. If you look closely on each of

(23:18):
the three uniforms, the uniform that is white, the uniform
that is red, the uniform that is black. It appears
that that would be an accurate description of what is
on those jerseys.

Speaker 4 (23:29):
It's not.

Speaker 2 (23:30):
They are not pinstripes, and when you look closely, they
won't look like pin stripes. And when you see them,
I think on television or even in person, or even
at the merchandise store and the pop up that they
will have tomorrow, you'll definitely see that is not what
they are, maybe at first glance, but upon further review.
And this is definitely a lean into the rockets and
the space and astronauts and lights. And if you saw

(23:56):
the videos, many of them that they've produced, they definitely
have a constantly like outer space feel to it. In
addition to the fact that the jerseys are the tag
and the belt line framed by quasars, which you will
note inside those linings it's not a pinst right, but

(24:16):
in the linings you'll see it there the Dunkstrat logos
right there on the waispand the R logo is there
on the white uniforms. You'll see that new logo which
has the yellow band around the R right there on
the shorts on down the side. There's little parts of
space obviously there's the number two with the titles right

(24:37):
there on the back neckline. Because this is a team
that has a pair of championships. So the Icon, the Association,
all those jerseys, it says Rockets on the Icon edition,
it says Houston on the Association edition, both with that
very familiar lowercase signature, lowercase team.

Speaker 1 (24:55):
That was the other thing, and I was I got
a lot of messages this morning when the announcement dropped
from people that I've talked about this subject with for
literally decades, literally decades, not years, like decades, been wanting
these colors back, if nothing else. And one thing it

(25:16):
was like, you know, if you look at the Championship
era font when you saw Rockets on the jersey, the
E was also a lower case, like they put the
lower case T in there as a nod to that.
That's one thing I would have probably done too, But
let's face it, like they hit a home run with these.

Speaker 4 (25:36):
They scored a touchdown with these.

Speaker 1 (25:38):
They did everything I think short of changing the logo
back to the Championship. They took everything that was good
about multiple eras and packaged it into this thing. And
it took a three year process. As we were told
many many times to come to this conclusion.

Speaker 2 (25:56):
Yeah, I think different people are gonna say which one
is their favorite. And I've already changed my mind several times.
When I first saw the black uniforms, they were my
immediate favorite, only because a couple of the logos, the
Jordan brand logo which is on those uniforms, which is
League regulated rather than the swoosh, the yellow with which

(26:16):
is the color they've used for it. It pops so loudly.
I basically couldn't take my eyes off it. You got
the red lettering with Houston, you have the red banding
around the neckline and the R on the shorts. You
have the commander stripped down the back. And then I
looked at the other uniforms more and I'm like, how
can the one that Kevin Durant is modeling, the red
one with the R on the side, with the yellow

(26:39):
around the neckline, the armholes very prominently around the shorts,
and it says rockets across the front, the slanted rockets
with that lower kit.

Speaker 4 (26:48):
How can that not be my favorite? That has to be.
But and then the muted.

Speaker 2 (26:54):
Axle rods that are on the white uniform that you
really have to look to see they're nice too, Like
I would still say White. I bet you this is
probably league wide. White is probably coming in third with
most teams. The other two are just they pop out
at you so loudly. I don't even know. How could

(27:15):
they not be your favorite? Well, and again, of course,
as always, Tari Easton was also wearing the Ketchman mustards. Yeah,
you know, it's all subjective. People have their opinions and
all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 4 (27:25):
That's fine.

Speaker 1 (27:25):
You like this, you don't like that, you like all
of it, you don't like any of it. Whatever, I'm
gonna judge on that. I will go ahead.

Speaker 2 (27:33):
The A Men and Jabari are in black, Alpern and
Reed are in white, and Kevin and Tari were the
Ketchriman mustards. Seeing a men in most I mean yes,
you could see us obviously. Alparin is smiling in his
Picture's happy. It's very fitting, you know. Kevin Duran is
smiling in one and looking to the stars, and the

(27:53):
other Reed Shepherd is Abercrombie and fitching.

Speaker 4 (27:56):
In his picture.

Speaker 2 (27:58):
Jabari has a tip I need this from you, pose
you need to look serious and stern and amend Thompson
when one of his pictures goes backs to you, so
they could feature that commander stripe the other one. I
feel like it might not have been an accident that
he was given the black as an ominous as in

(28:21):
get out of my way, get out of my face.
Choice for a men to be modeling.

Speaker 4 (28:27):
Or I'm going to be in your face, or I'm.

Speaker 2 (28:29):
Going to toss you to the court, or I'm going
to stand up for my team. If you're Tyler Hero,
that's what happens to you.

Speaker 1 (28:34):
But the one thing I will take issue with, and
it's not from the actual product, but rather the reactions
to it. You don't have to reveal what a dumb
ass you are, but most people do in these situations.
Two things I saw that were absolutely that if you

(28:56):
were commenting some semblance of the following two things disqualifies
as you you're a dumbass.

Speaker 4 (29:03):
Uh wow. So they look like the Atlanta Hawks.

Speaker 1 (29:05):
Now I mean, just use Google or something, just use
your brain, Like they wore these from like nineteen seventy
two until nineteen ninety five, this color scheme like the
Hawks were there.

Speaker 4 (29:21):
It looks similar or whatever you want to.

Speaker 1 (29:23):
Call it, But this is not like, oh, look, the
Atlanta Hawks have ketchup and mustard.

Speaker 2 (29:27):
Let's copy them. Don't be stupid. I don't see everything
you see. And that's the first time it had been
even mentioned to me. And the other one I thought
never crossed my mind.

Speaker 4 (29:35):
They look like the Hawks. What's stupid?

Speaker 2 (29:37):
They look like the Rockets, right, exactly like the long
time look of the rocket. The other thing, well, oh
it looks like McDonald's. Well that's okay because that's been
around a long time. But again, that thought of ketchup
and mustard and red and yellow, that's been a part
of If people wanted to say it, there just wasn't
social media back then.

Speaker 4 (29:57):
They would have said it louder than too.

Speaker 1 (29:58):
But say, you don't tell me more that you're fifteen
years old, or you know, like more like you're eighty
years old. I'm just it's just never ceases to amaze me.
I'm not saying, oh, I'm an old head, you're young,
you don't know anything, but we've never had more information
at our fingertips.

Speaker 4 (30:14):
It's you don't well.

Speaker 2 (30:16):
Ronald McDonald shares these colors, yeah, and that's the link.

Speaker 4 (30:21):
It's totally understable. He shares them with the Rockets. Yes
he does.

Speaker 2 (30:25):
And again I think it's more eighty year olds that
associate with Ronald McDonald the representative of a burger chain,
than the youth of America. He seems to be a
lot less face forward for the wurger brand than he
once was.

Speaker 1 (30:40):
Yes, and when it comes to the specifically the people
that just don't know any better because they weren't around
that that had more to do with the first comment like, oh,
you look like the Atlanta Hawks now, so you're just
copy because you know, you heard that a lot when
the Texans came out with their new jerseys, the dark ones,
they look like the Falcons. You're the Atlanta Falcons. It's
not the same, not the same even at all. Plus

(31:00):
that's blue and the Falcons were black.

Speaker 2 (31:02):
Well they're they're white uniforms and the lettering that was
used because of a very few other details on these
football uniforms very clean, they very somch.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
But these are clean too, and I like that. So
good job overall by the Houston Rockets. I think they
hit it out of the park. They scored a touchdown,
they scored a they hit a three three pointer. There
it is so and one we'll take your we'll take
your thoughts. And speaking of the NBA, Carl Anthony Towns
he might be an American treasure. We'll explain next Adam Wexler,

(31:32):
Karl Anthony Towns pushing around Victor weinbin Yama. That's not
to say people don't push him around. That happens all
the time.

Speaker 2 (31:41):
Well, Carl Anthony Towns is a legitimate big in size,
legitimate center. Why wouldn't he push a wing player around. Well,
because that's what Victor wembin Yama is.

Speaker 1 (31:52):
Other bigs in the NBA choose or just don't sometimes
to do that with him, and I'll I'll never understand it,
because if you're physical with him, that's the best chance
you have at success in my opinion.

Speaker 2 (32:06):
Defensively, Yeah, if you're listening to the entirety of yesterday's show,
you would have heard us dissect this series at its
fullest length. Or, to be more truthful, if you listen
to the final three minutes of the show, we gave
you some analysis of last night's Game one in the forthcoming.

Speaker 4 (32:20):
Series, and that was one of the matchups.

Speaker 2 (32:22):
Again, it's obvious everybody thought this, but that's a matchup
that the Knicks can win the matchup between Karl Anthony
Towns and Victor wemen Yam and it's not exclusive just
like last series Chet Holmgren versus Victor wemen Yama. It's
okay if you want to watch the series so you
can say, yeah, they weren't even guarding each other that much,
which is true because why would Victor go hang out

(32:44):
in the corner and do nothing defensively, because that's where
Chet Holmgren was crying in the corner for almost all
of Game seven. There were parts of the other rest
of the series where Chet would have the ball and
Victor would say, well, I have to do a standout here.
He's going to stupidly try to drive by me. He's
not quick enough too, so he won't and then I'll
be standing in front of him, and then he'll give
the ball up because he doesn't know what to do
with it. Karl Anthony Town's very, very different than that.

(33:07):
There's no spot on the court on offense where this
particular center isn't an asset like nikol Jokich.

Speaker 4 (33:15):
He clearly can shoot from deep.

Speaker 2 (33:16):
He's been one of the more accurate bigs in the
league for years and He's also a very pretty good
playmaker or at least someone to run the offense through,
which is what the Knicks have done a lot of
as Mike Brown has learned more and more about this team,
and they've gotten better and better. Oh look at this,
they're peaking in the finals in the playoffs.

Speaker 4 (33:33):
How nice.

Speaker 2 (33:34):
And then clearly he's a very good rebounder, good defensive player,
all those things. He's one of the better players in
the league that probably is thought of otherwise, not as
one of the best players in the league. And the
center on the other team, I could easily just tell
you this. Yeah, he had six makes and he turned
the ball over six times. That's what Victor webin Yama
did last night. He said it himself. He did not

(33:55):
play well. He missed fifteen of his twenty one shots.
He's not nearly the factor he needs to be. He
does stand in the lane, which prevents guys from going
as far as they'd like to when they attack. But
Jalen Brunson played like he's played in every other game
against every other defense this entire postseason. That cannot happen

(34:16):
if Victor guan Bagnam is on the court. Is is
it really necessary or helpful for him to be guarding
players outside the lane as often as he was. I mean,
let the Knicks burn you for that before you let
that happen. Jalen Brunson, FYI now finally regarded as one
of the better players in the league. That was clearly
the other matchup Brunson v. Castle or whomever in the

(34:37):
back court that Mitch Johnson chose to play.

Speaker 4 (34:40):
He's one of the.

Speaker 2 (34:41):
Better players in the league, as evidenced by the fact
he made All NBA Second Team. Now there was not
one single voter who thought he was one of the
best five players. He didn't get any first team votes.
That also meant nobody thought he was one of the
best eight players because three of his teammates on second team,
including Donovan Mitchell, did I'm not sure at what point

(35:01):
during twenty twenty five twenty six anybody should think that
Donovan Mitchell is better than Jalen Brunson. And you definitely
can't think that ever again, because you've now been presented
with this postseason another example of Jalen Brunson being a
much more helpful player to winning than Donovan Mitchell. So
you should vote him higher on all NBA when all

(35:23):
the other things are equal enough, and last night was
is on display. He's the best fourth quarter player in
the playoffs this postseason by a pretty wide margin. For
players who I would count, I appreciate Dylan Brooks scoring
almost nine points per game in the four fourth quarters
that he played this postseason, but among players who played
in more than one series, played in more than five games,

(35:46):
he's the best fourth quarter.

Speaker 4 (35:47):
He's shooting fifty.

Speaker 2 (35:48):
Nine percent in the fourth quarter. He's number one in
the NBA in scoring in the fourth quarter, all things
he was doing in the regular season.

Speaker 4 (35:55):
Do the Rockets know that? Absolutely? Because he did it
to them. Crucify everybody.

Speaker 2 (36:02):
The best player on the court in the fourth quarter
of a close game in the finals was on the Knicks,
and it's Jalen Brunson, and he proved it to you.
If you didn't already know that Wemby had his best
quarter in the fourth quarter, you know, credit to him.
After a terrible game. And here's what I thought as
was unfolding. The Knicks had an eight point lead, and
they had the ball like five times with a chance

(36:24):
to get a double figure lead, eleven point lead, and
they missed, and they missed and they missed, and I'm like,
they just blew it. And the Spurs immediately went on
a nine to zer run and they took the lead.
I'm like, that's it. They had a chance to win
Game one and they blew it. And then then Spurs
didn't score again an eleven zero run.

Speaker 1 (36:40):
Those misses by Victor winbin Yama were not they were
bad misses. They weren't like just hit the rent like
one of them hit the top of the backboard.

Speaker 4 (36:49):
It was awful. I loved it.

Speaker 2 (36:51):
Seven of his nine three point attempts did not go
through the net.

Speaker 1 (36:56):
I just can't take that, seriously. I know that's the
new NBA and all this kind of stuff. I just
I come from a different time.

Speaker 2 (37:02):
Well, you have an advantage pretty much everywhere on the court,
Go ahead and take advantage of it in the places
where you should be not necessarily out there. Anybody can
shoot from out there at a much higher percentage.

Speaker 4 (37:12):
That's an hour in the books. Three more to go.
Half hour from now. We hear from Josh Reddick.

Speaker 2 (37:16):
Texans were on the field earlier this afternoon and morning,
so we'll tell you a little bit about that and
we will give it its proper due six run eighth
inning gets the Astros victory and a chant even up
the homestand and take the series against the Pirates tonight
right here on Sports Talk.

Speaker 1 (37:30):
Seven ninety, the A on Sports Talk seven ninety, MIDS,
Sports Talk seven ninety and now sc h N simulcast.

Speaker 4 (37:39):
Underway on a Thursday.

Speaker 1 (37:42):
We have talked a lot about the astros comeback win
last night in game two of their three games set
against the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Speaker 4 (37:48):
We will continue to do so here in our number two.

Speaker 1 (37:51):
As a matter of fact that you heard WEX mentioned
at the bottom of this hour, Josh Reddick in his
visit with the station will replay portion of that conversation
talking about that comeback victory, Astro's tacking on a slew
of runs in the eighth inning which gave way to
Josh Hater's first appearance and save of the year, when

(38:13):
maybe he definitely didn't expect to be doing that earlier
in the night because Spencer Arighetty was cruising along until
he gave up a grand slam, and then it was
it turned into not a pitcher's duel, although I guess
it was. I don't know what you would call it,
like Paul Skenes was doing that fully not that well.
Early on it he said, early on it looked like
it was sort of that. And then, like I said,

(38:35):
the aforementioned Grand Slam, and I loved Spencer Araghetty's assessment
of his pitching at that moment of the game last night.

Speaker 4 (38:43):
There's a three letter word that rhymes with sass. That's
how he characterized his effort.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
Yeah, even when he was working out of trouble, which
if if you were paying attention in the month of May,
where he gave up only three runs, there were still
plenty of moments of trouble for him, and a few
too many walks and a few too many long at bats.
It wasn't quite as dominating as the numbers suggested. Now,
he wasn't giving up any hits, so it makes it

(39:10):
even that is dominant type of performs because nobody was
knocking him around. He kept making his pitches. That's what
it looked like he was having trouble doing in last
night's game. Obviously, the inning he got into trouble, the
pitch he threw to Henry Davis was awful, and the
fact that the bases were loaded were obviously because of
a slew of other issues. He ended up getting twelve

(39:30):
outs in the game. He only lasted four innings, gave
up six runs, walked a batter, gave up a home run,
hit a batter. That's very atypical of what he had
done in all five of his starts, and as it
was clearly easy to note mathematically, he pitched an entire
month one pitcher of the month, gave up three runs.

(39:51):
He pitched for forty five minutes and hour and change
last night, and gave up four runs in the month
of June, He's already surpassed his runs allowed for the month.
In his first appearance, which again only lasted four innings,
and not long after his day was done, Paul Skeen's
day was done. He could not get through the fifth inning.
They were working great at bats. You're gonna hear more
about that from Josh Reddick coming up as we continue.

(40:13):
They did a phenomenal job of making a really good
pitcher with really good stuff work really hard to make
his way through the Astros order, and in two of
the five innings that he pitched, in the third and
the fifth, they scored on him. It was his fourth
consecutive not particularly good start, and it is the fourth
consecutive game he's started that the Pirates have lost. They're

(40:36):
six and seven when Paul Skeens starts, and they have
one of the five best offenses in baseball. Well, not
always when he pitches right, but Paul Skeen's just pitched
in a game where his team scored nine times and
they lost.

Speaker 1 (40:49):
He's got to be thinking this is ridiculous because he's
done this before where he pitches well in a game
and his team doesn't win, but not this year.

Speaker 2 (40:57):
He didn't pitch well in this game.

Speaker 1 (41:01):
Know what I'm saying is there's been times where Paul
Skins was Paul Skans, but the Pirates weren't going to
prop him up with any sort of help. This season,
you can give the blame as much to his effort
at times as you can their offense or lack thereof, because,
like you said, it hasn't been this situation where it
was a lack thereof.

Speaker 4 (41:21):
They've actually scored some runs.

Speaker 2 (41:22):
Yeah, when he left the game, it was, you know,
it was four to three and he was not through
the fifth inning. He did what everybody that they had
go out there did Ultimately, by the end of the night,
he got the two run homer off Ramirez to get
to five. They put those runs on both Montgomery and
Soto three each in that eighth inning. They pretty much
got to everybody until they finally got out of the

(41:43):
eighth inning. And the Astras have not been great at home.
They've lost far too many games at Dykin Park for
anybody's liking. But it's related to where they are. They're
seven games under five hundred. They're not a good baseball
team on the whole, and they're into their final one
hundred games of the season. Now that's pretty good chunk
of season. You're into the third month of play. You
have not played winning baseball. As simply as you can

(42:05):
put it, they've not been a winning team. They're like
a lot of teams in the American League, and they're
by no means out of it. We were here on
the air yesterday when the Mariners winning streak came to
an end. They had been just absolutely destroying baseball's twenty
one home runs during their eight game winning streak, and
then they let off yesterday's game with a home run
and they didn't score after that and their winning streak
came to an end. So in two days you've lost

(42:27):
a game to them, and Josh Hater came back and said, hey,
we're still in this and all of a sudden they
were six games out. Well after play yesterday, you're back
to five. Mariners are off today. You can get back
to four and a half. You can also win a series.
You can also even this home stand up at three
wins and three losses and feel a lot better about
trying to do something directly to one of the teams
in front of you in the division. They did not

(42:49):
play well so far against the Athletics or the Mariners,
two of the three teams in front of them in
the division. They have a chance to rectify that Friday, Saturday,
and Sunday.

Speaker 1 (42:57):
Yeah, we talked a little bit last hour as well
about the the Rockets dropping their new Threads new logo.

Speaker 4 (43:05):
Even though it's the primary R logo remains.

Speaker 2 (43:08):
They've just they've added a little mustard to it, if
you will, but uh look really sharp. And we absolutely
still encourage any of you guys to weigh in if
you'd like, via social media or the telephone seven one
three two one two five seven ninety and then of
course the Texans today and before like we go any further.

Speaker 4 (43:27):
I do think it's a big deal that Tank Dell
was out there.

Speaker 1 (43:30):
I do think it's a big deal that, you know,
the Texans have basically, for lack of a better way
of putting it, a weapon that was already in house
that they'll be able to deploy again. It feels like
they got an additional draft pick or a guaranteed draft
pick if he winds up producing anywhere near what he

(43:53):
did before that catastrophic knee injury he suffered in Kansas
City and a couple of Decembers ago.

Speaker 2 (43:58):
Yeah, I would love to say that that's where they're headed,
and it very well could be. And he hasn't had
any recent reason set back, et cetera to slow this down.
It's slow enough. He hasn't played since twenty twenty four.
I wouldn't exactly pencil him in by any means yet.
They don't have a game though, until September, so you
got all of June, all of July, which is very

(44:18):
little on field work. They've got another few days of
work through next Thursday, and then they'll basically be off
from the on field work with the team, practice wise,
mini camps, et cetera, mandatory or voluntary, and then they
return for training camp. But there's no reason to believe
at this point he won't be participating in training camp
in some form or fashion. It's six weeks long. You
got plenty of time to get a player like that

(44:38):
ramped up for whatever role you hope for him to have.
Whatever health do you think if you can be what
you consider one hundred percent despite being away for so long,
that's what they're after. I couldn't tell you after what
I saw today that I know any more about him
being active on Opening night or Opening afternoon. Maybe I
have to see a lot more of him, and that
won't come until training camp. But it was It's some

(45:00):
that I was looking for every day he's been out there,
which is every day we've been out there, and today
it looked a little different when he was participating slightly
more in their stretching, like it was noticeable because you know,
I do watch as much as I can out there,
and you know, he was in the line like everybody else,
which sometimes he has been in the past. But over
the course of the three practices we've been out there

(45:22):
for he wasn't. He was getting loose, but he wasn't
doing it with the rest of the team today. He
was and just looked like anybody else out there. Then,
when they went into their wide receiver drills where they're
catching passes from special teams coordinator Frank Ross who throws bebes,
Tank Dell was not participating in that. He was helping
to be the ball retriever. They catch the pass, they

(45:44):
throw it to a coach who then throws it back
towards Frank. That's where Tank was standing so he could
then catch it and hand it to him. He wasn't
participating in that. NKO Collins wasn't either. By the way,
I did not participate in a lot of those drills.
And when they were going through all those things, and
then when CJ would then work with the receivers, CJ,
Davis and Graham, the three quarterbacks go through all their
throwing progressions with them on either side, he wasn't participating

(46:05):
in that either. And then when they did some seven
on sevens, not there either. When they did some eleven
on eleven's, he did actually, as I said earlier last hour,
I saw it. He took a snap ran his route,
ball came his way, jumped up and he caught it,
and then he turned upfield.

Speaker 1 (46:21):
Well, I do think that the other aspect of this
story that's interesting to kind of keep an eye on
as it unfolds, because you're talking about September and when
games would actually count, talking about training camp at the
fairy tail end of July into August th Casario and
I would say, to a lesser extent, but still, you know, similarly,
in Lockstep, Demiko Ryans have all been fairly consistent with

(46:45):
how they've talked about this particular storyline as it pertains
to twenty twenty six. They don't know for sure either.
They definitely have a better idea than all of us,
and maybe they're not letting on aspects of that. But
it's almost like they don't want to jinx it because
he is er than he's ever been. Clearly, I mean,
this is insane progress compared to just a year ago

(47:05):
at this time, but they don't. It's almost like they
don't want to jinx it by saying too much or
revealing too much.

Speaker 4 (47:11):
I don't.

Speaker 2 (47:11):
I mean, that's ready when he's ready, is what Nick
Cassario has basically said, because there's no reason to say
any more than that the timeline he's on, he's not
missing a timeline. He's not on some this is this
was expected to take a long time.

Speaker 4 (47:23):
He's not behind him.

Speaker 2 (47:24):
He was honestly, he was never expected to see the
field last year, right, That was not the timeline that
he was on. And they never were super clear about
it because they don't have to be. There's a player
had practiced, one of their rookies had practiced the first
two days we've been out there, or the first day
we were out there. The second day, which was two
days ago, he wasn't out there, and Demiko rans was
asked if he could give an update on that player,

(47:44):
and he said no, that was his entire one word
answer because he doesn't have to, and so he didn't.
Uh the player walked across the uh bridge today and
stayed inside, so he did not practice. Again, it's Marlon
Klein who has some sort of undisclosed issue that kept
him off the field. They actually have a pair of
tight ends that aren't practicing because neither was Lane prior,
but he was on the field, and I think that's

(48:05):
why you saw them sign a tight end earlier today
and he was out of practice for the first time,
his first practice with the team. But you know, the
timeline for Tank Dell is sadly exactly what they say it.
This is a little bit undetermined, but everything points to
him with no setbacks in the future, to being a
part of some of their plans. I'm not sure if
that's at the start of the season. I'm not sure

(48:25):
if if it's some later point in the season. But
I don't have any reason to think he won't be
a part of the twenty twenty six Texans as much
as other people might say otherwise. Keep in mind, he's
wide receiver five at best. Right now, He's not ahead
of Xavier Hutchinson and won't be until he proves otherwise.
He's not ahead of either of the two second year players,
and Nico Collins has him by a bit.

Speaker 4 (48:45):
Yeah, I would say Nico Collins has a lot of guys.

Speaker 2 (48:48):
Astros made a host of moves in front of tonight's game,
several moves and one of which I definitely did not
see coming. We'll tell you about that when we come
back on the other side.

Speaker 1 (49:00):
Smartsox seven ninety schn So when you see Luka Doncic
take your team to the NBA Finals and then you
immediately chip him off for a hand sandwich. And then
prior to that, I think it was a free agency acquisition,

(49:21):
was it not?

Speaker 4 (49:21):
Or did the Knicks trade for Jalen Brunson. This was
free agency?

Speaker 2 (49:25):
Remember when they were looking at one hundred million dollars deal,
And I said, the Mavericks just got saved from themselves.
The Knicks were willing to pay him and so they
didn't have to essentially paraphrasing myself. But I thought the
MAVs made the right decision. I've said that a bunch
of different times. I thought the Knicks made a bad decision.
Obviously was missing the boat because he was doing some

(49:46):
of these things in Dallas, just in a more secondary role,
obviously playing alongside Luka Doncic or not being the star
of the team, which he clearly is now. And it
didn't take very long for when he got to New
York to show what he can do, and he's now
elevated his game to it at the very least being
considered one of the ten best players in the league.
He's playing for a championship and he's doing what very
few players at his height do in the NBA, and

(50:08):
that's maybe win an NBA championship. So yeah, I was
in the group of dead wrong, totally missed it, did
not realize what he could become in the NBA. And
he shared a back court with Luka Doncic up the
road in Dallas. And now not only are neither of
them there, nothing of great consequence remains from what they
could have had from those guys other than they landed

(50:31):
high enough in the lottery to win the lottery and
draft Cooper Flag because they weren't as good anymore.

Speaker 1 (50:36):
Yeah, and I mean, look, Cooper Flag might go on
to have a great career. I don't know if it's
ever going to sniff either of these two guys when
you consider what they like. Unless Cooper Flagg leads the
Mavericks to the NBA finals, I.

Speaker 2 (50:49):
Mean he could lead them to multiple appearances in the finals.
This is finals appearance won for Brunson, Luca has been
there once. You really think that if he leads them
to two finals?

Speaker 1 (50:58):
No, I'm saying you really think think Cooper Flag is
good enough?

Speaker 7 (51:02):
Off?

Speaker 2 (51:02):
No, I wasn't even getting into the possibility of it.
I was just trying to say how he could surpass them.

Speaker 4 (51:06):
He's probably not.

Speaker 2 (51:07):
I mean, I guess he could end up in an
MVP race. I don't think so with who else is
currently in the league. But I'm super bullish on his game.
But look where he has to go. You're gonna he's
one of the ten best players in this league. I mean,
it's possible, but there a lot of players I think
are currently better than him that will remain better than him.

Speaker 1 (51:25):
You think it's fair to say right now Tyrese Halliburton's injury,
notwithstanding Jalen Bronson is the best player in the Eastern Conference.

Speaker 4 (51:33):
It's hard to argue with it. If you think about it.

Speaker 2 (51:36):
Well, take a look at who's ahead of him, so
to speak, in the voting. Since I brought it up earlier,
the guys who made All NBA because he All NBA
First Team or landed first team consideration and had more
points in the voting than he did. You know two
guards are ahead of him, Donovan Mitchell and Ky Cunningham.

Speaker 4 (51:53):
Well, you already took care of one of those.

Speaker 2 (51:54):
Yes, I mean, Donovan Mitchell had a perfectly good postseason.
He's a perfectly good player and He's absolutely deserving of
recognition on all NBA. But how you're voting for him
over Jalen brunts and I have no idea.

Speaker 1 (52:06):
It's weird because he did as you mentioned, he absolutely
torched the Rockets in the fourth quarter of one of
their games.

Speaker 2 (52:12):
Like you can watch Brunson play and think, well, the
Spurs should be attacking him, and the Celtics or whomever,
the Sixers, whoever might have been up against them, the Caves,
they should be attacking him. Well, we would be saying
the exact same thing about Donovan Mitchell. People should attack him.
Now we say it less because well, yes, you in

(52:33):
the back, why don't we attack the other guy in
the back court first? James Harden. Yeah, that's probably a
better plan. Let's do that mean attack everybody on the Knicks.
Look who's out who he's out there with, Karl, Anthony Towns,
Annan Ubi, Josh Hart and mckel bridges all good defensive players. Yeah,
of course you're going to attack him, not only because

(52:53):
of that, but he's a smaller player.

Speaker 4 (52:55):
He's a tough matchup for players.

Speaker 1 (52:58):
Since you've hind that up, that's the most fascinating, slash
interesting part of this. It's not like the Spurs didn't
just get done playing a good defensive team, one of
the best defensive teams. But it's just, for whatever reason,
it's a bad matchup for OKC when they play the Spurs,
and at least through one game. And I know that

(53:19):
the Spurs led for a huge chunk of last night's contest,
but it just didn't seem like, even though it went
seven games, I'm like convincing myself of all this in
my head on the fly. I just I've it doesn't
seem like it's it's the same type of matchup and
it's more advantage New York with what they are able

(53:40):
to do adjustment wise.

Speaker 2 (53:41):
Yeah, I don't want to be the usual semantics nitpicky argument.

Speaker 7 (53:45):
Guy.

Speaker 2 (53:46):
I don't view the Spurs versus the Thunder or the
Spurs versus the Knicks as a matchup issue. I look
at it more like the Spurs just aren't much better
than them, and the Thunder aren't much better than the Spurs,
and the Knicks aren't much better than San Anton They're
close enough. Like, it's not a matchup issue, it's they're
talented and you're not overwhelming the Thunder we're overwhelming against

(54:09):
everybody else, Right, they're not playing everybody else, They're playing
the Spurs.

Speaker 4 (54:13):
It's not a matchup issue. It's they're as good as You.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
Would not say that, or you wouldn't think to say
that about the Knicks until you consider they've now won
twelve straight in the playoffs.

Speaker 4 (54:23):
Well, no one's done that.

Speaker 2 (54:23):
I wouldn't say it that way because I crapped on
it yesterday and I.

Speaker 4 (54:27):
I said this.

Speaker 2 (54:28):
I don't know if I said it on the show
or only on the social or with my outsiders. What
was more impressive the Spurs beating the Thunder or the
Knicks winning eleven straight games against Eastern Conference playoff teams.

Speaker 4 (54:40):
What's more impressive? It seems like it's the Spurs beating them.

Speaker 2 (54:43):
I mean, I did present it with the tone of
my voice to tell you what to answer, but I agree,
I think it is this. What the Spurs did in
one series against an awesome team is more impressive than
what the Knicks did. Now, the Knicks just went out
and beat them, And when you're saying they've just won
twelve in a row, that's obviously been done once before
in NBA history. But to me, what they did is
beat the Spurs for the third time this season in

(55:05):
four meetings.

Speaker 4 (55:07):
It sounds a lot like Thunder Spurs.

Speaker 2 (55:09):
Well, I think the Knicks believed in something that maybe
it took him a while to get to.

Speaker 4 (55:14):
This year, we're good. We're really hard to beat.

Speaker 2 (55:17):
We have an elite, elite, elite closer, arguably the closer,
this six foot whatever you want to call Jalen Brunson.
He's the elite closer in the NBA.

Speaker 4 (55:29):
YEP.

Speaker 2 (55:29):
I mean I could say fight me after that comment,
because I think it's worthy of it.

Speaker 4 (55:33):
Who would you rather have?

Speaker 2 (55:34):
Nikola Jokic, Shay Caid, Cunningham, k D Steph.

Speaker 4 (55:40):
He's the elite closer.

Speaker 2 (55:41):
He's the best fourth quarter player in the league offensively,
So maybe you could counter that with, well, he can
go and score his twelve, but they're gonna score thirteen
on the That's a fair argument. But as much as
your many are disinterested, I do think having the Thunder
on the sidelines is a good thing for the NBA.
I think game ones competitive level of play was a
very good thing for the NBA. We just laid it

(56:02):
out in the last segment that we talked about this
the Knicks led by eight in the fourth quarter, biggest
lead of the game going into the final five minutes,
and then the Spurs went on a nine to zero
run to take the lead from them with two minutes
to go, roughly, and then the Spurs gave up the
final eleven points of the game on their home floor
to lose. This was wildly entertaining, super exciting, limited controversy

(56:25):
with the officials, and I'm glad we've talked about it
multiple times and not talked about the incident that I
still it's impossible for security to be perfect and stop
all these things as too many people want it. I
cannot believe some clown ran on the court for a selfie.
I hope there's not more to it, and if there
has been today, I haven't seen it. I've seen the

(56:47):
video of him his own video of it running onto
the court. I've seen the look of Mitchell Robinson, who
is defending Wemby, who is the subject of this desired selfie.
But it's not funny and there was no mess. I
don't think to present like we've had in previous NBA
court stormings. But it's not safe for the players to
have that happen. Luckily that did. Nothing of the sword

(57:09):
happened last night.

Speaker 4 (57:10):
No, we'll get we'll get to that a little bit
later on.

Speaker 1 (57:12):
But something you brought up about Victor Winmbinyama, it was
we kind of touched on a little bit earlier. If
you look at his stat line from last night, it's
very deceptive, like, oh, they had a great game, twenty
six points, double digit rebounds, Dad. He was atrocious and
yet got his from a point total because he was

(57:33):
paraded to the foul line and the Knicks noticed, probably
more than anybody because he was right up there with
their total amount of free throw attempts.

Speaker 2 (57:42):
Nothing about how the game was official. It's okay to
shoot thirteen free throws in a game. It's okay to
shoot fifteen free throws in a game if that's what
the game calls for, If that's what the calls need
to be made because of what's taking place, go for
it the officialga. And then it's they didn't make mistakes
and send him to the line. He was driving into traffic,
he was getting killed.

Speaker 4 (58:00):
He wasn't flopping.

Speaker 2 (58:01):
Now, they were instances where he probably was fouled and
it wasn't called very typical of an NBA postseason game.
I mean, you can start on the farthest side of
the box score and say, yeah, he had twenty six points, Yeah,
it looks pretty good. Or you can start on the
front side of it. He was six for twenty one.
He missed fifteen shots. Fifteen shots and only twelve of
them were inside the three point line. Well, that's dumb.

(58:24):
He had twenty six points, twelve boards, and three blocks.
Or he made six shots and he turned it over
six times. That's what I prefer I mentioned before we
hit the segment, and I wanted to at least pass
the information along. We can analyze it as we continue.
But the Astros told two players, one of whom was
on the roster, you are no longer needed, and that

(58:46):
saysar Salazar. They dfa'd him earlier today to create a
forty man roster spot. Did the same with Ryland Thomas,
who was only a minor leaguer for them. They had
brought him in a couple weeks ago, but got a
forty man spot for him. He never was elevated, so
he was dfad. Zach cole Is back to Triple A.
Joey Lo Perfido is now on the roster in Triple
A because they activated him off the AL but he

(59:07):
has been optioned to Triple A to continue hitting and
hopefully be ready to come up. They're bringing up Colin
Price to be their second catcher, so he's going to play.
Your second catcher has to play, and it'll be his
major league debut when he does. And according to Shandler,
Roman others a million dollars to sign former Major leaguer
Lamont Way Junior. He's an outfielder and first baseman, probably

(59:29):
an outfielder for this team, and he's on the active roster.
He has not played a game in twenty twenty six.
His twenty twenty five was awful, and the years before
that he was a productive player. Left handed hitter who
does have positional flexibility, does not strike out a lot,
and he will be available. We'll see if he's in
the lineup on its first day when we continue here

(59:49):
on the eighteen.

Speaker 4 (59:52):
The eighty one want to hear for.

Speaker 2 (59:55):
Josh Reddick here in just a moment, but I can
tell you that both of the two new astro are
in the lineup tonight. On Price will do the catching
for Kaiwai Tang and Lamont Way Junior will we'll show
what he can do for the Astros. He was in
the minor leagues this year for the White Sox, but
upon his release he will now get an opportunity to
play Major League Baseball for your Houston Astros. Going up

(01:00:16):
against Saga Jones, who's only made one appearance so far
this season due to injury, and again Kiwait Tang continue
to show he's been very, very very helpful and flexible,
pitching very well out of the bullpen initially and now
part of their starting rotation. It's also Hunter Brown Day.
He will pitch in al Passo for the Sugarland Space Cowboys,
and in advance of tonight's game over at Tikan Park

(01:00:38):
the second day in a row that jose L Tuvey
is taking live BP, so she should have an update
on that in the next few hours in advance of
Astros on deck. But let's get right to Josh Reddick
made an appearance earlier this morning on the Morning Drive
his thoughts as he was in the booth doing radio
alongside Robert Ford. Initially that will play for you. Here
is what a comeback last night for the Astros.

Speaker 7 (01:01:00):
Tredit Dese guys you always hear, don't giving it bad away,
And that's exactly what that you know, eight and nine
hole hitter did in him and basket And when you
do things like that, things can happen. When you turn
over the lineup and get pain and you're done. And
Eastock and all those guys rolling, and that's what they did.
They just piggybacked off one another and kind of use
that energy and the prior bad as well. So it
was good to see them come back. I think it

(01:01:20):
was their first one after trailing after seven in general,
but the comeback down that many that that had to
feel good for not only in the fan base, for
that clubhouse as well, considering their struggles right now.

Speaker 9 (01:01:29):
And I mean speaking of the clubhouse, I mean you've
been in these clubhouses, you'd been in a lot of
them during your career over the spand that you played,
I mean, you just take us through it. After you
come back and you win a game like that, what's
that high five and handshake line, like, what's that clubhouse like?

Speaker 4 (01:01:45):
Afterwards?

Speaker 5 (01:01:46):
Oh man? Fired up?

Speaker 7 (01:01:47):
It's just as big as a walk off a win
for you in the bottom of the line and you
can come back get to their closer, get to their
you know, their their top relievers in the bullpen, and
you get the damage done. It makes you feel really good,
but you know you can look down there.

Speaker 4 (01:02:00):
I was.

Speaker 7 (01:02:01):
I was watching the dugout after Cam Smith at the
ball down the line, and it's always fun to watch
the guys get so excited get out of the dug out.
They're waving the runners around themselves. So I bet that
clubhouse was booking pretty hard last night after that win.

Speaker 3 (01:02:15):
Josh, I got to ask, just because of everyone talks
about him as the next big time name, the Randy
Johnson of the twenty twenties, and you got to watch
him up closer in person, Paul skeens, the record, doesn't
I think, justify how talented a pitcher he is. And
maybe that's just a little bit of bad luck, maybe
a little bit of offensive innovation from his side. But
when you noticed last night, I mean the Ashos ran
him out in one hundred and three pitches through four

(01:02:37):
and two thirds. What were you notizing that was working
for the bats last night against him?

Speaker 7 (01:02:41):
I saw the guys working at bats. They may have
not got a lot of hits off of him to
reach base a lot, but when they did, han't a
bad against them. They were making him throw four to
five even more pitches. It felt like current bats. They
were working him, they weren't necessarily doing very great off
of him. But at the same time, like games like
this show you when you knock a guy at that
elite level out of the game before the fifth and

(01:03:03):
then come back and win, that just shows you're you're
still having good at bats regardless of what the end
result may be. But yeah, I mean, anytime you can
watch a guy like Paul Stein's I think that completely overshadowed.
You know, a star from Arrighetti minus one bad pitch
for him last night on What We've Done is pretty
fantastic as well. But watching the Skiings do it he
does on a daily basis, it's it's fun to watch.

(01:03:24):
I had the pleasure of watching him in the USA
Mexico game and the Classic here in Houston, so that
was that was even even more electric. But you know,
when you go back to run support for somebody, it
always brings me back to the Jacob de gram in
New York kind of deal. You know, you look last Bee,
I think da Grum finally got his one hundred proer Win,
which is crazy to think about it because this is

(01:03:44):
one of the best pictures and all of the generation
in the last twenty years. And it just goes to
show when the Mets were one, we're not hitting. He
wasn't getting your roups for and you see it from Steams.
I mean his last three starts before last night he
had one total run I think of support and prestart.
So gods like that, teams like that that aren't quite
hit their ceiling it and talent wise, are going to

(01:04:05):
have to grind through that. And you know, once once
the good times role for him, it's going to be
a lot better when they can at least average you know,
three or four runs has to feel like a ten
run lead for him right now.

Speaker 9 (01:04:14):
Camp Smith a guy, I mean, you've been looking for
some socc out of this outfield and seems like the
better part of the end of May and even into
this month, he's kind of starting to figure things out.

Speaker 4 (01:04:25):
What do you see from him?

Speaker 7 (01:04:27):
I mean just coustic growth. I mean this kid you
get everybody has to remember we get cam Smith a
hard time, but camp Smith is only two years out
of college. Didn't get that seasoning like you get in
the minors. He's growing as the game goes on in
the big leagues. And I mean when you're looking.

Speaker 5 (01:04:42):
At at a staff and at a roster all up.

Speaker 7 (01:04:44):
And down the league, there's not many guys that take
the path he took to the big leagues. And even
Paul s Keens had a few starts in the minor league.
He's a generational, you know, once in a generation type player.
So what Cam Smith is doing is already exceeding what
was kind offfected for him in my mind, because he's
so young, he's so inexperienced.

Speaker 5 (01:05:03):
But what he's been able to do.

Speaker 7 (01:05:05):
Ability wise, the athleticism obviously and clearly there.

Speaker 5 (01:05:08):
This is the guy that I feel like this team
can build.

Speaker 7 (01:05:11):
Around in the future. I feel like him, he and
your Don can be even to Hunter Brown. If they
can keep these guys around, those could be a very
tight nucleus to build a really good team around them.
Those are the guys you're going to need if you
want to continue to win. And the way that Cam's going,
he keeps getting better, He's going to be a superstar
real quick. He's already got elite defense and right field,
which is crazy to even think I can come and

(01:05:32):
considering here's a third base but not too long ago.
But he's got that part of his game down. It's
just a matter of being a little bit more consistent
in the batter's box and just understanding what it takes
to still play one hundred.

Speaker 5 (01:05:44):
And sixty two game season, because.

Speaker 7 (01:05:46):
If you're not trained for it, and you don't get
that kind of preparation of the miners and build up
that body, it's going to take a while to get
that when when you're not used to playing every day
and getting one off day every fifteen days. So his
body is still learning a lot at the big league.

Speaker 3 (01:05:59):
Love, and you just mentioned that this was a guy
who was drafted by the Cubs to play third base
out of Florida State, and now you got him being
a Gold Glove caliber right fielder.

Speaker 4 (01:06:08):
You know the position very well. How hard is that transition.

Speaker 3 (01:06:11):
To be able to go from making quick grounders that
are over the first to trying to go throw guys
out at third that way they don't tag up at second.

Speaker 7 (01:06:20):
Well, well, personally, I play. I only played shorts up
till I was seventeen, so I had a luckily a
lot more experience in the outfield, I can't even imagine
doing that one just at the professional level, but two
to take that to the major league level and go
from a guy who's you know, having to be a
quick reaction at third, which I think helps him in
the outfield with his jumps and his route running because
he's so quick a reacting to the ball as being

(01:06:41):
a third basemin and he's just grown and you know,
watching him run the route even the last year was natural,
So I don't think the transition for Hill is very hard.
As a part to the route running efficiency, his arm
strength is obviously very top notch. He throws about ninety
eight miles an hour from the outfield, And for me,
the one thing I wanted to talk to him and

(01:07:03):
work with him about and when I went to spring
training for a week and even just chatting with him
here this past couple of days is just getting rid
of the ball quicker at an outfielders, and he's done
a fantastic job of that. He even came up to me,
I think the first game of this series, we're talking
outside the batting pages and he goes in, you know,
I've been working on this right foot planning thing, so

(01:07:24):
I don't have to take that extra step, and I
really love it, Ritt and I go, yeah, man, this
all I was starting to get to you in spring
training because our job as outfielders to get the ball
back to the end field as quickly as possible, let
him handle it, get it out of our hands so
we can't screw anything up. But the quicker we get
it in, the quicker we have a better chance of
one stopping the runner or throwing him out, because you

(01:07:44):
think the extra step we take in the outfield continue
to be more steps for that base runner. So the
quicker we get it in, Especially when you throw the
ball as hard as Tam Smith does, it just makes
sense to pick it up, throw it as hard as
you can in the direction you know it's going to be,
and get it to Jeremy payn Ye Is that's the
guy you want for me? It was always Pray at
this Pray. It was so great at cutoffs and throws

(01:08:04):
and putting on the money. You just want to look
for your short stocks. See you go in that generation.
Let them float around and make them.

Speaker 4 (01:08:10):
Play, make plays, get rid of the ball.

Speaker 2 (01:08:13):
Now that last part that Josh Reddick talked about with
his personal work and conversations outfield and otherwise with Cam Smith.
Definitely worth a discussion from us. We'll do that on
the other side, not to mention our thoughts on the if.
Here's number one for Josh Hater when we come back
here on the A Team.

Speaker 4 (01:08:30):
The A on Sports Talk seven ninety A.

Speaker 2 (01:08:34):
Really good conversation with Josh Reddick. If you missed that
this morning on the Morning Drive, you can catch it
in its entirety, and there's another good chunk of it
there for you.

Speaker 4 (01:08:42):
We gave you a snippet of it.

Speaker 2 (01:08:43):
It's right there at Sports Talk seven ninety dot com
or via the iHeartRadio app. You can easily access all
that we do here on the station by subscribing to
our respective programs, the Morning Drive, the Matt Thomas Show
with Ross or this one the eight Team, and you'd
always have it at your disposal, right there in the
of your computer, hand phone, cam skin anything is who

(01:09:04):
Josh Reddick was having that last bit of the conversation
we shared with you. He hit the triple that drove
in runs ten and eleven after the putt batters in
front of him all reached base, all six of them.
And all six of them scored, so to speak. One
of them came back to the dugout and I didn't

(01:09:24):
bring that up here, but I will yord On Alvarez
singled during that everyone reaches base stretch, Nick Allen, Christian Vasquez,
Jeremy Paania and Jordon Walker and Perettis and ultimately you
had Cam Smith driving two of them, the last two in.
But after yord On Alvarez singled, he was the tying run.

(01:09:45):
There obviously were still two outs and he was on
first base. Much more damage needed to be done. Another hit,
an extra base hit, Maybe you get him to second
base and score on a single and tie the game.
There's a lot of things that could have happen, and
you're in the eighth inning. He was taken out of
the game for a pinch runner. It was Zach Cole,

(01:10:07):
and Zach Cole's final act as an astro for this time,
he was sent down.

Speaker 4 (01:10:10):
To act as an astro. It sounds like he just
went to death Row and he went to sugar Land.

Speaker 2 (01:10:14):
Okay, although I'm pretty sure he's not going to be
available for them tonight unless they told him during last
night's game, do not run onto the field. After this victory,
your day got to get to l Passo because that's
where the space Cowboys are. If they were at home, Yes,
he could play, they are not. El Paso is not
a short drive. But he came into pinch run and
my immediate thought was, this is a two run game.

(01:10:36):
Could the Astros tie it? Absolutely? Is it definitely going
to be right here, right now in this inning or
are you going to tie it and then you're going
to extra innings? Yeah, maybe he doesn't end up scoring.
That run scores and it's nine to nine. The more
you think about getting to extra innings, well, that means
two more runs have to score. That presumably means one
or two batters have to hit, and then each of

(01:10:58):
the three batters that quivocally it would then have to
hit in the ninth inning. So you're that much closer
to Jordan Alvarez hitting in the tenth inning. I don't
want the option of him not hitting to be presented.
If Zach Cole comes in, and he did, he has
to steal second, right, That's why he's out there. You're

(01:11:21):
trying to make it easier to tie the game. He didn't.
It turned out he didn't need to because the bleeder
that Christian Walker hit was booted. It was a single
because he was going to beat it out. But it
was such a bad, underhanded, terrible idea throw from Low
that Zach Cole was able to run the bases badly
in my opinion, but still get to third base. He
never even considered looking at the third base coach. He

(01:11:43):
was watching the play in front of him, then he
was watching the play behind him, and then when the
ball got away, he jogged over to third base. He
then easily scored on an outrageously poorly scored wild pitch,
the pitch that got away from Henry Davis, that hit
him in every part of his glove. It's a pass ball,
doesn't matter. Zach Cole scores easily. So the pinch runner

(01:12:03):
you put in for jord On Alvarez did in fact
score the tying run in that inning.

Speaker 4 (01:12:07):
It worked out perfectly.

Speaker 2 (01:12:09):
Jord On Alvarez would have easily gotten to third all
things the same.

Speaker 4 (01:12:13):
But he wouldn't get hurt. He would also have scored.

Speaker 2 (01:12:15):
You do prevent the possibility of Tony Paris Chica winding
his arm and saying you're the ninth run.

Speaker 4 (01:12:22):
Jord On pick it up.

Speaker 2 (01:12:23):
We're sending you home for a potential collision, for a
potential I get it.

Speaker 4 (01:12:28):
Just planting his foot on the back ankle, all that
is in play.

Speaker 2 (01:12:33):
And so again I didn't want to present it, as
I did on social media, like some sort of firerauble offense.
But I'm allowed to have an opinion. I did not
like it, and I would not do that for the
reasons I just laid out the day. You don't have
an opinion on something, I'm gonna check your pulse. Why
I'm here, That's why we're both here now. I brought
up Henry Davis earlier in the show and didn't mention

(01:12:53):
exactly what I was talking about. Now that I've mentioned
him again, that's why. Henry Davis is the player who
hit this Grand Slam, his first, his first Grand Slam.
He's having an awful offensive season, hence the first. Well,
he's hit several home runs, but none of them were
Grand Slams. Yeah, he's hitting in the one thirties.

Speaker 1 (01:13:14):
He someone else hit there first the other night, did
they not, for the Pirates against uh Rodriguez.

Speaker 2 (01:13:20):
Yeah, yeah, that was his first overall, So he's having
a bad offensive season.

Speaker 4 (01:13:25):
It was impossible to miss.

Speaker 2 (01:13:27):
And I don't like coming down on players for being
happy about something good that they've done. His non bat
flip but immediate mic drop of the bat himped was
sleep out of it?

Speaker 4 (01:13:39):
What play? I'm that's great? Do it? You did it.

Speaker 2 (01:13:42):
He didn't barely clear the Crawford boxes, he didn't barely
clearly out of town scoreboards, no doubt. He destroyed that baseball,
drove in four runs for the two run deficited to
a two run lead. He enjoyed it. He didn't do
anything to the Astros. He didn't show up Spencer, but
it was extremely demonstrative from a player who probably like

(01:14:04):
when Cam Smith had gotten a hit recently, Man, this
feels good. He's having a bad offensive year. But I
did kind of feel like later in the game, as
the Astros made their comeback and he had that miserable
pass ball and then he was pinch hit for it
kind of was like it felt a little karma.

Speaker 4 (01:14:24):
Maybe you shouldn't have pimped it so much.

Speaker 2 (01:14:25):
But again, I like when players are playing a game
and are having fun.

Speaker 4 (01:14:30):
Having a personality. Yeah that too.

Speaker 1 (01:14:32):
Well again and it goes back to the old age,
and it doesn't feel good, especially in that kind of
situation because you're rooting for the team that it's being
done to.

Speaker 4 (01:14:41):
Don't let it happen.

Speaker 1 (01:14:42):
Spencer ararighedty'd be the first person to tell you that,
as he described his effort last night with a word
that rhymes with sass.

Speaker 4 (01:14:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:14:48):
I brought up Cam Smith and we were talking about
him with the Josh Reddick's comments, it should be noted that,
you know, the triple he hit last night is right
in line with what he's been doing lately. He's been
hitting the ball again. He had a good start. He
had a massive and long slump where we were asking
is it time to get him at bats every day
at the minor league level? Is it time to sit
him down for a few days and clear his head.

(01:15:10):
He never really seemed like he was showing outward. I
don't like it here. I'm uncomfortable and in my own
head because he continued to barrel baseballs. He had some
bad at bats where he's swinging at pitches that Craig
Biggio thought were outside. But he's back in a good
groove where he's continuing to barrel almost everything. When you're
hitting the ball up the middle as often as he does.

(01:15:32):
That usually means you're in a very very good place.
When you're hitting it opposite field like he's been doing,
that also usually means you're in a very good place.
His last week, ten fourteen days, he's been as productive
with is it bats as just about any other hitter
in the lineup. But ops of nearly nine hundred and
there was you know, the four runs that had already scored.
Feel great because you've tied the game. This is winning time.

(01:15:56):
When he stepped to the play, the winning run is
right there for you to drive in, and he drove
in both of them.

Speaker 1 (01:16:03):
Yeah, it was. Todd Kallis called it the best win
of the season. Agreed it was. Well, even if you.

Speaker 2 (01:16:10):
Don't agree, it was definitely the most entertaining one of
the season. It was very unexpected. But yeah, tap it
off tonight, though, don't lose this series tonight when you
really shouldn't. Yeah, baseball is very different. And then this
very clear way they just threw a no hitter with
tatsu Emi on the front side and Oliberg Santa on

(01:16:30):
the backside, could not be much more unexpected and pointed
to as a this could turn things around. This could
get this team going. Last night's the same thing. Yeah,
but baseball almost disallows that.

Speaker 4 (01:16:42):
You never know.

Speaker 1 (01:16:43):
Momentum is so fleeting. And uh, by the way, Santa
really giving up a run?

Speaker 4 (01:16:48):
What are you doing? Bum No, I'm kidding.

Speaker 2 (01:16:50):
Eighteen consecutive batters retired upon his major league careers at the beginning,
that's crazy. He walked a couple of batters and got lifted,
and his second inning of work was still throwing the ball. Well,
a very very big helpful find for your Houston Astros.
Two in two to go a little bit more on
the Knicks. And if you didn't know this was coming

(01:17:10):
to the A Team with the Knicks in the NBA Finals, then.

Speaker 4 (01:17:14):
Where have you been? Do you even listen? It's next.

Speaker 1 (01:17:19):
Cower, number three of a Thursday edition of The A Team.
It's Sports Talk seven ninety sch n two hours are
already in the books. A lot of Astro's conversation, a
little bit of NBA Finals conversation, a little bit of
Texans OTA's conversation. And of course I don't know if
you can see this. I think I'm zoomed in a

(01:17:39):
little bit too much. The Rockets, this is their new
logo right here. I'm kidding it is, but it's very,
very similar to their old logo. We've talked a lot
about the look of the new logo the jerseys with
the throwback to Ketchup and mustard and obviously the updated
font if you will. It really is kind of a

(01:18:00):
combination of what they've had and then kind of an
homage to the ketchup and mustard from the Championship era,
which really you say Championship era, that's the last two
years that they wore them. It was seventy two to
ninety five, a long, long chunk of time, and I
didn't realize.

Speaker 4 (01:18:14):
The longest chunk of time.

Speaker 1 (01:18:16):
Well, isn't this last era? We just came out of
the exact same amount of time as that. I didn't
do the math.

Speaker 4 (01:18:23):
With these uniforms. No, with this logo. So they went
from the Championship logo to the R.

Speaker 2 (01:18:32):
The R's been around less than ten years. The logo
they had at that time was there, as you just noticed.

Speaker 4 (01:18:37):
For the arms. The r's been around since two thousand
and two. That's it has Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:18:43):
Oh okay, don't you remember when they hired Van Gundy
and he was still wearing a hard hat inside Toyota
Center because it wasn't quite finished. He had the R
on it. That's when they came out without logo. Don't
remember that, Oh yeah, I mean the R was what
they came up with off the championship or off of
the the the blue whatever that I.

Speaker 2 (01:19:04):
Was looking at that logo, the blue pajama logo with
the shark toothed rocket, other than the shark toothed rocket,
which made it, from whatever you thought of it too awful.
The rest of the logo's good. I actually like it.
It's not as good as some of their others. So
you say that when you're comparing it to what else
they have, it looks worse. The logo itself I had

(01:19:25):
no issue with. But now you've got the jerseys that
nobody likes. Now you've got the rocket with teeth on it,
and then nobody likes it made it.

Speaker 4 (01:19:30):
It just made it undesirable.

Speaker 1 (01:19:32):
I'll tell you the thing I disliked most about that
whole look, which was only worn from the fall of
ninety five until they moved into Toyota Center in two
thousand and two, as I mentioned, and that's when the
R came out. So there was that little reprieve between
championship logo and and what we've been seeing lately until today.

(01:19:54):
The penn stripes which weren't pen stripes, and I was
told back upon a time they were vapor trails, but
now they're called something else, and I Jose said it fifty.

Speaker 4 (01:20:03):
Rods, that axl rose. Sure they didn't want to name
it after slash No.

Speaker 1 (01:20:10):
But here's the thing. I never liked those to me.
You know what it looked like. It looked like, you know,
those white out pins, not the brush that you can
do manually. I'm talking about the pins where you squeeze
out the white out and you cover up something that
you've written.

Speaker 4 (01:20:23):
Once upon a time.

Speaker 1 (01:20:25):
It looked like somebody had taken those down the jersey
and I just didn't like that. Well, if you were
going to incorporate all aspects of the previous all of
the looks, and you had to do the vapor trail,
axl rod, pen stripes, whatever you want to call them,
they did it the right way. They're on all these
new jerseys, but you barely see them because they're the
same color roughly as whatever version you're talking about, red

(01:20:49):
white or the black ones.

Speaker 4 (01:20:50):
They're all there.

Speaker 1 (01:20:53):
All of this is to say it's been a long
time since they've worn ketchup and mustard, and the second
to last year they wore the ketchup and mustard. Well,
they were in the NBA Finals for the second time,
no third time in franchise history. Nineteen ninety four. Rockets
and Knicks, and Game five of that series is remembered

(01:21:16):
for a lot more than just a basketball game.

Speaker 4 (01:21:18):
Trying to determine a championship in a season.

Speaker 2 (01:21:21):
There's a brief, brief period of time during that series
following Game five and preceding the finish of Game six,
it's the only time the Knicks were ahead in that series.
Rockets won Game one, Knicks won Game two, Rockets won
Game three, Knicks one.

Speaker 4 (01:21:38):
Game four.

Speaker 2 (01:21:39):
June seventeenth, nineteen ninety four, the Knicks beat the Rockets
ninety one to eighty four to take a three games
to two lead in the series and carried that into
the Game six, very close finish, so into the final moments,
and then the Rockets beat them, so the series was
tied again, and then the Rockets untied it and won
the championship. So last night's victory opening the NBAS winning

(01:22:02):
on the road in San Antonio, taking a one games
to none lead, which they will hold at least until
tomorrow night's final buzzer, maybe longer. Is the first time
the Knicks have held the lead in the finals since
June seventeenth, nineteen ninety four.

Speaker 4 (01:22:17):
What else happened that night?

Speaker 2 (01:22:18):
Wex Olajuan had twenty seven, OT had thirteen. This was
the finals that Patrick Ewing was healthy for. He was
out there. He put in twenty five and twelve. There
was another game where Jalen Brunson's dad didn't play. He
wasn't even on that team. He was on the ninety
nine team. Chris Jent got two minutes. Chris Gent, one

(01:22:40):
of the panelists on ESPNS inside the NBA program, got
scored six points. Kenny Smith not a good series for him.

Speaker 1 (01:22:48):
Derek Harper was busting his butt that whole series. That's
because kids, they could do this thing called hand checking.
It was where you were allowed to be physical with
an offensive player, meaning Jordan played under these rules as well.
When you're starting to talk about this goat debate, I
would have loved to have seen Lebron play in the
hand checking era.

Speaker 4 (01:23:07):
He would have just bowled over everybody anyway.

Speaker 2 (01:23:09):
Yeah, The game five victory for the Knicks featured Robert
Rory dropping in seven points, had six assists in a block,
yet nine rebounds. He did miss twelve of his fourteen shots.

Speaker 4 (01:23:22):
Not a great night for Bob.

Speaker 2 (01:23:24):
But we barely got to focus on all of that.
Why because a friend, Al Collings was driving a car.

Speaker 1 (01:23:33):
Wasn't a car, it was an suv, specifically a nineteen
ninety three white Ford Bronco.

Speaker 2 (01:23:38):
June seventeenth, nineteen ninety four, the last time the Knicks
Hill Believe in the finals, Oj Simpson's Bronco escort was
taking place.

Speaker 4 (01:23:47):
The juice was loose. Now I haven't started the document,
The juice is loose? Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:23:52):
Wasn't he loose for every day of his life preceding that?

Speaker 4 (01:23:55):
Also?

Speaker 2 (01:23:57):
Yeah, unfortunately for two people, he was and he stayed
loose for a lot of days after June seventeenth, nineteen
ninety four.

Speaker 1 (01:24:06):
Well, actually he didn't. That's when he was incarcerated. He
was in jail for how long until after the trial
He was booked That night was held until because once
the trial, I mean, he.

Speaker 4 (01:24:20):
Was trying to just throw like an anklet on him
and let him go back to bord.

Speaker 1 (01:24:22):
Remember the whole reason he was supposed he was in
the Bronco, not being chased, but rather being escorted by.

Speaker 2 (01:24:28):
The There are fans lining the free like the lapd
If you have any doubt fans of OJ Simpson. Nothing
has changed. These idiots are still voting in like straight
communists in LA. They're dumb people, all of them.

Speaker 1 (01:24:42):
I'm sorry you are, because those are the type of
people that get up on a freeway and root for
the juice who clearly butchered two people, including his ex wife.
I know you didn't know what DNA was, but then
you open up your mouth after the trial and the documentary,
we actually realized why you voted not guilty, and so
that kind of negates all that. But anyway, getting back

(01:25:05):
to the original story at hand. June seventeenth, nineteen ninety four,
he's down in Where was she from?

Speaker 2 (01:25:12):
Laguna? One of those beach who Nicole? I know, Come on, man,
this is your wheelhouse. I don't remember the deats.

Speaker 4 (01:25:21):
I should have. I should be more prepared. This is
on me.

Speaker 1 (01:25:23):
But he was starting way down there and then they
located him. I think it was called the El Toro,
why somewhere down on the southern part of outside of
Los Angeles. And again this thing, I remember it, and
we've talked about this before. I mean I was thirteen
years old, so I barely knew what was going on
from the standpoint of I just want to see my team.

(01:25:45):
How mad was everybody in Houston and New York that
they couldn't watch a finals game because the game was
like this big on the screen and then this big
was a for Bronco.

Speaker 2 (01:25:57):
And not everybody pretty much nobody had fifty fifty five
sixty five inch seventy five inch ninety inch TVs.

Speaker 1 (01:26:07):
The best you had back then, if you were super rich,
was a projection like not unlike which you would see
at mister Gaddy's, I mean real projection like the three
color projection. Yes, but most people had a traditional tube television,
and even if it was a big screen, the bigger
it was, the heavier it was. We had one of
those that was like built into a base. It was

(01:26:28):
roughly the equivalent of the cyber truck seven thousand pounds
to move that bad boy around.

Speaker 2 (01:26:33):
The Knicks being a good story this year in the East,
the Knicks reaching the finals the Knicks now having a
win in the finals, knew this was all coming. Like
we're clearly because they're playing the Spurs, the ninety nine
finals are being brought up a lot, and Brunson was
in it, and the big brunts happening and not happening
in ninety nine for sure, and then this now because
they like iPhones not happening, among other things. We didn't

(01:26:56):
really get into the non fun part of this segment,
Like the basketball. I said yesterday, I thought the Spurs
were gonna win six, but I also very much fence
road with my initial comment.

Speaker 4 (01:27:09):
That whoever wins this game's gonna win the series.

Speaker 2 (01:27:11):
Now you got to go back on it, Well, I'm
kind of gonna well, whichever one I want to say
is what I want.

Speaker 1 (01:27:16):
They've already stolen home court advantage, and if this were again,
it's not as big a deal as back in the day.
Back in the day, kids, the finals was a two
to three to two format. So if you split on
the road as the road team, you now took a
series tie at worst home for three straight games, which

(01:27:37):
is what the Knicks did in nineteen ninety four. They
actually came back to Houston for the final two games.
The Rockets hoped with that three to two series lead.

Speaker 2 (01:27:45):
Third time since two thousand and five, the road team
has won game one of the finals each of those
three times that team lost the finals.

Speaker 4 (01:27:58):
Yes, I Pacers did it last year.

Speaker 2 (01:28:00):
This point Lytics four years ago and San Antonio in
twenty thirteen.

Speaker 1 (01:28:04):
Yeah, but now do the percentages of people that win
game people teams that win game one of the series,
they win over seventy percent of the time.

Speaker 2 (01:28:12):
The whole thing, yep. I think what the Knicks showed
is this is legit.

Speaker 4 (01:28:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:28:18):
I don't think the Spurs are about to win four
in a row and say and be very overwhelming to
the Spur to the Knicks. I think this is what
I thought. It's a legit series. I didn't say it
would go seven, but I think the Knicks were a
live dog, were a real chance to win this, winning
game one where they were the rested team and took it,
maybe took advantage of that was probably pretty huge for them.

Speaker 1 (01:28:38):
By the way, as we wrap up this segment about
OJ Simpson, my favorite part of the non chase was
when he got on the call with one of the detectives.
I think it was Lang and he was trying to
like talk him, you know, out of his suicidal place,
and he was telling him all the people who love
him and we're gonna miss him and all that kind
of stuff. And you can hear OJ go into the phone.

Speaker 4 (01:29:03):
That's my favorite part. Okay, I didn't remember that. He's
a bad play. We should get that audio and play it, Josh.
It's like what you just did. I don't know that
we need it. And there you have it.

Speaker 1 (01:29:18):
It is the eighteen Sports Talk seven ninety Do you
think OJ has found the real killers in the afterlife?

Speaker 2 (01:29:27):
I mean, if you do some thought about that. So
this was nineteen ninety four. What was the date of
the murders, Well, June twelfth, But okay, so June twelfth,
nineteen ninety four, that's thirty two years ago.

Speaker 4 (01:29:40):
Uh huh, a little less than thirty two years yep.

Speaker 2 (01:29:42):
Rough age of a presumed person that OJ's looking for
is no younger than twenty five.

Speaker 4 (01:29:48):
I know he was forty six when he did the killings.
I mean, so.

Speaker 2 (01:29:52):
If the murderer that OJ's been looking for since nineteen
ninety four was twenty five, then they'd beat at fifty
seven now and if OJ was still looking for them,
they would need to be with him in the afterlife.
But if seven year old is there, as he pontificated,
this murderer also probably was not leading a great life

(01:30:14):
like that he was murdering people. An NFL running back
shelf life is average three half years. I apologize that
should be an equal a female hypothetical murderer.

Speaker 1 (01:30:23):
It definitely could have been a female that killed both
of them in a very physical way, not him.

Speaker 4 (01:30:31):
Yeah, a drug dealer.

Speaker 2 (01:30:32):
The short answer should have been yes. I think he's
found them in the afterlife.

Speaker 4 (01:30:37):
His loan handed him a mirror.

Speaker 2 (01:30:39):
When he's not playing afterlife fantasy football at a laker
fire at a golf course, I'm sure he has found
the real killer. He's probably also written a book in
the afterlife. See I told you I'd find him. I
thought you were going to say it was see I
did do it. No, No, I would say, see I
told you I'd find him, and it's uh. You've got
the book jacket. He's got his picture on the back

(01:31:01):
as the author. A little synopsis about Oh, he did
this when he was toting the rock, and he wore
these gloves when he was on the sidelines and he
jumped over this airline seats when he was speaking for them.
And then you open the book and it's just a mirror.
There's no pages. Uh, did you ever I think I
showed this to you? Did you ever see the footage
of of Ron? You say it like, I think I

(01:31:23):
showed this to you because I have this footage of Ron,
one of the people that OJ murdered, on my phone,
my phone.

Speaker 4 (01:31:30):
That's when you made it sound like that show this
to you? Have ever? Well, it's easy to show you
stuff that's not on my phone. Oh it was he
on the studs. Yes, it wasn't. Blind date. I think
I've seen it.

Speaker 2 (01:31:43):
Blind Date came later after he was deceased, just like
a year before. I think, a year before he found Nicole.
No a year before OJ found him, to year before
he was waiting tables at mesalone random people and then
just being nice to random people and returning glasses. He

(01:32:05):
was bringing her mom's glasses home after she had drawn
a bath and was eating ice cream. Okay, I believe you.
That's another thing, minor details, nothing to do with Oja.
You've probably taken a bath in your life. Most of
our listeners have two and then I turned it on.

(01:32:30):
Certain I've never said it, nor has anyone ever said
it to me, in the event that a bath was forthcoming.

Speaker 4 (01:32:37):
Drawn a bath, that's what you say, I know, But
why because that's how you say it. But why say
that at all? What are you supposed to say?

Speaker 2 (01:32:44):
Every other sense of the word. I'm not filling a
bath tub up with water and calling it drawing.

Speaker 4 (01:32:52):
I don't get it. So what did you what do
you call it? Take a bath?

Speaker 2 (01:32:55):
No, the bath is ready? Prepare the bath? But can
you turn the walls?

Speaker 4 (01:33:00):
Prepare the bath? That sounds like you're going to battle
or something. Hey, prepare the bath.

Speaker 2 (01:33:06):
If they said it like that, yes, that's what prepare insinuates,
prepare the bath, throwing the bath, salts or whatever it
is you want in there, epsom or otherwise. But I mean, like,
turn on the soft music, like the turn the bath on.
Make sure my uh, the book that I'm going to
read on my iPad while I'm sitting there for hours
and hours on end is ready.

Speaker 4 (01:33:27):
Prepare the bath? I mean, baths have you taken in
your life? Bath five?

Speaker 2 (01:33:31):
I'm gonna say here in twenty twenty six, this is
a century that's been bath free for me.

Speaker 4 (01:33:39):
So twenty six years in, you're not gonna break your street.

Speaker 2 (01:33:42):
I'm pretty sure it started long before we flipped into
this century, but I couldn't tell you when long time ago. Dude,
you ever thought about the concept of a bath by
the way, yeah, here, get clean by resting in your
dirty water.

Speaker 1 (01:33:54):
You're not getting clean though, like unless you shower after
that bath, You've just been sitting there in your own filth.

Speaker 2 (01:34:01):
Well, I'm pretty sure like weed to talk a lot
of sports here on the show, we talk about the Texans, Rockets,
the Astros, the Nick Spurs, et cetera. The Texans didn't
finish up their season their last home game and celebrate
one of their nine consecutive victories and walk off the
field in front of their home fans, super excited, joyous,

(01:34:25):
fired up, headed into the locker room, get the pep
talk from Demico.

Speaker 4 (01:34:30):
Ryans get their gear off and hop into a bath.

Speaker 2 (01:34:35):
Well that's the I know there's cold tub and I
know there's hot tubs. I get that they're not attempting
to get clean, certainly not as a team in a bath.

Speaker 4 (01:34:47):
Well that the adults, who was it?

Speaker 3 (01:34:50):
It?

Speaker 1 (01:34:50):
Was an athlete recently that was like, ah, I mean,
if I've been in the pool all day long.

Speaker 2 (01:34:55):
It was Dan Orlovsky. He was like, if I've been
in the pool all day long, I don't shower. That's
the fork and knife candy bar eater.

Speaker 1 (01:35:03):
Probably yes, as someone that's eating pizza with a fork
and a knife. Because I was trying to host a
show at the same time. I get that, Okay, can't
you just take a small fork size bite. What I'm
saying is if it's pizza, it's greasy and you're trying
to keep your hands clean. Yeah, because I'm using one
of these, that's like, looks like I had six heads.

(01:35:24):
I've done a show, to believe it or not, at
Big City Wings before. Yeah, and I've been I've asked
them to bring me some wings while I've been on
the air. We just did it for our draft show.
But see, I used a fork for the very same reason.
And this is why I was so anti Hey, where
are the Texans at halftime?

Speaker 4 (01:35:38):
We'll be serving wings and not tenders.

Speaker 1 (01:35:41):
Or nothing of that. It's the kind you got to
pick up to eat with your fingers otherwise it doesn't work.
And it won't work with a fork, So here you go,
eat these at halftime, and then good luck typing stuff
out on your own personal laptop and not getting filthy,
disgusting wing sauce all inside the keys. I'm glad they
graduated from that concept. Only took him like fifteen years

(01:36:03):
of existence.

Speaker 4 (01:36:04):
Job well done. I don't even know where to go
from here, what we're even going to talk about OTAs.

Speaker 2 (01:36:11):
The Texans did post additional video which I figured took place,
but we just weren't there for it, of Tank Dell
running more routes, participating a little bit more in practice.
Definitely would call it a limited participant. If the Texans
were bold enough to issue an injury report following OTAs
today for their game coming up in September, he would
have been listed as a limited participant. You want to

(01:36:33):
hear my But like I said, media was there for
only one of those snaps. It's the very first one
you see on the post that the Texas a fired
off on social media. But clearly they have footage of
him working in some more reps with the team, going
through some of their shorts and T shirts.

Speaker 4 (01:36:49):
Eleven on eleven work.

Speaker 1 (01:36:50):
You want to hear my darkest take about that whole situation,
Like I hate that even crossed my mind, but I
couldn't help it. I was greatly concerned. You see this
all the time, that that leg it was. I mean,
it was a gruesome injury. There's no other way to
describe it. It was like, I mean, pick an L

(01:37:11):
and an acronym that was attached to it, and he
tore it. It wasn't just oh he tore his acl,
Oh he tore his PCO. No, he tore everything in
there and just mangled it like it had been in
a car accident or something. I was worried legit, worried
about that leg overall, like somehow being like atrophied or whatever,
like being weaker, being well.

Speaker 2 (01:37:31):
Sometimes you get worried about something that's been You've got
to make sure the blood flow is still going, and
you make sure those things have not happened to the
whatever remaining portion of the leg below the injury.

Speaker 1 (01:37:41):
But that's that's at the very outset. You're in your
most dire part. You're trying to repair the leg so
it's functional. But then okay, after that, this is I'm
forget talking about being an elite level sensational athlete, as
Jerry Maguire would say, like just not having an overcompensation injury,
which we see a lot of time in sports with

(01:38:02):
one leg or the other, one arm or the other
because you're trying to not you know, in your head
mentally mess up the leg that has been injured and
so you wind up injuring the other leg. We see
that all the time. I was just worried from that standpoint.
But again, this is why today doesn't seem like it's
a big deal. It's totally a big deal.

Speaker 2 (01:38:23):
Yeah, I didn't want to underplay it or overplay it,
but it's very significant. It doesn't tell you necessarily anything
about the future of what he actually will be, but
it probably is a pretty good indicator, which I think
we already knew, but seeing it is definitely a part
of it that he's going to play, that he's going
to give it a go to play.

Speaker 4 (01:38:40):
That his career did not end.

Speaker 2 (01:38:41):
Now his career is going to end if he can't
play at the level he was at because the NFL
is just that good, you know, you lose a little bit.
And interestingly in that today is the day that Tank
Dell went out there and it was just yesterday. I
don't know that we would have brought it up otherwise.
But if you're paying any attention to Chicago Bears off
season work, not that they're moving to Hammond, Indiana, but

(01:39:03):
that they're actually getting on field work, Roma Dunes basically said,
I am not the same player I was because my
foot is not the same as it was suffered an injury.
He basically said, it is what it is. This is
what I'm working with. I can still play, I can
still do things, but it isn't the same. And I'm
paraphrasing what he said, but it's pretty it was pretty

(01:39:24):
alarming when most of the media there was listening to
what he said and they wanted to not pull just
a snippet of it. Here's the full quote, and here's
what he said, and here's what he meant. But it's
it's definitely noteworthy to a number one pick, a first
round pick who a bright, bright future, super talented, and
this could certainly change things a little bit. Alex, who's
the number one overall pick, the quarterback that JJ Watt mangled.

(01:39:46):
Kareem had a hand in it too, Okay, so he
got double thing. Okay, Alex Smith that was you probably
saw it E sixty show. Yeah, I wouldn't recommend that.

Speaker 4 (01:39:55):
I've watched it more than once. Oh my god, why
would you watch that more than once?

Speaker 2 (01:39:59):
So we can answer the question next in our signature segment,
what's that with that?

Speaker 8 (01:40:08):
On Sports Talk seven ninety I really need to send
that text before the segment started.

Speaker 4 (01:40:12):
All right, what's up with that? We talked about this earlier.

Speaker 9 (01:40:15):
Now.

Speaker 1 (01:40:17):
There are moments in your life where you attend events
and you're probably depending on how much of a fan
you are of said person that is performing or playing
in the game, where you're you're overcome with whatever emotion
and you're so overcome with that emotion. Wex not you

(01:40:40):
normal people that you just like can't you can't control yourself.

Speaker 4 (01:40:44):
You're overcome. You do things you wouldn't normally do in
your right state of mind.

Speaker 1 (01:40:50):
I guess that's what happened last night when two people
got lifetime bands from every single NBA arena because they
try to get a selfie with some French bum Can
you imagine getting banned from every NBA game ever, not
just crappy Spurs games because you just had to try

(01:41:12):
and get a selfie with Vicky.

Speaker 4 (01:41:17):
Just moronic, I mean every way stupid. Now it did.

Speaker 2 (01:41:21):
It took place during live play when the fan ran
on to the court and did run over in the
direction of Wemby for an attempted selfie defended by Mitchell Robinson.
There'd basically been you know, Dylan Harper was up top
and the ball was kind of stolen from him. The
whistle went off before the Knicks truly fully had possession,
and I think it did impact how hard that those

(01:41:42):
two players were playing because they heard the whistle. So
the referees actually had to conference about what they wanted
to do. Uh, this is simple, and I hope it's useful.
Punishment like this, there's not much else to do, I mean,
charges of any and sure, these people should never come
to an NBA game again, and you should do your

(01:42:04):
best to make sure that every arena can adhere to
that and make sure that it doesn't happen, because you
want to deter other people from doing dumb stuff like this.

Speaker 4 (01:42:12):
It didn't turn out to be dangerous.

Speaker 2 (01:42:14):
You never know what's coming, and you never know I
mean honestly, you know, as I was watching when it happened,
and a player could react what if Mitchell Robinson punched
the guy in the face.

Speaker 4 (01:42:25):
Well, what if Victor webberyanod tackle him?

Speaker 1 (01:42:28):
That you're describing what actually happens when people do this
crap at wrestling events.

Speaker 4 (01:42:33):
They get pummeled and nobody says anything or does anything.

Speaker 1 (01:42:36):
And to the best of my knowledge, nobody that's ever
done this has then turned around and tried to press
charges on the wrestlers for doing what they should do.

Speaker 2 (01:42:44):
By the way, and you're in the NFL, that happens.
You get truck when they're making their way away from security,
making their way trying to figure out what I was
trying to say. When they're avoiding security, athletes say well
I think I can get you, and they do you.

Speaker 1 (01:43:04):
Mean when Kevin Harlan is doing a play by play
of their activities, Yes, I get it. This is this
is so simple.

Speaker 4 (01:43:11):
But he doesn't care.

Speaker 2 (01:43:12):
As a gag, as a stupid advertisement, whatever it is.

Speaker 4 (01:43:16):
Man, just stay off the field, just stop, just stop
doing it. And I know he was Do you think
he was drunk?

Speaker 2 (01:43:24):
I don't think so, but I really have no. I
just visually watching it, I would I would have said no.

Speaker 1 (01:43:28):
Typically, and again this comes into play and came into
play at the Mauice at the Palace. No playing surface
in any sport whatsoever. I mean, this includes tennis. I
can't think of one where you're closer to the action
than the NBA. Yeah, I mean think about what do
they call them? Where you're sitting.

Speaker 4 (01:43:49):
Court side seats.

Speaker 1 (01:43:51):
Even tennis, also played on a court, does not get
you as close to the action, which way makes what
happened to Monica Sells even worse.

Speaker 2 (01:43:58):
You make a diving catch in baseball, you could be
diving into the stands. You could be diving into the net,
you could be diving into the outfield seats where you're
at somebody's waist or whatever. You could end up in
the stands because you've jumped over the wall that's in
between you and them. Football players don't usually deal with
that because there's that much space in between the playing
surface and the stands. Yeah, they only after a touchdown

(01:44:21):
in the NBA forty eight minute game. How many times
does a fan get touched by an NBA player? Turning
a lot more than you think, twenty five, thirty, forty.
I mean somebody crashes into a court side fan and
they're wearing their nachos. Now, oh, we got to pick
up a spill drink that wasn't purposely put there by
Jason Kidd.

Speaker 4 (01:44:40):
It happens a lot. You're hilling Brooks there.

Speaker 2 (01:44:42):
It's a simple statement. We don't need to you're on
the court. They're playing on the court, and you're sitting
on the court. Yeah, and there's nothing in between. Your
feet are on the same surface their feet, and the
fact that nothing's in between you is the biggest Like this,
running onto the court, no problem. You're you're right on
the court, if your court side, if you're inside the
stands that do have a wall in front of which
again you're not gonna there. No NBA teams are going

(01:45:03):
to reevaluate things and say, well, we don't have enough
security here. They have a lot of security there, both
for the team when they get into it and for
preventing this, and I think they do as good a
job as we could reasonably expect them to do. You know,
timeouts happen anybody that's been to a game, and most
of the time when you watch on TV, you see
it immediately the second the whistle is blown and the
officials appointed to the two benches, the players start walking

(01:45:25):
that direction, and now there's fifteen security people on the
court facing the fans with their backs to the court
to prevent anybody from running on. They clearly aren't going
to do that during gameplay because there's no place for them.
There's no room because the fans are right there.

Speaker 1 (01:45:41):
This is the irony here, though, because this person has
now been arrested and banned from every NBA arena ever,
which is the kind of punishment you have to give
to people that do this so that other people, like
you said, don't also be morons.

Speaker 4 (01:45:58):
But that's what's funny about this.

Speaker 1 (01:45:59):
This person was trying to get his selfie with a
guy who didn't even get fined for throwing an elbow
at a throat.

Speaker 2 (01:46:06):
It looked like it was a young fan when I
was watching it, and apparently it was.

Speaker 4 (01:46:11):
It was a juvenile. So the details of who that
is and other things are not being reported on in
this series.

Speaker 1 (01:46:17):
When Kat is out physicaling him again, he wasn't fined
or suspended the last time he did it, so I
bet you he just rares up and takes an elbow
to the throat of his defender. Who's to say he
wouldn't Why would he he didn't get deterred last time.

Speaker 4 (01:46:30):
Highly unlikely.

Speaker 2 (01:46:32):
When we were talking about the game itself, obviously we're
talking about the fifteen misshots from wemby the fact that
he had six turnovers and six makes. We complimented Karl
Anthony Towns for his play eighteen points, twelve boards. Josh
Hart had a monster impact on the game with six
assists and fifteen rebounds, and he was a plus twenty
two in less than twenty seven minutes. And I told

(01:46:54):
you that one of the ten best players in the
NBA was the best player on the court last night
in the fourth quarter, and it's Jalen Brunson. He's the
best fourth quarter player in the NBA in my opinion.
He missed nineteen shots.

Speaker 4 (01:47:06):
He missed thirty one.

Speaker 2 (01:47:07):
He missed fifteen shots in the first three quarters. He
was having a very bad game in his overall numbers.
To get to thirty, he took, as you said, thirty
one shots thirty George. He played really well on the
fourth quarter. He struggled to put the ball in the
basket before that. Before that, he was seven of twenty two.
And I'm guessing that Stefan Castle gets some credit for that.

(01:47:30):
He definitely does. I thought Castle, well, what really happened?
If you want to get into the details of what
one of the things that went wrong. Castle played well,
Wenby did enough.

Speaker 4 (01:47:40):
They were in the game.

Speaker 2 (01:47:41):
They had the actually had a fourteen point lead, and
one of the reasons they had it was Dylan Harper
played great, and so his coach said, I love that,
but we don't need you anymore. How would you say,
how would you feel about three minutes and thirty three
seconds worth of playing the fourth quarter? And definitely don't
take any shots when you're out there. Okay, do we
have a deal, Rookie? Perfect? That way, I can get

(01:48:03):
more of Deer and Fox to score zero points in
eleven minutes. By the way, that was a mistake made
down to the Rockets fans in some deep dark way.
Did you feel at least a little.

Speaker 1 (01:48:13):
Better that Champagne was putting up all of those shots
like he did to you earlier?

Speaker 4 (01:48:18):
This year you get three point shooter.

Speaker 2 (01:48:20):
Most of his work was done in the first half offensively,
and he is hunted by the New York Knicks defensively.

Speaker 4 (01:48:26):
Go Nicks. I'm so happy they won. Good news and
bad news. Ask for the bad news. First, wex and
I see here on the A team. Let's get the
bad news.

Speaker 1 (01:48:38):
Other Rockets aren't in the NBA Finals, and they haven't
been since nineteen ninety five.

Speaker 4 (01:48:42):
Okay, that's bad news, isn't it. Yes, it is. Well,
it's just been so long.

Speaker 1 (01:48:48):
I mean, I love the jerseys and the new look
and all that kind of stuff, but it's also a
reminder that they're not participating like the Knicks and the
stupid other team that's in the finals.

Speaker 2 (01:48:59):
But we have the same number of wins in the
finals this year as the Spurs do.

Speaker 4 (01:49:04):
None. That's true. That's true.

Speaker 2 (01:49:06):
Better, No, no, what about Wolves, Pelicans, Grizzlies, Kings, Clippers,
Jazz and Blazers are the Western Conference teams that have
not been to the finals more recently than Houston.

Speaker 1 (01:49:21):
Well, I'm glad you brought that up, but you only
gave us the Western Conference.

Speaker 2 (01:49:26):
Yeah, in the West list, I could have also added
the Hawk's Hornets.

Speaker 1 (01:49:29):
Whiz, I'm done. That's the longest. That's the list of
longest NBA championship droughts. The Wizards four appearances in the final,
that's true, not champions not championship. So that does change
things a bit. It's been forty eight years since the
Washington Wizards won the nineteen seventy eight NBA Championship with

(01:49:55):
I believe wasn't Big E on that team or am
I crazy?

Speaker 4 (01:49:59):
Nineteen seventy eight? Yeah, I think he was over there.

Speaker 1 (01:50:04):
Now I was Wes Nzald. Never mind, he was a
series MVP. I mean, he might be on that team, but.

Speaker 4 (01:50:10):
I don't remember. So what's the good news.

Speaker 1 (01:50:13):
There are teams that have been there far, far longer
ago since the Rockets appearance.

Speaker 2 (01:50:18):
Hate looking at things like that. Your situation isn't any
better just because other people have suffered longer.

Speaker 1 (01:50:23):
Portland they won seventy seven the year before, But then
you got to go back to there's a tie for
seven fifty years ago. Pacers won the seventy seven championship.
The Brooklyn Nets won it in seventy six. So as
part of the ABA NBA merger, which I don't know
nearly enough about like I want.

Speaker 2 (01:50:44):
To, so the Pacers are on a list for having
not been to the NBA finals for a long long time, championship,
not winning a championship.

Speaker 1 (01:50:52):
Yeah, because they were in the ABA before joining the
NBA as part of that merger the Utah she has
fifty one years of existence, remember so. And then the
Knicks are number five on this list, fifty three years
since that seventy three game season where they won the
championship with player Phil Jackson as part of their roster.

(01:51:16):
Short shorts. Yeah, the Clippers fifty six years. I mean,
nobody really even needs to say anything, even though they
had some really good teams in the last couple of decades,
haven't gone and won. And obviously the Phoenix Suns got
as close as they ever had in their fifty eight
years when they lost to the Bucks. And the top

(01:51:39):
two on this list the aforementioned Atlanta Hawks sixty eight years.
They're one of the oldest franchises in the history of
the league and that dates back to their time which
you remember. Finally, obviously wex as the Buffalo Bisons in
the NBL. You remember that back in nineteen forty six.
I do when they started, and then I remember when

(01:52:01):
they were the Milwaukee Hawks, do you really? I remember
when they were the Tri Cities Blackhawks the late forties
and early fifties, then of course Saint Louis.

Speaker 4 (01:52:11):
And now what we know them as today. Dominique Wilkins
at Lanta Hawks. Yeah, the team that stole the Rockets.

Speaker 2 (01:52:18):
Look again, major professional sports franchise jerseys red, black, blue, yellow, green, purple.

Speaker 4 (01:52:35):
Orange.

Speaker 2 (01:52:37):
That's there's only so many combinations, rainbow. You're gonna have
teams that share the same colors.

Speaker 1 (01:52:44):
Yeah, the Chiefs, same thing. I think that's why I
like their color scheme so much. Looks like the Rockets.

Speaker 7 (01:52:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:52:49):
I thought Kevin Durant got traded to the Chiefs. I
thought he was their new tight end playing alongside Travis Kelcey.

Speaker 1 (01:52:54):
Yeah, you hear what he said. Dumb commenters on the
Rockets ig account. So number one on this list, far
and away. And this is so pathetic slash sad when
you think about how close they actually were before Tim
Donahe and Cruz screwed them. The Sacramento Kings seventy five
years they absolutely should have won the two thousand and
two NBA Championship because whoever won the West was the

(01:53:17):
de facto champ, which is the way it was and
frankly has been for a long time.

Speaker 4 (01:53:21):
I don't know if this year is going to be
like that, but seventy.

Speaker 1 (01:53:24):
Five years, seventy five years if you're a Kings fan,
you think they would have been able to handle the
nets and the manner that the Lakers were able to
handle the nets. In fact, I think they would have
scored more points against the Nets than the Lakers did.

Speaker 4 (01:53:38):
The Nets did lose all four games.

Speaker 2 (01:53:40):
Yeah, yes, sweat and serious know why because their best
player was Jason Kidd. What don't do kJ Martin's dad like,
I am absolutely gonna do kJ Martin's dad like that.
He was their third best player. WHOA that is absolutely
in no way. You can't give me this, Kerry Kittles nonsense.
Don't Keith van Horne, everybody, I'm I don't even know

(01:54:04):
who Richard Jefferson Jefferson baby not even close.

Speaker 1 (01:54:08):
Uh Or seriously though, in that that list of players
you just mentioned on that just this is what the
East had to offer.

Speaker 2 (01:54:15):
Here we are go beat us. Wasn't Vince Carter on
that team too, No, you would have. He would have
been their best player. That was later That's right, that's right,
because he was just they got swept by the Lakers.
Mitch Richmond, Lindsay Hunter, Samaki Walker, Brian Shaw, and Devin
George former King Mitch Richmond wept him in four straight
Devin George. In all honesty, though, that King's team which

(01:54:37):
was coached by Rick Adelman, and that has not been
the same since. As you mentioned earlier this week when
we were talking about the passing of Rick Adelman, they've
I mean, they would have run them out of the gym.
Their offense was actually I think more elite than the Lakers.
The Lakers were just very dominant with the two guys.
They did have deep team, good talent, shooting, rebounding size,

(01:55:00):
playmaking ability.

Speaker 4 (01:55:01):
They were awesome. By the way.

Speaker 2 (01:55:03):
The point gar Smith was a huge part of that.
Played twelve games that year. Did Yeah, Javaris Smith was.

Speaker 1 (01:55:09):
On that Dad, I don't even remember that whatever happened
with the point guard position for them, because that team
was Mike Bibbie. But White Chocolate was there before that.
Was he still there or had he been not on
that team? Is he part of the trade in Memphis?
I mean, Vancouver sure don't have the memory for that,

(01:55:30):
all right, Sacramento Kings seventy five years. In other words,
there's This is a list of the ten longest active
championship droughts in the NBA and the Rockets didn't even
make it, despite the fact their last title win was
in nineteen ninety five.

Speaker 2 (01:55:43):
Just a quick glance over that list, since you're staring
at it, Rockets aren't on it, so they are not
a possible answer. Correct, there's still three in front of
which of those ten is breaking the drought?

Speaker 9 (01:55:54):
First?

Speaker 4 (01:55:55):
The Nicks.

Speaker 7 (01:55:58):
What.

Speaker 1 (01:55:58):
It's not gonna be the Wizards. It's definitely not gonna
be the Blazers. It's not gonna be the Pacers, even
though they were just in the finals last year, because
the team that went to the finals can never be
put together again because they got rid of one of
the other big pieces. So Tyrese Haliburton comes back completely healthy,
doesn't matter. It's not gonna be the Nets. Come on, Jazz, No,

(01:56:20):
Danny Ainge runs them. The Knicks are number five. It's
not gonna be the Clippers. They're about to get.

Speaker 2 (01:56:26):
In some You're running down a list of teams that
have no chance, and the Knicks, who are one of
the better teams in the league.

Speaker 1 (01:56:34):
The Phoenix Suns. No, they're not championship caliber. The Hawks
aren't doing anything, and the Kings are never doing anything.
We've already established that seventy five years.

Speaker 2 (01:56:43):
Five o'clock hour, Beckins an hour from getting into Astros
coverage with the Pirates in town for the finale.

Speaker 4 (01:56:49):
The Astros can win the series with that.

Speaker 2 (01:56:50):
But at five o'clock, as we always do, we dive
into football at five. Texans on the field today. Why
was it important? We'll tell you next.

Speaker 8 (01:57:01):
The A on Sports Talk seven ninety. All right, this
is for my main man, Jeff listening out there.

Speaker 2 (01:57:12):
He was.

Speaker 1 (01:57:12):
He texted me during that last segment and he said,
football at five.

Speaker 4 (01:57:17):
Please.

Speaker 1 (01:57:18):
I'm guessing that's how his text sounded since he's sent
it in all caps. So here you go, Jeff, It's
time for football at five. Wex was out at OTAs today.
We have talked about the fact that the Tank Dell
not only I mean saying he made an appearance is
not really doing it justice. But I'm I'm telling you

(01:57:40):
right now, you know the guys in that locker room.
I've been around the guys in that locker room. We
know what Tank Dell meant to the team before he
went down. We obviously saw how CJ reacted amongst others
when he went down. I mean, it's not often you
see an actual ambulance drive onto the playing surface during
a game. That's how serious this was. You may not

(01:58:01):
know the answer to this. That's why I'm asking this.

Speaker 2 (01:58:03):
Who do you think over the three days we've been
out there, because I think it was two of the
three days, not all three days.

Speaker 4 (01:58:08):
Who do you think you?

Speaker 2 (01:58:09):
I have seen Tank Dell walking across from the stadium
to the practice facility with and spend the most time
on that walk with. Who do you think that player is?
I feel like CJ is too easy of an answer.

Speaker 4 (01:58:20):
It's not. CJ.

Speaker 2 (01:58:21):
Has walked across with some coaches, Bill Laser one day,
usually he's not with the other. The three quarterbacks have
actually come across separately every day. Are they on opposite
sides of the room like JJ McCarthy and Kyler Murray? No, no,
this is no.

Speaker 4 (01:58:36):
It's not CJ. Nico Collins, he has been around him,
But that's not the answer. Is it a coach or
another player?

Speaker 2 (01:58:42):
It's another player, David Montgomery, It's Brevin Jordan oh an
off injured receiver, a rehabbing player, a guy has been
hurt a lot, unfortunately, and the two of them missed
the entire season and last year together.

Speaker 4 (01:59:01):
So they have in common.

Speaker 2 (01:59:02):
No, so what did they do all year together rehabbed?
They've came around each other probably more than any two
players on the entire football team, and they obviously understand
one another. Both Brevin Jordan and now Tank Dell have
participated in various parts of practice while we've been out there,
and remember we don't we're not invited. I don't mean
to say it that way, but it's true to every
single off season activity that they have on the field.

(01:59:24):
They've probably had minimum six practices, maybe a couple more.
We've been out there for three of them. Will be
out there all week next week when they're out there,
and then they'll take the rest of the summer off.
But I couldn't tell you the exact amount of work
that those two particular players are getting in. But they're
both in position, it looks like to be ready for
this start of training camp and to be only held
back by what we want to make sure they're ready

(01:59:46):
for the season. So even though they're fully healthy, our
plan of practicing is, well, they're not going to practice
four straight days. We're not gonna practice four out of
six days, or we're gonna practice specifically on this day
and not that day, and then when we have pads on,
you're gonna be out there for this and not that,
because I'm sure there's a plan to make sure that
they are ready for the season, just because they've been
away so long and they want to make sure that

(02:00:07):
these injuries are not something that slow them down. They're
both past them, but football is still different and doing
football activities definitely is a different animal. And then at
some point we'll see about what if any activity and
joint practices or preseason games will take place. I mean,
as silly as this sounds, I don't know why this

(02:00:28):
thought crossed my mind when I was watching the team
work today, but it did, and so I'll share it here.

Speaker 4 (02:00:33):
I was looking at, you know, just guys being used.

Speaker 2 (02:00:35):
The second teamers are out there and third teams are working,
and he's this is what's happening, and you know, Davis
Mills is throwing to this guy and this guy's catching
that pass. I was ready to say that Jawar Jordan
and Lewis Bond are going to lead the team in
rushing and receiving respectively during the preseason. Players that are
going to be there that they're going to want to

(02:00:56):
get work for so either other guys aren't getting work
that they don't want to get out there, or in
Bond's case, he's obviously a rookie wide receiver. And I again,
the little that we get to see, I think he's
somebody that they are are very very excited that they
did draft and they're probably gonna get a lot of
work from him, probably part of their return game during
the preseason. And that was one thing that we talked

(02:01:18):
to Frank Ross a little bit about today.

Speaker 4 (02:01:20):
The return game.

Speaker 2 (02:01:21):
You know, you can see who's getting work, and wood
he marks is one of them. I mentioned this with
CJ the other day and I'll mention it with Woody today.
I can't tell exactly what he's wearing with his jersey.
Does he have more padding underneath it? Is there a
little bit more of a shell or something that he's
got on. If not, he looks significantly bigger. And I've
seen him around over the offseason. He's been involved in

(02:01:43):
some events that I've seen him there. He looks like
he's just big everywhere. Bigger legs, bigger chest, bigger arms,
and that happens a lot. I don't know if that's
accurate or not. I'm just telling you what I'm seeing,
and he's gotten some work in with their you know,
return teams, you know, receiving and punts and kicks and
getting out there and them. I think he'll be given
that opportunity in training camp, preseason, joint practices, et cetera.

Speaker 4 (02:02:07):
But all of this is likely still going to be
Jalen Nole's gig.

Speaker 2 (02:02:11):
Knowles should have a bigger role in the offense, but
he should have the biggest role in the return game.
Tank Dell was electric and somewhat tentative from a team stamp,
Do we really want him back there for all these
punt returns? Would we use him more on kick return?
You know he's going to be electric, but do you
want to put him in harm's win. A lot of
teams feel that way about players who matter to their offense.

(02:02:34):
Last year, Jalen Nole barely mattered for their offense, so
having him as the return man no problem at all.
Darren Sproles is on this coaching staff during the offseason.
It's part of the Bill Walsh coaching diversity initiative, and.

Speaker 4 (02:02:47):
He knows a thing or two about that.

Speaker 2 (02:02:49):
It was impossible for me not to notice because I
don't talk to anybody and only lock in on practice
and I'm not social. When they were going through their
kick return drills, Nol maybe first in line than Woody,
then Jordan and Kelly and a few others. As soon
as he received the first kick and ran his little return,
he wasn't a real return and there was no blocking.

(02:03:10):
He comes back and he spent forty five seconds, a minute,
minute and a half talking to Darren Sprolls, you know,
looking up in the air and here's where your feet
and do it. And he was clearly he's talking about
very specific things. Sprolls was just electric every time he
had the ball in his hands, no matter how he
was being used, whether he was out of the backfield
or very very significantly as a return man, both in
college and then when he got to the NFL. It's

(02:03:32):
why he was an NFL player for as long as
he was because with the ball in his hands and
the size that he was and he's Jalen Knowle's not
the tallest or biggest guy. He's noticeably bigger than coach
coach Sprolls out there. But I was just tiny, Yeah
he is, And I just noticed that they were having
a pretty significant, detailed conversation. And when we talked to
Frank Ross today, I had asked him a question because

(02:03:55):
he said we were talking about He was talking about
what he Mark's bigger guy. You know, falling forward for
three yards on a return matters. Guys who do that,
you know, he said, wide receivers sometimes aren't. Aren't the
guys that are willing to run through the trash of
a return. They've got speed, so they'll just bounce it outside,
and which is fine too, But he was talking about that.
So I brought it up to him, when you said

(02:04:16):
that about wide receivers, how does that apply to say
Jalen Nole and and about what he can do? And
he brought up Darren Sproles in the midst of his
answer and said, you know, he brought up that he
remembered doing what he did in a bowl game at
Kansas State twenty plus years ago, and that he and
Darren have had conversations about how to get the most
and what's what are some things to do with Jalen

(02:04:37):
Knowle specifically, I think we're gonna see incredible things in
their return game for those reasons, I might have thought
this anyway, But having Darren Sproles around, I've seen him
to obviously he was working with the running backs more today.
These are the things you he's It's good for him.
It's great for Jordan Hicks, who's a part of this program.
You've got to coach Rice, that's part of this. It's

(02:04:58):
great for them. It's it's an awe awesome deal. But
the teams actually can benefit from these coaches already who
are relatively young in their career when many of them
are former players. Many of them are particularly skilled at
certain things. Hicks is in that same group Darren Sproles.
I don't know what kind of path his coaching career takes,
but I can't imagine a coaching staff that has him

(02:05:19):
on their coaching staff doesn't think this guy's awesome. This
guy is extremely helpful because he can teach things firsthand
on field knowledge that you know, maybe resonates more with players.

Speaker 1 (02:05:31):
Sometimes I wonder about guys like that, and he was not.
I mean, he was a superstar, like in a niche
part of the game. You always hear about coaches, but
this happens, especially in the NBA, where they were a
superstar and so they can't possibly coach because they can't
Isaiah Magic. Well, that's why Larry Bird was such an aberration. Yep,

(02:05:51):
he took him to within this close of going to
the finals. But yeah, there's an MJ guy, which, by
the way, greatest send off exchange in the history of
the NBA when he and MJ meet up on the
last dance after the Bulls win in seven games and
he says, bleep you you bleep like it's nothing. Larry

(02:06:12):
just kind of smirks because he's Larry.

Speaker 4 (02:06:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:06:15):
Anyway, I just don't know if if sometimes you know
what you have in your brain and what you were
able to do in the case of Sprolls, you know,
it's it's hard to be coaching a guy that just
doesn't have that speed or those instincts, are all of
the above, but yet you're you're tasked.

Speaker 4 (02:06:33):
With coaching him up, so to speak.

Speaker 2 (02:06:34):
Anyone come to mind immediately when I throw this question
at you, the best NFL player that's a current NFL coach.

Speaker 4 (02:06:43):
Gosh, that's a really really names.

Speaker 2 (02:06:46):
Jumped to my mind, even though they weren't unbelievable players
necessarily good because one of the two and Mike Rabel.

Speaker 1 (02:06:53):
Is Mike Frabel was an All Pro linebacker. He was,
I mean him and him and Tomiko have a lot
in common, both AFC linebackers who were kind of captains
of their defenses.

Speaker 2 (02:07:04):
Having said that, would you say that Aaron Glenn is
the answer, though.

Speaker 1 (02:07:10):
I mean, did he have the most accolades as a
defensive player or player of any kind? It's a coach
about looking all that stuff up. It feels like, yes,
multiple time pro bowler, I'm sure elite level player at
his position for more than a decade.

Speaker 2 (02:07:28):
I just i'd need the list of coaches. We're talking
head coaches only off Yeah, head coaches, Oh my gosh.
Stafs are full of coaches that have had some, you know,
some noteworthy moments. But again, the other part of it
is in this day and age, I talk about it
in baseball all the time, like you really have to
love it because if you played in the last fifteen
twenty years, you have made so much money, you're not

(02:07:52):
gonna you usually don't want to go into that type
of lifestyle because you.

Speaker 4 (02:07:55):
Just don't have to.

Speaker 1 (02:07:56):
Funny, you should mention that just last night in a
YouTube rabbit hole as part of my activities that were
not watching a CURRENTA finals game. Yeah, I saw the
game six of the Western Conference Finals between the Spurs
and the Rockets. I think it was, you know, the
algorithm because of whatever was my timeline lately in the

(02:08:17):
Spurs and all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 2 (02:08:19):
So that's Sam Cassell's second year baller. He's big, big wheelbarrow. Yeah,
and he showed you he's still coaching. Hasn't gotten a
head coaching gig. But I was thinking about that Ellie
coach Trexler coached a little bit true.

Speaker 4 (02:08:39):
Now he's commissionering three.

Speaker 1 (02:08:41):
Yeah, but that's that's hard to do unless it's ingrained
because you're still doing the same travel gig, the same
grind and all that kind of stuff. You have to
love it, you really do, especially NFL though you're sleeping there.

Speaker 2 (02:08:53):
Nice little moment before last night's game between the Spurs
and the Knicks and Charles Barkley is famous for his
mouth as it refers to when it opens and says
things about San Antonio. They had a nice little moment
regarding that last night before the game. We'll share that
with again next.

Speaker 8 (02:09:11):
The all right, when Charles Barkley was.

Speaker 1 (02:09:18):
Being derogatory towards the city of San Antonio, which time, Well,
that's the thing.

Speaker 4 (02:09:25):
He was kind of complimentary in so doing.

Speaker 1 (02:09:28):
Do you realize that he was complimenting one of their
food desserts but also saying it was the cause of
the size of their women population when he referred to
them as I believe.

Speaker 2 (02:09:41):
The size of their women in their population or the size.

Speaker 1 (02:09:45):
Of their correct. I don't think churros are causing more
births of females.

Speaker 4 (02:09:50):
Okay, okay, I was.

Speaker 2 (02:09:51):
Not aware of that. So there's no churros in the
audio put together. Uh well, yeah, that's older. I'm just
saying he has mentioned that before as a highlight of
the city. Yeah, absolutely so.

Speaker 4 (02:10:05):
In other words, he said some.

Speaker 1 (02:10:07):
Derogatory things about the population of the city, the city itself,
so on and so forth.

Speaker 4 (02:10:13):
So what do you think the inside the NBA crew
thought they'd do.

Speaker 6 (02:10:17):
Well.

Speaker 4 (02:10:18):
They completely ambushed him with the current mayor of San Antonio.

Speaker 2 (02:10:23):
So they had their stage in arena jack Ernie, Kenny Charles.

Speaker 4 (02:10:29):
First time they've ever covered the finals.

Speaker 2 (02:10:32):
Yeah, that we mentioned their whole who's covering all this
stuff for ESPN and who's doing what conference finals? Veterans
bringing this as part of their acquisition. Product was a
no brainer. Having them do the finals and all these
postseason games.

Speaker 4 (02:10:47):
Perfect. That's why, it's why they're there.

Speaker 2 (02:10:50):
Any of ESPN's it's great pregame coverage, it's great postgame
coverage extended. It's awesome. It's great that they're there. It's
definitely what fans I think want. So they had them
all there on their little studio set inside the arena
before the game, and they trotted out a little montage
of alved Charles Barkley's San Antonio Negativity, and then when
they came out of that, they were all sitting on

(02:11:11):
their studio set with the Mayor of San Antonio.

Speaker 10 (02:11:14):
He jones, it's the mayor of San Antonio. Well before
you were mayor. For a background, you needed his history.
What you're dealing with here with Chuck and set a
long time ago.

Speaker 4 (02:11:24):
You can't teach courage, you can't teach class, and mister
Barkley reminds us of that.

Speaker 10 (02:11:31):
I'm so glad to be back in your beautiful city. Hey, everybody,
I took my walk today.

Speaker 4 (02:11:36):
Everybody was fantastic.

Speaker 10 (02:11:38):
They know I'm just joking around.

Speaker 4 (02:11:39):
I'm waiting for that porgy to prove you wrong. Stories
are gonna win this.

Speaker 2 (02:11:43):
The dog that's been predicting NFL or NBA games by
bouncing a ball off his face down the staircase into
trash cans representing teams obviously picked the other team.

Speaker 4 (02:11:53):
Yeah. He also picked the Rockets to beat the Lakers.
So that guy's a fraud. The dog. Yeah, that that guy,
the dog.

Speaker 2 (02:11:58):
Charles was talking about his walk around San Antonio. I
thought I did the necessary research to make sure it
wasn't AI generated or I got duped. But the four
Things seated behind Mitch Johnson in the last series on
two women. I believe both of those women were with
Charles during his time in San Antonio. They took pictures

(02:12:20):
with him. They were really nice. It's great here in
San Antonio, and I'm sure everybody knows about the four
Things that were behind Mitch Johnson.

Speaker 4 (02:12:26):
Throughout the series.

Speaker 2 (02:12:29):
They were exposed chests to the amount they can be
exposed on TV the way you say it, Bazangas.

Speaker 1 (02:12:39):
Come on, dude, do you want me to just like
throw away the rest of the next ten minutes of
the segment?

Speaker 2 (02:12:44):
I mean, I bags of fun. They're very, very well known,
despite their not very well. Can I tell everybody more
well known listening to the show and watching us that
if I could get in the time machine and go
back to when Adam Wexler was approaching women during his
dating days, I would.

Speaker 4 (02:13:05):
I wouldn't have been talking about that, so probably be
shut down like Jim Carrey in the Elevator. Yes, well,
he couldn't lie. He used an analogy with Sugar Ray Leonard.
We got to go back there and see how it happened. Yeah,
like you, I mean, come on, you didn't say come
here often? That is accurate. Where did you pick up hicks?

Speaker 5 (02:13:26):
Come on?

Speaker 1 (02:13:27):
Where is your favorite go to a watering hole of
some sort in Austin? Yes, parties, I know you said
this before. Where did you an RM meet.

Speaker 4 (02:13:36):
At a local watering in Austin?

Speaker 7 (02:13:39):
No?

Speaker 4 (02:13:40):
Here in Houston.

Speaker 2 (02:13:40):
We did not know each other in Austin despite being
there for the same four years. We met back in
Houston not long after, and yes, it was at a bar.

Speaker 1 (02:13:49):
This is like the time me and Teresa discovered that
we were actually living across the street from each other
for about a year when I was in some apartments
and she was in the town homes across the street
and we never knew it.

Speaker 4 (02:14:00):
But what did you say? Seriously, I want to know.

Speaker 2 (02:14:04):
No, I can't even know idea. I can't even say
on air what I said to Teresa. I'm sure somebody news.
I mean we had similar friends and ultimately that's probably
where rituals.

Speaker 4 (02:14:14):
Yeah, she were you set up? No, I mean it
wasn't a blind date.

Speaker 2 (02:14:18):
I asked her out after we had met in public
at a few places and she said yes, she said
yes more than once.

Speaker 4 (02:14:26):
What do you mean, Oh, yeah, I know that. Will you?

Speaker 2 (02:14:30):
You've made my life as this great and will you
something like that? I can't imagine another day something I
don't know if there's ever a man where I know
for a fact he will not be doing the whole
renew your vows thing. It's Adam Wexley.

Speaker 4 (02:14:48):
That would be fun.

Speaker 1 (02:14:48):
It's a party, right, No, because I can just hear
you like it's just saying for the sake of argument,
R comes up. She's like, you know, we're coming up
on twenty years or whatever. I feel like we should
renew our vows. And I, without a shadow of a
doubt wex would turn to her, might not even look
at her and be like why we already did it once.
That's the most wex answer response to that question I

(02:15:11):
can think of.

Speaker 2 (02:15:12):
I could always imagined our life together, our family would
be just unbelievably great in every way, but it's been
so much more. Love yare something like that? Oh my gosh,
what are you a Hallmark card writer? I mean I
could probably find something to say in one of those cards. Yeah,
maybe personalize it a little bit.

Speaker 1 (02:15:34):
You know we hate cards. Well, it's it's a waste
of time and money. I can understand that. Let me
just tell you what I feel like.

Speaker 4 (02:15:41):
Make your own homemade card. That's what the kids do.

Speaker 2 (02:15:44):
The adults should do it. So Charles Barkley he I'm
assuming he picked the Spurs, right. I don't honestly know
who he picked. I know he shouted out, Jenobili.

Speaker 4 (02:15:53):
I can't.

Speaker 2 (02:15:54):
Nobody comes to mind, after looking at all this stuff
or reading all this stuff watching that of anybody who
picked the Knicks.

Speaker 4 (02:16:00):
I do think it was pretty all even.

Speaker 2 (02:16:03):
Okay, which doesn't count for anything because he's Stevens and
it's it's to me it probably shouldn't have been that way.
I was thinking that way forever, Like whoever wins, look
who's in the Western Conference Finals. Of course I'm picking
them whoever it is, and I ultimately did. But by
the time both of these teams arrived, it was a
much tougher decision than I thought it was ever gonna be.

Speaker 1 (02:16:23):
Whatever happened to Oh my gosh, the Spurs just played
a knockdown, drag out all seven game series. They're gonna
be like, it's gonna be tough on them. Nobody's talking
about that at least, which I'm glad.

Speaker 2 (02:16:34):
I think the point of view I brought it up
in the first time we brought this topic up. The
Knicks need they have to win a game on the
road to win the series.

Speaker 4 (02:16:43):
They've already done that.

Speaker 2 (02:16:44):
This was the game. They've been rested, they've been looking
at film, they've been getting prepared, they've been doing everything
necessary to take this game.

Speaker 4 (02:16:53):
Do you think the rust fact they did play in
and that's why they trailed early.

Speaker 2 (02:16:57):
It was maybe it didn't seem like it the way
they were playing, it didn't seem like it was anything
of consequence.

Speaker 4 (02:17:03):
Not really. I mean I brought it up yesterday.

Speaker 2 (02:17:05):
I thought it might be a factor, and I said,
they need to kind of survive the first five minutes,
eight minutes, they.

Speaker 4 (02:17:10):
Clearly did say I'm with you. It's just they were
just better.

Speaker 2 (02:17:13):
That's that really is all they were. They were down
the stretch for sure. This was a Kevin Durant game.
What does he always say? And everybody says it with
the Rockets because they miss so often.

Speaker 4 (02:17:21):
I'm Kevin Durant.

Speaker 2 (02:17:22):
It's a make or miss league. Oh he doesn't miss.
He doesn't miss. But his rest of them Steam has
had some bad shooting nights. Oh man, And well he
didn't miss, nor did he play.

Speaker 4 (02:17:33):
He didn't.

Speaker 2 (02:17:33):
All the Rockets were having bad shooting nights against the Lakes.

Speaker 4 (02:17:36):
He did miss most of the series.

Speaker 2 (02:17:40):
Gosh, what a Critill looks good in the uniform though, well, yeah,
by the way, we should probably go ahead and share
his reaction.

Speaker 4 (02:17:46):
I don't think it's a I don't think it's a problem.
If we do.

Speaker 1 (02:17:48):
We were told on good authority that you know, they
shot all these vignettes and basically all the social media
content that you're seeing today weeks months ago. In fact,
I think they told us.

Speaker 2 (02:18:05):
Yeah, I know the season has been over for a bit.
We got this Jersey reveal. If we could get you
all all you guys back to the earlier Yeah, they
did it a long time ago, and.

Speaker 4 (02:18:14):
We'll come out to you.

Speaker 1 (02:18:15):
Apparently, when Kevin Durant was the first one there that
day and when he walked in, his exact reaction to
seeing the new jerseys because they were all there in
front of him to put on, was holy.

Speaker 4 (02:18:27):
And then he said something else. So he liked it.

Speaker 1 (02:18:31):
He like, yeah, he liked it a lot. He liked
and most of them did so again. Pop up tomorrow
at the George R. Brown I believe it's Hall D
but it's in the George R.

Speaker 4 (02:18:42):
Browns.

Speaker 1 (02:18:42):
If you get inside, you're in a good place. Ten
am to eight pm is the hours, and you'll have
Rudy T, Steve Francis, and Vernon Maxwell all there at
different times, starting at noon. I believe Rudy's the first
one who's gonna be signing autographs. And it's really cool
event you get your hands on that gear, not the jerseys.

(02:19:03):
I just want to say this. The jerseys aren't available.
They are available for pre order, but everything else that
you've seen, hats, tops, t shirts, all that kind of
stuff is going to be available at this pop up,
So pretty cool thing.

Speaker 4 (02:19:18):
Very awesome stuff. They'll enjoy it.

Speaker 2 (02:19:21):
Yep, you'll buy it, you'll wear it, and hopefully they
will win in it. The next championship will look like that.

Speaker 4 (02:19:27):
How's that sound just like the last one looked.

Speaker 2 (02:19:29):
I hope that's the case we got In case you
missed it coming your way. Next, we have tickets to
give away that we have not mentioned. You have to
go see Motley Crew. All that on the other side.
Next here on the A team, the eight.

Speaker 4 (02:19:40):
A few things to get to here.

Speaker 2 (02:19:42):
On a Thursday edition of we didn't talk about anything important.
Then that's what in case you missed it is here
for to get you caught up on things we might
have otherwise missed. One thing we didn't miss, but worth
hitting it again. The Astros are playing the Pirates tonight,
and two players who were not a part of last
night's incredible come from behind victory are now on the

(02:20:02):
team and in the lineup. Lamont Wade Junior is in
left field. Colin Price is doing the catching for Kaiwai Tang.
Wade was signed in free agency. He was with the
Triple A team for the Chicago White Sox before they
let him go.

Speaker 4 (02:20:17):
He's not appeared in a major league game in twenty
twenty six.

Speaker 2 (02:20:20):
This has a pretty good amount of major league experience
at a multitude of positions. He's not been particularly good
the last two years, but was perfectly capable of holding
down a spot in the lineup every day before that.
And Colin Price is making his major league debut for
the Astros. Looking over the astros top prospects and will
be Pipeline's top thirty, Colin Price catcher not among them,

(02:20:43):
he is a catcher in their system. It's had a
reasonably good offensive season so far this season for the
Space Cowboys. Payna Alvarez Walker, Perettis Wade is batting fifth.
He has a left handed batter, does a strikeout a lot,
Cam Smith sixth. Tremeel is your center fielder batting seventh,
fall by Price and Nick Allen at second base. Possibility

(02:21:05):
that with today's session of live VP for Jose al
Tuve going seemingly just as well as yesterday's did, he
could be activated essentially at any time, possibly as early
as this weekend against the Athletics, who visit after tonight's
series finale with the Pirates.

Speaker 4 (02:21:24):
What else do we have? Josh a little bit at
Texans News here for you.

Speaker 11 (02:21:28):
The Houston Texans have agreed to terms with their first
round pick, Kelin rutt Ledge. Kind of a formality now
that all these deals are slotted, but nice to know
it's taken care of afore your deal as you would expect.
And this signing leaves only their fourth round guard for
Betchy wee Wu is the only unsigned draft picks at
this point.

Speaker 2 (02:21:47):
Yeah, both of them getting work as if they have
been here from under contract. It's as Josh noted, it's
of no significance, and it also doesn't prevent players from practicing.
You know, they practiced during rookie mini camp, and they
practiced every day as healthy players during their Ota sessions.
The kid from Oklahoma, Fabeci's getting all of his work
at guard, and as expected, Rutledge is getting work at

(02:22:10):
both guard and center. I would say more of the
work that we've seen has come at the center position,
both with the ones and the two's just different combinations
they've looked at. So that is exactly what I think
we expected when they made him a first round pick,
and I think that is the one of the few
real competitions that they will have this training camp. I

(02:22:34):
think they clearly have a competition that will all be
watching for the punter. But this is a real competition
they actually will have on the offensive line. Between Jake
Andrews and Keelan Rutledge. I think one of them will
be starting on opening day at center and the other
one will not be in the starting not among the
starting five linemen.

Speaker 4 (02:22:53):
But there's always a rotation. I hope not. Well, why not?

Speaker 2 (02:22:57):
I'm not rotating my center ever, walks say offensive line
in general? I hope not this year's team Ursery and
Braden Smith or your tackles teller and Ingram of your guards.
Whoever wins the competition is your center. They take every
single snap of healthy right now.

Speaker 4 (02:23:13):
On June fourth. Who wins that competition at center? Guess?
That's what I was gonna say.

Speaker 2 (02:23:20):
It's unfortunate in that he would obviously be all of
this is new to him. It's his first go around.
The center is the extremely important with his line calls
and everything else that goes into the line. You're playing
from a deficit already. But he's probably the better physical
player and if you can handle all those things, then
that's why I'll make him my guess. Having not seen

(02:23:42):
them in a single play where they're wearing pads against
any players wearing pads as a Texan, what else do
we have?

Speaker 4 (02:23:49):
Yeah, Ea Sports.

Speaker 11 (02:23:50):
We talked about Madden yesterday with Caleb Williams being on
the cover there. Well, they're going to drop tonight the
latest version of the game, and they put out some
social media posts promoting it that. The posts included Fernando
Mendoza and his Raiders uniform, Miles Garrett and his new
duds as a ram, but it also showed a game
with the Eagles and Giants where they're featuring a play

(02:24:10):
and it's the tush push. The tush push has not
been available on Madden in previous versions like that. Of course,
they had quarterback sneaks, but not the tush push. So
it looks like that is happening. Is they show a
shot at Jalen Hurts preparing to plunge into the line
and attempt to touch down.

Speaker 4 (02:24:26):
All right, Josh, you play a lot of madd in
your life.

Speaker 3 (02:24:28):
I have.

Speaker 4 (02:24:30):
You have two a once upon a time.

Speaker 2 (02:24:33):
Well, what would your opponent do previously that would make
you say, come on man, that's just ridiculous.

Speaker 4 (02:24:42):
This is you do it every single time. This is
no fun. What was it? I'll tell you, okay, because
that's what the tushpush will be. Well, it's not.

Speaker 1 (02:24:51):
So this is also egregious in a completely different way,
if this makes sense. When I was in school college,
I mean, my roommate loved to just backpedal, backpedal into
the backfield with Michael Vick of course yep, and just
keep running around until somebody inevitably got open and throw

(02:25:11):
some bs up there.

Speaker 4 (02:25:13):
That's what it was, just straight bs and score a touchdown.
That's what this is.

Speaker 1 (02:25:19):
It's just in a goal line setting and or a
first down setting, but for the most part goal line.

Speaker 4 (02:25:25):
So it's a weighted sheet. So josh, now they're putting
it into the game.

Speaker 2 (02:25:28):
What's what's your Come on, man, throw your controller and
leave the apartment.

Speaker 11 (02:25:32):
I threw a lot of controllers the same one because
it's the one with Michael Vick on the cover, and
he goes so fast. My opponent would take the snap.
You can out him here, who is my buddy Joe?
And then he would sprint directly to the sideline where
there was nobody over there.

Speaker 4 (02:25:45):
It's the same Joe that I know.

Speaker 1 (02:25:47):
I doubt it, but maybe we all did see crap
to me on that game too one time, and wex
witnessed it.

Speaker 4 (02:25:53):
It's possible. Yeah, same deal he was. You just couldn't
do anything against Vick.

Speaker 2 (02:25:57):
It was nasty, like someone who would only play you
if they got to pick a very specific I only
play with this team, just what you.

Speaker 1 (02:26:05):
Wanted to end up doing. You would say to them, Uh,
why don't you play me with any other team? You
can't beat me with everybody else since you're so good.
That's kind of how it felt.

Speaker 11 (02:26:13):
My way to respond was I put Antonio Gates in
motion and have him run a hot route over the
middle of the field.

Speaker 4 (02:26:20):
And that was pretty darn hard. So you were a
big Chargers guy.

Speaker 11 (02:26:23):
Just because of Gates. I would do it with the
Patriots with Gronk. I just found with the tight end
you had an advantage.

Speaker 1 (02:26:28):
Like the Chargers had a lot of players that were
very mad and friendly like that. Not Philip Rivers from
a running standpoint, because we all know he was a statue.
He was stuck in quicksand. But they had lt they
had Gates, they had uh didn't they have sprolls?

Speaker 2 (02:26:44):
Yes?

Speaker 1 (02:26:44):
I mean it weren't Sprolls and lt on the same
team at one point. Yes, I mean that's a lot
of speed on the outside.

Speaker 2 (02:26:50):
I'm an older fella, and I think for me, I
was with Bill Walsh college football and the opponent would
always be Florida State, and they had an unstoppable play.
It was basically a full back circle, a pass to
William Floyd and he just over and over.

Speaker 4 (02:27:10):
I'm like, how is this fun?

Speaker 1 (02:27:12):
But why didn't you tell that person, okay, you can't
play with him? I just said you with me, and
I just rolled out and you left. You threw the
controller and you dropped everything and left something like that
and anything else.

Speaker 4 (02:27:24):
Nothing, That's all right. I got something tail end here.

Speaker 1 (02:27:28):
Happy ninety seventh birthday to my paternal grandfather, Gerald Clinton.
I actually wish him a happy birthday. On the show
a few years back, this guy is bionic.

Speaker 4 (02:27:41):
I don't know what he ate, I don't know what
he did.

Speaker 1 (02:27:43):
I know he exercised a lot, like individual exercises every day.
This guy still mows his yard every single week during
the summer. He builds things with his bare hands. He's
the man. So happy birthday.

Speaker 2 (02:27:55):
Another tremendous example of why you are just so much
better of a person than I am. Why it was
Robin's birthday yesterday. I didn't say a word on the
show Happy birthday, Grandpa. Sorry my co host didn't wish
abby birthday to his wife on the air. I think

(02:28:17):
you should have gone with that as a trivia question, actually,
but I didn't. We do have tickets to give away,
not yet mentioned here on the show, but we got
them for you here Motley Cruz playing the Woodlands Pavilion.
They're bringing Tesla and Extreme with them. It's the return
of the Carnival of Sins tour and it's on September eleventh.
It's at the Woodlands Pavilion. Tickets are on sale now

(02:28:38):
ticketmaster dot com. But you can win them right now
because you've been listening to the show. We love you
for doing that, and that's how we're gonna get the
tickets to you.

Speaker 4 (02:28:45):
Listen to the show. Know the answer.

Speaker 2 (02:28:46):
We'll ask you a question here momentarily and you can
call in at seven one three two one two five
seven ninety to get to the show. And like I said,
you could buy him a Ticketmaster dot Com or you
could win them with us here. Uh, the very last segment,
we talked about something we want to see if you
were listening to and thus you'll have the answer to
We're talking about the Madden game, Madden twenty seven, the

(02:29:08):
one with Caleb Williams on the cover, the one that
is now going to include the ability to break the
huddle and jam all of your players into the line
and run a tush push. The tush push is being
introduced in Madden twenty seven. It's in the NFL, thus
it's in the game, and now it is going to
be in the game. So I asked both a See

(02:29:30):
and Josh, what was it that ticked you off so
much that an opponent of yours would always do when
they played you in Madden over the years that might
make you throw the controller, quit the game, or start crying.

Speaker 4 (02:29:43):
Neither of them admitted to crying, but both of them
said they threw the never cried over a Madden.

Speaker 2 (02:29:48):
But they also chose the very same thing that an
opponent would always do that made them very angry.

Speaker 4 (02:29:56):
It was a very specific thing.

Speaker 2 (02:29:58):
It was actually choosing a team that you had this
very very specific player on it that was rather difficult
to defend, and they would always use him and it
was really really not fun. Who was that player that
would be used against not only these two guys, but
everybody else knows it because it probably happened to them too.
Who is that player that would make them say, come on, man,

(02:30:20):
what fun is this? Why do you have to use
that team that player and run that play all the time?
Who's that player seven one three, two one two five
seven ninety used in Madden that makes you want us
not play at all? It's dog eat dog world, It
absolutely is. We'll see if you know the answer to that.
Seven one three, two one two five seven to ninety.

(02:30:41):
Game one of the NBA Finals last night went the
way of the Knicks. We'll have plenty of time to
dissect our thoughts on game two. It is Friday nights.
Game two of the NHL Standley Cup is tonight, Game
three of the Astros series with the Pirates, game six
of their home stand They lost to out of three
to the Despite playing very good baseball in that series,

(02:31:03):
got Mizerowski in the finale and shut out. They did
not play good baseball in the opening game of the
series against the Pirates in losing and it did not
look like anything was going to be different last night
when they went to the bottom of the seventh inning
down eight to three, only four innings from the ragining
pitcher of the month in May, and then multiple bullpen
arms gave up those four runs, including the three spot

(02:31:24):
put on Nate Pearson, the first base runners and run
scored against oliber Santa, and then the Astros got a
two run homer in the bottom of the seventh, a
very unlikely rally. With two outs in the eighth, down four,
they scored six. Cam Smith driving in the game, winning
a go ahead runs with his triple, and the Astros

(02:31:46):
got Josh haterback. Truly, he came back to be available
when this series began, but he pitched in his first
game last night, first time since August eleventh. The no
hitter didn't really jump start the Astros season like many
thought it might. Well, last night's outrageously exciting, awesome, great

(02:32:08):
vibes long victory almost four hours worth, well, that send
the Astros way closer to five hundred than they are.
It feels like they're closer than they are. There's still
seven games under heading into play tonight. My honest opinion, yes,
it's fifty to fifty.

Speaker 1 (02:32:29):
Like, I know that sounds like it's disingenuous, but it's
the most baseball answer I can give, because, like you
said earlier, momentum is nothing if not fleeting in baseball,
and it's a new picture every day. It's a new
game every.

Speaker 4 (02:32:44):
Yeah, i'd look I like it. I like their chances.
I just think that.

Speaker 1 (02:32:52):
It's just so hard to harness something like that. And
that's why you get so many cliches when you talk
to managers, when you talk to players. There are no
there is no more of a cliche sport or cliche
full sport than baseball. And that's why Craig Bigio, no
matter how many times he said, other than tip your caf,
it's just baseball, he would say.

Speaker 4 (02:33:13):
What just one game at that time?

Speaker 2 (02:33:15):
Will yord On Alvarez pass Alex Bregman on the Astros
all time home run list tonight? Yeah, they're tied at
one ninety one.

Speaker 4 (02:33:23):
Yeah, Well, look who he's facing.

Speaker 2 (02:33:26):
He's only pitched once this year. Jared Joe's is making
his second appearance of the season.

Speaker 1 (02:33:31):
He chooses to pitch to the Monster Gods speed Man
because that's what's going to be on that baseball.

Speaker 4 (02:33:38):
You see what I just did there. If he chooses
what's going to be on the baseball the speed of God.

Speaker 1 (02:33:43):
Okay, all right, so god speed trying to pitch that
guy and get him out, because I really do think
he won't.

Speaker 4 (02:33:49):
Like he'll do the faith four. Last night they pitched
to him.

Speaker 7 (02:33:53):
I know.

Speaker 1 (02:33:53):
That's why they're not going to pitch to him tonight.
That's what I'm saying. I don't think he's going to
see a pitch to hit, whether it's intentional or not. Oh, intentional,
even though it's intentional. I think that's what we're looking at.

Speaker 4 (02:34:03):
I say he walks less than one time, one time
or less tonight, Well.

Speaker 1 (02:34:07):
If he hits a nuke the first time up, he's
gonna walk more than once because they're not gonna pitch
to him.

Speaker 2 (02:34:11):
No, say that kid, No game tonight for the Mariners.
The Athletics will be here tomorrow. They have a rare
not as rare as it once was. Night game at
Wrigley tonight. I guess the Cubs, why.

Speaker 1 (02:34:23):
Don't you go ahead and stop acting like they're the
big bad A's and start beating up on them again?

Speaker 4 (02:34:27):
Astros?

Speaker 2 (02:34:28):
Yeah, they come in not I mean they've played a
little bit better, but they've fallen under five hundred. They've
obviously think not only have they fallen out of first place,
they're not even in second place, but they've.

Speaker 4 (02:34:36):
Owned the Astros for two straight seasons.

Speaker 7 (02:34:38):
Now.

Speaker 2 (02:34:39):
Yes, the first series of the season, during that ten
game road trip, I don't know what other word to use.

Speaker 4 (02:34:45):
It was disastrous.

Speaker 2 (02:34:46):
It was an awful time, and it's spread into more
awful baseball that road trip, and that's really their whole season.
The Astros went one to nine on that ten game
road trip, their first road trip of the season.

Speaker 4 (02:34:57):
Take it out.

Speaker 2 (02:34:58):
They're twenty seven and twenty with all the injuries and
everything else. Again, you can't take out game five s.
That's the whole reason they're not an average baseball team.
They're a bad baseball team. Seven games under five hundred
and sixty three games of the year, you're bad. If
that one road trip didn't take place, that's the whole thing.

Speaker 1 (02:35:16):
And then some a game over five hundred has you
solidly in second place in the division right now, right, Yeah,
I mean, look, I hope that's the case. I hope
that something comes of this, but I think more than
anything else, momentum, any of that kind of stuff. You
just want the most healthy version of all. I mean,
Jeff Passen was doing an article today where he trades

(02:35:38):
somebody or somebody's off of every single team, and that's
what he talked about his Astro that might be dealt.
By the way, in case you're wondering, it's purely hypothetical.
It's not because he knows anything. Was Jeremy Pana, But
what he said in the little synopsis underneath that was
Al two Bay's coming back soon.

Speaker 4 (02:35:57):
Hunter Brown is right around the corner at it.

Speaker 1 (02:36:00):
Hater who came back, and they're about as good as
they're going to be from a health standpoint.

Speaker 4 (02:36:04):
And then you just see what's what, And he mentioned.

Speaker 1 (02:36:07):
The relative mediocrey to awfulness of their division has them
again five games back of the lead.

Speaker 2 (02:36:15):
That's nothing less fewer games back of the wildcard spot
or spots that are available in the American League. Two
other things will get you to the Astros on deck show.
Tonight is also the third rehab appearance for Hunter Brown.
About half an hour after the Astros start, they will
start their game in El Paso against the Chihuahuas, So
hopefully Hunter Brown continues to do what he has done

(02:36:38):
pitch with pitch without issue, thirty three pitches in his
first outing, forty four in the one most recently, and
presumably a little bit more tonight. I'll leave it to
MT if he wants to share with his listeners during
the on Deck show, which is coming up next, about
how things went last night for Christian Javier in his
first rehab appearance.

Speaker 4 (02:36:58):
Path to future success is that what you're saying here?

Speaker 6 (02:37:01):
Uh?

Speaker 2 (02:37:01):
Yeah, it's probably a pretty long path for Javier based
on how he pitched last night. But like I said,
we'll leave it to MT if he wants to share
that with his listeners, which I'm sure he will, because
he does a nice, thorough job of giving him all
the information they need when it comes to ice hosting duties,
and he's got that for you next right here on
Sports Talk seven ninety