Hunter Brown Hurt, Rockets Survive... and Get Lakers?

Moday on The A-Team, Adam Clanton and Adam Wexler react to the Astros losing a series to the A's over the weekend, examine what Hunter Brown's injury means moving forward, and share their thougths on the Rockets' win over the Warriors.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Coming in to a Monday edition of the A Team
Sports Talks seven to ninety, but not nearly as exhausted
as Wex is going to be on Wednesday's edition. Oh wait,
we don't have a show, so he gets bailed out.
I was talking about this with Ross for like two seconds.
This is the first time I think that the Rockets
will tip off at ten o'clock local time, which actually
means like ten to fifteen, right, It's not It is not.

(00:24):
When's the last time they tipped off at ten after
ten o'clock one of these games earlier this year.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
It's just the schedule change this year because there are
new partners and they decided to give more space in
between their games sometimes so they don't have to push them,
slide them, and give their studio show a little bit
of breathing.

Speaker 1 (00:40):
Room and hate everybody that lives from Boston to Florida. Basically,
I mean, it's half an hour you pretty much. There's brutal, man,
but the start time is just going to be so
insanely late, right for all those.

Speaker 2 (00:53):
Half an hour later than it would have been in
previous years. I just feel like a game against Phoenix
on Wednesday and is what referring to because we're already
to Wednesday show that doesn't exist. Well, I don't even
think we're gonna talk about this weekend at all. We're
just trying to jump ahead three Stags. Their upcoming game
in two days against the Phoenix Suns is scheduled for
a ten o'clock start time, which means ten twelve our time.

Speaker 1 (01:17):
Basically, yeah, it's brutal. Absolutely, it'll be just fine. It's
just awful. It'll be just like the other eighty one.
Do you think everybody will be in their seats for
a change since it starts so late.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
I don't know what people at the Footprint Center's habits are.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
Here's the deal. Last night, I got a I got
a communication from someone after that rock Gus gets out
of the way.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
The Rockets won last night and the Astros lost yesterday,
A right go.

Speaker 1 (01:41):
Ahead, And this person said to me, and I quote,
I needed to vent to somebody who was awake because
it feels like we actually lost that game. Did you
feel I know the answer to this already, but I
don't think you do. Did you feel like that? Yes?
What I did? Are you finally getting on board with

(02:02):
the knee jerk reactions.

Speaker 2 (02:03):
No, it's just the way that it felt. There's no
reason for they did that. I know, Golden State, it appears,
and maybe it sounded to those that were not listening
to it here on Sports Talk seven ninety it sounded
like the Warriors were doing all the things necessary to
get back in the game. I know there's another team,
and I know they can be credited for doing this
and line up that and pressure this and make shot that.

(02:26):
But man, the Rockets have got to be got to
figure some things out in games like that. It's great
that they made the shot late. That was an extremely
well thought out play, extremely well executed play they did.
In my opinion, they did benefit from something on that play. Well,
we'll get to that later. But they don't win the
game unless they go out and make a play they
shouldn't have. They should never have had to do that.

(02:49):
You know, the Warriors played like I expected them to.
They were hot early and then ice cold the rest
of the game. And maybe that's a bad way to
say it. They made shots they wouldn't normally make early
in the game, and then they missshots like they were
supposed to the rest of the game.

Speaker 1 (03:02):
Oh, except for Curry.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
Curry coming back showed you what kind of team they
can be, which is probably about the eighth or ninth
best team in the Western Conference.

Speaker 1 (03:10):
They won't be eighth, by the way.

Speaker 2 (03:12):
Their loss last night clinched the fact that they cannot
make the playoffs at any higher than the eighth seed,
and they will have to win two games in order
to do that. They'll play in the nine to ten
game that is now locked in for the Warriors. They
just don't know against whom or where that game will be.
But they're clearly are much. I mean, they're a bad
basketball team. They're a middle of the lottery team without

(03:32):
Steph Curry. They're the tenth best team in the West
with Steph Curry, and it showed last night. But the
Rockets did what they've been doing during this five game
winning streak. They were creating good looks that were making
enough of them, and then they would just get lazy,
like I'm not sure. I don't want to say this
player is lazy. I'll say it the easy radio way.
He was playing lazy. Did you just call me crazy?

(03:54):
I said you were acting crazy. I didn't call you crazy,
I said you were acting crazy. It's the same type
deal the Rockets get sometimes and sometimes they get called
out for it by their coach. Under no circumstances. When
you're playing against the team who has one big and
you foul him out and Draymond Green is pretty much
never guarding you because he's guarding Kevin Durant, should alprin

(04:15):
Shangoon attempt five threes. I don't care if he makes
the first four. You should never attempt five to threes
in a game like that. Just go to the basket
every time, Just post up every time. If they need
you on that particular offensive, let go do it. Why
he's out there early in the shot clock taking threes
is It's insane, and it's all Rocket related. It's not
coaching related. It's the players. It's not Warriors related. These

(04:37):
are the things you'd like to see them get rid of.
By the time they figure out who they're gonna play,
it is gonna be Denver, Minnesota or the Lakers. Things
have tightened up because of what took place over the weekend.
Laid out what's in front of them over the final
seven games. Posted that a couple times on the Twitter sphere,
But obviously we'll get into it today, everyone's sitting on
the same number of games remaining a lot of other

(05:00):
factors will likely play into who's on everybody's schedule because
in this particular game, because what happens on maybe, you know,
Tuesday and Wednesday, maybe this team now has clinched. Nobody's
clinched anything yet in the West except here are the
ten teams that play more basketball.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
The number one.

Speaker 2 (05:18):
Seed is still up for grabs, so is two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.
At least two teams could be one of those seeds.
Sometimes three, four, five, six spots could land any one
of these teams. So you don't know necessarily what what
are the Spurs gonna do in Game eighty one, What
are the Nuggets gonna do in Game eighty two? What
are the thunder gonna do in Game eighty So knowing
who plays against them, I can't just sit here and say, well,

(05:41):
they're not gonna have anybody going for that game.

Speaker 1 (05:43):
Because they will have already clinched. Maybe maybe not. And
so the Rockets just hope to brought it up.

Speaker 2 (05:48):
Last week I said the best case scenario for the
Rockets is the simplest one, finish the season on a
ten game winning streak. Well they're at six right now,
and what has happened with the Lakers obviously plays into it.
Lot of details to all this, so we look forward
to diving into all of those with your Houston Rockets,
and obviously they will be back on the court for
their game to close out the Rose portion of their

(06:10):
schedule tomorrow night.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
Well, it is going to be a very interesting final
handful of days to see how it all shakes out.
But yeah, we will get into that Lakers news because
I think everybody that can play them is probably begging
to play them at this point. And that's the other
part of it.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
I mean, if every team's trying to land next to them, well,
everybody can't get that to happen. Don't think the Lakers
are in shape to win many games no matter who
they play, And I'm being dead serious, no matter who's
on the opposite side of the court, even if that
team is trying to lose, I don't know what they
will have to offer. Obviously, lost to the Mavericks last
night couldn't slow down the possible debatable Rookie of the Year.

(06:50):
Somehow in the last week or so, that debate has
now turned into a rager on social media with the
Cooper flag and kon Kinnipple. But all that is almost
had what you hoped for for the Astros this weekend.
I don't expect them to win every game they play.
I don't expect them to sweep teams often, but they
now have the varieties of series so far through their

(07:13):
first three series. A split in the opening series with
the Angels, a sweep of the Red Sox and the
three games that followed, and a lost series two games
to one to the Athletics. Over the weekend, tons of offense,
as expected in that ballpark, especially with how the Astros
are hitting and who the Athletics are made of. And unfortunately,

(07:33):
you had one day of good pitching. That one day
of good pitching got your one victory. The other two
days you didn't have any offense in one of them,
and you had more than enough offense in the other,
but you lost both because you couldn't slow down the
Athletics offense.

Speaker 1 (07:46):
Yeah, that's the offense that I was afraid of going
into this series. I hated the fact that when Jiner Diez,
I believe it was a pop up. I'm trying to
remember now, the infield pop up he didn't catch. No, no, no, no, no,
that's different. That was something else bad he did now
when he had either the bases loaded or two men
on base to meekly fly out in the inning.

Speaker 2 (08:08):
The Astros are first in the Majors and runs scored.
They're also first in the Majors and runners left in
scoring position because.

Speaker 1 (08:15):
Their offense is awesome. Yeah, that's what's going on.

Speaker 2 (08:18):
They're probably going to lead the league and hidden into
double plays too, because they got runners on base non stop.

Speaker 1 (08:24):
I just knew that when they only had a one
run lead going into the bottom half of that extra inning,
it just wasn't going to be enough.

Speaker 2 (08:29):
Sam Smith striking out right in front of him was
the real killer. That was you gotta make contact.

Speaker 1 (08:33):
But I just feel like when there's guys on base,
whoever you are, either one of those guys gets blame.
I mean, just they didn't scoring one.

Speaker 2 (08:42):
Running extra innings is a surefire way to be disappointed
when you are the home road.

Speaker 1 (08:45):
Tea because it's so easy to do. There's the guy
on second base already, because gimmicks are permanent. Now, well,
you also wild pitched him over to third. Yeah, that
didn't help your cause either, and blocked home because you
gave up a walk off homerra who's not good. I
don't know if we're gonna just like pretend he is.
Why would we pretend he is? I don't know.

Speaker 2 (09:06):
I don't even think the team's pretending he is. But
at some point, I mean, this is who you are
right now, and that's what you do. You can not
use him if you want. You can move him to
another spot if you want. And four games into the season,
I guarantee you there are real discussions about that being held.
Three games into the season before yesterday's fourth appearance, probably
not last appearance was finished off with strikeout, strikeout, strikeout,

(09:27):
all swinging against the Red Sox, and then obviously we
saw what happened. He's made appearances in four games this year.
Talking about Brian Abray, he's allowed runs in four games,
and he's allowed three home runs. He's thrown seventy two
pitches this year and he's allowed three home runs. Last
year he allowed four home runs the whole year.

Speaker 1 (09:46):
And we haven't even completed two full weeks of the season.

Speaker 2 (09:49):
He's in it, He's going through it, he claims, and
Joe Espotto was pretty emphatic about it at following a
meeting with Abra last week, says he's not hurt. Velocity
was up in yesterday's appearance, but not to where it
has been obviously over the course of his career. I
don't know if that's where we are in the season,
or there really is something to it, or it's still
more mechanical. And the pitch that got hit out of

(10:10):
the park was just absolutely grooved, no movement whatsoever right
down the pipe. And Brent Rooker, who like most of
his team, did nothing to open the season on the road,
several of them exploded over the weekend, and he certainly
was one of them with the two homer, six RBI
game yesterday.

Speaker 1 (10:24):
Well, he loves hitting against the Astros too specifically, but yes,
he's better than probably what he had shown. And we're
burying the lead. And we'll get to that in the
very next segment. Because all of that is to say,
none of it it pales in comparison. Let's just put
it that way, to the news that we all got
about the astros best pitcher before the finale of that

(10:47):
three game series even commenced. So we'll get to that
in the very next segment, what did we ever do
here in Houston to deserve Hunter Brown on the fifteen
day IL less than two weeks into the season. We
shall the discuss, among many many other things on a
Monday edition of the eighteen. If you have been under
a rock he's on the fifteen day ILL with a

(11:09):
right shoulder strain. Is that it's not his elbow or
forearm right like when I saw that he was going
on the fifteen DAYIL. That sucks. It's not what you
want to hear, especially coming off of last year, and
especially since he is the undisputed ace of this rotation.
But if you have to have a guy go on

(11:30):
the fifteen DAYIL, I would assume you would want a
right shoulder strain as opposed to right forearm or right
elbow discomfort.

Speaker 2 (11:40):
Yeah, I don't think there's any doubt about that from
a long term healing, potential, surgical standpoint. But nonetheless, I'd
be pretty shocked if there was another pitch in April
thrown by Hunter Brown here for the Houston Astros. There's
no timetable that's been given, and the Astros certainly have
not gotten results back from the needed work to be done.
They said he threw on the side and felt like

(12:02):
it wasn't right and told him about it, and they
started that imaging process and felt like they needed to
send him back to Houston to continue having their doctors
look at it, which is what they are doing today.
I would imagine pregame before Tonight's Rockies game, we might
have a little bit of an update on where things
stand at this point. Again, I seriously doubt there's a
timetable also, but you don't have a guy immediately go

(12:25):
on the il when you learn something's wrong and look
at it and have expectations that, oh perfect retroactive to
April second. So April seventeenth, who do the Astros play
Hunter should be pitching that day? Be very very surprising
if that happened. They do have a lot of options
to fill the starting slot, but they have zero options
on how to get a pitcher at that level. No

(12:48):
team in baseball would be able to replace Hunter Brown
to that level unless he was a teammate of Garrett
Crochet's and they weren't facing the Astros, or he was
a teammate of Tark Schools. The only the only two
pitchers that are pitching his level since the beginning of
last year and through the first two starts this year,
he was fantastic in both just one run aloud over
his works or his time's work point oh four era

(13:10):
in those games, league leader in strikeouts. Everything looked like
it was fine. Now he did throw one hundred and
two pitches in his first start, and we're gonna hear
from Steve Sparks in a little over an hour. He
had his weekly visit with the Morning Drive eight am
Monday mornings. Steve Sparks visits his weekly visit here on
Sports Talk seven ninety and he'll get into some specifics
about his thoughts about why, but also, as we are

(13:31):
doing here, wants to wait for what imaging might say
and doctors might say before he gives any thoughts on
you know, the long term ramifications. We don't know that either,
but we do know some things. You can give the
ball to Cody Bolton tonight, which they are doing. This
would otherwise have been a Hunter Brown's start. You can
make some changes to who you give the ball to
on Tuesday and Wednesday because you have the off day Thursday.

(13:52):
I'm sure you want to keep Emi on regular rest
I don't think anybody else's rest is of any consequence. Heck,
you could even skip Chris Chanhavier if you'd like to
give Mike Burrows the ball tomorrow, skip Hobby's turn and
give the ball to Spencerraghetty, Colton, Gordon, Jason, Alexander. You
have options in that regard. Peter Lambert is now part

(14:13):
of the rotation in sugar Land. He's pitched a little
too recently for that option, and obviously Miguel Yola pitched yesterday,
so he would not be an option in any of
these upcoming games. I was very patiently waiting for a
first pitch, so I was not able to contact anybody
with the Space Cowboys before the air their game with
the Jumbo Shrimp over the weekend to see if, in

(14:35):
fact Uloa would make that start, because obviously he could
have just skipped him and said, all right, he's gonna
make his major league debut tomorrow in Colorado against the Rockies.
They chose otherwise, and I don't blame them one bit.
Cody Bolton will get the start tonight. He's never made
a major league start before, but he obviously has length,
and that's really all that they're looking for is pitch
for a couple of teams.

Speaker 1 (14:55):
He's pitched for this team.

Speaker 2 (14:57):
Once, and he pitched the same day Hunter Brown did,
and they hope for similar results, giving them an opportunity.
He was in a great situation, then gave up a
home run and very little else, struck out five over
those three innings. The Rockies aren't a particularly good team,
but this game is very much like the three they
just played. They're playing in a ballpark that's very offense friendly,

(15:17):
so I do think there's some concern there, but I
do think this probably opens the.

Speaker 1 (15:21):
Door wide wide open.

Speaker 2 (15:24):
I don't know if Spencer Righetti makes any more starts
for the Space Cowboys. I would imagine that you just
find a spot to fit him in and he's one
of your five moving forward. Maybe it's not the first
start and he picks it up a little later, just
based on timing. He pitched on the third his last start.
Both of his starts have been outstanding over his eight
and a third there, so I think that's probably your

(15:45):
best bet. They don't have any issue giving the ball
to Colton Gordon. They obviously did that for half a
season a year ago. Jason Alexander. I said it then,
and I'm still baffled now. What he's doing so far
through two starts in the miners this year is kind
of what I expected, not particularly effect. I don't know
how he was so effective last year, but he was.
And they don't have any issue giving him the ball either.

(16:05):
But now you don't have any spot in your rotation
where you're fully expecting, well, this guy's getting us through
six maybe seven. Every time he gets the ball, he's
gonna give you six innings. Every time he gets the ball.
You're only gonna need three more innings from the rest
of your bullpen. And now you have five straight days
every day you give the ball to anybody, and maybe
when they go to a six man rotation, we gotta

(16:26):
fill at least nine outs, maybe twelve, maybe fifteen on
a regular basis. And that is the biggest part of
you know, he's a losing streak ender, he's a winning
streak continuer. He's an ace. They don't have another ace
in this organization.

Speaker 1 (16:41):
Now. If Hunter Brown is completely healthy today, this isn't
an issue. We're not talking about Hunter Brown. The Christian
Javier still happened? Do you still and I intend to
talk about this this segment, but since you brought up
Spencer Araghetty's name, it's the first thing I thought of,
because he was the is odd man out the right

(17:01):
way to describe how that happened? Ye, coming out of
spring training? One hundred percent? I just well, I mean,
there's there's a lot of there's reasons why, but there's
a lot of talent he should not be.

Speaker 2 (17:11):
He's not a minor league pitcher. Yeah, but they did
not have a spot for him. I hated that because
and I don't that's I don't really have.

Speaker 1 (17:17):
A problem with it. They didn't need a sixth starter,
and they felt like he was six I know why
they did it. I just hate that because I think,
like you said, I don't think he's a minor league
starter anymore. Like you said, I agree, but I guess.
And we'll get to this a little bit later on.
But if you were, if you were hoping for it
bounce back performance from Christian Javier whatever, the exact opposite

(17:38):
of that is is what you got.

Speaker 2 (17:40):
It doesn't throw strikes, and you brutally you make it
too easy for a team that's gonna hammer the baseball
in their ballpark. In a ballpark with a ball obviously
is flying out of the yard. You know, see the
home runs that were hit and how they every home
run that was hit during this series, you could tell
by the crack of the bat, even Jake Myers homer,
definitely Cam Smith's homer, the home run hit by Jordan Alvarez,
and all of the A's homers similarly, you know the

(18:02):
ball is gonna fly out of the art if you
get a hold of it, you barrel it up. You've
hit too much of the plate, it's gonna go over
the fence. And when you make yourself pitch in traffic
as often as Javier has done so far this season,
there's really almost no way you're gonna get out of
He's not a ground ball pitcher. On top of it,
to try to weasel his way out with a double
play ball or lober of double play balls. I mean,

(18:22):
Lance mccullors did it yesterday in the first inning, put
a couple of runners on, I got a double play ball,
and there's still a zero on the board after that
first inning with traffic, and Hobby just does not do that.
He relied on not getting hit hard. He had one
of the best batting average against in the miners and
then copied that mirrored that when he became a major
leaguer and his whip was super crazy low, he wasn't
giving up hits, he wasn't giving up walks. The exact

(18:44):
opposite is who he has been now since his return.
The only hope was a healthy offseason will produce a
little bit better results here in April of twenty twenty six,
and they.

Speaker 1 (18:53):
Just definitively, definitively have not. Well, did you agree since
you brought his name of did you agree with Lance
McCullers Junior's assessment of how he pitched? Following the game yesterday?
What was his assessment of how he pitched? I'm paraphrasing
unless you happen to have the audio right then and
there audio? What are you kidding me? I had five
cuts since we walked out of here on Friday. Whatever

(19:15):
the one is about him thinking he pitched, Well, if
you have it, no, No, I'm not joking. There's nothing
in the system on this anything.

Speaker 2 (19:24):
I mean, I got three recorded segments for a show
that was aired yesterday. I have one that says someone
had a baby at a hockey game, and then there's
a cut from U.

Speaker 1 (19:34):
It says for the A team, you must have Josh
put that together. I wish I wish you guys knew
how much I love when he does this on the air.
It's actually it makes my heart sing. But I'm paraphrasing.
He thought he pitched well. He didn't think he pitched
a bad game, just had some things unfortunate.

Speaker 2 (19:53):
He's right, if that's what you're asking me, and you did,
I think he's right. I think he pitched fine. You
obviously want him to get through that fit inning. He
didn't get any outs in that inning. You want length,
and you want kind of the recovery from you know
what has happened before that and what you now know
is going. I mean, everybody that's in yesterday's dugout or
bullpen that they know where the team is. Tomorrow's starter

(20:14):
is a question mark, and they might the players might
even have known they were going to give the ball
to Cody Bolton. With the point is they knew they
weren't giving the ball to Hunter Brown. So setting up
this game on a string of four games with no
days off, without your starting pitcher getting more than twelve outs,
that's problematic. But it wasn't. It didn't look like he
pitched last year at all. The way he pitched yesterday

(20:35):
clearly wasn't as sharp as he was in his opening start.
But it didn't look to me like he reverted back
to the season prior. He just wasn't as sharp. His
stuff just wasn't quite as good. I think he pitched
the same way. I think he attacked similarly. I think
he tried not to put guys on base and tried
to make them hit the ball. I mean he walked
off the mountain yesterday and there was one run on
the board. Obviously several more would come across because of

(20:58):
the opinion. I know, you can wear sunglasses and everybody
plays under the same conditions.

Speaker 1 (21:03):
But that was wild.

Speaker 2 (21:05):
There were three There were three plays, one in each
game where a pop up or fly ball with tons
of air underneath it. Essentially they were all pop ups,
and they were all dropped yonderd he has in the infield,
and this probably poorly played and had a lot less
to do in the sun and the ballpark, but it
obviously had a huge impact on the game. Soderstrom did
it in Saturday's game. There's a fly ball right to him,

(21:27):
he moved about two feet. He couldn't find it, never
had any handle on it. And if you're listening to
the radio broadcast, they did a great job of describing.
I don't think he lost it in the sun. I
don't think he ever saw it, never ever hacked it up.
It happened to land near him. And then obviously what
happened with Jake Myers when he was going back on
this is a gold glove player again not wearing sunglasses,
but he also didn't put them on for any future,

(21:49):
and he back he knows what he can work with,
and he's played at this ballpark before. But he absolutely
lost it in the sun. He drifted back to the
spot where he thought it was going to land, and
he put his glove up and it went right past it.

Speaker 1 (22:01):
I thought it hit him in the head.

Speaker 2 (22:03):
Luckily it did not, but three runs came across on
what otherwise would have been a sacrifice fly, and one
run would have scored.

Speaker 1 (22:09):
I hate that ballpark because it's just it's like a
little league game played by adults.

Speaker 2 (22:14):
I mean, yeah, I think I mean it's more like
more like bud lights should be involved.

Speaker 1 (22:19):
It's like bare league softball. There you go, well, and
here's twelve to ten. Here is the thing. They got
another year there, so just get used to it.

Speaker 2 (22:27):
Well, they have so far in twenty twenty six played
zero games in their West Sacramento home where at least
one team didn't.

Speaker 1 (22:35):
Reach double figures. It's insane.

Speaker 2 (22:37):
Four times in six possible outcomes one of the teams
and in one game both of the teams reached double figures.

Speaker 1 (22:44):
Do the Dodgers play there this year because they might
put up fifty?

Speaker 2 (22:47):
Why the Astros have the best offense in baseball and
I have the Dodgers.

Speaker 1 (22:51):
I know. By the way, little tidbit, the Astros record
is what six and four? You know, the last two
times their record was six and four. It's only the
last two times. I assume they won the World Series
since you said it up seventeen and twenty twenty two,
all right, just saying I like it.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
Yeah, I'm sure positive you nobody, nobody is more positive
than us here on the A team. The Astros just
got beat twelve ten on a walk off and the
tenth inning. And Brian Abrew can't throw strikes that aren't
hit for miles and Hunter Brown isn't healthy and you know,
right now, ten games in, it is over for the
other twenty nine teams. I felt like watches Championship, lock

(23:29):
it up.

Speaker 1 (23:29):
We're not even mad, it's actually amazing. Lost twelve to
ten in a walkoff and extras. All right, it's time
for the best of X And I know that there
is video of this, but we're gonna use our words
because it's radio at least until the top of the hour.
And uh I was a huge fan of a little altercation,
let's put it that way between ema Udoka and one

(23:51):
of his best players during a timeout and last night's
Rockets survival over the Warriors. We'll discuss that.

Speaker 2 (23:57):
Next halfway through our number one, we hit you with
the best Evec's something that you may have seen, you
may have heard, but you probably got more out of
it because somebody's decided to post it on social media
and everybody got after it in the comments and the
replies and everything like that. Or maybe you found it
on your old Facebook and it was totally utterly, completely

(24:19):
fabricated and it was on a fan site and you
still fell for it, even on a day that's not
April first, because that's a lot of what is out
there on that particular site. Maybe you found it on
Instagram and instead of just putting a heart or clapping hands,
you actually had a replier two or ten today comes
from the X platform.

Speaker 1 (24:36):
Yes it does, and it is more about the reactions
to it. But people were reacting to this list. It
was a national game.

Speaker 2 (24:44):
So if you were unwise and weren't listening to AC
and MT on Rockets Radio last night, you could have
listened to Noah, Reggie and what appeared to be a
super green sideline reporter.

Speaker 1 (25:00):
You were watching it on the Wait wait, further expand
on that last part.

Speaker 2 (25:05):
I'm trying to remember who he interviewed in game, but
I'm forgetting Oh Jabari.

Speaker 1 (25:10):
So it wasn't uh Shahti. I guess is who does
that normally? No? No, not Ashley. Why was she not there?
That's normally it was still a hatter. She had the
Dallas Lakers. Oh. For some reason, I thought she's always
with Noah and Reggie. I wasn't. Every time I lived
quite a bit because the sounds off and we're doing radios.
Every time I looked up, if I saw anybody, it
was only them. I never saw it.

Speaker 2 (25:30):
I'll find it before too long, But I really cannot
recall the gentleman's name.

Speaker 1 (25:34):
You don't seem to care that much either.

Speaker 2 (25:36):
No, I didn't know that we were going to play
audio here, but it's here because Josh is awesome and
we will play it. But if you were watching on
the TV side, then you would have heard the description
of this, which is the genesis of what we're going
to get into into the best of X the Rockets
opening segment of our show today. I think I brought
something up about their very low quality, low success rate

(25:58):
center that shoots a lot of three pointers. He's made
a bunch in a game recently. I guess the green
light is as green as it needs to be unless
you're Emyre.

Speaker 3 (26:08):
Here by Shane Goon and coach ema Udoka is absolutely livid.

Speaker 4 (26:14):
You can get anything you want.

Speaker 3 (26:16):
He says, my bad that ema Udoka didn't want to
hear it, because now you've opened the door for Stephen
Curry and the Warriors. You take bad shots which leads
to long rebounds.

Speaker 1 (26:33):
Could you read Emy's lips? I know they slowed it down. Yeah,
I think you could, but I already forgot what it was.
I don't I'm still not for sure, but I know
he said some semblance of what the f are you
doing shooting three pointers, especially when now the best shooter
in the last century gets a shot to beat us.

Speaker 2 (26:51):
Well, Reggie actually said what I said in the opening segment.
If you're listening closely, he said, you can get anything
you want. It's not that you're taking the shot and
it was wide open. It's the don't it's the settling factor,
it's the laziness factors. Don't take it just to take it.
Oh they left me open, perfect, Go get a better shot.
You're much more likely as a twenty eight to thirty
thirty one percent shooter or wherever you want to section

(27:13):
off Shngoon shoot, Go get a layup. They haven't stopped
you all night. You fouled Porzingis out in what eighteen
minutes of defense? I mean, it was incredible. Just keep
doing that. That's what's working. That's where they have no
answer for you. And honestly, the more they have no
answer for you, maybe even there's a shred of possibility
that they're gonna have to put Draymond Green on you.
If they put Draymond Green on Shngun, then Kevin Durant's

(27:35):
gonna have an even bigger field day than one of
the all time greatest offensive players to ever see this
league did anyway, even with Draymond defending him almost the
entire game. So it's just not smart basketball. And I'm
pretty sure he and the rest of the coaching staff
e may are trying to coach smart basketball into their players,
and it just wasn't there for too much of an
eight or nine minutes awesome third quarter ball movement. Shot

(27:58):
making lead increase is dumb basketball in the fourth quarter
shot missing lead decreases.

Speaker 1 (28:05):
It's pretty simple. I'll get the one member of shing
Gun's family out of the way before we move on
to the real comments like this guy Tari don't get
this treatment. If I'm Shingoon, I be tired of getting
this type of treatment all the time. Yeah, well, I
be tired of him shooting these threes all the time, Larry,
So you can miss me with that comment. But then again,

(28:27):
he ad Adam Clinton, do you on that one? These
are just responses to the video that we use for this.
There's but there's other people that are even they're a
different kind of dumb. And then Alpi comes in it
makes the game winner, e may is a joke what
he made? He make the game winner? Where was this
shot from moron? You know why emy's not a joke
as it pertains to what you're trying to say here,
because that's what Ima was trying to say to him.

(28:49):
Stop launching thirty footers and take the ball inside where
you're most effective. For con that's his name, if I
pronounced it right, yeah, it's.

Speaker 2 (28:58):
It seems pretty simple. And I think while the anger people,
I don't know, what do you want here? I like
a coach that it doesn't mind. I like players who
don't mind it. I don't think the Rockets minded. I
don't think Alpie minds. I don't think Tari or anybody
else that's received it read obviously is worse off for it,
or is struggling to handle it. It's just not a
smart play. And I think pretty clearly everybody else knows it.

(29:21):
This is a shot ten point lead. It's one oh
six ninety six if I'm not mistaken. Rebound goes to
brand new Warriors center Charles Bassi, and a couple seconds later,
the Anthony Melton fires up a wide open three. They
were up twelve. Two possessions before that. I don't know
how Amen Thompson missed the pass on the alley oot,

(29:42):
but he did, and he shot it right over the
rim from one inch away, and then Alpi took that shot.
So they went from up fourteen a minute before that
to a miss, another miss, the second miss being Alpie's,
and all of a sudden, it was a fourteen point game.
Out's a seven point game and you got a call
time out. There's no reason for it to get to that.
I mean, if you miss a shot at the rim
after twenty seconds of possession, and it's a shot you want,

(30:05):
a shot you've been making all game, that's a lot
different than a low percentage three point shooter shooting a
shot the defense is ecstatic about you launching.

Speaker 1 (30:14):
I am quickly, and it's not that I haven't been aware.
I know you're aware, even though you despise paying as
much attention as I do. To just the general reaction
on social media, there is a very strong contingent of
pro alpre and chingoon. Doesn't matter what this guy does.

(30:35):
He just hit my entire family with a mac truck
and killed them all, doesn't matter. Love the guy. He
can do no wrong people on social media and it's
it's I'm to the point now where I actually want
them to shop him for Giannis this summer, just to
piss these people off. It doesn't even have to have
a good basketball this He'll be somewhere else where he
can thrive. Sure, go ahead, go to Milwaukee. Held down right?

(30:58):
Sure by Emay? Ask these is holding him down?

Speaker 2 (31:01):
You know these hit He and Reed Shepherd are usually
the large, large percentage of people that are looking at
you know, e May's doing this. How can he not
see what we all see with those two players. I mean,
you can't hide from what their defensive rating is with
those two players on the court, and you can't hide
from it if you watch basketball, I mean how many
different Almost all of the points in the first quarter,

(31:23):
almost all of the points in the first quarter that
Golden State.

Speaker 1 (31:26):
Score wide ass open hoops at the at the rim.

Speaker 2 (31:29):
They were just a result of bad defense by two
of the five rockets that were out there. And I
think everybody knows which two.

Speaker 1 (31:34):
Sometimes they were conjunction.

Speaker 2 (31:36):
Yes, I mean, this is your guy, stand in front
of him. He's a three point shooter. He might get
by you, but you can't just give him a wide
open shot. Gist Santos has two wide open looks. He
makes them both, and he can't make them all game.
And maybe that's how you've designed it, ask them to
shoot that, but the same things keep happening over and over.
The team clearly plays so much better offensively, then I
think I may's reluctantly saying, look, this is the only

(31:57):
way we can win. We're giving up points left and right.
You know why they lost their lead in the fourth quarter.
Sure they didn't score a ton, but they made zero
stop there. They can't stop anybody anymore. So they have
to run lineups that can score, because I don't think
they think they have any lineups that can get stopped.

Speaker 1 (32:13):
And unfortunately those lineups definitely most of the time, one
hundred percent of the time include the two players were
talking about. And here's the thing, like you can be
an outbran shingoon truther, we'll call them that. Where he
can do no wrong. That's what I'll just refer to
him as that. You can if you're that guy or girl,
you cannot dispute that he has not only slacked off,
he has regressed defensively. There were times last year. Yeah,

(32:37):
you make like I would never refer to Aubran Shingoon
in twenty twenty four to twenty five as a cone.
I've done that a million times here in twenty twenty five,
twenty six.

Speaker 2 (32:47):
I mean, he's just his effort needs to be higher
in addition to some of the issues he has, and
he's always.

Speaker 1 (32:52):
Gonna he can play defense, that's the thing he can.

Speaker 2 (32:55):
He just he gets he's not as focused in on
what needs to be done often time defensively. And I
think everybody on both sides, the other teams know what
the Rocket staff and teammates know it, but they've gone
they're going about it differently here and they've won six
games largely because of it. They're trying to outscore people
now they're just trying to We need to play better offense.
The best offense the Rockets have played all year. A

(33:15):
thirty assist night is almost a given the way that
they're playing. You know, the last night's game, you got
eight assists for Durant, seven apiece for Shangoun, and a
men and your top four scorers are all connecting at
an incredibly high rate. This is the best offense with
the best players for offense, they don't really have a
really good defensive group to combat that lineup with. You
can't say, man, I know they're playing great offensively, but

(33:38):
if you would just play these five guys a lot more,
they would be stopping the other team.

Speaker 1 (33:42):
They don't have that. They don't have a.

Speaker 2 (33:44):
Group of five players that are really really good defensively
with who they need to have on the court. And
so again this is not very email like, but he
and the staff are slowly adjusting to that, as long
as they adjust to it when it matters most, which
are the games the beginning either April eighteenth or ninethings
game one of Rockets Lakers right here from Toyota Center,

(34:04):
Saturday night, April.

Speaker 1 (34:06):
Eighteenth, Sunday night. Maybe it's a Sunday night game. Why
because Lebron's still involved involved that's it, I know, that's all.

Speaker 4 (34:14):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 (34:15):
They've got Bronny Brons all right. We talked Slash exactly,
We talked about one of them. But there is a
rash of legit MLB stars, very very hurt, sometimes significantly
here in the first less than two weeks of the season.
We'll discuss that next. The bad news is that Hunter

(34:38):
Brown is on the fifteen day IO. The not great news,
but it's I mean, if you want to feel better.
Lots of other teams are going through this right now
with big time names on their roster. It's not good.
We're not rooting for it.

Speaker 2 (34:50):
Fifty three whole minutes and he's trying to get me
back on board. Get Mookie Betts, Let's try to Let's
try to wager on some more injuries. Let's get wex
to make the looking forward to to another play, another
man down. It's like I've got a voodoo dartboard in here.
I just hit Mookie Bets in the back. I hit
Mike Trout in the hand. Who else have we hit
this umpire in the face cushion?

Speaker 1 (35:11):
He's wearing a mask. He's not a star either.

Speaker 2 (35:14):
Yesterday's umpire got absolutely smoked in the mask and he
just put it back on. Luckily, the masks are like
sometimes there's like Nascar cages, there's tougher.

Speaker 1 (35:23):
It just caught him a little dirt concussion. I don't
think he's tougher, so uh and I I'll say this
right now, and this is I mean, why why don't
we just lean into this morbid discussion. I would prefer
a right shoulder strain over and oblique, because we've had
that with Jordan Alvarez and b injury. Mookie bets.

Speaker 2 (35:42):
So Mookie bets they're not sure. I think they think
maybe when he was running the bases that happened, which is.

Speaker 1 (35:48):
Crazy because it normally happens in violent swings. I mean,
it could have happened in yesterday's game. Say to Carlos
Correa when you had that wild pitch in the tenth
inning and Yainer ran after it fired at to third
base and he had to just make a very easy
lean out to his right move split second to keep
that from being the last play of the game because
Langeleer scores easily if that ball gets by Korea. Those

(36:09):
are the types of things a bad swing or you
know again, I think maybe when you catch the base
and maybe you're rounding it, maybe when you're picking up
speed and you know, getting your cleats in the dirt
to extend a sprint, it could happen. But yes, major
League Baseball players, NBA players, NFL players, you play a sport,
you're gonna get hurt. It's gonna happen. Well, yeah, I

(36:29):
mean that's that is very much the case in football,
but in baseball. I mean, injuries happen all the time
in every sport. This is a lot of big names
to get. You just mentioned Mike Trout. He's another one.
We talked about Hunter Brown on the second segment of
the show, and I know I'm probably leaving out someone.

Speaker 2 (36:46):
I mean, there's every almost if something's gonna happen almost
every day.

Speaker 1 (36:49):
I got thirty teams full of players well, and I
do feel like that this type of scenario where a
bunch of guys are getting hurt early, lends itself to well,
you come off spring training and yeah, oh look there's
a hamstring injury because you weren't really ready or your
body wasn't really ready to do this every day for us.

Speaker 2 (37:05):
In other words, as I viewed this segment as a
big negative injury segment, he has actually brought this whole
up to be a positive. I say all that because
look at how the Astros have handled Jeremy Pania's let's
give him a round of applause. Let's hat tip to them,
cognizant of him not having spring training, trying to do
everything they can to prevent a long term injury of

(37:27):
any variety. He doesn't have any leg problems, he doesn't
have any shoulder problems. You don't have any armor, elbow problems.
He has a finger problem. But they're very very very
very worried about long term injury. So he was out
in the lineup again yesterday. He's going to play back
to back games and West Sacramento. They told us that
before they left, and they didn't lie. He played back
to back games. He played Friday night and Saturday afternoon,

(37:49):
and then they gave him the day off yesterday, and
with hopes of him probably doing the same thing. I
don't expect to play in all three games in Colorado.
Got two games in two nights tonight and tomorrow, and
then you have the afternoon get out game on a Wednesday,
although the getaway day is in front of an off day,
So maybe this is there's the opportunity to get him
two days off in a row and he doesn't have
to sit out any of the games in Seattle. But

(38:11):
I think they're very very concerned and are operating because
of that in a very certain way. With Jeremy Paine.
Yet I can't tell you that Mike Trott isn't hurt,
because he is, but that doesn't have anything to do
with spring training. That is the dude with the Seattle
Mariners treating him like Jordan Alvarez. They don't know how
to get him out, so they're throwing him inside. They

(38:31):
threw at him. It looked like with Brian wu early
in that game, and that got Juliu Rodriguez thrown at
later in the game. Unfortunately, read deebt meurs missed him.
So your purpose pitch missed. I don't mean to hurt him,
but you missed him. And then Mike Trouck got hit
on the hand. That's why he's hurt. He didn't have
a running issue, he didn't have an injury issue. They

(38:52):
hit him with a pitch. But he probably will soon.
Let's face it, he always does.

Speaker 1 (38:55):
All right, We'll leave it at that. We've got a
simulcast segment out plural as a matter of fact coming
up next. Rockets survived, but yeah, they found a way
to make it nauseating out there in the Bay Area.
We'll explain next. The A Team Sports Talks seven to
ninety schn If you want to watch us, do the

(39:16):
show simulcast up until six o'clock tonight, as we've got
a whole lot to get to. It's been primarily Rockets
and Astros in the first hour, as you could imagine,
since both teams were very, very busy over the weekend,
specifically the Astros with all the scoring they did, and
still found a way to only come up with one

(39:37):
victory in three nights. First of all, Friday night, that
was just what's the word you would use? I know
you've said stinky in the past, but that's not strong enough.
I need some more lass.

Speaker 2 (39:47):
That much going on, Springs had them pretty well dialed up.
They didn't have a ton of traffic, although again over
the course of these ten games they've had an incredible
amount of guys on the basis through walks and hits
and everything else that goes along with to score seventy
runs in ten games, but they shoud have a whole
lot going against him, like they have in every game
other than the opener.

Speaker 1 (40:08):
Yeah, it just wasn't And then they completely flipped the script.
Christian Walker continues to who was I talking to about this?
He so what he's doing this year, it's impressive from
the standpoint of, well, it's not him as an Astro
last year. But this is just what I thought he

(40:28):
would do last season for the money they signed him
for and what he had as his track record. So
it's not that I'm saying he gets zero credit, but
I'm just like, yeah, he's doing his job. He's doing
what I thought he would do once the Astros signed him.
That's it. He's doing his job.

Speaker 2 (40:41):
Well, yeah, dude, he's like the best offensive first basement
in baseball this year.

Speaker 1 (40:44):
I think he's like a lot more than that I
thought he would be. Maybe not that, but you know
some semblance of that last season. That's why the Astros
went out and spent the money on him. I'm beyond
thrilled with what he's done.

Speaker 2 (40:56):
I think it's outrageously successful start to his season has
nothing to do with last year, if you really want
to get down.

Speaker 1 (41:02):
So he's just been fantastic.

Speaker 2 (41:04):
Clearly it stands out because last year he was so
opposite of that. But this is I've never expected him
to do this. I mean a three series where he's
been an offensive plus all three of them, a big
driving force. One of the reasons they were able to
come back in yesterday's game. You need somebody to get
it started. And after you turned your three nothing lead
into a five to three deficit, he's the player that
got it started. You launched another one of the homers.

(41:27):
I probably didn't mention earlier, and everybody knew it was gone.
Everybody in the stadium, all eleven thousand of them knew
that that ball was gone off of Christian Walker's bat yesterday.
It doesn't have to leave the park by you know,
one hundred feet, but everybody knows. You hit it on
this trajectory in this ballpark at this time of day,
it's over, and it's It was a huge start to them,
you know, making their way back into it. Obviously they

(41:47):
immediately fell behind again. Then you had to lean on
Jake Myers to hit a homer to get the offense
started again.

Speaker 1 (41:52):
But I'm thrilled.

Speaker 2 (41:54):
With what appeared to be and hopefully are permanent tweaks
to his approach. I think he's probably in a little
bit leaner shape this year. He said as much during
the off season, and he definitely looks that way as
Batsby looks much more like the best times he had
in Arizona. They actually looked better, and if you look
at a lot of the analytics behind it, you know,

(42:15):
the barrel rates and things like that you'll find on
Baseball Savant.

Speaker 1 (42:19):
He's not he hasn't done this before.

Speaker 2 (42:21):
I mean maybe he's done it over ten days before, sure,
but over previous really good offensive seasons.

Speaker 1 (42:26):
He's blowing those away. Well, I was trying to temper
my enthusiasm. You know why six extra RaSE hits? Yeah, no,
I'm take it. I'm very very happy. And when you
can buy that, this is why I, you know, talk
about just if your tom is healthy last year because
Christian Walker was one of the few guys that was
out there pretty much every day last year, and he

(42:47):
was good at home by the way, I mean he
was well, he was better at home. He was the opposite.
I thought he was good at home and bat on
the road. It was the opposite of that. Last year.
His home road splits were not what you would hope for.

Speaker 2 (42:59):
I guess maybe the nice and we're trying to be
nice to Christian Walker right.

Speaker 1 (43:04):
Where the show of positivity on seven ninety five. Yes,
at home he hit two h two.

Speaker 2 (43:09):
Okay, have a six twenty two ops, which is also awful,
but he had a seven ninety three ops away from home.

Speaker 1 (43:16):
That's awful as excellent, that's hard say more softly, it's
not very good. Okay, substandard that is a that's the
most diplomatic eible, the most diplomatic way way to say
he sucks is substandard. He's been.

Speaker 2 (43:33):
If not for yourd on, it would stand out even
more what Walker is doing. Three guys have had incredible
offensive starts, Altuve Alvarez and Christian Walker. You had a
couple other guys somewhere in between, little Berffito, cam Smith's
had his moments, and you know, Peretis has obviously missed
some time. If you missed Dana Brown's stop by the
booths during yesterday's game, and obviously Sunday he also has

(43:55):
his general manager show with Robert Ford.

Speaker 1 (43:58):
He'll be with our crew the morning drive.

Speaker 2 (44:00):
On Wednesday morning, it sounded like Escoch Perettis would be
back from bereavement leave today but would not necessarily be
in the lineup today, So he wasn't even certain of that,
and this was yesterday. They're obviously expecting him to meet
them in Colorado and then we'll see about his availability.
But you did play a handful of games without him,
and it's Obviously it's much more unfortunate from the personal side.

(44:23):
I don't know the specifics of the need for bereavemently,
but obviously it's not very good playing in West Sacramento
followed by playing in Colorado and Denver back to back series,
six straight games in ballparks where you probably would enjoy
some success. Hopefully we'll get enough out of that and
have some good vibes going into their next stop.

Speaker 1 (44:42):
Yes See, normally I would say, ah, he should probably
get some physical activity in and get back in the
rhythm of things. But this might be one of the
few gems, aside from the one they just played in
for three days, where Estoc Preatis could probably go yard
with no problem whatsoever.

Speaker 2 (44:55):
One of his two dramatic hamstring injuries last year did
a current West Sacramento though.

Speaker 1 (45:01):
One of them. That just shows you how last year
went well.

Speaker 2 (45:04):
The first time he did I thought, oh man, he's
never coming back, and then I knew the second time
he did it really and then he came back again.

Speaker 1 (45:11):
Yeah, and then he got Luka Doncic's treatment. We'll get
to That's that's very very interesting as is, and again
I'm gonna lean into this now because at this point
it's comical. Wex likes to get upset whenever I go
to the Worldwide Leader for any sort of information, but
I can't help myself, and I get it because this

(45:32):
is the Bay Area's version of Malika. Andrews's husband, Anthony Slater,
is a Warriors hank for the Four Letter Network.

Speaker 2 (45:41):
He used to work for the Athletics, so he's covered
the Warriors for a long time, but they poached him
a couple of years back.

Speaker 1 (45:47):
Yeah, he's basic always covering the Warrior. Ethan Sherwood Strauss
Light Ethan Sherwood Strauss, for those of you who don't know,
is one of the biggest dorks in the history of journalism,
if you want to call it that, who actually thought
he can attributed to the Warriors championships by writing about them.

Speaker 2 (46:03):
So he wrote about them, did some analytics behind them,
traveled with them and gave him that it gave them
his ring size.

Speaker 1 (46:09):
And had one Yes, he did that last part especially,
and had one very very heavy and awkward elevator ride
with yours truly at Toyota Center during a playoff series one.

Speaker 2 (46:20):
Do you mean he wanted to Nope, it was heavy
for him like that, you could cut the tension with
a knife heavy if.

Speaker 1 (46:27):
You want to say that. He wanted to be literally
everywhere else on the planet except for in that small
little box with me.

Speaker 2 (46:36):
So the Rockets went to San Francisco yesterday. They played
at Chase Center. They beat the Warriors. Seth and Steph Curry,
both of Del Curry's male kids played in the game.

Speaker 1 (46:46):
Last one of them a good basketball player, and the
other one Seth. I mean what they combined for thirty
two points? I think, right, tell us what Steph I forgot?

Speaker 2 (46:55):
How many what Wardel scored? I think the only points
that Seth got he hit a three. Andy got fouled
on a three, so it's probably more like five or six.

Speaker 1 (47:03):
Was that the one that kd fouled on?

Speaker 2 (47:06):
No, when Joshua Kogi went right in front of him
and he kicked his leg out and there was almost
no contact, and they said after.

Speaker 1 (47:11):
They said an illegal screen, and they didn't call that.
When they reviewed the place, they said it was still
a foul in josh But back to Wardell, Yeah, Wardell,
this is the headline from Anthony Slater. Stephen Curry puts
up twenty nine in return Comma nearly hands Warriors win.
Now I get it.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
That's like literally exist, Well, exactly what happened. He launched
game winning shot, it missed.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
Now tell me how many guys you would have gotten
that headline with Lebron's one of them. And that's the
end of the list, Meaning I.

Speaker 2 (47:41):
Do think you're I don't want to stifle what is
obviously appreciating gimmick. It's not really a gimmick, but the
league is. He works for ESPN. He wants people to
read it. They want people to read your stuff. There's
no debating what last night's story was it there isn't

(48:01):
some others abmitting its clickbait. Then will you want people
to read what you're writing? And if it's the story
you should be writing, which he is, then that's how
you headline it. Like Steph Curry's return, he hasn't been
on the court. He's one of the marquee put butts
in the seats players all NBA caliber any given season
this year too, and he's been away for two months

(48:21):
and this team doesn't really matter when he's not out there.
So for this night, his return night, they do matter.
And on top of that, he was spectacular he was.
This is a good thing they had him. Otherwise they
would have lost by forty. They would have gotten smoked
by the Rockets last night without him, embarrassed by the
Rockets without him.

Speaker 1 (48:40):
To me, it's not to take away anything from Steph
because clearly you have to have not only the skill
but also the health to do what he did last night.
He didn't look like he was hurt at all. He
hadn't He didn't look like he hadn't played since January
thirtieth at all. But that was also the Rockets, like, hey,
maybe we should sho you defend the perimeter like the

(49:01):
worst way possible, regardless of who it is, whether it's
Curry or anyone else, because they got I mean, and
it wasn't the perimeter, It wasn't just the perimeter, it
was the interior. How many times did and I'm not
read his own category, he gets hunted, it's just what
it is. But how many times was Shingoon out of place?
If he was even in the vicinity. I have a layup.

Speaker 2 (49:22):
I can't think of a single rocket of the core
six top six guys that didn't get beat on a
cut to the lane for a lip they all did
a men got beat by Gary Payton, Reid got beat
a couple of times, Katie got blown by.

Speaker 1 (49:34):
It happens because that's how they get.

Speaker 2 (49:36):
That's how they play, as much as it stinks, and
nobody likes it here because of what they've done over
the top of the Rockets all these years, no matter
who's been on their team. It's no fun to watch
that happen. The Rockets know what's coming, Nobody, fans know
what's coming. Yeah, they're good at it and nobody.

Speaker 1 (49:52):
First of all, Brandon Pajemski just can go to absolute
you know where. I do like him for one reason why.
I can't tell who hates him, Mores fans or Golden
State fans. Pagens awesome.

Speaker 2 (50:08):
He sucks and he thinks he's good. Well, they kept
giving him run out dunks and lay ups.

Speaker 1 (50:12):
He says it, though I'm not assuming he has come
out and said I basically should be like Steff. I mean,
he's such a bore on I'm paraphrasing. It's his hair
that's doing it. He could shave his head tomorrow, I'd
still hate his guts and you should too.

Speaker 2 (50:25):
A Warriors fan, there was a really good list I saw.
Maybe I'll bring it up later on the show if
we want to turn this into Warriors Radio. All that
being said, Rockets extended their winning streak. They're whin they
a game of Denver and LA. They don't have the
tiebreaker over eat either of those teams, so obviously passing
them is mandatory if they want to land in anywhere
other than the five spot. And they have not eliminated
the Tea Wolves yet from passing them. Astros situation three

(50:50):
game series with the Rockies, a little look at what
the Rockies have been and who the Astros will be
up against when they are at the plate facing the Rockies.
And obviously the injury bug we mentioned on the Major
League Baseball side, let's pretty well hit the NBA side
as well.

Speaker 1 (51:03):
We'll do that next eighteen rolling along here on a
Monday edition of the program. By the way, I forgot
to mention one of the major names in Major League
Baseball when I was going through all those litany of injuries,
Wan Soto, with the calf injury with him right.

Speaker 2 (51:20):
Yeah, two to three weeks he went on the il
running the bases. Also, it appeared to be where his
leg left him wondering, well, that doesn't feel right.

Speaker 1 (51:29):
Yeah, that's not good, especially when you pay him seven
hundred and sixty million not a year. No, no, but
at least they didn't defer all of it, right show Hey, I.

Speaker 2 (51:41):
Mean he's they'll both be fine financially for many years
to come.

Speaker 1 (51:45):
All right, Where what was your reaction when you found
out on consecutive nights basically that Luka Doncic is out
with a Grade two hamstring and then Austin Reeves is
out with an oblique I.

Speaker 2 (51:58):
Didn't think the Lakers had a chance to beat anybody
they would be up against after the Luke injury in
the opening round. If it was Denver, I thought they'd lose.
If was Houston, I thought they'd lose. It was Minnesota
with Anthony Edwards, I thought they'd lose. That's not a
given though, By the way, anymore with Anthony Edwards, now
he's got what apparently Steph Curry has been dealing with,
and you can kind of see it in the way
that he has been back in the lineup and then

(52:19):
back out of the lineup, right, obviously not really over it,
and then wondering why.

Speaker 1 (52:23):
Not am I not really over it?

Speaker 2 (52:24):
But then when the Austin Reeves injury was added to it,
that just you know, doubled it up all the three
of those teams again, Phoenix has an outside chance to
slide into the sixth spot. Minnesota could ultimately end up seventh.
That's the only thing that could upset three, four, five, six.
As it currently is and has been for weeks, two
of those teams are going home in the opening round,

(52:44):
and two of those teams are advancing. One of those
teams going home is definitely the Los Angeles Lakers. If
neither of those players are available, we can pretend like
Luca Doncis is gonna get magic treatment overseas where he
already is in Europe, probably for some treatment that's either
more advanced or easily attainable, accessible and administerrable overseas than

(53:08):
it is here, and he will be able to not
only come back, but play at a very very high
level during the opening round. If they're getting nothing from
Luca and nothing from Austin Reeves in the opening round,
which will begin either on the eighteenth or nineteenth as
twelve days or thirteen days away. This is the last
week of the NBA regular season, and the Lakers, and
the Rockets and the Nuggets have all clinched having the

(53:31):
week off, so all game ones are Saturday and Sunday,
the eighteenth and nineteenth. The series will extend two weeks
if it goes the distance, so there's some leeway in there.
They just don't have enough talent. They just simply don't.
Many teams with high priced talent don't either. Hard to
have a lot of depth when you're paying that amount
of money to your top level players and they've got
two max level players and Reeves's contract on the top

(53:53):
side of their salary structure and two of those players
are out. Every other NBA team would be in the
same boat. Take your best two players off the team
or two of your best three, and now go win
a playoff series. Nobody would be favored to do that,
and they're not, And so everybody around them, the other
three teams I'm talking about, I do think that's in
the front of their mind, Well, how do we make
this happen. It's a little bit different for every team.

(54:17):
Houston's fifth, Denver's going to outplay the Lakers the rest
of the way, So the Lakers are going to be
fourth unless the Rockets pass them, they're going to well,
the Rockets have to outplay them by two games. The
rest of the way, they trail them by one. They
have fifty wins, the Rockets have forty nine. Everybody among
these four teams have all played the same number of games.
They all have four games remaining, so you got out

(54:38):
play them by two. If you go four to oh, well,
if they win twice, you've beaten them. If you go
three and one, well, if they win twice, you haven't
beaten them. And so on down the line. There are
games that are losable for them. And I said it
earlier and I mean it. I think every game the
Lakers play without Luca and without Reeves, Austin Reeves, those
are losable games.

Speaker 1 (54:59):
Game.

Speaker 2 (55:00):
It's only not losable because the other team is just
trying so hard to make sure.

Speaker 1 (55:06):
But the Utah at home that you sho is trying
to lose.

Speaker 2 (55:10):
The organization, not the players on the court. I know
Bryce Sensiba is not trying to lose. Cody Williams not
trying to lose.

Speaker 1 (55:15):
With the Rockets put up one hundred and forty on them,
and then the Thunder put up one hundred and forty
six on them. It's not just that they're losing. They're
getting waxed. And even though the Lakers suck, and they
do suck with Lebron James, they suck. Bronni's gonna put
up twenty six on the Utah Jazz. They're terrible, Bronni. Yeah,
that's not true. I know it was joke.

Speaker 2 (55:35):
No, I'm being This is a totally serious comment. You know,
look at the Lakers last night. They played the Mavericks
and obviously this is a game without Reeves and without Donch.
It's the group that they have moving forward. So put
Utah on the other side. The Rockets just played Utah.
You pretty much know what they have and it really
won't change. The players that were out then are going
to continue to be out for the remainder of the season.

(55:55):
They'll be playing their ninth through eighteenth best rostered players
of the course of the year, and they'll be going
up against Jake la Ravia, Van doh Jackson, Hayes, Ruey Hachimura,
DeAndre Ayt and Luke Cannard and Lebron James.

Speaker 1 (56:10):
That's not a very talented team.

Speaker 2 (56:12):
No, it's not a very talented team at all, it's
the worst team among the ten that are inside the playoffs,
the worst among the ten every team in the Western
Conference playoff picture that includes all the way down to ten,
where the Warriors are, where the Blazers and Clippers are.
That is the worst talent as the least talented group.
They can't lose to Utah. The Mavericks are doing everything

(56:35):
they can within reason to lose. They have the worst record.

Speaker 1 (56:39):
In the NBA going in the last Night's game over
the last two months, and they beat them. Here's the thing, easily.
The Lakers have Oklahoma City tomorrow night.

Speaker 2 (56:48):
And Oklahoma City needs to clinch Number one, so Oklahoma
City will crash.

Speaker 1 (56:51):
Them at Golden State on Thursday. Golden State's kind of
in no man's land right now.

Speaker 2 (56:57):
Yeah, they can still get to nine an out, you know,
that's all.

Speaker 1 (57:02):
They can continue this momentum so that they can do
whatever they're gonna do losing in the playoff.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
I mean, they want to get a home game so
they still have something to play for Phoenix.

Speaker 1 (57:10):
I don't know what to make of Phoenix. The Rockets
play them tomorrow night. I fully expect the Rockets to
win that game. They have not lost the Phoenix all season,
and Phoenix was a lot healthier in some of those
other games, and then Utah, conversely, the Rockets are at
Phoenix tomorrow night, and then they finish the season at
home with the Sixers, who aren't allowing Joe elll Embiid

(57:33):
to play right now, I don't know what to deal
with with that situation. Some he just doesn't play every night,
and now he's mad at Daryl Moury. Apparently everybody eventually
gets mad at Darryl Moury. Minnesota, who will have Anthony Edwards,
won't have Anthony Edwards. I don't know. You already lost
to them in spectacular fashion, so you're probably smarting about that,
regardless of who's in the lineup. And then Memphis is

(57:54):
terrible if you can't make up those games in four
games against the Lakers, so you don't deserve it, but
I think you will. And I think what's gonna happen
is the Nuggets, even with one more game against the Spurs,
will get to the third seed. Rockets will move ahead
of the Lakers for the fourth seed, who will go
to fifth because the Timberwolves won't be able to make
up that ground. They'll be sixth, they might even be seventh.

Speaker 2 (58:16):
Yeah, the San Antonio game, unfortunately, this is the last
game of the year.

Speaker 1 (58:19):
It will be meaningful to the Spurs.

Speaker 2 (58:20):
They will be the number two seed that will be
locked up, and they I mean they'll have a week off,
so maybe some player, some of their players will play,
but I doubt it, and I doubt Wemby will play.
And they just played and lost to the Denver Nuggets,
so it's not like they can't go out and beat
them anyway. If the Nuggets also have nothing but home
games in between now and that final road game against
San Antonio. Friday's game is the Oklahoma City game for Denver.

(58:42):
Will the team's care will they want a playoff preview
or with Oklahoma City having already clinched, which they have
not yet but likely will by then the number one
overall seed, why would they put any of their players
at risk.

Speaker 1 (58:53):
It would make no sense.

Speaker 2 (58:54):
So Denver's probably going to finish fifty four and twenty eight.
They're fifty to twe eight today and their winning streak
is longer than the Rockets winning streak. That's how well
they've been playing. I just mentioned they beat San Antonio
the other night in a very playoff like atmosphere type
of game. So they get to fifty four the Rockets,
like you just laid out their schedule the way that

(59:15):
they're playing, Yes, they should finish four to Oh. The
game against Phoenix probably a challenging game, and that the Suns,
you know, with Brooks, Green and Booker all playing against
them for the first time, it could make a difference.

Speaker 1 (59:28):
Minnesota game shouldn't come down to it.

Speaker 2 (59:30):
But if the Rockets win that game, that eliminates the
Wolves from catching them, and they would Rockets would lock
up no worse than five, and by then they'd only
have one game remaining and they would know, have we
already gotten past the Lakers? If do we need to
win this game to ease past the Lakers. Yeah, there's
a pretty good chance they finish Nuggets three, Rockets for
Lakers five and Wolves six.

Speaker 1 (59:51):
Which means you open up against the depleted Lakers at
home in that game that series is I'll give them
a gentleman sweep.

Speaker 2 (59:59):
It would be fantastic. There's everybody would be trying to
play them. If the Nuggets can finagle their way into
you know, having two teams pass them and have the
Lakers fall behind them, or they like they're in the
toughest position to make it happen, Like the Rockets are
really the only team in position to go out and
just play basketball and it will happen. I know Minnesota
would would love to say sixth, but not if the

(01:00:21):
Lakers aren't still third. They love where they sit today,
but they're not gonna love where they are when the
Nuggets are their opponent or the Rockets are their opponent.
So any number of things could happen, but most likely
what I just laid out Nuggets three Rockets, four, Lakers,
five Wolves six and if that's not accurate, well, the
Rockets and Lakers probably will still play one another in

(01:00:41):
the four or five game, maybe not with home court advantage.

Speaker 1 (01:00:44):
I don't like that scenario.

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
If the Rockets lose to the Lakers and Luca and
Austin Reeves combined for the same number of minutes played
in that series as the eight team does, then the
Rockets are breaking out mirrors and taking a good, hard,
long look at themselves. Back to back playoff losses to
teams that are worse than you, that's not good.

Speaker 1 (01:01:06):
Matchups.

Speaker 2 (01:01:07):
If you lose to the Lebron led and they will
be led by Lebron with those two stars out if
you lose to them in a postseason series.

Speaker 1 (01:01:13):
That group that they have, come on, man, yeah, that's
that's a fireable offense. Somebody needs to go. I don't
know who it is. If you're healthy, somebody needs to go.
If that happens, all right, we'll leave it at that.
We'll switch back to some baseball conversation. Steve Sparks his
weekly visit here on Sports Talk seven ninety year home
for Astros Baseball that took place earlier today. A portion
of that conversation, starting with his thoughts on Brian Abreu's

(01:01:37):
current downturn. We'll get to that next the eighteen on
Sports Talk seven ninety. You're on the eighteen.

Speaker 2 (01:01:46):
It's Monday afternoon here around three thirty. Oftentimes you will
hear us. Let you hear from Steve Sparks, Astros radio
analyst of course, former major league pitcher, who joins the
Morning Drive each and every Monday morning around.

Speaker 1 (01:01:58):
Eight a m.

Speaker 2 (01:01:59):
Ten games into the season, the Astros sit in first place.
They have the best offense in baseball. They have one
of the less least successful pitching stabs in baseball, although
the majority of that is resting on the respective right
arms of Christian Javier, Brian Abrew and Roderie. Muno's reports
indicate that Munho's is time with the Astros is already

(01:02:20):
over and they will have another arm available to them
in the bullpen today when Cody Bolton starts. But Steve
Sparks joined the Morning Drive this morning and a lot
of questions about pitching. You can catch this interview in
its entirety right there at SportsTalk seven ninety dot com
or with you the iHeartRadio app where you should already be,
or might you now consider being a subscriber to our podcast,

(01:02:41):
the Matt Thomas Show podcast, the Morning Drive podcast, and
way you catch everything that you would otherwise have missed
right here on Sports Talk seven to ninety. A portion
of that conversation with Steve Sparks here, beginning with his
thoughts about current until further notice, Astro's closer Bryan A brave.

Speaker 5 (01:03:02):
And Brian's gotten off to a tough start and the
spring training wasn't great either, So you know, it's pitch shapes.
You know, one thing that I've been encouraged by his
last two outings at least that he's been over ninety
five miles per.

Speaker 6 (01:03:14):
Hour, So that's encouraging.

Speaker 5 (01:03:16):
So I think mechanically he's just trying to get to
a spot where he stays closed a little bit longer,
especially with his lower half, to be able to drive,
and changing the shape of his slider, I think is
a big thing to make it look like his fastball again.

Speaker 6 (01:03:30):
Right now, you've got.

Speaker 5 (01:03:31):
A little hump because his arm's late, and when there's
a hump, when the ball pops up out of the hand,
it's easily recognizable.

Speaker 6 (01:03:39):
So I think that's a big part of his problem
right now. Let's not forget too.

Speaker 5 (01:03:45):
I mean, he's one of the best pitchers relief pitchers
in all of baseball the last three years, and never
you know, pooh pooh the idea that this guy is
trying to get paid and he becomes a free agent
at the end of the year, so that's always going
to add stress. I'm just telling you the reality of
ways the way guys go. Man, they're trying to get

(01:04:08):
to the end of the line to take care of
their families, and he's probably putting even a little extra
pressure on himself.

Speaker 7 (01:04:13):
Another guy that's going to get paid very soon, whether
it be in Houston or elsewhere. Hunter Brown fifteen day
IL with shorter discomfort. You guys were able to speak
to Dana yesterday overall concern level of losing your ace
this early in the season.

Speaker 5 (01:04:28):
You know, I usually hold judgment on as far as
the concern goes.

Speaker 6 (01:04:33):
You just have to wait in these situations.

Speaker 5 (01:04:35):
And there's been plenty of times where the Astros have
lost a main cock for two or three months. And
I said this yesterday. I feel like this is probably
better early. I mean, if it's something that he's just
going to.

Speaker 6 (01:04:49):
Have to rehab it and give a little rest, I'd
rather this happened earlier than later. And if that's the case,
here we go. It might be a lesson learned to.

Speaker 5 (01:05:00):
I going to barely touch on this, and I'm not
sure if this is the way he intended it to go.

Speaker 6 (01:05:05):
The one hundred we're going ninety miles per hour to
spring training.

Speaker 5 (01:05:08):
It might be a lesson to say, hey, in spring training,
let's make sure that we're just getting our body used
to the riggers and we're going to keep it around
ninety four ninety five miles per hour and not be
so juiced up and competitive. And I'm not saying he
did that he overthrew or anything, but it was coming
out hot in spring training and sometimes it might be

(01:05:30):
a little too much too early.

Speaker 8 (01:05:32):
Now, let's keep it going with the pitching side, because
we've got two starts of Christian Javier and two pretty
lackluster performances out of him.

Speaker 4 (01:05:39):
What are you seeing from the Astros number three right now?

Speaker 5 (01:05:42):
Well, he needs a little more hop on the fastball.
I mean, he doesn't have that acceleration that we've seen,
especially up in the zone right now, and we've seen
a little flash here and there, so where it.

Speaker 6 (01:05:53):
Looks like it takes a little bit more effort for
him to get to it.

Speaker 5 (01:05:57):
But if that's what it takes for a while now,
I think he's got to he's got to reach back
and grunt every once in a while just to get
it by some of these guys. And more than anything,
if you look at the numbers, I mean, we've always
been wild by his elevated his elevated stuff.

Speaker 6 (01:06:14):
His fastball plays so well.

Speaker 5 (01:06:15):
Up in the zone, it really plays well low in
the zone too, because everybody looks upstairs for his fastball.

Speaker 6 (01:06:24):
His pitch is low in the zone.

Speaker 5 (01:06:26):
Guys are hitting like one sixty five, one seventy on
those pitches. So maybe a little difference in philosophy to
getting down in the zone a little bit. But more
than anything.

Speaker 6 (01:06:36):
He's just got a leverage counts.

Speaker 5 (01:06:37):
He's got to get ahead of the count and keep
everybody a little more engaged by throwing more strikes.

Speaker 7 (01:06:43):
What was your overall review of day start number two
for TOTSI my nine strikeouts, really good control and that
splitter man, I mean, it has the movement that is
going to get out of jams early and often.

Speaker 6 (01:06:58):
You know what's funny is a.

Speaker 5 (01:06:59):
Lot of people and I remember, I've seen a couple
of pitchers like this in years past, and I'm.

Speaker 6 (01:07:04):
Not gonna date myself with guys that used to do this.
So guys, there's been guys that.

Speaker 5 (01:07:11):
Throw their slider and it looks like a slip finger
fastball because of its shaped And I'm not kidding. EMI's
performance a couple of days ago, it was my favorite
of the year.

Speaker 6 (01:07:21):
It was pitching at its best. He said it after
the game.

Speaker 5 (01:07:24):
I was going to be more concerned with locating my
pitches than I was at velocity. I think he gave
a little bit too much credit to major leaguers. He
felt like he was going to have to gear it
up a little bit more to compete at this level,
and he does it. Man, it was a throwback performance
to see a guy change speeds with his fastball the

(01:07:45):
way he did.

Speaker 6 (01:07:46):
Nobody hardly does that anymore.

Speaker 5 (01:07:48):
I thought it was beautiful if it rubs off on
a couple more guys watching the way he goes about
it to serve energy, but it just looks like he
was having fun. Looked very effortless, and I can't wait
till he pitches again.

Speaker 8 (01:08:03):
How much does it help to have Christian Vasquez, not
only for him but for the rest of this pitching staff.

Speaker 6 (01:08:09):
It helps the time, you know.

Speaker 5 (01:08:11):
I mean, don't forget he caught thirty three innings in
the postseason in twenty twenty two in the pitchers when
he was in there, only gave up one earned run.

Speaker 4 (01:08:21):
That's how good he was.

Speaker 6 (01:08:22):
I mean, he he was a great acquisition. And I
know you gave up Will You're going to bray you
in that deal.

Speaker 5 (01:08:27):
But the Astros won a World Series and a lot
a lot of credit goes to Christian Basquez, and he's
gonna help him.

Speaker 6 (01:08:36):
He's going to help guyer Ds, He's going to help
everybody else. And I love what Carlos Correa says about it.
He says he's a clown. You know, we love it.

Speaker 5 (01:08:45):
I mean he things light in the clubhouse, and every
team meets a guy like that inside there.

Speaker 2 (01:08:51):
Well, they have one late addition just out of the
World Baseball Classic, actually was added during the World Baseball
Classic and then join the team with about a week
to go, got in a tiny bit of work behind
the plate and at the dish, and then he made
the team over Seesar Salazar. It's gotten into a couple
of games, has hit very well. Obviously, he's catching very well,
and I do think he has pretty good value to

(01:09:12):
this team for some of those external reasons, both on
days he does not catch and days he does. He
also caught a game, allowing Jiner Diaz to DH that day,
and while we were listening to Steve talk about the
pitching staff, very unsurprisingly, yord On Alvarez was named American
League Player of the Week. He had three home runs
this week and his OPS is closer to two thousand

(01:09:33):
than one thousand. That'll get you an award. He's very good.

Speaker 1 (01:09:36):
Yes, he's really really good. And well, I've got a
hot take on Jordan and a little comeback down to
Earth from a guy who well competes with him. If
you want to put that in quotation marks within the division,
we'll tell you about that. In fact, I'll let you
choose which one is the hotter take when we return

(01:09:58):
here on a Monday of the eighteen the eight on
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Speaker 5 (01:11:07):
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Speaker 1 (01:11:10):
Afternoons at three.

Speaker 2 (01:11:11):
Hear us and see us talking your teams on Sports.

Speaker 1 (01:11:15):
Talk seven ninety now simulcast on Space City Home Network.
Now your clutch city commute on Sports Talk. Oh, Steve
sparks that we replayed for you. Talking mostly about the
Astros pitchings. Let's focus on the Astros hitting. It is
the best in baseball.

Speaker 2 (01:11:36):
You're back here on the A Team and we are
your home for Astros baseball. Nobody's done it better. The
number one in Major League Baseball in runs runs per
game as well, it's not everybody has played the ten
that the Astros have. They lead the majors and walks
and in both of those categories, by the way, it's
not close.

Speaker 1 (01:11:53):
It's not even remotely close.

Speaker 2 (01:11:55):
Their number one in baseball and ops as well, and
they needed to be in order to get some of
these wins. Yesterday they scored ten runs in a loss,
losing twelve to ten in extra innings, but six wins
in ten games to start the season, a series split,
a series sweep, and then a lost series to the Athletics.
They begin tonight with Cody Bolton on the mound against

(01:12:17):
the Colorado Rockies. Rockies have gotten off to a typically
insert dad joke here, unstable start. I guess I could
say they've gotten off to a rocky start. They're in
Denver as per usual, but they're probably not quite as
pushovery as they have been in previous years. I think
some of their young offensive talent is actually worthwhile, but
overall it's going to be they're gonna finish last into

(01:12:39):
their division. They're gonna suffer a lot of losses. Probably
ninety five is about as few as I could see
them happening, but again, that would be a step forward
from where they've been. But offensively speaking, the Astros have
enjoyed the season from jord On quite obviously. I think
everybody knows about what he's doing this year. He only
leads the league and runs, walks, on base percentage, slugging plus,

(01:13:01):
and the very very popular Roba and our bat plus.
He doesn't even lead the team in runs batted in,
that's Christian Walker. He doesn't lead the team in barrel percentage,
that's Christian Walker. Jose Altuve is actually tied with him
for the most walks in the league. If that gives

(01:13:22):
you any idea of how good this offense is, and
that Jordan's having one of the best ten game stretches
of his remarkably awesome offensive career, and he's out doing that,
and yet teammates are kind of right there with him
near the top of the list in a number of
different categories. But individually speaking, and knowing how teams are
clearly attempting to lessen his impact by not giving him

(01:13:46):
pitches to hit, it hardly has seemed to matter.

Speaker 1 (01:13:50):
He's been that good, he's been that locked in. Felt
like he might have maybe felt a little of that
coming around late in spring training. It's essentially been here
since midway through the series against the Angels, when his
first home run of the year was a foul ball. Well, look,
I knew that they would be better with him that's

(01:14:10):
like goes without saying, and I knew that if he
was healthy, he doesn't take a long time to get
into the groove, like he's come back from injuries and
hit a home run his first game back. Having said
all the stuff is the stuff we just got done saying,
I mean, this is exceeding all expectations, right, I.

Speaker 2 (01:14:30):
Was gonna say the same because it was what I
said about Walker different degrees, clearly, but yeah, I didn't
expect this from Jordan. I thought he'd be awesome. I
thought he'd hit I don't know, three fifty three h five.
I mean, he thought he'd have an eleven hundred ops.
I mean, he's not going to finish the season with
any of these numbers. But when he walks to the plate,
there's a fifty seven percent chance he's going to reach

(01:14:52):
first base.

Speaker 1 (01:14:53):
That's insane, it's crazy, and I mean, yeah, yeah, walks
are a huge part of that, but that's that's the
respect factor.

Speaker 2 (01:15:00):
And nine of his walks have been earned, and three
of his walks have been.

Speaker 1 (01:15:07):
Just trying just go to first base exactly, and that's
going to increase by a lot. I think if he
keeps this other stuff up, when he actually is pitched
to last.

Speaker 2 (01:15:15):
Yesterday, runners on second, third, first base open, they pitched
to him, yeah, and it worked. Uh yeah, I guess
he ended up walking.

Speaker 1 (01:15:26):
But then the Astros did not play add on. Yeah.
Well and again with with Estak. Perettis coming back sooner
rather than later, and the aforementioned log jam that we
knew was coming finally going to be an actual issue.
It will be interesting to see how they try and
cram all these guys in one lineup, and and it'll

(01:15:47):
be interesting to see if his numbers change based on
whether or not he's playing in the field or not.
Like we've talked about so many times over the years
with him, he.

Speaker 2 (01:15:57):
Played the outfield in one of the games in West Sacramento,
which may have been a surprise to us or others.
So he's played in the outfield three times. I mean,
he's mashing no matter what is next to his name
in the in the lineup.

Speaker 1 (01:16:09):
N It used to be his numbers took a slight
dip when he wasn't playing in the field.

Speaker 2 (01:16:12):
If there was a reason for it, nobody ever had one, right, So,
I mean it was clear it was it was there.
I couldn't deny that it was a part of it,
but there just really wasn't ever any I mean, because
he's not into the game, because you know, it's what
DH feels a certain way.

Speaker 1 (01:16:28):
I mean, brandtlely.

Speaker 2 (01:16:29):
I think I talked about how you feel when you're
the designated hitter, and we clearly know Jordon wants to
play in the field, and so that might already put
a little bit of a downer, But as a you know,
I really don't think I would put much into it.
And certainly we're this crazy tiny sample size this year,
but his numbers are almost identical as his three days

(01:16:50):
in the left versus his seven days as a DH SO.

Speaker 1 (01:16:53):
Or within the two week period of the opening of
the season. Hotter Take Jordan or MVP like he continues
some sort of torrid pace, maybe not quite this this
blazing hot, but he puts up that first forty home
run season and all the stuff that goes with it,
or some semblance of Christian Javier being sent down out

(01:17:18):
of the rotator, whatever you want to call it. What's
what's the more knee jerk reaction. I'm again, I'm guessing
you're gonna say it's hoavier. Well, Jordon Alvarez for MVP.
Is it was the thing before he did this, that's true,
Like going into the season, could Jordon win MVP, Yeah,
I'd have to outplay Vlattie, Bobby Witt and Aaron Judge.

(01:17:41):
Not cal Raley. Yeah, probably not.

Speaker 2 (01:17:43):
I mean you probably vote MVP based on whether not
guys with the bases loaded an extra inning strikeout or not.

Speaker 1 (01:17:51):
Over the weekend.

Speaker 2 (01:17:51):
But yeah, Jordon doing there, they're you know, Christian Xavier
getting sent down was far less of a thing.

Speaker 1 (01:17:58):
But it's it's it's a thing now.

Speaker 2 (01:18:00):
I don't think it's imminent, but like I said this
earlier today, I think there's a real possibility. You know,
they just look at where their potential options are for
starting now that a spot is open. Cody Bolton has
it today, but I don't think that he has it
the next time around. And it's obviously a bullpen day
when you give the ball to Cody Bolton, But between
Alexander Gordon and Arraghetty and Peter Lambert for that matter,
I think any one of them could be inserted into

(01:18:22):
the starting rotation. You have to insert somebody because Brown's out,
and you might have to insert to somebody's if you
want a six man rotation, and you might have to
do even more if you don't want to give the
ball to Christian Javier. You could skip his turn easily
this week or push him back several days because of
the off day, and because of the fact that I
think somebody else could you know, is going to start

(01:18:44):
if you skip him Wednesday.

Speaker 1 (01:18:45):
It's very easy. You just call one of those players
I mentioned up, and you have the opening to do it,
and you have the options on those pitchers to do it.

Speaker 2 (01:18:51):
Burrows starts tomorrow and Javier pitches Friday, or he probably
would more likely pitch Saturday because they were going to
keep Emi on normal rest, which is five days off
in between stars.

Speaker 1 (01:19:02):
We also had a nice bounce back. He was great.
That was what they hoped he would be.

Speaker 2 (01:19:06):
I mean, maybe even more so because it was a
zero run outing and he had hitters baffled. He had
the players on his own team baffled with some of
his stuff. But hotter take is it's it's I guess
it's Hoavier gets sent down because I don't You're gonna
tell me Jordon's gonna win MVP, And I would.

Speaker 1 (01:19:21):
Say, whoa no, what are you crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:19:24):
He's the best left handed hitter in the American League
and this year he's the best any hitter in the
American League. That's what an MVP does. Well, we'll keep
this up. Biggest al surprise early on. And I'm talking
about teams. But one of these teams it is bad, bad,
bad for their best player. And I'll read you it
just delightful graphic.

Speaker 1 (01:19:45):
If you're an Astros fan looking to take back the
AO West throwne when we return for the four o'clock
hour next Kitty Home Network, simulcash. If you want to
watch us like Grace is doing right now, shout out
to her and Chico. Yeah, I put animals to sleep routinely.
I thought that was interesting wording you use. I did
it intentionally. I knew what I was talking about. That's

(01:20:06):
usually what the vets do, not sports talk rating. Maybe
if you want to look at things from a dark perspective,
it's a pretty common phrase. The dog was sleeping in
the picture. Okay, I said I did that. I didn't notice.
I thought the dog was just in the picture. I
talked about a dog dying here. Now I'm kidding, all right.

Speaker 2 (01:20:23):
We love when you guys are out there listening to
us and viewing us. You let us know where you're
at and send us a little picture. It's always good
to know.

Speaker 1 (01:20:31):
Now, before we get to the biggest American league surprizes
early on here in twenty twenty six, I want to
delve into one player specifically, since we were talking about
Jordan Alvarez, who won the al MVP last year, Aaron
Judge who was right there with him, and a bunch
of Seattle fans were whining that he didn't win it.

(01:20:51):
Their catcher, what's his name, cal Raley? What's his nickname?
The Big Dumper? Thank you. So I'm going to read
aloud the MLB strikeout leaders so far this year, and
I'm gonna go in as sending order.

Speaker 2 (01:21:05):
Ready among offensive players. No, I'm just gonna read this, okay,
So it's a list of pitchers with the most striker I'm.

Speaker 1 (01:21:12):
Gonna read the list. Jacob Misarowski with eighteen. Heyesus Lozardo
with eighteen, Dylan Cease with eighteen, Kevin Goussman with twenty one,
and right there in the middle with twenty, Cal Rawley.

(01:21:33):
I love that graphic. This guy sucks this year.

Speaker 2 (01:21:37):
His last strikeout was with the bases loaded and extra innings.

Speaker 1 (01:21:42):
It's kind of a downer for Mariners.

Speaker 2 (01:21:43):
Not very clutch, is it. No, But, like I pointed
out last week, not that he'd like he didn't do
this last year too.

Speaker 1 (01:21:49):
I'm just break my arm patting yourself on the back
of the rest of his season to balance it out.
I mean, cal Rawley will play at an All Star
level this year offensively, Nay, somebody's gonna beat him out.
I don't know who that catcher is.

Speaker 2 (01:22:03):
Well, I don't even mean he's gonna make the All
Star team. I'm just saying he's caliber. He's gonna have
the same type of season he's had prior to hitting
sixty homers, which is very very good.

Speaker 1 (01:22:12):
I'm not anticipating sixty. Nobody was. And that's why. See,
that's why I asked this question, because it goes in
many ranging directions. Who's the biggest American league? Only forget
the National League, we don't care about them. The biggest
American league surprise early on in twenty twenty six, and
we do mean early. I mean, since we're just jumping
to conclusions here on the mat that we have for

(01:22:33):
ourselves two weeks.

Speaker 2 (01:22:34):
In, I would probably say the Red Sox.

Speaker 1 (01:22:38):
Well, your three choices are them? Oh there are only
three choices. Yeah, well, I'm gonna give you these three.
If you want to submit another one, that's fine. I
mean Red Sox, Mariners or Angels. Oh, the Angels are
a five hundred team. Nothing too spectacular about winning five
out of your ten game. I think too spectacular about
Joe Adele's three home run robberies. One of what chad

(01:23:00):
one of the best photos I've ever seen. He's in
the stands holding the ball. I caught it.

Speaker 2 (01:23:06):
There's some controversy there from some First of all, it
was a one nothing game during each of those home
run robberies, right, his teammate Zach Netto hit a lead
off home against the Yes, his teammate hit a lead
off homer in that game, and then the Mariners hit
definitely two balls over the fence. Maybe there's some question
about the second one if it would have been a homer.
But I'm okay with the storyline three homer run robberies

(01:23:27):
for I mean, come on, you saw what they put
on the whiteboard for the next day on their game
plan whiteboard.

Speaker 1 (01:23:35):
The Mariners, I missed it. Don't hit it to Joseph
adel Oh, yes, that's right. His name's not Joseph. It's
not even Joe with an e.

Speaker 2 (01:23:44):
It's it's well, why don't you This is for you
and our our former producer.

Speaker 1 (01:23:48):
What is his first name? Joe? No, he has a
longer version of Joe. I'm not saying that. You're not
gonna say Jordan. Why would you go by Joe if
your name was Jordan?

Speaker 2 (01:23:58):
Well it is, but I say it for you and
Cole's purpose because it's j O R D O N
Jordan Jordan. No, that's how you pronounced Jordan. But no,
I get what Seattle was trying to say. But nobody
named Joseph Adell even plays Major League Baseball, So I
think I know who they were talking about. But yeah,
the Angels. You don't think the Angels went five and

(01:24:18):
five last year? It's multiple different spots, doesn't it feel
differently though? After having seen them firsthand? I mean it
pitched a little bit better than I would have expected
them to. They hit a little bit better, Their average
is a little bit higher for now.

Speaker 1 (01:24:32):
I mean they they went up against the Astros best
they had to offer in the first week of the season,
and like they just they didn't look like your typical
pushover and Joe Adele just we're talking about him. Defensively,
this guy's good for punting something every single game. I mean,

(01:24:52):
he had a reputation as being, well, this guy's a
wild card defensively. You never know what's gonna happen when
he's out there, you know, patrolling the outfield.

Speaker 2 (01:24:59):
But you gotta give it to him at least in this game. Okay,
So my answer is not the Angels. Yeah, I think
you've limited me to two other teams.

Speaker 1 (01:25:06):
Who are they? The Mariners, okay, and the Red Sox.

Speaker 2 (01:25:10):
So I said the Red Sox without being given options
their offense, I didn't think it would be awesome, but
I didn't think it would be embarrassingly bad. And that's
what it's been so far. Maybe a little bit of
who they've played, although I would say, no, it's not.

Speaker 1 (01:25:22):
I just can't score runs.

Speaker 2 (01:25:24):
They're not expected to get a bunch of guys back,
They're not missing a bunch of guys. I do not
think Tristan Cassis will make hardly any difference at all
with this offense and all this we can't score any
runs is happening. While williar Abreu looks like Jordan Alvarez
at the plate. He's been insane to start the season,
and it just really hasn't mattered because nobody else is

(01:25:44):
doing anything. That's too many spots of emptiness. Their pitching
wasn't likely going to be able to carry them. I
like the addition of Gray, and he pitched well in
his start, and you know, obviously Crochet is probably better
than his last start, which was against the Astros, where
he did not pitch very well. But they I don't
really have a whole lot. I don't think you got
a lot of time to figure it out. Nobody's done
anything crazy record wise, clearly. I mean, the Astros are

(01:26:08):
a six win team that's easily a top their division
by a game. Nobody in the Central has a winning record,
but the Guardians. Nobody in the East has a winning record,
but the Yankees, who already have a three game lead.
I don't think they're gonna run away with this, although
their pitching has been insane, but you probably don't want
to get off to a bad start in the American leagues.
To me, they're the biggest surprise, and it's a negative surprise.

(01:26:28):
They're two and seven. They've lost seven of nine to
start the season. I'm not sure why that's going to
change a whole lot. I rolled as Chapman, you know,
lost a game, tie game, but gave up a couple
of hits to lose.

Speaker 1 (01:26:39):
That's not a good sign. I was and I can't
remember who tweeted this, but somebody was talking about what
the the Red Sox have done from a personnel standpoint
just in the last year and change. They brought in
Alex Bregman to play third base. What else did he do?
What do you mean help them run off Rafael Devers? Well,

(01:27:00):
that's what I was getting to. That caused the controversy
with Devers, who was then shipped out of town. But
then Alex Bregman just said, all right, well, I'm going
to opt out of my I haven't opt out every
year of this three year contract that I got from
Scott Boris, and I'm going to opt out and I'm
going to go to play for the Chicago Cubs now.
And then they were talking about some of the other

(01:27:21):
personnel moves. They die, it's just been a day.

Speaker 2 (01:27:22):
Well, Boston Sports Gordo can can pick it up from
there if you'd like. Yes, Red Sox ruined their relationship
with Rafael Devers in the name of making Alex Bregman
their third day. They found it, so they traded Devers
for a package centered around Kyle Harrison and James Tibbs.
James Tibbs, by the way, was extremely highly thought of
teammate of Cam Smith's at Florida State, and they were

(01:27:43):
both first round picks a couple of years ago. Despite that,
they let Alex Bredman walk just seven months later over
a no trade clause, so they gave that money to
Ron Hare Suarez. He's made two starts, a bad one
against the Astros and then more recently another bad start.
He's got an eight to sixty four er. Maybe he
should change his name back to Ranger. They made Caleb
Durban their new third baseman. He's got a two zero

(01:28:05):
four OPS, not batting average, not slugging ops. And they
traded one of those two players they had Kyle Harrison,
and more to the Brewers, Harrison's pitch well for them.
By the way, James Tibbs is also not a Red
Sox because they sent him to the Dodgers for Dustin
May the oft injured right handed flamethrower who's not been

(01:28:27):
good in his few games with Boston and Tibbs is
the Minor league leader in home runs, having hit seven
in nine games. And he's a Dodger. He's a Dodgers
prospect right now.

Speaker 1 (01:28:39):
Right Great job, great, great job, Boston Like these are
the types of moves that they usually would get right
over the years, at least during their run of excellence.

Speaker 2 (01:28:48):
These are the types of moves that have management ownership.
I should say saying we need new management.

Speaker 1 (01:28:53):
I'm not.

Speaker 2 (01:28:54):
This is definitely if the season continues even remotely like this,
you'll see them. I think looking for different people to
call the shots.

Speaker 1 (01:29:02):
I really do. Will they be sellers at the deadline
or will they think.

Speaker 2 (01:29:06):
I think it would make a lot of sense to
You can still build a team around a few of
the guys you want to keep, especially the young guys
and probably Crochet for sure. But if you're expecting to
finish fourth or fifth in the American League East in
the future, than anybody that is worthwhile that you can move.
And I think I just mentioned one of those players
I would move one hundred percent hundred times out of

(01:29:29):
one hundred. I'm trading a role as Chapman. Is he fixed,
is he broken? He was unbelievable last year, is basically
unhittable and untouchable.

Speaker 1 (01:29:40):
Al T broke him. That wasn't last year. I know,
That's what I'm saying. Though he's been more consistent.

Speaker 2 (01:29:46):
He's had a really good go of things since leaving
the Yankees, where he was also good. He wasn't as
good as he's been. His last four years have been really,
really good.

Speaker 1 (01:29:55):
Yeah. Yeah, he has bounced back that al East, I mean,
Boston is one of the reasons why the Yankees are
able to try and run away with things. All the
other teams are as well. By the way, it's not
nearly as competitive as I thought.

Speaker 2 (01:30:12):
As I thought it was a question you didn't ask,
but I'll give you an answer to anyway, the biggest
positive surprise, if you limit it to that, it's the Yankees.
Their pitching is stupid. Bullpen has been great. It's outraged,
not just better than everybody else, way better historically good.

Speaker 1 (01:30:29):
Yeah, yeah, that'll change. They'll play real teams soon, they're
playing Major League Baseball. Lyn suck. Come on, the Marlins suck.
And who they open up the season against Oh yeah,
the Giants, who also suck. Apparently we didn't know that. Yes,
they can't. Who can score against the Yankees? Nobody stop it.
They play the Mariners too, that's true. But the Mariners

(01:30:51):
suck too because they're playing the Yankees. They suck. I
just gave you cal Rawley's numbers. He's not just striking
out against Yankees pitching. It'll be interesting to see how
it all out. All right, So there you have it.
Wex gave us not a real definitive answer. Who's the
biggest surprise? This is the Red Sox. Yes, that was
super definitive word. I thought you were kind of uh,
I thought you were a wishy washy wishy washy. All right,

(01:31:14):
the Astros might be the most bipolar team in the majors.
Will go to Wex's timeline to prove that statement. Next,
Gracie Hunt, it only happened over the weekend. How much
money can one family steal from another?

Speaker 2 (01:31:33):
Trent Green, former NFL quarterback, current NFL.

Speaker 1 (01:31:36):
Broadcast say congratulations to the young col He.

Speaker 2 (01:31:39):
Did play some of his football right there in Kansas City.
Among the engagement photos that Gracie and her fiance posted
were of the owner of the team shaking hands with
Trent because that's her dad and her fiance's dad.

Speaker 1 (01:31:55):
Well, he just got a new contract. It's nice. Generational
wealth literally now multi generational.

Speaker 2 (01:32:02):
Not only is his son marrying into a wealthy family,
it's his son. So they'll be paying for the wedding too. True,
that's true, that's tradition.

Speaker 1 (01:32:12):
Sure, it'll be nice. I don't think it's going to
be small. I doubt it.

Speaker 2 (01:32:17):
And uh, now, will some celebrities be in attendancy? You think, well,
Kermin will be there. Okay, so Brittany probably will accompany
her husband there.

Speaker 1 (01:32:27):
Well, that's unfortunate.

Speaker 2 (01:32:29):
Now do you think anybody with the last name of
Kelsey will be there?

Speaker 1 (01:32:33):
Yeah, all of the Kelsey's are everywhere now, they are,
all of them.

Speaker 2 (01:32:37):
Luckily for all of us. It's Master's Week and Jason
Kelsey will be a part of it. Go away. I
have no issue with him. I find him pretty entertaining.
Why because he makes me laugh? Is that the most
important entertaining thing that he does? He makes you laugh? Well,
he's they're going broadcaster. Oh you're supposed to inform me
or entertain me. He entertains every.

Speaker 1 (01:32:59):
Aspect poss Well, you know I'm always talking about how
you hate ESPN. This is why you should hate them more.

Speaker 2 (01:33:04):
Well, they're utilizing different people now that are probably less
like he can bother people, but he's more agenda free
than some people who've worked there in the past, as
many of them have done less and less work to
the point that they don't work there anymore.

Speaker 1 (01:33:20):
Yeah, and we can thank our lucky stars for some
of those. Well, I again, I didn't have a problem
with that them. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (01:33:26):
I happen to think he's entertaining, Like I liked him
when he was being interviewed, I liked him on his podcast,
like him entertaining, Well, he's not doing as much. All
that he really does is with his brother.

Speaker 1 (01:33:37):
Yeah, well I only bring that up because he's less entertaining.

Speaker 2 (01:33:41):
But just grade them for their comparable gifts to us
all speaking at the parade. Who was more entertaining Not Travis,
Not Travis.

Speaker 1 (01:33:52):
Now Travis is fiance. You may have heard of her
her music. Well, one of the musical selections of hers
was used in this Instagram post by Gracie Hunt to
announce that she's engaged.

Speaker 2 (01:34:05):
I think I did see it, but I can't remember
what song I'm imagining. It's not lover Oh, don't worry,
I have it. It's probably a little early, even though
the parents probably know.

Speaker 1 (01:34:13):
It's appropriate for the occasion. It's about belonging. I don't what.
I don't know you. I don't even know how the
song goes. It's apparently called you Belong with Me? You
don't know about that. That's like one of the easiest
songs to know. Come on, it's not the first time
you sang on the show. Do you have performance anxiety? No?

(01:34:35):
Just because we're on live radio and television. No, not
give me ten seconds of it. I'm not gonna hit
play on this. Good don't. I won't thank you. Gracie
Hunt is very very nice, young lady.

Speaker 2 (01:34:50):
Congratulations to both the Hunts and the Greens.

Speaker 1 (01:34:54):
Do you think she's not gonna go by that? And
he's not going to hyphenate it either. She's not a hyphenator.
Gracie Hunt Green, why not doesn't roll off the tongue?

Speaker 6 (01:35:06):
Is?

Speaker 1 (01:35:06):
She'll be Gracie? I would I would give Travis Johnson
a bazillion dollars if he would go to the comments
and just write the words, God don't like ugly, you know,
like you said to his old man on the field.
Actually it was after they were on the field together,
and how did you describe it when we were recently
having a conversation about that very play. Trent tried to
tackle Travis with his head.

Speaker 2 (01:35:28):
He tried to tackle Travis's knee with his head, his
helmeted head.

Speaker 1 (01:35:33):
And then Travis said, God don't like ugly.

Speaker 2 (01:35:36):
I was in the locker room at he was ticked
off because obviously Trent did get hurt, but the way
he hit Travis is something that NFL defensive players absolutely
despised because it is a hit to get them hurt, right,
it's not I don't think Green as a quarterback is
intending to do that ever. But you can't do that,

(01:35:57):
and it's a it's a penalty play. He don't with
his legs with his head helmet first into Travis's knee.
That's career ending stuff. That's you're out for the year stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:36:07):
Don't do that. Now, this is a People article, so
I have to read this this following statement in May
twenty five, Hunt talking about Gracie. Yeah, let's do Derek
a solid at least mention he as a first name.
Hard launched her romance with Green. What can I back

(01:36:27):
it up a second? Yeah, it doesn't apply to me
in R so it's only you. When did you two,
as equal celebrities Hard launch your relationship? First of all,
we're not equal celebrities, and I'm not a celebrity. Just
because I'm on TV and radio right now, does it
make me a celebrity a power couple? If you will,
let me ask you, when rock public Hard launch her

(01:36:49):
relationship with you? How many people ask for pictures with me? Ever,
when we're out in public. Now, let's compare that number
they give you the phone to take a picture of
the two of them. Gosh, I don't even I just
hate me, you guy, Hey, could you take a picture
of us? Hey, whoever you are, you're close by, could
you take this?

Speaker 5 (01:37:06):
No?

Speaker 1 (01:37:06):
Because they're always taken? So don't you remember me?

Speaker 2 (01:37:08):
I Hard launched our relationship years ago.

Speaker 1 (01:37:12):
We Hard launched in twenty fifteen. Awesome, that's the dumbest
thing ever, and so People magazine. So yeah. In May
twenty twenty five, Hunt Hard launched her romance with Green,
the son of former Super Bowl champion quarterback Trent Green,
who spent six seasons with Kansas City, none of which
were that Super Bowl season, on Instagram, uploading a series

(01:37:35):
of photos holding hands together while on vacation. Quote, my
heart is full. This is the emoji she used. You
look like Jeremy Pania. Grateful, grateful. You know what when
I do that? You know what? Carson says. He goes think, Okay,
it's bad. Grateful for you gets that from his mom
for some much needed time to rest, reflect, and reset

(01:38:00):
the alliteration after a whirlwind few months post football season win.
Did it end.

Speaker 2 (01:38:07):
So regular season? Like always for Kansas City?

Speaker 1 (01:38:10):
So thankful for time with the people who keep me grounded,
Remind me I'm loved and never failed to make me laugh.
Swipe for a few favorite snapshots from life lately.

Speaker 2 (01:38:21):
I just threw up, what's wrong with that? That's what
instagram is for. Read other captures. They sound just like that.
Another ring for Gracie. Another ring for Gracie. She's got
a few of them. If you were in charge ownership,
she has rings.

Speaker 1 (01:38:37):
If you were in charge of her social media account,
that's what you would have written. Another ring for me, Ah,
I bet you. Gracie's very in charge of her own captions.
I think if this whole radio television thing doesn't work
out for Wex, he should just write captions for people
on social media. If as if he were Wex.

Speaker 2 (01:38:54):
I'm going to add a line to the bio in
my Instagram page for inquiries and I'll give my management's handle.

Speaker 1 (01:39:01):
You know, I can't pronounce that weer inquiries. I can't
ever do it. I'm thinking about how I see it
on the page when I'm trying to pronounce it, and
it's like a bugaboo. I can't do it. Easy to
stay away from. Just keep doing that. Yeah, it's not
I'm thankful that it's not used often. So yeah, there
you go. Congratulations to the heiress to the Chief's kingdom.

(01:39:24):
You see what I did there.

Speaker 2 (01:39:25):
How about I mean we're not Yeah take it to
that level. How many years away are we from Derek
running the team?

Speaker 1 (01:39:32):
That's pretty brutal because that's basically what happened here in Houston.
Whoever married into the McNair family ended up running the team.
Tell me I'm wrong, Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:39:46):
It is, you're right, but this is the opposite sex
is the daughter of the owner is bringing the her
husband in.

Speaker 1 (01:39:54):
Is when they have press conferences together. He's not going
to answer all the question while she just stands there
looking like this the whole time because she talks.

Speaker 2 (01:40:05):
We don't know how Grace has been around football her
whole life. Derek's been around it in a different way.

Speaker 1 (01:40:09):
His whole life. This is the Hunt family. Yes, that
the ketchup conglomerate? Is that what we call this? Sure?
You like how I used the wedding crasher's reference. We're
gonna be what do they say from from Vermont? We're
gonna be a maple syrup syrup conglomerate.

Speaker 2 (01:40:26):
I thought they were trying to help their company, Holy
shirts and pants.

Speaker 1 (01:40:32):
I don't know the last time I purchased Hunts ketchup.
It's either Hines or better yet, water Bird.

Speaker 2 (01:40:39):
Do you have both of these in your refrigerator or
condiment drawer? Ketchup packets and a bottle? No, you have
one or together?

Speaker 1 (01:40:46):
Right? We're not serial killers like at the house.

Speaker 2 (01:40:49):
I don't remember the last time I used ketchup on
something at the house. Eating a meal when it didn't
come in the bag, I got the food in, so.

Speaker 1 (01:40:58):
You don't take the bottle. What I'm saying I don't.
I think we have ketchup. I'm not sure because I
never used myself to eat French fries. I would wherever
they came from, doesn't matter where. But then I'm taking
the spicy ketchup bottle from water Burger that's in the fridge.
This is provided we brought them home. That's what's going on.
Wherever we got those fries from. I've got so many
other sauces in there. I usually don't resort to ketchup,

(01:41:20):
and even if I do, I usually mix it with
something else entergy spicy ketchup gough of course, spicy everything. Okay,
So congrats to the young couple to be on their
Instagram post with Taylor Swift music. Who breaks up first?
Them or Travis and her?

Speaker 2 (01:41:39):
The broom almost as good as injury talk forecasting breakups.

Speaker 1 (01:41:44):
I'm not wishing divorces upon them, but I'm neither of
them are married yet. Maybe they won't make it and
just call it off. What they call it, cold feet,
wet feet, whatever it is cold feet coming up next? Hey,
speaking of Wes wet feet, just dip your toe in
the water, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Speaker 2 (01:42:01):
Next it is halfway through our number three.

Speaker 1 (01:42:11):
It's four thirty in the afternoon on the eighteen. Let's
hard launch this segment.

Speaker 2 (01:42:15):
Let's hard launch our signature segment. Josh wex Ac here
with you. It is coming back from the weekend as always,
the good, the bad, the ugly.

Speaker 1 (01:42:24):
There's plenty of things to choose from.

Speaker 2 (01:42:25):
Will probably, you know, leave the Tiger Woods memes for
another day. They could be all three, probably for the
next year. They still going strong, still lots of good
stuff out there. But we'll take you through the good,
the bad, the ugly. I will bring up the rear
with the ugly.

Speaker 1 (01:42:42):
Ac. You gotta sit back and wait for the good.
You're the bad.

Speaker 2 (01:42:45):
Josh gets us started with the weekend of good?

Speaker 1 (01:42:48):
What is it?

Speaker 9 (01:42:49):
I'll take the low hanging fruit here. How about the
Astros offense pretty much in first or second place in
all of baseball in every important statistical category They've they've
been amazing. The ops, the power, the on base percentage,
the walks.

Speaker 4 (01:43:02):
It's just that's everything we wanted.

Speaker 9 (01:43:05):
Isn't it funny that we're going into this season thinking, oh,
the pitching's going to be so dominant. Hopefully they can
get enough runs to win some ball games, and it's
been the total opposite. Hitting's been awesome and the pitching's
been a little sketchy so far.

Speaker 2 (01:43:16):
All right, make one statement, pick one thing, one player,
one area that you'd highlight about the outstanding Astros offense
through ten games.

Speaker 1 (01:43:25):
What would it be.

Speaker 4 (01:43:26):
I'm gonna stay consistent.

Speaker 9 (01:43:28):
Al Tuve still not swinging at everything getting on base,
that's al Tuove has just been awesome. What a turnaround
for him.

Speaker 1 (01:43:34):
With his approach at the point, Jose Altuve will be
the third batter that Ryan Feltner sees this evening in Colorado,
Ryan Feltner, Jeremy Panne is back in the starting lineup.
He will lead off.

Speaker 2 (01:43:46):
He'll hit in front of jord On Alvarez, followed by
Jose Altuve. Of course, Jordan is been the player they've
designated to hit only this evening. Carlos Korea continues to
bat in the cleanup spot. He's had more at bats
with the bases loaded than anybody in baseball. Christian Walker
over at first, bat's fifth. Camp Smith and right that's sixth.

(01:44:06):
A right handed pitcher on the mound for Colorado. A
second consecutive start for Joey Low Perfido He actually started
against Jacob Lopez yesterday, another lefty, but he's in left
field bat seventh. Jan Diaz will catch all of the
pitchers today, starting with Cody Bolton.

Speaker 1 (01:44:22):
And the astro centerfielder, of course, is Jake.

Speaker 2 (01:44:25):
Myers, who's red hot, having hit his first home run
of the season in yesterday's game, and.

Speaker 1 (01:44:31):
He wants to deal with the stupid son in Sacramento. No,
just the cold er weather, not too cold in Colorado.
The Rockies lineup looks like it usually does, all right,
what is the bad ac Well, there have been no
shortage of, frankly, just despicable aspects and storylines to come

(01:44:52):
out of the Oklahoma City Thunders championship defense this year.
I mean, they're just like the least likable team of
since the Warriors, and and they say things to back
it up constantly. Chet holnggrenan, First of all, let me
preface this. You were there. You remember the early two
thousands Lakers with Shaq and Kobe. Do you remember the

(01:45:12):
numbers those two individually, particularly Shack put up in the
first three peat there that the Lakers had.

Speaker 2 (01:45:19):
I think it's come up on the show a few
times and their eye popping.

Speaker 1 (01:45:22):
He was dominant with a straight face. I might add
Chet Holngren sixty five pound. Chet Holnggren compared himself to
that guy, and he compared him an SGA to those two.
To be honest, me and Shay could cook Kobe Bryant

(01:45:42):
and Shaquille O'Neal. Chet Holgren reportedly believes that he and
Shay Gildess Alexander could cook Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O'Neill
in a two on two matchup, even in a seven
game series against their championship versions. Holmgren prest confidence in
their modern play style, saying their spacing, versatility, and skill

(01:46:07):
set would allow them to compete against one of the
most dominant duos in NBA history. Let me break this
down to Chet Holmgren, who again weighs sixty five pounds
soaking wet. Shaq would snap you over his leg and
Kobe on SGA, are you kidding me? Kobe's the closest
we've ever gotten from a mentality standpoint, to Jordan, he

(01:46:29):
would make SGA cry using only his words. That's before
they even got on the floor. Those two would annihilate
these frauds, frauds. SGA didn't do crap, by the way,
until he got a bunch of Sam Presty draft picks
around him and got eighteen free throws per night minimum.
And chet Holmgren camps out on the on the three

(01:46:50):
point line most nights. He hits a lot of them,
but come on, unless he's just gonna sit out there
and camp and shoot three's while Shack tries to block them,
I don't know what he's high on. Something.

Speaker 2 (01:47:04):
Little help, Josh, if you would, if you have had
the opportunity, because he was nice enough to link this
up in our show doc.

Speaker 1 (01:47:11):
I don't know if you've read this quote.

Speaker 2 (01:47:13):
He just read it aloud, so if you're locked in
on his commentary or if you've read it, I need
a ruling from you now. Normally, whatever we do here
on this show, no matter who else is participating, as
long as I'm here, I'm the only judge that matters,
because that's how I act, very full of myself.

Speaker 1 (01:47:28):
But I'll ask for your help here.

Speaker 2 (01:47:30):
If one is oh, yeah, he definitely said that versus
zero percent? Is there is a zero percent chance those
words came out of Chet Holmgren's mouth.

Speaker 1 (01:47:40):
Where would you put the number?

Speaker 9 (01:47:43):
I mean it sounds kind of nuts, but I'm looking
at it here on the sheet.

Speaker 2 (01:47:47):
If you're looking at it on the sheet, you've seen
someone post about it on the X platform. The person
who posted this doesn't look unlegit with nearly a million followers,
although if you look at the other stuff that's posted,
it doesn't seem like much of an NBA count, even
though it claims to be. There's no source anywhere. There's
no audio anywhere. Nobody else posted this anywhere. Nobody else

(01:48:09):
wrote about this anywhere. No writer that he said this
to wrote an article about it because he only wrote
it down in his notebook and double checked the quote,
but doesn't have audio of it.

Speaker 1 (01:48:19):
It's on the internet. It never lies.

Speaker 2 (01:48:20):
There is a this is a John Blue Tarski grade
point average chance that this is true. But I need
zero point zero.

Speaker 1 (01:48:31):
I need it to be true. It's so utterly ridiculous. Now,
to be fair, you know it would actually be more
plausible as if in an Oklahoma City fan account, because
you look at and some they are like, hmm, maybe this.

Speaker 2 (01:48:45):
Most of the people commenting here, obviously the other side,
the Laker fans are NBA people, not fans people who
watch the NBA. They know how ridiculous this sounds. Absolutely,
could a two man team of SGA and Chet Holmgren
play good basketball against some other two man team from
other NBA champions? Yeah, probably not this one, Not this

(01:49:10):
particular two man team match to the This is NBA jam.
All right, Let's flip a coin to get to see
who picks first. You can either get SGA and Chet
and see who's on fire, or you can take Kobe
and Shack. Well, flip a coin and wait for our
movie to start. I've already bought the popcorn and the
ninety dollars soda, and let's play in the arcade at

(01:49:32):
the movie theater. NBA jam, my two favorite comics. Who's
picking Chet and SGA?

Speaker 1 (01:49:38):
Nobody first? Michael Farmer says one. I'm an OKC fan,
and I don't believe for one second he said this,
But if he did, there's no way and the follow
up and I don't have to clean this up saying
bleep like this is just wild, disrespectful. Kobe would deep
fry SGA and Shack has bodied Hall of famers and

(01:49:59):
got promising prospects shipped back to their country for underperforming
against him. The big deporter was real af so good.
I had to Chet Holmgren, I don't happen to believe
he said he got jokes. Not in a million years
could they beat shocking Kobe. The early two thousands Lakers

(01:50:20):
would annihilate this team.

Speaker 2 (01:50:22):
I'll hit you with the ugly and it will be
wrapping up tonight when we come back on the other
side here on the eight team putting a rap on
the signature segments, which on Mondays is the good, the bad,
the ugly. The Astros offense quite obviously is very good.
A made up quote from Chet Holmgren is obviously very bad.

Speaker 1 (01:50:45):
You're really wanting me.

Speaker 2 (01:50:46):
To be just totally dark and heartless about this as always. Yes,
so he did say it, and he does mean it,
and he was acting like it was for some sort
of paid for event, made for TV event that's on
the horizon. Me and currently alive SGA against four hundred

(01:51:07):
pounds shack and deceased Kobe Bryant. I think we would
cook them, that's what you think he said? Well, he
said during so much darker and unnecessary than that.

Speaker 1 (01:51:17):
Well, I was just going to ignore the part about
one of them not all right, So there's the ugly
coming up from me. That's the bad.

Speaker 2 (01:51:23):
The ugly is we left here on Friday with six
games left in their respective men's and women's college basketball tournaments,
the final four Friday and Sunday from the women's side,
and the final four Saturday and now tonight on the
men's side, and they've given us absolutely nothing.

Speaker 1 (01:51:43):
Unfortunately.

Speaker 2 (01:51:45):
I'm all for the best players being healthy and giving
us their best performances, and thus hopefully we have the
best games. I want competition. I don't think we've gotten
any of it yet. Illinois flirted with competing with Yukon
on Saturday night when they put together a ten ozer run,
but the game was mostly non competitive, and then at
the end it was equally non competitive. One shot maybe

(01:52:07):
mattered when Mullins hit that long three to put away
any idea that the A line. I thought that they
would emerge victorious, and that was as bit, pretty much
as close as we got in my opinion all weekend.
I know how the final few minutes of the Texas
UCLA second semifinal on Friday night went. UCLA thought they
had stymied their offense enough that it didn't matter what
they did at the end of the game, but it

(01:52:28):
did get tight. But the performance from Kevin Durant's basically clone,
Madison Booker, I don't even know. I feel bad for her,
and I did what you know me in press conferences. Yes,
I walked her and Rory and Sarah and Vick at
the podium and she went three for twenty three in
the national semifinal. That was nothing but one seeds. She

(01:52:51):
goes five for twenty three, they probably win. She goes
seven for twenty three, they definitely win. But it was
just it was not a really entertaining game. And the
South Carolina game was a blowout. Yukon's never gonna lose.
They're their overwhelming favorite. That's an awesome story, but nobody
even cared about the game because the nonsense from Gino

(01:53:12):
and down Staley and everything that went around. I only
say her name because she was the other coach. She
didn't do anything wrong. She reacted to somebody doing something wrong.
But it was a non competitive game. South Carolina embarrassed
them again. That's great for the story of it. It's
okay for upsets, but it was a non competitive game.
And then they got absolutely smashed in the final UCLA

(01:53:37):
boat raced them, boat raced them in the final where
their star was struggling to breathe on the bench. I'm
glad Lauren Betts is fine, but three somewhat unwatchable games,
the last three games of the season with only number
one seeds and the other men's game. I didn't mention
the Michigan Arizona game, non competitive and uninteresting.

Speaker 1 (01:54:00):
Arizona's been awesome. I thought they were gonna win the title.
No showed.

Speaker 2 (01:54:04):
Michigan whooped them. I mean, concrats to Michigan for doing it.
Credit to them. I don't want to take it away
from them, but two non competitive semi finals. Is it
gonna be salvaged tonight Michigan and Yukon. It might be
because Michigan will probably have all their players suited up
and maybe even play, But two of their best players

(01:54:26):
are nowhere near one hundred percent and probably in any
other game.

Speaker 1 (01:54:30):
Wouldn't even be suited up tonight.

Speaker 2 (01:54:31):
And that's what we're left with to culminate the college
basketball season. This tournament was awesome until we got here.

Speaker 1 (01:54:42):
Yeah, well this, but this is what I always talk
about with college basketball. It's unwatchable and I know, the
tournament normally gets rid of that aspect. College basketball is
far from unwatchable.

Speaker 2 (01:54:52):
It's why pointing this out as the ugly because it's abnormal.
It's not normal, it was not expected, it shouldn't happen.
The the tournament wasn't magically awesome. It's always awesome and
this one was one of the best ones yet for excitement,
high quality play, and late game drama.

Speaker 1 (01:55:10):
People that try to say that it's the best day
on the sports calendar or which, first of all, doesn't
even so me. Yeah, but it's not. It's not a day.
First of all, you can't cheat and say it's a tournament.
We had the discussion last week. You let me get
away with it. Then I'll take you. That's because I
was being nice. I'll take the super Bowl over that anytime. Yeah.
The commercials help make it, no, take all. The commercial

(01:55:34):
concert helps, eh not this year. The eight hours of
pregame makes it what it is. Nope. The food that
has nothing to do with the broadcast the super Bowl.
It depends on where you're at. Okay, it's got a
lot of advantages, by the way, a lot of advantages
vantages some people have never had. Uh, you know how
I'm always harping on officiating. Sure. The NBA says there

(01:55:59):
were two incorrect calls in last night's Golden State Warriors
Houston matchup in one of the last two minutes. Very yes,
which would have directly impacted the game. Are you ready
for these?

Speaker 2 (01:56:11):
Every incorrect call and correct call directly impacts the game,
Brett Wow, very un worthwhile follow by the way, I'm
not very well respected.

Speaker 1 (01:56:25):
The NBA says Amen Thompson should have been called for
a foul on Steph Curry with one twenty seven left
after a made layup. Number two, Alpera and Shingoon should
have been called for a three second violation with one
ten left, which would have resulted in a turnover. This
led to Alpera and Shingoon making a layup and Draymond
Green fouling him. Shingoon made the subsequent free throw. The

(01:56:52):
comments responding to him are awesome, including the guy that
said they missed calls all night for show. But I'm
also wondering why he didn't mention the three second violation
They said they should have called on Draymond that would
have given Houston a free throw. He just kind of
cherry picked with his tweet here and now who is

(01:57:13):
this Brett Siegel? Right?

Speaker 2 (01:57:15):
So, like I said, why do you think he's not
very well respected because he pulls stuff like that? It
says quite clearly there were three Every call listed here
is either a correct no call or a correct call
except for three neglects. To mention that against the last
two minutes report, you got to take it for what
it is. It only references the last two minutes. You

(01:57:36):
had a game that was separated by two possessions for
thirty minutes of basketball.

Speaker 1 (01:57:39):
You don't think any of those calls might have made
a difference.

Speaker 2 (01:57:42):
And I'm just saying hypothetically, but yes, it would be
nice if we could see them just get more calls.
Right in one of these calls that they're talking about,
the call on that was not called on a Men
Thompson on the Steph Curry drive, and make what happened
immediately after that was the foul called on Draymond on
the layup, and he went into one of the officials
grills and did all the things that are.

Speaker 1 (01:58:04):
Textbook and didn't get a tech. Of course, not just
like he didn't get a tech when he assaulted Jabbari
escalated the situation by grabbing him by both shoulders and
saying you ain't like that, don't do that, Uh, don't
do that, okay, and then continue to I take hold
of him, and.

Speaker 2 (01:58:24):
The officials were just like, well, that was a dramon.
We can't call it. Tell you think that was correct?
You think they should have both gotten technicals pretty.

Speaker 1 (01:58:31):
Much least double tech because he's assaulting him repeatedly and continuously.
He put his hands on another player and was moving
across the court, and the refs are like, y'all see
anything because it's Draymond Green. Yeah, if we need to,
we probably don't.

Speaker 2 (01:58:50):
We could probably get into more aspects of the game
and how it's officiated and why I think Golden State
is viewed by a lot of people the way they
are viewed, and I think the NBA.

Speaker 1 (01:58:59):
Right where they need to be, circling the drain.

Speaker 2 (01:59:01):
Yeah, I think that's definitely true. Five o'clock hour, beckons
that means football. At five we are two full weeks
away from being one full week away from the NFL Draft,
so we will look into.

Speaker 1 (01:59:13):
Who do you think it is?

Speaker 2 (01:59:14):
I have three names which I'll share with you over
the next couple of weeks of who I think the
Texans will actually select with the first Nick Cassario selection
in this draft, but specifically, what if some Mocker think
they will do.

Speaker 1 (01:59:27):
We'll hit that next the eight this hour, we got
an hour of US, we got a half hour of
the nightcap, and then we got Astros baseball coverage beginning
at six point thirty for the seven to forty first
pitch tonight for the long awaited Major League Baseball starting
debut for Houston Astros hurler Cody Bolton will make the

(01:59:50):
start tonight, be the first in his career to do so.
Second appearance with the Stros, and they take on the
Rockies for the first of three seven games remaining on
their road trip to attempt to have it a winning
road trip.

Speaker 2 (02:00:02):
I need to do a little bit more winning than losing.
Dropping two out of three to the Athletics, three with
the Rockies day off, then four with the Mariners. Mariners
and Rangers. Do you think gets started on a series tonight?
Rangers trying to shake free of a four game losing streak.

Speaker 1 (02:00:19):
Do you think there's any relation to that? Singer Guy Michael, Yeah,
I'm gonna I'm gonna go with no, just say no.
I can't believe the Rangers have hung in it as
long as they have.

Speaker 2 (02:00:30):
A good pitching. Terrible offense has been their story so
far this season. So if I used if I take
pitching out and drop defense in, would sound like we're
talking about the Texans from this past year. They have
at their disposal some selections for Nick Casseio to fiddle with.
I don't even want to sit here and say, well,
he's got nine selections going into the draft. He's got
these because I know that they won't be the ones

(02:00:52):
that they actually ultimately use.

Speaker 1 (02:00:54):
But at number twenty eight.

Speaker 2 (02:00:56):
Is the first time as of today where we can
expect them to pick.

Speaker 1 (02:01:00):
Could they move up?

Speaker 2 (02:01:02):
I said many times I think they definitely have the weaponry,
the arsenal to do so, but you gotta have a
reason to do it. I don't think they would do
it for an offensive lineman. That's something they've really not
shown the desire to do in the past. And the
way they've put together the offensive line this year, and
in my opinion, how the draft looks this year, I
think they're in a very similar position last year. Last
year there were tackles any which way you wanted him.

(02:01:22):
You want a draft one at number ten, You want
a draft one at fifteen, how.

Speaker 1 (02:01:25):
About twenty two, how about twenty eight, how about thirty,
how about forty eight? There were so many of them,
you probably had your idea that these three are the
best for what we'd like to do, and they're different
than that team's three. And ultimately they worked their way
through the draft board and at forty eight they took
tay Ursery and all indications are he's not clearly better
than the group that was taken ahead of him or

(02:01:46):
after him, and he's clearly not worse.

Speaker 2 (02:01:48):
He's probably among the better linemen. I think Kelvin Banks
had a really good year. I like the future for
Josh Simmons playing for Derek Hunt's new team there in
Kansas City. But I think tay Orsier is pretty said
just inside the top fifty, and I think if they
just sit there at twenty eight, they'll actually probably go
defensive tackle.

Speaker 1 (02:02:08):
That's just my thought today.

Speaker 2 (02:02:09):
April sixth, got two weeks and three days until April
twenty third, when it does play out, and maybe even
before that, we'll know that they've traded up or traded
out of the first round. But other people have ideas
of what this team needs, they don't necessarily mess with mine.

Speaker 1 (02:02:26):
Well, yeah, that's obviously the case this time of year.
You really think at twenty eight they would take a
defensive tackle. I certainly do their defensive tackle because they
think they can get the offensive lineman they would want later.

Speaker 2 (02:02:40):
I just think you're finding starting offensive lineman and starting
defensive linemen similarly once. I mean, you're gonna get an
all world player to either those positions in the top twelve.
You're gonna get a starter in spots twenty five through
sixty five seventy five. Yeah, okay, and the defensive tackle position,
they haven't really done anything with it.

Speaker 1 (02:03:01):
Youthfully.

Speaker 2 (02:03:02):
Everything they've done has been this veteran player from that team,
this veteran player from that team, you know, the only
kind of developmental younger players TOJII, And they hit on
that too. But they've basically hit on all of them,
and I expect them to do that again.

Speaker 1 (02:03:14):
But it's about maddening about them not being able to
do that one position group. I mean, they've done it
every which way they have.

Speaker 2 (02:03:21):
They also haven't had a reason to change, Like, who
are they listening to on offense on staff about what
they need from their offensive lineman. Well, in year one
it was Bobby Slowick and Cole Strasser and Chris Strasser. Well,
by year three, both of them were gone, right, and
you got a new offensive coordinator. You've got a new
offensive line head coach. He was the assistant there, Cole Popovich.

(02:03:43):
And in Draft one, who are you listening to about
what you needed for your defense? You're definitely listening to
loudly and clearly what Tamiko Ryans was saying. This is
the defense we're running, This is the type of defensive
lineman we need, and we're gonna go out and maliek
Collins is gonna be part of it, Sheldon Rankins is
gonna be part of it, and we're gonna add this guy.

Speaker 1 (02:04:00):
We're gonna do.

Speaker 2 (02:04:00):
This is what we need upfront, so everything else on
this defense can work. And then every off season after that,
they've changed it. They've got new players, they've worked out
every single time. And on top of it, the DC
has not changed either. Matt Burk's been there the whole time.

Speaker 1 (02:04:14):
Did you see that video of Aziz al Shire talking
about Demiko Ryan's teaching defense and specifically the linebacking position.
And how just how the attention to detail all that.
I mean, it was such a I actually think I
had it in the rundown for us to play. We
can get to it.

Speaker 2 (02:04:30):
It's why when so good you hear a report. In
this case, it was from Dallas. Totally fine for them
to say their sources indicate the Cowboys would be interested
in pursuing a ziz al Shire in trade, and that's fine.
From there end, they can make the phone call, they
can make overtures.

Speaker 1 (02:04:47):
It's also been interested in pursuing an appearance in the
NFC Championship Game every year, but that hasn't happened.

Speaker 2 (02:04:52):
Either the other parties, like the teams that have to
lose to them, or in the trade scenario, the teams
that have to say, yeah, sure, like you're not trading.
Even there are players on this defense that are awesome
that would be easier for this team to let go
of than Aziz al Shier. He's the quartermantally like, he
is what they do, and it's because of what you
just talked about.

Speaker 1 (02:05:13):
He is the quarterback of the defense. He already knew
this defense before he got here, and he only knows
it even better now that he's played in it for
multiple additional seasons. What they want to do defensively.

Speaker 2 (02:05:23):
While their front end is ridiculously good, especially at the edge,
and their back end is the best in the NFL,
they still do get pretty significantly worse. And you could
obviously see it more in twenty twenty four because he
missed time both for injury and for Trevor Lawrence than
he did in twenty twenty five. He barely was off
the field in twenty twenty five. How are you gonna
notice what they would like when he wasn't out there? Right,

(02:05:45):
you could see how good they were because he was
out there. He's not going anywhere, and they still have
the opportunity to figure out what his future looks like.
He's currently today. He is in the final year of
his deal. He will not make it to the season,
and the final year of his deal he'll have an
extension in.

Speaker 1 (02:06:00):
And danil esk like two years. That's good question.

Speaker 2 (02:06:04):
I mean, based on how Nick does, things probably shorter,
but I don't think it would.

Speaker 1 (02:06:08):
I think he'd probably want it for a little longer.
Why why are they waiting on with the Landerson Jr.

Speaker 2 (02:06:12):
H there's no timeline, there's no deadline. Wow, what's the hurry? Well,
I'm kidding when I say that, but you just saw
one defensive end get paid for Von Walker. We don't
think we've mentioned that the Jacksonville Jaguars at the one
hundred and ten million with seventy seven guaranteed, which doesn't
put him anywhere near the highest high end, but it
is money spent this offseason that will factor into it. Again,

(02:06:33):
Will Anderson, for the moment he signs it, he'll be
the highest paid edge rusher in the NFL. Just a
matter off. Is there somebody else in the marketplace when
he does it that could pass him. He'll get passed,
but he'll be number one when he signs it. In
my opinion, he'll be higher than Micah, higher than Aiden,
higher than Miles, all of them.

Speaker 1 (02:06:48):
Yeah, well that's how it works. That's what happened with
JJ Watt and who was the highest paid. For like
five seconds, I did read somewhere and I I knew
I should have creed. This is why I text you
the way I do, especially on the weekend. I feel
like it was it was somebody that was reputable and
they were basically saying CJ's not getting an extension this year.

(02:07:09):
This offseason, he's going to They're going to pick up
that option, he's going to play through it, and it's
basically going to be approve it year, which is always
what I thought they would do, especially in light of
the fact that Will Anderson juniors also do for a contract,
and unlike CJ, there's been no question about him being
worth it. I'm not saying CJ wasn't worth the pick.

Speaker 2 (02:07:29):
But every it doesn't happen often, But when you do
what the Texans did in twenty twenty three on draft
night and you draft two players in the top three,
it's pretty rarem Hm. Well, they're obviously on the both
on the same cycle of pay. We've got four years,
we had a fifth year option. We have the ability
after year three if they've played well, to extend them.
It's costly. Most teams are only considering that for the

(02:07:52):
one player in that cycle that they drafted and hoped
would be awesome. They did that with two different players
at the very high almost end of the draft, So
it's very costly, and you do have to figure out
what's the best way to figure out this year's cap
and the next three or four. How are we gonna
work with them on what else we have? And his
performance has made it easy to allow for that to

(02:08:16):
be pushed back a year.

Speaker 1 (02:08:20):
Yeah, I'm I don't know when they'll do this with
Will Anderson Junior. I'm assuming, like I think you are,
that it will happen this offseason.

Speaker 2 (02:08:27):
But I know we are supposed to know everything and
make bold predictions it's happening.

Speaker 1 (02:08:34):
I don't know what day. I don't know what month.

Speaker 2 (02:08:36):
I don't know the amount, even though it'll be Number
one is not playing any more games for the Texans
without an extension, right, I don't know how.

Speaker 1 (02:08:42):
I guess the reason I'm saying this more than anything
else is that they have handed out some extensions already,
So I'm just wondering why that's not one of them.

Speaker 2 (02:08:50):
Because they're apples and oranges. Quite honestly, in my opinion,
big apple, Yeah, and the other guys are little tiny cuties.

Speaker 1 (02:08:57):
That's what they're called. They're little oranges. They're not Granny Smiths.

Speaker 2 (02:09:02):
I mean, when you buy that package in the ridiculous netting,
they're cuties.

Speaker 1 (02:09:06):
Well, here's a pro tip on that. If you get
that package. You better eat it that night. It's going
to rot.

Speaker 2 (02:09:13):
Well, you're telling people in my family that eat them.
I eat none of them.

Speaker 1 (02:09:17):
Because it's a fruit.

Speaker 6 (02:09:19):
Fruit.

Speaker 1 (02:09:20):
I mean, you can throw it in a lunch box,
you can snack on it. Nobody snacks on fruit, do they.

Speaker 2 (02:09:26):
Well, you peel it off and you got a bunch
of different small bites of food.

Speaker 1 (02:09:29):
See that's the thing. It's too much effort. People ask
me why I don't eat certain like crawfish boil. We're
in the smack Dad, in the middle of the good
that since last night for dinner? Did you was it
the boiled crawfish?

Speaker 2 (02:09:42):
No, we have a red hammer, and no, we don't
need all that. I just was already peeled, cut up
the potatoes, cut up the corn, season it up, pre peeled.

Speaker 1 (02:09:53):
Exactly and exactly. You know why, because it was easy, right,
because you don't want to do that, didn't It.

Speaker 2 (02:09:59):
Wasn't a crawfish boil. We made it in their home
kitchen indoors.

Speaker 1 (02:10:03):
It's like, you want to come to this crawfish. I'm like, no,
I don't. I've got one this weekend. I don't want
to work too much to eat that little ball.

Speaker 2 (02:10:10):
It's a party. Look, who hates parties? Would you guys
have ever guessed that I love them? I'm in waiting
besides the crawfish at the party. Yeah, you can go
inside the garage for the thing that stuff that everybody
else brought, cookies from the store, and the fruit or
the vegetable tray that nobody touches. Oh, this kid's gonna
be here. Oh, you get some chicken nuggets.

Speaker 1 (02:10:31):
I don't you enjoy what everybody else is having off
the table, which is awesome? You know what I mean?
Vein a chocolate chip cookie.

Speaker 2 (02:10:38):
Get the divein the stuff. You just peel it and
eat it. Suck on my heads. No, don't come to
my party. I won't not invited.

Speaker 1 (02:10:46):
I'm not I'm not coming. All right, Hunter Brown, We're
gonna jump back into that discussion when we come back.
It's a big loss for the Astros. How big of
a loss is it for the Astros? How long is
the last? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (02:10:57):
And also too as well, How big of a kick
to the gut is it? Astros fans? The hundred Brown
injury next, last of the home openers, almost complete, just
a couple outs away, two outs away from the top
on the trop getting.

Speaker 1 (02:11:14):
Treated to victory number one this year. Dude. Okay, they
spent six sixty dollars to fix the hurricane ravaged trop
and they're still not going to stay there. Yep. This
is like Bud Adams getting a renovation on the Dome
and then saying.

Speaker 2 (02:11:31):
Hey, in order to play there, they needed to cover it.
And it also keeps them from playing at George M.

Speaker 1 (02:11:41):
Steinbrenner Field. Yeah, because then they're no better than Athletics East. Uh.

Speaker 2 (02:11:46):
The Rays are going to get to five hundred and
dip Alex Bregman's team to four and six if they
don't orchestrate a three run rally here in the top
of the ninth inning raised and Cubs winning of that
game at four and five. The Astros head into play
tonight at six and four. There are a couple teams
in baseball looting the Yankees that have seven wins.

Speaker 1 (02:12:09):
The Astros are pretty close to the top.

Speaker 2 (02:12:10):
They have not pitched very well as a team, even
though a lot of that is just three guys.

Speaker 1 (02:12:14):
Munno's who's not an Astro anymore.

Speaker 2 (02:12:17):
Officially, the Astros dfa'd him after making just three appearances.
He was a rule five acquisition, and when he clears waivers,
which he will, you'll have to be offered back to
the Reds and he won't pitch again for the Astros.
I thought it was an odd ad at the time
because of his track record. He strikes guys out, he
gives up a lot of hits, and he doesn't throw strikes,
and he's been up and down from the miners many

(02:12:38):
times over before the Astros took a chance. They took
a chance on him, didn't work out, and they're quickly
changing course. I can appreciate that they did reinstate Esach
Perettis from the bereavement list, and after Ennuel de los
Santos got his necessary rehab work in, he has now
been reinstated from the injured list, where he began the

(02:13:00):
year because of a knee injury. So those two players
on the roster Munno's and Shay Whitcomb, who gets sent
back down to Triple A, are the two players off
the roster as they enter played tonight three games with
the Rockies. They did list their pitching probables for the
remainder of this series. It includes Mike Burrows, who's next
in line. He pitches tomorrow. It includes Christian Javier who

(02:13:23):
is next in line. He's their third starter and his
turn to throw comes Wednesday, before the off day. We
wondered aloud with the loss of Hunter Brown, and if
you were not aware, the Astros put him on the
injured list with a right shoulder string this weekend made
it retroactive to the second of the month.

Speaker 1 (02:13:40):
He threw one hundred and.

Speaker 2 (02:13:42):
Two pitches in his first start through seventy eight pitches
in his next start. He gave up one run and
was the league leader in strikeouts when he left off
the mound and got the win in his second start.
Then he had his side session he threw in between starts.
Tonight would have been his turn to start, and he
felt something in his shoulder. Got it looked at there
in West Sacramento, and based on what they had, they

(02:14:04):
decided to send it back to Houston to get more
tests done. Like I said, maybe later on this evening
when Joe Spottam meets with the media, there will be
further information on it, but we don't as of yet
have a time to well, it's a pretty big size
kick to the gut no matter what it would have been.
One last year, even with from Bervaldez on the roster.
It's a monster sized one. It's probably multiple kicks with

(02:14:26):
you not ready for them in the gut. I mean,
you may go to the gym, you may work out,
you may have almost as many rock hard abs as
I do. But if you're not ready for it's still
going to hurt a little bit. I think you get
kicked twice. When this happens, you are aceless moving forward
without Hunter Brown, and you're not likely to see a
pitcher sent to the IL with a shoulder problem of

(02:14:47):
any kind severe, not severe, very limiting, and see them
back off the IL and pitching again fifteen days from
April second. I said it earlier in the day, and
it's totally guess, but a reasonable one. He's not pitching
this month for the Astros. Josh Hater's back before Hunter
Brown's back. I would hope that's not true, but it

(02:15:09):
is certainly possible. I think Josh Hater he stayed off
of this road trip so he could get multiple live
vps in and maybe there'll be an update on that
now that they're one city in.

Speaker 1 (02:15:19):
He and Bennett Sussa. By the way, Happy birthday, Bennett.

Speaker 2 (02:15:22):
Also stayed back, probably a little bit closer to a return,
which would be good news because their bullpen. I mentioned
there were three guys that really are to blame for
where the TmrA is. Team ARA is twenty seventh in
the majors.

Speaker 1 (02:15:35):
It's awful.

Speaker 2 (02:15:36):
It's almost five and a half runs per game. They've
given up fifty four earned runs one unearned run, which
is nuts. They've only committed one error all season in
ten games defense matters, and by the way, that error
was a throwing error on Lance mccullors attempting to pick
a runner off of second base. He got out of
the inning on the very next batters. It's probably something

(02:15:56):
you could almost see in his face, like what am
I doing?

Speaker 5 (02:15:58):
Why?

Speaker 1 (02:16:00):
That was very fromber of him.

Speaker 2 (02:16:01):
It just but he obviously recovered very well. The only
unearned run was the first run that was scored in
the tenth inning last night, the tying run on a
walk off three run homer the player on second base
to begin extra inning, Shay Langliers. Every other run has
been earned, obviously, because they haven't committed any errors that
impacted that. Twenty eight of the runs have come when
anybody else is on the mound other than Muno's Javier

(02:16:24):
and Abreu. Eleven pitchers, twenty eight runs. Three pitchers, twenty
six runs from just those three pitchers, one of whom
was let go today, the other they might have to
consider pulling him out of the closers role. And the
other one is Christian Javier, who if they wanted to
reorganize the rotation, give him more time, take him out

(02:16:47):
for one turn, turn to one of their minor league
starting pitchers. Jason Alexander Last threw on the first. This
would actually be his day to throw, but they obviously
did not call him up. Colton Gordon threw on the second.
He would obviously be available to throw in Wednesday's game.
Spencerrighetty threw on the third. He would be available for
any game after this series or potentially that last game,

(02:17:09):
but like I said, they did list Christian Javier as
the starting pitcher for that. Tatsu Emi had a great start.
I think Lance mccullors threw the ball just slightly worse
than he did in his first start, and we'll see
what Mike Burrows maybe give us a little balance of
not very good in his first start, got better in
his second start. Let's see what he has tomorrow. But
Hunter Brown's not pitching in any of these games against

(02:17:30):
the Mariners coming up. It's not pitching in any of
the games when they come back home with the Cardinals,
They've got the Yankees here at home. You're gonna have
to have to be beating these teams out, pitching these teams,
trying not to play Beer League softball with all these teams,
expecting your offense to be the best in baseball for
who knows how long as you go through an aceless
month of your season.

Speaker 1 (02:17:51):
This is when this is the scenario where when you
thought about Fromer Valdez not being a part of things,
it was the nightmare, worst case scenario possible because you
weren't replacing him with anybody even close to You were
just basically moving the lineup. And then you signed Mike Burrows. Yeah,
and in EMI.

Speaker 2 (02:18:11):
You're you're clearly you're sitting at the top of the
league offensively. And Jordon just was named Player of the Week,
so he's been awesome. He's carrying the offense, but he's
carrying an offense that might be able to succeed without
his dangerous bat in It might be able to it'd
be nicely.

Speaker 1 (02:18:25):
It's nice that we don't have to see.

Speaker 2 (02:18:26):
It, but you know, losing him from the lineup obviously
impacts everybody else.

Speaker 1 (02:18:30):
Al Tuove is gonna see different pitches.

Speaker 2 (02:18:31):
Walker's going to be in a different spot in the
order the pitches that you see when that player of
that magnitude is not on in it or standing on
first base fifty seven point eight percent of the time
like he is, it.

Speaker 1 (02:18:41):
Is going to impact everybody.

Speaker 2 (02:18:43):
However, I think it's definitely, my opinion, curious about everybody
Else's losing Jordon Alvarez less of a kick to the
gut to this team than what actually happened, and that's
losing Hunter Brown. It is the most indispensable player on
this roster because of how strong he is versus what

(02:19:03):
they're missing without him.

Speaker 1 (02:19:05):
Well, and again, this is the first that I can
recall prolonged injury situation for Hunter Brown. I don't believe
he's been on the aisle in his major career. Like Fromber,
He's been an iron man. So whether or not he
was being effective is one thing. But he always answered
the bell. You know, he had stretches where that didn't happen,

(02:19:25):
but he was always making those starts. And going back
to the Christian Javier thing since we're on the subject
of this, because if Christian Javier is the old Christian Xavier,
that makes this less of a blow. It's not just
about you don't have Fromber, but it's about every single
guy behind him still you just aren't sure of. You
might feel good about Emi because of his second start,

(02:19:48):
you might feel better about Burrows because of his second start,
and you might feel better than you did before the
season began about Lance mccullors junior, just because he's pitched
feasibly well. But you don't have anybody who's going. And
so with Christian Javier, you know, I always would talk
about you remember how much I was just like rooting

(02:20:09):
for Jose or Keaty because of what he had done
once upon time in basically a World Series game. I mean,
Christian Haavier had a no hitter in the World Series
or spearheaded it. He spearheaded another no hitter in Yankee
Stadium that very same season in the regular season, and
at one point he wasn't like unhittable, but his eer

(02:20:30):
was like in the playoffs was like two four eight
or still is I think in seventeen games he has
like a five and two or six and two record.
I want to say this is not a small sample size,
but that guy's just nowhere to be found, and isn't.
I don't plan on him walking through the door anytime soon,
because why would I.

Speaker 2 (02:20:47):
He's at the bottom of the list of players you
have good vibes about, and that's meanings means he's behind
Lancet Coullor's jummaculate, and that's among starting pitchers. Because I
don't know how you grate out Brian Obrew, because you're
vibes for him have.

Speaker 1 (02:21:00):
To be equally in toilet. Unfortunately Blue Baw is offsetting them.
He would have been nice.

Speaker 2 (02:21:06):
He looked gassed yesterday, but obviously he did not have
it yesterday.

Speaker 1 (02:21:09):
Very few people did. Basically Brian King and nobody else
tomorrow's guest on the show.

Speaker 2 (02:21:13):
Brian King, set to join the eight team tomorrow at
two thirty, our weekly guest with the Astros in season,
so looking forward to that conversation. But they get it
all started tonight with Colorado, the magnitude of the loss
of Hunter Brown as they continue to play through this
Colorado Seattle then Colorado. Saint Louis the next four series
for your Houston Astros. In case you missed it, there's

(02:21:35):
a few items there next there are plenty that we
have not touched on on all few others may be
worth a revisit. We also should mention coming up in
the final segment of the show, New Week, so new
concert for us to send you guys too, got tickets
to give away to the return of the Carnival of
Sins tour. Should you know who that is without me

(02:21:58):
telling you? Shouldn't you know that without me telling you?

Speaker 1 (02:22:01):
Absolutely? Yep? With Tesla an extreme what's your favorite extreme
song that was parodied by Jimmy Fallon and Jack Black?
What did they do more than words? Oh yeah, that's
my favorite song.

Speaker 2 (02:22:15):
Uh, Tesla Signs and Motley Cruez their tour doctor feel Good.

Speaker 1 (02:22:22):
Just kidding. It's girls, girls, girls and guys kating kicks
top my heart. I didn't say what your favorite video was.
They're all my favorite video. I mean, some of them
have more to look at than others. Well, technically, if
we're talking about videos that members of Motley Crue were in,
my favorite one is the one with Pam Anderson. Uh yeah,
that's a good one. What about uh a song called.

Speaker 2 (02:22:43):
There's No Music that I'm familiar with? They were on
a boat, They were on a boat.

Speaker 1 (02:22:49):
But it's that's not the song.

Speaker 2 (02:22:50):
What about Motley Cruz contributions to Monster ballads your Home,
Sweet Home Guy.

Speaker 1 (02:22:57):
Yeah, the piano intro is classic, recognize all the time
life right now, you can get it kidding.

Speaker 2 (02:23:04):
And the spinning drum set that is a legendary poster move.
So Motley Crue performing Woodland's Pavilion later this year September eleventh.
We got tickets on sale now for that event a
ticketmaster dot com. Listen to that for that giveaway in
the final segment, listen now and previously, because we give

(02:23:25):
it away to listeners who only know the answer to
the question because you've been listening to the show, never
because of hints or because it's googleable.

Speaker 1 (02:23:33):
All right, Josh, what do you having in case you
missed it?

Speaker 9 (02:23:36):
All right, let's look over to those Kansas City chiefs
who were talking about earlier today, looks like they catch
your break. Their wide receiver, Rashie Rice will face no
NFL discipline over abuse allegations. His ex claims there was
some abuse but apparently under oath she said that it
wasn't it was just verbal. The NFL investigated. There was

(02:23:57):
an Instagram post that's since been deleted, but he's basically
been cleared. And we know that could have been really
heavy on him because of the car wreck that he
was suspended for in the past. That could have been
a second strike for him. But it looks like he
will be good to go.

Speaker 6 (02:24:10):
Oh.

Speaker 2 (02:24:10):
The NFL believes there was no strike in this particular instance,
only verbal. This is the ex girlfriend, correct, but mother
of their two children.

Speaker 1 (02:24:22):
Okay, so where did it come from?

Speaker 2 (02:24:26):
They just didn't either she reade it into part of
it or they did not find it credible.

Speaker 9 (02:24:31):
She posted it on Instagram, but then when she was
sworn in under oath, she said she wasn't physically hit.
So the NFL investigated, and this is what they decided
to do.

Speaker 2 (02:24:42):
Insufficient evidence is how they'll turn it on the NFL side. Yeah,
great news, that's great news. Good dude, that she Rice
is now that we know this all right?

Speaker 1 (02:24:52):
What else I know? And the only reason I bring
it up.

Speaker 9 (02:24:55):
He's a big part of their offense and with Travis
Kelsey getting older and EXAs if you're worthy. Even though
we can run a four to two forty, he's not
exactly killing it for them.

Speaker 1 (02:25:04):
So I thank Josh.

Speaker 2 (02:25:05):
Well, we'll keep in mind where you're slotted into the
fantasy football draft and your affinity for resheet Rice and
the production that he could produce this year.

Speaker 1 (02:25:13):
So noted, all right, what else do we have?

Speaker 9 (02:25:15):
Well, how about we uh give it to Chris Ballard
a little bit.

Speaker 4 (02:25:20):
I know you guys like that. So basically it came out.

Speaker 9 (02:25:23):
Eric Ebron on his podcast is basically saying that they
kind of pressured Andrew Luck into playing through injury and
that Luck was upset with that and that was one
of the main reasons that caused him to retire and
not deal with it, and it was pressure through Chris Ballard.
Now Luck has since come out and said that that
is without merit, that that's not true. But I find

(02:25:44):
that very interesting. Why would Eric Ebron make that up?

Speaker 2 (02:25:47):
That is always the question when something is not credible,
And we just talked about a similar situation, totally different circumstances,
but proved to be not credible. So many people have
tried to reporters otherwise. If you use logic here and
you walk yourself through the situation. And one reporter you
even said, if you actually were there at the time

(02:26:08):
and you think about some of the things that Andrew
Luck did or said, he without telling you, he was
kind of telling you this is where he was headed.
And now this story from Ebron, who did not depart
the Cults on very good terms. He's telling you that
the GM helped to orchestrate the end of Andrew Luck's career,

(02:26:30):
somewhat at the team's nudging, so they could do what
go through almost a decade of consecutive years of having
significantly worse quarterback play with zero franchise direction.

Speaker 1 (02:26:46):
It doesn't really add up, does it, know? It's wild?

Speaker 6 (02:26:49):
Right.

Speaker 2 (02:26:49):
Basically, if you're covering the Colts and you've had to,
you've gone out of your way to write something up,
post something on social media, or do a full article
about it, reach out to Ebron, reach out to Andrew Luck,
which is what Mike Chappelle I think did. And Andrew
himself refuted this story, saying this is untrue.

Speaker 1 (02:27:10):
I have never cared less about a quarterback retiring and
a GM being involved. I know I should care more
because he's from here.

Speaker 2 (02:27:21):
Well, this many years later, it's it only matters that
the Colts are still in somewhat of quarterback that's array. Yeah,
I mean the best quarterback in the division? Is that crazy?

Speaker 1 (02:27:31):
Who is it?

Speaker 6 (02:27:32):
Well?

Speaker 1 (02:27:32):
You got Daniel Jones, Trevor Lawrence and c J. Stroud.
I'm not gonna include cam Ward in the discussion just yet.
How How on earth do they have the best quarterback
in the division?

Speaker 2 (02:27:43):
I unfortunately c J. Stroud's recent performances and overall career
is not Oh my god, he's unbelievable. It definitely isn't.
Trevor Lawrence has had one good season this past year.

Speaker 1 (02:27:54):
And Daniel Jones had one good half season against a
bunch of terrible tea lacks. They all have warts. How
is someone someone has to be the best? How? How
is I said it got crazy? You could say no,
it is great, not correct lunacy? Okay, Josh? Is that crazy?

Speaker 4 (02:28:11):
I mean I would I would give it to Trevor
Lawrence right now. I don't think it's that close.

Speaker 1 (02:28:17):
Like asking for your answer, I'm asking you to point
blank tell me if I'm crazy, er, tell them you're
not crazy? Oh man, you think you know somebody? What
else do we have?

Speaker 9 (02:28:28):
Yeah, I was just gonna remind everybody about what happened
with the Astros there. They made some roster moves today,
so it looks like Yel de los Santos is coming up.
That's gonna be big Estok Perettis is gonna be available,
So wex you kind of hit on this earlier, but
that's what matters for the Astros tonight.

Speaker 4 (02:28:45):
That's who they will have available.

Speaker 1 (02:28:47):
Yeah, available is accurate.

Speaker 2 (02:28:48):
Gave you the starting lineup a little bit earlier, but
if you did not hear it will not include h
Esach Perettis. Yesterday, Dana Brown he's with the team and
he's traveling with the team and made a stop with
the Both booths Radio on TV side indicated they expected
Esak to return to the team, but weren't necessarily counting
on him being in the lineup tonight. He's not, but

(02:29:08):
like Josh Shaded, I imagine if necessary, he's available for
a pinch hitting appearance in Denver, Colorado. Payna Alvarez, Altuve, Carreo, Walker, Smith,
low Braffeedo Diaz, Myers, Jordan is your DH and of
course Jeremy Panna back in the lineup. Got two days
in a row in West Sacramento Friday, Saturday off day
yesterday for him, and maybe those are a thing of

(02:29:29):
the past. As he starts tonight at the shortstop against
the Almighty Colorado Rockies. Rockies have gotten off to a
three and six start. Astros are six and four. They're
first in the American League West.

Speaker 1 (02:29:41):
The baseballs are going to be flying out of that place.
Hopefully they are launched by Astros bats. We shall see,
all right, final segment of the program coming up next
on a Monday edition of the show. We still have
a ton of meat left on the bone we haven't
gotten to. We'll get to some of that all. So
we'll give away those tickets we were talking about. It's

(02:30:03):
all straight ahead as chn So you were talking about
giving away Motley Crue tickets earlier. Yeah, let's do that.

Speaker 2 (02:30:12):
If you've been listening to the show, you will be
able to answer this very simple question because it was
about something we discussed very recently on the program.

Speaker 1 (02:30:19):
And then you can win tickets to pared tickets to.

Speaker 2 (02:30:20):
Go see Motley Crue return to the Carnival of Sins tour.
They'll be performing along with Tesla and Extreme. They're part
of the bill over at Woodlands Pavilion that is September eleventh.
You can purchase tickets now via ticketmaster dot com.

Speaker 1 (02:30:34):
If you don't win the mayor that's true, or if
you call seven one three two two five, seven ninety
or earlier. We were talking about this very show, and
we were talking about that very band, Motley Crue, I mean,
and we ran down the list of some of their
best songs slash videos, and I mentioned a very particular

(02:30:56):
video that their drummer, Tommy Lee started starred is a
very loose term. Featured. Featured is definitely a better word
for it. And I mentioned a female he was in
that video with name that female seb one three ninety.

Speaker 2 (02:31:16):
In a roundabout kind of way, was the answer to
a question, what's your favorite Motley Crew video?

Speaker 1 (02:31:22):
And who was in it? He was featured in it.
There you go. She was also in it, and she's
the answer. She's the answer. Did you ever watch the uh,
you know show that they made?

Speaker 2 (02:31:35):
No, I mean, I'm familiar with the scenery and everything,
but not the show.

Speaker 1 (02:31:39):
Believably accurate casting, unbelievably accurate casting for both of them.

Speaker 2 (02:31:46):
Oh that show, Yeah, I think I did watch it.
I mean, it was just you know, what's his name, Stan?

Speaker 1 (02:31:53):
Sure? And what was her She doesn't Lily Allen? Maybe sure?
This is like when I ask you about years. I
have no idea. You know, by the way, you don't
know the whole JFK Carolyn Bessett thing love story or whatever.
Oh yeah, yeah, guess what happened with that? She ended badly? Right?

(02:32:14):
They spoiler alert? He crashes his plane and everyone dies.
Guess who won't watch the last two episodes? Your wife?
Guess why because that happens. Well, I've seen all the
clips on social and it's just so sad. Did you
think it was gonna be a joyous occasion when his
piper Saratoga hit the water? Probably not. I mean she

(02:32:38):
sat there and made me watch all the other episodes
of this show and then decides, I can't watch it
because it's gonna be too sad and I'm gonna cry.
First of all, you didn't even know them. Their celebrities.
They die all the time.

Speaker 2 (02:32:52):
Into certain movies, miniseries, programs that you know they're gonna
make you sad. You're still in sometimes, right, like you're
in for it? Like what I mean, I don't do
that The.

Speaker 1 (02:33:00):
Only time I ever cried was when Bobby Simone died
on NYPD Blue, and I cry every time he get shot. Nope,
did he get in the car. Everyone else in Cipplewitz's
life got shot. Did he shoot them? He had heart failure.
He was written out of the show because he didn't
want to come back and sign a new contract.

Speaker 2 (02:33:18):
So they wanted to renegotiate the deal. Liked what he
was doing, he said, but he asked for more money
and they said no.

Speaker 1 (02:33:25):
That was David Caruso before him. He did not like
the fact that David Milch was an alcoholic and was
rewriting scenes on the fly day of shoot, and he
was like, I can't do this anymore. I'm more of
a professional. I gotta go. But the other people on
the show were fine with it. Yeah. Cipowitz was like,
I'm getting a lot of money here, so I'm gonna
stay It's smart for like eight more seasons. Yeah, but anyway,

(02:33:46):
I'm like, how do you make me watch this show?
And then you're just like peace out. Last two episodes,
I'm not watching him. I said, well, I'm gonna have
to sit down and watch it now, and I hope
it's horrific.

Speaker 2 (02:33:58):
I did watch movie this weekend. Obviously was not very recent.

Speaker 1 (02:34:02):
Was it on the list?

Speaker 2 (02:34:03):
No, I'd never even heard of it before. But when
it started, I didn't turn the channel and then stuck
with it throughout.

Speaker 1 (02:34:08):
From twenty ten. Did it have commercials? It's on a
movie channel with no commercials. You'reolving.

Speaker 2 (02:34:15):
It starred Angelina Jolie, and like I said, I'd never
heard of it's twenty ten. Her last name was a
very popular.

Speaker 1 (02:34:24):
Mister and Missus Smith table side condiment. That was the
name of the movie, not pepper salt salt. What's the
Rotten Tomatoes score on this thing? After watching? And I
would imagine it's okay, like the fans liked it and
the critics hated it or vice versa. I could believe anything.

Speaker 2 (02:34:45):
I never saw that movie, Like I said, I she
honestly hadn't even heard of it.

Speaker 1 (02:34:48):
Had a run of like really like, and then it
just got weird. Mister and Missus Smith is a good movie.
Her and Brad Pitt. That was the movie where he
started cheating on Jennifer Aniston with her while they were shooting.
Sixty two percent on the Tomato meter, fifty nine on
the pop meter time it works every ten. That's a
worthwhile watch, isn't it. That's the crowds rating the popcorn

(02:35:08):
meter is fifty nine percent. Oh so they pretty much agreed.
It's decent. HM better than fifty to fifty.

Speaker 2 (02:35:15):
Fifty nine percent same score from the Super Mario Brosse movie.

Speaker 1 (02:35:19):
I went and saw that this weekend, the new one.
Do you agree? Then you get a fifty nine percent approval? Well,
it was it's a kids movie, and so they just
made a good kids movie. They didn't load it with
a bunch of stuff that doesn't need to be in there.
So I was fine with it.

Speaker 7 (02:35:33):
Good.

Speaker 1 (02:35:34):
Well to hear it, he liked it. It was in three
D by the way, and King, Wow, yeah, all right.

Speaker 2 (02:35:38):
Cody Bolton goes tonight, what are your expectations?

Speaker 1 (02:35:41):
Four and two thirty? Wow, that's very shy. He was
gonna get sheld. No, that's I'm impressed. I mean, he's
gonna give them good, nice spate of innings and then
hopefully the bullpen can take over. Hopefully Brian King gets
in there and we can talk to him about it tomorrow.
But I think he's kinda taxed. He that's such a
quick work in last night.

Speaker 2 (02:36:01):
I'm almost surprised they took him out before he finished
two full innix as they were basically swinging at every
pitch he threw and grounding out. It was awesome, but
I imagine Ryan Weiss's is probably in tonight's game at some
point another guy can give him length. The only roster
moves they made pitching wise yesterday when Hunter Brown went
on the aisle, they brought up Christian Roll he pitched
in yesterday's game, but it's probably up also for today's game.

(02:36:25):
And then today they've activated Enniel de los Santos, and
I'm sure they wouldn't do that unless he was available today,
considering it's a bullpen game today.

Speaker 1 (02:36:34):
So that's what you have to look forward to.

Speaker 2 (02:36:36):
Their first games against Colorado, and they're going to be
done with Colorado two three game series with the Rockies
that will wrap up on the Astros next homestand they
are one of the two teams they will see here,
so over and done with and hopefully you're catch them
at the right time, which might be the whole season,
probably going to finish with one of the worst records
in the National League. Typical roster full of players you

(02:36:58):
don't know too well other than their catcher who hit
the Astros very well last year. And Mickey Moniac just
because of his pedigree, but after he joined the Rockies
last year, he really kind of took off and he's
had a nice start to his season. Those two guys
near the top of the line up probably of the
greatest concern. But keep in mind yesterday or Friday of
last week, I ran through what the A's were doing

(02:37:19):
heading home. I told you for sure they're going to
get well. They're coming home. It's a hitters ballpark, it's
two day games, and Hunter Brown's not scheduled to pitch
in either game. They're gonna get well. You still shut
them out on Saturday while giving up twenty three runs
in the series, when we gave up twenty three runs,
but none of them on Saturday, And obviously the two

(02:37:41):
games where they scored double figures, they won needed to
score double figures in order to beat the Astros. Yesterday,
Astros trailed nine to five, got a late home run
from Jake Myers, put a three spot on the board
after that, and then played into the tenth inning. They
scored first, but left the bases loaded with one out
and did not add an eleventh or twelfth, or thirteenth
or fourteenth run. And then Brian Brady came in wild

(02:38:03):
pitch walk home run ballgame, tired of losing to those fools.
They take two out of three, and the Astros, like
I said, still sit atop the division.

Speaker 1 (02:38:13):
Jordan Alvarez is your American League Player of the week.

Speaker 2 (02:38:17):
Three of his four home runs we're hit this week,
and he's basically been the best offensive player in baseball.
And as long as that continues and he's in the
lineup tonight, it designated hitter. Your Astros in a very
good position to continue pacing this division, which features zero
other teams that win more than they lose. Nobody in

(02:38:37):
this division can win more than they lose other than Houston.
By the way, their fifteen team American League three winning teams.
The Astros are six and four, the Guardians are six
and four, the Yankees are seven and two. The other
twelve teams are at five hundred or worse. There's only
two teams at five hundred. There's ten teams under five hundred.

(02:38:59):
Right now, When do the Yankees come to town. It's
the end of this month.

Speaker 1 (02:39:04):
Middle of this month, somewhere to the middle of the
end of the month, so in the twenties. Yes, why
are you the lad that you are? Okay, I think
that's going to be a really electric series.

Speaker 2 (02:39:17):
Yeah, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, three weekends from now, second night
of the Draft, third night of the Draft, and Sunday
after the haul of Texans have made their names known.

Speaker 1 (02:39:26):
I'm hoping, hoping, fingers crossed, it's on. It's it's out
there in the universe for a Nicholas Teturo appearance during
that series. All right, we shall see.

Speaker 2 (02:39:36):
They'll wrap up the road trip in Seattle, four games
Friday through Monday. Lots of time for us to talk
about that. The Nightcap is next, and I'll be with
you for the Astros on Deck show at six