Rockets Are Now 7-0, Astros Tonight, Derek Stingley Jr Is Now Official !

Derek Stngely, Has now came out on social media solidifing his stay with the texans, Rockets are on Fire, and Do coogs have enough to make to the final four?

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (01:30):
The A Team.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
I think I finally got enough rest after that marathon
last night. It is the A team. Sports Talk seven ninety.
You know what you guys don't know about Wex. I'm
gonna out him right here in the first segment of
the show. This guy's sports fomo knows no bounds. And
I know him because we were texting during the game

(01:59):
last night and when that kind of scene is unfolding,
and I'm not just talking about the end, I'm clearly
talking about the first half of the Rockets game between
the mash unit that was the sixers. I know it
was killing you not to be watching that unfold in
person and just see how that was all just percolating.

Speaker 3 (02:15):
I mean, this is to me, I feel like it's
special case. Yes, we have the same job, right, That's
what I mean. I don't get to work every game.
You don't get to work every game. I definitely have
a fear of missing out half of the season because
I'm literally missing out.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
We should do every game, but I like that first
half and I don't. I can't. Honestly.

Speaker 4 (02:35):
I kind of kicked in the third quarter, right.

Speaker 2 (02:37):
Right when when Jabari Smith started launching threes, so I
feel like I don't know which end of the court
they were worse on in the first half. Would you
like an open.

Speaker 4 (02:47):
Shot, you get an open shot, You get an open shot.
Were making shotout to make them that you do?

Speaker 2 (02:53):
Some of those guys are like twenty eight percent shooters
from distance, and they were just clocking them off.

Speaker 4 (02:57):
Yeah, the ones that aren't Quinton Grimes.

Speaker 2 (02:59):
Yeah, quick Grimes. Hey Dallas, why don't you be reminded
of another bad personnel move you've made in the last
few seasons.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
I don't think people realize he actually was playing very
He played really well when he first got to the league. Yeah,
he was really good with the Knicks. He's been really
good with the Mavericks. He's been exceptional for the Sixers.
They need somebody to score, and he has said me,
how about me? And he's been shooting a tremendous percentage.
He obviously was huge last night. This was It happens

(03:26):
all the time in the NBA, and it happens with
different players. They couldn't stop him, whatever defense they threw
at him. He was still making the shots he shouldn't
be making, and it made the Rockets come back that
much sweeter. In that he still had answers in the
third quarter. They erased a twenty five point lead in
ten minutes of the third quarter. That's why you know
there's more too, Hey, they came back from a twenty

(03:47):
five point deficit. Well, they weren't down forty to fifteen.
They weren't down sixty to thirty five. Now, both of
those are probably first half scores with more than half
the game remaining. They were down twenty five five points
in the second half. In the third quarter. They were
also tied at the end of the third quarter. That's

(04:07):
how fast they came back from that large of a deficit.
And then you blinked the Matt Thomas and Adam Clanton
went to commercial and then you opened your eyes back
up and they were down ten again, giving up the
first ten points of the fourth.

Speaker 2 (04:21):
Run after I think it was a thirteen to one
run to in the third or something like that.

Speaker 4 (04:26):
I have, I have it in front of me.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
I guess I could just pull that up, but the
notes that I made, but it was just it was
a game of runs. But they had no business being
in that game.

Speaker 3 (04:38):
Well, at some point, the other team's gonna stop furthering
the lead six in the game the Rockets, even though
I could say that sixers had no business meaning oh
because it's yeah, well.

Speaker 2 (04:49):
Clinton, Grimes and a bunch of Jamokes.

Speaker 3 (04:51):
That's when we have to push back and say, okay,
you are telling the truth when we won't want to
believe it. When they say, well, the they're all NBA players,
they all get paid till they're here too, and you
got to respect your opponent. They said it about the
Bulls a couple nights ago when they played basically, you know,
an even up game with them almost the whole night.

(05:11):
You know, Bulls led by a little bit most of
the first half. The Rockets led by a little bit
most of the second half and ultimately won the game.
Last night was definitely one of the wilder ones. Hopefully
everybody inside Toyota Center, everybody listening on Sports Talk seven
to ninety, everybody watching on Space City Home Network basically
couldn't look away because in the first half you wanted to.
And then everything that took place in the second half. Jabari,

(05:33):
like you said, was hot. Jalen Green was exceptional in
the second half of this game. Dylan Brooks and Jalen
worked just so bad shooting the ball in the first half,
and they both came around in the third quarter. Tarry
Easton was at least keeping them from being down thirty
five in the first half because he was the only
one who seemed like he could put the ball in
the basket for the first twenty plus minutes, and they

(05:54):
made enough shots.

Speaker 4 (05:55):
Finally.

Speaker 3 (05:55):
The way they got back in the game is what
has been hurting them all year. They're a bad shooting team.
They're a bad three point shooting team. This month, they've
been surprisingly good. They're in the top eight and three
point shooting percentage here in March, and they're on a
seven game winning streak. They have three road trips remaining,
begins in Orlando tomorrow. The two Florida teams are in

(06:17):
front of them. Both of them are on the play
in tournament side of things with the Eastern Conference. They
need a payback win over Miami, who beat them here
in Houston, and they need to double up on Orlando,
who they have already beaten during this streak.

Speaker 2 (06:32):
I hear Florida by the way, they don't do well
there because they enjoy it too much.

Speaker 3 (06:37):
The Heat are in an absolute tail spin. But I
totally agree with what's been said there. I'm curious about
the health status of Amn Thompson a may Udoka indicating
it's certainly getting better. Still seems like he's not going
to be on the court with Tyler Hero That's unfortunately.

Speaker 4 (06:52):
We'll see.

Speaker 3 (06:53):
And then they obviously have a big chunk of road
games still remaining, you know, still have more than half
of their remaining games on the road. Nine on the road,
five at home, three more road trips to more, a
couple more home stands. They they win, they keep their spot.
That's as simple as you can make it. You know,
Denver was a winner last night. The Lakers were a
winner last night. The Grizzlies came up on the wrong

(07:14):
end of things on the road against Sacramento, who lost
Demanda Sibonis during the game with a badly sprained ankle.
That could also impact what's happening at nine, ten, and eleven.
The Mavericks have watched the Suns get within a half
game of them for the ten spot. The first of
the or the worst of the play in spots. A
lot is going to change.

Speaker 2 (07:34):
We will have no idea who the Rockets are playing
in the first round until the last day of the season.
I firmly believe that, Well.

Speaker 3 (07:40):
If they're number two, you won't know it until the
last the first night of the play in tournament, when
whoever wins the seven eight actually your opponent.

Speaker 4 (07:46):
I think about that aspect.

Speaker 3 (07:47):
Yeah, so if you finish first or second, you won't
know your opponent. If you finish first, you know who
your opponent is immediately. Whoever wins the seven eight game,
all right, take it back. If you're number two, you
know who you're playing immediately, because the winner of the
seven eight game, that's seven, the number one seed actually
has to wait longer because the loser of the seven
eight game then goes back home or stays home and

(08:09):
hosts the winner of the nine to ten game, and
that team winner becomes the eighth seed to get smashed.

Speaker 4 (08:14):
By Oklahoma City.

Speaker 3 (08:16):
Golden State A lost last night and have not lost
a lot of games, but now they have, so they're
basically neck and neck with Minnesota. Minnesota somewhat miraculously lost
last night. Good Obi Toppin hit a corner three with
two guys in his face as he was fading out
of bounds to give them the lead in the final
few seconds. Anthony Edwards had attempted to win the game

(08:38):
for Minnesota, and I didn't have a chance to double
check this stat last night. They said he's oh for
fourteen in late game tire go ahead situations in the
fourth quarter or overtime, and I don't know how that's possible.
He literally missed the exact same shot he hit against
the Rockets to finish off their fifteen point come back

(09:00):
in the fourth quarter to beat Houston. That sounds like
he's made at least one. We all watched it, and
I was on the call for that one, so you
had fomo. But there's a lot going on in the
Western Conference, obviously, there's a lot going on today in
Florida with the Astros set to hit the diamond in
a little under three hours. Some notes from them recently
indicated it's a one inning outing. In his return to

(09:22):
the mound for Lance McCullers Junior, a lineup that will
not feature originally planned Jordon Alvarez or Thumb, but he
is expected to play tomorrow. Will not feature Christian Walker,
but that was planned. He is expected to play in
spring training games, probably this weekend before they come back
to Houston, so that's also good news. Luis Garcia and
Caleb ort To, pitchers on the mend, are expected to

(09:46):
have some live BP their very near future today tomorrow.
So these are things that push most of the players
that you have questions about injury wise in the obvious
and clear correct direction to maybe give in the astro
something to think about either for opening day. In some
of their cases are certainly not too far down the line.
In the case of mccullor's junior and Luis Garcia.

Speaker 2 (10:08):
I'm uh, I'm just so happy that we're as close
as we are, even though the season has already begun.
And when I was dropping off my kiddo this morning,
I checked in on the Sean Salisbury Show to see
the update on the opening round of MLB Action, and
I think at that opening round a golf tournament, I know,
it's just it's what it felt like.

Speaker 4 (10:28):
They hit te off pretty early. There's five te off
for the Cubs this morning.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
Dodgers were staggering their teas they teed off in a
group of nine.

Speaker 4 (10:36):
Just after that.

Speaker 2 (10:36):
Well, I'm driving along the the accounts, the roads like
the main drag to our street in our neighborhood and
I'm watching this beautiful sunrise, and I'm hearing that Kyle
Tucker is so far over so and that.

Speaker 4 (10:50):
Is still true as we speak.

Speaker 3 (10:52):
He heads into play tomorrow morning at five o'clock as
an zero for four performer for the Cubs. Cubs only
got three hits, got to make a cut. Dodgers are
one and zero. We mentioned yesterday Mookie Betts is ill,
so he was not participating in their season opener. They
played today early this morning. They'll play again tomorrow early
in the morning, and then both teams will make their
way back to the States for a handful more days

(11:13):
of spring training work, so to speak, and the Major
League Baseball season on Thursday next week. The Astros one
of the featured teams basically during the opening weekend on
the National side. After the opener, which we will have
for you of course, basically Home Network will also on Thursday.
It's an afternoon game. The two of us will be
coming in early. We'll be on at ten a m.

(11:34):
From the ballpark just outside dyke In Park for the
first regular season game played at the newly named dyke
In Park, and we'll take you right up into the
three ten first pitch Robert Steve will take it from
us a couple minutes before that, and then the following
two days will of course have for you on Sports
Talk seven ninety. There are national broadcast both Friday and Saturday,

(11:54):
and the always popular opening weekend Sunday day off follow
for the Astros and Mets.

Speaker 4 (12:01):
Do it myself before probably.

Speaker 3 (12:03):
Sunday, I would assume Justin Verlander will fly into town
to play, probably pitch against the Houston Astros for games four, five,
and six of the season. I don't believe the Giants
have made their way through much of their announcements of
who's starting when I think there's a reasonable chance he
does not get the ball in their first three games
of the season, thus could pitch for the first time

(12:23):
in a Giants uniform against his former team. Astros have
made it pretty clear on what was already clear. Robert
Valdez is the opening day starter announced earlier this week,
and Hunter Brown will get the ball on Friday in
game two, three, four, and five yet to be announced,
probably Blanco Arraghetti and Edon was Nesky and obviously another
day forward on what else is happening around the NFL

(12:47):
that doesn't involve the Texans. I don't know that anything
will be coming down the pike for Houston. Had a
question asked of me on the old X platform, when
will the Texans make something significant happen with it addition
on the offensive line, and I thought I had a
very clear and obvious response.

Speaker 4 (13:05):
I'll tell you what that is when we come back.

Speaker 3 (13:06):
Here on the A Team Early stages of the Tuesday
edition of the program.

Speaker 1 (13:12):
The A Team on Sports Talk seven.

Speaker 2 (13:15):
Ninety team Sports Talk seven ninety Tuesday edition of the
program Astro's Baseball right around the corner as the but
we are going to get into the portion of the
calendar here at the tail end of March and into May,
I mean the into April where the season is underway,

(13:36):
and I swear Matt Thomas is going to be crying
so much about our schedule. You can already see it
coming from a mile away.

Speaker 3 (13:44):
And with our new schedule and his new schedule, it's
not that new, but it's not where it was last
year for Astros Baseball season. It is a little bit different.
They're on from ten to two, we're on from two
to six. Obviously, Sewn Salisbury Show continues from six to ten.
That does become rather impactful when the baseball season arrives.

(14:04):
Where are the home for Rockets and Astros baseball. The
Rockets have extremely few afternoon weekday games. Not gonna say
they have none, but it's pretty rare. The Astros, on
the other hand, have quite a few, whether it's one
o'clock starts here at home, two o'clock, or three o'clock elsewhere.
The season opener is a three o'clock game the second
week of the season as they finish up with San

(14:24):
Francisco and begin their first road trip of the season
in Minnesota and then Seattle, which is obviously where you
would go on a two city road trip, Minnesota and
then Seattle. There is a day off on that road trip,
but it's not a travel day. They play their first
road game Thursday, Minnesota, week after the home opener, and

(14:46):
then they rest all day Friday. We cannot play a
second game in a row on the road. We must rest.
Then they finish up the series Saturday Sunday and play
Monday Tuesday Wednesday in Seattle. So they finish up their
afternoon game Sunday in Minnesota and fly out for an
evening game the following night on Monday.

Speaker 2 (15:03):
But those games you were talking about.

Speaker 3 (15:04):
They finish up the San Francisco series with a three
o'clock first pitch, No.

Speaker 2 (15:08):
Eighteen.

Speaker 3 (15:09):
They have the afternoon game on Wednesday. The following week,
same three to ten first pitch in Seattle.

Speaker 4 (15:16):
No A team. There'll be a few of those games.

Speaker 3 (15:19):
We'll catch you on the backside of their road trip
to Saint Louis, a one city road trip because they
got a twelve to fifteen game that Wednesday, So there's
quite a few to open up the season. Things will
slow down a little bit as we get closer to
the end of the month. We're looking forward to it
this I'm a little bit surprised some of the questions
I've seen being debated on some of the national shows

(15:43):
or on social media. I think there's full recognition that
the best team in the American League is not in
the American League West. But their discussions are about how competitive,
how incredibly competitive is the American League West going to
be this year. I think they believe it was going
to be a three team race like it was a
couple of years ago when we played all the way

(16:03):
into the final weekend knowing nothing about who is going
to win the division, who might also sneak in as
a wild card. Didn't happen last year because the Rangers
were not even a five hundred team. I think most
people believe it's going to happen this year, and it's
going to be including an Angels team that's significantly better,
an A's team that's significantly better, probably not in the race,
but significantly impacting the race, and that neither one of

(16:26):
them is probably gonna lose ninety games. They're probably more
in the seventy and eighty range. We'll go seventy four
and eighty eight somewhere in there, and that's much more
difficult to blow them out, you know, beat them ten
times out of thirteen eighty six wins.

Speaker 4 (16:40):
Last year they won.

Speaker 3 (16:41):
The Astros won the division in a one hundred and
sixty one game schedule for them, They won it with
eighty eight games. I feel like eighty eight games would
win it again, and it might actually come in a
little lower than that.

Speaker 2 (16:52):
By the way, that Minnesota Series where they have the
random Friday off, no way that's going to go as scheduled.
They'll be snowed out on Thursday, then play that game
on Friday, and have the regular Friday, Saturday Sunday series.

Speaker 3 (17:06):
So you've made it sound like they're actually thinking about it.
When I tried to make them look bad, You're You're corrected.
It is one of the reasons why they potentially have
scheduled it like that, because there's a real opportunity that
that is impactful in these cities.

Speaker 2 (17:22):
Hey, Minny Apple, we build a stadium with a roof.
I don't understand why these teams don't do this hearing well.
I don't know when they built that state, but it's
relatively new.

Speaker 3 (17:32):
I don't think they're gonna get snowed out, but I
can't say it's impossible. They play there the third, fifth,
and sixth, according to the schedule, and it's basically Canada.
As April begins, they're expecting temperatures in the mid forties,
low fifties that Tuesday before the Astros arived.

Speaker 2 (17:50):
At the very least, it'll be cold. They'll be wearing
sleeves and all that.

Speaker 4 (17:54):
Weather reports are always accurate two weeks out.

Speaker 2 (17:56):
In fact, I feel like I recall they had an
early series against Minnesota. Gosh that was twenty three If
I'm not mistaken, where they began the season and one
of their first series was in Minnesota. It did not
go very well, as I recall, because I think Sonny
Gray lit them up and it was super cold, as

(18:19):
I recalled during that because it was like again, it
was about this time on the calendar.

Speaker 3 (18:22):
Yeah, a weather related schedule almost always hits the Guardians.
Guardians open the season at Kansas City at San Diego
at LA. They're home for six games, then they go
back out on the road for six more games. Fifteen
of their first twenty one games are not being played
in open air cold Cleveland smart.

Speaker 2 (18:41):
Yeah, that's good, that's good rainy. And you know what's
funny is we talk about this. You know, you think
of northernmost cities, you know, since we're doing the weather
segment here, But the Seattle Stadium has a roof, but
it's not enclosed, so whatever it is outside is going
to be the temperature of the inside.

Speaker 4 (19:00):
Yeah, but you can play baseball.

Speaker 2 (19:01):
No, for sure, he's not precipitation coming down on you,
but it's you know, and the wind is probably lessened
and all that kind of stuff. But it's I've always
thought that was interesting they can do those kinds of things.
Because they have seasons up there.

Speaker 3 (19:13):
Yeah, mentioned a couple of those astros notes, and hopefully
everything continues in the correct direction, a very positive direction
with all those players that are impacted. No final decisions
made on several different positions. Don't know who the opening
day second basement is. Even though it looks like it's
not Jose Altuve, doesn't mean it's more Asio to Bond
doesn't mean it's Brendan Rodgers. A move would have to
be made to get Rogers on the forty man roster

(19:34):
before he's then part of the everyday twenty six man roster.

Speaker 4 (19:38):
I do think that is going to happen.

Speaker 3 (19:40):
He has played, I think himself into the player that
thought they were getting.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
Hopefully he can hit a little bit.

Speaker 3 (19:45):
Hopefully he's not a massive, awful splits player that he
was with the Rockies, and they'll find out as the
season plays out.

Speaker 4 (19:51):
But it was a good signing at the time.

Speaker 3 (19:53):
It made a lot of sense to see if he
could show that, you know, he can bring something offensively.
He's an average defensive player, although a previous goal glove winner,
but it's been an everyday player for multiple seasons. Mauricio
dubon being in competition with him is great, but Mauricio
also provides tremendous value to this team on the days
he doesn't start. The days he doesn't start means it
doesn't matter where you want to plug a hole.

Speaker 2 (20:13):
He can do it.

Speaker 3 (20:14):
It doesn't matter when you want to pinch hit him
or use him as a defensive replacement if that needs
to happen, which is something honestly, will have to be
considered even more than ever before. If Jose al Tuovey's
time at bat in a tie game is set to
come up maybe fourth or fifth, or in a game
you're winning by one, I should say in the ninth

(20:34):
inning if you bat, does Mauricio Dubon come into play
left field and Jose al Tuovey's day is done?

Speaker 2 (20:40):
Is his bat no longer?

Speaker 3 (20:41):
Because we've watched it happen with jord On sometimes not always,
was he taken out when he was a left fielder.
It's something that Joe wouldn't have had to consider before,
no matter how bad his defense was at second base.
They weren't replacing him with a defensive player often or ever,
but they would have to consider it now.

Speaker 2 (20:59):
In left fi, I am fascinated by what this lineup's
gonna be this season, what the whole camp Smith thing is.

Speaker 4 (21:06):
That's without saying. I mean, that just goes without saying, because.

Speaker 2 (21:10):
I just feel like every time he plays, people are
finding reasons to point to to say, hey, he should
probably be on the opening day roster. I don't know
if that ends up happening. You know, maybe cooler heads prevail,
you know, the ones that run the team versus the fans.

Speaker 3 (21:24):
We talked about it the other day and I brought
up the name Dylan Cruz because he's a year ahead
of him draft wise, he was a top pick, he
was a collegiate player. He's a no question about it,
no doubt about it, stud prospect. He's gonna be great,
and he got close to six hundred Minor league at
bats before he made his debut last year. He's probably
gonna make the Nationals opening day roster, or we could

(21:45):
bring it closer to home. Alex Bregman's the same as
Dylan Cruz from a prospect standpoint, stud prospect, played college baseball,
super top pick. You know he's going to be great
as soon as you bring him here. Whenever that is.
He had over five hundred minor league at bats. He
made his way through the system rapidly and still five
hundred minor league at bats plus before he made his

(22:06):
major league debut. Cam Smith is in the low hundreds
right now, having spent just a couple of months with
a couple of different Cubs affiliates.

Speaker 2 (22:15):
You would know this who in the history of Major
League Baseball took the shortest amount of time and ended
up being like, not even a superstar, just a very
like a star.

Speaker 3 (22:25):
Well, I'd probably take a little further and I'll double
check on the numbers. The first name that comes to
mind was Trout, okay, and then looking back at it,
eleven hundred minor league at bats.

Speaker 2 (22:36):
Golly, so how many I don't even I couldn't even
begin to master. How long is that?

Speaker 3 (22:43):
That's probably two and a half three season He was
drafted in, say that's longer two thousand and nine draft,
debut in twenty eleven, and was a full time player
in twenty twelve, So you know, two and a half
minor league seasons.

Speaker 2 (22:55):
Twenty twelve, and it feels like he hasn't played since then.

Speaker 3 (22:58):
I mean, he did play twenty nine games last year.

Speaker 2 (23:01):
The year before that, they Honestly, there's some bad contracts
out there in sports. I don't know, like Deshaun Watson
is becoming a really bad one. But for the amount
of money they've paid, and I know he's won MVPs
under that contract. His contract to me brutal.

Speaker 4 (23:18):
But they're in a CBT world, a capitalists, yeah, sports,
So it's just monopoly money to us.

Speaker 3 (23:25):
It's a little different than the Sixers. Yeah and whatever.

Speaker 2 (23:29):
Oh, by the way, for the record, and I am
free to say this, Darryl Morey was fine with that
loss last night.

Speaker 4 (23:36):
I'm just gonna put it on the record.

Speaker 3 (23:38):
Well, if you look at how things sit inside their
own locker room for just a minute. Philadelphia's lost last night.
They're twenty three and forty five. That is the fifth
tied for the fifth worst record in the NBA, and
they're probably not going to catch anybody else. They could
win a few games and go from fifth to eighth, right,

(23:58):
So losing probably keeps them no worse than fifth, And
that means they have a forty percent chance of drafting
in the top four. Means they have a ten percent
chance of landing or a little bit higher. If Brooklyn's
no longer tied with him of landing the number one pick.
I told him to play with Paul George Tyrese Maxi
and Joel Embiid.

Speaker 4 (24:17):
Well Joel Embiid for some of the season.

Speaker 2 (24:19):
I told him, you can have Cooper Flagg as long
as the Spurs don't get him. That was the deal
we made.

Speaker 3 (24:24):
Yeah, Spurs currently sit with the eighth worst record. That's
a six percent chance of landing number one, twenty six
percent chance of landing top four. Rockets hold the odds
for the twelfth seed in the lottery.

Speaker 4 (24:36):
That's Phoenix right now. Phoenix won last night.

Speaker 3 (24:39):
Phoenix won last night very very easily against a very
bad st very bad Raptors team. They're half game back
of doubtless it again, making ten or nine or eight
or seven only matters if they win in the play Attorney.
If you don't make it out of the play Attorney,
you are right back in the lottery, but probably in

(25:00):
the same if they make the playing tournament in the
Western Conference odds there, they'll probably be thirteenth in draft
order when they don't make the playoffs, unless somebody in
the East really starts playing well in their playing tournament
and then misses the playoffs with a better record than Phoenix.

Speaker 4 (25:17):
It's pretty unlikely, but it's possible.

Speaker 3 (25:19):
Twelve or thirteen is probably what Phoenix would give Houston
unless they've already worked out a deal.

Speaker 2 (25:25):
I guess I thought that the Sixers came in last
night having won more games than they had when really
they're right where the Rockets were a few seasons back,
where the Rockets almost knocked off a very talented Sixers
team with that ragtag bunch coached by Steven Silas, and
then they didn't.

Speaker 3 (25:43):
Yet two overtime games with this year's Sixers team, this
year's twenty three wins Sixers team, but the Rockets on
the right end of both of those games. Halfway through
our number one of the A team, Well, that usually
means the best of X is next, and of course
that's exactly what it means today.

Speaker 1 (26:01):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety all right, we.

Speaker 2 (26:08):
Will get to the best of X shortly, but this music,
so we're in the portion of the show. The first
hour every day, regardless of whether or not we do TV,
is where we can actually play copyright of music. It's
a little peak behind the curtain, it's a little inside baseball.
I get that for radio here, But did you watch
Beavis and butt Heead when it was on? You were

(26:29):
in college then, right, No, you weren't in college. Well, yeah,
you were in college right in the mid nineties. I
was in college from nineteen ninety one to nineteen ninety five. Okay,
so that's right in their wheelhouse. And as I recall, I.

Speaker 3 (26:43):
Think we're too busy, you know, clogging up the television
with Nintendo, Doctor Mario, so Melrose Place and nine oh
two one zero.

Speaker 2 (26:53):
Yeah, well obviously, but you were also probably clogging up
the bong. Well you weren't, I mean some of your
housemates were.

Speaker 3 (27:01):
It still blows me away the life that I once liked,
I know, like and I look man, I and you're right,
had been told to be clear it It wasn't me, right,
But I lived in a frat house for a very
prevalent right then. I lived in two separate houses with

(27:21):
four roommates each time. And it's the house had a
very very distinctive in every room.

Speaker 2 (27:30):
And yet you haven't called any of them about my
summit chair first, and none of those guys are involved.

Speaker 4 (27:35):
Okay, I've had roommates college.

Speaker 2 (27:37):
I've been told I have it on good authority by
very good sources, one of which I'm married to, who
have absolutely used to do that a lot. Uh. That
is a show that is heightened by that activity.

Speaker 3 (27:51):
Well, it is a fact that each of these sets
of roommates had groups that would, Oh, yeah, absolutely, we're
gonna go see fish.

Speaker 2 (28:00):
Hey, let's go to the movies.

Speaker 3 (28:01):
Gosh, should we watch should we watch the movies after
we Yeah?

Speaker 2 (28:05):
Absolutely, it'll be even better, right right, especially the certain movies.
But so I bring all that up because that song
I just watched the video guy, so it came across
my Instagram feed this weekend. There is a uh it's
that song is called no No, No, no, No. He's talking
in my ear too. It's uh, it's a that song

(28:27):
was used for a Beavis and butt Heads. You know,
they would look at music videos and react to them
that Gore had a new video. They would go watch it,
like I feel I want I want JK to play
the beginning of that song again. That's okay, I know,
but like the video is so hilarious because that comes
on and all it is is both of them going yes, yes, yes, yeah,

(28:50):
yeah yeah.

Speaker 3 (28:51):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (28:51):
It's just it's the best.

Speaker 3 (28:52):
So I just thought, so, are you still pleased that
when Gosling hosted SNL and they were beat my buttthead,
that people got it, that everyone knew.

Speaker 2 (29:02):
It when I was when so when that show is
on and its heyday, I was like thirteen twelve, so
I'm in a different wheelhouse for that. I just thought, Oh,
they talk about you know, chicks and you know, the
type of stuff that makes twelve and thirteen year old
boys think is just the funniest thing.

Speaker 4 (29:20):
Ever.

Speaker 2 (29:20):
I didn't really get the humor of it. And then
I started like watching, like the last movie they came
out with was freaking hilarious. I'm sitting there, well, I'm no, no, no,
it was like recent they just came out with, like
not Beavers and butthhead do America talking about the last
one they came out with. And I'm sitting in the
theater one night and I'm like laughing so loud that
she comes back there and she goes, what are you watching?

(29:41):
And then she sees it and she's like yes, she
sits down because she thinks it's the greatest show ever.

Speaker 4 (29:45):
So all of that is to.

Speaker 2 (29:46):
Say Big Beavis and butthead fan, did he Yeah, I
can tell did No.

Speaker 4 (29:51):
I wouldn't.

Speaker 3 (29:52):
I wouldn't say it was regular afternoon or evening viewing.
But I'm I'm wasn't it on all the time quite
a bit. Yeah, back when MTV as they were trained,
positioning away from being a music video station into.

Speaker 2 (30:03):
A reality only I mean, if they start it was
Real World on MTV. The first reality show that was
like mainstream popular, It's.

Speaker 3 (30:11):
Possible, definitely in the early stage is Real World, then
transitioning into road Rules, then into people that aren't in
their twenties yet that we're getting pregnant, people that like
eating a certain type of fish, excuse me, dating catfish,
stuff like that, shows like.

Speaker 4 (30:26):
That, and then Survivor just ruined it.

Speaker 2 (30:29):
They just took over because it went to like the
broadcast channels, yeah, instead of cable.

Speaker 4 (30:34):
Yeah, Paradise Island, all the good stuff. Now she's still Island.

Speaker 3 (30:38):
She still watches that's the British still watches it. If
they're putting it out, people keep watching it.

Speaker 2 (30:43):
I come in there, I walk through the room and
it's a bunch of British babes and bikinis, shocking, and
they're I don't believe it and they're all unhappy and
they're all crying and they're all orange, and what are
you doing? What are you watching?

Speaker 3 (30:59):
We're telling you it's reality TV, even though we're telling
the people in the show cut. We need to reshoot that,
and you need to say this. We need to record
you saying this. We need you to sit over here
with perfect lighting and talk about the exact situation that's
going on, even though it's five days later, because so
we can edit that into the show and make it
look good and make it look like this is what

(31:20):
you were thinking at the.

Speaker 4 (31:21):
Time, because that's how reality tea.

Speaker 3 (31:23):
Reality TV works, nothing realted and written. So yeah, we'll
best of X next segment. There's a lot of things
that we can always choose from next never Disappoints, Instagram, Facebook, Snapface,
they're all there for you, all good time, So we
will hit you with that. On the other side, a
few items from Hoops we'll find its way there, and

(31:44):
obviously some more discussion with you guys right here on
the A team, including that discussion we were having before
about rapid path to the majors getting drafted going almost
directly to Major League Baseball. See if Cam Smith follows suit.
In fact, it would be without any astros minor league baseball,
he said the other day during an interview, when he

(32:05):
was asked to go back and think about where his
head was when the trade was made, cam Smith said,
I didn't even realize you could be traded that soon,
as in, well, they just drafted me. They just drafted me.
This is my first off season and I'm out there.
The GM called me, and then Dana Brown called me,
and we're often running as a Houston astro. I'll say
it for real this time. Best of X is next, eg.

Speaker 5 (32:29):
Fine Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (32:34):
Did you see this?

Speaker 3 (32:35):
We should be putting out Between five and posts day,
four hundred people were arrested for things that they said
on social media.

Speaker 6 (32:42):
History repeats itself, type Banguel's succeed.

Speaker 2 (32:47):
Never doubt that you're the one who plus we'll call
one building lead. Y're the best.

Speaker 4 (32:54):
X.

Speaker 2 (32:55):
Nothing's gonna ever.

Speaker 6 (32:56):
Top you know, yore, the best of X posting ever seen.
Will Dave, You're the best of the breaking the entire enginet.

Speaker 3 (33:10):
All right, we got best of the backs for you
each and every day, usually around two to thirty month
at a segment.

Speaker 4 (33:15):
Here for you I hope you will enjoy.

Speaker 2 (33:17):
You may have something to bring to the table here.

Speaker 3 (33:19):
A lot of the listeners will send us stuff that
we then bring to the table. Here one of our
listeners who had mentioned something earlier regarding the path to
the Major League sometimes being a very very quick one.
We'll get to that coming up momentarily, but wanted it
to take you to Los Angeles for a first stop
best of X. A post from a certain professional Los

(33:40):
Angeles basketball team reads as follows from earlier this month.
It's almost a little over a week old now. It
says we're looking for male practice players for the twenty
twenty five season.

Speaker 2 (33:55):
Do you have what it takes?

Speaker 3 (33:57):
Join us for tryouts coming up in April, Register and
fill out the waiver today. It includes a picture of
four professional basketball players from that specific LA sports franchise,
the Sparks, the Los Angeles basketball team, and the w
featuring some two very very well known players. Really all

(34:19):
four of them are very very well known players, one specifically,
who has a rapidly rising in popularity podcast it's called
Straight to Camp.

Speaker 4 (34:28):
Her name's Cameron Brink.

Speaker 3 (34:30):
She co hosts that podcast with essentially Basketball Royalty.

Speaker 4 (34:37):
If you will considering it's.

Speaker 3 (34:40):
I can't ever keep straight how Steph and Seth and
Austin and mister Lee the other member of the Warriors,
and Sidel their sister, how it all works. But this
is one of it's a Curry confused with Sidel three
now Siddel Curry, and she is married to a former

(35:02):
teammate Warriors teammate of Steph's. But she co hosts this
podcast with Cam Brinks. She's the younger sister of Steph
and Seth. Her husband is Damian Lee. I believe he's
currently a Phoenix Sun. They talk a lot of basketball,
they talk a lot of life. I think it's very popular,
it's very entertaining, and you know these people. It's certainly,
in Cam's case, a rising star in the W and

(35:24):
now moving past her injury, this is her team. And
this was a post on the X platform shocking the
comments that you would see follow this. She noticed I
will certainly read you some of those comments, but she
noticed and it became a brief topic in their discussion
on their podcast, and she kind of explains the whole

(35:46):
situation of how practice players work normally and kind of
what she saw with the comments, and we will We'll
take it from there.

Speaker 7 (35:53):
So I'm really picked out by the potential new practice players.
It's basically just like a fire is like Ni Dierka,
Rikia and Kelsey, and it's like male practice players wanted
and usually we use like USC college guys that also
like do it for the women's team at USC okay,
and all the comments are like let Cameron brank back.

Speaker 8 (36:11):
Me down, like something about PA or something on Kelsey
can to go through with heavy HR training. Who are
we trusting coming into this gym? But the nerve to
just like sit there on their phone. I'm not boxing
anyone out that Lynn, her new coach, is going to
be screaming at me for not rebounding them.

Speaker 2 (36:26):
I'm not boxing out Okay, let me see if I
can recreate that real quick. And it was what it
was icked out.

Speaker 3 (36:35):
That's what I'm really icked out by was how the
comment began, and it's from what she probably knew what
was going to be there. I think the team had
to be oblivious that they didn't know what was going
to be there. This is the X platform and this
is who likes to comment on it. Some people are
there just to surf around a little bit. Some people
like getting information. It's great for breaking news in the

(36:56):
sports world and elsewhere, and it's also a place where
people are in their basement. That's basically the kind of
comments you saw here. Oh I'm signing up, I'm cooking, y'all.
Anything to get dunked on by Brink Please release the
footage regardless. Tons of gifts, one that might feature you.

(37:17):
Are you familiar with the w W E giff where
it's a he looks like a salesman. He's wearing black
slacks and a blue polo and he is running as
fast as he can to get into the ring from backstage.

Speaker 4 (37:29):
Yes, that is there, as in sign me Up. It's
not Shane, is it McMahon?

Speaker 3 (37:34):
I don't know what Shane McMahon looks like. Really blonde? No,
not Shane McMahon. You're familiar with along came Polly. Yes,
while one of our favorite actors plays basketball in that
movie White Chocolate. That gif is there rain dance and uh,
someone says, pull your socks up, boys. Whatever you think

(37:56):
it is, it won't be that. A lot of people
not understand what this is about. And that's why I
played you her comment. It is totally normal, every really
good women's basketball team, and she brought up USC because
of where they are. USC is one of the best
teams in the country. Guess who they play against? It
practice often, very often, they play against men. They play

(38:20):
against students, oftentimes really good basketball players. They're not playing
on USC's team, and they're not going to play professional basketball,
but they're good at basketball, and this helps teams get
better play against tough, physical competition. They could play against
other women, But how many awesome basketball playing women do
you think are available? These are the best women's basketball

(38:40):
players in the world. It's a lot easier to find
comparable men's talent, and you know, signing a waiver. Guess
what if they wanted to, they could easily find five
available men, all six to eight and above. But they
won't because that's not what they need. That's not what
they need to practice against. They need to practice against
like sized players in this case that happen to be

(39:01):
men that will make them better at basketball. Professional basketball
teams do this all the time. College basketball teams do
this all the time. Go up to the gym the
rec center at your athletically based university. Texas for instance,
Texas a and m You don't think there's men playing
with women even at the rec center all the time,
on college campuses plenty. So that's the serious side of it.

(39:24):
But I totally understand her point of view for the
manner in which they decided to look for them. I mean,
a post on social media is going to bring out
the worst or in our case, the best.

Speaker 4 (39:36):
Who What was the video.

Speaker 2 (39:39):
That Peter from Office Space is in where he's trying
to order coffee and he's mad because the barista is
talking the way she does, right, that's who they sound like.
You don't talk like that?

Speaker 4 (39:49):
Yeah, I do. Most of them talk like that.

Speaker 3 (39:51):
I don't know if you've ever heard them do interviews before,
just speak in general.

Speaker 2 (39:56):
It's just what it reminded me of because I actually
also saw that video the other day. It came up
on my I've seen it before, but that and the
Beavis and Butt had both came up and they were
repeat views and I enjoyed them both again.

Speaker 3 (40:07):
So that was one thing that a team went out
and sought help for to develop their team. A baseball
team did something very very similar.

Speaker 2 (40:18):
Did you see that.

Speaker 3 (40:20):
No, The Miami Marlins sent out a post looking for
players that would help them build a practice squad to
play against their minor league teams during the season in
the early portion of the season out there where their
home is, and Major League Baseball basically said, no, we're

(40:41):
gonna shut that Downbatnew exactly.

Speaker 2 (40:44):
Yeah, there's a kind of like Dion's idea yesterday. I
think it probably got shut no, no.

Speaker 3 (40:49):
No, before we close Best of X for that very
reason you brought it up yesterday. I shot it down
very very clearly. But a friend of the show said otherwise.
We did the coaches carousel basically when we were live
from the Bear Bryan Awards earlier this off season, right

(41:11):
after the college football a rare day so the on
three network covers college football recruiting, et cetera. They posted
the story we were talking about Deon Sanders just trying
to face another team for Colorado spring game in April
at Fran brown Cues quote tweeted it the head coach
for the Styracuse Orange he was with us and was awesome.
You want to hit the archives of the podcast for

(41:32):
our program right there on the iHeartRadio app where we
already know Sports Talk seven ninety is number one in
your presets. Certainly in your presets. We know it's in
your presets. If you catch my drift. He quote tweeted
and said at Deon Sanders, we will come to Boulder
for three days.

Speaker 2 (41:48):
There you go. That's all Dion wanted.

Speaker 3 (41:50):
He only need he doesn't have to play eight teams.
I'll take the play and fran Brown is down.

Speaker 2 (41:56):
I could see it.

Speaker 4 (41:58):
Well.

Speaker 2 (41:59):
I just want to get hear them talk to each other. Mike,
those two up, that would be phenomen all right, three
o'clock hour is coming up next. Here on a Tuesday
edition of the program.

Speaker 1 (42:10):
The a team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 5 (42:18):
Two, lifelong Houston sports guys named Adham talking your team.
Adam Clinton and Adam Wexler are the eight team.

Speaker 2 (42:32):
Three o'clock hour underway here on a Tuesday edition of
the program Sports Talk seven ninety He's wex I may see.
We are taking you up until about four fifty. Well,
right on the dot four fifty that's when Astros and
Nationals will take over Spring training variety. Although the Major
League Baseball season is underway technically across many miles of ocean,

(42:59):
the Dodgers getting their season underway against the Chicago Cubs,
and that took place earlier this morning. Dodgers are well,
they're undefeated.

Speaker 3 (43:09):
As they were before the game started, but they did
win the game, so they also have a win to
go with their zero losses.

Speaker 4 (43:14):
They beat the Cubs for to one. They will do
it again tomorrow morning.

Speaker 3 (43:17):
Did not see Ryan Presley make his Cub's debut today,
so certainly that could be on tap for first thing
in the morning tomorrow. Kyle Tucker batted four times, he
was retired four times, and will probably not keep quite
as close tabs on him once everybody's playing Major League
Baseball probably will keep an eye on Kyle for much

(43:38):
of the early portion of the season, and probably we'll
do the same thing with Bregman while we're doing the
same thing with Cam Smith, whether it's here in Houston
or elsewhere. Cam not part of this afternoon's lineup, but
four fifty we do have Astros Baseball for you at
the home ballpark of both teams playing. They've got the
game against the Nationals today. Lance McCullers Junior will be
on the mound in live game action against opponent for

(44:01):
the first time since he pitched in the World Series
in twenty twenty two. He will He's expected to pitch
one inning. I'm pretty sure they can not have to
deviate from that. Probably means they won't don't want him
getting up and down, and probably would limit the number
of pitches he had in that one inning if things
went in a different direction. Jordan Alvarez in the original lineup,

(44:22):
but scratch turns out he actually hurt his thumb the
other day and then played the game that followed had
a little soreness, so did not want to have him
in the lineup today when they realized that he is
expected to play tomorrow. They're wrapping up their time in
Florida Tuesday through Sunday. They do have games there Monday
and Tuesday of next week. They'll be back here at
Dyke and Park, finishing, putting the finishing touches on all

(44:44):
the places you're gonna see the name the words Dyke
in Park. Two games against the Space Cowboys back in Houston,
and then the season begins back in Houston a week
from Thursday for the Astros and Mets against some national
TV coverage over the rest of the weekend, a series
that does not play on but rather Thursday, Friday, Saturday,
made it official that Hunter Brown gets the ball in
Game two, with from ber Valdez getting the ball in

(45:07):
Game one. He's been a fixture recently as their opening
day starter, but barring an agreement to keep him as
an Astro, this will be the last opening day start
as an Astro for from ber Valdez. Most of the
ones before him have been pretty good in seasons that
were pretty good, and I do think their belief is

(45:28):
this season will match. When we get down to our
show on the twenty sixth and seventh of next week,
we'll be much more in tune with our season predictions
for Major League Baseball division winners, some award winners, and
playoff predictions. Feel pretty confidence it's going to be a
lot of love for the Astros, even with what should
be an extremely competitive division. The Astros made major changes.

(45:52):
The Rangers did go out and try to make most
of their team better, barring a look at their bullpen,
which is probably worse or else, I think they got better.
And the Mariners who thought, hey man, last year's team
missed the playoffs, why don't we keep it together and
see what happens this year, and we'll see if they
can get better. Without doing anything to get better, and
maybe didn't make any moves to get better. But they're expecting,

(46:15):
you know, guys like JP Crawford, as like Julio Rodriguez,
just to simply have better seasons, a full season with
Randy Rose Arena and then somehow get a repeat performance
from their pitching staff, which was almost exclusively and fully
healthy all season long. They only needed six starters all
year and they all pitched very, very well. They have

(46:36):
a very distinct you can't score here ballpark. It does
apply to both teams. They don't give up many runs,
they don't score many runs, and usually leads to them
having a very good home record. We'll see if they
can match that with subquality wins on the road, and
if that's the case, it will most likely be a
three team race deep into September.

Speaker 2 (46:54):
In the American League West, eighty eight wins gets the
job done. Yeah, last or last hour.

Speaker 3 (46:59):
I know the Astros won eighty eight games last year,
and I think eighty eight games would win the division
again this year.

Speaker 2 (47:05):
I think each of.

Speaker 3 (47:05):
The teams has questions if they have this injury or that,
and inevitably that will happen.

Speaker 4 (47:12):
What do the Astros turn in April.

Speaker 3 (47:13):
If one of their five starters can't go, what happens
later in the season. If Garcia has not come back yet,
if mccullor's or somebody isn't ready to go.

Speaker 4 (47:20):
They don't have tremendous depth there.

Speaker 3 (47:22):
And clearly they've got questions all over the place offensively
because they don't even know what their lineup's going to
look like as we get closer to the season.

Speaker 4 (47:29):
There is no Bizarro alternate universe.

Speaker 2 (47:32):
And I'm not talking about through like May, mid May,
end of May, like you know, fools Gold every year
for the Seattle Mariners, where the Anaheim Angels are like
leading this division significantly at any point is there?

Speaker 3 (47:47):
I think you'd be best not taking them lightly. But no,
I don't think they're ready to compete for the division.
But if you forecasted, then last year is a sixty
four and ninety eight team. This year they're more like
a seventy four and eighty eighteen. That's respectable for them.

Speaker 4 (48:04):
Yeah, they have legitimate starting pitching.

Speaker 2 (48:06):
I don't know that they have.

Speaker 3 (48:08):
If he pitches like then he's front of the rotation starter.
Most of his career, he's been middle of the rotation
or back of the rotation starter. So we'll see what
he delivers them, as they paid him to deliver a
like an ace. He's their opening day starter, and that
was named by Ron Washington weeks ago. But they also
added several other legitimate major league quality players. They're they're

(48:30):
giving without going out and spending because spending crazy money
and being a part of some of the bigger free
ages that were out there, they legitimately are going to
put major league players on their team this year, with
or without the injuries. Anthony Rendon is not counted on
to even play it all this year, and Mike Trout
is expected to have a new position this year, no
longer their center fielder, but he will enter the season

(48:51):
ready to play baseball.

Speaker 2 (48:53):
Why do I feel so Rendon's definitely out the whole year.
I think there's a pretty good chance he plays there
because if the hip surgery.

Speaker 3 (48:59):
Which happened far too close to the start of the season,
just that is such a bad deal, that's such a
bad contract, and this guy had like no major injuries
prior to joining the Angels correct his last.

Speaker 4 (49:14):
Four years with Washington.

Speaker 3 (49:15):
I brought this up a couple of times last four
years with Washington, culminating with an accidental World Series championship. Yes,
he had five hundred and ninety seven played appearances or
more all four seasons. He has had three hundred played
appearances in a season during his five seasons with the Angels.
Oh my god, zero times he has played a fifty

(49:39):
ninth game of the year.

Speaker 4 (49:41):
Zero times in the time.

Speaker 2 (49:43):
Okay, tell me this, because I honestly think it's a
It might be a push. In the seasons they've played together,
who has missed fewer games? I guess I should say
who's played more games or fewer games?

Speaker 3 (50:00):
Trout's played more games? But five years, barely five years.

Speaker 2 (50:04):
One of them was a.

Speaker 4 (50:04):
COVID year, but just two years or the how many
years they together? Five years?

Speaker 3 (50:09):
One of them was a COVID year, and Anthony rendel
And is sitting at two hundred and fifty seven games played.

Speaker 2 (50:14):
I guess that makes sense since we saw him in
a national's uniform in twenty nineteen. Obviously, yeah, Trout's not
much better, but he's a little over three hundred what
an absolute in five years?

Speaker 4 (50:25):
And again one of those years was take a hundred
games off.

Speaker 2 (50:27):
Thisa that's the difference between somebody like the Angels and
somebody like the Pittsburgh Pirates. One team is actually spending money.
They're trying it from that standpoint, whereas the Pirates are like, Oh,
we've got the best pitcher in baseball, screw you, here's
our seventy million dollars payroll. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (50:43):
I think they're going to be better this year only
because they just happened to have found some pitching without
having to spend big money on it. I think they're
actually going to be a pretty decent pitching squad. But
they also were nowhere near as bad as the Angels
to begin with. The last two years, they've back to
back seventy six win seasons, and if you get thirty,

(51:06):
say you get thirty two starts out of Paul Skins,
you're probably gonna win twenty four of them.

Speaker 2 (51:11):
He's that good.

Speaker 4 (51:13):
So you're already sixteen games over five hundred he like.

Speaker 2 (51:17):
I Just that to me would drive me crazy, because
they do have a fantastic ballpark, They do have a
good fan base. That place is rocking when they're good
at Pittsburgh. That could be such a in twenty twenty five,
where market size does not matter in sports like it
used to, even a little with social media. Pittsburgh should

(51:38):
be the Pirates should be like an IT team. They
should be like the cool team, one of the cool
teams to just be a fan of.

Speaker 3 (51:46):
And they are, you know, just because they have cool
team colors. Yeah, it's uniforms and logo. Listen, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (51:52):
Anybody says, I know that there is some history between
Houston and Pittsburgh that goes way back where I should
have some sort of animosity, but I was born. Yeah
you should, But I think it's awesome when towns have
teams that have all the same colors. That's cool.

Speaker 4 (52:09):
What colors are their basses?

Speaker 3 (52:10):
The basketball team in Pitts one of those, but if
they did the Penguins, the Steelers and the ball clowesome,
it's pretty cool as long as you have cool colors, and.

Speaker 4 (52:18):
They do right like all time.

Speaker 3 (52:20):
It's still on one of my favorite hats ever, the
ones worn by Bill Madlock and Dave Parker, and it's
kept to Colby with the lines around it and the
stars on it for good play.

Speaker 2 (52:32):
And again like i've never been there, I've heard nothing
but good things about that ballpark.

Speaker 3 (52:38):
Well, we'll keep an eye on when on the schedule
of the Pirates play the Texas Rangers. Tommy fam is
a Pittsburgh Pirate. Jock Peterson is a Texas Ranger.

Speaker 4 (52:48):
Now somebody's getting slapped down and it's not Tommy.

Speaker 3 (52:51):
Just since I mentioned Schmes. Last year, he made twenty
three starts. They went fifteen and eight in those starts,
twenty four out of thirty two being wins for the team.

Speaker 2 (52:59):
It's pretty lofty.

Speaker 3 (53:00):
That's clearly say young caliber pitching, you do have to
score and winning that higher percentage of any pitchers starts.

Speaker 4 (53:07):
It's still pretty rare in Major League Baseball.

Speaker 2 (53:09):
But so is he astros over under.

Speaker 3 (53:12):
Uh yeah, we'll hit astro over unders for some of
the individual players.

Speaker 4 (53:16):
And when when we come back. One last thing on
Paul Skeens.

Speaker 3 (53:21):
The Pirates, like many teams, videoed the in manager's office
announcement of hey man, you're gonna you're gonna be our
opening day starter, right with Paul Skeen's his manager, and
they had a run of the middle conversation and hey man,
you're gonna this is gonna be your first opening day start.

Speaker 2 (53:40):
Remember he was not on the team to start the year.
So it is.

Speaker 3 (53:42):
It's a pretty big accomplishment. But it's also the kind
of acknowledgement that was met with a quote tweet that
just simply read, Hey, Wemby, You're gonna do the jump
ball for us tonight?

Speaker 4 (53:55):
Are you sure?

Speaker 3 (53:56):
How did you come up with that idea? Paul skeens
the opening day starter?

Speaker 4 (54:00):
Are you sure? Very good analogy? I like that a lot.
All right, Astro's over under coming up next The A.

Speaker 1 (54:06):
Team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (54:12):
Back at you here on the A Team.

Speaker 3 (54:15):
Nigel earlier called into the show and wanted to pass
along some information that I promise you we would in
talking about the path to the show can be a
rather short one.

Speaker 2 (54:26):
If you're a can't miss.

Speaker 3 (54:28):
I do think camp Smith is a camp miss thought
Alex Bregman and Dylan Cruz are also of the camp
miss category. There have been others that immediately almost to me,
there's been some pitchers that immediately have gotten there, and
we've seen players make their major league debuts during the
same calendar year they were drafted. But a couple of
names that he brought up were a kid in this case,

(54:53):
the kid Ken Griffy Jr. I don't know if you
guys know this, he was a pretty good player. In
nineteen eighty seven, when the Seattle Mariners went won to
one with him first player off the board, they thought
he might make it to the majors pretty quickly.

Speaker 4 (55:07):
He was seventeen years old when they drafted him.

Speaker 3 (55:10):
He got one hundred and eighty two at bats as
a seventeen year old following the draft. He got another
two hundred and seventy at bats as an eighteen year
old the following year, getting through High A Ball and
Double A Ball, and nineteen eighty nine, at age nineteen,
he was done playing minor league baseball other than a

(55:32):
rehab assignment later on his career. Nineteen year old Ken Griffy,
junior out of high school, did still not make his
major league debut until a full year of professional baseball
was under his belt. He only got in seventy five
games during that full year, and overall only played in
a little over one hundred and twenty minor league games

(55:54):
and had a little less than four hundred and fifty
at bats, but that's still way more than what Cam
Smith has seen to date. He went on to a
pretty good career. Ken Griffey junior. He's a pretty good ballplayer,
sweetest swing ever, right, he has about his pretty a
left handed swing, and usually the left handed swing is
regarded as the prettier of the two as we've ever seen.

Speaker 2 (56:16):
Yeah, you know what, I heard less and less of
as he continued his tenure here as a Houston astro
before being traded to the Cubs. Ted Williams comparisons to
Kyle Tucker remember that.

Speaker 3 (56:27):
Well, I think they were prevalent, but I do think
there was a little bit of tongue in cheek. Every
I mean, nobody was really saying resembled it in mechanics,
but the results.

Speaker 4 (56:38):
I think it did. And maybe I'm wrong.

Speaker 3 (56:40):
I didn't view Ted Williams swing even though the results
were as basically as good as you could get. I
don't think it was a beautiful this is how everybody
should do it. And I think that's why some of
the comparisons were made because I don't think Kyle Tucker's
is a prototypical beautiful left handed swing.

Speaker 2 (56:56):
As Jeff Bagwell will tell you, it doesn't have to
look good.

Speaker 3 (57:00):
Does that have to look good? I guess you know
a couple guys that would be on the list. I
always thought, even though he's playing for the hated Mets,
I love watching Darryl Strawberry swing a left handed bat.
John Olarude often gets mentioned as a great looking left
handed swing, and yeah, Kim Griphy Juniors certainly at the
top of the list. It brings me to some baseball conversation.
The Astros are getting set to play their season, so

(57:21):
is everybody else. It's good time to get the numbers going.
What kind of season is this player going to have?
To the tune of what where your wager might be.
With a couple of your Houston Astros, including two of
the newer Houston Astros, we've got some over unders for you.
Got over unders on ten Astro players, four pitchers, six

(57:43):
offensive performers.

Speaker 2 (57:45):
Who would you like to hear about first?

Speaker 4 (57:48):
One of my choices again.

Speaker 3 (57:50):
Pick one of the good pitchers or one of the
good hitters, Hunter Brown, Hunter Brown, what would you set
his win total at?

Speaker 4 (57:58):
Over under? What number wins?

Speaker 2 (58:03):
Fifteen?

Speaker 3 (58:04):
I figured you would say that. I thought it would
be higher, certainly higher than the number. But I'm glad
if this is a number that's available to me, I
could wager on it because I would smash the over
bad Hunter Brown in twenty twenty three, when eleven and
thirteen good for three quarters of the season two thirds

(58:26):
of the season Hunter Brown twenty twenty four went eleven
and nine. The over under is eleven. Oh wow, that
is that is basically saying your team's not good or
he's not going to pitch all year.

Speaker 2 (58:42):
Making He made thirty one starts in both of.

Speaker 3 (58:44):
Those years, but it wasn't very good and still won
eleven games with the really good Astros team. They got
a little bit worse last year. Yeah, and he managed
eleven wins. So setting the number based on last year
is not out of the out not crazy because if
he spent that much of last year awesome and still
only won eleven times.

Speaker 4 (59:06):
Remember was right around the end of May.

Speaker 3 (59:08):
That you know, maybe you look at it as the
relief appearance he made against Detroit in mid May. But
then he went and started every game the final four
months of the year. He had a five game winning streak,
and then after July he only won two games in
his final nine starts. The Astros only won four of

(59:28):
his final nine starts. Well, he continued to pitch brilliantly.

Speaker 9 (59:32):
Playing the role of Adam Wexler in his web blanket.
Today will be Adam Clanton. There's my sports soap opera disclaimer.
Do you remember why he didn't win as many games?
I don't want to say lost as many games. Why
he didn't win He.

Speaker 4 (59:49):
Didn't lose the games. He just didn't win the games.

Speaker 2 (59:51):
But a lot of times when he was going through
his rough stretch, it was obviously compounded by him putting
the men on base, but then behind him for whatever reason,
the defense just was not as good as it was
for other pitchers. And that was with Alex Bragman on
the hot corner.

Speaker 3 (01:00:08):
Yeah, he only had five earned or unearned runs against
his ledger over the course of the season. But every
poor play is not put in the books as an error.
It just means, well, they didn't make the play and
now the innings. Now, he wasn't necessarily given an error
for it. But first two months of the season there
just weren't wins to get. He had one win after
two months. He had one win after eleven appearances. And

(01:00:29):
this is why Vegas always wins, all right. So that's
what you got with Hunter Brown. They do offer you
his strikeout total. He and Fromber are basically in the
same pace place one hundred and sixty nine and a
half hundred and seventy half. Renel's at one hundred and
sixty and a half. I'd probably play the over on
Fromber and Hunter and the under on Renel fromber Valdez
over under thirteen and a half wins in what is

(01:00:52):
a contract year.

Speaker 2 (01:00:56):
I'm sure you're aware.

Speaker 3 (01:00:57):
As the opening day starter, Yeah, he is facing a
few opening day pitchers more often than other guys. Maybe
usually it plays out that way, but it's not a given.
He's all seen and a half wins the last four years.
He's been fairly healthy. He's been out there a lot.
He has been above thirteen and a half wins twice.
He's been below thirteen and a half wins twice.

Speaker 2 (01:01:17):
Well, this is where my good Frober bad Fromber analogy comes.

Speaker 4 (01:01:21):
Last year you could argue was the best year.

Speaker 3 (01:01:23):
Yeah, I think most people would say twenty twenty two,
but this year was pretty similar to that two ninety
one era they went. He went fifteen and seven and
made twenty eight starts. Remember, he did actually miss time
with injury early in the season, but when he was
out there for a team that not quite as dominant.
Twenty eight starts, they won nineteen of them. He had

(01:01:46):
fifteen wins. I'm taking the over on thirteen and a half,
even if the team isn't an even an eighty eight
win team.

Speaker 2 (01:01:53):
He's such a machine, like just more often than not
will be out there throwing beats well over one hundred pitches,
just not on Thursday of next week. Right, So yeah,
I will take the over all.

Speaker 3 (01:02:07):
Right, last pitcher, hater, save total, what did you have
last year? Well, you know how well he pitched when
it was a save opportunity, and he's probably not gonna
pitch two innings very often. His first year in Houston
was thirty four, his last year in San Diego was
thirty three.

Speaker 4 (01:02:26):
His number this year is thirty three and a half.

Speaker 2 (01:02:29):
I'll take the under.

Speaker 4 (01:02:30):
I would probably do the same. I think he's gonna
pitch three innings this year.

Speaker 3 (01:02:34):
No, No, he's probably gonna pitch in fewer games, fewer innings,
and more save situations unless the team's bad and the
number is going to be low.

Speaker 2 (01:02:43):
Right, that is just as big of a potential factor
as anything else.

Speaker 3 (01:02:47):
I got a few hitters to look at the guys
that will probably hit top six Altuve, Perettez, Alvarez, Walker, Diaz,
and Payna. I'll hit yourd on here. We'll have a
few more on the other side. What would you set
the over under on bombs from Jordon Alvarez at thirty five,
it's thirty three and a half.

Speaker 4 (01:03:06):
I'm taking the over. I think he's gonna get forty
this year.

Speaker 2 (01:03:08):
Feel better about him playing one hundred and fifty games
and that he's probably going to DH the vast majority
of them. That is the main reason why I feel like,
no matter what happens this year with the Astros, this
will be the best year of Jordon's career individually.

Speaker 3 (01:03:21):
And keep in mind, like what I said with Fromber,
he was over twice and under twice with his win total,
the same is true for Jordon A thirty three and
a half homers, he went under it twice. He went
over it twice in the last four seasons.

Speaker 2 (01:03:33):
Last year was twenty six.

Speaker 4 (01:03:35):
He had thirty five last year. Who had twenty six
last year? Bregman, Uh yeah, somebody had six and uh
tuck in little over half season had twenty three.

Speaker 2 (01:03:45):
Unbelievable.

Speaker 3 (01:03:46):
Ummmm, so THI yeah, that's over. I would take the
over two. If he's healthy, it's an easy win. If
he's not healthy, that's why the number is thirty three.

Speaker 2 (01:03:54):
And never ever ever gamble.

Speaker 3 (01:03:56):
Well you can always just pretended you know it's gonna
happen and take the other one that you have. With
a few more of those, and again a little lean
on what is taking place today right here on Sports
Talk seven ninety, Nationals and Astros, we bring you that
with the first inning being given to Lance McCullers junior,
expected to start, expected to pitch one inning tonight right
here on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 5 (01:04:19):
The A team on Sports Talk seven ninety Tyler heroes
so lucky.

Speaker 2 (01:04:25):
He's not playing.

Speaker 4 (01:04:27):
We don't know that yet.

Speaker 2 (01:04:29):
So if he came back, that would be like record time. Right.

Speaker 3 (01:04:32):
Well, it wasn't a severe injury. It happened at the
beginning of the home stand. It would have been eleven days.
I guess ten days from the injury to returning. They
play Orlando tomorrow. They play Miami on Friday. Team made
their way to Orlando this afternoon after taking care of
business as simple as you can put it. They came
back home off of the win in New Orleans and
then played six home games and won them all. They're

(01:04:53):
on a seven game winning streak. The last two games
of the win streak have been dramatic. They'd never really
put away the Bulls until Jalen Green's late offensive rebound
and put back, and they didn't put away the Philadelphia
seventy six ers until they took the lead for the
first time after forty eight minutes and ten seconds of
basketball had been played. They led that game, not at

(01:05:17):
all during regulation, not for one second, not for one minute,
not at all.

Speaker 2 (01:05:22):
Never led.

Speaker 3 (01:05:23):
Granted it was tied for some of the forty eight minutes,
but then ever went in front, and they did immediately
when overtime began. The last Rockets bucket of regulation was
pretty special? Or the Yeah, it was pretty special. How
it all played out? I thought the I don't know
if the Rockets played it well. You tell the listeners

(01:05:43):
how it played out for you guys. The Rockets were
down three and called time out, asked, ex did you
about this well? They called time out when Jalen Green
stole the ball down three, turned around, took it up court.
Under ten seconds. They called their last time out and
set up a play to obviously attempt to tie the game.
Whether they were going to go for a quick two,

(01:06:04):
which seems really unlikely when you have no timeouts left,
or they were going to try to prevent themselves from
getting fouled, or they knew whe they would get fouled
and would throw up a shot and hope they could
get to the free throw line. Well, what did take
place is they threw the ball into Jabari Smith Junior,
who had his back to the basket, so Andy was
thirty feet away. He was not going to be taking
a shot in the sixers with plenty of time left,

(01:06:26):
five seconds plus. They fouled him and was sent him
to the free throw line up three, which is probably
the right play on their end. We could debate if
it was the right play on the Rockets end. And
then Jabari Smith Junior went to the free throw line.
The first of those two free throws is rather important.
You're left with not much to do. That's likely going
to get you to overtime if you don't make the

(01:06:48):
first free throw, and he did.

Speaker 4 (01:06:50):
He rattled it. He did a little nervous.

Speaker 3 (01:06:53):
I do think what took place on the Rockets bench
and who checked in it was kind of obvious what
was going to happen. But if you missed it last night,
mash it up for you. This is what it sounded
like last night on the court, while you also get
to listen to what it sounded like after the game

(01:07:14):
at the Rockets postgame presser with their head coach, the
three tremendous voices you will hear Matt Thomas, Adam Clinton
and Rockets head coach Emy Udoka.

Speaker 4 (01:07:24):
We had to miss it, misses it one of the
best misses I've ever seen.

Speaker 2 (01:07:31):
Wrap scored ship.

Speaker 1 (01:07:33):
Dude, took you with two hands. He put it over
the cylinder, took by.

Speaker 6 (01:07:38):
The game.

Speaker 2 (01:07:40):
Obviously, did a great job.

Speaker 3 (01:07:41):
And it was drawn up to perfection, drawn up to perfection. Hey,
you two guys, you the big guys, the double bigs.
Go into the game. Steven, you get on his left,
I'll be you get on in the right block, all right, Steve,
And I want you to take the guy to your
left and the guy to your and pull them backwards,

(01:08:02):
away from the free throw line and away from the
rim alp. I wanted to take you to take the
guy that's in front of you to your right. I
want you to shove him in the back, and when
Jabbari intentionally misses right over the front of the rim
slightly to the right, that's when you jump up, grab
it with two hands and drop it over the front
of the rim.

Speaker 2 (01:08:18):
Okay, break, that's to make up for the fred foul
that should have been called that we argued about via
text during the game. You think I can't multitask, you
should have seen just the back and forth between Wax
and I during that sequence that was followed, Oh you're
gonna play it?

Speaker 4 (01:08:37):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:08:37):
Don't you want to hear what Ima said about the
flagrant foul that was called on Fred van Voil after
the three point shot that he had, according to the refs,
cleanly blocked. Yes, this is what he had to say
about the flagrant call.

Speaker 2 (01:08:51):
Yeah, he grabbed his arm, but he hit him in
arm like it's none to the head.

Speaker 4 (01:08:56):
It's a hard foul. I wind up. I guess this
is a flagrant to nowadays, even if you don't hit
him ahead intentionally grab his arm.

Speaker 2 (01:09:03):
Yes, but hell no, I wasn't flagrant two. So I
pulled a wex and I came home last night and
I rewatched probably from about well when they went on
the run midway through the third quarter on and when
we got to that juncture, we being me and my
chair uh. In viewing the game last night, I realized
for the first time, believe it or not, having been

(01:09:26):
there and called the game, that the initial call was flagrant.

Speaker 4 (01:09:30):
Yeah, that's why I was so upset.

Speaker 2 (01:09:32):
Yeah, I think whole time I thought it was a
foul that they then upgraded two steps to throw him out.

Speaker 4 (01:09:38):
Yeah, it doesn't happen often.

Speaker 3 (01:09:39):
It did happen earlier this year with I think it
was with Tari They called a common foul and then
oh it was a man. It was a common foul
and they upgraded to a flagrant too, and he was ejected.

Speaker 4 (01:09:51):
And that was when he didn't throw somebody down.

Speaker 3 (01:09:53):
But I think they got that one correct. It was
it was on Jannis. It was a foul. He should
not have committed in that manner.

Speaker 2 (01:10:00):
To his credit after the game was like foul, which
is how it should be. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:10:04):
Fred van Vliet was called for a flagrant foul. He
had seen that the ball was going behind him over
his head. He saw it fly over his head and
now he had little time to catch up because he
was also getting up from the ground because he had
been knocked to the ground after his own shot, and
then he he just he absolutely hammered him, but he
didn't grab him. He definitely made a The manner in

(01:10:27):
which you hit the other player matters. The contact with
the player is at the basketball. It's at the top
of the arm. He's holding the basketball, and that's a
basketball play. I think, because there wasn't any momentum for
the offensive player. He wasn't like flying in for a dunk.
He literally had taken one dribble or gathered it. He
was basically jumping straight up. And because Fred was flying in,

(01:10:50):
he threw him. He flew to a three hand. He
really did. He hit him in the manner that to
me was probably a flagrant one. I could have maybe
a common foul. I definitely did not agree a flagrant too.
And you know Kirkland describing it as the wind up,
there wasn't much of a wind up. It was more about, well,
I'm gonna hit him this way because I'm running back

(01:11:11):
to the play. I'm not just standing there. This is
the force of my motion, which can be dangerous. This
wasn't a dangerous play. It's not when a guy's going
up for a dunk and you hit him from behind.
It was nothing like that. Fred was blown away in
the Space City Home Network obviously had a really good
shot of it. I think you guys mentioned it also
when he heard the announcement, because that's the first he'll hear

(01:11:33):
of it, and he was like what And they have
the proper alignment of security and coaching personnel, so there
was nowhere for him to go to get to Courtney
Kirkland or any one of the officials. So he made
his way out to join Tarry Easton in the locker room.
He had fouled out and been ejected after he fouled,
and then later Dylan would foul out. But that doesn't

(01:11:54):
surprise anybody. And that's one other thing about Quentin Grimes
night probably worth mentioning. He went off and foul two
guys out.

Speaker 2 (01:12:00):
Yeah, I mean, when that's happening, you are, as the
kids say, in your bag. He was in his bag.
He was absolutely phenomenal because he was efficient.

Speaker 3 (01:12:09):
Yeah, in the front side of the Fred play, which
we've alluded to. You know, Fred van Vliet, it was
bad to me and we'll just regurgitate our conversation last night.
It's a bad Rockets possession. Fred van Vliet's the only
player to touch it. He dribbles and dribbles and dribbles
and then tries to launch a twenty six seven eight
foot over a much taller player.

Speaker 2 (01:12:25):
That is true, I agree, But if he is fouled
in the act of shooting, and if you want to
say he wasn't fouled on the wrist because it's part
of the hand, because that's part of the ball or whatever, okay, fine,
but the defender did not allow him to land. Yeah,
I supposedly emphasized now.

Speaker 3 (01:12:40):
So he hit him across the arm, the shooting arm,
which is why the ball was about five feet short
of its target. It did look like he didn't have
enough of the ball that should have been a foul.
I thought that would have been a call. It wasn't
because it happened in that way. Then the offensive player
does some unorthodox things. With Regie Miller, it kind of
clouds what really happen. And I don't know if he
really didn't have somewhere to land or he was already

(01:13:04):
kind of flailing, so that's when the defensive player ended
up underneath him. He definitely did not land properly. If
you think it was because of the defender, which I
think is a perfectly reasonable explanation, even from replay, then
those are the plays you if you missed the call,
if you didn't make the call initially, then you go.
You'd like to think, okay, we need to look at that.
But there's no whistle ball, and this is now continuing action.

Speaker 2 (01:13:26):
And I think that the the I don't call it viciousness,
but I think the manner, the degree in which he
did foul the player on the other end clearly had
some frustration behind it, which, by the way, is how
Tari got three of his six. I guess, yeah, I
get six, and then he got thrown out because I took.

Speaker 3 (01:13:44):
Take out from EMA's SoundBite on Fred's flagrant. During his
explanation of Fred's flagrant, he said, it's they should have
looked at that one. This is what we call. You said,
this is a point of emphasis. That's exactly what Eme said.
He got hit, he wasn't able to land, he was
in his landing space. This is what they're supposed to call.
This is what they're supposed to look at. I asked
them too. They didn't, and but everybody just moved on

(01:14:05):
a delivery. I guess that's a flavor two now.

Speaker 2 (01:14:07):
Yep. Just the way he mutters stuff with just such
a stain.

Speaker 4 (01:14:10):
I love that. I love that man.

Speaker 3 (01:14:11):
All that being said, a wild, wild win for the
Houston Rockets says they tried to maintain their position. The
Houston Rockets, one year removed from a third consecutive twenty
low twenties or teams winning season, back where they've been
most of the year. Yeah, they're number two in the West.
The only team ahead of them is Oklahoma City, Memphis,

(01:14:32):
the Lakers, the Grizzlies, or that's the same team twice.
The Nuggets, the Grizzlies, the Lakers, the Rockets. Those four
teams are going to be two, three, four and five
most likely. Lakers won again last night, though they still
have not welcomed Lebron James back to the roster. But
both Luca and Austin Reeves were great and they were
playing the Spurs, so they got to win last night.
That sets the table on what's going on in the NBA,

(01:14:54):
will reset the table on what else we need to
talk about here, including some news from the NFL, offense
of line talk, and of course that means, well, we
must not be talking about the Texans.

Speaker 2 (01:15:05):
That's next.

Speaker 5 (01:15:07):
The A team on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 2 (01:15:13):
It's killing me not to point this out today, but
I'll save it for best of X tomorrow.

Speaker 3 (01:15:19):
Just in from the Houston Texans. U. Oh, sting is
here to stay. Oh it's official? Now did he sign it?
I believe that's usually what social media recognition of a
reported deal means.

Speaker 4 (01:15:32):
Tomorrow he will meet with the media. Otherwise, I reached out.

Speaker 3 (01:15:38):
I knew that they were going to have an availability
this week, and the I learned that after Stingley had
reportedly signed his deal, but I was uncertain on if
this would be Stingley, Debiko, Nick CJ.

Speaker 4 (01:15:51):
Gardner, Johnson, anybody else.

Speaker 3 (01:15:53):
I wasn't just curious who might be available tomorrow, and
I asked about it over there and the response was excellent.
I asked who who's the list of participants will be
able to fire our questions at when they meet with
us later this week, And I asked who the preliminary
list was, Because you know, I like to be funny
like that, I go, I can give you a full

(01:16:13):
list of everybody. Derek Stingley Junior.

Speaker 4 (01:16:17):
That's what you got back. That's who's going to be,
you know, media.

Speaker 2 (01:16:21):
I don't expect like the whole team to show up
like they did for Al Twovey's first major. This is
off season, I know, I know, but like that's but
you've seen this before, No what.

Speaker 3 (01:16:33):
They did last year with a handful of the players,
because I think this is the Dmico era kind of
way of doing things. I can't remember which days they
were there, but we were meeting I think it was
with Joe Mixon and Danil Hunter, maybe the same day,
and we're in the team auditorium and one of them
came in and stood at the podium and answered our
questions and talked to us. And then the other one

(01:16:53):
came in and did the same thing. We met with
Nick Cayley earlier this offseason the same room. They had
a table for two and they sat there, no meal,
just Amiko and Nick Kyley, and we asked him a
bunch of questions and how was that?

Speaker 4 (01:17:05):
And this will be one person.

Speaker 3 (01:17:07):
Uh, if his preference is to be seated at a table,
I'm sure they'll accommodate. Otherwise he'll be standing at the podium.
I don't know though, when it's one person. Yeah, they
usually just roll up on a podium. And this is
not Derek Stingley Junior's favorite thing. Add he's been really
good with his media availabilities. The more he's been here

(01:17:27):
and you know, doing a few more things on his
own social media and obviously sitting down with The Pivot
their podcast earlier this offseason. He'll be I'm sure he'll
be very his his own post where he on his
Instagram saying it's time. Yeah, here's how I celebrate. Was
him enjoying crawfish?

Speaker 4 (01:17:45):
Yeah, well that sounds about right. He's awesome. He's good
at two things.

Speaker 2 (01:17:48):
He's really good at two things, being super shy and
cooking people.

Speaker 3 (01:17:52):
So how does that saying go about chewing gum and
you know, beating people up?

Speaker 2 (01:17:56):
What is that?

Speaker 4 (01:17:58):
He's all out of gum?

Speaker 2 (01:17:59):
Yeah, he's chewing gum and kicking ass. He's all out
of gum.

Speaker 3 (01:18:04):
He's not done with the he can be done chewing
gum all the way. He's not done with dominating. And again,
the timing of this, as we pointed out yesterday, this
is eight years of Stingley. You draft him in the
first round, that means if he's awesome. At the bare minimum,
the player can't choose to leave for seven years, four
years of his contract, fifth year option on the rookie contract,

(01:18:27):
two years of franchise tagging him. The Texans only three
years into that have locked him up for eight years.
They've got five more years he's gonna play out his
rookie contract with the option year that's year four and five,
and then the three year extension kicks in. That's year's three,
four and five of his tenure now under contract for
And that's probably the best case scenario for players of

(01:18:49):
this caliber. And I think it's exactly where we'll be
next year with presumably c. J.

Speaker 4 (01:18:56):
Stroud.

Speaker 3 (01:18:56):
First, I still don't think the Texans are gonna do
with the Cowboys done with Michah Parsons in relation to
what they're gonna do with Will Anderson Junior. As soon
as you can get the player and his agent to
lock into negotiations, you lock them in. And for some reason,
the Cowboys have been unable to kind of get anywhere
with Michah Parsons, who's still not under contract long term,
way way too talented of a player to even flirt

(01:19:20):
with the idea of are we gonna have to franchise
tag him when he goes into year six. And that's
something I think the Texans have already positioned themselves to
easily avoid with both c J. Stroud and everybody avoids
that with their quarterback unless it's Kirk Cousins and say
similarly they'll avoid it with will Ederson.

Speaker 2 (01:19:38):
Can you remember when you were that time when the
Texans gave all that money to Deshaun Watson and he
cried and we thought it was sincere.

Speaker 3 (01:19:45):
It was also up there by himself. Now there were
other people in the room. Bill was there, Jack was
there the same this time they also nice touch. I
thought they had a bunch of other people send in
his life or in the city, send recorded messages. JV
had a message. People from his family Mom and his

(01:20:06):
aunt had a message from his football life had messages
for him, like I.

Speaker 4 (01:20:11):
Fully expect that again.

Speaker 2 (01:20:13):
And like the Rockets, I think because CJ comes to
so many games or you know, relatively speaking.

Speaker 3 (01:20:17):
And tech brings them to a bunch of games, think
tankle record a video. Uh well, now we've brought this
up yesterday. His teammates similar comments on they're all reposting
on their stories on ig get in the bag, staying
You're my guy, all that stuff well earned.

Speaker 2 (01:20:33):
As much as that, And look, we were all moved
by it because we didn't know at the time he
was probably it.

Speaker 3 (01:20:38):
Was a really nice touch. See, some teams are very
good at when they have the right people in place.
Amy Pallisik was in place at the time and helped
orchestrate all that phenomenal job.

Speaker 2 (01:20:47):
Shout out to her because she's gonna also orchestrate me
meeting Taylor Rooks someday A big fan, big fan.

Speaker 3 (01:20:53):
As the Amazon Sports Amazon Prime Sports portfolio continues to
grow empire, so does her involvement in lining up talent
and making everything look great.

Speaker 2 (01:21:03):
Speaking Shout out to Noah Eagle. We are BFFs now Dude.

Speaker 3 (01:21:10):
Some of the stuff that Noah and his dad have
recorded on podcasts about what it was like growing up together,
one as an adult, one as a kid.

Speaker 4 (01:21:17):
Or just on a live broadcast so funny.

Speaker 2 (01:21:19):
He is the nicest guy who just happens to have
I mean, he's he'll never I don't want to say
he'll never be on his dad's level, but he's basically
on his dad's level right now. As far as like
where he's completely ascended to from a broadcaster. Could not
have been nicer when I ran into him. I do
the Super Bowl Pal on Nickelodeon. I am the man.

(01:21:45):
He's pretty entertaining. He's very entertaining and a nice guys.
In case I haven't mentioned it fifty times, A four
o'clock hour is.

Speaker 5 (01:21:51):
Next the age on Sports Talk seven ninety two lifelong
Houston sports guys named Adam talking your team. So Adam
Clinton and Adam Wexler are the A team?

Speaker 1 (01:22:13):
All right?

Speaker 2 (01:22:14):
The four o'clock hour is underway. I'm going to give
you a twenty two hour tease. You guys are ready
for this. By the way, it's the four o'clock hour
here on the eight team SportsTalk seven ninety He's wex
I may see one of us has been very very
very very very very very mean to a national Major
League Baseball writer on social media. You'll have to find

(01:22:37):
out which one of us it was and what we said. Tomorrow. Well,
you can probably figure out what was said, but us
discussing it's not gonna happen until then.

Speaker 3 (01:22:47):
So briefly, before we dive into the items, we need
to get into Astro's playing in about forty five minutes
with Lance McCullers Junior on the mound, the Rockets making
their way to Fla for a pair of games, Orlando Tomorrow,
My Emmy on Friday, and the Texans watching from a
far free Agency as another interior offensive Lineman has a

(01:23:11):
new home for several million dollars.

Speaker 2 (01:23:13):
But what were we talking about?

Speaker 3 (01:23:14):
To close out last segment, You got a new best
broadcasting friend. Oh yeah, no Eagle last December while he
was on the air doing Nuts Basketball alongside Sarah Coustock,
somehow a conversation about what life was like in his
home growing up with dad, broadcaster Iron Eagle, And I
thought Noah described it brilliantly, and I've watched it a

(01:23:34):
thousand times. I believe this will be the one thousand
and first time I've laughed at it.

Speaker 10 (01:23:38):
I would get home and it would be cleaner room,
and I would say not today. Honey would say breakfast tonight,
and I'd say I want some eggs, and then he
would say.

Speaker 2 (01:23:51):
Broken ankles and yolks, and.

Speaker 10 (01:23:54):
I would say I'm not hungry, and then I'd get grounded.

Speaker 1 (01:23:57):
That's usually how I would go.

Speaker 2 (01:24:00):
That's the best. You know, it's funny. So I went
to the Chiefs game breakfast de I it's just like him.
Like some people say sometimes I sound like my dad.
It's not like he's got a he's as Mark Vandermier
would say, he's got pipes from Mount Olympus.

Speaker 3 (01:24:17):
Brent still doing doing what he does he is, he's
he's plugging away just briefly. He's into his what decade
of broadcasting.

Speaker 2 (01:24:25):
I don't even know that. He just had his seventieth birthday.

Speaker 4 (01:24:28):
He's been at it a long time. Oh, he's in
the Texas Hall of Fame. Yeah, Charter, remember I imagine.

Speaker 2 (01:24:33):
No, not Charter. Geez, he didn't invent the thing. He
wasn't there when it opened. But yeah, going back to
what were we talking about, I've already forgotten. Uh think
you sound like him? No, we were. I was up
there in Kansas City for the regular season Chief Texans game,
and I go down the hall to say hi to

(01:24:54):
Mark and Andre because I've known them forever. We've both
known them forever, and uh, they're nice people. And so
I'm talking and everybody, like everybody was tired. I like
Andre is always tired because it's Sunday morning, and he's
done a college game and probably flown in on a
red eye or something. I don't know his schedule. It's insane.

(01:25:15):
It's just everybody was just kind of it's cold outside
and we're all just kind of like, and I just
he start, Mark starts talking to somebody behind my right shoulder,
and I'm like, who is It's just some guy's just
talking like he's one of the crew. I actually thought
it was one of their crew members. And I turn
around and like, definitely closer than you are to me
right now is Noah. And I'm just like, oh, hey man,

(01:25:36):
I'm a fan of yours, like you're hilarious because of
that video and other things. And and I you know,
Matt had told me because Matt and I and Eagle
are very tight, and he's been on the show a
million times. He's like, yeah, they're both just great. You
should if you ever see one of them in the
press box, go up and say hi, because they're cool.
So ended up happening, and yeah, he's he's just I'm

(01:25:58):
happy for him because he's good at what he does.
But I'm also happy because I think the product for
the NBA and just for everything they're gonna do is
gonna be better. I'm basically fascinated with how like the
inside the NBA is gonna work with because it's gonna

(01:26:18):
be on ESPN, yet it's still produced by all the
Turner people, and obviously the cast of characters is the
Turner people. But then you have the Amazon and then
the NBA NBC element of everything. So I'm hoping that
this leads to much much better coverage of the league,
and then that coinciding with kind of like the changing

(01:26:39):
of the guard, takes us into a new era that
is obviously full of rockets, championships. You know what we
haven't done lately?

Speaker 4 (01:26:46):
What's that.

Speaker 2 (01:26:48):
We have not done?

Speaker 3 (01:26:50):
The deep dive into April twenty fourth in the NFL full.

Speaker 6 (01:27:00):
Of scouts, scot the foras hell.

Speaker 1 (01:27:05):
If you'll think you beat off Pick for your age, you.

Speaker 2 (01:27:08):
Gotta see the wander leak, you bet? I want to mock.

Speaker 3 (01:27:24):
Daniel Jeremiah of the NFL Network probably rates he definitely
rates top three for me, might rate top one. UH
Draft experts that I think tells a very good story
about the prospects, and I think he's well connected enough
to tie together his own analysis with information to put
together a mock draft that I can believe in.

Speaker 2 (01:27:45):
He's come out with his third edition.

Speaker 3 (01:27:48):
I think every Monday, for sure, we will hit you
with mock draft madness. So you will hear that song
each and every Monday and multiple times throughout the week
as necessary based on Matt Miller, mel Kiper and a
few other select few.

Speaker 4 (01:28:03):
When they deliver updated mox, we'll hit you with that.

Speaker 3 (01:28:06):
April twenty fourth is the day at Lambeau in Green
Bay for the first round of the NFL Draft. Before
we get to what the Texans will do. According to
Daniel Jeremiah here on March eighteenth at twenty five, where
they are currently slotted to make their first selection, He
like most people, are locked in on cam Ward joining

(01:28:27):
the AFC South, and he's the number one overall pick
to the Tennessee Titans. Second quarterback to go is just
two picks later. New York Giants tabbing Dion Sanderson Shouldeur Sanders.
If I call Dion Shouldur's dad yesterday, it's only fitting.

Speaker 2 (01:28:43):
On Dion's kid in New York City that is either
going to go spectacularly amazing or spectacularly horrible.

Speaker 3 (01:28:50):
So there could be some similarities to Mark Sanchez's time
with the Jets. He's an sc quarterback boy, huge hype,
major eyeballs on him all throughout his football career at
yes See.

Speaker 2 (01:29:07):
And he went to New York and what did they do?

Speaker 3 (01:29:09):
Immediately started winning and things could not have been better
than butt fumble and it didn't work out. So I
think maybe things could be okay. I'm not first of all,
on that angle of it. Can he handle it? He
can handle it. If he's playing growth, their team is
playing poorly, he'll handle it fine. If the team is
playing well, my gosh, it could absolutely explode in the
most spectacularly awesome way possible for the team and for

(01:29:32):
the player. Browns take at dul Carter widely regards is
the best defensive player in the draft.

Speaker 2 (01:29:37):
They go to with.

Speaker 3 (01:29:38):
Him and pair him long term with Miles Garrett and
Travis Hunter, widely regarded as the most unique talent maybe
in years in the NFL. To go number four to
the Patriots, first offensive lineman off the board, goes at
seven to the Jets, second tenth to the Bears. That's
Will Campbell, and on down the line to number twenty.

(01:30:00):
Are there any good offensive lineman left for the Texans.
After Grey's Abel goes number sixteen. Matthew Golden and other
wideouts are gone long before the Texans finally get to pick.
Hours and hours into the evening.

Speaker 2 (01:30:14):
Maybe dive, the Texans traded up in the first round
and took Golden.

Speaker 3 (01:30:19):
Uh, Matthew Golden is I think still lines up as
the number one wide receiver off the board.

Speaker 2 (01:30:25):
I'm kidding. There's no way they They've already added too
many receivers this offseason to do a move like that.

Speaker 4 (01:30:30):
I don't think that's there.

Speaker 2 (01:30:31):
I think it is. I think the reason is they
don't have the.

Speaker 3 (01:30:36):
Flexible app they don't have the disposable assets to do
that with because if they're going to draft him. Just
so everybody knows where Matthew Golden goes off the board
in this particular mock draft, it's number twelve. Elsewhere in
the state, that's where the Cowboys pick. He goes twelve
to the Cowboys. You're at twenty five. What are you
training to get up to twelve? The second round pick
you just got for Laramie Tunsel and next year's draft

(01:30:59):
in the twenty twenty six D.

Speaker 2 (01:31:01):
Twelve, you're doing it to take your left tackle of
the future.

Speaker 3 (01:31:04):
Yeah, I don't think they can afford to give up
the assets that they have to make a move like
that for a wide out. But they absolutely need to
draft a wide out that needs to see the field
this year. Christian Kirk Nicocollins and a wide receiver that's
not been added this offseason needs to be the next
guy in line battling with Xavier Hutchinson, John Metchi, Justin Watson,

(01:31:28):
and anybody else. By the way, shout out to hutch
saw him over the weekend. He was enjoying the Rodeo carnival.
Saw one other Texans personnel member Braxton is not a factor,
and anybody else. Ye, I don't think he's playing much
offense for this team. He didn't play much offense anywhere else.

Speaker 2 (01:31:48):
Well, this is where he has his career resurgence. WEX.

Speaker 3 (01:31:50):
I did see special teams coordinator Frank Ross and family. Also,
I really did think about should I go this route
and take my chances.

Speaker 2 (01:32:01):
Throw your helmet down and shove him. Frank's over here.
I've got two of our party.

Speaker 3 (01:32:06):
They're gonna be out there going on the log ride,
and we're over by the Ferris Wheel and some funhouses.
Now he doesn't see me, but I see he and
his wife and his kids, full families there. Should I
get my back to him and bring Robin over and
pretend like I'm having a conversation and say, oh, I
didn't even tell you. The Texans freaking got rid of

(01:32:26):
John Weeks.

Speaker 2 (01:32:27):
Can you believe this? I was shocked. What a foolish thing.

Speaker 4 (01:32:31):
Oh, Frank, hey see there, But I didn't let that.
I think it's his. Honestly, why would Frank get rid
of John Weeks?

Speaker 3 (01:32:40):
I think they strike struck me more of a I
think he may snake move even. I'm not saying it's
all on Frank, but financially speaking, it's not. There's no
decision to be made, there's no finances involved. Whatever you
paid him is the same thing you're gonna pay his replacement.
Just don't get it. I think this is And I
don't know if the rules made much of a difference

(01:33:01):
with because again it's really the kickoff rules that have changed.
He's not involved there. He's involved in punt coverage and
all the other special teams play where he snaps. I
think they long thought they could get a player that
helped them more coverage wise, and so they were all
every year when we went through this, they were always
trying to see, is there are a way to do this,
Is there's somebody else that could do that part better,

(01:33:23):
because as I've said before, it is literally impossible to
find a long snapper to snap more successfully. If you
don't ever make a mistake, then there are any snaps
to get better.

Speaker 4 (01:33:31):
And that's what he's done here year after year after
year after year.

Speaker 3 (01:33:35):
So I think it was a little bit more of
the other parts, but he also is clearly he gets
older every year. Clearly, I think it becomes more and
more difficult to maintain health, even for a long snapper
for eighteen weeks plus playoffs.

Speaker 4 (01:33:46):
When Texans played twenty weeks.

Speaker 3 (01:33:47):
Now they got an eighteen week regular season and they're
going to play at least two weeks into the postseason.
Sotly it can't being healthy for all that I think
becomes more of a challenge for players as they get older,
even long snappers. Guess what hurts if you're John weeks,
Your shoulders, your arms, your elbows, things like.

Speaker 4 (01:34:04):
That should call QC kinetics.

Speaker 3 (01:34:06):
Yes, So I think that's always been a concern, but
he's managed to make it through every season. There have
been times when he's been on the injured list and
then gone out there and snapped, so they looked elsewhere. No,
I did not do that to Frank. I let him
enjoy his Sunda out at the Carnival. Same thing with Hutch.
But yeah, I think there's definitely an opening for them
to draft a wide receiver. You may just talk all
the way through and up to the break. So on

(01:34:28):
the other side, I'll tell you the Texans draft at
number twenty five, and it's not who everybody else has
been saying they were gonna draft at twenty five. The
last couple of days and the early days of free
agency have given most people a shift in where the
Texans go with that.

Speaker 4 (01:34:43):
But that selection, that's next. On the eighteen, the A
team on.

Speaker 1 (01:34:49):
Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 3 (01:34:56):
So we're talking about the Texans. First, the news from
the day guarding the offensive line movements. The Minnesota Vikings
did not like their offensive line last year. They benched
at Ingram and then they traded him to the Texans.
Funny that they played Garrett Bradbury all season and then
they said, well, you don't want you back anymore and
nobody wants to trade for you, so you're released.

Speaker 2 (01:35:16):
That was earlier this week.

Speaker 3 (01:35:17):
The New England Patriots had severed ties with David Andrews,
their longtime center, very very good center, but later on
in his career and felt like they could get better
and potentially cheaper. I'm not sure if that's how it's
worked out that Garrett Bradbury takes over in New England now.
He signs contract today, reportedly two year deal to move

(01:35:38):
from Minnesota's interior line. He's the center to the Patriots. Patriots,
I'm sure they would like to win. I think that's
why why Mike Vrabel went there someday. But yeah that
some days, probably not this year. It might not be
far off. And I'm a believer. I believe Drake may
will be quarterbacking the New England Patriots in the playoffs.

(01:35:59):
I just don't I think it's this year. Her division
might be pretty reasonable to manage. In the future. You
have the Buffalo Bills and not sure where the Dolphins
are headed. Certainly know where the Jets are headed, and
that's nowhere good, no where soon. And then you have
the Patriots the Texans again. I talked about Garrett Bradbury
earlier this week, So I'm not going to sit here

(01:36:19):
and say, what are they doing? Another player they could
have used is now playing elsewhere for what seems like
reasonable money and free agency. I'm not sure what your
plan is, but adding a bunch of players that are
just simply better than the ones you had is not
much of one. I think they should be shooting higher.
But I'll go back to what I answered a question

(01:36:40):
about on the ex platform earlier. When are the Texans
going to try to make their offensive line better? Not
just ad players who won't necessarily do that. My answer
was April twenty fourth, so to the mock Draft. The
first day of the draft, the twenty fifth pick, the
Houston Texans select Matthew Golden's teammate Kelvin Benn, the offensive

(01:37:01):
lineman who we met with this past season and ultimately
was the winner of the Lombardi Award. Late season injury
issues kept him from playing probably at his very best,
but has long been considered one of the best I
guess exterior lineman in this draft. He has a tackle,
probably is going to be the third tackle off the board.

(01:37:23):
A lot of people think there's a chance Josh Simmons
is the best remaining tackle for the Texans in that
Banks and Campbell will both be gone, along with the
player from Missouri. If that's the case, that becomes a
very very interesting decision. Josh Simmons has a really good resume,
lots of good film, probably has a nice career ahead

(01:37:46):
of him. But as injury concerns which put him on
the sidelines this year he tore the tell attendon in
his knee and missed the final ten games, you don't
draft him. It has nothing to do with next year.
If you think he's gonna get past that. It's an
injury that doesn't concern you, and you've seen other players
with it, and you think his year two, three, four

(01:38:07):
and beyond are gonna be awesome, then you draft him
and believe you stole him. Probably at twenty five. If
there's no injury with Simmons, there's pretty much no way
he's available at twenty five. He might not even be
available at fifteen. It's a risky move. It's a move
that could pay off big. It obviously could go the

(01:38:27):
other direction. And we're talking about Nick Casserio. Has he
done this before? Yeah, how about multiple times. He did
it with Kenyon Green, he did it with John Metchi.
He did it with Derek Stingley Junior. Each of them
had injury issues in their final college football season and
into the offseason preceding their first NFL season. Couldn't have

(01:38:52):
worked out much better. In Derek Stingley Junior's case, Kenyon
Green is not a Texan three years later, and John
Metchi is hoping to Pete for a big uptick in
playing time this year.

Speaker 2 (01:39:03):
We talked about how many hits that Nick Cassario has
had outside of the offensive line.

Speaker 3 (01:39:09):
Yeah, Jeremy Tunsel pointed that out yesterday. They've all he's
hit on all this first rounder.

Speaker 2 (01:39:13):
Yeah, and you have always brought up the fact that,
and it's obvious there is more to any position group
than just Nick Cassario saying I'll take that person in
the draft or I'll go get this person in free
agency or whatever. But like you know this this they
cannot not hit a home run.

Speaker 3 (01:39:33):
It would be the third consecutive year if they take Simmons,
they've taken a player from Ohio State. I point this
out just to remind everybody what he's very clearly doing.
And if you listen to mko Ryans throughout each of
the two seasons here when he talks about their best players,
Derek Stingley junior, c J. Stroud, Will Anderson, their best

(01:39:54):
young players, the core of what will be the leadership
group for this team moving forward. It's the same thing
I'm gonna say about Nick. They want players who've been
through this before before they got here in college at
big programs with big pressure in big games. Here's who
Nick Cassario drafts, blank player, blank position. From Georgia, from USC,

(01:40:17):
from Ohio State, from LSU, from Notre Dame, from Alabama,
from Penn State, over and over and over again every
single season. The small college player Texans draft selections literally
not figuratively, literally do not exist with Nick Cassario as
general manager. The least successful football programs. I don't even

(01:40:43):
know who to suggest, Like Tank Dell when he was
drafted out of u of H was not in a
big conference yet U of H had not yet made
the move. He's drafted a couple players from TCU still
in the Big twelve, like this is the very very
bad a Pack twelve. Thomas Booker, who just won the

(01:41:03):
Super Bowl this year with the Eagles was a fifth
round pick of Nick. It's nothing, but you went to
a major college football program and played in big time
football games. Thus you're high on our list and every round.

Speaker 2 (01:41:19):
That includes CJ. Stroud too. By the way, even though
he played quarterback in Ohio State.

Speaker 3 (01:41:23):
Yeah, that was a narrative that no team should have
ever thought to even consider. This is you're not drafting
Ohio State's history.

Speaker 4 (01:41:30):
Well he broke the narrative.

Speaker 3 (01:41:31):
You're drafting a player who played football at a college.

Speaker 2 (01:41:34):
You got to remember before CJ. Stroud, no one good
ever played in the NFL at quarterback from Ohio State.
That's the rules.

Speaker 3 (01:41:40):
Yeah you mean, like ough, this guy was a gun slinging,
run and shoot four wide out quarterback. Oh Andy played
at Texas Tech. No, thank you, Right, you can have
Pat Mahomes. I'm not taking Pat Mahomes.

Speaker 4 (01:41:54):
That's for you.

Speaker 3 (01:41:54):
Guys to make the mistake on how many quarterbacks dumb, dumb, dumb, how.

Speaker 2 (01:41:58):
Many quarterbacks were taken ahead of him in that draft.

Speaker 3 (01:42:02):
So Deshaun went right after him, right, or not directly
after him, but a couple of picks after him. He
was the tenth pick. This is twenty seventeen. I feel
like at least one day it was one. I thought
it was one, but I wasn't sure. A crappy one.
By the way, he backs up Josh Allen in Buffalo.

Speaker 2 (01:42:19):
Now, oh that means nothing. Mitched Trubisky. Oh my gosh,
the Bears suck. That's who they took, right, and didn't
they trade up to take him one spot? Oh okay,
it went from three to two. But they gave a
king's ransom for Caleb Williams, did they not? The Bears

(01:42:40):
got a king's ransom to or because it was the
year before the Bryce Young trade. Oh yeah, that's right,
that's right. I had my I had my moves mixed up.
They're still like, wow, okay, that's that's bad. But it's
not as bad as I thought. I mean, it's a
bad quarterback, They'll get me wrong.

Speaker 3 (01:42:59):
It's pretty good players that draft class, who I'm sure
talk about over the next couple of months leading up
to this NFL Draft. We're still just over one month
away April twenty fourth, Opening Day in baseball next Thursday.
For thursdays after that, the NFL Draft. We got a
lot on our plates. Will continue here on the eighteen.

Speaker 1 (01:43:19):
The eighteen on Sports Talk seven ninety.

Speaker 4 (01:43:25):
It is the A team Sports Talks seven to ninety.

Speaker 2 (01:43:28):
Few more minutes left with you guys before we make
way for Astros Nationals Spring training action.

Speaker 4 (01:43:35):
I got on kind of a roll last night.

Speaker 3 (01:43:37):
While I was watching and enjoying both the radio and
TV broadcast of the Rockets and Sixers, I also took
a little peek over at the iHeart Music Awards. My
son is he's a fan of most of the artists
that were up for iHeart Music Awards.

Speaker 4 (01:43:53):
Was over a fox last night.

Speaker 3 (01:43:54):
We we our company headed out some awards and I thought, hey, man,
it's some good bond time here before they started announcing
all these things and we get a great Nelly performance
where he mashes up all the songs. Why don't we
go through the list and pick some winners and see who.

Speaker 2 (01:44:11):
So you can do better? And of course you make
a spreadsheet. No, I just put it in the notes
on my phone. I really wanted a spreadsheet, so in order.

Speaker 3 (01:44:21):
In correct correctly guests, who would win Best Collab, Best
New Pop Artist, Country Song of the Year, Country Artist
of the Year, Best New Artist, Hip Hong Hip Hop
Song of the Year, in succession.

Speaker 2 (01:44:37):
I got each of those correct. They must have been
really obvious picks.

Speaker 3 (01:44:41):
I don't think so, because this is the iHeart Awards.
Not all of them are strictly social media votes because
if they are, then we know who won all those
Travis Kelsey's Girl, and she did. But these are I
don't think there's an obvious winner and.

Speaker 2 (01:44:56):
All these colors, what are my choices? And let me
see if I can do.

Speaker 4 (01:44:59):
This Collaboration of the Year. I thought it was obvious.

Speaker 3 (01:45:03):
But Taylor Swift the Fortnite with post Malone post Malone again,
his song with Morgan.

Speaker 2 (01:45:08):
Wallen pretty a lot of collaborating. He had some help.
That's what a collab is. Like that.

Speaker 3 (01:45:15):
Kendrick Lamar, Future Metrove Miles on It for that, Kane Brown,
Marshmallow and the Winner Die with a Smile, Lady gagaon
Bruno Mars Best New Artists, Teddy Swims, Crush Shaboozy, Gracie Abrams,
Chapel Roan and Benson Boone.

Speaker 8 (01:45:33):
I had.

Speaker 4 (01:45:34):
I had some help. Was the winner for Country Song
of the Year.

Speaker 3 (01:45:38):
Your Country Artists of the Year morganwall and Luke Combs,
Landy Wilson Caine, Brown, jelly Roll, who's the winner?

Speaker 2 (01:45:43):
Ah?

Speaker 3 (01:45:45):
Again one I correctly guessed. I don't know jelly Roll. Okay,
Best New Country Artists last one. Then we'll get back
to extremely long conversation about sports before Astros Baseball, Best
New Country Artist Tucker what more, shaboo George Burg, Dasha
or Ashley Cook.

Speaker 2 (01:46:04):
Shaboozy correct only because I share about them more. Okay,
so we could run through the rest. I have never
Just go ahead and hit up our site and you
can find out all the educations.

Speaker 4 (01:46:14):
I have never felt more forty four in my life.
I mean, I did I know of many of these artists?
You what, I knew every single artist? He said, Well,
of course you're like, yeah, you're like twenty right, she.

Speaker 2 (01:46:24):
Shouldn't give you any excuse twenty two, But you know.

Speaker 4 (01:46:29):
I know who. That is why I guess he would
win the award.

Speaker 2 (01:46:32):
Yeah, I don't know. Man like awards shows. I think
I still enjoy music award shows a little bit. I
have no time for the TV.

Speaker 3 (01:46:41):
And I mean this was a music awards show that
specialized in performances. There weren't as many awards that some
of these were already handed out, but I did happen
to tune in when this is Nelly. Ashanti noted that
Nelly was there our iHeartRadio Landmark Award winner.

Speaker 2 (01:46:58):
Teresa went to some event where Nelly performed. I think
it was like, it wasn't Hangout Fest. It was something
like that.

Speaker 4 (01:47:05):
Firefest won No.

Speaker 2 (01:47:07):
No, she wasn't in a tent with a head cheese
sandwich and nothing else.

Speaker 4 (01:47:13):
Lilith Fair definitely not.

Speaker 2 (01:47:16):
Sarah mclaughin wasn't there anyway, She said, well that was
That was a long time ago, both of them. She said,
he like destroyed the set like that was by far
the biggest crowd reaction all that, and she wasn't expecting that.
Where was it on a beach somewhere? It was a
big It was an outdoor festival type thing. She and

(01:47:38):
Brooklyn went to it.

Speaker 4 (01:47:39):
I don't know, I remember beach Fest.

Speaker 2 (01:47:42):
That's hangout Fest, but I don't think. I don't feel
like that was when that was. Well, he's a good performer.

Speaker 4 (01:47:47):
It's a nice little career. Does he still wear the
gandate on his face?

Speaker 2 (01:47:51):
Man? What you do to your cheek?

Speaker 4 (01:47:53):
I don't know, man, It's just part of the show.

Speaker 3 (01:47:56):
Just happened to be noting that it was a pretty
entertaining evening if you were locked in on what the
Rockets were doing, and they do need to keep winning. Obviously,
they got two more games on this road trip before
they return home, two more West Coast road trips before
the season concludes, and more of their games now that
they finished the six game homestand are away from Toyota Center.

Speaker 2 (01:48:16):
Well, since we are doing this on a nightly basis
even when they're not playing, now, I should let you
guys know there are only four matchups in the Association tonight,
and really only two of them have any sort of
consequence on the Rockets, one away or the other.

Speaker 3 (01:48:32):
None of the two, three, four, five's Rockets, Nuggets, Lakers,
Grizzlies played tonight. All four of them play on Wednesday,
and only three games. The Rockets are at the Magic,
the Grizzlies are at the Blazers, and we've got another
Nuggets Lakers game. Nuggets won last night against the Warriors
without Jamal Murray, without Nikola Jokicic got a triple double

(01:48:52):
from Russell Westbrook.

Speaker 2 (01:48:54):
Russell Westbrook is like fascinating to me, Like what is
going on in Denver?

Speaker 4 (01:49:00):
Well, first of all. I don't know what was he
learned how to shoot? He didn't.

Speaker 3 (01:49:04):
He had a triple double, but that doesn't mean he
learned how to shoot. The numbers he put up last night,
I was like this, screams, you can't be serious. He
took eighteen shots. Half of them were threes, which is
a disaster idea. He made two of them. He was
five of eighteen, but he was a plus five twelve points,

(01:49:25):
twelve boards, sixteen assists, and they won without their two
best players. Aaron Gordon went off though he had thirty eight.
He was on the receiving end of quite a few
of those dimes. He look your boy six Steph Curry
six for twenty one.

Speaker 2 (01:49:40):
Bad night. He's exhausted, per sources Steve Kerr, Well, then
give the ball to Jimmy Butler. That's why you traded
for him. Jimmy Butler had a nice night.

Speaker 3 (01:49:49):
And the Warriors are on the second night of a
back to back tonight and trying to get hintobbled that
he could be sitting tonight. Clippers Warriors are too west
of note that at least are on the court tonight,
Clippers hosting the Calves, Warriors hosting the Bucks.

Speaker 2 (01:50:07):
Yeah, that's that's how that's going to go down. All right.
We will leave it at that. We will send you
to Astro's baseball coverage in a matter of moments. Here,
I do want to tell you very quickly before we
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Speaker 3 (01:51:32):
Over the next couple of shows, We've got a show
like today again. Tomorrow Astros have a second evening game
of the week, so we'll take you up until four
point fifty. Then we also hit that much closer to
getting out of Florida, getting back to Houston, getting ready
for the season, probably another day closer to seeing Christian
Walker in the lineup over the weekend. I suspect, based

(01:51:54):
on what Joe spot has said today, that is their plan.
I wish we could make some ridiculous predictions about what
we're going to see from Lance mcculler's junior in the
next few minutes as they throw first pitch just after
five o'clock there with him on the hill for that.
But Joe Spots said he's going to throw one inning,
so I don't know what we need to discuss. This
is a very clear situation. Give them the ball, throw

(01:52:16):
your pitches, get off the hill, get ready for your
next outing. And I think if all goes well, he
stays on the exact same timeline that he's been on
since they arrived in Florida, and that would be the
most promising news.

Speaker 4 (01:52:27):
He has continued to hear, which is the best news.

Speaker 2 (01:52:30):
For weeks.

Speaker 3 (01:52:31):
There have been no setbacks, there's been no reason to
push the timeline back, every indication that his season with
Houston will begin four to five weeks into the Major
League Baseball season still on track to do that.

Speaker 2 (01:52:42):
It would be quite the comeback story for Lance McCuller
as a junior in a career that's already been fantastic,
by the way, even though it's had its ups and downs.
All Right, we'll call today. We will talk to you
again tomorrow afternoon.